"The man who lays a hand upon a woman," said Jimmy, paddling strongly, "save in the way of kindness—I'm very sorry, Molly, but you didn't seem able to make up your mind. You aren't angry, are you?"
There was a brief pause, while Molly apparently debated the matter in her mind.
You wouldn't take me back even if I were angry, she said.
You have guessed it, said Jimmy approvingly. "Do you read much poetry, Molly?"
Why?
I was only thinking how neatly some of these poets put a thing. The chap who said, 'distance lends enchantment to the view,' for instance. Take the case of Wesson. He looks quite nice when you see him at a distance like this, with a good strip of water in between.
Mr. Wesson was still standing in a statuesque attitude on the bank. Molly, gazing over the side of the boat into the lake, abstained from feasting her eyes on the picturesque spectacle.
Jolly the water looks, said Jimmy.
I was just thinking it looked rather dirty.
Beastly, agreed Jimmy.
The water as a topic of conversation dried up. Mr. Wesson had started now to leave the stricken field. There was a reproachful look about his back which harassed Molly's sensitive conscience. Jimmy, on the other hand—men being of coarser fibre than women, especially as to the conscience—appeared in no way distressed at the sight.
You oughtn't to have done it, Jimmy, said Molly.
I had to. There seemed to be no other way of ever getting you by yourself for five minutes at a stretch. You're always in the middle of a crowd nowadays.
But I must look after my guests.
Not a bit of it. Let 'em rip. Why should they monopolize you?
It will be awfully unpleasant meeting Mr. Wesson after this.
It is always unpleasant meeting Wesson.
I shan't know what to say.
Don't say anything.
I shan't be able to look him in the face.
That's a bit of luck for you.
You aren't much help, Jimmy.
The subject of Wesson doesn't inspire me somehow—I don't know why. Besides, you've simply got to say you changed your mind. You're a woman. It's expected of you.
I feel awfully mean.
What you want to do is to take your thoughts off the business. Keep your mind occupied with something else. Then you'll forget all about it. Keep talking to me about things. That's the plan. There are heaps of subjects. The weather, for instance, as a start. Hot, isn't it?
We're going to have a storm. There's a sort of feel in the air. We'd better go back, I think.
Tush! And possibly bah! said Jimmy, digging the paddle into the water. "We've only just started. I say, who was that man I saw you talking to after lunch?"
How soon after lunch?
Just before the rehearsal. He was with your father. Short chap with a square face. Dressed in gray. I hadn't seen him before.
Oh, that was Mr. Galer. A New York friend of father's.
Did you know him out in New York?
I didn't. But he seems to know father very well.
What's his name, did you say?
Galer. Samuel Galer. Did you ever hear of him?
Never. But there were several people in New York I didn't know. How did your father meet him over here?
He was stopping at the inn in the village, and he'd heard about the abbey being so old, so he came over to look at it, and the first person he met was father. He's going to stay in the house now. The cart was sent down for his things this afternoon. Did you feel a spot of rain then? I wish you'd paddle back.
Not a drop. That storm's not coming till to-night. Why, it's a gorgeous evening.
He turned the nose of the boat toward the island, which lay, cool and green and mysterious, in the middle of the lake. The heat was intense. The sun, as if conscious of having only a brief spell of work before it, blazed fiercely, with the apparent intention of showing what it could do before the rain came. The air felt curiously parched.
There! said Molly. "Surely you felt something, then."
I did.
Is there time to get back before it begins?
No.
We shall get soaked!
Not a bit of it. On the other side of the island there is a handy little boat-house sort of place. We will put in there.
The boathouse was simply a little creek covered over with boards and capable of sheltering an ordinary rowing boat. Jimmy ran the canoe in just as the storm began, and turned her broadside on so that they could watch the rain, which was sweeping over the lake in sheets.
Just in time, he said, shipping the paddle. "Snug in here, isn't it?"
We should have got wet in another minute! I hope it won't last long.
I hope it will, because I've got something very important to say to you, and I don't want to have to hurry it. Are you quite comfortable?
Yes, thanks.
I don't know how to put it exactly. I mean, I don't want to offend you or anything. What I mean to say is—do you mind if I smoke? Thanks. I don't know why it is, but I always talk easier if I've got a cigarette going.
He rolled one with great deliberation and care. Molly watched him admiringly.
You're the only man I've ever seen roll a cigarette properly, Jimmy, she said. "Everybody else leaves them all flabby at the ends."
I learned the trick from a little Italian who kept a clothing store in the Bowery. It was the only useful thing he could do.
Look at the rain!
Jimmy leaned forward.
Molly——
I wonder if poor Mr. Wesson got indoors before it began. I do hope he did.
Jimmy sat back again. He scowled. Every man is liable on occasion to behave like a sulky schoolboy. Jimmy did so.
You seem to spend most of your time thinking about Wesson, he said savagely.
Molly had begun to hum a tune to herself as she watched the rain. She stopped. A profound and ghastly silence brooded over the canoe.
Molly, said Jimmy at last, "I'm sorry."
No reply.
Molly.
Well?
I'm sorry.
Molly turned.
I wish you wouldn't say things like that, Jimmy. It hurts—from you.
He could see that there were tears in her eyes.
Molly, don't!
She turned her head away once more.
I can't help it, Jimmy. It hurts. Everything's so changed. I'm miserable. You wouldn't have said a thing like that in the old days.
Molly, if you knew——
It's all right, Jimmy. It was silly of me. I'm all right now! The rain has stopped. Let's go back, shall we?
Not yet. For God's sake, not yet! This is my only chance. Directly we get back, it will be the same miserable business all over again; the same that it's been every day since I came to this place. Heavens! When you first told me that you were living at the abbey, I was absolutely happy, like a fool. I might have known how it would be. Every day there's a crowd round you. I never get a chance of talking to you. I consider myself lucky if you speak a couple of words to me. If I'd known the slow torture it was going to be, I'd have taken the next train back to London. I can't stand it. Molly, you remember what friends we were in the old days. Was it ever anything more with you? Was it? Is it now?
I was very fond of you, Jimmy. He could hardly hear the words.
Was it ever anything more than that? Is it now? That was three years ago. You were a child. We were just good friends then. I don't want friendship now. It's not enough. I want you—you. You were right a moment ago. Everything has changed. For me, at least. Has it for you? Has it for you, Molly?
On the island a thrush had begun to sing. Molly raised her head, as if to listen. The water lapped against the sides of the canoe.
Has it, Molly?
She bent over, and dabbled one finger in the water.
I—I think it has, Jimmy, she whispered.
The Honorable Louis Wesson, meanwhile, having left the water side, lit a cigarette, and proceeded to make a moody tour of the grounds. He felt aggrieved with the world. One is never at one's best and sunniest when a rival has performed a brilliant and successful piece of cutting-out work beneath one's very eyes. Something of a jaundiced tinge stains one's outlook on life in such circumstances. Mr. Wesson did not pretend to himself that he was violently in love with Molly. But he certainly admired her, and intended, unless he changed his mind later on, to marry her.
He walked, drawing thoughtfully at his cigarette. The more he reviewed the late episode, the less he liked it. He had not seen Jimmy put Molly in the canoe, and her departure seemed to him a deliberate desertion. She had promised to play tennis with him, and at the last moment she had gone off with this fellow Pitt. Who was Pitt? He was always in the way—shoving himself in.
At this moment, a large, warm raindrop fell on his hand. From the bushes all round came an ever-increasing patter. The sky was leaden.
He looked round him for shelter. He had reached the rose garden in the course of his perambulations. At the far end was a summerhouse. He turned up his coat collar and ran.
As he drew near, he heard a slow and dirgelike whistling proceeding from the interior. Plunging in out of breath, just as the deluge began, he found Spennie seated at the little wooden table with an earnest expression on his face. The table was covered with cards.
How Jim took exercise, said Spennie, glancing up. "Hello, Wesson. By
Jove, isn't it coming down!"
With which greeting he turned his attention to his cards once more. He took one from the pack in his left hand, looked at it, hesitated for a moment, as if doubtful whereabouts on the table it would produce the most artistic effect; and finally put it down, face upward.
Then he moved another card from the table, and put it on top of the other one. Throughout the performance he whistled painfully.
Wesson regarded him with disfavor. "That looks damned exciting," he said. He reserved his more polished periods for use in public. "What are you playing at?"
Wha-a-a'? said Spennie abstractedly, dealing another card.
Oh, don't sit there looking like a frog, said Wesson irritably. "Talk, man."
What's the matter? What do you want? Hello, I've done it. No, I haven't. No luck at all. Haven't brought up a demon all day.
He gathered up the cards, and began to shuffle. "Ah, lov'," he sang sentimentally, with a vacant eye on the roof of the summerhouse, "could I bot tell thee how moch——"
Oh, stop it! said Wesson.
You seem depressed, laddie. What's the matter? Ah, lov', could I bot tell thee——
Spennie, who's this fellow Pitt?
Jimmy Pitt? Pal of mine. One of the absolute. Ay, nutty to the core, good my lord. Ah, lov', could I bot tell——
Where did you meet him?
London. Why?
He and your sister seem pretty good friends.
I shouldn't wonder. Knew each other out in America. Bridge, bridge, ber-ridge, a capital game for two. Shuffle and cut and deal away, and let the lo-oser pay-ah. Ber-ridge——
Well, let's have a game, then. Anything for something to do. Curse this rain! We shall be cooped up here till dinner at this rate.
Double dummy's a frightfully rotten game, said Spennie. "Ever played picquet? I could teach it to you in five minutes."
A look of almost awe came into Wesson's face, the look of one who sees a miracle performed before his eyes. For years he had been using all the large stock of diplomacy at his command to induce callow youths to play picquet with him and here was this admirable young man, this pearl among young men, positively offering to teach him. It was too much happiness. What had he done to deserve this? He felt as a toil-worn lion might have felt if an antelope, instead of making its customary bee line for the horizon, had expressed a friendly hope that it would be found tender and inserted its head between his jaws.
I—it's very good of you. I shouldn't mind being shown the idea.
He listened attentively while Spennie explained at some length the principles which govern the game of picquet. Every now and then he asked a question. It was evident that he was beginning to grasp the idea of the game.
What exactly is repicquing? he asked, as Spennie paused.
It's like this, said Spennie, returning to his lecture.
Yes, I see now, said the neophyte.
They began playing. Spennie, as was only to be expected in a contest between teacher and student, won the first two hands. Wesson won the next.
I've got the hang of it all right, now, he said complacently. "It's a simple sort of game. Make it more exciting, don't you think, if we played for something?"
All right, said Spennie slowly, "if you like."
He would not have suggested it himself, but after all, hang it, if the man simply asked for it—It was not his fault if the winning of a hand should have given the fellow the impression that he knew all that there was to be known about picquet. Of course, picquet was a game where skill was practically bound to win. But—After all, Wesson had plenty of money. He could afford it.
All right, said Spennie again. "How much?"
Something fairly moderate. Ten bob a hundred?
There is no doubt that Spennie ought at this suggestion to have corrected the novice's notion that ten shillings a hundred was fairly moderate. He knew that it was possible for a poor player to lose four hundred points in a twenty-minute game, and usual for him to lose two hundred. But he let the thing go.
Very well, he said.
Twenty minutes later, Mr. Wesson was looking somewhat ruefully at the score sheet. "I owe you eighteen shillings," he said. "Shall I pay you, now, or shall we settle up in a lump after we've finished?"
What about stopping now? said Spennie. "It's quite fine out."
No, let's go on. I've nothing to do till dinner, and I'm sure you haven't.
Spennie's conscience made one last effort. "You'd much better stop, you know, Wesson, really," he said. "You can lose a frightful lot at this game."
My dear Spennie, said Wesson stiffly, "I can look after myself, thanks. Of course, if you think you are risking too much, by all means—"
Oh, if you don't mind, said Spennie, outraged, "I'm only too frightfully pleased. Only, remember I warned you."
I'll bear it in mind. By the way, before we start, care to make it a sovereign a hundred?
Spennie could not afford to play picquet for a sovereign a hundred, or anything like it; but after his adversary's innuendo it was impossible for a young gentleman of spirit to admit the humiliating fact. He nodded.
* * * * *
It's about time, I fancy, said Mr. Wesson, looking at his watch an hour later, "that we were going in to dress for dinner."
Spennie made no reply. He was wrapped in thought.
Let's see, that's twenty pounds you owe me, isn't it? continued Mr. Wesson. "No hurry, of course. Any time you like. Shocking bad luck you had."
They went out into the rose garden.
Jolly everything smells after the rain, said Mr. Wesson. "Freshened everything up."
Spennie did not appear to have noticed it. He seemed to be thinking of something else. His air was pensive and abstracted.
The emotions of a man who has just proposed and been accepted are complex and overwhelming. A certain stunned sensation is perhaps predominant. Blended with this is relief, the relief of a general who has brought a difficult campaign to a successful end, or of a member of a forlorn hope who finds that the danger is over, and he is still alive. To this must be added a newly born sense of magnificence, of finding oneself to be, without having known it, the devil of a fellow. We have dimly suspected, perhaps, from time to time that we were something rather out of the ordinary run of men, but there has always been a haunting fear that this view was to be attributed to a personal bias in our own favor. When, however, our suspicion is suddenly confirmed by the only judge for whose opinion we have the least respect, our bosom heaves with complacency, and the world has nothing more to offer.
With some accepted suitors there is an alloy of apprehension in the metal of their happiness; and the strain of an engagement sometimes brings with it even a faint shadow of regret. "She makes me buy new clothes," one swain, in the third quarter of his engagement, was overheard to moan to a friend. "Two new ties only yesterday." He seemed to be debating within himself whether human nature could stand the strain.
But, whatever tragedies may cloud the end of the period, its beginning at least is bathed in sunshine. Jimmy, regarding his lathered face in the glass as he dressed for dinner that night, called himself the luckiest man on earth, and wondered if he were worthy of such happiness. Thinking it over, he came to the conclusion that he was not, but that all the same he meant to have it.
No doubt distressed him. It might have occurred to him that the relations between Mr. McEachern and himself offered a very serious bar to his prospects; but in his present frame of mind he declined to consider the existence of the ex-constable at all. In a world that contained Molly there was no room for other people. They were not in the picture. They did not exist.
There are men in the world who, through long custom, can find themselves engaged without any particular whirl of emotion. King Solomon probably belonged to this class; and even Henry the Eighth must have become a trifle blasé in time. But to the average man, the novice, the fact of being accepted seems to divide existence into two definite parts, before and after. A sensitive conscience goads some into compiling a full and unexpurgated autobiography, the edition limited to one copy, which is presented to the lady most interested. Some men find a melancholy pleasure in these confessions. They like to draw the girl of their affections aside and have a long, cozy chat about what scoundrels they were before they met her.
But, after all, the past is past and cannot be altered, and it is to be supposed that, whatever we may have done in that checkered period, we intend to behave ourselves for the future. So, why harp on it?
Jimmy acted upon this plan. Many men in his place, no doubt, would have steered the conversation skillfully to the subject of the eighth commandment, and then said: "Talking about stealing, did I ever tell you that I was a burglar myself for about six years?" Jimmy was reticent. All that was over, he told himself. He had given it up. He had buried the past. Why exhume it? It did not occur to him to confess his New York crimes to Molly any more than to tell her that, when seven, he had been caned for stealing jam.
These things had happened to a man of the name of Jimmy Pitt, it was true. But it was not the Jimmy Pitt who had proposed to Molly in the canoe on the lake.
The vapid and irreflective reader may jump to the conclusion that
Jimmy was a casuist, and ought to have been ashamed of himself.
He will be perfectly right.
On the other hand, one excuse may urged in his favor. His casuistry imposed upon himself.
To Jimmy, shaving, there entered, in the furtive manner habitual to that unreclaimed buccaneer, Spike Mullins.
Say, Mr. Chames, he said.
Well, said Jimmy, "and how goes the world with young Lord Fitz
Mullins? Spike, have you ever been best man?"
On your way! What's that?
Best man at a wedding. Chap who stands by the bridegroom with a hand on the scruff of his neck to see that he goes through with it. Fellow who looks after everything, crowds the crisp banknotes onto the clergyman after the ceremony, and then goes off and marries the first bridesmaid, and lives happily ever after.
I ain't got no use for gettin' married, Mr. Chames.
Spike, the misogynist! You wait, Spike. Some day love will awake in your heart, and you'll start writing poetry.
I'se not dat kind of mug, Mr. Chames, protested Spike. "Dere was a goil, dough. Only I was never her steady. And she married one of de odder boys."
Why didn't you knock him down and carry her off?
He was de lightweight champion of de woild.
That makes a difference, doesn't it? But away with melancholy, Spike! I'm feeling as if somebody had given me Broadway for a birthday present.
Youse to de good, agreed Spike.
Well, any news? Keggs all right? How are you getting on?
Mr. Chames. Spike sank his voice to a whisper. "Dat's what I chased meself here about. Dere's a mug down in de soivant's hall what's a detective. Yes, dat's right, if I ever saw one."
What makes you think so?
On your way, Mr. Chames! Can't I tell? I could pick out a fly cop out of a bunch of a thousand. Sure. Dis mug's vally to Sir Thomas, dat's him. But he ain't no vally. He's come to see dat no one don't get busy wit de jools. Say, what do you t'ink of dem jools, Mr. Chames?
Finest I ever saw.
Yes, dat's right. De limit, ain't dey? Ain't youse really——
No, Spike, I am not, thank you very much for inquiring. I'm never going to touch a jewel again unless I've paid for it and got the receipt in my pocket.
Spike shuffled despondently.
All the same, said Jimmy, "I shouldn't give yourself away to this detective. If he tries pumping you at all, give him the frozen face."
Sure. But he ain't de only one.
What, more detectives? They'll have to put up 'house full' boards at this rate. Who's the other?
"
De mug what came dis afternoon. Ole man McEachern brought him. I seed Miss Molly talking to him.
" "The chap from the inn? Why, that's an old New York friend of McEachern's.
"Anyhow, Mr. Chames, he's a sleut'. I can tell 'em by deir eyes and deir feet, and de whole of dem.
An idea came into Jimmy's mind.
I see, he said. "Our friend McEachern has got him in to spy on us. I might have known he'd be up to something like that."
Dat's right, Mr. Chames.
Of course you may be mistaken.
Not me, Mr. Chames.
Anyhow, I shall be seeing him at dinner. I can get talking to him afterward. I shall soon find out what his game is.
For the moment, Molly was forgotten. The old reckless spirit was carrying him away. This thing was a deliberate challenge. He had been on parole. He had imagined that his word was all that McEachern had to rely on. But if the policeman had been working secretly against him all this time, his parole was withdrawn automatically. The thought that, if he did nothing, McEachern would put it down complacently to the vigilance of his detective and his own astuteness in engaging him stung Jimmy. His six years of burglary had given him an odd sort of professional pride. "I've half a mind," he said softly. The familiar expression on his face was not lost on Spike.
To try for de jools, Mr. Chames? he asked eagerly.
His words broke the spell. Molly resumed her place. The hard look died out of Jimmy's eyes.
No, he said. "Not that. It can't be done."
Yes, it could, Mr. Chames. Dead easy. I've been up to de room, and I've seen de box what de jools is put in at night. We could get at them easy as pullin' de plug out of a bottle. Say, dis is de softest proposition, dis house. Look what I got dis afternoon, Mr. Chames.
He plunged his hand into his pocket, and drew it out again. As he unclosed his fingers, Jimmy caught the gleam of precious stones.
He started as one who sees snakes in the grass.
What the—— he gasped.
Spike was looking at his treasure-trove with an air of affectionate proprietorship.
Where on earth did you get those? asked Jimmy.
Out of one of de rooms. Dey belonged to one of de loidies. It was de easiest old t'ing ever, Mr. Chames. I went in when dere was nobody about, and dere dey were on de toible. I never butted into anyt'ing so soft, Mr. Chames.
Spike.
Yes, Mr. Chames?
Do you remember the room you took them from?
Sure. It was de foist on de——
Then just listen to me for a moment. When we're at dinner, you've got to go to that room and put those things back—all of them, mind you—just where you found them. Do you understand?
Spike's jaw had fallen.
Put dem back, Mr. Chames! he faltered.
Every single one of them.
Mr. Chames! said Spike plaintively.
You'll bear it in mind? Directly dinner has begun, every one of those things goes back where it belongs. See?
Very well, Mr. Chames.
The dejection in his voice would have moved the sternest to pity. Gloom had enveloped Spike's spirit. The sunlight had gone out of his life.
Spennie Blunt, meanwhile, was not feeling happy. Out of his life, too, had the sunshine gone. His assets amounted to one pound seven and fourpence and he owed twenty pounds. He had succeeded, after dinner, in borrowing five pounds from Jimmy, who was in the mood when he would have lent five pounds to anybody who asked for it, but beyond that he had had no successes in the course of a borrowing tour among the inmates of the abbey.
In the seclusion of his bedroom, he sat down to smoke a last cigarette and think the thing over in all its aspects. He could see no way out of his difficulties. The thought had something of the dull persistency of a toothache. It refused to leave him. If only this had happened at Oxford, he knew of twenty kindly men who would have rallied round him, and placed portions of their fathers' money at his disposal. But this was July. He would not see Oxford again for months. And, in the meantime, Wesson would be pressing for his money.
Oh, damn! he said.
He had come to this conclusion for the fiftieth time, when the door opened, and his creditor appeared in person. To Spennie, he looked like the embodiment of Fate, a sort of male Nemesis.
I want to have a talk with you, Spennie, said Wesson, closing the door.
Well?
Wesson lit a cigarette, and threw the match out of the window before replying.
Look here, Spennie, he said, "I want to marry Miss McEachern."
Spennie was in no mood to listen to the love affairs of other men.
Oh! he said.
Yes. And I want you to help me.
Help you?
You must have a certain amount of influence with her. She's your sister.
Stepsister.
Same thing.
Well, anyhow, it's no good coming to me. Nobody's likely to make Molly do a thing unless she wants to. I couldn't, if I tried for a year. We're good pals, and all that, but she'd shut me up like a knife if I went to her and said I wanted her to marry some one.
Not being a perfect fool, said Wesson impatiently, "I don't suggest that you should do that."
What's the idea, then?
You can easily talk about me to her. Praise me, and so on.
Spennie's eyes opened wide.
Praise you? How?
Thanks, said Wesson, with a laugh. "If you can't think of any admirable qualities in me, you'd better invent some."
I should feel such a silly ass.
That would be a new experience for you, wouldn't it? And then you can arrange it so that I shall get chances of talking to her. You can bring us together.
Spennie's eyes became rounder.
You seem to have mapped out quite a programme for me.
She'll listen to you. You can help me a lot.
Can I?
Wesson threw away his cigarette.
And there's another thing, he said. "You can queer that fellow Pitt's game. She's always with him now. You must get her away from him. Run him down to her. And get him out of this place as soon as possible. You invited him here. He doesn't expect to stop here indefinitely, I suppose? If you left, he'd have to, too. What you must do is to go back to London directly after the theatricals are over. He'll have to go with you. Then you can drop him in London and come back."
It is improbable that Wesson was blind to certain blemishes which could have been urged against this ingenious scheme by a critic with a nice sense of the honorable; but, in his general conduct of life, as in his play at cards, he was accustomed to ignore the rules when he felt disposed to do so. He proceeded to mention in detail a few of the things which he proposed to call upon his ally to do. A delicate pink flush might have been seen to spread over Spennie's face. He began to look like an angry rabbit. He had not a great deal of pride in his composition, but the thought of the ignominious rôle which Wesson was sketching out for him stirred what he had to its shallow depths.
Talking on, Wesson managed with his final words to add the last straw.
Of course, he said, "that money you lost to me at picquet—What was it? Ten? Twenty? Twenty pounds, wasn't it? Well, we could look on that as canceled, of course. That will be all right."
Spennie exploded.
Will it? he cried, pink to the ears. "Will it, by George? I'll pay you every frightful penny of it before the end of the week. What do you take me for, I should like to know?"
A fool, if you refuse my offer.
I've a fearfully good mind to give you a most frightful kicking.
I shouldn't try, Spennie, if I were you. It's not the form of indoor game at which you'd shine. Better stick to picquet.
If you think I can't pay you your rotten money——
I do. But if you can, so much the better. Money is always useful.
I may be a fool in some ways——
You understate it, my dear Spennie.
But I'm not a cad.
You're getting quite rosy, Spennie. Wrath is good for the complexion.
And if you think you can bribe me to do your dirty work, you never made a bigger mistake in your life.
Yes, I did, said Wesson, "when I thought you had some glimmerings of intelligence. But if it gives you any pleasure to behave like the juvenile lead in a melodrama, by all means do. Personally, I shouldn't have thought the game would be worth the candle. Your keen sense of honor, I understand you to say, will force you to pay your debt. It's an expensive luxury nowadays, Spennie. You mentioned the end of the week, I believe? That will suit me admirably. But if you change your mind, my offer is still open. Good night, Galahad."
For pure discomfort there are few things in the world that can compete with the final rehearsals of an amateur theatrical performance at a country house. Every day the atmosphere becomes more and more heavily charged with restlessness and irritability. The producer of the piece, especially if he is also the author of it, develops a sort of intermittent insanity. He plucks at his mustache, if he has one; at his hair, if he has not. He mutters to himself. He gives vent to occasional despairing cries. The soothing suavity which marked his demeanor in the earlier rehearsals disappears. He no longer says with a winning smile: "Splendid, old man; splendid. Couldn't be better. But I think we'll take that over just once more, if you don't mind. You missed out a few rather good lines, and you forgot to give Miss Robinson her cue for upsetting the flowerpot." Instead, he rolls his eyes and snaps out: "Once more, please. This'll never do. At this rate we might just as well cut out the show altogether. For Heaven's sake, Brown, do try and remember your lines. It's no good having the best part in the piece if you go and forget everything you've got to say. What's that? All right on the night? No, it won't be all right on the night. And another thing. You must remember to say, 'How calm and peaceful the morning is', or how on earth do you think Miss Robinson is going to know when to upset that flowerpot? Now, then, once more; and do pull yourself together this time." After which the scene is sulkily resumed by the now thoroughly irritated actors; and conversation, when the parties concerned meet subsequently, is cold and strained.
Matters had reached this stage at the abbey. Everybody was thoroughly tired of the piece, and, but for the thought of the disappointment which—presumably—would rack the neighboring nobility and gentry if it were not to be produced, would have resigned without a twinge of regret. People who had schemed to get the best and longest parts were wishing now that they had been content with First Footman or Giles, a villager.
I'll never run an amateur show again as long as I live, confided
Charteris to Jimmy, almost tearfully the night before the production.
"It's not good enough. Most of them aren't word-perfect yet. And we've just had the dress rehearsal!
"It'll be all right on——
Oh, don't say it'll be all right on the night.
I wasn't going to, said Jimmy. "I was going to say it'll be all right after the night. People will soon forget how badly the thing went."
You're a nice, comforting sort of man, aren't you? said Charteris.
Why worry? said Jimmy. "If you go on like this, it'll be Westminster
Abbey for you in your prime. You'll be getting brain fever."
Jimmy himself was feeling particularly cheerful. He was deriving a keen amusement at present from the manoeuvres of Mr. Samuel Galer, of New York. This lynx-eyed man, having been instructed by Mr. McEachern to watch Jimmy, was doing so with a pertinacity which would have made a man with the snowiest of consciences suspicious. If Jimmy went to the billiard room after dinner, Mr. Galer was there to keep him company. If, during the course of the day, he had occasion to fetch a handkerchief or a cigarette case from his bedroom, he was sure, on emerging, to stumble upon Mr. Galer in the corridor. The employees of Wragge's Detective Agency, Ltd., believed in earning their salaries. Occasionally, after these encounters, Jimmy would come upon Sir Thomas Blunt's valet, the other man in whom Spike's trained eye had discerned the distinguishing trait of the detective. He was usually somewhere round the corner at these moments, and, when collided with, apologized with great politeness. It tickled Jimmy to think that both these giant brains should be so greatly exercised on his account.
Spennie, meanwhile, had been doing quite an unprecedented amount of thinking. Quite an intellectual pallor had begun to appear on his normally pink cheeks. He had discovered the profound truth that it is one thing to talk about paying one's debts, another actually to do it, and that this is more particularly the case when we owe twenty pounds and possess but six pounds seven shillings and fourpence. Spennie was acutely conscious of the fact that, if he could not follow up his words to Wesson with actual coin, the result would be something of an anticlimax. Somehow or other he would have to get the money—and at once. The difficulty was that no one seemed at all inclined to lend it to him.
There is a good deal to be said against stealing as a habit; but it cannot he denied that, in certain circumstances, it offers an admirable solution of a difficulty, and if the penalties were not so exceedingly unpleasant, it is probable that it would become far more fashionable than it is.
Spennie's mind did not turn immediately to this outlet from his embarrassment. He had never stolen before, and it did not occur to him directly to do so now. There is a conservative strain in all of us. But gradually, as it was borne in upon him that it was the only course possible, unless he applied to his stepfather—a task for which his courage was not sufficient—he found himself contemplating the possibility of having to secure the money by unlawful means. By lunch time, on the morning of the day fixed for the theatricals, he had decided definitely to do so. By dinner time he had fixed upon the object of his attentions.
With a vague idea of keeping the thing in the family, he had resolved to make his raid upon Sir Thomas Blunt. Somehow it did not seem so bad robbing one's relatives.
A man's first crime is, as a rule, a shockingly amateurish affair. Now and then, it is true, we find beginners forging with the accuracy of old hands or breaking into houses with the finish of experts. But these are isolated cases. The average tyro lacks generalship altogether. Spennie may be cited as a typical novice. It did not strike him that inquiries might be instituted by Sir Thomas, when he found his money gone, and that Wesson, finding a man whom he knew to be impecunious suddenly in possession of twenty pounds, might have suspicions. His mind was entirely filled with the thought of getting the money. There was no room in it for any other reflection.
His plan was simple. Sir Thomas, he knew, always carried a good deal of money with him. It was unlikely that he kept this on his person in the evening. A man to whom the set of his clothes is as important as it was to Sir Thomas, does not carry a pocket-book full of banknotes when he is dressed for dinner. He would leave it somewhere, reasoned Spennie. Where, he asked himself. The answer was easy. In his dressing room. Spennie's plan of campaign was complete.
The theatricals began at half-past eight. The audience had been hustled into their seats, happier than is usual in such circumstances from the rumor that the proceedings were to terminate with an informal dance. The abbey was singularly well constructed for such a purpose. There was plenty of room, and a sufficiency of retreat for those who sat out, in addition to a conservatory large enough to have married off half the couples in the county. The audience was in an excellent humor, and the monologue, the first item of the programme, was received with a warmth which gave Charteris, whom rehearsals had turned into a pessimist, a faint hope that the main item on the programme might not be the complete failure it had promised to be.
Spennie's idea had been to get through his burglarious specialty during the monologue, when his absence would not be noticed. It might be that if he disappeared later in the evening people would wonder what had become of him.
He lurked apart till the last of the audience had taken their seats.
As he was passing through the hall, a hand fell on his shoulder.
Conscience makes cowards of us all. Spennie bit his tongue and leaped
three inches into the air.
Hello, Charteris! he said gaspingly.
Spennie, my boyhood's only friend, said Charteris, "where are you off to?"
What—what do you mean? I was just going upstairs.
Then don't. You're wanted. Our prompter can't be found. I want you to take his place till he blows in. Come along.
The official prompter arrived at the end of the monologue with the remark that he had been having a bit of a smoke in the garden and his watch had gone wrong. Leaving him to discuss the point with Charteris, Spennie slipped quietly away, and flitted up the stairs toward Sir Thomas' dressing room. At the door, he stopped and listened. There was no sound. The house might have been deserted. He opened the door, and switched on the electric light.
Fortune was with him. On the dressing table, together with a bunch of keys and some small change, lay a brown leather pocketbook. Evidently Sir Thomas did not share Lady Blunt's impression that the world was waiting for a chance to rob him as soon as his back was turned.
Spennie opened the pocketbook, and counted the contents. There were two ten-pound notes, and four of five pounds.
He took a specimen of each variety, replaced the pocketbook, and crept out of the door.
Then he walked rapidly down the corridor to his own room.
Just as he reached it, he received a shock only less severe than the former one from the fact that this time no hand was placed on his shoulder.
Spennie! cried a voice.
He turned, to see Molly. She wore the costume of the stage milkmaid. Coming out of her room after dressing for her part, she had been in time to see Spennie emerge through Sir Thomas' door with a look on his face furtive enough to have made any jury bring in a verdict of guilty on any count without further evidence. She did not know what he had been doing; but she was very certain that it was something which he ought to have left undone.
Er—hullo, Molly! said Spennie bonelessly.
What were you doing in Uncle Thomas' room, Spennie?
Nothing. I was just looking round.
Just looking round?
That's all.
Molly was puzzled.
Why did you look like that when you came out?
Like what?
So guilty.
Guilty! What are you talking about?
Molly suddenly saw light.
Spennie, she said, "what were you putting in your pocket as you came out?"
Putting in my pocket! said Spennie, rallying with the desperation of one fighting a lost cause. "What do you mean?"
You were putting something.
Another denial was hovering on Spennie's lips, when, in a flash, he saw what he had not seen before, the cloud of suspicion which must hang over him when the loss of the notes was discovered. Sir Thomas would remember that he had tried to borrow money from him. Wesson would wonder how he had become possessed of twenty pounds. And Molly had actually seen him coming out of the room, putting something in his pocket.
He threw himself at the mercy of the court.
It's like this, Molly, he said. And, having prefaced his narrative with the sound remark that he had been a fool, he gave her a summary of recent events.
I see, said Molly. "And you must pay him at once?"
By the end of the week. We had—we had a bit of a row.
What about?
Oh, nothing, said Spennie. "Anyhow, I told him I'd pay him by
Saturday, and I don't want to have to climb down."
Of course not. Jimmy shall lend you the money.
Who? Jimmy Pitt?
Yes.
But, I say, look here, Molly. I mean, I've been to him, already. He lent me a fiver. He might kick if I tried to touch him again so soon.
I'll ask him for it.
But, look here, Molly——
Jimmy and I are engaged, Spennie.
What! Not really? I say, I'm frightfully pleased. He's one of the best. I'm fearfully glad. Why, that's absolutely topping. It'll be all right. I'll sweat to pay him back. I'll save out of my allowance. I can easily do it if I cut out a few things and don't go about so much. You're a frightfully good sort, Molly. I say, will you ask him to-night? I want to pay Wesson first thing to-morrow morning.
Very well. You'd better give me those notes, Spennie. I'll put them back.
The amateur cracksman handed over his loot, and retired toward the stairs. Molly could hear him going down them three at a time, in a whirl of relief and good resolutions. She went to Sir Thomas' room, and replaced the notes. Having done this, she could not resist the temptation to examine herself in the glass for a few moments. Then she turned away, switched off the light, and was just about to leave the room when a soft footstep in the passage outside came to her ears.
She shrank back. She felt a curiously guilty sensation, as if she had been in the room with criminal rather than benevolent intentions. Her motives in being where she was were excellent—but she would wait till this person had passed before coming out into the passage.
Then it came to her with a shock that the person was not going to pass. The footsteps halted outside the door.
There was a curtain at her side, behind which hung certain suits of
Sir Thomas'. She stepped noiselessly behind this.
The footsteps passed on into the room.
Jimmy had gone up to his room to put on the costume he was to wear in the first act at about the time when Spennie was being seized upon by Charteris to act as prompter. As he moved toward the stairs, a square-cut figure appeared.
It was the faithful Galer.
There was nothing in his appearance to betray the detective to the unskilled eye, but years of practice had left Spike with a sort of sixth sense as regarded the force. He could pierce the subtlest disguise. Jimmy had this gift in an almost equal degree, and it had not needed Mr. Galer's constant shadowing of himself to prove to Jimmy the correctness of Spike's judgment. He looked at the representative of Wragge's Detective Agency, Ltd., as he stood before him now, taking in his every detail: the square, unintelligent face; the badly cut clothes; the clumsy heels; the enormous feet.
And this, he said to himself, "is the man McEachern thinks capable of tying my hands!" There were moments when the spectacle of Mr. Galer filled Jimmy with an odd sort of fury, a kind of hurt professional pride. The feeling that this espionage was a direct challenge enraged him. Behind this clumsy watcher he saw always the self-satisfied figure of Mr. McEachern. He seemed to hear him chuckling to himself.
If it wasn't for Molly, he said to himself, "I'd teach McEachern a lesson. I'm trying to hold myself in, and he sets these fool detectives onto me. I shouldn't mind if he'd chosen somebody who knew the rudiments of the game, but Galer! Galer!
Well, Mr. Galer, he said, aloud, "you aren't trying to escape, are you? You're coming in to see the show, aren't you?"
Oh, yes, said the detective. "Jest wanted to go upstairs for 'alf a minute. You coming, too?"
I was going to dress, said Jimmy, as they went up. "See you later," he added, at the door. "Hope you'll like the show."
He went into his room. Mr. Galer passed on.
* * * * *
Jimmy had finished dressing, and had picked up a book to occupy the ten minutes before he would be needed downstairs, when there burst into the room Spike Mullins, in a state of obvious excitement.
Gee, Mr. Chames!
Hello, Spike.
Spike went to the door, opened it, and looked up and down the passage.
Mr. Chames, he said, in a whisper, shutting the door, "there's bin doin's to-night for fair. Me coco's still buzzin'. Say, I was to Sir Thomas' dressin' room——"
What! What were you doing there?
Spike looked somewhat embarrassed. He grinned apologetically, and shuffled his feet.
I've got dem, Mr. Chames, he said.
Got them? Got what?
Dese.
He plunged his hand in his pocket, and drew forth a glittering mass.
Jimmy's jaw dropped as he gazed at Lady Blunt's rope of pearls.
Two hundred t'ousand plunks, murmured Spike, gazing lovingly at them. "I says to myself, Mr. Chames ain't got no time to be getting' after dem himself. He's too busy dese days wit' jollyin' along the swells. So it's up to me, I says, 'cos Mr. Chames'll be tickled to deat', all right, all right, if we can git away wit' dem. So I——"
Jimmy gave tongue with an energy which amazed his faithful follower.
Spike! You lunatic! Didn't I tell you there was nothing doing when you wanted to take those things the other day?
Sure, Mr. Chames. But dose was little dinky t'ings. Dese poils is boids, for fair.
Good heavens, Spike, you must be mad. Can't you see—Oh, Lord! Directly the loss of those pearls is discovered, we shall have those detectives after us in a minute. Didn't you know they had been watching us?
An involuntary chuckle escaped Spike.
"
'Scuse me, Mr. Chames, but dat's funny about dem sleut's. Listen. Dey's bin an' arrest each other.
"What!
Dat's right. Dey had a scrap in de dark, each finking de odder was after de jools, an' not knowin' dey was bote sleut's, an' now one of dem's bin an' taken de odder off, an' locked him in de cellar.
What on earth do you mean?
Spike giggled at the recollection.
Listen, Mr. Chames, it's dis way. I'm in de dressin' room, chasin' around wit' dis lantern here for de jool box—he produced from his other pocket a small bicycle lamp—"and just as I gets a line on it, gee! I hears a footstep comin' down de passage straight for de door. Was to de bad? Dat's right. Gee, I says to m'self, here's one of de sleut' guys what's bin an' got wise to me, and he's comin' in to put de grip on me. So I gets up, an' I blows out de lantern, and I stands dere in de dark, waitin' for him to come in. And den I'm going to get busy before he can see who I am, and jolt him one on de point, and den, while he's down and out, chase meself for de soivants' hall."
Yes? said Jimmy.
Well, dis guy, he gets to de door, and opens it, and I'm just goin' to butt in, when dere suddenly jumps out from de room on de odder side de passage anodder guy, and gets de rapid strangleholt on dis foist mug. Say, wouldn't dat make you wonder was you on your feet or your coco?
Go on. What happened, then?
Dey begins to scrap good and hard in de dark. Dey couldn't see me, and I couldn't see dem, but I could hear dem bumpin' about an' sluggin' each odder, all right, all right. And by an' by one of dem puts de odder to de bad, so dat he goes down and takes de count; an' den I hears a click. And I know what dat is. One of de guys has put de irons on de odder guy. Den I hears him strike a light—I'd turned de switch what lights up de passage before I got into de room—and den he says, 'Ah', he says, 'got youse, have I? Not the boid I expected, but you'll do.' I knew his voice. It was dat mug what calls himself Galer.
I suppose I'm the bird he expected, said Jimmy. "Well?"
De odder mug was too busy catchin' up wit' his breat' to shoot it back swift, but after he's bin doin' de deep breathin' stunt for a while, he says, 'You mutt', he says, 'youse to de bad. You've made a break, you have.' He put it different, but dat's what he meant. Den he says that he's a sleut', too. Does de Galer mug give him de glad eye? Not on your life. He says dat dat's de woist tale that's ever bin handed to him. De odder mug says, 'I'm Sir Tummas' vally', he says. 'Aw, cut it out', says Galer. 'Sure youse ain't Sir Tummas himself?' 'Show me to him', says de foist guy, 'den you'll see.' 'Not on your life', says Galer. 'What! Butt in among de swells what's enjoyin' themselves and spoil deir evenin' by showin' dem a face like yours? To de woods! It's youse for de coal cellar, me man, and we'll see what youse has got to say afterward. G'wan!' And off dey went. And I lit me lantern again, got de jools, and chased meself here.
Jimmy stretched out his hand.
All very exciting, he said. "And now you'll just hand me those pearls, and I'll seize the opportunity while the coast is clear to put them back where they belong."
Only for a moment did Spike hesitate. Then he pulled out the jewels, and placed them in Jimmy's hand. Mr. Chames was Mr. Chames, and what he said went. But his demeanor was tragic, telling eloquently of hopes blighted.
Jimmy took the necklace with a thrill. He was an expert in jewels, and a fine gem affected him much as a fine picture affects the artistic. He went to the light, and inspected them gloatingly.
As he did so, he uttered a surprised exclamation. He ran the jewels through his fingers. He scrutinized them again, more closely this time.
Then he turned to Spike, with a curious smile.
You'd better be going downstairs, he said. "I'll just run along and replace them. Where is the box?"
It's on de floor against de wall, near de window, Mr. Chames.
Good. Better give me that lamp.
There was no one in the passage. He raced softly along it to Sir
Thomas Blunt's dressing room.
He lit his lamp, and found the box without difficulty. Dropping the necklace in, he closed down the lid.
They'll want a new lock, I'm afraid, he said. "However!"
He rose to his feet.
Jimmy! said a startled voice.
He whipped round. The light of the lamp fell on Molly, standing, pale and open-eyed, beside the curtain by the door.
Pressed, rigid, against the wall behind her curtain, Molly had listened in utter bewilderment to the sounds of strife in the passage outside. The half-heard conversation between the detectives had done nothing toward a solution of the mystery. Galer's voice she thought she recognized as one that she had heard before; but she could not identify it.
When the detectives had passed away together down the corridor, she had imagined that the adventure was at an end and that she was at liberty to emerge—cautiously—from her hiding place and follow them downstairs. She had stretched out a hand, to draw the curtain aside, when she caught sight of the yellow ray of the lamp on the floor, and shrank back again. As she did so, she heard the sound of breathing. Somebody was still in the room.
Her mystification deepened. She had supposed that the tale of visitors to the dressing room was complete with the two who had striven in the passage. Yet here was another.
She strained her ears to catch a sound. For a while she heard nothing. Then came a voice that she knew well; and, abandoning concealment, she came out into the room, and found Jimmy kneeling on the floor beside the rifled jewel box.
For a full minute they stood staring at each other, without a word. The light of the lamp hurt Molly's eyes. She put up a hand, to shade them. The silence was oppressive. It seemed to Molly that they had been standing like this for years.
Jimmy had not moved. There was something in his attitude which filled Molly with a vague fear. In the shadow behind the lamp, he looked shapeless and inhuman.
What are you doing here? he said at last, in a harsh, unnatural voice.
I——
She stopped.
You're hurting my eyes, she said.
I'm sorry. I didn't think. Is that better?
He turned the light from her face. Something in his voice and the apologetic haste with which he moved the lamp seemed to relax the strain of the situation. The feeling of stunned surprise began to leave her. She found herself thinking coherently again.
The relief was but momentary. Why was Jimmy in the room at that time? Why had he a lamp? What had he been doing? The questions shot from her brain like sparks from an anvil.
The darkness began to tear at her nerves. She felt along the wall for the switch, and flooded the room with light.
Jimmy laid down the lantern, and stood for a moment, undecided. He looked at Molly, and suddenly there came over him an overwhelming desire to tell her everything. He had tried to stifle his conscience, to assure himself that the old days were over, and that there was no need to refer to them. And for a while he had imposed upon himself. But lately the falseness of his position had come home to him. He could not allow her to marry him, in ignorance of what he had been. It would be a villainous thing to do. Often he had tried to tell her, but had failed. He saw that it must be done, here and now.
He lifted the lid of the jewel box, and dangled the necklace before her eyes.
She drew back.
Jimmy! You were—stealing them?
No, I was putting them back.
Putting them back?
Listen. I'm going to tell you the truth, Molly—I've been trying to for days, but I never had the pluck. I wasn't stealing this necklace, but for seven years I lived by this sort of thing.
By——
By stealing. By breaking into houses and stealing. There. It isn't nice, is it? But it's the truth. And whatever happens, I'm glad you know.
Stealing! said Molly slowly. "You!"
He took a step forward, and laid his hand on her arm. She shrank away from him. His hand fell to his side like lead.
Molly, do you hate me?
How could you? she whispered. "How could you?"
Molly, I want to tell you a story. Are you listening? It's the story of a weak devil who was put up to fight the world, and wasn't strong enough for it. He got a bad start, and he never made it up. They sent him to school, the best school in the country; and he got expelled. Then they gave him a hundred pounds, and told him to make out for himself. He was seventeen, then. Seventeen, mind you. And all he knew was a little Latin and Greek, a very little, and nothing else. And they sent him out to make his fortune.
He stopped.
It will be much simpler to tell it in the first person, he said, with a short laugh. "I arrived in New York—I was seventeen, you will remember—with ninety pounds in my pocket. It seemed illimitable wealth at the time. Two pounds was the most I had ever possessed before. I could not imagine its ever coming to an end. In dollars it seemed an inconceivable amount of money. I put up at the Waldorf. I remember, I took a cab there. I gave the man three dollars."
He laughed again.
You can guess how long my ninety pounds lasted. Within a month I had begun to realize that my purse was shallower than I had thought. It occurred to me that work of some sort would be an advantage. I went round and tried to get some. My God! Remember, I was seventeen, and absolutely ignorant of every useful trade under the sun.
Go on.
One day I was lunching at the Quentin, when a man came and sat down at the same table, and we got into conversation. I had spent the morning answering want advertisements, and I was going to break my last twenty-dollar bill to pay for my lunch. I was in the frame of mind when I would have done anything, good or bad, that would have given me some money. The man was very friendly. After lunch, he took me off to his rooms. He had a couple of parlor rooms in Forty-fifth Street. Then he showed his hand. He was a pretty scoundrel, but I didn't care. I didn't care for anything, except that there seemed to be money to be had from him. Honesty! Put a man in New York with nineteen dollars and a few cents in his pockets, and no friends, and see what happens! It's a hell for the poor, in New York. An iron, grinding city. It frightens you. It's so big and hard and cruel. It takes the fight out of you. I've felt it, and I know.
He stopped, and gave a little shiver. Nine years had passed since that day, but a man who has all but gone under in a big city does not readily forget the nightmare horror of it.
"
Stone—that was the man's name—was running a tapless wire-tapping game. You've read about the trick, I expect. Every one has known about it since Larry Summerfield was sent to Sing Sing. But it was new then. There are lots of ways of doing it. Stone's was to hire a room and fix it up to look like a branch of the Western union Telegraph Company. He would bring men in there and introduce them to a man he called the manager of the branch, who was supposed to get racing results ten minutes before they were sent out to the pool rooms. The victim would put up the money for a bet, and Stone and his friends got it at once. Stone was looking for an assistant. He wanted a man who looked like a gentleman. To inspire confidence! I looked older than I was, and he took me on. It was a filthy business, but I was in a panic. I was with Stone eight months. Then I left him. It was too unsavory—even for me. It was after that that I became a cracksman. I wanted money. It was no use hoping for work. I couldn't get it, and I couldn't have done it if I had got it. I was a pirate, and fit for nothing except piracy. One night I met a man in a Broadway rathskeller. I knew him by sight. I had seen him about at places. 'You're with Stone, aren't you?' he said, after we had talked about racing and other things for a while. I stared at him in surprise. I was frightened, too. 'It's all right', he said, 'I know all about Stone. You needn't be afraid of me. Aren't you with him?' 'I was', I said. 'You left him? Why?' I told him. 'You seem a bright kid', he said. 'Join me if you feel like it.' He was a cracksman. I never found out his real name. He was always called Bob. A curious man. He had been at Harvard, and spoke half a dozen languages. I think he took to burglary from sheer craving for excitement. He used to speak of it as if it were an art. I joined him, and he taught me all he knew. When he died—he was run over by a car—I went on with the thing. Then my uncle died, and I came back to England, rich.
"
When I left the lawyer's office, I made up my mind that I would draw a line across my life. I swore I would never crack another crib. And when I met you I swore it again.
And yet——
No. It isn't as bad as you think. When I was in London I fell in with a man named Mullins, who used to work with me in the old days. He was starving, so I took him in, and brought him along here with me, to keep him out of mischief. To-night he came to me with this necklace. He had been in here, and stolen it. I took it from him, and came to put it back. You believe me, don't you, Molly?
Yes, said she simply.
He came a step nearer.
Molly, don't give me up. I know I've been a blackguard, but I swear that's all over now. I've drawn a line right through it. I oughtn't to have let myself love you. But I couldn't help it. I couldn't, dear. You won't give me up, will you? If you'd only take me in hand, you could make what you liked of me. I'd do anything for you. Any mortal thing you wanted. You can make me just anything you please. Will you try? Molly!
He stopped. She held out both her hands to him.
The next moment she had gone.
With a wonderful feeling of light-heartedness, Jimmy turned once more to the jewel box. He picked up the lamp and switched off the electric light. He had dropped the necklace to the floor, and had knelt to recover it when the opening of the door, followed by a blaze of light and a startled exclamation, brought him to his feet with a bound, blinking but alert.
In the doorway stood Sir Thomas Blunt. His face expressed the most lively astonishment. His bulging eyes were fixed upon the pearls in Jimmy's hand.
Good evening, said Jimmy pleasantly.
Sir Thomas stammered. It is a disquieting experience to find the floor of one's dressing room occupied by a burglar.
What—what—what— said Sir Thomas.
Out with it, said Jimmy.
What——
I knew a man once who stammered, said Jimmy. "He used to chew dog biscuit while he was speaking. It cured him. Besides being nutritious."
You—you blackguard! said Sir Thomas.
Jimmy placed the pearls carefully on the dressing table. Then he turned to Sir Thomas, with his hands in the pockets of his coat. It was a tight corner, but he had been in tighter in his time, and in this instance he fancied that he held a winning card. He found himself enjoying the interview.
So—so it's you, is it? said Sir Thomas.
Who told you?
So you're a thief, went on the baronet viciously, "a low thief."
Dash it all—I say, come now, protested Jimmy. "Not low. You may not know me, over here, but I've got a big American reputation. Ask anybody. But——
And, I say, added Jimmy, "I know you don't mean to be offensive, but I wish you wouldn't call me a thief. I'm a cracksman. There's a world of difference between the two branches of the profession. I mean, well, suppose you were an actor-manager, you wouldn't like to be called a super, would you? I mean—well, you see don't you? An ordinary thief, for instance, would use violence in a case like this. Violence—except in extreme cases; I hope this won't be one of them—is contrary to cracksmen's etiquette. On the other hand, Sir Thomas, I should like to say that I have you covered."
There was a pipe in the pocket of his coat. He thrust the stem of this earnestly against the lining. Sir Thomas eyed the protuberance apprehensively, and turned a little pale.
My gun, as you see, is in my pocket. It is loaded and cocked. It is pointing straight at you at the present moment, and my finger is on the trigger. I may add that I am a dead shot at a yard and a half. So I should recommend you not to touch that bell you are looking at.
Sir Thomas' hand wavered.
Do, if you like, of course, said Jimmy agreeably. "In any case, I shan't fire to kill you. I shall just smash your knees. Beastly painful, but not fatal."
He waggled the pipe suggestively. Sir Thomas blanched. His hand fell to his side.
How are the theatricals going? asked Jimmy. "Did you like the monologue?"
Sir Thomas had backed away from the bell, but the retreat was merely for the convenience of the moment. He understood that it might be inconvenient to press the button just then; but he had recovered his composure by this time, and he saw that the game must be his. Jimmy was trapped, and he hastened to make this clear to him.
How, may I ask, he said, "do you propose to leave the abbey?"
I suppose they'll let me have the automobile, said Jimmy. "They can hardly ask me to walk. But I wasn't thinking of leaving just yet."
You mean to stop!
Why not? It's a pretty place.
And what steps, if I may ask, do you imagine I shall take?
"
Waltz steps. They're going to have a dance after the show, you know. You ought to be in that.
"You wish me, in fact, to become a silent accomplice? To refrain from mentioning this little matter?
You put things so well.
And do you propose to keep my wife's jewels, or may I have them?
Oh, you may have those, said Jimmy.
Thank you.
I never touch paste.
Sir Thomas failed to see the significance of this remark. Jimmy repeated it, with emphasis.
I never touch paste, he said, "and Lady Blunt's necklace is, I regret to say, made of that material."
Sir Thomas grew purple.
Mind you, said Jimmy, "it's very good paste. I'll say that for it. I didn't see through it till I had it in my hands. Looking at the thing—even quite close—I was taken in for a moment."
The baronet made strange, gurgling noises.
Paste! he said, speaking with difficulty. "Paste! Paste! Damn your impertinence, sir! Are you aware that that necklace cost forty thousand pounds?"
Then whoever paid that sum for it wasted a great deal of money. Paste it is, and paste it always will be.
It can't be paste. How do you know?
How do I know? I'm an expert. Ask a jeweler how he knows diamonds from paste. He can feel them. He can almost smell them.
Let me look. It's impossible.
Certainly. I don't know the extent of your knowledge of pearls. If it is even moderate, I think you will admit that I am right.
Sir Thomas snatched the necklace from the table and darted with it to the electric light. He scrutinized it, breathing heavily. Jimmy's prophecy was fulfilled. The baronet burst into a vehement flood of oaths, and hurled the glittering mass across the room. The unemotional mask of the man seemed to have been torn off him. He shook with futile passion.
Jimmy watched him in interested silence.
Sir Thomas ran to the jewels, and would have crushed them beneath his feet, had not Jimmy sprang forward and jerked him away from them.
Be quiet, he said. "Confound you, sir, will you stop that noise?"
Sir Thomas, unaccustomed to this style of address, checked the flood for a moment.
Now, said Jimmy, "you see the situation. At present, you and I are the only persons alive, to the best of our knowledge, who know about this. Stay, though, there must be one other. The real necklace must have been stolen. It is impossible to say when. Years ago, perhaps. Well, that doesn't affect us. The thief, whoever he is, is not likely to reveal what he knows. So here you have it in a nutshell. Let me go, and don't say a word about having found me here, and I will do the same for you. No one will know that the necklace is not genuine. I shall not mention the subject, and I imagine that you will not. Very well, then. Now, for the alternative. Give me up, give the alarm, and I get—well, whatever they give me. I don't know what it would be, exactly. Something unpleasant. But what do you get out of it? Lady Blunt, if I may say so, is not precisely the sort of lady, I should think, who would bear a loss like this calmly. If I know her, she will shout loudly for another necklace, and see that she gets it. I should fancy you would find the expense unpleasantly heavy. That is only one disadvantage of the alternative. Others will suggest themselves to you. Which is it to be?"
Sir Thomas suspended his operation of glaring at the paste necklace to glare at Jimmy.
Well? said Jimmy. "I should like your decision as soon as it's convenient to you. They will be wanting me on the stage in a few minutes. Which is it to be?"
Which? snapped Sir Thomas. "Why, go away, and go to the devil!"
All in good time, said Jimmy cheerfully. "I think you have chosen wisely. Coming downstairs?"
Sir Thomas made no response. He was regarding the necklace moodily.
You'd better come. You'll enjoy the show. Charteris says it's the best piece there's been since 'The Magistrate'! And he ought to know. He wrote it. Well, good-by, then. See you downstairs later, I suppose?
For some time after he had gone Sir Thomas stood, motionless. Then he went across the room and picked up the necklace. It occurred to him that if Lady Blunt found it lying in a corner, there would be questions. And questions from Lady Blunt ranked among the keenest of his trials.
* * * * *
If I had gone into the army, said Jimmy complacently to himself, as he went downstairs, "I should have been a great general. Instead of which I go about the country, scoring off dyspeptic baronets. Well, well!"
The evening's entertainment was over. The last of the nobility and gentry had departed, and Mr. McEachern had retired to his lair to smoke—in his shirt sleeves—the last and best cigar of the day, when his solitude was invaded by his old New York friend, Mr. Samuel Galer.
I've done a fair cop, sir, said Mr. Galer, without preamble, quivering with self-congratulation.
How's that? said the master of the house.
A fair cop, sir. Caught him in the very blooming act, sir. Dark it was. Oo, pitch. Fair pitch. Like this, sir. Room opposite where the jewels was. One of the gents' bedrooms. Me hiding in there. Door on the jar. Waited a goodish bit. Footsteps. Hullo, they've stopped! Opened door a trifle and looked out. Couldn't see much. Just made out man's figure. Door of dressing room was open. Showed up against opening. Just see him. Caught you at it, my beauty, have I? says I to myself. Out I jumped. Got hold of him. Being a bit to the good in strength, and knowing something about the game, downed him after a while and got the darbies on him. Took him off and locked him in the cellar. That's how it was, sir.
Good boy, said Mr. McEachern approvingly. "You're no rube."
No, sir.
Put one of these cigars into your face.
Thank you, sir. Very enjoyable thing, a cigar, sir. 'Specially a good un. I have a light, I thank you, sir.
Well, and who was he?
Not the man you told me to watch, for. 'Nother chap altogether.
That red-headed——
No, sir. Dark-haired chap. Seen him hanging about, suspicious, for a long time. Had my eye on him.
Mr. Galer chuckled reminiscently.
Rummest card, sir, I ever lagged in my natural, he said.
"
How's that? inquired Mr. McEachern amiably. Why,"" grinned Mr. Galer, ""you'll hardly believe it, sir, but he had the impudence, the gall, if I may use the word, the sauce to tell me he was in my own line of business. A detective, sir! Said he was going into the room to keep guard. I said to him at the time, I said, it's too thin, cocky. That's to say——""
"
Mr. McEachern started.
A detective!
A detective, sir, said Mr. Galer, with a chuckle. "I said to him at the time——"
The valet! cried Mr. McEachern.
That's it, sir. Sir Thomas Blunt's valet, he was. That's how he got into the house, sir.
Mr. McEachern grunted despairingly.
The man was right. He is a detective. Sir Thomas brought him down from London. He niver travels without him. Ye've done it. Ye've arristed wan of the bhoys.
Mr. Galer's jaw dropped slightly.
He was? He really was——
Ye'd better go straight to where it was ye locked him up, and let him loose. And I'd suggest ye hand him an apology. G'wan, mister. Lively as you can step.
I never thought——
That's the trouble with you fly cops, said his employer caustically.
Ye niver do think.
It never occurred to me——
G'wan! said the master of the house. "Up an alley!"
Mr. Galer departed.
And I asked them, said Mr. McEachern, "I asked them particularly not to send me a rube!"
He lit another cigar, and began to brood over the folly of mankind.
He was in a very pessimistic frame of mind when Jimmy curveted into the room, with his head in the clouds and his feet on air.
Can you spare me a few minutes, Mr. McEachern? said Jimmy.
The policeman stared heavily.
I can, he said slowly. "What is ut?"
Several things, said Jimmy, sitting down. "I'll take them in order.
I'll start with our bright friend, Galer."
Galer!
Of New York, according to you. Personally, I should think that he's seen about as much of New York as I have of Timbuctoo. Look here, McEachern, we've known each other some time, and I ask you, as man to man, do you think it playing the game to set a farmer like poor old Galer to watch me? I put it to you?
The policeman stammered. The question chimed in so exactly with the opinion he had just formed, on his own account, of the human bloodhound who was now in the cellar making the peace with his injured fellow worker.
Hits you where you live, that, doesn't it? said Jimmy. "I wonder you didn't have more self-respect, let alone consideration for my feelings. I'm surprised at you."
Ye're——
In fact, if you weren't going to be my father-in-law, I doubt if I could bring myself to forgive you. As it is, I overlook it.
The policeman's face turned purple.
Only, said Jimmy, with quiet severity, taking a cigar from the box and snipping off the end, "don't let it occur again."
He lit the cigar. Mr. McEachern continued to stare fixedly at him. So might the colonel of a regiment have looked at the latest-joined subaltern, if the latter, during mess, had offered to teach him how to conduct himself on parade.
I'm going to marry your daughter, said Jimmy.
You are going to marry me daughter! echoed Mr. McEachern, as one in a trance.
I am going to marry your daughter.
The purple deepened on Mr. McEachern's face.
More, said Jimmy, blowing a smoke ring. "She is going to marry me. We are going to marry each other," he explained.
McEachern's glare became frightful. He struggled for speech.
I must congratulate you, said Jimmy, "on the way things went off tonight. It was a thorough success. Everybody was saying so. You're the most popular man in the county. What would they say of you at Jefferson Market, if they knew? By the way, do you correspond with any of the old set? Splendid fellows, they were. I wish we had some of them here tonight."
Mr. McEachern's emotions found relief in words. He rose, and waved a huge fist in Jimmy's face. His great body was shaking with rage.
You! shouted the policeman. "You!"
The fist was within an inch of Jimmy's chin.
Outwardly calm, inwardly very much alive to the fact that at any moment the primitive man in him might lead his prospective father-in-law beyond the confines of self-restraint, Jimmy sat still in his chair, his eyes fixed steadily on those of his relative-to-be. It was an uncomfortable moment. Mr. McEachern, if he made an assault, might regret it subsequently. But he would not be the first to do so. The man who did that would be a certain James Pitt. If it came to blows, the younger man could not hope to hold his own with the huge policeman.
You! roared McEachern. Jimmy fancied he could feel the wind of moving fist. "You marry me daughter! A New York crook. The sweepings of the Bowery. A man who ought to be in jail. I'd like to break your face in."
I noticed that, said Jimmy. "If it's all the same to you, will you take your fist out of my mouth? It makes it a little difficult to carry on a conversation. And I've several things I should like to say."
Ye'll listen to me!
Certainly. You were saying?
Ye come here. Ye worm yourself into my house, crawl into it——
"
I came by invitation, and in passing, not on all fours. Mr. McEachern, may I ask one question?
"What is ut?
If you didn't want me, why did you let me stop here?
The policeman stopped as if he had received a blow. There came flooding back into his mind the recollection of his position. In his wrath, he had forgotten that Jimmy knew his secret. And he looked on Jimmy as a man who would use his knowledge.
He sat down heavily.
Jimmy went on smoking in silence for a while. He saw what was passing in his adversary's mind, and it seemed to him that it would do no harm to let the thing sink in.
Look here, Mr. McEachern, he said, at last, "I wish you could listen quietly to me for a minute or two. There's really no reason on earth why we should always be at one another's throats in this way. We might just a well be friends, as we should be if we met now for the first time. Our difficulty is that we know too much about each other. You knew me in New York, and you know what I did there. Naturally, you don't like the idea of my marrying your daughter. You can't believe that I'm not simply an ordinary yegg, like the rest of the crooks you used to know. I promise you, I'm not. Can't you see that it doesn't matter what a man has been? It's what he is and what he means to be that counts. Mr. Patrick McEachern, of Corven Abbey, isn't the same as Constable McEachern, of the New York police. Well, then, I have nothing to do with the man I was when you knew me first. I have disowned him. He's a back number. I am an ordinary English gentleman now. My uncle has left me more than well off. I am a baronet. And is it likely that a baronet—with money, mind you—is going to carry on the yegg business as a side line? Be reasonable. There's really no possible objection to me now. Let's shake, and call the fight off. Does that go?"
The policeman was plainly not unmoved by these arguments. He drummed his fingers on the table, and stared thoughtfully at Jimmy.
Is Molly— he said, at length, "does Molly——"
Yes, said Jimmy. "And I can promise you I love her. Come along, now.
Why wait?"
McEachern looked doubtfully at Jimmy's outstretched hand. He moved his own an inch from the table, then let it fall again.
Come on, said Jimmy. "Do it now. Be a sport."
And with a great grunt, which might have meant anything, from resignation to cordiality, Mr. McEachern capitulated.
The American liner, St. Louis, lay in the Empress Dock, at Southampton, taking aboard her passengers. All sorts and conditions of men flowed in an unceasing stream up the gangway.
Leaning over the second-class railing, Jimmy Pitt and Spike Mullins watched them thoughtfully.
Jimmy looked up at the Blue Peter that fluttered from the foremast, and then at Spike. The Bowery boy's face was stolid and expressionless. He was smoking a short wooden pipe, with an air of detachment.
Well, Spike, said Jimmy. "Your schooner's on the tide now, isn't it? Your vessel's at the quay. You've got some queer-looking fellow travellers. Don't miss the two Cinghalese sports, and the man in the turban and the baggy breeches. I wonder if they're air-tight. Useful if he fell overboard."
Sure, said Spike, directing a contemplative eye toward the garment in question. "He knows his business."
I wonder what those men on the deck are writing. They've been scribbling away ever since we came here. Probably society journalists. We shall see in next week's Sphere: 'Among the second-class passengers we noticed Mr. Spike" Mullins, looking as cheery as ever.' It's a pity you're so set on going, Spike. Why not change your mind, and stop?"
For a moment, Spike looked wistful. Then his countenance resumed its
woodenness. "Dere ain't no use for me dis side, Mr. Chames," he said.
"New York's de spot. Youse don't want none of me, now you're married. How's Miss Molly, Mr. Chames?
"Splendid, Spike; thanks. We're going over to France by to-night's boat.
It's been a queer business, said Jimmy, after a pause. "A deuced rum business. Well, I've come very well out of it, at any rate. It seems to me that you're the only one of us who doesn't end happily, Spike. I'm married. McEachern's butted into society so deep that it would take an excavating party with dynamite to get him out of it. Molly. Well, Molly's made a bad bargain, but I hope she won't regret it. We're all going some, except you. You're going out on the old trail again—which begins in Third Avenue and ends in Sing Sing. Why tear yourself away, Spike?"
Spike concentrated his gaze on a weedy young emigrant in a blue jersey, who was having his eye examined by the overworked doctor, and seemed to be resenting it.
Dere's nuttin' doin' dis side, Mr. Chames, he said, at length. "I want to get busy."
Ulysses Mullins! said Jimmy, looking at him curiously. "I know the feeling. There's only one cure, and I don't suppose you'll ever take it. You don't think a lot of women, do you? You're the rugged bachelor."
Goils—— began Spike comprehensively, and abandoned the topic without dilating on it further.
Jimmy lit his pipe, and threw the match overboard. The sun came out from behind a cloud, and the water sparkled.
Dose were great jools, Mr. Chames, said Spike thoughtfully.
I believe you're still brooding over them, Spike.
We could have got away wit' dem, if you'd have stood for it. Dead easy.
You are brooding over them. Spike, I'll tell you something which will console you a little before you start out on your wanderings. That necklace was paste.
What's dat?
Nothing but paste. They weren't worth thirty dollars.
A light of understanding came into Spike's eyes. His face beamed with the smile of one to whom dark matters are made clear.
So dat's why you wouldn't stand for gettin' away wit' dem! he exclaimed.
* * * * *
The last voyager had embarked. The deck was full to congestion.
They'll be sending us ashore in a minute, said Jimmy. "I'd better be moving. Let me know how you're making out, Spike, from time to time. You know the address. And, I say. It's just possible you may find you want a dollar or two, every now and then. When you're going to buy another automobile, for instance. Well, you know where to write for it, don't you?"
T'anks, Mr. Chames. But dat'll be all right. I'm going to sit in at another game dis time. Politics, Mr. Chames. A fr'en' of a mug what I knows has got a pull. Me brother Dan is an alderman wit' a grip on de 'Levent' Ward, he went on softly. "He'll find me a job!"
You'll be a boss before you know where you are.
Sure! said Spike, grinning modestly.
You ought to be a thundering success in American politics, said
Jimmy. "You've got all the necessary qualities."
A steward passed.
Any more for the shore?
Which shore? asked Jimmy. "Well, Spike——"
Good-by, Mr. Chames.
Good-by, said Jimmy. "And good luck!"
Two tugs attached themselves excitedly to the liner's side. The great ship began to move slowly from the shore. Jimmy stood at the water side, and watched her. The rails were lined with gesticulating figures. In the front row, Spike waved his hat with silent vigor.
The sun had gone behind the clouds. As the ship slid out on its way, a stray beam pierced the grayness.
It shone on a red head.