Mr. Poopendyke began to develop a streak of romantic invention—in fact, tomfoolery—A day or two after my experience with Count Tarnowsy in the Rempf Hotel. He is the last person in the world of whom I—or any one else—would suspect silliness of a radical nature.
We were finding it rather difficult to get down to actual, serious work on the book. The plot and the synopsis, of course, were quite completely outlined; with ordinary intensity of purpose on my part the tale might have galloped through the introductory chapters with some clarity and decisiveness. But for some reason I lacked the power of concentration, or perhaps more properly speaking the power of initiative. I laid it to the hub-bub created by the final effort of the workmen to finish the job of repairing my castle before cold weather set in.
"That isn't it, Mr. Smart," said my secretary darkly. We were in the study and my pad of paper was lying idly on my knees. For half an hour I had been trying to think of a handy sentence with which to open the story; the kind of sentence that catches the unwary reader's attention at a glance and makes for interest.
"What is it, then?" I demanded, at once resenting an opinion.
He smiled mysteriously. "You were not thinking of the workmen just now, were you?"
"Certainly," said I, coldly. "What's that got to do with it?"
"Nothing, I suppose," said he resignedly.
I hesitated. "Of course it is the work that upsets me. What are you driving at?"
He stared for a long time at the portrait of Ludwig the Red. "Isn't it odd that the Countess, an American, should be descended from the old Rothhoefens? What a small world it is, after all!"
I became wary. "Nothing odd about it to me. We've all got to descend from somebody."
"I dare say. Still it is odd that she should be hiding in the castle of her ances—"
"Not at all, not at all. It just happens to be a handy place. Perfectly natural."
We lapsed into a prolonged spell of silence. I found myself watching him rather combatively, as who would anticipate the move of an adversary.
"Perfect rot," said I, at last, without rhyme or reason.
He grinned. "Nevertheless, it's the general opinion that you are," said he.
I sat up very straight. "What's that?"
"You're in love," said he succinctly. It was like a bomb, and a bomb is the very last thing in succinctness. It comes to the point without palaver or conjecture, and it reduces havoc to a single synonymous syllable.
"You're crazy!" I gasped.
"And the workmen haven't anything at all to do with it," he pronounced emphatically. It was a direct charge. I distinctly felt called upon to refute it. But while I was striving to collect my thoughts he went on, somewhat arbitrarily, I thought: "You don't think we're all blind, do you, Mr. Smart?" "We?" I murmured, a curious dampness assailing me.
"That is to say, Britton, the Schmicks and myself."
"The Schmicks?" It was high time that I should laugh. "Ha! ha! The Schmicks! Good Lord, man,—the Schmicks." It sounded inane even to me, but, on my soul, it was all I could think of to say.
"The Schmicks are tickled to death over it," said he. "And so is Britton."
Collecting all the sarcasm that I could command at the instant, I inquired: "And you, Mr. Poopendyke,—are you not ticklish?"
"Very," said he.
"Well, I'm not!" said I, savagely. "What does all this nonsense mean. Don't be an ass, Fred."
"Perhaps you don't know it, Mr. Smart, but you are in love," said he so convincingly that I was conscious of an abrupt sinking of the heart. Good heavens! Was he right? Was there anything in this silly twaddle? "You are quite mad about her."
"The deuce you say!" I exclaimed, rather blankly.
"Oh, I've seen it coming. For that matter, so has she. It's as plain as the nose—"
I leaped to my feet, startled. "She? You don't—Has she said anything that leads you to believe—Oh, the deuce! What rot!"
"No use getting angry over it," he said consolingly. "Falling in love is the sort of thing a fellow can't help, you know. It happens without his assistance. It is so easy. Now I was once in love with a girl for two years without really knowing it."
"And how did you find it out?" I asked, weakly.
"I didn't find it out until she married another chap. Then I knew I'd been in love with her all the time. But that's neither here nor there. You are heels over head in love with the Countess Tarnowsy and—"
"Shut up, Fred! You're going daffy from reading my books, or absorbing my manuscripts, or—"
"Heaven is my witness, I don't read your books and I merely correct your manuscripts. God knows there is no romance in that! You are in love. Now what are you going to do about it?"
"Do about it?" I demanded.
"You can't go on in this way, you know," he said relentlessly. "She won't—"
"Why, you blithering idiot," I roared, "do you know what you are saying? I'm not in love with anybody. My heart is—is—But never mind! Now, listen to me, Fred. This nonsense has got to cease. I won't have it. Why, she's already got a husband. She's had all she can stand in the way of husb—"
"Rubbish! She can stand a husband or two more, if you are going to look at it in a literal way. Besides, she hasn't a husband. She's chucked him. Good riddance, too. Now, do you imagine for a single instant that a beautiful, adorable young woman of twenty-three is going to spend the rest of her life without a man? Not much! She's free to marry again and she will."
"Admitting that to be true, why should she marry me?"
"I didn't say she was in love with you. I said you were in love with her."
"Oh," I said, and my face fell "I see."
He seemed to be considering something. After a few seconds, he nodded his head decisively. "Yes, I am sure of it. If the right man gets her, she'll make the finest, sweetest wife in the world. She's never had a chance to show what's really in her. She would be adorable, wouldn't she?"
The sudden question caught me unawares.
"She would!" I said, with conviction.
"Well," said he, slowly and deliberately, "why don't you set about it, then?"
He was so ridiculous that I thought for the fun of it, I'd humour him.
"Assuming that you are right in regard to my feelings toward her, Fred, what leads you to believe that I would stand a chance of winning her?" It was a silly question, but I declare I hung on his answer with a tenseness that surprised me.
"Why not? You are good looking, a gentleman, a celebrity, and a man. Bless my soul, she could do worse."
"But you forget that I am—let me see—thirty-five and she is but twenty-three."
"To offset that, she has been married and unhappy. That brings her about up to your level, I should say. She's a mother, and that makes you seem a good bit younger. Moreover, she isn't a sod widow. She's a grass widow, and she's got a living example to use as a contrast. Regulation widows sometimes forget the past because it is dim and dead; but, by George, sir, the divorced wife doesn't forget the hard time she's had. She's mighty careful when she goes about it the second time. The other kind has lost her sense of comparison, her standard, so to speak. Her husband may have been a rotter and all that sort of thing, but he's dead and buried and she can't see anything but the good that was in him for the simple reason that it's on his tombstone. But when they're still alive and as bad as ever,—well, don't you see it's different?"
"It occurs to me she'd be more likely to see the evil in all men and steer clear of them."
"That isn't feminine nature. All women want to be loved. They want to be married. They want to make some man happy."
"I suppose all this is philosophy," I mused, somewhat pleased and mollified. "But we'll look at it from another point of view. The former Miss Titus set out for a title. She got it. Do you imagine she'll marry a man who has no position—By Jove! That reminds me of something. You are altogether wrong in your reasoning, Fred. With her own lips she declared to me one day that she'd never marry again. There you are!"
He rolled his eyes heavenward.
"They take delight in self-pity," said he. "You can't believe 'em under oath when they're in that mood."
"Well, granting that she will marry again," said I, rather insistently, "it doesn't follow that her parents will consent to a marriage with any one less than a duke the next time."
"They've had their lesson."
"And she is probably a mercenary creature, after all. She's had a taste of poverty, after a fashion. I imagine—"
"If I know anything about women, the Countess Tarnowsy wants love more than anything else in the world, my friend. She was made to be loved and she knows it. And she hasn't had any of it, except from men who didn't happen to know how to combine love and respect. I'll give you my candid opinion, Mr. John Bellamy Smart. She's in a receptive mood. Strike while the iron is hot. You'll win or my name isn't—"
"Fred Poopendyke, you haven't a grain of sense," I broke in sharply. "Do you suppose, just to oblige you, I'll get myself mixed up in this wretched squabble? Why, she's not really clear of the fellow yet. She's got a good many months to wait before the matter of the child and the final decree—"
"Isn't she worth waiting a year for—or ten years? Besides, the whole squabble will come to an end the minute old man Titus puts up the back million. And the minute the Countess goes to him and says she's willing for him to pay it, you take my word for it, he'll settle like a flash. It rests with her."
"I don't quite get your meaning."
"She isn't going to let a stingy little million stand between her and happiness."
"Confound you, do you mean to say she'd ask her father to pay over that million in order to be free to marry—" I did not condescend to finish the sentence.
"Why not?" he demanded after a moment. "He owes it, doesn't he?"
I gasped. "But you wouldn't have him pay over a million to that damned brute of a Count!"
He grinned. "You've changed your song, my friend. A few weeks ago you were saying he ought to pay it, that it would serve him right, and—"
"Did I say that?"
"You did. You even said it to the Countess."
"But not with the view to making it possible for her to hurry off and marry again. Please understand that, Fred."
"He ought to pay what he owes. He gave a million to get one husband for her. He ought to give a million to be rid of him, so that she could marry the next one without putting him to any expense whatsoever. It's only fair to her, I say. And now I'll tell you something else: the Countess, who has stood out stubbornly against the payment of this money, is now halfway inclined to advise the old gentleman to settle with Tarnowsy."
"She is?" I cried in astonishment. "How do you know?"
"I told her I thought it was the cheapest and quickest way out of it, and she said: 'I wonder!'"
"Have you been discussing her most sacred affairs with her, you blithering—"
"No, sir," said he, with dignity. "She has been discussing them with me."
I have no recollection of what I said as I stalked out of the room. He called out after me, somewhat pleadingly, I thought:
"Ask Britton what he has to say about it."
Things had come to a pretty pass! Couldn't a gentleman be polite and agreeable to a young and charming lady whom circumstances had thrown in his way without having his motives misconstrued by a lot of snooping, idiotic menials whose only zest in life sprung from a temperamental tendency to belittle the big things and enlarge upon the small ones? What rot! What utter rot! Ask Britton! The more I thought of Poopendyke's injunction the more furious I grew. What insufferable insolence! Ask Britton! The idea! Ask my valet! Ask him what? Ask him politely if he could oblige me by telling me whether I was in love? I suppose that is what Poopendyke meant.
It was the silliest idea in the world. In the first place I was not in love, and in the second place whose business was it but mine if I were? Certainly not Poopendyke's, certainly not Britton's, certainly not the Schmicks'! Absolute lack of any sense of proportion, that's what ailed the whole bally of them. What looked like love to them—benighted dolts!—was no more than a rather resolute effort on my part to be kind to and patient with a person who had invaded my home and set everybody—including myself—by the ears.
But, even so, what right had my secretary to constitute himself adviser and mentor to the charming invader? What right had he to suggest what she should do, or what her father should do, or what anybody should do? He was getting to be disgustingly officious. What he needed was a smart jacking up, a little plain talk from me. Give a privileged and admittedly faithful secretary an inch and he'll have you up to your ears in trouble before you know what has happened. By the same token, what right had she to engage herself in confidential chats with—But just then I caught sight of Britton coming upstairs with my neatly polished tan shoes in one hand and a pair of number 3-1/2A tan pumps in the other. Not expecting to meet me in the hall, he had neglected to remove his cap when he came in from the courtyard. In some confusion, he tried to take it off, first with one hand, then with the other, sustaining what one might designate as absent treatment kicks on either jaw from two distinct sexes in the shape of shoes. He managed to get all four of them into one hand, however, and then grabbed off his cap.
"Anythink more, sir?" he asked, purely from habit. I was regarding the shoes with interest. Never have I known anything so ludicrous as the contrast between my stupendous number tens and the dainty pumps that seemed almost babyish beside them.
Then I did the very thing I had excoriated Poopendyke for even suggesting. I asked Britton!
"Britton, what's all this gossip I hear going the rounds of the castle behind my back?"
Confound him, he looked pleased! "It's quite true, sir, quite true."
"Quite true!" I roared. "What's quite true, sir?"
"Isn't it, sir?" he asked, dismayed.
"Isn't what?"
"I mean to say, sir, isn't it true?"
"My God!" I cried, throwing up my hands in hopeless despair. "You—you—wait! I'm going to get to the bottom of this. I want the truth, Britton. Who put it into that confounded head of yours that I am—er—in love with the Countess? Speak! Who did it?"
He lowered his voice, presumably because I had dropped mine to a very loud whisper. I also had glanced over both shoulders.
"Begging your pardon, sir, but I must be honest, sir. It was you as first put it into my 'ead, sir."
"I?" My face went the colour of a cardinal's cap.
"You, sir. It's as plain as the nose on your—"
"That will do, Britton," I commanded. He remained discreetly silent. "That will do, I say," I repeated, somewhat testily. "Do you hear, sir?"
"Yes, sir," he responded. "That will do, you says."
"Ahem! I—ahem!" Somewhat clumsily I put on my nose-glasses and made a pretext of examining his burden rather closely. "What's this you have here."
"Shoes, sir."
"I see, I see. Let me have them."
He handed me my own. "The others, if you please," I said, disdaining the number tens. "May I inquire, sir, where you are taking these?" I had the Countess's pumps in my hands. He explained that he was going to drop mine in my room and then take hers upstairs. "You may drop mine as you intended. I shall take care of these."
"Very good, sir," said he, with such positive relief in his voice that I glared at him. He left me standing there, a small pump in each hand.
Five minutes later I was at her door, a pump in each hand and my heart in my mouth. A sudden, inexplicable form of panic took possession of me. I stood there ready to tap resoundingly on the panel of the door with the heel of a slipper; I never raised my hand for the purpose.
Instead of carrying out my original design, I developed an overpowering desire to do nothing of the sort. Why go on making a fool of myself? Why add fuel to the already pernicious flame? Of course I was not in love with her, the idea was preposterous. But, just the same, the confounded servants were beginning to gossip, and back stair scandal is the very worst type. It was wrong for me to encourage it. Like a ninny, I had just given Britton something to support his contention, and he wouldn't be long in getting down to the servants' hall with the latest exhibit in the charge against me.
Moreover, if every one was talking about it, what was to prevent the silly gossip from reaching the sensitive ears of the Countess? A sickening thought struck me: could it be possible that the Countess herself suspected me of being in love with her? A woman's vanity goes a long way sometimes. The thought did not lessen the panic that afflicted me. I tip-toed away from the door to a less exposed spot at the bend in the stairway.
There, after some deliberation, I came to a decision. The proper thing for me to do was to show all of them that their ridiculous suspicions were wrong. I owed it to the Countess, to say the least. She was my guest, as it were, and it was my duty to protect her while she was in my house. The only thing for me to do, therefore, was to stay away from her.
The thought of it distressed me, but it seemed to be the only way, and the fair one. No doubt she would expect some sort of an explanation for the sudden indifference on my part, but I could attribute everything to an overpowering desire to work on my story. (I have a habit of using my work as an excuse for not doing a great many things that I ought to do.)
All this time I was regarding the small tan pumps with something akin to pain in my eyes. I could not help thinking about the tiny feet they sometimes covered. By some sort of intuitive computation I arrived at the conclusion that they were adorably small, and pink, and warm. Suddenly it occurred to me that my present conduct was reprehensible, that no man of honour would be holding a lady's pumps in his hands and allowing his imagination to go too far. Resolutely I put them behind my back and marched downstairs.
"Britton," said I, a few minutes later, "you may take these up to the Countess, after all."
He blinked his eyes. "Wasn't she at 'ome, sir?"
"Don't be insolent, Britton. Do as I tell you."
"Very good, sir." He held the pumps up to admire them. "They're very cute, ain't they, sir?"
"They are just like all pumps," said I, indifferently, and walked away. If I could have been quite sure that it was a chuckle I heard, I should have given Britton something to think about for the rest of his days. The impertinent rascal!
For some two long and extremely monotonous days I toiled. A chapter shaped itself—after a fashion. Even as I wrote, I knew that it wasn't satisfactory and that I should tear it up the instant it was finished. What irritated me more than anything else was the certain conviction that Poopendyke, who typed it as I progressed, also knew that it would go into the waste paper basket.
Both nights I went to bed early and to sleep late. I could not deny to myself that I was missing those pleasant hours with the Countess. I did miss them. I missed Rosemary and Jinko and Helen Marie Louise Antoinette and Blake.
An atmosphere of gloom settled around Poopendyke and Britton. They eyed me with a sort of pathetic wonder in their faces. As time went on they began to look positively forlorn and unhappy. Once or twice I caught them whispering in the hallway. On seeing me they assumed an air of nonchalance that brought a grim smile to my lips. I was beginning to hate them. Toward the end of the second day, the four Schmicks became so aggravatingly doleful that I ordered them, one and all, to keep out of my sight. Even the emotionless Hawkes and the perfect Blatchford were infected. I don't believe I've ever seen a human face as solemnly respectful as Hawkes' was that night at dinner. He seemed to be pitying me from the bottom of his heart. It was getting on my nerves.
I took a stroll in the courtyard after dinner, and I may be forgiven I hope for the few surreptitious glances I sent upwards in the direction of the rear windows in the eastern wing. I wondered what she was doing, and what she was thinking of my extraordinary behaviour, and why the deuce she hadn't sent down to ask me to come up and tell her how busy I was. She had not made a single sign. The omission was not particularly gratifying, to say the least.
Approaching the servants' hall, I loitered. I heard voices, a mixture of tongues. Britton appeared to be doing the most of the talking. Gradually I became aware of the fact that he was explaining to the four Schmicks the meaning of an expression in which must have been incorporated the words "turned him down."
Hawkes, the impeccable Hawkes, joined in. "If I know anything about it, I'd say she has threw the 'ooks into 'im."
Then they had to explain that to Conrad and Gretel, who repeated "Ach, Gott" and other simple expletives in such a state of misery that I could almost detect tears in their voices.
"It ain't that, Mr. 'Awkes," protested Britton loyally. "He's lost his nerve, that's wot it is. They allus do when they realise 'ow bad they're hit. Turn 'im down? Not much, Mr. 'Awkes. Take it from me, Mr. 'Awkes, he's not going to give 'er the chawnce to turn 'im down."
"Ach, Gott!" said Gretel. I will stake my head that she wrung her hands.
"Women is funny," said Hawkes. (I had no idea the wretch was so ungrammatical.) "You can't put your finger on 'em ever. While I 'aven't seen much of the Countess during my present engagement, I will say this: she has a lot more sense than people give 'er credit for. Now why should she throw the 'ooks into a fine, upstanding chap like 'im, even if he is an American? She made a rotten bad job the first time, mind you. If she has threw the 'ooks into 'im, as I am afeared, I can't see wot the deuce ails 'er."
My perfect footman, Blatchford, ventured an opinion, and I blessed him for it. "We may be off our nuts on the 'ole bloomink business," said he. "Maybe he 'as thrown the 'ooks into 'er. Who knows? It looks that w'y to me." (I remember distinctly that he used the word "thrown" and I was of half a mind to rush in and put him over Hawkes, there and then.)
"In any case," said Britton, gloom in his voice, "it's a most unhappy state of affairs. He's getting to be a perfect crank. Complines about everything I do. He won't 'ave 'is trousers pressed and he 'asn't been shaved since Monday."
I stole away, rage in my soul. Or was it mortification? In any event, I had come to an irrevocable decision: I would ship the whole lot of them, without notice, before another day was gone.
The more I thought of the way I was being treated by my own servants, and the longer I dwelt upon the ignominious figure I must have presented as the hero of their back-door romance, the angrier I got. I was an object of concern to them, an object of pity! Confound them, they were feeling sorry for me because I had received my conge, and they were actually finding fault with me for not taking it with a grin on my face!
Before going to bed I went into the loggia (for the first time in three days) and, keeping myself pretty well hidden behind a projection in the wall, tried to get a glimpse of the Countess's windows. Failing there, I turned my steps in another direction and soon stood upon my little balcony. There was no sign of her in the windows, although a faint light glowed against the curtains of a well-remembered room near the top of the tower.
Ah, what a cosy, jolly room! What a delicious dinner I had had there! And what a supper! Somehow, I found myself thinking of those little tan pumps. As a matter of fact, they had been a source of annoyance to me for more than forty-eight hours. I had found myself thinking of them at most inopportune times, greatly to the detriment of my work as a realist.
It was cool on the balcony, and I was abnormally warm, as might be expected. It occurred to me that I might do worse than to sit out there in the cool of the evening and enjoy a cigar or two—three or four, if necessary.
But, though I sat there until nearly midnight and chattered my teeth almost out of my head with the cold, she did not appear at her window. The aggravating part of it was that while I was shivering out there in the beastly raw, miasmic air, she doubtless was lying on a luxurious couch before a warm fire in a dressing gown and slippers,—ah, slippers!—reading a novel and thinking of nothing in the world but her own comfort! And those rascally beggars presumed to think that I was in love with a selfish, self-centred, spoiled creature like that! Rubbish!
I am afraid that Poopendyke found me in a particularly irascible frame of mind the next morning. I know that Britton did. I thought better of my determination to discharge Britton. He was an exceptionally good servant and a loyal fellow, so why should I deprive myself of a treasure simply because the eastern wing of my abode was inhabited by an unfeeling creature who hadn't a thought beyond fine feathers and bonbons? I was not so charitably inclined toward Hawkes and Blatchford, who were in my service through an influence over which I did not appear to have any control. They would have to go.
"Mr. Poopendyke," said I, after Blatchford had left the breakfast room, "I want you to give notice to Hawkes and Blatchford to-day."
"Notice?" he exclaimed incredulously.
"Notice," said I, very distinctly.
He looked distressed. "I thought they were most; satisfactory to you."
"I've changed my opinion."
"By Jove, Mr. Smart, I—I don't know how the Countess will take such high-handed—ahem! You see, sir, she—she was good enough to recommend them to me. It will be quite a shock to—"
"By the Lord Harry, Fred, am I to—"
"Don't misunderstand me," he made haste to say. "This is your house. You have a perfect right to hire and discharge, but—but—Don't you think you'd better consider very carefully—" He seemed to be finding his collar rather tight.
I held up my hand. "Of course I do not care to offend the Countess Tarnowsy. It was very kind of her to recommend them. We—we will let the matter rest for a few days."
"She has informed me that you were especially pleased with the manner in which they served the dinner the other night. I think she said you regarded them as incomparable diadems, or something of the sort. It may have been the champagne."
My thoughts leaped backward to that wonderful dinner. "It wasn't the champagne," said I, very stiffly.
"Do you also contemplate giving notice to the chef and his wife, our only chambermaid?"
"No, I don't," I snapped. "I think they were in bed."
He looked at me as if he thought I had gone crazy. I wriggled uncomfortably in my chair for a second or two, and then abruptly announced that we'd better get to work. I have never ceased to wonder what construction he could have put on that stupid slip of the tongue.
I cannot explain why, but at the slightest unusual sound that morning I found myself shooting an involuntary glance at the imperturbable features of Ludwig the Red. Sometimes I stopped in the middle of a sentence, to look and to listen rather more intently than seemed absolutely necessary, and on each occasion I was obliged to begin the sentence all over again, because, for the life of me, I couldn't remember what it was I had set out to say in dictation. Poopendyke had an air of patient tolerance about him that irritated me intensely. More than once I thought I detected him in the act of suppressing a smile.
At eleven o'clock, Blatchford came to the door. His ordinarily stoical features bore signs of a great, though subdued excitement. I had a fleeting glimpse of Britton in the distance,—a sort of passing shadow, as it were.
"A note for you, sir, if you please," said he. He was holding the salver almost on a level with his nose. It seemed to me that he was looking at it out of the corner of his eye.
My heart—my incomprehensible heart—gave a leap that sent the blood rushing to my face. He advanced, not with his usual imposing tread but with a sprightliness that pleased me vastly. I took the little pearl grey envelope from the salver, and carelessly glanced at the superscription. There was a curious ringing in my ears.
"Thank you, Blatchford; that will do."
"I beg pardon, sir, but there is to be an answer."
"Oh," said I. I had the feeling that at least fifty eyes were upon me, although I am bound to admit that both Poopendyke and the footman were actively engaged in looking in another direction.
I tore open the envelope.
"Have you deserted me entirely? Won't you please come and see me? Thanks 'for the violets, but I can't talk to violets, you know. Please come up for luncheon."
I managed to dash off a brief note in a fairly nonchalant manner. Blatchford almost committed the unpardonable crime of slamming the door behind him, he was in such a hurry to be off with the message.
Then I went over and stood above Mr. Poopendyke.
"Mr. Poopendyke," said I slowly, darkly, "what do you know about those violets?"
He quailed. "I hope you don't mind, Mr. Smart. It's all right. I put one of your cards in, so that there couldn't be any mistake."
Halfway up the winding stairways, I paused in some astonishment. It had just occurred to me that I was going up the steps two at a time and that my heart was beating like mad.
I reflected. Here was I racing along like a schoolboy, and wherefor? What occasion was there for such unseemly haste? In the first place, it was now but a few minutes after eleven, and she had asked me for luncheon; there was no getting around that. At best luncheon was two hours off. So why was I galloping like this? The series of self-inflicted questions found me utterly unprepared; I couldn't answer one of them. My brain somehow couldn't get at them intelligently; I was befuddled. I progressed more slowly, more deliberately, finally coming to a full stop in a sitting posture in one of the window casements, where I lighted a cigarette and proceeded to thresh the thing out in my mind before going any farther.
The fundamental problem was this: why was I breaking my neck to get to her before Blatchford had time to deliver my response to her appealing little note? It was something of a facer, and it set me to wondering. Why was I so eager? Could it be possible that there was anything in the speculation of my servants? I recalled the sensation of supreme delight that shot through me when I received her note, but after that a queer sort of oblivion seems to have surrounded me, from which I was but now emerging in a timely struggle for self-control. There was something really startling about it, after all.
I profess to be a steady, level-headed, prosaic sort of person, and this surprising reversion to extreme youthfulness rather staggered me. In fact it brought a cold chill of suspicion into existence. Grown-up men do not, as a rule, fly off the head unless confronted by some prodigious emotion, such as terror, grief or guilt. And yet here was I going into a perfect rampage of rapture over a simple, unconventional communication from a lady whom I had known for less than a month and for whom I had no real feeling of sympathy whatever. The chill of suspicion continued to increase.
If it had been a cigar that I was smoking it would have gone out through neglect. A cigarette goes on forever and smells.
After ten minutes of serious, undisturbed consideration of the matter, I came to the final conclusion that it was not love but pity that had driven me to such abnormal activity. It was nonsense to even argue the point.
Having thoroughly settled the matter to my own satisfaction and relief, I acknowledged a feeling of shame for having been so precipitous. I shudder to think of the look she would have given me if I had burst in upon her while in the throes of that extraordinary seizure. Obviously I had lost my wits. Now I had them once more, I knew what to do with them. First of all, I would wait until one o'clock before presenting myself for luncheon. Clearly that was the thing to do. Secondly, I would wait on this side of the castle instead of returning to my own rooms, thereby avoiding a very unpleasant gauntlet. Luckily I had profited by the discussion in the servants' quarters and was not wearing a three days' growth of beard. Moreover, I had taken considerable pains in dressing that morning. Evidently a presentiment.
For an hour and a half by my watch, but five or six by my nerves, I paced the lonely, sequestered halls in the lower regions of the castle. Two or three times I was sure that my watch had stopped, the hands seemed so stationary. The third time I tried to wind it, I broke the mainspring, but as it was nearly one o'clock not much harm was done.
That one little sentence, "Have you deserted me?" grew to be a voluminous indictment. I could think of nothing else. There was something ineffably sad and pathetic about it. Had she been unhappy because of my beastly behaviour? Was her poor little heart sore over my incomprehensible conduct? Perhaps she had cried through sheer loneliness—But no! It would never do for me to even think of her in tears. I remembered having detected tears in her lovely eyes early in our acquaintance and the sight of them—or the sensation, if you please—quite unmanned me.
At last I approached her door. Upon my soul, my legs were trembling! I experienced a silly sensation of fear. A new problem confronted me: what was I to say to her? Following close upon this came another and even graver question: what would she say to me? Suppose she were to look at me with hurt, reproachful eyes and speak to me with a little quaver in her voice as she held out her hand to me timidly—what then? What would become of me? By Jove, the answer that flashed through my whole body almost deprived me of reason!
I hesitated, then, plucking up my courage and putting all silly questions behind me, I rapped resoundingly on the door.
The excellent Hawkes opened it! I started back in dismay. He stood aside impressively.
"Mr. Smart!" he announced. Damn it all!
I caught sight of the Countess. She was arranging some flowers on the table. Blatchford was placing the knives and forks. Helen Marie Louise Antoinette stood beside her mistress holding a box of flowers in her hands.
What was it that I had been thinking out there in those gloomy halls? That she would greet me with a pathetic, hurt look and...
"Good morning!" she cried gaily. Hurt? Pathetic? She was radiant! "So glad to see you again. Hawkes has told me how busy you've been." She dried her hands on the abbreviated apron of Helen Marie Louise Antoinette and then quite composedly extended one for me to shake.
I bowed low over it. "Awfully, awfully busy," I murmured. Was it relief at finding her so happy and unconcerned that swept through me? I am morally, but shamelessly certain it wasn't!
"Don't you think the roses are lovely in that old silver bowl?"
"Exquisite."
"Blatchford found it in the plate vault," she said, standing off to admire the effect. "Do you mind if I go on arranging them?" she asked, and without waiting for an answer resumed her employment.
"Bon jour, m'sieur," said Helen Marie Louise Antoinette over her mistress's shoulder. One never knows whether a French maid is polite or merely spiteful.
"It seems ages since I saw you last," said the Countess in a matter-of-fact tone, jiggling a rose into position and then standing off to study the effect, her head cocked prettily at an angle of inquiry.
It suddenly occurred to me that she had got on very well without me during the ages. The discovery irritated me. She was not behaving at all as I had expected. This cool, even casual reception certainly was not in keeping with my idea of what it ought to have been. "But Mr. Poopendyke has been awfully kind. He has given me all the news."
Poopendyke! Had he been visiting her without my knowledge or—was I about to say consent?
"There hasn't been a great deal of news," I said.
She dropped a long-stemmed rose and waited for me to pick it up.
"Thank you," she said. "Oh, did it prick you?"
"Yes," said I flatly. Then we both gave the closest attention to the end of my thumb while I triumphantly squeezed a tiny drop of blood out of it. I sucked it. The incident was closed. She was no longer interested in the laceration.
"Mr. Poopendyke knew how lonely I would be. He telephoned twice a day."
I thought I detected a slight note of pique in her voice. But it was so slight that it was hardly worth while to exult.
"So you thought I had deserted you," I said, and was a little surprised at the gruffness in my voice.
"The violets appeased me," she said, with a smile. For the first time I noticed that she was wearing a large bunch of them. "You will be bankrupt, Mr. Smart, if you keep on buying roses and violets and orchids for me."
So the roses were mine also! I shot a swift glance at the mantelpiece, irresistibly moved by some mysterious force. There were two bowls of orchids there. I couldn't help thinking of the meddling, over-zealous geni that served the hero of Anstey's "Brass Bottle" tale. He was being outdone by my efficacious secretary.
"But they are lovely," she cried, noting the expression in my face and misconstruing it. "You are an angel."
That was the last straw. "I am nothing of the sort," I exclaimed, very hot and uncomfortable.
"You are," was her retort. "There! Isn't it a lovely centre-piece? Now, you must come and see Rosemary. She adores the new elephant you sent to her."
"Ele—" I began, blinking my eyes. "Oh—oh, yes, yes. Ha, ha! the elephant." Good Heavens, had that idiotic Poopendyke started a menagerie in my castle?
I was vastly relieved to find that the elephant was made of felt and not too large to keep Rosemary from wielding it skilfully in an assault upon the hapless Jinko. She had it firmly gripped by the proboscis, and she was shrieking with delight. Jinko was barking in vain-glorious defence. The racket was terrible.
The Countess succeeded in quelling the disturbance, and Rosemary ran up to kiss me. Jinko, who disliked me because I looked like the Count, also ran up but his object was to bite me. I made up my mind, there and then that if I should ever, by any chance, fall in love with his mistress I would inaugurate the courting period by slaying Jinko.
Rosemary gleefully permitted me to sip honey from that warm little spot on her neck, and I forgot many odious things. As I held her in my arms I experienced a vivid longing to have a child of my own, just like Rosemary.
Our luncheon was not as gay nor as unconventional as others that had preceded it. The Countess vainly tried to make it as sprightly as its predecessors, but gave over in despair in the face of my taciturnity. Her spirits drooped. She became strangely uneasy and, I thought, preoccupied.
"What is on your mind, Countess?" I asked rather gruffly, after a painful silence of some duration.
She regarded me fixedly for a moment. She seemed to be searching my thoughts. "You," she said very succinctly. "Why are you so quiet, so funereal?" I observed a faint tinge of red in her cheeks and an ominous steadiness in her gaze. Was there anger also?
I apologised for my manners, and assured her that my work was responsible. But her moodiness increased. At last, apparently at the end of her resources, she announced that she was tired: that after we had had a cigarette she would ask to be excused, as she wanted to lie down. Would I come to see her the next day?
"But don't think of coming, Mr. Smart," she declared, "if you feel you cannot spare the time away from your work."
I began to feel heartily ashamed of my boorishness. After all, why should I expend my unpleasant humour on her?
"My dear Countess," I exclaimed, displaying a livelier interest than at any time before, "I shall be delighted to come. Permit me to add that my work may go hang."
Her face brightened. "But men must work," she objected.
"Not when women are willing to play," I said.
"Splendid!" she cried. "You are reviving. I feel better. If you are going to be nice, I'll let you stay."
"Thanks. I'll do my best."
She seemed to be weighing something in her mind. Her chin was in her hands, her elbows resting on the edge of the table. She was regarding me with speculative eyes.
"If you don't mind what the servants are saying about us, Mr. Smart, I am quite sure I do not."
I caught my breath.
"Oh, I understand everything," she cried mischievously, before I could stammer anything in reply. "They are building a delightful romance around us. And why not? Why begrudge them the pleasure? No harm can come of it, you see."
"Certainly no harm," I floundered.
"The gossip is confined to the castle. It will not go any farther. We can afford to laugh in our sleeves, can't we?"
"Ha, ha!" I laughed in a strained effort, but not into my sleeve. "I rejoice to hear you say that you don't mind. No more do I. It's rather jolly."
"Fancy any one thinking we could possibly fall in love with each other," she scoffed. Her eyes were very bright. There was a suggestion of cold water in that remark.
"Yes, just fancy," I agreed.
"Absurd!"
"But, of course, as you say, if they can get any pleasure out of it, why should we object? It's a difficult matter keeping a cook any way."
"Well, we are bosom friends once more, are we not? I am so relieved."
"I suppose Poopendyke told you the—the gossip?"
"Oh, no! I had it from my maid. She is perfectly terrible. All French maids are, Mr. Smart. Beware of French maids! She won't have it any other way than that I am desperately in love with you. Isn't she delicious?"
"Eh?" I gasped.
"And she confides the wonderful secret to every one in the castle, from Rosemary down to Jinko."
"'Pon my soul!" I murmured.
"And so now they all are saying that I am in love with you," she laughed. "Isn't it perfectly ludicrous?"
"Perfectly," I said without enthusiasm. My heart sank like lead. Ludicrous? Was that the way it appeared to her? I had a little spirit left. "Quite as ludicrous as the fancy Britton has about me. He is obsessed by the idea that I am in love with you. What do you think of that?"
She started. I thought her eyes narrowed for a second. "Ridiculous," she said, very simply. Then she arose abruptly. "Please ring the bell for Hawkes."
I did so. Hawkes appeared. "Clear the table, Hawkes," she said. "I want you to read all these newspaper clippings, Mr. Smart," she went on, pointing to a bundle on a chair near the window. We crossed the room. "Now that you know who I am, I insist on your reading all that the papers have been saying about me during the past five or six weeks."
I protested but she was firm. "Every one else in the world has been reading about my affairs, so you must do likewise. No, it isn't necessary to read all of them. I will select the most lurid and the most glowing. You see there are two sides to the case. The papers that father can control are united in defending my action; the European press is just the other way. Sit down, please. I'll hand them to you."
For an hour I sat there in the window absorbing the astonishing history of the Tarnowsy abduction case. I felt rather than observed the intense scrutiny with which she favoured me.
At last she tossed the remainder of the bundle unread, into a corner. Her face was aglow with pleasure.
"You've read both sides, and I've watched you—oh, so closely. You don't believe what the papers over here have to say. I saw the scowls when you read the translations that Mr. Poopendyke has typed for me. Now I know that you do not feel so bitterly toward me as you did at first."
I was resolved to make a last determined stand for my original convictions.
"But our own papers, the New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Chicago journals,—still voice, in a way, my principal contention in the matter, Countess. They deplore the wretched custom among the idle but ambitious rich that made possible this whole lamentable state of affairs. I mean the custom of getting a title into the family at any cost."
"My dear Mr. Smart," she said seriously, "do you really contend that all of the conjugal unhappiness and unrest of the world is confined to the American girls who marry noblemen? Has it escaped your notice that there are thousands of unhappy marriages and equally happy divorces in America every year in which noblemen do not figure at all? Have you not read of countless cases over there in which conditions are quite similar to those which make the Tarnowsy fiasco so notorious? Are not American women stealing their children from American husbands? Are all American husbands so perfect that Count Tarnowsy would appear black among them? Are there no American men who marry for money, and are there no American girls given in marriage to wealthy suitors of all ages, creeds and habits? Why do you maintain that an unfortunate alliance with a foreign nobleman is any worse than an unhappy marriage with an ordinary American brute? Are there no bad husbands in America?"
"All husbands are bad," I said, "but some are more pre-eminently evil than others. I am not finding fault with Tarnowsy as a husband. He did just what was expected of him. He did what he set out to do. He isn't to be blamed for living up to his creed. There are bad husbands in America, and bad wives. But they went into the game blindly, most of them. They didn't find out their mistake until after the marriage. The same statement applies to husbands and wives the world over. I hold a brief only against the marriage wherein the contracting parties, their families, their friends, their enemies, their bankers and their creditors know beforehand that it's a business proposition and not a sacred compact. But we've gone into all this before. Why rake it up again."
"But there are many happy marriages between American girls and foreign noblemen—dozens of them that I could mention."
"I grant you that. I know of a few myself. But I think if you will reflect for a moment you'll find that money had no place in the covenant. They married because they loved one another. The noblemen in such cases are real noblemen, and their American wives are real wives. There are no Count Tarnowsys among them. My blood curdles when I think of you being married to a man of the Tarnowsy type. It is that sort of a marriage that I execrate."
"The buy and sell kind?" she said, and her eyes fell. The colour had faded from her cheeks.
"Yes. The premeditated murder type."
She looked up after a moment. There was a bleak expression in her eyes.
"Will you believe me if I say to you that I went into it blindly?"
"God bless my soul, I am sure of it," I cried earnestly. "You had never been in love. You did not know."
"I have told you that I believed myself to be in love with Maris. Doesn't—doesn't that help matters a little bit?"
I looked away. The hurt, appealing look was in her eyes. It had come at last, and, upon my soul, I was as little prepared to repel it as when I entered the room hours ago after having lived in fear of it for hours before that. I looked away because I knew that I should do something rash if I were to lose my head for an instant.
She was like an unhappy pleading child. I solemnly affirm that it was tender-heartedness that moved me in this crucial instant. What man could have felt otherwise?
I assumed a coldly impersonal tone. "Not a single editorial in any of these papers holds you responsible for what happened in New York," I said.
She began to collect the scattered newspaper clippings and the type-written transcriptions. I gathered up those in the corner and laid them in her lap. Her fingers trembled a little.
"Throw them in the fireplace, please," she said in a low voice. "I kept them only for the purpose of showing them to you. Oh, how I hate, how I loathe it all!"
When I came back from the fireplace, she was lying back in the big, comfortable chair, a careless, whimsical smile on her lips. She was as serene as if she had never known what it was to have a heart-pang or an instant of regret in all her life. I could not understand that side of her.
"And now I have some pleasant news for you," she said. "My mother will be here on Thursday. You will not like her, of course, because you are already prejudiced, but I know she will like you."
I knew I should hate her mother, but of course it would not do to say so.
"Next Thursday?" I inquired. She nodded her head. "I hope she will like me," I added feeling that it was necessary.
"She was a Colingraft, you know."
"Indeed?" The Colingraft family was one of the oldest and most exclusive in New York. I had a vague recollection of hearing one of my fastidious friends at home say that it must have been a bitter blow to the Colingrafts when, as an expedient, she married the vulgarly rich Jasper Titus, then of St. Paul, Minnesota. It had been a clear case of marrying the money, not the man. Aline's marriage, therefore, was due to hereditary cold-bloodedness and not to covetousness. "A fine old name, Countess."
"Titus suggests titles, therefore it has come to be our family name," she said, with her satiric smile. "You will like my father. He loves me more than any one else in the world—more than all the world. He is making the great fight for me, Mr. Smart. He would buy off the Count to-morrow if I would permit him to do so. Of late I have been thinking very seriously of suggesting it to him. It would be the simplest way out of our troubles, wouldn't it? A million is nothing to my father."
"Nothing at all, I submit, in view of the fact that it may be the means of saving you from a term in prison for abducting Rosemary?"
She paled. "Do you really think they would put me in prison?"
"Unquestionably," I pronounced emphatically.
"Oh, dear!" she murmured.
"But they can't lock you up until they've caught you," said I reassuringly. "And I will see to it that they do not catch you."
"I—I am depending on you entirely, Mr. Smart," she said anxiously. "Some day I may be in a position to repay you for all the kindness—"
"Please, please!"
"—and all the risk you are taking for me," she completed. "You see, you haven't the excuse any longer that you don't know my name and story. You are liable to be arrested yourself for—"
There came a sharp rapping on the door at this instant—a rather imperative, sinister rapping, if one were to judge by the way we started and the way we looked at each other. We laughed nervously.
"Goodness! You'd thing Sherlock Holmes himself was at the door," she cried. "See who it is, please."
I went to the door. Poopendyke was there. He was visibly excited.
"Can you come down at once, Mr. Smart?" he said in a voice not meant to reach the ears of the Countess.
"What's up?" I questioned sharply.
"The jig, I'm afraid," he whispered sententiously. Poopendyke, being a stenographer, never wasted words. He would have made a fine playwright.
"Good Lord! Detectives?"
"No. Count Tarnowsy and a stranger."
"Impossible!"
The Countess, alarmed by our manner, quickly crossed the room.
"What is it?" she demanded.
"The Count is downstairs," I said. "Don't be alarmed. Nothing can happen. You—"
She laughed. "Oh, is that all? My dear Mr. Smart, he has come to see you about the frescoes."
"But I have insulted him!"
"Not permanently," she said. "I know him too well. He is like a leech. He has given you time to reflect and therefore regret your action of the other night. Go down and see him."
Poopendyke volunteered further information. "There is also a man down there—a cheap looking person—who says he must see the Countess Tarnowsy at once."
"A middle-aged man with the upper button of his waistcoat off?" she asked sharply.
"I—I can't say as to the button."
"I am expecting one of my lawyers. It must be he. He was to have a button off."
"I'll look him over again," said Poopendyke.
"Do. And be careful not to let the Count catch a glimpse of him. That would be fatal."
"No danger of that. He went at once to old Conrad's room."
"Good! I had a note from him this morning, Mr. Smart. He is Mr. Bangs of London."
"May I inquire, Countess, how you manage to have letters delivered to you here? Isn't it extremely dangerous to have them go through the mails?"
"They are all directed to the Schmicks," she explained.
"They are passed on to me. Now go and see the Count. Don't lend him any money."
"I shall probably kick him over the cliff," I said, with a scowl.
She laid her hand upon my arm. "Be careful," she said very earnestly, "for my sake."
Poopendyke had already started down the stairs. I raised her hand to my lips. Then I rushed away, cursing myself for a fool, an ingrate, a presumptuous bounder.
My uncalled-for act had brought a swift flush of anger to her cheek. I saw it quite plainly as she lowered her head and drew back into the shadow of the curtain. Bounder! That is what I was for taking advantage of her simple trust in me. Strange to say, she came to the head of the stairs and watched me until I was out of sight in the hall below.
The Count was waiting for me in the loggia. It was quite warm and he fanned himself lazily with his broad straw hat. As I approached, he tossed his cigarette over the wall and hastened to meet me. There was a quaint diffident smile on his lips.
"It is good to see you again, old fellow," he said, with an amiability that surprised me. "I was afraid you might hold a grievance against me. You Americans are queer chaps, you know. Our little tilt of the other evening, you understand. Stupid way for two grown-up men to behave, wasn't it? Of course, the explanation is simple. We had been drinking. Men do silly things in their cups."
Consummate assurance! I had not touched a drop of anything that night.
"I assure you, Count Tarnowsy, the little tilt, as you are pleased to call it, was of no consequence. I had quite forgotten that it occurred. Sorry you reminded me of it."
The irony was wasted. He beamed. "My dear fellow, shall we not shake hands?"
There was something irresistibly winning about him, as I've said before. Something boyish, ingenuous, charming,—what you will,—that went far toward accounting for many things that you who have never seen him may consider incomprehensible.
A certain wariness took possession of me. I could well afford to temporise. We shook hands with what seemed to be genuine fervour.
"I suppose you are wondering what brings me here," he said, as we started toward the entrance to the loggia, his arm through mine. "I do not forget a promise, Mr. Smart. You may remember that I agreed to fetch a man from Munchen to look over your fine old frescoes and to give you an estimate. Well, he is here, the very best man in Europe."
"I am sure I am greatly indebted to you, Count," I said, "but after thinking it over I've—"
"Don't say that you have already engaged some one to do the work," he cried, in horror. "My dear fellow, don't tell me that! You are certain to make a dreadful mistake if you listen to any one but Schwartzmuller. He is the last word in restorations. He is the best bet, as you would say in New York. Any one else will make a botch of the work. You will curse the day you—"
I checked him. "I have virtually decided to let the whole matter go over until next spring. However, I shall be happy to have Mr. Schwartzmuller's opinion. We may be able to plan ahead."
A look of disappointment flitted across his face. The suggestion of hard old age crept into his features for a second and then disappeared.
"Delays are dangerous," he said. "My judgment is that those gorgeous paintings will disintegrate more during the coming winter than in all the years gone by. They are at the critical stage. If not preserved now,—well, I cannot bear to think of the consequences. Ah, here is Herr Schwartzmuller."
Just inside the door, we came upon a pompous yet servile German who could not by any means have been mistaken for anything but the last word in restoration. I have never seen any one in my life whose appearance suggested a more complete state of rehabilitation. His frock coat was new, it had the unfailing smell of new wool freshly dyed; his shoes were painfully new; his gloves were new; his silk hat was resplendently new; his fat jowl was shaved to a luminous pink; his gorgeous moustache was twisted up at the ends to such a degree that when he smiled the points wavered in front of his eyes, causing him to blink with astonishment. He was undeniably dressed up for the occasion. My critical eye, however, discovered a pair of well-worn striped trousers badly stained, slightly frayed at the bottom and inclined to bag outward at the knee. Perhaps I should have said that he was dressed up from the knee.
"This is the great Herr Schwartzmuller, of the Imperial galleries in Munchen," said the Count introducing us.
The stranger bowed very profoundly and at the same time extracted a business card from the tail pocket of his coat. This he delivered to me with a smile which seemed to invite me to participate in a great and serious secret: the secret of irreproachable standing as an art expert and connoisseur. I confess to a mistaken impression concerning him up to the moment he handed me his clumsy business card. My suspicions had set him down as a confederate of Count Tarnowsy, a spy, a secret agent or whatever you choose to consider one who is employed in furthering a secret purpose. But the business card removed my doubts and misgivings. It stamped him for what he really was: there is no mistaking a German who hands you his business card. He destroys all possible chance for discussion.
In three languages the card announced that he was "August Schwartzmuller, of the Imperial galleries, Munchen, Zumpe & Schwartzmuller, proprietors. Restorations a specialty." There was much more, but I did not have time to read all of it. Moreover, the card was a trifle soiled, as if it had been used before. There could be no doubt as to his genuineness. He was an art expert.
For ten minutes I allowed them to expatiate on the perils of procrastination in the treatment of rare old canvases and pigments, and then, having formulated my plans, blandly inquired what the cost would be. It appears that Herr Schwartzmuller had examined the frescoes no longer than six months before in the interests of a New York gentleman to whom Count Hohendahl had tried to sell them for a lump sum. He was unable to recall the gentleman's name.
"I should say not more than one hundred and fifty thousand marks, perhaps less," said the expert, rolling his calculative eye upward and running it along the vast dome of the hall as if to figure it out in yards and inches.
The Count was watching me with an eager light in his eyes. He looked away as I shot a quick glance at his face. The whole matter became as clear as day to me. He was to receive a handsome commission if the contract was awarded. No doubt his share would be at least half of the amount stipulated. I had reason to believe that the work could be performed at a profit for less than half the figure mentioned by the German.
"Nearly forty thousand dollars, in other words," said I reflectively.
"They are worth ten times that amount, sir," said the expert gravely.
I smiled skeptically. The Count took instant alarm. He realised that I was not such a fool as I looked, perhaps.
"Hohendahl was once offered two hundred and fifty thousand dollars, Mr. Smart," he said.