diff options
| author | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-15 01:23:07 -0700 |
|---|---|---|
| committer | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-15 01:23:07 -0700 |
| commit | 71febf8d5acaae0eebf339f764b4d701e178f854 (patch) | |
| tree | 8a2161c9052e4153cab5cd77c6329702b5dc8b16 /20445-h | |
Diffstat (limited to '20445-h')
| -rw-r--r-- | 20445-h/20445-h.htm | 9524 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 20445-h/images/image_on_000.jpg | bin | 0 -> 97026 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 20445-h/images/image_on_012.jpg | bin | 0 -> 98437 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 20445-h/images/image_on_086.jpg | bin | 0 -> 100615 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 20445-h/images/image_on_272.jpg | bin | 0 -> 98028 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 20445-h/images/image_on_cover.jpg | bin | 0 -> 101528 bytes |
6 files changed, 9524 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/20445-h/20445-h.htm b/20445-h/20445-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..8d2cef3 --- /dev/null +++ b/20445-h/20445-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,9524 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> + <head> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=iso-8859-1" /> + <title> + The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Coast of Chance, by Esther and Lucia Chamberlain. + </title> + <style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[ XML blockout */ +<!-- + p { margin-top: .75em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; + } + h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 { + text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ + clear: both; + } + hr { width: 33%; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + clear: both; + } + + hr.smler { width: 10%; } + + body{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + } + + .pagenum { /* uncomment the next line for invisible page numbers */ + /* visibility: hidden; */ + position: absolute; + left: 92%; + font-size: smaller; + text-align: right; + text-indent: 0px; + } /* page numbers */ + + .center {text-align: center;} + .smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + + .right {text-align: right;} + .tbrk { margin-top: 2.75em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em;} + + /* index */ + + div.index ul { list-style: none; } + div.index ul li span.mono {font-family: monospace;} + // --> + /* XML end ]]>*/ + </style> + </head> +<body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Coast of Chance, by +Esther Chamberlain and Lucia Chamberlain + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Coast of Chance + +Author: Esther Chamberlain + Lucia Chamberlain + +Illustrator: Clarence F. Underwood + +Release Date: January 25, 2007 [EBook #20445] +Last updated: March 2, 2009 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE COAST OF CHANCE *** + + + + +Produced by Alicia Williams, Martin Pettit and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + +</pre> + + +<h2>THE</h2> + +<h1>COAST OF CHANCE</h1> + +<p class="tbrk"> </p> + +<h3><i>By</i></h3> + +<h2>ESTHER AND LUCIA CHAMBERLAIN</h2> + +<p class="tbrk"> </p> + +<p class="tbrk"> </p> + +<p class="center">WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY</p> + +<h2>CLARENCE F. UNDERWOOD</h2> + +<p class="tbrk"> </p> + +<h3>NEW YORK</h3> + +<h2>GROSSET & DUNLAP</h2> + +<h3>PUBLISHERS</h3> + +<hr class="smler" /> + +<p class="center"><a name="image_on_cover.jpg" id="image_on_cover.jpg"></a><img src="images/image_on_cover.jpg" width='456' height='700' alt="cover" /></p> + +<hr class="smler" /> + +<p class="center"><span class="smcap">Copyright</span> 1908<br /> +<span class="smcap">The Bobbs-Merrill Company</span><br /><br /> +<span class="smcap">April</span></p> + +<hr class="smler" /> + +<p class="center"><a name="image_on_000.jpg" id="image_on_000.jpg"></a><img src="images/image_on_000.jpg" width='463' height='700' alt="Flora Gilsey" /></p> + +<h3><span class="smcap">Flora Gilsey.</span></h3> + +<hr /> + +<h2>CONTENTS</h2> + +<div class="index"> +<ul> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#I">I.</a></span> <span class="smcap">The Vanishing Mystery</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#II">II.</a></span> <span class="smcap">A Name Goes Round a Table</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#III">III.</a></span> <span class="smcap">Encounters on Parade</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#IV">IV.</a></span> <span class="smcap">Flowers by the Way</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#V">V.</a></span> <span class="smcap">On Guard</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#VI">VI.</a></span> <span class="smcap">Black Magic</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#VII">VII.</a></span> <span class="smcap">A Spell Is Cast</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#VIII">VIII.</a></span> <span class="smcap">A Spark of Horror</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#IX">IX.</a></span> <span class="smcap">Illumination</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#X">X.</a></span> <span class="smcap">A Lady Unveiled</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#XI">XI.</a></span> <span class="smcap">The Mystery Takes Human Form</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#XII">XII.</a></span> <span class="smcap">Disenchantment</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#XIII">XIII.</a></span> <span class="smcap">Thrust and Parry</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#XIV">XIV.</a></span> <span class="smcap">Comedy Conveys a Warning</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#XV">XV.</a></span> <span class="smcap">A Lady in Distress</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#XVI">XVI.</a></span> <span class="smcap">The Heart of the Dilemma</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#XVII">XVII.</a></span> <span class="smcap">The Demigod</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#XVIII">XVIII.</a></span> <span class="smcap">Goblin Tactics</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#XIX">XIX.</a></span> <span class="smcap">The Face in the Garden</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#XX">XX.</a></span> <span class="smcap">Flight</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#XXI">XXI.</a></span> <span class="smcap">The House of Quiet</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#XXII">XXII.</a></span> <span class="smcap">Clara's Market</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#XXIII">XXIII.</a></span> <span class="smcap">Touche</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#XXIV">XXIV.</a></span> <span class="smcap">The Comic Mask</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#XXV">XXV.</a></span> <span class="smcap">The Last Enchantment</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#ADVERTISEMENTS">ADVERTISEMENTS.</a></span> </li> +</ul> +</div> + +<hr /> + +<h2>LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS</h2> + +<div class="index"> +<ul> +<li><span class="mono"> </span> <a href="#image_on_cover.jpg"><span class="smcap">Cover</span></a></li> +<li><span class="mono"> </span> <a href="#image_on_000.jpg"><span class="smcap">Flora Gilsey</span></a></li> +<li><span class="mono"> </span> <a href="#image_on_012.jpg"><span class="smcap">Yes, he was magnificent, she thought.</span></a></li> +<li><span class="mono"> </span> <a href="#image_on_086.jpg"><span class="smcap">He took the lilies up daintily, and returned to her.</span></a></li> +<li><span class="mono"> </span> <a href="#image_on_272.jpg"><span class="smcap">"Forgive me, I followed you."</span></a></li> +</ul> +</div> + +<hr /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[Pg 1]</a></span></p> + +<h1>THE COAST OF CHANCE</h1> + +<h2><a name="I" id="I"></a>I</h2> + +<h3>THE VANISHING MYSTERY</h3> + +<p>Flora Gilsey stood on the threshold of her dining-room. She had turned +her back on it. She swayed forward. Her bare arms were lifted. Her hands +lightly caught the molding on either side of the door. She was looking +intently into the mirror at the other end of the hall. All the lights in +the dining-room were lit, and she saw herself rather keenly set against +their brilliance. The straight-held head, the lifted arms, the short, +slender waist, the long, long sweep of her skirts made her seem taller +than she actually was; and the strong, bright growth of her hair and the +vivacity of her face made her seem more deeply colored.</p> + +<p>She had poised there for the mere survey of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[Pg 2]</a></span> a new gown, but after a +moment of dwelling on her own reflection she found herself considering +it only as an object in the foreground of a picture. That picture, seen +through the open door, reflected in the glass, was all of a bright, hard +glitter, all a high, harsh tone of newness. In its paneled oak, in its +glare of cut-glass and silver, in the shining vacant faces of its floors +and walls, there was not a color that filled the eye, not a shadow where +imagination could find play. As a background for herself it struck her +as incongruous. Like a child looking at the landscape upside down, she +felt herself in a foreign country. Yet it was hers. She turned about to +bring it into familiar association. There was nothing wrong with it. But +its great capacity suggested large parties rather than close intimacies. +In the high lift of its ceilings, the ample openings of its doors, the +swept, garnished, polished beauty of its cold surfaces, it proclaimed +itself conceived, created and decorated for large, fine functions. She +thought whimsically that any one who knew her, coming into her house, +would<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[Pg 3]</a></span> realize that some one other than herself had the ordering of it.</p> + +<p>She glanced over the table. It was set for three. It lacked nothing but +the serving of dinner. She looked at the clock. It wanted a few minutes +to the hour. Shima, the Japanese butler, came in softly with the evening +papers. She took them from him. Nothing bored her so much as a paper, +but to-night she knew it contained something she really wanted to see. +She opened one of the damp sheets at the page of sales.</p> + +<p>There it was at the head of the column in thick black type:</p> + +<p class="center">AT AUCTION, FEBRUARY 18<br /> +PERSONAL ESTATE OF<br />ELIZABETH HUNTER CHATWORTH<br /> +CONSISTING OF——</p> + +<p>She read the details with interest down to the end, where the name of +the "famous Chatworth ring" finished the announcement with a flourish. +Why "famous"? It was very provoking to ad<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[Pg 4]</a></span>vertise with that vague +adjective and not explain it.</p> + +<p>She turned indifferently to the first page. She read a sentence, re-read +it, read it again. Then, as if she could not read fast enough, her eyes +galloped down the column. Color came into her cheeks. The grasp of her +hands on the edges of the paper tightened. It was the most extraordinary +thing! She was bewildered with the feeling that what was blazing at her +from the columns of the paper was at once the wildest thing that could +possibly have happened, and yet the one most to have been expected.</p> + +<p>For, from the first the business had been sinister, from as far back as +the tragedy—the end of poor young Chatworth and his wife—the Bessie, +who, before her English marriage, they had all known so well. Her death, +that had befallen in far Italian Alps, had made a sensation in their +little city, and the large announcements of auction that had followed +hard upon it had bred among the women who had known her a morbid +excitement, a feverish desire to buy,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</a></span> as if there might be some special +luck in them, the jewels of a woman who had so tragically died. They had +been ready to make a social affair of the private view held in the +"Maple Room" before the auction. And now the whole spectacular business +was capped by a sensation so dramatic as to strain credulity to its +limit. She could not believe it; yet here it was glaring at her from the +first page. Still—it might be an exaggeration, a mistake. She must go +back to the beginning and read it over slowly.</p> + +<p>The striking of the hour hurried her. Shima's announcement of dinner +only sent her eyes faster down the page. But when, with a faint, smooth +rustle, Mrs. Britton came in, she let the paper fall. She always faced +her chaperon with a little nervousness, and with the same sense of +strangeness with which she so frequently regarded her house.</p> + +<p>"It's fifteen minutes after eight," Mrs. Britton observed. "We would +better not wait any longer."</p> + +<p>She took the place opposite Flora's at the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</a></span> round table. Flora sat down, +still holding the paper, flushed and bolt upright with her news.</p> + +<p>"It's the most extraordinary thing!" she burst forth.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Britton paused mildly with a radish in her fingers. She took in the +presence of the paper, and the suppressed excitement of her companion's +face—seemed to absorb them through the large pupils of her light eyes, +through all her smooth, pretty person, before she reached for an +explanation.</p> + +<p>"What is the most extraordinary thing?" The query came bland and smooth, +as if, whatever it was, it could not surprise her.</p> + +<p>"Why, the Chatworth ring! At the private view this afternoon it simply +vanished! And—and it was all our own crowd who were there!"</p> + +<p>"Vanished!" Clara Britton leaned forward, peering hard in the face of +this extraordinary statement. "Stolen, do you mean?" She made it +definite.</p> + +<p>Flora flung out her hands.</p> + +<p>"Well, it disappeared in the Maple Room, in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span> the middle of the +afternoon, when everybody was there—and they haven't the faintest +clue."</p> + +<p>"But how?" For a moment the preposterous fact left Clara too quick to be +calm.</p> + +<p>Again Flora's eloquent hands. "That is it! It was in a case like all the +other jewels. Harry saw it"—she glanced at the paper—"as late as four +o'clock. When he came back with Judge Buller, half an hour after, it was +gone."</p> + +<p>Flora leaned forward on her elbows, chin in hands. No two could have +differed more than these two women in their blondness and their +prettiness and their wonder. For Clara was sharp and pale, with silvery +lights in eyes and hair, and confronted the facts with an alert and +calculating observation; but Flora was tawny, toned from brown to ivory +through all the gamut of gold—hair color of a panther's hide, eyes dark +hazel, glinting through dust-colored lashes, chin round like a fruit. +The pressure of her fingers accented the slight uptilt of her brows to +elfishness, and her look was introspective. She might, instead of +wondering on the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span> outside, have been the very center of the mystery +itself, toying with unthinkable possibilities of revelation. She looked +far over the head of Clara Britton's annoyance that there should be no +clue.</p> + +<p>"Why, don't you see," she pointed out, "that is just the fun of it? It +might be anybody. It might be you, or me, or Ella Buller. Though I would +much prefer to think it was some one we didn't know so well—some one +strange and fascinating, who will presently go slipping out the Golden +Gate in a little junk boat, so that no one need be embarrassed."</p> + +<p>Clara looked back with extraordinary intentness.</p> + +<p>"Oh, it's not possible the thing is stolen. There's some mistake! And if +it were"—her eyes seemed to open a little wider to take in this +possibility—"they will have detectives all around the water front by +to-night. Any one would find it difficult to get away," she pointed out. +"You see, the ring is an important piece of property."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span>"Of course; I know," Flora murmured. A faint twitch of humor pulled her +mouth, but the passionate romantic color was dying out of her face. How +was it that one's romances could be so cruelly pulled down to earth? She +ought to have learned by this time, she thought, never to fly her little +flag of romance except to an empty horizon—never, at least, to fly it +in Clara's face. It was always as promptly surrounded by Clara's common +sense as San Francisco would be surrounded by the police. But still she +couldn't quite come down to Clara. "At least," she sighed, "he has saved +me an awful expense, whoever took it, for I should have had to have it."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Britton surveyed this statement consideringly. "Was it the most +valuable thing in the collection?"</p> + +<p>Flora hesitated in the face of the alert question. "I—don't know. But +it was the most remarkable. It was a Chatworth heirloom, the papers say, +and was given to Bessie at the time of her marriage." The thought of the +death<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span> that had so quickly followed that marriage gave Flora a little +shiver, but no shade of the tragedy touched Clara. There was nothing but +speculation in Clara's eyes—that, and a little disappointment. "Then +they will put off the auction—if it is really so," she mused.</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes," Flora mourned, "they can put it off as long as they please. +The only thing I wanted is gone—and I hadn't even seen it."</p> + +<p>"Well, I wouldn't be too sure. There may be some mistake about it. The +papers love a sensation."</p> + +<p>"But there must be something in it, Clara. Why, they closed the doors +and searched them—<i>that</i> crowd! It's ridiculous!"</p> + +<p>Clara Britton glanced at the empty place. "Then that must be what has +kept him."</p> + +<p>"Who? Oh, Harry!" It took Flora a moment to remember she had been +expecting Harry. She hoped Clara had not noticed it. Clara always had +too much the assumption that she was taking him only as the +best-looking, best-natured, safest bargain presented. "He will be<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span> +here," she reassured, "but I wish he would hurry. His dinner will be +spoiled; and, poor dear, he likes his dinner so much!"</p> + +<p>The faint silver sound of the electric bell, a precipitate double peal, +seemed to uphold this statement. The women faced each other in a +moment's suspense, a moment of expectation, such as the advance column +may feel at sight of a scout hotfoot from the field of battle. There +were muffled movements in the hall, then light, even steps crossing the +drawing-room. Those light steps always suggested a slight frame, and, as +always, Flora was re-surprised at his bulk as now it appeared between +the parted curtains, the dull black and sharp white of his evening +clothes topped by his square, fresh-colored face.</p> + +<p class="center"><a name="image_on_012.jpg" id="image_on_012.jpg"></a><img src="images/image_on_012.jpg" width='523' height='700' alt="Yes, he was magnificent, she thought." /></p> + +<h3><span class="smcap">Yes, he was magnificent, she thought.</span></h3> + +<p>"Well, Flora," he said, "I know I'm late," and took the hand she held to +him from where she sat. Her face danced with pleasure. Yes, he was +magnificent, she thought, as he crossed with his light stride to Mrs. +Britton's chair. He could even stand the harsh lines and lights of +even<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span>ing clothes. He dominated their ugly convention with his height, +his face so ruddy and fresh under the pale brown of his hair, his alert, +assured, deft movement. His high good nature had the effect of +sweetening for him even Clara Britton's flavorless manner. The "We were +speaking of you," with which she saw him to his seat, had all the warmth +of a smile, but a smile far in the background of Flora's immediate +possession. Indeed, Flora had seldom had so much to say to Harry as at +this moment of her excitement over what he had actually seen. For the +evidence that he had seen something was vivid in his face. She had never +found him so splendidly alive. She had never seen him, it came to her, +quite like this before.</p> + +<p>She shook the paper at him. "Tell us everything, instantly!"</p> + +<p>He gaily acknowledged her right to make him thus stand and deliver. He +shot his hands into the air with the lightening vivacity that was in him +a sort of wit. "Not guilty," he grinned at her.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span>"Harry, you know you were in it. The papers have you the most important +personage."</p> + +<p>"Oh, not all that," he denied her allegation. "They had the whole lot of +us cooped up together for investigation for as much as two hours. I +thought I shouldn't have time to dress! I'm as hungry as a hawk!" He +rolled it out with the full gusto with which he was by this time engaged +on his first course.</p> + +<p>"Poor dear," said Flora with cooing mock-sympathy, "and did they starve +it? But would it mind telling us, now that it has its food, what is +true, and what was the gallant part it played this afternoon?"</p> + +<p>"Well," he followed her whimsical lead, "the chief detective and I were +the star performers. I found the ring wasn't there, and he found he +couldn't find it."</p> + +<p>"Don't you know any more than the paper?" Flora mourned.</p> + +<p>"Considerably less—if I know the papers." He grinned with a fine flash +of even teeth. "What do you want me to say?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Why, stupid, the adventures of Harry Cressy, Esquire. How did you +feel?"</p> + +<p>"Thirsty."</p> + +<p>"Oh, Harry!" She glanced about, as if for a missile to threaten him +with.</p> + +<p>"Upon my word! But look here—wait a minute!" he arrived deliberately at +what was required of him. "Never mind how I felt; but if you want to +know the way it happened—here's your Maple Room." He began a diagram +with forks on the cloth before him, and Clara, who had watched their +sparring from her point of vantage in the background, now leaned +forward, as if at last they were getting to the point.</p> + +<p>"This is the case, furthest from the door." He planted a salt-cellar in +his silver inclosure. "I come in very early, at half-past two, before +the crowd; fail to meet you there." He made mischievous bows to right +and left. "I go out again. But first I see this ring."</p> + +<p>"What was it like?" Flora demanded.</p> + +<p>"Like?" Harry turned a speculative eye to the dull glow of the +candelabrum, as if between<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span> its points of flame he conjured up the +vision of the vanished jewel. "Like a bit of an old gold heathen god +curled round himself, with his head, which was mostly two yellow +sapphires, between his knees, and a big, blue stone on top. Soft, yellow +gold, so fine you could almost dent it. And carved! Even through a glass +every line of it is right." He paused and ran the tip of his finger +along the silver outline of his diagram, as if the mere memory of the +precious eyes of the little god had power to arrest all other +consideration. "Well, there he was," he pulled himself up, "and I can't +remember when a thing of that sort has stayed by me so. I couldn't seem +to get away from it. I dropped into the club and talked to Buller about +it. He got keen, and I went back with him to have another look at it. +Well, at the door Buller stops to speak to a chap going out—a crazy +Englishman he had picked up at the club. I go on. By this time there's a +crowd inside, but I manage to get up to the case. And first I miss the +spot altogether. And then I see the card with his name; and then, +under<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span>neath I see the hole in the velvet where the god has been."</p> + +<p>Flora gave out a little sigh of suspense, and even Clara showed a gleam +of excitement. He looked from one to the other. "Then there were +fireworks. Buller came up. The detective came up. Everybody came up. +Nobody'd believe it. Lots of 'em thought they had seen it only a few +minutes before. But there was the hole in the velvet—and nothing more +to be found."</p> + +<p>"But does no one know anything? Has no one an idea?" Clara almost panted +in her impatience.</p> + +<p>"Not the ghost of a glimmer of a clue. There were upward of two hundred +of us, and they let us out like a chain-gang, one by one. My number was +one hundred and ninety-three, and so far I can vouch there were no +discoveries. It has vanished—sunk out of sight."</p> + +<p>Flora sighed. "Oh, poor Bessie Chatworth!" It came out with a quick +inconsequence that made Clara—even in her impatience—ever so faintly +smile. "It seems so cruel to have your things<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span> taken like that when +you're dead, and can't help it," Flora rather lamely explained. "I +should hate it."</p> + +<p>Harry stared at her. "Oh, come. I guess you wouldn't care." His eyes +rested for a moment on the fine flare of jewels presented by Flora's +clasped hands. "Besides,"—his voice dropped to a graver level—"the +deuce of it is—" he paused, they, both rather breathless, looking at +him. He had the air of a man about to give information, and then the air +of a man who has thought better of it. His voice consciously shook off +its gravity. "Well, there'll be such a row kicked up, the probability is +the thing'll be returned and no questions asked. Purdie's keen—very +keen. He's responsible, the executor of the estate, you see."</p> + +<p>But Clara Britton leveled her eyes at him, as if the thing he had +produced was not at all the thing he had led up to. "Still, unless there +was enormous pressure somewhere—and in this case I don't see where—I +can't see what Mr. Purdie's keenness will do toward getting it back."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span>Harry played a little sulkily with the proposition, but he would not +pick up the thread he had dropped. "I don't know that any one sees. The +question now is—who took it?"</p> + +<p>"Why, one of us," said Flora flippantly. "Of course, it is all on the +Western Addition."</p> + +<p>"Don't you believe it!" he answered her. "It's a confounded fine +professional job. It takes more than sleight of hand—it takes genius, a +thing like that!"</p> + +<p>Flora gave him a quick glance, but he had not spoken flippantly. He was +serious in his admiration. She didn't quite fancy his tone. "Why, +Harry," she protested, "you talk as if you admired him!"</p> + +<p>At this he laughed. "Well, how do you know I don't? But I can tell you +one thing"—he dropped back into the same tone again—"there's no local +crook work in this affair. It should be some one big—some one—" He +frowned straight before him. He shook his head and smiled. "There was a +chap in England, Farrell Wand."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span>The name floated in a little silence.</p> + +<p>"He kept them guessing," Harry went on recalling it; "did some great +vanishing acts."</p> + +<p>"You mean he could take things before their eyes without people knowing +it?" Flora's eyes were wide beyond their wont.</p> + +<p>"Something of that sort. I remember at one of the Embassy balls at St. +James' he talked five minutes to Lady Tilton. Her emeralds were on when +he began. She never saw 'em again."</p> + +<p>Flora began to laugh. "He must have been attractive."</p> + +<p>"Well," Harry conceded practically, "he knew his business."</p> + +<p>"But you can't rely on those stories," Clara objected.</p> + +<p>"You must this time," he shook his tawny head at her; "I give you my +word; for I was there."</p> + +<p>It seemed to Flora fairly preposterous that Harry could sit there +looking so matter-of-fact with such experiences behind him. Even Clara<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span> +looked a little taken aback, but the effect was only to set her more +sharply on.</p> + +<p>"Then such a man could easily have taken the ring in the Maple Room this +afternoon? You think it might have been the man himself?"</p> + +<p>His broad smile of appreciation enveloped her. "Oh, you have a scent +like a bloodhound. You haven't let go of that once since you started. He +could have done it—oh, easy—but he went out eight, ten years ago."</p> + +<p>"Died?" Flora's rising inflection was a lament.</p> + +<p>"Went over the horizon—over the range. Believe he died in the +colonies."</p> + +<p>"Oh," Flora sighed, "then I shall have to fancy he has come back again, +just for the sake of the Chatworth ring. That wouldn't be too strange. +It's all so strange I keep forgetting it is real. At least," she went on +explaining herself to Harry's smile, "it seems as if this must be going +on a long way off, as if it couldn't be so close to us, as if the ring I +wanted so much couldn't really be the one that has disappeared."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span> All +the while she felt Harry's smile enveloping her with an odd, +half-protecting watchfulness, but at the close of her sentence he +frowned a little.</p> + +<p>"Well, perhaps we can find another ring to take the place of it."</p> + +<p>She felt that she had been stupid where she should have been most +delicate. "But you don't understand," she protested, leaning far toward +him as if to coerce him with her generous warmth. "The Chatworth ring +was nothing but a fancy I had. I never thought of it for a moment as an +engagement ring!"</p> + +<p>By the light stir of silk she was aware that Clara had risen. She looked +up quickly to encounter that odd look. Clara's face was so smooth, so +polished, so unruffled, as to appear almost blank, but none the less +Flora saw it all in Clara's eye—a look that was not new to her. It was +the same with which Clara had met the announcement of her engagement; +the same look with which she had confronted every allusion to the +approaching marriage; the same with<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span> which she now surveyed the mention +of the engagement ring—a look neither approving nor dissenting, whose +calm, considerate speculation seemed to repudiate all interest positive +or negative in the approaching event except the one large question, +"What is to become of me?" Many times Clara had held it up before her, +not as a question, certainly not as an accusation; as a flat assertion +of fact; but to-night Flora felt it so directly and imperatively aimed +at her that it seemed this time to demand an audible response. And +Clara's way of getting up, and standing there, with her gloves on, +poised and expectant, as if she were only waiting an opportunity to take +farewell, took on, in the light of her look, the fantastic appearance of +a final departure. "I'm afraid," she mildly reminded them, "that Shima +announced the carriage ten minutes ago."</p> + +<p>"Oh, dear, I'm so sorry!" Flora's eyes wavered apologetically in the +direction of the waiting Japanese. Clara's flicker of amusement made her +hate herself the moment it was out.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span> She could always depend on herself +when she knew she was on exhibition. She could be sure of the right +thing if it were only large enough, but she was still caught at odd +moments by the trifles, the web of a certain social habit into which she +had slipped, full grown on the smooth surface of her father's millions. +Clara's fleeting smile lit up these trifles to her now as enormous. It +took advantage of her small deficit to point out to her more plainly +than ever to what large blunders she might be liable when she had cut +loose from Clara's guiding, reminding, prompting genius, and chose to +confront the world without it.</p> + +<p>To be sure, she was not to confront it alone; but, looking at Harry, it +came to her with a moment's qualm that she did not know him as well as she had thought.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="II" id="II"></a>II</h2> + +<h3>A NAME GOES ROUND A TABLE</h3> + +<p>For to-night, from the moment he had appeared, she had recognized an +unfamiliar mood in him, and it had come out more the more they had +discussed the Chatworth ring. It was not in any special word or action +on his part. It was in his whole presence that she felt the difference, +as if the afternoon's scandal had been a stimulant to him—not through +its romantic aspect, as it had affected her, but merely by the daring of +the theft itself.</p> + +<p>She wondered, as he heaped her ermine on her shoulders, if Harry might +not have more surprises for her than she had supposed. Perhaps she had +taken him too much for granted. After all, she had known him only for a +year.</p> + +<p>She herself was but three years old in San<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span> Francisco, and to her new +eyes Harry had seemed an old resident thoroughly established. So firmly +established was he in his bachelor quarters, in his clubs, in the +demands made upon him by the city's society, that it had never occurred +to her he had ever lived anywhere else. Nor had he happened to mention +anything of his previous life until to-night, when he had given her, in +that mention of a London ball, one flashing glimpse of former +experiences.</p> + +<p>Impulsively she summed up the possibilities of what these might have +been. She gave him a look, incredulous, delighted, as he handed her into +the carriage. She had actually got a thrill out of easy-going, +matter-of-fact, well-tubbed Harry! It was a comradeship in itself. Not +that she would have told him. This capacity of hers for thrills she had +found need always to keep carefully covered. In the days when she was a +shoeless child—those days of her father's labor in shaft and dump—she +had dimly felt her world to be a creature of a keen, a fairly cruel +humor, for all things that did not pertain to the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span> essence of the life +it struggled for. The wonder of the western flare of day, the magic in +the white eyes of the stars before sunrise, the mystery in the pulse of +the pounding mine heard in the dark—of such it had been as ruthless as +this new world that looked as narrowly forth at as starved a prospect +with even keener ridicule. Instinctively she had turned to both the +hard, bright face they required. It seemed that in the world at large +this faculty of hers was queer. And to be queer, to have anything that +other people had not, except money, was to be open to suspicion. And yet +from the first she had had to be queer.</p> + +<p>Fatherless, motherless, alone upon the pinnacle of her fortune, she had +known that such an extraordinary entrance, even at this rather wide +social portal, would only be acceptable if toned down, glossed over, and +drawn out by a personality sufficiently neutral, sufficiently potent, +and sufficiently in need of what she had to give. The successive +flickers of the gas-lamps through the carriage window made of Clara's<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span> +profile so hard and fine a little medallion that it was impossible to +conceive it in need of anything. And yet it was just their mutual need +that had drawn these two women together, and after three years it was +still the only thing that held them. As much of a fight as she had put +up with the rest—the people who had taken her in—she had put up the +hardest with Clara. Yet of them all Clara was the only one she had +failed to capture. Clara was always there in the middle of her affairs, +but surveying them from a distance, and Flora's struggle with her had +resolved itself into the attempt to keep her from seeing too much, from +seeing more than she herself saw. Clara's seeing, thus far, had always +been to help, but Flora sometimes wondered whether in an emergency this +help could be depended on—whether Clara could give anything without +exacting a price.</p> + +<p>Their dubious intimacy had created for Flora a special sort of +loneliness—a loneliness which lacked the security of solitude; and it +was partly as an escape from this that she had accepted<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span> Harry Cressy. +By herself she could never have escaped. The initiative was not hers. +But he had presented himself, he had insisted, had overruled her +objections, had captured her before she knew whether she wanted it or +not—and held her now, fascinated by his very success in capturing her, +and by his beautiful ruddy masculinity. She did not ask herself whether +women ever married for greater reasons than these. She only wondered +sometimes if he did not stand out more brilliantly against Clara and the +others than he intrinsically was. But these moments when she was obliged +to defend him to herself were always when he was not with her. Even in +the dusky carriage she had been as aware of the splendor of his +attraction as now when they had stopped between the high lamps of the +club entrance, and she saw clearly the broad lines of his shoulders and +the stoop of his square-set head as he stepped swingingly to the +pavement. After all, she ought to be glad to think that he was going to +stand up as tall and protectingly between her and the world, as now he +did between<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span> her and the press of people which, like a tide of water, +swept them forward down the hall, sucked them back in its eddy, and +finally cast them, ruffled like birds that have ridden a storm, on the +more generous space of the wide, upward stair.</p> + +<p>From here, looking down on the current sweeping past them, the little +islands of black coats seemed fairly drowned in the feminine sea around +them—the flow of white, of pale blue and rose, and the high chatter, +like a cage of birds, that for the evening held possession.</p> + +<p>"Ladies' Night!" Harry Cressy mopped his flushed face. "It's awful!"</p> + +<p>Flora laughed in the effervescence of her spirits. She wanted to know, +teasingly, as they mounted, if this were why he had brought two more to +add to the lot. He only looked at her, with his short note of laughter +that made her keenly conscious of his right to be proud of her. She was +proud of herself, inasmuch as herself was shown in the long trail of +daring blue her gown made up the stair, and the powdery blue of the +aigrette that shivered in her bright,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span> soft puffs and curls—proud that +her daring, as it appeared in these things, was still discriminating +enough to make her right.</p> + +<p>She could recall a time when she had not even been quite sure of her +clothes. Not Clara's subdued rustle at her side could make her doubt +them now; but her security was still recent enough to be sometimes +conscious of itself. It was so short a time since all these talking +groups, that made a personage of her, had had the power to put her quite +out of countenance. The women who craned over their shoulders to speak +to her—how hard she had had to work to make them see her at all! And +now she did not know which she felt more like laughing at, herself or +them, for having taken it so seriously. For, when one thought of it, +wasn't it absurd that people out of nowhere should suppose themselves +exclusive? And people out of nowhere they were, herself and all the rest +of them. From causes not far dissimilar they had drifted or scrambled to +where they now stood. It was a question of squatter rights. The first on +the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span> ground were dictators, and how long they could hold their claim +against invaders a dubious cast of fate. For there were for ever fresh +invasions, and departures; swift risings from obscurity, sudden fallings +back into oblivion, brilliant shootings through of strange meteors; and +in the tide of fluctuation, the things that were established or +traditional upon this coast of chance were mere islands in the wash of +ocean. It was amazing, it was almost frightening, the fluid, unstable +quality of life; the rapid, inconsequent changes; yet it was also this +very quality of transformation that most stirred and delighted her.</p> + +<p>And to-night it was not the picture exhibition, nor the function itself +that elated her, but the fancy she had as she looked over the moving +mass below her that the crowning excitement of the day, the vanishing +mystery, hovered over them all. It was fantastic, but it persisted; for +had not the Chatworth ring itself proved that the most ordinary +appearances might cover unimagined wonders? Which of those bland, +satis<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span>fied faces might not change shockingly at the whisper "Chatworth" +in its ear? She wanted to confide the naughty thought to Harry. But no, +he wasn't the one. If Harry were apprehensive of anything at all it was +only of being caught in too hot a crush. He saw no possibilities in the +mob below except boredom. He saw no possibilities in the evening but his +conventional duty; and Flora could read in his eye his intention of +getting through that as comfortably as possible. His suggestion that +they have a look at the pictures brought the two women's eyes together +in a rare gleam of mutual mirth. They knew he suspected that the picture +gallery would be the emptiest place in the club, since to have a look at +the pictures was what they were all supposed to be there for. That was +so infallibly the note of their life, Flora thought, as she followed up +the wide sweep of the middle stair, and along the high-ceiled, gilded +hall whose open arches overlooked the rooms below.</p> + +<p>The picture gallery was new, an addition; and the plain, narrow, +unexpected door in this<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span> place, where all was high, arched, elaborate +and flourished, was like a loophole through which to slip into a foreign +atmosphere. This atmosphere was resinous of fresh wood; the light was +thick with drifting motes; the carpets harshly new, slipping beneath the +feet on the too polished floor; the bare bones of the place yet scarcely +covered. But its quiet was after all comparative. There were plenty of +people lingering in groups in the center of the gallery which was dusky, +eclipsed by the great reflectors that circled the room, throwing out the +pictures in a bright band of color around the walls. People leaning from +this border of light back into the dusk to murmur together, vanished and +reappeared with such fascinating abruptness that Flora caught herself +guessing what sort of face, where this nearest group stood just on the +edge of shadow, would pop out of the dark next.</p> + +<p>She was ready for something extraordinary, but now, when it came, she +was taken aback by it. It gave her a start, that toss of black hair, +that long, irregular, pale face whose scintillant,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span> sardonic smile was +mercilessly upon the poor, inadequate picture-face fronting him. His +stoop above the rail was so abrupt that his long, lean back was almost +horizontal, yet even thus there was something elegant in the swing of +him—in the careless twist of his head, around, to speak to the woman +behind him. The light above struck blind on the glass in one eye, but +the other danced with a genial, a mad scintillation. The light of it +caught like contagion, and touched the merest glancer at him with the +spark of its warm, ironic mirth. The question which naturally rose to +Flora's lips—"Who in the world is that?"—she checked; why, she didn't +ask herself. She only felt as she followed Clara, trailing away across +the floor, that the interest of the evening which had promised so well, +beginning with the Chatworth ring, had been raised even a note higher. +Her restive fancy was beginning again. All the footlights of her little +secret stage were up.</p> + +<p>Clara turned to the right, following a beckoning fan, and Flora, +dallying with her anticipa<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span>tion, reasoned that now they must circle the +room before they should face him—the interesting apparition. It was a +pilgrimage of which he on the other side was performing his half. +Perfunctorily talking from group to group, conscious now and again of +the lagging Clara or Harry, she could nevertheless keep a sly eye on the +stranger's equal progress. The flash of jet, and the voluble, +substantial shoulders of the lady so profusely introducing him, were an +assurance of how that pilgrimage would terminate, since it was Ella +Buller who was parading him. She even wondered before which of the +florid pictures at the far, other end of the room, as before a shrine, +the ceremony would take place.</p> + +<p>She kept her eyes fixed on the paintings before her, and as she moved +down from one to another, and the voices of the approaching group drew +nearer, one separated itself from the general murmur, so clear, so +resonantly carried, so clean-clipped off the tongue, that it stood out +in syllables on the blur of sound which was Ella Buller's conversation. +It had color,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span> that voice; it had a quality so sharp, so individual that +it touched her with a mischievous wonder that he dared speak so +differently from all the world about him. Then, six pictures away, she +heard her own name.</p> + +<p>"Why, Flora Gilsey!" It was Ella's husky, boyish note. "I've been +looking for you all the evening! How d'y'do, Harry?" She waved her hand +at him. "Why, how d'y'do, Mrs. Britton? I wouldn't let papa go to supper +until I'd found you. 'Papa,' I said, 'wait; Flora and Harry will be +here.' Besides," she had quite reached Flora's side by this time and +communicated it in an impressive whisper, "I want you to meet my +Englishman." She looked over her shoulder, and largely beckoned to where +the blunt and florid Buller and his companion, with their backs to what +they were supposed to be looking at, were exchanging an anecdote of +infinite amusement.</p> + +<p>Buller's expression came around slowly to his daughter's beckoning hand, +but the Englishman's face seemed to flash at the instant from what he +was enjoying to what was expected of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span> him. In the flourish of +introductions, across and across, Flora found herself thinking the +reality less extraordinary than she had at first supposed. Now that Mr. +Kerr was fairly before her, presented to her, and taking her in with the +same lively, impersonal interest with which he took in the whole room, +"as if," she put it vexedly to herself, "I were a specimen poked at him +on the end of a pin," it stirred in her a vague resentment; and +involuntarily she held him up to Harry. The comparison showed him a +little worn, a little battered, a little too perfunctory in manner; but +his genial eyes, deep under threatening brows, made Harry's eyes seem to +stare rather coldly; and the fine form of his long, plain face, and the +sensitive line of his long thin lips made Harry's beauty look,—well, +how did it look? Hardly callous.</p> + +<p>This mixed impression the two men gave her was disconcerting. She was +all the more ready to be wary of the stranger. She had begun with him in +the way she did with every one—instinctively throwing out a breastwork +of conversa<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span>tion from behind which she could observe the enemy. But +though he had blinked at it, he had not taken her up, nor helped her +out; but had merely stood with his head a little canted forward, as if +he watched her through her defenses.</p> + +<p>"But San Francisco must seem so limited after London," she had wound up; +and the way he had considered it, a little humorously, down his long +nose, made her doubt the interest of cities to be reckoned in round +numbers.</p> + +<p>"It's all extraordinary," he said. "You're quite as extraordinary in +your way as we in ours."</p> + +<p>"Oh," she wondered, still vexed with his inventory, "I had always +supposed us awfully commonplace. What <i>is</i> our way, please?"</p> + +<p>"Ah," he said, measuring his long step to hers as they sauntered a +little, "for one thing, you're so awfully good to a fellow. In +London"—and he nodded back, as if London were merely across the +room—"they're awfully good to the somebodies. It's the way you take in +the nobodies over here that is so astonishing—the stray<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span> leaves that +blow in with your 'trade,' and can't show any credentials but a letter +or two, and their faces; and those"—his <i>diablerie</i> danced out +again—"sometimes such deucedly damaged ones."</p> + +<p>It was almost indecent, this parade of his nonentity! She wanted to say, +"Oh, hush! Those are the things one only enjoys—never talks about." But +instead, somewhere up at the top of her voice, she said: "Oh, we always +lock up our silver!"</p> + +<p>"But even then," he quizzed her, "I wonder how you dare to do it?"</p> + +<p>"Perhaps we have to, because we ourselves are all—" ("without any +credentials but those you mention,") she had been about to say—but +there she caught herself on the very edge of giving herself and all the +rest of them away to him; "—all so awfully bored," she mischievously +ended with the daintiest, faintest possible yawn behind her spread fan.</p> + +<p>He looked as if she had taken him by surprise; then laughed out. "Oh, +that is the way they<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span> don't do here," he provoked her. "You mustn't, +when I'm not expecting it."</p> + +<p>"Then what are you expecting?" she inquired a little coolly.</p> + +<p>"Well," he deliberated, "not expecting you to get me ready for a sweet, +and then pop in a pickle; and presently expecting, hoping, anxiously +anticipating, what you really care to say."</p> + +<p>He was expecting, she looked maliciously, more than he was likely to +get; but the fact that he did see through her to that extent was at once +delightful and alarming. She swayed back into the shadow beyond the +dazzling line of light. She wanted to escape his scrutiny, to be able to +look him over from a safe vantage-ground. But he wouldn't have it. An +instant he stood under the torrent of white radiance, challenging her to +see what she could—then followed her into her retreat. "Shall we sit +here?" he said, and she found herself hopelessly cut off and isolated +with the enemy.</p> + +<p>She couldn't withhold a little grudging pleasure in the sharpness with +which he had turned<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span> her maneuver, and the way it had detached them from +the surrounding crowd. For there, in the dusky center of the room, it +was as if they watched from safe covert the rest of their party exposed +in the glare of light; though not, as Flora presently noted, quite +escaping observation themselves. For an instant Harry turned and peered +toward them with a look in his intentness that struck Flora as something +new in him, and made her wonder if he could be jealous. She turned +tentatively to see if Kerr had noticed it, and surprised his glance in a +quick transition back to hers.</p> + +<p>"By your leave," he said, and took away her fan, which in his hand +presently assumed such rhythmic motion that it ceased to be any more +present to her than a delicate current of air upon her face. Her face, +which in the first place he had so well looked over, he now looked into +with something more personal in his quest, as if under the low brows and +crowding lashes there was a puzzle to solve in the timid, unassured +glances of such splendid eyes.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span>He was not, she felt sure, in spite of his light manipulation of her +fan, a person who cared to please women, but one of that devastating +sort who care above everything to please themselves, and who are skilful +without practice; too skilful, she feared, for her defenses to hold out +against if he intended to find out what she really thought. "Aren't we +supposed to be looking at the pictures?" she wanted to know.</p> + +<p>He turned his back on the wall and its attendant glare. "Why pictures," +he inquired, "when there are live people to look at? Pictures for places +where they're all half dead. But here, where even the damnable dust in +the street is alive, why should they paint, or write, or sculpt, or do +anything but live?" His irascible brows shot the query at her.</p> + +<p>Again the proposition of life—whatever that was—was held up before +her, and as ever she faltered in the face of it. "I suppose they do it +here," she murmured, with a vague glance at the paintings around her, +"because people do it everywhere else."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span>His disparagement was almost a snarl. "That's the rotten part of +it—because they do it everywhere else! As if there wasn't enough +monotony in the world already without every chap trying to be like the +next instead of being himself!"</p> + +<p>"Ah!" Her small, uncertain smile in the midst of her outward splendor +was pathetic. "But it is different to you. You're a man. You're not one +of us."</p> + +<p>"One of what? I'm a man. I'm myself. Which, pardon me, dear lady, is +just what you won't be—yourself."</p> + +<p>"But if you have to be what people expect?" She clung to her first +principle of safety in the midst of this onslaught.</p> + +<p>"People don't want what they expect—if you care for that." He waved it +away with his quick, white hand.</p> + +<p>"But you have to care, unless you want to be queer." Her poor little +secret was out before she knew, and he looked at it, laughing +immoderately, yet somehow delightfully.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span>"Ah, if you think the social game is the game that counts! I had +expected braver things of you. The game that counts, my girl," he +preached it at her with his long white hand, "the game that is going on +out here is the big, red game of life. That's the only one that's worth +a guinea; and there's no winning or losing, there's no right or wrong to +it, and it doesn't matter what a man is in it as long as he's a good +one."</p> + +<p>"Even if he is a thief?" The question was out of Flora's lips before she +could catch it. It was a challenge. She had meant to confound him; but +he caught it as if it delighted him.</p> + +<p>"Well, what would you think?"</p> + +<p>He threw it back at her.</p> + +<p>What hadn't she thought! How persistently her fancy had played with the +question of what sort of man that one might be who had so wonderfully +put his hand under a glass case and drawn out the Chatworth ring. Why, +outwardly, he must have been like all the crowd around him, to have +escaped unnoticed; but, in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span>wardly, how much superior in power and skill +to have so completely overreached them!</p> + +<p>"Oh," she laughed dubiously, "I suppose he is a good one as long as he +isn't caught."</p> + +<p>"What!" His face disowned her. "You think he's a renegade, do you? A +chap in perpetual flight, taking things because he has to, more or less +pursued by the law? Bah! It's a guild as old, and a deal more honorable, +than the beggar's. Your good thief is born to it. It's his caste. It's +in his blood. It isn't money that he wants. If he had a million he'd be +the same. And it isn't a mania either. It's a profession." The +Englishman leaned back and smiled at her over the elegance of his long, +joined finger-tips.</p> + +<p>She looked at him with a delighted alarm, with an increasing elation; +but whether these arose from his lawless declarations and the singular +way they kept setting before her more vividly moment by moment the +possible character of the present keeper of the Chatworth ring, or +whether it was just the sight of Kerr himself as<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span> he sat there that +stirred her, she didn't try to distinguish.</p> + +<p>"But suppose he was your own thief," she urged; "took your own things, I +mean," she hastily amended, "and suppose he turned out to be—some one +you knew and liked—" She hesitated. She had come at last to what she +really wanted to say. She had brought out a question that had been +teasing her fancy at intervals all the while he had been talking, and he +hadn't even heard it. He wasn't even looking at her. She had caught him +off his guard. He was looking across her shoulder straight down the dim +vista of the room to the little blaze of bordering light. He was looking +at Harry. No, Harry was looking at him. Harry was looking with a steady, +an intent gaze, and Kerr meeting it—it might have been merely the blank +glare of his monocle—seemed, to Flora, to meet it a little insolently. +She fancied in the instant something to pass between the two men, +something which, this time, she did not mistake for jealousy—a shade +too dim for defiance or suspicion, a deep<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span> scrutiny that struggled to +place something, some one.</p> + +<p>Flora felt a sudden wish to break that curious scrutiny. It had broken +her little moment. It had shattered the personal, almost intimate note +that had been sounded between them. The look Kerr turned back to her was +vague, and stirred in her a dim resentment that he could drop it all so +easily.</p> + +<p>"Shall we join the others?" It was the voice with which she had begun +with him, but her eyes were hot through their light mist of lashes, and +he threw her a comprehending glance of amusement.</p> + +<p>"Oh, no," he assured her, "we can't help ourselves. They are going to +join us."</p> + +<p>Ella Buller, in the van of her procession, was already descending upon +them. Her approach dissipated the last remnant of their personal moment. +Her presence always insisted that there was nothing worth while but +instant participation in her geniality, and whatever subject it might at +the moment be taken up with. This<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span> conviction of Ella's had been wont to +overawe Flora, and it still overwhelmed her; so that now, as she +followed in the tail of Ella's marshaled force, she had a guilty feeling +that there should be nothing in her mind but a normal desire for supper.</p> + +<p>Yet all the way down the great stair, "the Corridors of Time," where the +white owl glared his glassy wisdom on the passings and counter-passings, +she was haunted with the thought that Harry had seen the extraordinary +Kerr before; not shaken hands with him, perhaps—perhaps not even heard +his name; but somewhere, across some distance, once glimpsed him, and +had never quite shaken the memory from his mind. For there was something +marked, notable, unforgettable in that lean distinctiveness. Against the +sleek form of the men they met and shook hands with, he flashed +out—seemed in contrast fairly electric. She saw him, just ahead of her +where the crowd was thickening in the door of the supper-room, making +way for Clara through the press with that exasperating solicitude of +his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span> that was half ironic. And the large broadside offered by her +elegant Harry, matter-of-factly towing Ella by the elbow, herself +conscious of a curl or two awry, and Judge Buller tramping heavily at +her side, all took on to her the aspect of a well-chosen peep-show with +the satanic Kerr officiating as showman. Even the smooth and pallid +Clara, who usually coerced by her sheer correctness, failed to dominate +this fantastic image; rather, she took on, as she was handed into the +supper-room, the aspect of his chief exhibit.</p> + +<p>The room, hot, polished, flaring reflections of electric lights from its +glistening floor, announced itself the heart of high festivity, through +the midst of which their entrance made an added ripple. The flushed +faces of the women under their flowers, under their pale-tinted hats, +with their smiling recognitions to Clara, to Flora, to Ella, smiled with +a sharpened interest. It proclaimed that Kerr was a stranger, and, in a +circle which found itself a little stale for lack of innovations, a +desirable one.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span> Exclamatory greetings, running into skirmishes of talk, +here and there halted their progress, and even after they had settled +about their table in the center of the room the attention of one and +another was drawn over the shoulder to some special, trans-table +recognition.</p> + +<p>Apparently the dominant note of their party was Ella's clamorous +selection for the supper; but to Flora the more real thing was the +atmosphere of excitement and mystery she had been moving in all the +evening. She was pursued by the obsession of something more about to +happen—something imminent—though, of course, nothing would; at least, +how could anything happen here, to them? And by "them," she meant +herself and these people around her so stupidly talking—the eternal +repetition of the story she had read out that evening to Clara, and not +one glimmer of light! She wondered if her obsession was all her own—or +did it reach to one of them? Certainly not Ella; not Judge Buller, +settled into his collar, choosing champagnes. Clara? She had to skip +Clara. One never knew whether<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span> Clara had not more behind her smooth +prettiness than ever she brought to light. Kerr? Perhaps. With him she +felt potentialities enormous. Harry? Never. Harry was being appealed to +by all the women who could get at him as to his part in the affair—what +had been his sensations and emotions? But Flora knew perfectly well he +had had none. He was only oppressed by the attention his fame in the +matter, and the central position of their table, brought upon him. +Protesting, he made his part as small as possible.</p> + +<p>"Oh, confound it, if I can't get at my oysters!" he complained, leaning +back into his group again with a sigh.</p> + +<p>"You divide the honors with the mysterious unknown, eh?" Kerr inquired +across the table.</p> + +<p>"Hang it, there's no division! I'd offer you a share!" Harry laughed, +and it occurred to Flora how much Kerr could have made of it.</p> + +<p>"Purdie'd like to share something," Buller vouchsafed. "He's been pawing +the air ever since Crew cabled, and this has blown him up completely."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span>"Crew?" Flora wondered. Here was something more happening. Crew? She had +not heard that name before. It made a stir among them all; but if Kerr +looked sharp, Clara looked sharper. She looked at Harry and Harry was +vexed.</p> + +<p>"Who's Crew?" said Ella; and the judge looked around on the silence.</p> + +<p>"Why, bless my soul, isn't it—Oh, anyway, it will all be out to-morrow. +But I thought Harry'd told you. The Chatworth ring wasn't Bessie's."</p> + +<p>It had the effect of startling them all apart, and then drawing them +closer together again around the table over the uncorked bottles.</p> + +<p>"Why," Judge Buller went on, "this ring is a celebrated thing. It's the +'Crew Idol'!" He threw the name out as if that in itself explained +everything, but the three women, at least, were blank.</p> + +<p>"Why celebrated?" Clara objected. "The stones were only sapphires."</p> + +<p>Kerr smiled at this measure of fame.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span>"Quite so," he nodded to her, "but there are several sorts of value +about that ring. Its age, for one."</p> + +<p>He had the attention of the table, as if they sensed behind his words +more even than Judge Buller could have told them.</p> + +<p>"And then the superstition about it. It's rather a pretty tale," said +Kerr, looking at Flora. "You've seen the ring—a figure of Vishnu bent +backward into a circle, with a head of sapphire; two yellow stones for +the cheeks and the brain of him of the one blue. Just as a piece of +carving it is so fine that Cellini couldn't have equaled it, but no one +knows when or where it was made. The first that is known, the Shah Jehan +had it in his treasure-house. The story is he stole it, but, however +that may be, he gave it as a betrothal gift to his wife—possibly the +most beautiful"—his eyebrows signaled to Flora his uncertainty of that +fact—"without doubt the best-loved woman in the world. When she died it +was buried with her—not in the tomb itself, but in the Taj Mehal; and +for a century<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span> or so it lay there and gathered legends about it as thick +as dust. It was believed to be a talisman of good fortune—especially in +love.</p> + +<p>"It had age; it had intrinsic value; it had beauty, and that one other +quality no man can resist—it was the only thing of its kind in the +world. At all events, it was too much for old Neville Crew, when he saw +it there some couple of hundred years ago. When he left India the ring +went with him. He never told how he got it, but lucky marriages came +with it, and the Crews would not take the House of Lords for it. Their +women have worn it ever since."</p> + +<p>For a moment the wonder of the tale and the curious spark of excitement +it had produced in the teller kept the listeners silent. Clara was the +first to return to facts. "Then Bessie—" she prompted eagerly.</p> + +<p>Kerr turned his glass in meditative fingers. "She wore it as young +Chatworth's wife." He held them all in an increasing tension, as if he +drew them toward him.</p> + +<p>"The elder Chatworth, Lord Crew, is a bache<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span>lor, but, of course, the +ring reverted to him on Chatworth's death."</p> + +<p>"And Lord only knows," the judge broke in, "how it got shipped with +Bessie's property. Crew was out of England at the time. He kept the +wires hot about it, and they managed to keep the fact of what the ring +was quiet—but it got out to-day when Purdie found it was gone. You see +he was showing it—and without special permission."</p> + +<p>Flora had a bewildered feeling that this judicial summing up of facts +wasn't the sort of thing the evening had led up to. She couldn't see, if +this was what it amounted to, why Harry had changed his mind about +telling them at the dinner table. She could not even understand where +this belonged in the march of events in their story, but Clara took it +up, clipped it out, and fitted it into its place.</p> + +<p>"Then there will be pressure—enormous pressure, brought to bear to +recover it?"</p> + +<p>"Oh-o-oh!" Buller drew out the syllable with unctuous relish. "They'll +rip the town inside<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span> out. They'll do worse. There'll be a string of +detectives across the country—yes, and at intervals to China—so tight +you couldn't step from Kalamazoo to Oshkosh without running into one. +The thing is too big to be covered. The chap who took it will play a +lone game; and to do that—Lord knows there aren't many who could—to do +that he'd have to be a—a—"</p> + +<p>"Farrell Wand?" Flora flung it out as a challenge among these prosaic +people; but the effect of it was even sharper than she had expected. She +fancied she saw them all start; that Harry squared himself, that Kerr +met it as if he swallowed it with almost a facial grimace; that Judge +Buller blinked it hard in the face—the most bothered of the lot. He +came at it first in words.</p> + +<p>"Farrell Wand?" He felt it over, as if, like a doubtful coin, it might +have rung false. "Now, what did I know of Farrell Wand?"</p> + +<p>"Farrell Wand?" Kerr took it up rapidly. "Why, he was the great Johnnie +who went through the Scotland Yard men at Perth in '94, and got off. +Don't you remember? He took a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span> great assortment of things under the most +peculiar circumstances—took the Tilton emeralds off Lady Tilton's neck +at St. James'."</p> + +<p>"Why, Harry, you—" Flora began. "You told us that," was what she had +meant to say, but Harry stopped her. Stopped her just with a look, with +a nod; but it was as if he had shaken his head at her. His tawny lashes, +half drooped over watching eyes, gave him more than ever the look of a +great, still cat; a domestic, good-humored cat, but in sight of +legitimate prey. Her eyes went back to Kerr with a sense of +bewilderment. His voice was still going on, expansively, brilliantly, +juggling his subject.</p> + +<p>"He knew them all, the big-wigs up in Parliament, the big-wigs on +'Change, the little duchesses in Mayfair, and they all liked him, asked +him, dined him, and—great Scott, they paid! Paid in hereditary jewels, +or the shock to their decency when the thing came out—but, poor devil, +so did he!"</p> + +<p>And through it all Buller gloomed unsmiling, with out-thrust underlip.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span>"No, no," he said slowly, "that's not my connection with Farrell Wand. +What happened afterward? What did they do with him?"</p> + +<p>Kerr was silent, and Flora thought his face seemed suddenly at its +sharpest.</p> + +<p>It was Clara who answered with another question. "Didn't he get to the +colonies? Didn't he die there?"</p> + +<p>Judge Buller caught it with a snap of his fingers. "Got it!" he +triumphed, and the two men turned square upon him. "They ran him to +earth in Australia. That was the year I was there—'96. I got a snapshot +of him at the time."</p> + +<p>It was now the whole table that turned on him, and Flora felt, with that +unanimous movement, something crucial, the something that she had been +waiting for; and yet she could in no way connect it with what had +happened, nor understand why Clara, why Harry, why Kerr above all should +be so alert. For more than all he looked expectant, poised, and ready +for whatever was coming next.</p> + +<p>"What sort of a chap?" he mused and fixed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span> the judge a moment with the +same stare that Flora remembered to have first confronted her.</p> + +<p>"What sort? Sort of a criminal," the judge smiled. "They all look +alike."</p> + +<p>"Still," Clara suggested, "such a man could hardly have been ordinary—"</p> + +<p>"In the chain-gang—oh, yes," said Buller with conviction.</p> + +<p>"Oh! Then the picture wasn't worth anything?"</p> + +<p>"Why, no," Buller admitted slowly, "though, come to think of it, it +wasn't the chain-gang either. They were taking him aboard the ship. The +crowd was so thick I hardly saw him, and—only got one shot at him. But +the name was a queer one. It stuck in my mind."</p> + +<p>"But then," Clara insisted, "what became of him?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, gave them the slip," the judge chuckled. "He always did. Reported +to have changed ships in mid-ocean. Hal, is that another bottle?"</p> + +<p>Harry stretched his hand for it, but it stayed suspended—and, for an +instant, it seemed as if<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span> the whole table waited expectant. Had Buller's +camera caught the clear face of Farrell Wand, or only a dim figure? +Flora wondered if that was the question Harry wanted to ask. He +wanted—and yet he hesitated, as if he did not quite dare touch it. He +laughed and filled the glasses. He had dropped his question, and there +was no one at the table who seemed ready to put another.</p> + +<p>And yet there were questions there, in all the eyes; but some impassable +barrier seemed to have come between these eager people, and what, for +incalculable reasons, they so much wanted to know. It was not the genial +indifference with which Buller had dropped the subject for the +approaching bottle. It seemed rather their own timidity that withheld +them from touching this subject which at every turn produced upon some +one of the eager three some fresh startling effect the others could not +understand. They were restless; Clara notably, even under her calm.</p> + +<p>Flora knew she was not giving up the quest of Farrell Wand, but only +setting it aside with<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span> her unfailing thrift, which saved everything. But +why, in this case? And Harry, who had been so merry with the mystery at +dinner—why had he suddenly tried to suppress her, to want to ignore the +whole business; why had he hesitated over his question, and finally let +it fall? And why, above all, was Kerr so brilliantly talking at Ella, in +the same way he had begun at Flora herself? Talking at Ella as if he +hardly saw her, but like some magician flinging out a brilliant train of +pyrotechnics to hypnotize the senses, before he proceeds with his trick. +And the way Ella was looking at him—her bewildered alacrity, the way +she was struggling with what was being so rapidly shot at her—appeared +to Flora the prototype of her own struggle to understand what reality +these appearances around her could possibly shadow. Never before had her +sense of standing on the outside edge of life been so strong. It seemed +as though there were some large, impalpable thing growing in the midst +of them, around the edges of which they were tiptoeing, daringly, +fearfully, each<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span> one for himself. But though it loomed so large that she +felt herself in the very shadow of it, rub her eyes as she would, she +couldn't see it.</p> + +<p>Often enough in the crowds she moved among she had felt herself lonely +and not wondered at it. But now and here, sitting among her close, +intimate circle, her friends and her lover, it seemed like a horrible +obsession—yet it was true. As clear as if it had been shown her in a +revelation she saw herself absolutely alone.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="III" id="III"></a>III</h2> + +<h3>ENCOUNTERS ON PARADE</h3> + +<p>Flora, before the mirror, gaily stabbing in her long hat-pins, confessed +to herself that last night had been queer, as queer as queer could be; +but this morning, luckily, was real again. Her fancy last night +had—yes, she was afraid it really had—run away with her. And she +turned and held the hand-mirror high, to be sure of the line of her +tilted hat, gave a touch to the turn of her wide, close belt, a flirt to +the frills of her bodice.</p> + +<p>The wind was lightly ruffling and puffing out the muslin curtains of the +windows, and from the garden below came the long, silvery clash of +eucalyptus leaves. She leaned on the high window-ledge to look downward +over red roofs, over terraced green, over steep streets running +ab<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span>ruptly to the broken blue of the bay. She tried to fancy how Kerr +would look in this morning sun. He seemed to belong only beneath the +high artificial lights, in the thicker atmosphere of evening. Would he +return again, with renewed potency, with the same singular, almost +sinister charm, as a wizard who works his will only by moonlight? When +she should see him again, what, she wondered, would be his extraordinary +mood? On what new breathless flights might he not take her—or would he +see her at all? It was too fantastic. The sunlight thinned him to an +impalpable ghost.</p> + +<p>It was Clara, standing at the foot of the stairs, who belonged to the +morning, so brisk, so fresh, so practical she appeared. She held a book +in her hand. The door, open for her immediate departure, showed, beyond +the descent of marble steps, the landau glistening black against white +pavements. It was unusual for this formal vehicle to put in an +appearance so early.</p> + +<p>"I am going to drive over to the Purdies'," Clara explained. "I have an errand there."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span>Flora smiled at the thought of how many persons would be having errands +to the Purdies' now. It was refreshing to catch Clara in this weakness. +She felt a throb of it herself when she recalled the breathless moment +at the supper table last evening. "Oh, that will be a heavenly drive," +she said. "Please ask me to go with you. My errand can wait."</p> + +<p>"Why, certainly. I should like to have you," said Clara. But if she had +returned a flat "no," Flora would not have had a dryer sense of +unwelcome. Still, she had gone too far to retreat. After all, this was +only Clara's manner, and her buoyant interest in the expedition was +stronger than her diffidence.</p> + +<p>Mischievous reflections of the doctrine the Englishman had startled her +with the night before flickered in her mind, as they drove from the +door. Was this part of "the big red game," not being accommodating, nor +so very polite? The streets were still wet with early fog, and, turning +in at the Presidio gate, the cypresses dripped dankly on their heads, +and hung out<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span> cobwebs pearled with dew. She was sure, even under their +dripping, that the "damnable dust" was alive.</p> + +<p>Down the broad slopes that were swept by the drive all was green to the +water's edge. The long line of barracks, the officers' quarters, the +great parade-ground, set in the flat land between hills and bay, looked +like a child's toy, pretty and little. They heard the note of a bugle, +thin and silver clear, and they could see the tiny figures mustering; +but in her preoccupation it did not occur to Flora that they were +arriving just in time for parade. But when the carriage had crossed the +viaduct, and swung them past the acacias, and around the last white +curve into the white dust of the parade-ground, Clara turned, as if with +a fresh idea.</p> + +<p>"Wouldn't you like to stop and watch it?"</p> + +<p>"Why, yes," Flora assented. The brilliance of light and color, the +precision of movement, the sound of the brasses under the open sky were +an intermezzo in harmony with her spirited mood.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span>The carriage stopped under the scanty shadow of trees that bordered the +walk to the officers' quarters. Clara, book in hand, alertly rose.</p> + +<p>"I'll just run up to the Purdies' and leave this," she said.</p> + +<p>"Then she really did want to be rid of me," Flora mused, as she watched +the brisk back moving away; "and how beautifully she has done it!" Her +eyes followed Clara's little figure retreating up the neat and narrow +board walk, to where it disappeared in overarching depths of eucalyptus +trees. Further on, beyond the trees, two figures, smaller than Clara's +in their greater distance, were coming down. Flora almost grinned as she +recognized the large linen umbrella that Mrs. Purdie invariably carried +when abroad in the reservation, and presently the trim and bounding +figure of Mrs. Purdie herself, under it. The Purdies were coming down to +parade—at least Mrs. Purdie was. But the tall figure beside her—that +was not the major. She took up her lorgnon. It was—no it could not +be—yet surely<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span> it <i>was</i> Harry! Lazy Harry, up and out, and squiring +Mrs. Purdie to the review at half-past ten in the morning! "Are we all +mad?" Flora thought.</p> + +<p>The three little figures, the one going up, the two coming down, touched +opposite fringes of the grove—disappeared within it. On which side +would they come out together? Flora wondered. They emerged on her side +with Harry a little in advance. He came swingingly down the walk, +straight toward her, and across the road to the carriage, his hat +lifted, his hand out.</p> + +<p>"Well, Flora," he said, "this is luck!"</p> + +<p>"What in the world has got you out so early?" she rallied him.</p> + +<p>"Came out to see Purdie on business, and here you are all ready to drive +me back."</p> + +<p>"That's your reward."</p> + +<p>He brushed his handkerchief over his damp forehead. "Well, there's one +coming to me, for I haven't found Purdie."</p> + +<p>Her eyes were dancing with mischief. "Harry,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span> I believe you're out here +about the Crew Idol, too!"</p> + +<p>He shook his head at her, smiling. "I wouldn't talk too much about that, +Flora. It flicks poor Purdie on the raw every time that—" His sentence +trailed off into something else, for Mrs. Purdie and Clara had come up.</p> + +<p>The book had changed hands, together, evidently, with several +explanations, and Mrs. Purdie, with her foot on the carriage step, was +ready to make one of these over again.</p> + +<p>"The major'll be so sorry. He's gone in town. It's so unusual for him to +get off at this hour, but he said he had to catch a man. As Mrs. Britton +and I were saying, he's likely to be very busy until this dreadful +affair is straightened out. If you can only wait a little longer, Mr. +Cressy," she went on, "I am expecting him every moment."</p> + +<p>"Oh, it's of no importance," said Harry, but he looked at his watch with +a fold between his brows, and then at the car that was coming in.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span>"Well, at least, you'll have time to see the parade," said Mrs. Purdie. +"I always think it's a pretty sight, though most of the women get tired +of it."</p> + +<p>Clara's face showed that she belonged to the latter class; but Flora, +too keenly attuned to sounds and sights not to be swayed by outward +circumstances, was content for the time to watch, in the cloud of dust, +the wheeling platoons and rhythmic columns.</p> + +<p>Yet through all—even when she was not looking at him—she was aware of +Harry's restlessness, of his impatience; and as the last company swung +barrackward, and the cloud began to settle over the empty field, he +snapped his watch-case smartly, and remarked, "Still no major."</p> + +<p>"Why, there he is now!" Mrs. Purdie screamed, pointing across the +parade-ground.</p> + +<p>Flora looked. Half-way down on the adjoining side of the parallelogram, +back toward her, the redoubtable Kerr was standing. She recognized him +on the instant, as if he were the most familiar figure in her life. Yet +she was more<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span> surprised to see him here than she had been to see Harry. +She felt inclined to rub her eyes. It took a moment for her to realize +that his companion was indeed Major Purdie.</p> + +<p>The major had recognized his wife's signaling umbrella. Now he turned +toward it, but Kerr, with a quick motion of hand toward hat, turned in +the opposite direction. In her mind Flora was with the major who ran +after him. The two men stood for a little, expostulating. Then both +walked toward the landau and the linen umbrella.</p> + +<p>The carriage group waited, watching with flagging conversation, which +finally fell into silence. But the two approaching strolled easily and +talked. Even in cold daylight Kerr still gave Flora the impression that +the open was not big enough to hold him, but she saw a difference in his +mood, a graver eye, a colder mouth, and when he finally greeted them, a +manner that was brusk. It showed uncivil beside the major's urbanity.</p> + +<p>The major was glad, very glad, to see them<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span> all. He was evidently also a +little flurried. He seemed to know that they had all met Kerr before. +Had it been at the moment of his attempted departure that Kerr had told +him, Flora wondered? And had he given them as his excuse for going away? +It hurt her; though why should she be hurt because a stranger had not +wanted to cross the parade-ground to shake hands with her? He was less +interested in her than he was in Harry, at whom he had looked keenly.</p> + +<p>But Harry's nervousness had left him, now that Purdie was within his +reach. He returned the glance indifferently. He stood close to the +major—his hand on his shoulder. The major, with his bland blue eyes +twinkling from Clara to Flora, seemed the only man ready to devote +himself to the service of the ladies.</p> + +<p>"And what's the news from the front?" said Clara gaily. Kerr gave her a +rapid glance; but the major blinked as if the allusion had got by him.</p> + +<p>"I mean the mystery—the Chatworth ring,"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span> she explained. However +lightly and sweetly Clara said it, it was a little brazen to fling such +a question at poor Purdie, whose responsibility the ring had been.</p> + +<p>He received it amicably enough, but conclusively. "No news whatever, my +dear Mrs. Britton."</p> + +<p>She smiled. "We're all rather interested in the mystery. Flora has made +a dozen romances about it."</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes, yes," said the major indulgently. "It will do for young ladies +to make romances about. It'll be a two days' wonder, and then you'll +suddenly find out it's something very tame indeed."</p> + +<p>"Why, have they fixed the suspicion?" said Clara.</p> + +<p>There was a restless movement from Kerr.</p> + +<p>"No, no, nothing of that sort," said the major quickly.</p> + +<p>Harry passed his hand through his arm. "May I see you for five minutes, +Major?"</p> + +<p>The excellent major looked harassed.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span>"Suppose we all step up to the house," he suggested. "Why, you're not +going, man?" he objected, for Kerr had fallen back a step, and, with +lifted hat and balanced cane, was signaling his farewells.</p> + +<p>"Do let us go up to the house," said Clara. "And Mrs. Purdie, won't you +drive up with me? Flora wants to walk."</p> + +<p>Flora stood up. She had a confused impression that she had expressed no +such desire, and that there was room for three in the landau; but the +mental shove that Clara had administered gave her an impetus that +carried her out of the carriage before she realized what she was about. +Some one had offered a hand to help her, and when she was on the ground +she saw it was Kerr, who had come back and was standing beside her. He +was smiling quizzically.</p> + +<p>"I feel rather like walking, myself," he said. "Do you want a +companion?"</p> + +<p>She turned to him with gratitude. "I should be glad of one," she said +quickly. She was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span> touched. She had not thought he could be so gentle.</p> + +<p>Harry was already moving off up the board walk with the major. The +carriage was turning. Kerr looked at the backs of the two women being +driven away, and then at Flora. "Very good," he said, raising her +parasol; "you are the deposed heir, and I am your faithful servant."</p> + +<p>"But indeed I do want to walk," she protested, a little shy at the way +he read her case.</p> + +<p>"But you didn't think of it until she gave you the suggestion, eh?" he +quizzed.</p> + +<p>"She probably had something to say to Mrs. Purdie that—"</p> + +<p>"My dear child," he caught her up earnestly, "don't think I'm +criticizing your friend's motive. I am only saying I saw something done +that was not pretty, though really, if you will forgive me—it was very +funny."</p> + +<p>Flora smiled ruefully. "It must have been—absurd. I am afraid I often +am. But what else could I have done?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span>He seemed to ponder a moment. "I fancy <i>you</i> couldn't have done anything +different. That's why I came back for you," he volunteered gaily.</p> + +<p>The casual words seemed in her ears fraught with deeper meaning. Her +cheeks were hot behind her thin veil. They were strolling slowly up the +board walk, and for a moment she could not look at him. She could only +listen to the flutter of the fringes of the parasol carried above her +head. She felt herself small and stupid. She could not understand what +he could see in her to come back to. Then she gave a side glance at him. +She saw an unsmiling profile. The lines in his face were indeed +extraordinary, but none was hard. She liked that wonderful mobility that +had survived the batterings of experience.</p> + +<p>As if he were conscious of her eyes, he looked down and smiled; but +vaguely. He did not speak; and she was aware that it was at her +appearance he had smiled, as if that only reached him through his +preoccupation and pleased him.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span> And since he seemed content with this +vague looking, she was content to move beside him silent, a mere image +of youth and—since he liked it—of prettiness, with a fleeting color +and a gust of little curls blowing out under a fluttering veil.</p> + +<p>But what was he thinking about so seriously between those smiling +glances? Not her problem, she was sure.</p> + +<p>Yet he had stayed for her when he had not meant to stay. He had been +anxious to get away since he had first sighted them. Surely he must like +her more than he disliked some other member of her party. Or had he +simply reached forth out of his kindness to rescue her, as he might have +rescued a blind kitten that he pitied? "No," he had said, "<i>you</i> could +not have done anything different."</p> + +<p>They had almost reached the major's gate, and it was now or never to +find out what he thought of her. She looked up at him suddenly, with +inquiring eyes.</p> + +<p>"Do you think I am weak?" she demanded.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span>The lines of his face broke up into laughter. "No," he said, "I think +you are misplaced."</p> + +<p>She knitted her brows in perplexity, but his hand was on the white +picket gate, and she had to walk through it ahead of him as he set it +open for her.</p> + +<p>Of their party only the two women were in sight waiting on the +diminutive veranda. Clara had a mild domestic appearance, rocking there +behind the potted geraniums. All the windows were open into the little +shell of a house. Trunks still stood in the hall, though the Purdies had +been quartered at the Presidio for nine months. From the rear of the +house came the sound of bowl and chopper, where the Chinese cook was +preparing luncheon, and the major's man appeared, walking around the +garden to the veranda, with a cluster of mint juleps on a copper tray.</p> + +<p>In this easy atmosphere, how was it that the thread of restraint ran so +sharply defined? Clara and Mrs. Purdie were matching crewels; and, +sitting on the top step Flora instructed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span> Kerr as to the composition of +the tropical glacier they were drinking. Ten girls had probably so +instructed him before, but it would do to fill up the gap. It was so, +Flora thought, they were all feeling. Even the carriage, driving slowly +round and round the rectangle of officers' row, added its note of +restlessness.</p> + +<p>Like a stone plumped into a pool the major and Harry reëntered this +stagnation. They were brisk and buoyant. Harry, especially, had the air +of a man who sees stimulating business before him. Immediately all +talked at once.</p> + +<p>"Now that we've got you here, you must all stay to luncheon," Mrs. +Purdie determined.</p> + +<p>It looked as if they were about to accept her invitation unanimously, +but Harry demurred. He had to be at Montgomery Street and Jackson by one +o'clock. "I hoped," he added, glancing at Flora, "that some one was to +drive me—part of the way, at least."</p> + +<p>Flora, with an unruly sense of disappointment, yet opened her lips for +the courteous answer. But Clara was quicker. She rose.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span>"Yes," she said, "I'll drive you back with pleasure."</p> + +<p>Harry's glimmer of annoyance was comic.</p> + +<p>"I have to be at the house for luncheon," Clara explained to her hostess +as she buttoned her glove, "but there is no reason why Flora shouldn't +stay."</p> + +<p>"Oh, I should love to," Flora murmured, not knowing whether she was more +embarrassed or pleased at this high-handed dispensation which placed her +where she wanted to be.</p> + +<p>But the way Clara had leaped at her opportunity! Flora looked curiously +at Harry.</p> + +<p>He seemed uneasy at being pounced upon, but that might be merely because +he was balked of a tête-à-tête with herself. For while Clara went on to +the gate with their hostess he lingered a moment with Flora.</p> + +<p>"May I see you to-night?"</p> + +<p>"All you have to do is to come."</p> + +<p>She gave him an oblique, upward glance, and had a pleasant sense of +power in seeing his face relax and smile. She had a dance for that +even<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span>ing; but she thrust it aside without regret. For suppose Harry +should have something to tell her about the Chatworth ring? She wondered +if Clara would get it out of him first on the way home.</p> + +<p>The four left on the veranda watched the two driving away with a sudden +clearing of the social atmosphere. In vain Flora told herself it was +only the relief she always felt in getting free of Clara. For in the +return of the major's elderly blandishments, in Kerr's kindlier mood, as +well as in her own lightened spirits, she had the proofs that, with them +all, some tension had relaxed. It seemed to her as if those two, +departing, were bearing away between them the very mystery of the Crew Idol.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="IV" id="IV"></a>IV</h2> + +<h3>FLOWERS BY THE WAY</h3> + +<p>Flora liked this funny little dining-room with walls as frail as +box-boards, low-ceiled and flooded with sun. It recalled surroundings +she had known later than the mining camp, but long before the great red +house. It seemed to her that she fitted here better than the Purdies. +She looked across at Kerr, sitting opposite, to see if perhaps he fitted +too. But he was foreign, decidedly. He kept about him still the hint of +delicate masquerade that she had noticed the night before. Out of doors, +alone with her, he had lost it. For a moment he had been absolutely off +his guard. And even now he was more off his guard than he had been last +night. She was surprised to see him so un<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span>studied, so uncritical, so +humorously anecdotal. If she and the major, between them, had dragged +him into this against his will he did not show it. She rose from the +table with the feeling that in an hour all three of them had become +quite old friends of his, though without knowing anything further about +him.</p> + +<p>"We must do this again," Mrs. Purdie said, as they parted from her in +the garden.</p> + +<p>"Surely we will," Kerr answered her.</p> + +<p>But Flora had the feeling that they never, never would. For him it had +been a chance touching on a strange shore.</p> + +<p>But at least they were going away together. They would walk together as +far as the little car, whose terminal was the edge of the parade-ground. +But just outside of the gate he stopped.</p> + +<p>"Do you especially like board walks?" he asked.</p> + +<p>It was an instant before she took his meaning. Then she laughed. "No. I +like green paths."</p> + +<p>He waved with his cane. "There is a path<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span> yonder, that goes over a +bridge, and beyond that a hill."</p> + +<p>"And at the top of that another car," Flora reminded him.</p> + +<p>"Ah well," he said, "there are flowers on the way, at least." He looked +at her whimsically. "There are three purple irises under the bridge. I +noticed them as I came down."</p> + +<p>She was pleased that he had noticed that for himself—pleased, too, that +he had suggested the longer way.</p> + +<p>The narrow path that they had chosen branched out upon the main path, +broad and yellow, which dipped downward into the hollow. From there came +the murmur of water. Green showed through the white grass of last +summer. The odor of wet evergreens was pungent in their nostrils. They +looked at the delicate fringed acacias, at the circle of hills showing +above the low tree-tops, at the cloudless sky; but always their eyes +returned to each other's faces, as if they found these the pleasantest +points of the landscape. Sauntering be<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span>tween plantations of young +eucalyptus, they came to the arched stone bridge. They leaned on the +parapet, looking down at the marshy stream beneath and at the three +irises Kerr had remarked, knee-deep in swamp ground.</p> + +<p>"Now that I see them I suppose I want them," Flora remarked.</p> + +<p>"Of course," he assented. "Then hold all these."</p> + +<p>He put into her hands the loose bunch of syringa and rose plucked for +her in the Purdies' garden, laid his hat and gloves on the parapet; +then, with an eye for the better bank, walked to the end of the bridge.</p> + +<p>She watched him descending the steep bank and issuing into the broad +shallow basin of the stream's way. The sun was still high enough to fill +the hollows with warm light and mellow the doubles of trees and grass in +the stream. In this landscape of green and pale gold he looked black and +tall and angular. The wind blew longish locks of hair across his +forehead, and she had a moment's pleased and timorous<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span> reflection that +he looked like Satan coming into the Garden.</p> + +<p>He advanced from tussock to tussock. He came to the brink of the marsh. +The lilies wavered what seemed but a hand's-breadth from him. But he +stooped, he reached—Oh, could anything so foolish happen as that he +could not get them! Or, more foolish still, plunge in to the knees! He +straightened from his fruitless effort, drew back, but before she could +think what he was about he had leaned forward again, flashed out his +cane, and with three quick, cutting slashes the lilies were mown. It was +deftly, delicately, astonishingly done, but it gave her a singular +shock, as if she had seen a hawk strike its prey. He drew them cleverly +toward him in the crook of his cane, took them up daintily in his +fingers, and returned to her across the shallow valley. She waited him +with mixed emotions.</p> + +<p class="center"><a name="image_on_086.jpg" id="image_on_086.jpg"></a><img src="images/image_on_086.jpg" width='494' height='700' alt="He took the lilies up daintily, and returned to her" /></p> + +<h3><span class="smcap">He took the lilies up daintily, and returned to her.</span></h3> + +<p>"Oh, how could you!" she murmured, as he put them into her hand.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span>He looked at her in amused astonishment. "Why, aren't they right?"</p> + +<p>They were as clean clipped off and as perfect as if the daintiest hand +had plucked them.</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes," she admitted, "they're lovely, but I don't like the way you +got them."</p> + +<p>"I took the means I had," he objected.</p> + +<p>"I don't think I like it."</p> + +<p>His whole face was sparkling with interest and amusement. "Is that so? +Why not?"</p> + +<p>"You're too—too"—she cast about for the word—"too terribly +resourceful!"</p> + +<p>"I see," he said. If she had feared he would laugh, it showed how little +she had gauged the limits of his laughter. He only looked at her rather +more intently than he had before.</p> + +<p>"But, my good child, resourcefulness is a very natural instinct. I am +afraid you read more into it than is there. You wanted the flowers, I +had a stick, and in my youth I was taught to strike clean and straight. +I am really a very simple fellow."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span>Looking him in the eyes, which were of a clear, candid gray, she was +ready to believe it. It seemed as if he had let her look for a moment +through his manner, his ironies, his armor of indifference, to the frank +foundations of his nature.</p> + +<p>"But, you see, the trouble is you don't in the least look it," she +argued.</p> + +<p>"So you think because I have a long face and wild hair that I am a +sinister person? My dear Miss Gilsey, the most desperate character I +ever knew was five feet high and wore mutton-chop whiskers. It is an +uncertain business judging men by their appearance."</p> + +<p>She could not help smiling. "But most people do."</p> + +<p>"I don't class you with most people."</p> + +<p>She gave him a quick look. "You <i>did</i> the first night."</p> + +<p>"Possibly—but less and less ever since. You have me now in the state of +mind where I don't know what you'll be at next."</p> + +<p>This was fortunate, she thought, since she<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span> had not the least idea +herself, beyond a teasing desire to find out more about him. He had +shown her many fleeting phases which, put together, seemed +contradictory. She could not connect this man, so mild and amusing, +strolling beside her, with the alert, whetted, combative person of the +night before, or even with the aloof and reticent figure on the +parade-ground. His very attitude toward herself had changed from the +amused scrutiny of the first night into something more indulgent, more +sympathetic. There was only one attitude on his part that had remained +the same—one attitude toward one person—and her mind hovered over +this. On each occasion it had stirred her curiosity and, though she had +not admitted it, made her uneasy. Why not probe him on the subject, now +that she had him completely to herself? But as soon as silence fell +between them she saw that wave of preoccupation which had submerged him +during their walk from the parade-ground to the Purdies' rising over him +again and floating him away from her. He no longer even<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span> looked at her. +His eyes were on the ground, and it was not until they had crossed the +open expanse of the shallow valley and were climbing toward the avenue +of cypress that she found courage to put her question.</p> + +<p>"Have you and Mr. Cressy met before?"</p> + +<p>He raised his head with a jerk and looked at her a moment in +astonishment.</p> + +<p>"Do you mind if I answer your question American fashion by asking +another?" he said presently. "What put it into your head that we may +have met before?"</p> + +<p>"The way you looked at each other at the club, and again this morning."</p> + +<p>Kerr shook his head. "You are an observant young person! The fact is, +I've never met him—of that I'm certain, but I believe I've seen him +before, and for the life of me, I can't think where. At the moment you +spoke I was trying to remember."</p> + +<p>"Was it in this country?" Flora prompted, hopeful of fishing something +definite out of this vagueness.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span>"No, it was years ago. It must have been in England." He looked at her +inquiringly, as if he expected her to help him.</p> + +<p>"Oh, Harry's been in England," she said quickly; and then, with a +flashing thought, came to her the one scene Harry had mentioned in his +English experience. Was it at a ball? The question came to her lips, but +she checked it there. She remembered how Harry had stopped her the night +before with a nod, with a look, from mentioning that very thing. Still +she hesitated—for the temptation was strong. But no; it was only loyal +to Harry to speak to him first.</p> + +<p>"So you're not going to tell me?" Kerr remarked, and she came back to a +sudden consciousness of how her face must have reflected her thought.</p> + +<p>"No—not this time!" she said, smiling, though somewhat flushed.</p> + +<p>He knitted his brows at her. They had reached the arched gate, and the +car that would carry her home was approaching.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span>"Ah, then, I am afraid it will be never," he said.</p> + +<p>Was it possible this was their last meeting? Did he mean he was going +away? The questions formed in her mind, but there was no time for words. +He had stopped the car with a flick of his agile cane, and handed her in +as if he had handed her into a carriage; and not a word as to whether +they would see each other again, though she hoped and hesitated to the +last moment.</p> + +<p>Her hand was in his for the fraction of a minute. Then the car was +widening the distance between them, and she was no longer looking into +his face, which had seemed at their last moment both merry and wistful, +but back at his diminishing figure, showing black against the pale Presidio hills.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="V" id="V"></a>V</h2> + +<h3>ON GUARD</h3> + +<p>He had so disturbed her, his presence had so obliterated other presences +and annihilated time, that it took an encounter with Clara to remind her +of her arrangement for the evening. The dance? No, she had given that +up. She had promised Harry to be at home. Clara wanted to know rather +austerely what she intended to do about the dinner. This was dreadful! +Flora had forgotten it completely. Nothing to be done but go, and leave +a message for Harry—apology, and assurance that she would be home +early. She wondered if she were losing her memory.</p> + +<p>She appeared to be changing altogether, for the dinner—a merry +one—bored her. What she wanted was to get away from it as soon as +pos<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span>sible for that interesting evening. When she had made the +appointment with Harry she had been excited by the thought that he might +tell her whether he had learned anything from the major that morning in +the matter of the ring. But now she was more engrossed with the idea of +asking about Kerr—whether Harry had really met him—if so, where; and, +finally, why did not Harry want her to mention that Embassy ball?</p> + +<p>Primed with these questions, she left immediately after coffee, arriving +at her own red stone portal at ten. But coming in, all a-flutter with +the idea of having kept him waiting when she had so much to ask, she +found her note as she had left it. She questioned Shima. There had been +no message from Mr. Cressy. Her first annoyance was lost in wonder. What +could be the matter? If this was neglect on Harry's part—well, it would +be the first time. But she did not believe it was neglect. He had been +too eager that morning.</p> + +<p>She went into the drawing-room—a dull-pink, stupendous chamber—knelt a +moment before the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span> flashing wood fire, then rose, and crossing to the +window, looked anxiously out. She had a flight of fancy toward +accidents, but in that case she would certainly have heard. The French +clock on the mantel rang half-past ten. The sound had hardly died in the +great spaces before she heard the fine snarl of the electric bell.</p> + +<p>She restrained an impulse to dash into the hall, and stood impatient in +the middle of the room.</p> + +<p>He came in hastily, his lips all ready with words which hesitated at +sight of her.</p> + +<p>"Why, you're going out!" he said.</p> + +<p>She had forgotten the cloak that still hung from her shoulders.</p> + +<p>"No, I've just come in, and all my fine apologies for being out are +wasted. How long do you think Clara'll let you stop at this hour?"</p> + +<p>"Clara isn't here," he said.</p> + +<p>"Well, then your time is all the shorter." She was nettled that he +should be oblivious of his lapse. Their relation had never been +sentimental, but he had always been punctilious.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span>"I'm sorry," he said, arriving at last at his apology. "I couldn't help +being late. I've had a day of it." He drew his hands across his +forehead, and she noticed that he was in his morning clothes and looked +as rumpled and flurried as a man just from the office.</p> + +<p>She relented. "Poor dear! You do look tired! Don't take that chair. It's +more Louis Quinze than comfortable. Come into the library. And +remember," she added, when Shima had set the decanter and glasses beside +him, "you are to stay just twenty minutes."</p> + +<p>He took a sip of his drink and looked at her over the top of his glass. +"I may have to stay longer if you want to hear about it."</p> + +<p>"Oh, Harry, you really know something? All the evening I've heard +nothing but the wildest rumors. Some say Major Purdie couldn't speak +because some one 'way up knows more than she should about it. And +somebody else said it wasn't the real ring at all that was taken, only a +paste copy, and that is why they're not doing more about getting it back."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span>"Not doing more about getting it back?" Harry laughed. "Is that the idea +that generally prevails? Why, Flora—" He stopped, waited a moment while +she leaned forward expectant. "Flora," he began again, "are you mum?"</p> + +<p>She nodded, breathless.</p> + +<p>"Not a word to Clara?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, of course not."</p> + +<p>"Well—" He twisted around in his chair the better to face her. +"To-morrow there will be published a reward of twenty thousand dollars +for the return of the Crew Idol, and no questions asked."</p> + +<p>"Oh!" she said. And again, "Oh, is that all!" She was disappointed. "I +don't see why you and the major should have been so mysterious about +that."</p> + +<p>"You don't, eh? Suppose you had taken the ring—wouldn't it make a +difference to you if you knew twenty-four hours ahead that a reward of +twenty thousand dollars would be published? Wouldn't you expect every +man's hand<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span> to be against you at that price? If you had a pal, wouldn't +you be afraid he'd sell you up? Wouldn't you be glad of twenty-four +hours' start to keep him from turning state's evidence? Well—it's just +so that he shan't have the start that the authorities are keeping so +almighty dark about the reward. They want to spring it on him."</p> + +<p>Flora leaned forward with knitted brows. "Yes, I can see that, but +still, just among ourselves, this morning—"</p> + +<p>Harry smiled. "You've lost sight of the fact that it is just among +ourselves the thing has happened."</p> + +<p>"Oh, oh! Now you're ridiculous!"</p> + +<p>"I might be, if the thing had happened anywhere but in this town; but +think a moment. How much do we know of the people we meet, where they +were, and who they were, before they came here? There's a case in point. +It was not quite 'among ourselves' this morning."</p> + +<p>"Harry, how horrid of you!" She was on the point of declaring that she +knew Kerr very<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span> well indeed; but she remembered this might not be the +thing to say to Harry.</p> + +<p>"My dear girl, I'm not saying anything against him. I only remarked that +we did not know him."</p> + +<p>"Don't <i>you</i>, Harry?"</p> + +<p>He gave her a quick look. "Why, what put that into your head?"</p> + +<p>"I—I don't know. I thought you looked at him very hard last night in +the picture gallery. And afterward, at supper, don't you remember, you +did not want me to mention your connection with something or other he +was talking about?"</p> + +<p>"Something or other he was talking about?" Harry inquired with a +frowning smile.</p> + +<p>"I think it was about that Embassy ball—"</p> + +<p>"<i>I</i> didn't want you to mention the Embassy ball?" he repeated, and now +he was only smiling. "My dear child, surely you are dreaming."</p> + +<p>She looked at him with the bewildered feeling that he was flatly +contradicting himself.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span> And yet she could remember he had not shaken his +head at her. He had only nodded. Could it be that her cherished +imagination had played her a trick at last? But the next moment it +occurred to her that somehow she had been led away from her first +question.</p> + +<p>"Then <i>have</i> you seen him, Harry?" she insisted.</p> + +<p>"No!" He jerked it out so sharply that it startled her, but she stuck to +her subject.</p> + +<p>"And you wouldn't have minded my telling him you had been at that ball?"</p> + +<p>There was a pause while Harry looked at the fire. Then—"Look here," he +burst out, "did he ask you about it?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, no," she protested. "I only just happened to wonder."</p> + +<p>He stared at her as if he would have liked to shake her. But then he +rose from his frowning attitude before the fire, came over to her, sat +on the arm of her chair, and, with the tip of one finger under her chin, +lifted her face; but she did not lift her eyes. She heard only<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span> his +voice, very low, with a caressing note that she hardly knew as Harry's.</p> + +<p>"It isn't that I care <i>what</i> you say to him. The fact is, Flora, I +suppose I was a little jealous, but I naturally don't like the +suggestion that you would discuss me with a stranger."</p> + +<p>She knew herself properly reproved, and she reproached herself, not for +what she had actually said to Kerr of Harry—that had been trivial +enough—but for that wayward impulse she had to confide in this +clear-eyed, whimsical stranger, as it had never occurred to her to +confide in Harry.</p> + +<p>She raised her eyes. "Certainly I shall not discuss you with him."</p> + +<p>"Is that a promise?"</p> + +<p>"Harry, how you do dislike him!"</p> + +<p>"Well, suppose I do?" he shrugged.</p> + +<p>"You've used up twice your twenty minutes," she said, "and Clara will be +scandalized."</p> + +<p>He stopped the caressing movement of his hand on her hair. "Are you +afraid of Clara?" he asked.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span>"Mercy, yes!" She was half in earnest and half laughing. "But then I'm +afraid of every one."</p> + +<p>He put his arm affectionately around her. "But not of me?"</p> + +<p>"Oh," she told him, "you're a great big purring pussy-cat, and I am your +poor little mouse."</p> + +<p>He thought this reply immensely witty, and Flora thought what a great +boy he was, after all.</p> + +<p>"Now, really, you must go home," she urged, trying to rise.</p> + +<p>"But look here," he protested, still on the arm of her chair, "there's +another thing I want to ask you about." And by the tip of one finger he +lifted her left hand shining with rings. "You will have to have another +one of these, you know. It's been on my mind for a week. Is there any +sort you haven't already?"</p> + +<p>She held up her hand to the light and fluttered its glitter.</p> + +<p>"Any one that you gave me would be dif<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span>ferent from the others, wouldn't +it?" she asked prettily.</p> + +<p>"Oh, that's very nice of you, Flora, but I want to find you something +new. When shall we look for it? To-morrow, in the morning?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, I should love it," she answered, but with no particular +enthusiasm, for the idea of shopping with Harry, and shopping at +Shrove's, did not present a wide field of possibility. "But I have a +luncheon to-morrow," she added, "so we must make it as early as ten."</p> + +<p>"Oh, you two!"</p> + +<p>At Clara's mildly reproving voice so close beside them both started like +conspirators. They had not heard her come in, yet there she was, just +inside the doorway, still wrapped in her cloak. But there was none of +the impetus of arrested motion in her attitude. She stood at repose as +if she might have waited not to interrupt them.</p> + +<p>"Don't scold Flora," said Harry, rising. "It's my fault. She sent me +away half an hour ago. But it is so comfortable here!"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span>Flora couldn't tell whether he was simply natural, or whether he was +giving this domestic color to their interview on purpose. She rather +thought it was the latter.</p> + +<p>"To-morrow at ten, then!" he said cheerfully to Flora. The stiff +curtains rustled behind him and the two women were left together.</p> + +<p>"What an important appointment," said Clara lightly, "to bring a man at +this hour to make it."</p> + +<p>"Oh, it is, awfully!" Flora answered in the same key. "To choose my +engagement ring."</p> + +<p>Clara's delicate brows flew upward, and though Clara herself made no +comment, the quick facial movement said, "I don't believe it."</p> + +<hr /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="VI" id="VI"></a>VI</h2> + +<h3>BLACK MAGIC</h3> + +<p>The memory of Clara's incredulous glance remained with her as something +curious, and she was not unprepared to be challenged when, the next +morning, she hurried down the hall, drawing on her gloves. Clara's door +did open, but the lady herself, yawning lightly on the threshold, had +this time no questions for her. "Remember the luncheon," she advised, +"and by the way, Ella wants us to sit in their box to-night. Don't +forget to tell Harry."</p> + +<p>Flora threw back a gay "All right," but she was in danger of forgetting +even the object of their errand, once she and Harry were out in the +bright glare of the street. The wind, keen and resinous from the wet +Presidio woods, blew<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span> at their back down the short block of pavement, +and buffeted them, broadside, as they waited on the corner for the +slow-crawling little car. In spite of the blustering air Flora insisted +on the side seat of the "dummy," and, catching her hat with one hand, +pressing down her fluttering skirts with the other, she laughed, now +sidelong at Harry, now out at the dancing face of the bay.</p> + +<p>Each succeeding cross-street gave up a flash of blue water. The short +blocks slid by, first stone fronts and fresh lawns, stucco and tiles; +then here and there corner lots, the great gray, towered, wooden +mansions the stock-brokers of the "seventies" built, and below them, +like a contingent of shabby-genteel relations, the narrow gray wooden +faces of what was "smart" in the "sixties". It was a continuous progress +backward toward the old, the original town. There was no stately +nucleus. This town was a succession of widening ripples of progress, +each newer, more polished than the last, but not different in quality +from the old center that still<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span> teemed—a region of frail wooden +rookeries full of foreign contending interests, haunted with the +adventures of its feverish past. It had built itself on the hopes of a +moment, and what spread from it still was the spell of the new, the +changing, and the reckless. It drew still from the ends of the earth. +The broad road in over the mountains, the broad road out over the ocean +made it where it stood, touching all trades, a road-house of the world.</p> + +<p>Some dim perception of this touched Flora as the houses, gliding past, +grew older, grayer, with steeper gardens, narrower streets, here and +there even trees, lone, sentinel, at the edge of cobbled gutters. From +the crest of the last hill they had looked a mile down the long gray +throat of the street to where the ferry building lay stretched out with +its one tall tower pricked up among the masts of shipping. Half-way +between their momentary perch and the ferry slips the street suddenly +thickened, darkened, swarmed, flying a yellow pennon high above +blackened roofs. And now, as they slip<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span>ped down the long decline into +the foreign quarter the pungent oriental breath of Chinatown was blown +up to them. She breathed it in readily. It was pleasant because it was +strange, outlandish, suggesting a wide web of life beyond her own +knowledge. She wondered what Harry was thinking of it, as he sat with +his passive profile turned from her to the heathen street ahead. She +guessed, by the curl of his nostril, that it was only present to him as +an unpleasant odor to be got through as quickly as possible; but she was +wrong. He had another thought. This time, oddly enough, a thought for +her.</p> + +<p>He gave it to her presently, abrupt, matter-of-fact, material. "That +Chinese goldsmith down there has good stuff now and then. How'd you like +to look in there before we go on to what-you-call-'em's,—the regular +place?"</p> + +<p>"You mean for a ring?" She was doubtful only of his being in earnest.</p> + +<p>"You have so many of the Shrove kind," he explained. "I thought you +might like it, Flora; you're so romantic!" he laughed.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span>"Like it!" she cried, too touched at his thought for her to resent the +imputation. "I should love it! But I didn't know they had such things."</p> + +<p>"Now and then—though it is a rare chance."</p> + +<p>"But that will be just the fun of it," she hastened, half afraid lest +Harry should change his mind, "to see if we can possibly find one that +will be different from all these others."</p> + +<p>She kept this little feeling of exploration close about her, as they +left the car, a block above the green trees of the plaza, and entered +one of the narrow streets that was not even a cross-street, but an +alley, running to a bag's end, with balconies, green railings and +narcissi taking the sun.</p> + +<p>A slant-eyed baby in a mauve blouse stared after them; and a white face +so poisoned in its badness that it gave Flora a start, peered at them +from across the street. It made her shrink a little behind Harry's broad +shoulder and take hold of his arm. The mere touch of that arm was +security. His big presence, moving agilely<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span> beside her, seemed to fill +the street with its strength, as if, by merely flinging out his arms, +Samson-like, he could burst the dark walls asunder.</p> + +<p>In the middle of the block, sunk a little back from the fronts of the +others, the goldsmith's shop showed a single, filmed window; and the +pale glow through it proclaimed that the worker in metals preferred +another light to the sun's. The threshold was worn to a hollow that +surprised the foot; and the interior into which it led them gloomed so +suddenly around them after the broad sunlight, that it was a moment +before they made out the little man behind the counter, sitting hunched +up on a high stool.</p> + +<p>"Hullo, Joe," said Harry, in the same voice that hailed his friends on +the street-corners; but the goldsmith only nodded like a nodding +mandarin, as if, without looking up, he took them in and sensed their +errand. He wore a round, blue Chinese cap drawn over his crown; a pair +of strange goggles like a mask over his eyes, and his little body seemed +to poise as<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span> lightly on his high stool as a wisp, as if there were no +more flesh in it than in his long, dry fingers that so marvelously +manipulated the metal. Save for that glitter of gold on his glass plate, +and the grin of a lighted brazier, all was dark, discolored and +cluttered.</p> + +<p>And the way Harry bloomed upon this background of dubious antiquity! He +leaned on the little counter, which creaked under his weight, in his +big, fresh coat, with his clear, fresh face bent above the shallow tray +of trinkets—doubtful jades, dim-eyed rings, dull clasps and coins—his +large, fastidious finger poked among. He was the one vital thing in the +shop.</p> + +<p>Over everything else was spread a dimness of age like dust. It enveloped +the little man behind the counter, not with the frailness that belongs +to human age, but with that weathered, polished hardness which time +brings to antiques of wood and metal. Indeed, he appeared so like a +carved idol in a curio shop that Flora was a little startled to find +that he was looking at her. Chinamen had always seemed to her blank +automatons;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span> but this one looked keenly, pointedly, as if he personally +took note. She told herself whimsically that perhaps it was his +extraordinary glasses that gave point to that expression; and presently +when he took them off she was surprised to see it seemed verily true. +His little physiognomy had no more expression than a withered nut. But +there was something about it more disturbing than its vanishing +intelligence, something unexpected, and out of harmony with the rest of +him, yet so illusive that, flit over him as her eye would, she failed to +find it.</p> + +<p>"Harry," she murmured to Cressy, who was still stirring the contents of +the box with a disdainful forefinger, "this little man gives me the +shivers."</p> + +<p>"Old Joe?" Harry smiled indulgently. "He's a queer customer. Been quite +a figurehead in Chinatown for twenty years. Say, Joe, heap bad!" and +with the back of his hand he flicked the tray away from him.</p> + +<p>The little man undoubled his knees and de<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span>scended the stool. He stood +breast-high behind the counter. He dropped a lack-luster eye to the box. +"Velly nice," he murmured with vague, falling inflection.</p> + +<p>"Oh, rotten!" Harry laughed at him.</p> + +<p>"You no like?"</p> + +<p>"No. No like. You got something else—something nice?"</p> + +<p>"No." It was like a door closed in the face of their hope—that falling +inflection, that blank of vacuity that settled over his face, and his +whole drooping figure. He seemed to be only mutely awaiting their +immediate departure to climb back again on his high stool. But Harry +still leaned on the counter and grinned ingratiatingly. "Oh, Joe, you +good flen'. You got something pretty—maybe?"</p> + +<p>The curtain of vacuity parted just a crack—let through a gleam of +intense intelligence. "Maybe." The goldsmith chuckled deeply, as if +Harry had unwittingly perpetrated some joke—some particularly clever +conjurer's trick. He sidled out behind the counter, past the grin<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span>ning +brazier, and shuffled into the back of the shop where he opened a door.</p> + +<p>Flora had expected a cupboard, but the vista it gave upon was a long, +black, incredibly narrow passage, that stretched away into gloom with +all the suggestion of distance of a road going over a horizon. Down this +the goldsmith went, with his straw slippers clapping on his heels, until +his small figure merged in the gloom and presently disappeared +altogether, and only the faint flipper-flap of his slippers came back +growing more and more distant to them, and finally dying into silence. +In the stillness that followed while they waited they could hear each +other breathe. The little shop with the water-stained walls and the +ancient odor—ancient as the empire of China—inclosed them like a spell +cast around them by a vanishing enchanter to hold them there mute until +his returning. They did not look at each other, but rather at the +glowing brazier, at the gold on the glass plates, at the forms of people +passing in the street, moving palely across the dim window pane, as<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</a></span> +distant to Flora's eye as though they moved in another world. Then came +the flipper-flap of the goldsmith's slippers returning. The sound +snapped their tension, and Harry laughed.</p> + +<p>"Lord knows how far he went to get it!"</p> + +<p>"Across the street?" Flora wondered.</p> + +<p>"Or under it. And it won't be worth two bits when it gets here." He +peered at the little man coming toward them down the passage, flapping +and shuffling, and carrying, held before him in both hands, a square, +deep little box.</p> + +<p>It was a worn, nondescript box that he set down before them, but the +jealous way he had carried it had suggested treasure, and Flora leaned +eagerly forward as he raised the cover, half expecting the blaze of a +jewel-case. She saw at first only dull shanks of metal tumbled one upon +the other. But, after a moment's peering, between them she caught gleams +of veritable light. Her fingers went in to retrieve a hoop of heavy +silver, in the midst of which was sunk a flawed topaz. She admired a +moment the play of light over the imperfection.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[Pg 116]</a></span>"But this isn't Chinese," she objected, turning her surprise on Harry.</p> + +<p>"Lots of 'em aren't. These men glean everywhere. That's pretty." He held +up a little circle of discolored but lusterful pearls—let it fall +again, since it was worth only a glance. He leaned on the counter, +indifferent to urge where value seemed so slight. He seemed amused at +Flora's enthusiasm for clouded opals.</p> + +<p>"They look well enough among this junk," he said, "but compare them with +your own rings and you'll see the difference."</p> + +<p>She heard him dreamily. She was wishing, as she turned over the tumble +of damaged jewels, that things so pretty might have been perfect. To +find a perfect thing in this place would be too extraordinary to hope +for. Yet, taking up the next, and the next, she found herself wishing it +might be this one—this cracked intaglio. No? Then this blue one—say. +The setting spoke nothing for it. It was a plain, thin, round hoop of +palpable brass, and the battered thing seemed almost too feeble to hold +the soli<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</a></span>tary stone. But the stone! She looked it full in the eye, the +big, blazing, blue eye of it. What was the matter with this one? A flaw? +She held it to the light.</p> + +<p>She felt Harry move behind her. She knew he couldn't but be looking at +it. For how, by all that was marvelous, had she for a moment doubted it? +Down to its very heart, which was near to black, it was clear fire, and +outward toward the facets struck flaming hyacinth hues with zigzag white +cross-lights that dazzled and mesmerized. Just the look of it—the +marvelous deep well of its light—declared its truth.</p> + +<p>"Harry," she breathed, without taking her gaze from the thing in her +hand, "do look at this!"</p> + +<p>She felt him lean closer. Then with an abrupt "Let's see it," he took it +from her—held it to the light, laid it on his palm, looking sharply +across the counter at the shopkeeper, then back at the ring with a long +scrutiny. His face, too, had a flush of excitement.</p> + +<p>"Is it—good?" Flora faltered.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</a></span>"A sapphire," he said, and taking her third finger by the tip, he slid +on the thin circle of metal.</p> + +<p>She breathed high, looking down at the stone with eyes absorbed in the +blue fire. There was none of the cupidity of women for jewels in her +look. It was the intrinsic beauty of this drop of dark liquid light that +had captured her. It had mystery, and her imagination woke to it—the +wistful mystery of perfect beauty. And perfect beauty in such a place! +It was too beautiful. The feeling it brought her was too sharp for pure +pleasure. It was dimly like fear. Yet instinctively she shut her hand +about the ring. She murmured out her wonder.</p> + +<p>"How in the world did such a thing come here?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, not so strange," Harry answered. He leaned on his elbow upon the +counter, his head bent close to hers above the single, glittering point +that drew the four eyes to one focus. "Sailors now and then pick up a +thing of whose value they have no idea—get hard up, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</a></span> pawn it—still +without any idea. These chaps"—and his bold hand indicated the +shopkeeper—"take in anything—that is, anything worth their while; and +wait, and wait, and wait until they see just the moment—and turn it to +account."</p> + +<p>It might be because Harry's eyes were so taken with the jewel that his +tongue ran recklessly. He had spoken low, but Flora sent an anxious +glance to be sure the shopkeeper hadn't overheard. She had meant only to +glance, but she found herself staring into eyes that stared back from +the other side of the counter. That wide, unwinking scrutiny filled her +whole vision. For an instant she saw nothing but the dance of +scintillant pupils. Then, with a little gasp she clutched at her +companion's arm.</p> + +<p>"Oh, Harry!"</p> + +<p>His glance came quickly round to her. "Why, what's the matter?"</p> + +<p>She murmured, "That Chinaman has blue eyes."</p> + +<p>He looked at her with good-natured wonder.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</a></span>"Why, Flora, haven't you blue on the brain? I believe he has, though," +he added, as he peered across the counter at the shopkeeper, whose gaze +now fluttered under narrowed lids; "but why in the world should blue +eyes scare you?" His look returned indulgently to Flora's face.</p> + +<p>She could not explain her reason of fear to him. She could not explain +it to herself more than that the eyes had seemed to know. What? She +could not tell; but they had had a deadly intelligence. She only +whispered back, "But he is awful!"</p> + +<p>"Oh, I guess not," Harry grinned, and turned his back to the counter, +"only part white. Makes him a little sharper at a bargain."</p> + +<p>But, in spite of his off-handedness, Flora saw he was alert, touched +with excitement. Once or twice he looked from the shopkeeper to the +sapphire.</p> + +<p>"Do you like it, Flora?" he said. "Do you<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</a></span> want it?" He spoke eagerly +against her reluctance.</p> + +<p>"It is the most beautiful thing I ever saw, but—" She could not put it +to him why she shrank from it. That feeling which had touched her at the +first had a little expanded, the sense of the sapphire's sinister charm. +She faltered out as much as she could explain. "It's too much for me."</p> + +<p>His shoulders shook with appreciation of this. "Oh, I guess not! If you +keep that up I shall be thinking you mean it is too much for me."</p> + +<p>It hadn't been in the least what she meant, but now that he had +suggested it to her—"Well, I shouldn't like it to be," she blushed, but +she braved him.</p> + +<p>The ring of his laughter filled the little, dark, old shop, and made the +proprietor blink.</p> + +<p>"Oh, I guess not," he said again, and with that he seemed to make an end +of her hesitations. There was not another objection she could bring up. +She let him draw the ring off<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[Pg 122]</a></span> her hand with a mingled feeling of +reluctance and relief. She saw him turn briskly to the shopkeeper.</p> + +<p>"Now, Joe, how much you want?" That much she heard as she turned away +with a fear lest it might, and a hope that it would be, too much for +him!</p> + +<p>She lingered away to the door, through whose upper glazed half she saw +the street swarming and sunny, picked out with streamers of red and +squares of green. The murmur of traffic outside was faint to her ears. +The murmur of the two voices talking on inside the shop momently grew +fainter. She looked behind her and saw them now in the back of the shop, +close by the grinning brazier.</p> + +<p>The light of it showed what would have been otherwise dark. It showed +her Harry, straddling, hands in pockets, hat thrust back, a silhouette +as hard as if cast in cold metal. The aspect of him, thus, was strange, +not quite unlike himself, but giving her the feeling that she<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</a></span> had never +known how much Harry smoothed over.</p> + +<p>Perhaps men were always like that with men. Still she looked away again +because she felt she had taken a liberty in catching him when he was +coming out so plain and coming out so positive to the shopkeeper, whom +he seemed really to be bullying. She felt that, considering the +sapphire, nothing that went on about it could be too extraordinary. And +yet the tone their voices were taking on made her nervous. Whatever they +were arguing about, she found it hard to go on standing thus with her +back to it, and for so long, while her expectancy tightened, and her +unreasonable idea that she did not want the ring, more and more took +hold of her. If he did not want to sell it, why not let it go—the +beautiful thing!</p> + +<p>She thought she would call Harry, and suggest it—but no. She hesitated. +She would give them a chance to finish it themselves. She would count +ten pigtails past the window first.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[Pg 124]</a></span> She watched the last far into the +distance, and still she was there, blowing hot and cold. She would call +to Harry—call out to him from where she stood, that she wouldn't have +the thing.</p> + +<p>She turned, and there they were yet. They had not moved. The shadow of +the gesticulating little Chinaman danced like a bird on the wall, and +before him Harry glowed, immovable, but ruddy, as if the hard metal +whereof he was cast was slowly heating through. The thought came to her +then. Harry was iron! The hard shade of his profile on the wall, the +stiff movement of his lips, the forward thrust of his head on his +shoulders gave her another thought. Was Harry also brutal? The sight of +that brutality awake, feeding, as it were, on the fluttering little +figure before it, distressed her. How long were they going on putting an +edge to their argument? There was continually with her the fear that it +might sharpen into a quarrel; for now the goldsmith had ceased his +gesticulation and became suddenly immobile, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</a></span> still Harry was +requiring of him the same thing. It was insisted upon, by all the lines +of his stiff braced figure, and she had a fluttered expectancy that if +the little man didn't do something quickly, now—now it would happen.</p> + +<p>What she expected of Harry, a violent act or a quick relaxation of his +iron mood, she had not time to consider, for the shopkeeper had moved. +He was jerking his head, his thumb, and finally his arm in the direction +of the long, dim passage—such a pointed direction, such a singular +gesture, as to startle her with its incongruity. What had that to do +with the price of the ring? And if it had nothing to do with the price +of the ring, what had they been talking about? Her small scruple against +knowing what was going on behind her was forgotten. Indeed, now she was +oblivious of everything else. She was taking it in with all her eyes, +when Harry turned and looked at her. And, oddly enough, she thought he +looked as if he wondered how she came there. She saw him return to it +slowly. Then, in a flash, he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[Pg 126]</a></span> met her brilliantly. He came toward her +out of the gloom, holding the ring before him, as if with the light of +that, and the flash of his smile, he was anxious immediately to cover +his deficit.</p> + +<p>"I had the very devil of a time getting it," he said. "The little beggar +didn't want to let me have it." But there was a subsiding excitement in +his face, and a something in his manner, both triumphant and troubled, +which his explanation did not reasonably account for. Had Harry felt the +touch of the same strange influence that the little shop, and the +blue-eyed Chinaman, and the sapphire, had wrought around her? Or was it +something more salient, the same thing that had suggested itself to her +with the violent gesticulation of the shopkeeper at the passage—that +some question other than the mere transfer of the ring had come up +between them?</p> + +<p>"Harry"—she hesitated—"are you quite sure it's all right?"</p> + +<p>"All right?" The sudden edge in his voice<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</a></span> made her look at him. "Why, +it's genuine, if that's what you mean."</p> + +<p>It hadn't been, quite; but her meaning was too vague to put into +words—a mere sensation of uneasiness. She watched Harry turn the ring +over, as if he were reluctant to let it go out of his hands. And then, +looking at her, she thought his glance was a little uncertain. She +thought he hesitated, and when he finally slid the ring over her finger, +"I wouldn't wear it until it is reset," he said. "That setting isn't +gold. It's hardly decent."</p> + +<p>"Yes," she assented; "Clara will laugh at us."</p> + +<p>"She won't if we don't show it to her until it's fit to appear. In fact, +I would rather you wouldn't. As it is now, the thing doesn't represent +my gift to you."</p> + +<p>She felt this was Harry's conventional streak asserting itself. But even +she had to admit that an engagement ring which was palpably not gold was +rather out of the way.</p> + +<p>"You'd better keep it a day or two and look it over and make up your +mind how you want<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[Pg 128]</a></span> it set, and then we'll spring it on them," he +advised.</p> + +<p>But now it was finally on her finger, she did not want to think it would +ever have to be taken off again. She drew her glove over it. The great +facets showed sharp angles under the thin kid. She wished the sapphire +were not quite so large, so difficult to reconcile with everything else. +Now that she had the perfect thing with her, clasping her so heavily +around the third finger, she was half afraid it was going to be too much +for her, after all.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="VII" id="VII"></a>VII</h2> + +<h3>A SPELL IS CAST</h3> + +<p>It was hers! She did not believe it. It had been done too quickly. It +seemed to her she had hardly felt Harry slip it on her finger before +they had left the shop; that she had hardly shaken off the musty +inclosed atmosphere, before Harry had left her on the corner of +California and Powell Streets—left her alone with the ring! Still, she +didn't believe she had it, even while she looked at the large lump it +made under her glove. She kept feeling it with a cautious finger-tip.</p> + +<p>A trio of girls she knew flocked off the California Street car and +surrounded her. They were going to the White House for bargains in shirt +waists. They wanted to carry her off in their company. They encompassed +her in a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</a></span> chatter of lace and lingerie. There were held up to her all +the interests of her every-day existence; but these seemed to have no +part in her real life. They had never appeared more remote and trivial. +She kept her conscious hand in the folds of her skirt. She would have +liked to strip off her glove and show them the ring. It would have +entertained them so much. To herself its entertainment was of the +Arabian Nights—the way of its finding, its beauty in the false setting, +the struggle over it in the shop—all were wine to her imagination. It +was a thing to conjure adventure; it was a talisman of romance.</p> + +<p>She colored faintly as she mentally corrected herself. It was her +engagement ring, and as such she had never once thought of it. Strange, +when all the forms of her engagement had been so well observed; when +Harry himself represented that side of life to which she had tried to +form herself from as far back as the old days when her mother had made +fun of her fancies. It must be right, she thought, this life of +conventions and forms; and the queer way she saw<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[Pg 131]</a></span> things, something +wrong in her. But because she knew herself different, and because she +felt life without understanding it, she feared it. It was too big to +take hold of alone. And she was so alone; and Harry was so strong, so +matter-of-fact; alone like herself, yet adequate in the world she was +afraid of. She had accepted him as naturally, and yet as unreally, as +she took all that life, and to the moment she had never questioned the +wisdom or the happiness. She didn't question now. She only was shocked +that so large a fact in her life as her engagement could be completely +wiped out for the moment by a thing so trivial. It was not even the +ring. It was the feeling she had about the ring. Her imagination was +always running away with her, as it had the night at the club. And here +it was, still uncurbed, speeding her forward into fields of romance.</p> + +<p>She went over whole dramas—imaginary histories of chance and +circumstance—woven about the ring, as she walked up and down the long, +windy hills, westward and homeward, the blue<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[Pg 132]</a></span> bay on the one hand beaten +green under the rising "trade," and the fog coming in before her. With +the experience of the morning, and the exercise and the lively air, her +spirits were riding high. From time to time she had the greatest longing +to peep again at the sapphire, but not until the house door had closed +after her did she dare draw off her glove and look. It was still +glorious. What a pity she must take it off! Yet that point Harry had +made about not showing it had been too sharp to be disregarded. But what +could she say, supposing Clara asked about the morning's expedition? At +this thought all her spring deserted her, and she went slowly up the +stair. Perhaps Clara had forgotten about it, and then it recurred +reassuringly to her mind how seldom Clara touched anywhere near the +subject of her engagement.</p> + +<p>None the less, she went very softly down the hall, anxious lest Clara +might open her door and ask what she had brought home with her.</p> + +<p>But even in the refuge of her own rooms the ring encircled Flora with +unease. The light<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</a></span> of it on her finger made her restless. It wasn't that +she was apprehensive of it, but she could not forget it. She could hear +the maid Marrika moving about in the room beyond. She could hear the +rustle of clothes carried to and fro. She knew there were things to +dress for—a luncheon, and a bevy of teas—things which must be gone +through with, things which at other times she had found sufficiently +pleasurable. But now, try as she would to turn her mind to these, it +persistently wandered back to the jewel. All the fine, simple pleasure +of the morning was dazzled out by it. She slipped it off her finger on +to the dressing-table, and it lay among her laces like a purple prism, +cast by some unearthly sun in a magic glass. She had jewels, rubies +even—the most precious—but nothing that gave her this sense of +individual beauty, of beauty so keen as to be disturbing. She emptied +her jewel casket in a glittering heap around it. It shone out +unquenched. It had not been the dingy little shop, and the dingy little +street, and the odds and ends of jade and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</a></span> tarnished silver that had +made it of such a value. It seemed to her that any eye would fix it, any +hand pluck it out first from that shining heap before her.</p> + +<p>Marrika was coming in, and quickly Flora swept the jewels and the +sapphire back into the casket, turned the key upon them, and thrust it +back in the far corner of the drawer. She would give every one a great +surprise when the ring was properly set. She glanced nervously over her +shoulder to see if Marrika had noticed her action. The Russian had been +moving to and fro between the wardrobe and the dressing-table with a +droning thread of song. And now she took up the combs and brushes, and +filling her mouth with pins, began on the long river of yellow-brown +hair that flowed down Flora's back. The broad, pale face reflected +beside her own in the mirror was reassuring by its serene indifference. +She had soothing hands, Marrika. It was a luxury to be dressed by her, a +mental soporific. But to-day it wrought no relaxation in Flora's +tightened nerves. All the while she<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</a></span> was being combed and laced and +hooked her eyes were alertly on the dressing-table drawer, that remained +a little open; and presently she caught herself vaguely speculating on +how, after she had been fastened up and into her clothes so securely, +she could dispose upon herself the sapphire. How had she arrived at this +consideration? No course of reasoning led up to it. She was annoyed with +herself. If she wasn't going to wear the ring on her finger, and show +it, why did she want to take it with her at all? For fear it might be +lost? Lost, in her jewel box, in the back of the drawer! She blushed for +herself. She looked severely at her guilty reflection in the mirror. +Perhaps she did look tall; yes, and outwardly sophisticated, but +underneath that bold exterior Flora knew she was only the smallest, +youngest, most ridiculous child ever born. There were moments when this +fact appeared to her more vividly than at others. One had been the other +night when Kerr's eyes had looked through and through her; and here she +was again, when<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</a></span> she was going to a girls' luncheon, and most wanted to +feel competent, stared out of countenance by the wonderful eye of a +ring.</p> + +<p>Through the long afternoon it was more apparent to her than the faces of +the people around her. She was restless to get back to it, but people +talked interminably. At the luncheon they talked of Kerr. Flora knew +these girls felt a little resentment that she had so easily captured +Harry Cressy; for Harry had been more than an eligible man in the little +city. He had been an eligible personage. Not that he had money; not that +his family tree was plainly planted in their midst; but that without +these two things he had achieved what, with these things, the people he +knew were all striving for. He stood before them as the embodiment of +what they most believed in—perfect bodily splendor, and perfect +knowledge of how to get on with the world; and the fact that he wouldn't +quite be one of them, but after five years still stood a little +off—made him shine with greater brilliance, especially in the eyes of +these young<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</a></span> girls. It was hard, they seemed to feel, that such an +apparently remote and difficult person should have succumbed so easily; +and now that a new luminary of equal luster was apparent in their sky, +Flora felt their remarks a little triumphantly aimed at her. It was odd +to her that they should envy her anything, especially those one or two +exquisite flowers of old families, whose lovely eyes saw not one inch +farther than her turquoise collar. And the way they talked of Kerr, with +flourishes, made her feel a faint, responsive irritation that he had +talked to so many of them in exactly the same way.</p> + +<p>But between the threads of interest the table group wove together, kept +flashing up her furtive desire to be away, to be at home, to see what +had happened to the sapphire. Of course, she knew that nothing could +have happened; but she wanted to look at it, to open the casket and see +the flash of it before her eyes. For was she quite sure that it was not +one of those fairy gifts, which, put into the hand in a blaze of beauty, +may be found in the pocket as withered<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</a></span> leaves? Yet her tenacious nets +of duty caught and caught, and again caught her, so that when the +carriage finally fetched her home it was between lighted street-lamps.</p> + +<p>They were dining early that night on account of the Bullers' box party, +but it was nearly eight o'clock before Flora reached the house. And it +was, of course, for that reason that she ran up-stairs—ran wildly, +regardlessly, before the eyes of Shima—and along the hall, her high +heels clacking on the hard floors, and through her bedroom to the +dressing-room, snatched open the table drawer, unlocked the casket with +a twitch of the key—and, ah, it was there! It was really real! Why, +what had she expected? She was laughing at herself.</p> + +<p>She was gay in her relief at getting back to the sapphire, but at the +same time she was already wondering what she should do about it that +night—take it with her or leave it alone? Dared she wear it on her +finger under her glove? Clara might notice the unfamiliar form of the +jewel through the thin kid. Harry's<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</a></span> warning had been phrased +conventionally enough, but the hints his words conveyed had expanded in +her mind—fear not only of Clara's laughter, that such a jewel had come +from a junk shop, but of her wonder, her questions, her ability of +getting out the story of the whole erratic proceeding, even to the +strange pantomime between Harry and the blue-eyed Chinaman. Clara was +marvelous!</p> + +<p>Flora watched her curiously across the table that evening, wondering +what was that quality of hers by which she acquired. Hitherto Flora had +accepted it as a fact without question, but now she had a desire to +place it. It was not beauty, for though Clara was pretty, like a +polished Greuze, she was colorless and flavorless, lacking the vivid +heat of magnetism. More probably it consisted in a certain sort of +sweetness Clara could produce on occasions, a way she had of looking and +speaking which Flora could only describe as smooth. But smooth without +texture or softness; smooth as quick-flowing water, smooth as glass—a +surface upon which even cau<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</a></span>tion might lose its equilibrium. For the +danger in Clara was that she was disarming. There was nothing +antagonistic in her. One noticed her slowly. The flat tones of her voice +made background for other people's conversations. The pale tints of her +gown blended with the pale tones of her hair and flesh. Beside Clara's +exquisite gradations Flora felt herself without shades, a creature of +violent contrasts and impulses. If Clara had been going to carry the +ring about with her she would have had a reason for it. But Flora had +nothing but a silly fancy.</p> + +<p>She made up her mind to leave the sapphire at home; but in her last +moment in her room the resolution failed her. Harry, of course, would be +angry if he knew, but Harry wouldn't see the thing under her glove.</p> + +<p>She came down to where Clara was waiting for her, with the guilty +feeling of a child who has concealed a contraband cake; but the way +Clara looked her over made her conscious that she had not concealed her +excitement. Clara<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</a></span> was always cool. What would it be like, she wondered, +to feel the same about everything? How would it seem to be no more +elated by the expectation of listening to the most beautiful of tenors +than over the next meeting of the Decade Club? Was that what she was +coming to in time? Not to-night, she thought; and not, at least, while +that talisman of romance clasped her around the third finger.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="VIII" id="VIII"></a>VIII</h2> + +<h3>A SPARK OF HORROR</h3> + +<p>They found Harry waiting for them in the theater lobby. He had come up +too late from Burlingame to do more than meet the party there. The +Bullers were already in the box, he said, and the second act of <i>I' +Pagliacci</i> just beginning.</p> + +<p>As they came to the door of the box the lights were down, the curtain up +on a dim stage, and the chorus still floating into the roof, while the +three occupants of the box were indistinguishable figures, risen up and +shuffling chairs to the front for Flora and Clara. It was too dark to +distinguish faces.</p> + +<p>But dark as it was, Flora knew who was sitting behind her. She heard him +speaking. Un<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[Pg 143]</a></span>der the notes of the recitative he was speaking to Clara. +The pleasure of finding him here was sharpened by the surprise. She +listened to his voice, the mere intonation of which brought back to her +their walk through the Presidio woods as deliciously as if she were +still there.</p> + +<p>Then, as the tenor took up the theme, all talking ceased—Ella's husky +whisper, Clara's smoother syllables, and the flat, slow, variable voice +of Kerr—the whole house seemed to sink into stiller repose; the high +chords floated above the heads of the black pit like colored bubbles, +and Flora forgot the sapphire in the triple spell of the singing, the +darkness, and the face she was yet to see. She felt relaxed and released +from her guard by this darkness around her, that blotted out the sea of +faces beneath, that dissolved the walls and high galleries, that +obscured the very outline of the box where she sat, until she seemed to +be poised, half-way up a void of darkness, looking into a pit in the +hollowness of which a voice was singing.</p> + +<p>The stage was a narrow shelf of wood swung<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[Pg 144]</a></span> in that void, from which the +voice sang, and a bare finger of light followed it about from place to +place. The sweet, searching tenor notes, the semblance of passion and +reality the gesticulating Frenchman threw over all the stage, and the +<i>crescendo</i> of the tragedy carried her into a mood that barred out Ella, +barred out Clara, barred out Harry more than any; but, unaccountably, +Kerr was still with her. He was there by no will of hers, but by some +essence of his own, some quality that linked him, as it linked her, to +the passionate subtleties of life. He seemed to her the eager spirit +that was prompting and putting forward this comedy and tragedy playing +on before her. She heard him reasserted, vigorous, lawless, wandering, +in the voice of the mimic strolling player addressing his mimic +audience. The appeal of the tenor to the voiceless galleries, +"Underneath this little play we show, there is another play," seemed +indeed the very voice of Kerr repeating itself. And with the climax of +the sharp tragedy in the middle of the comic stage she<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[Pg 145]</a></span> placed him +again, but placed him this time in the mimic audience looking on, +neither applauding nor dissenting; but rather as if he watched the play +and played it, too.</p> + +<p>The lights went up with a spring. A wave of motion flickered over the +house, the talking voices burst forth all at once, and she saw him, +really saw him for the first time that evening, as in her fancy, part of +the audience; as in her fancy, neither applauding nor dissenting, yet +with what a difference! He leaned back in his chair, and leaned his head +a little back, as if, for weariness, he wished there were a rest behind +it; and how indifferently, how critically, how levelly he surveyed the +fluttered house, and the figures in the box beside him! How foreign he +appeared to the ardent spirit who had dominated the dark; how emptied of +the heat of imagination, how worn, how dry; and even in his salience, +how singularly pathetic! He was neither the satanic person of the first +night, nor her comrade of the Presidio hills. And if the expression of +his face was not quite so cheap as<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</a></span> cynicism, it was just the absence of +belief in anything.</p> + +<p>She felt a lump in her throat, an ache of the cruelest disappointment, +as though some masker, masking as the fire of life, had suddenly removed +the covering of his face and showed her the burnt-out bones beneath. The +shift from what she remembered him to what he now appeared was too rapid +and considerable for her. She found herself looking at him through a +mist of tears—there in the heart of publicity, in the middle of the +circle of red velvet curtains!</p> + +<p>He turned and saw her. She watched a smile of the frankest pleasure +rising, as it were, to the surface of his weary preoccupation. Something +had delighted him. Why, it was herself—just her being there! And she +could only helplessly blink at him. Was ever anything so stupid as to be +caught in tears over nothing! For the next moment he had caught her. She +knew by the change of his look, interrogative, amused, incredulous. He +straightened and leaned forward.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Really," he said, "you must remember that little man has only gone out +for a glass of beer."</p> + +<p>So he thought it was the tenor who had brought her to the point of +tears.</p> + +<p>"Ah, why do you say that?" she protested.</p> + +<p>He continued to smile indulgently upon her. "Would you really rather +believe it true?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know. But I wish <i>you</i> hadn't thought of the beer."</p> + +<p>He brought the glare of his monocle to bear full upon her. "Why not? It +is all we make sure of."</p> + +<p>So he had taken that side of it. By his words as well as his looks he +repudiated all the gallant show of romance he had paraded to her before, +and had taken up the cause of the world as flatly as Harry could have +done.</p> + +<p>"Oh, if to be sure is all you want," she burst out; "but you don't mean +it! Wouldn't you rather have something beautiful you weren't sure of, +than something certain that didn't matter?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[Pg 148]</a></span>He nodded to this quite casually, as if it were an old acquaintance.</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes; but the time comes round when you want to be sure of +something. The sun never sets twice alike over Mont Pelee; but you can +always get the same brand of lager to-day that you had the week before." +He looked at her with a faint amusement. "And by your expression I take +it you don't know how fine some of those brands are. Life is not half +bad—even when it is only a means to the beer."</p> + +<p>Under these garish lights, in the middle of this theater of people, +facing the bland, almost banal, stare of that monocle, it looked +exceedingly probable that, after all, in spite of her dreaming, this was +what life would prove to be. But she hated the thought, as she hated +that Kerr should be the one to show it to her; as she would have hated +her ring if, after all its splendor in the shop, it should have turned +out to be a piece of colored glass.</p> + +<p>"No, no! I won't believe you," she stoutly denied him. "There <i>is</i> more +in life than you<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[Pg 149]</a></span> can touch. You're not like yourself to say there is +not."</p> + +<p>He laughed, but rather shortly.</p> + +<p>"My dear child, forgive me; I'm sulky to-night. I feel, as I felt at +eighteen, that the world has treated me badly. I've lost my luck."</p> + +<p>The way his voice dropped at the last sounded to her the weariest thing +she had ever heard. He settled back in his chair again, and looked +moodily out across the brilliant house.</p> + +<p>"I'm sorry." Her tone was sweetly vague. What could be the matter with +him? Then, half timidly, she rallied him. "If you go on like this, I +shall have to show you my talisman."</p> + +<p>"Oh, have you indeed a talisman?" he humored her. And it was as if he +said, "Oh, have you a doll?" He did not even turn his head to look at +her.</p> + +<p>She was chilled. She felt the disappointment, that his quick smile had +lightened, return upon her. She hardly noticed the rise of the curtain +on the second little play, and the singing voices did not reach her with +any poignancy.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[Pg 150]</a></span> She was vaguely aware of movements in the box—of +Harry's coming in, of Clara's little rustle making room for him, of the +shift of Ella's chair away from the business of listening, toward him, +and her husky whisper going on with some prolonged tale of dull +escapade; but to Flora they all made only a banal background for the +brooding silence of her companion. He had thrown his mood over her until +she was ready to doubt even the potency of her talisman to counteract +it.</p> + +<p>She felt of the stone. She drew off her glove and tried to look at it in +the dim light, but couldn't get a gleam out of it. She was as impatient +for the lights to go up that she might secretly be cheered by its +wonder, as she had been that afternoon to get back from the luncheon, +and make sure it was still in the drawer. She must see it in spite of +Clara at her right hand, whose little chiseled profile might turn upon +her at any moment a full face of inquiry.</p> + +<p>She held her left hand low in the shadow of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[Pg 151]</a></span> her chair; and if, as the +lights went up again, there was any change in the sapphire, it was +merely a sharper brilliance, as if, like an eye, it had moods, and this +was one of its moments of excitement. In its extraordinary luster it +seemed to possess a beauty that could not be valued; and she wanted to +hold it up to Kerr, to see if she couldn't startle him out of his +mood—to see if he wouldn't respond to it, "Yes, there is more in it +than you can touch."</p> + +<p>She turned to him with the daring flash of timid spirits. It was so +sharp a motion that he started instantly from his reverie to meet it, +but his alacrity was mechanical. She felt the smile he summoned was +slow, as if he returned, from a long distance, a little painfully to his +present surroundings.</p> + +<p>The <i>Intermezzo</i> was playing, and to speak under the music he leaned so +close his shoulder touched her chair. Through that narrow space between +them, almost beneath his eyes, she moved her hand—a gesture so slightly +emphasized as to seem accident. He had started to speak, but<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[Pg 152]</a></span> her motion +seemed to stop his tongue. He looked hard at her hand, and something +violent in his intentness made her clutch the side of the chair. +Instantly she met his look, so fiercely, cruelly challenging, that it +took her like a blow. For a moment they looked at each other, her eyes +wide with fright, his narrowed to a glare under the terrible intentness +of his brows. What had she done? What threatened her? What could save +her in this sea of people? Then, while she gazed, his challenge burned +out to a pale hard scrutiny, that faded to no expression at all—or was +it that any expression would have seemed dim after the terrible one that +had flashed across his face?</p> + +<p>She was as shaken as if he had seized hold of her. If he had snatched +the ring off her finger she wouldn't have been more shocked. The whole +box must be transfixed by him, and the whole house be looking at nothing +but their little circle of horror! She was ready for it. She was braced +for anything but the fact which actually confronted her—that no one had +noticed them at all. It was monstrous that such a thing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[Pg 153]</a></span> could have been +without their knowing! But there was no face in all the orchestra, the +crowded galleries, or the tiers of boxes to affirm that anything had +happened; no face in their own box had even stirred, but Clara's, and +that had merely turned from profile to the full, faintly inquiring, +mild, and palely pink in the warm reflections of the red velvet +curtains.</p> + +<p>And what could Clara have seen, if she had seen at all, but Flora a +little paler than usual with a hand that trembled; and what worse could +Clara conjecture than that she was being silly about Kerr? She turned +slowly toward him, and looked at him with a courage that was part of her +fear. But wasn't she, in a way, being silly about Kerr? What had become +of his expression that had threatened her? There was nothing left of it +but her own violent impression—and the longer Kerr sat there, talking +from her to Clara, from Clara to Judge Buller, his eyes keeping pace +with his light conversational flights, the less Flora felt sure he had +ever fixed her with that intensity.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[Pg 154]</a></span>And yet the thing had actually happened. Its evidence was before her. He +had been silent. Now he was talking. He had been absent. Now she thought +she had never seen him more vividly concerned with the moment. Yet for +all his cool looks and diffuse talk around the box, she felt uneasily +that his concern was pointed at her, and that he would never let her go. +He only waited for the cover of the last act to come back to her +single-handed.</p> + +<p>She would have deflected his attack, but it was too quick, too +unexpected for her to do more than sit helpless, and let him lift up her +left hand, delicately between thumb and finger, as if in itself it was +some rare, fine curio, and, bending close, contemplate the sapphire +unwinkingly. She had an instant when she thought she must cry out, but +how impossible in the awful publicity of her place—a pinnacle in the +face of thousands! And after the first fluttered impulse came a certain +reassurance in such a frank and trivial action. For all its intensity, +how could it be construed otherwise than a lively if unconven<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</a></span>tional +interest? It must have been her own fancy which had discerned anything +more than that in his first look at her. And yet, when he had laid her +hand lightly back, and readjusted his monocle, and looked out, away from +her, across the black house, she didn't know whether she was more +reassured or troubled because he had not spoken a word. Yet the next +moment he looked around at her.</p> + +<p>"We shan't meet every evening in such a way as this," he said, and left +the statement dangling unanswerable between them. It sounded +portentous—final. She wondered that in the middle of her fear it could +strike such a sharp note of regret in her. She knew she would regret not +meeting him again; and yet she shrank from the thought she could still +want to meet him. By one look her whole feeling of sympathy, of +reliance, of admiration, that had flowed out to him so naturally she had +scarcely been aware of it, had been troubled and mixed with fear. She +couldn't answer. She could only look at him with a reflection of her +trouble in her face.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[Pg 156]</a></span>"Are you surprised that I thought of that?" he inquired. "It's not so +odd as you seem to think that I should want to see you again. I don't +want to leave it to chance; do you?" He shot the question at her so +suddenly, with such a casual eye, and such dry gravity of mouth, that he +had her admission out of her before she realized the extent of its +meaning. And the way he took that admission for granted, and overlooked +her confusion, made her feel that for the sake of whatever he was after +he was intentionally ignoring what it did not suit his convenience to +see. She knew he must have seen; that every moment while she had changed +and fluttered his eye had never left her.</p> + +<p>"Then when are you at home?" he asked her; and by his tone, he conveyed +the impression that he was only making courteous response to some +invitation she had offered him; though, when she thought, she had not +offered it, he had got it out of her. He had got it by sheer +impertinence. But none the less he had it. She couldn't escape him there.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[Pg 157]</a></span>She answered somewhat stiffly: "Fridays, second and fourth."</p> + +<p>He looked at her with a humorous twist of mouth. "What? So seldom?"</p> + +<p>She was impotent if he wouldn't be snubbed; but at the worst she +wouldn't be cornered. "Oh, dear, no—but people who come at other times +take a chance."</p> + +<p>"Does that mean that I may take mine to-morrow?"</p> + +<p>He was pressing her too hard. Why was he so anxious to see her, as he +had not been the first night or yesterday, or even ten minutes ago? She, +who, ten minutes ago, would have been glad, now was doing her best to +put him off. She was silent a moment, considering the conventions, and +then, like him, she abandoned them. Without a word she turned away from +him. Whatever she said, he had her. But, if she said nothing and still +he came to-morrow, whatever she did then, he would have to take the +consequences of his insistence. Her only desire now was to evade him, +lest he should force her out<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[Pg 158]</a></span> of her non-committal attitude. She wanted +to shield herself from further pursuit.</p> + +<p>She couldn't escape yet, for the figures on the stage were still +gesticulating and trilling, and the people around her, in the small +inclosure where she sat, hemmed her in so that she could no more move +away from Kerr than if she had been that impaled specimen he had made +her feel at their first meeting. The most she could do was to turn away, +but even thus, with her eyes averted and her ears full of Ella's voice, +she was still acutely aware of him, sitting looking straight before him +across the black house with a face worn, wary, weathered to any +catastrophe, and such an air of being alertly fixed on something a long +way off, that her silence made no more difference to him than her +flutterings and her rudeness. And yet she knew he was only waiting; +waiting his chance to get at her again and make her commit herself; and +that, she was determined, should not happen.</p> + +<p>What had already happened, through its very violence, had left an +impression like a dream.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[Pg 159]</a></span> It seemed unreal, and yet it had made her +forget everything else—the stage, the people around her, and even the +very sapphire that had generated her inexplicable situation. She drew +her glove over the ring. The lights were imminent. It would be hard to +hide the great flash of the jewel. And besides, she didn't trust it. She +couldn't tell in what direction it might not strike out a spark of +horror next.</p> + +<p>The rustle of final departure was all over the house. The people in the +box were stirring and beginning to stand up; and Flora saw Kerr turn and +look at her. She wanted some one to stand between herself and Kerr, and +it was to Harry that she turned; not alone that he was so large and +adequate, but because she thought she saw in him an inclination to step +into that very place where she wanted him. She saw he was a little +sullen, and though she didn't suspect him quite of jealousy, she +wondered if he had not a right to blame her for the appearance of +flirtation that she and Kerr must have presented. Then how much more +might he blame her for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[Pg 160]</a></span> what she had actually done—for deliberately +showing the sapphire to Kerr! The very thought of it frightened her. She +knew she was rattling to Harry all the while he fetched her cloak and +put it on her, and she was glad now of that ability she had cultivated +in herself of making a smooth crust of talk over her seething feelings. +She talked the harder, she even took hold of Harry's arm to be sure of +keeping him there between her and what she was afraid of, as they came +out on the sidewalk and stood waiting in the windy night for the +approach of their carriage lights.</p> + +<p>Row upon row of street lamps flared in the traveling gusts. The midnight +noises of the city were at their loudest; and half their volume seemed +to be a scattered chorus of hoarse voices yelling all together like a +pack of wolves. Thin, ragged shapes shot in and out among the crowd, +ducked under horses' feet and cut wild zigzags across the street like +flying goblins. The sense of their cry was indistinguishable, but it was +the same—the same inarticulate shape of sound on every tongue. First +one throat, then<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[Pg 161]</a></span> another took up the raucous singsong shout, then all +together again, as if the pack were in full cry on the scent of +something. What was this fresh quarry of the press, Flora wondered, that +made it give tongue so hideously? The hunting note of it made her want +to cover her ears, and yet she strained to catch its meaning.</p> + +<p>She had stooped her head to the carriage door, when Harry stopped and +took one of the damp papers from a crier in the pack. She saw the +head-line. It covered half the sheet—the great figure that was offered +for the return of the Chatworth ring.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[Pg 162]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="IX" id="IX"></a>IX</h2> + +<h3>ILLUMINATION</h3> + +<p>Just when the two ideas had coalesced in her mind Flora couldn't be +sure. It had been some time in the first dark hour that she had spent +wide awake in her bed. There had been two ideas distinctly. Two +impressions of the evening remained with her; and the last one, the +great figures that had stared at her from the paper, the fact that had +been Harry's secret, made common now in round numbers, had for the +moment swallowed up the first.</p> + +<p>For all the way home that sum was kept before her by Clara's talk. She +could remember nothing of that talk except that it hadn't been able for +a moment to leave the Chatworth ring alone. It had been aimed at Harry, +but it had<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[Pg 163]</a></span> fallen to Flora herself to answer Clara's quick +speculations, for Harry had been obstinately silent, though not +indifferent, as if in his own mind he was as unable to leave it alone as +Clara. One with his silence, one with her talk, they had written the +figures of the reward so blazingly in Flora's mind that for the moment +she could see nothing else. Yet now she was alone her first adventure +recurred to her. As soon as she was quiet in the dark there came back +with reminiscent terror the look that Kerr had given her in the box. She +wasn't really afraid of Kerr himself. She was afraid of the meaning of +his look which she didn't understand. It only established in her mind a +great significance for the sapphire, if it could produce such an +expression on a human face. It had given him more than a mere +expression. It had given him an impulse for pursuit, as if, like a +magnet, it was fairly dragging him. He had covered his impulse by his +very frankness, but she knew he had pursued her—that for the matter of +seeing her again he had hunted her down. And what<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</a></span> had followed that? +Why, she was back again to the great figures in the paper.</p> + +<p>At first it seemed as though she had taken a clean leap from one subject +to another. She had in no way connected them. But all at once they were +connected. She couldn't separate them. She didn't know whether she had +been stupid not to have seen them so before, or whether she was stupid +to see them so now. For the thought that had sprung up in her mind was +monstrous. It startled her so broad awake that she sat up in bed to meet +it the more alertly. She sat up trembling. She felt like one who has +walked a long way in a wood, hearing crafty footsteps following in the +bushes. And now the beast had sprung out, and she was panting, +terrified, not knowing which way to run.</p> + +<p>The room was dark except for now and again the yellow square of light, +from some passing cable car, traveling along the ceiling. The four walls +around her, their dark bulks of furniture and light ripple of moving +curtains, shut her up with this monster of her mind. The longer she<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[Pg 165]</a></span> +looked at it the less she felt sure it was real, and yet it was before +her. It was there with none of the loveliness of her first fancies about +the ring. It was there with grisly reality. It had not been conjured up. +It had sprung upon her from the solid actualities of the night. And, +yes, of the day before—and the night before that. Oh, she had known +well enough that there had been something wrong at the goldsmith's shop. +She had felt it even before she had seen the sapphire; and afterward how +it had held them, both herself and Harry! To have moved Harry it must be +something indeed! Had he suspected it then, or had he only wondered?</p> + +<p>If he had suspected why hadn't he spoken of it? Well, her appalling +fancy prompted, hadn't he spoken of it?—though not to her. There +flashed back to her the memory of him there in the back of the shop with +the blue-eyed Chinaman. How furiously he had assailed the little man! +How uneasily, with what a dissatisfied air he had looked at the ring +even after it was on her finger, as if, after all, he had not compassed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[Pg 166]</a></span> +what he had wanted. She could be almost sure that the monstrous idea +which had just overtaken her had, however fleetingly, flashed before +Harry's mind in the goldsmith's shop. But surely he couldn't have +entertained it for a moment. That was impossible, or he would never have +let her take the sapphire—Harry, who had seen the ring, the very Crew +Idol itself, within the twenty-four hours.</p> + +<p>"A little heathen god curled round himself with a big blue stone on the +top-of his head." Harry hadn't said what sort of stone it was; but Kerr +had said it was a sapphire. There was a sapphire on her hand now. She +touched it with her finger-tips cautiously, as if to touch something +hot. So near to her! In the same room with her! On her own hand! It was +too much to be alone with in the dark! She reached out softly, as if she +feared to disturb some threatening presence lurking around her, and lit +the small night lamp on the low table by her bed. The shade was yellow, +and that contended with the blue of the sapphire, but couldn't break +its<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[Pg 167]</a></span> light. With the first flash of its splendor in her face she felt +certainty threatening her. She shook the ring quickly off her finger and +it fell with a light clatter on the table's marble top—fell with the +sapphire face down, and all its light hidden. She took it up again a +little fearfully, as if it might have got some harm; and again while she +looked at it it seemed to her that nothing that happened about this +jewel could be too extraordinary. If only it had been less wonderful, +less beautiful, she would not have felt so terribly afraid! She put it +back on the table and for a moment held her hand over it, as if she +imprisoned a living thing.</p> + +<p>Then, without looking again, she got out of bed and went to the window. +It overlooked the dark steep of the garden, the moving trees and the +lighter plane of the water. She leaned out, far out. Black housetops +marched against the bay, and between them, light by light, her eyes +followed the street-lamps down to the shore. If one could recover from +such a nightmare as she had it would be by leaning out<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[Pg 168]</a></span> into and facing +this wide soft dark. These shapeless roofs just below her the night made +mysterious; and yet they covered people that she knew—her +friends—kind, safe people! There had been nights when the city, through +this very window, had seemed to her a savage place; but now the wicked +fear that stood behind her—the fear that had got inside her house, that +had slipped unseen through the circle of friends, that stood behind her +now, filling her own room with its shadowy menace—had transformed the +city into a very haven of security.</p> + +<p>Oh, to escape out of this window into the innocent, sleeping city, away +from the horror at her back! To look in from the outside and be even +sure there was a horror! And if there was, to run away into the wide +soft dark! But how did she know, her fantastic idea persisted, that the +sapphire wouldn't follow her—the sapphire itself—the embodiment of her +fear? Then she dared not be driven out.</p> + +<p>But there was another way to be rid of it. The real idea occurred to +her. How easy it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[Pg 169]</a></span> would be to take it—that beautiful thing—and throw +it; throw it as hard as she could, and let the night take care of it. +The window was open, as if it stood ready, and there was the ring on the +table. She went to it, looked at it a moment without touching it, +holding her hands away.</p> + +<p>Then with a little shiver she backed away from it and sat down on the +foot of the bed. She looked pale and little, as if the eye of the ring, +blazing under the feeble lamp, like the evil eye, had sapped her fire +and youth. The only thing about her of any size and color was the heavy +braid of hair fallen over her shoulder. She hugged her arms around her +updrawn knees, and resting her chin upon them eyed the sapphire bravely.</p> + +<p>"What shall I do with you?" she somberly inquired of it. "You are a +dreadful thing. I don't know where you came from nor what you are, but I +am afraid—I am afraid you are—" She hesitated. The sapphire lay +shining like some idol set up for worship, and in spite of herself its +beauty moved her, if not to worship, at least to awe and fear.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</a></span>"I suppose you know I can't throw you away," she murmured, "and yet I +can't keep you!" She pondered, chin in hand. To take it to Harry! That +seemed the natural thing to do—the simplest way to be rid of it. She +hesitated.</p> + +<p>"If I only <i>knew</i>! If I only were sure!" She locked her fingers closer, +staring hard. If it had been the whole Crew Idol, the undismembered god +himself, then there would have been less terror, and one plain thing to +do. She looked hard at the sapphire setting, as if she hoped to discover +upon its brilliance some tell-tale trace of old soft gold; but there was +only one great, glassy, polished eye, and out of what head it had come, +whether from the forehead of the Crew Idol, or from that of some +unheralded deity, who was there who could tell her?</p> + +<p>She tried to summon a coherent thought, but again it was only a flash +out of the darkness.</p> + +<p>"Kerr! Why, he knows more than I." She looked at this stupidly for a +moment as if it were too large to take in at once. Of course he must +have known! Why hadn't she thought of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[Pg 171]</a></span> that before? Why hadn't she +thought of it that first moment, when he had turned on her in the box +with such terrible eyes? She drew in her shoulders, looking all around +at the dim corners of the room which the lamp flame failed to penetrate. +Behind her present lively fear a second shadow was growing, more dim, +more formless, more vast and dubious.</p> + +<p>What series of circumstances might have led up to Kerr's knowledge she +could not dream. He was one of whom nothing was incredible. From the +first moment his face had shot into the light, from the moment she had +heard his voice, like color in the level voices around him, she had been +bewildered by his variety. He had caught her up to the clouds. He had +whirled her along dubious levels, and more than once he had shown her +that the lines she had supposed drawn so sharply between this and that +could no more be discerned than meridians on green earth.</p> + +<p>If she had noticed any earnestness in him, it was his relish, his gusto +for the whole of life. He had no theory to set up. Just as it was he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[Pg 172]</a></span> +took it. If he persisted in requiring people to be themselves it was for +no good to themselves, but for the pleasure he himself got out of it. If +he made society into a little ball, and threw it away, it was only to +show it could be done.</p> + +<p>And where, she asked herself in a summing up, might such a man not be +found? But there were few places, indeed, in even the broadest plain of +possibility, which could hold knowledge of so particular and piercing a +quality as his look had implied. There had been so much more than +curiosity or surprise in it. She could hardly face the memory of it, so +cruelly it had struck her. There was no doubt in her mind that Kerr had +seen the ring. Somewhere in the pageant of his experience he had met it, +known it—but what he wanted of it—</p> + +<p>She broke off that thought, and looked long at the little flame of the +lamp. It was strange, but there was no doubt in her mind but that he +wanted it. That had been the strongest thing in his look. She felt +herself picking her way along a very narrow path, one step over either<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</a></span> +edge of which would plunge her chasms deep. Now she snatched at a frail +sapling to save herself. The fact that Kerr knew her stone didn't prove +it belonged to the Crew Idol. And if it didn't—if it wasn't the crown +of the heathen god, then her whole dreadful supposition fell to pieces. +But she hadn't proved it and the simplest way was just to ask Kerr. Her +chance for that was the chance he had fought so hard for, the chance of +their meeting the next day.</p> + +<p>She hadn't wanted that meeting when he had first asked her for it in the +box. She had feared it then, and all the more she feared it now, because +now she would have to do more than defend herself. She would take the +offensive; she would make the attack, now that she had a question to +ask. Why should the thought of it frighten her? If this was not the Crew +sapphire she would be no worse off than she had been. If it was, her +course would be clear. It seemed it should be simple, it should be easy +to face Kerr with her question; but she was possessed by the +apprehension that it would be neither. Would<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[Pg 174]</a></span> the question she had to +ask be a safe thing to give him? And if she dared undertake it and +should be overpowered after all—then everything would be lost.</p> + +<p>What the "everything" was she feared to lose would not come clear to +her. The only thing that did emerge definitely from the agitation of her +mind was the knowledge that this question that had been thrust upon her +made it tenfold more difficult to meet Kerr. And yet, to refuse to meet +him now would be as cowardly as throwing the ring out of the window.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[Pg 175]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="X" id="X"></a>X</h2> + +<h3>A LADY UNVEILED</h3> + +<p>She wakened in the morning to some one knocking. She thought the sound +had been going on for a long time, but, now she was finally roused, it +had stopped. This was odd, for no one came to her in the morning except +Marrika, and it was tiresome to be thus imperatively beset before she +was half awake. Now the knocking came again with a level, unimpatient +repetition, and she called, "Come in!" at which Clara, in a pale morning +gown, promptly entered—an apparition as cool and smooth and burnished +as if she had spent the night, like a French doll, in tissue paper.</p> + +<p>Clara's coming in in the morning was an unheard-of thing. Flora was +taken aback.</p> + +<p>"Why, Clara!" She was blank with astonish<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[Pg 176]</a></span>ment. She sat up, flushed and +tumbled, and still blinking. "I hope I didn't keep you knocking long."</p> + +<p>"Oh, no, indeed; only three taps." Clara looked straight through Flora's +astonishment, as if there had been no such thing in evidence. She drew +up a chair and sat down beside the bed. It was a rocking-chair, but it +did not sway with her calm poise. In the fine finish of her morning +attire, with her hands placidly folded on her knee, she made Flora feel +taken at a disadvantage, thus scarcely awake, disheveled and all but +stripped. But Clara, if she looked at anything but Flora's eyes, looked +only at her hands, one and then the other as they lay upon the coverlet.</p> + +<p>"It isn't so very late," she said, "but I have ordered your breakfast. I +thought you would want it if you had that ten-o'clock appointment; and +there is something I want to ask you before you go out." Flora was +conscious of a little apprehension. "It's about that place you talked of +taking for the summer." She felt vaguely relieved, though she had had no +actual grounds for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[Pg 177]</a></span> anticipating an awkward question. "I came upon +something in the oddest way you can imagine," Clara pursued her subject. +"Had you any idea the Herricks were in straits?"</p> + +<p>"The young Herricks?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, no! The old Herricks, <i>the</i> Herricks, Mrs. Herrick whom you so much +admire! Of course, one isn't told; but they must be, to be willing to +let the old place."</p> + +<p>"Not the San Mateo place?" said Flora, with a stir of interest. She felt +as astonished as if some Confucian fanatic had set up his joss at +auction.</p> + +<p>Clara complacently nodded.</p> + +<p>"Mrs. Herrick spoke to me herself. They don't want any publicity about +it, but she had heard that we were looking, and she did me the +favor"—Clara smiled a little dryly—"of telling me first."</p> + +<p>Flora looked reflective. "I've never seen it, but they say it's +beautiful."</p> + +<p>"It is, in a way," Clara grudgingly admitted, "but it isn't new; and the +ridiculous part is that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[Pg 178]</a></span> she will let it only on condition that it shall +not be done over. It is in sufficiently good shape, but it stands now +just as Colonel Herrick furnished it forty years ago."</p> + +<p>"Why, I should love that!" Flora frankly confessed, and gave a wistful +glance at the walls around her, wondering how long before the soft, dark +bloom of time, of use and wont, should descend on their crude faces.</p> + +<p>"Well," Clara conceded, "at any rate we know it's genuine, and that's a +consolation. The number of imitations going about and the way people +pick them up is appalling! While I was getting that rug for you at +Vigo's yesterday, Ella Buller came in and bought three imitation +Bokharas, with the greatest enthusiasm. She buys quantities, and she's +always taken in. It is enough to make one nervous about the people one +sits next to at dinner there. One can not help suspecting them of being +some of Ella's bargains. I wonder, now, where she picked up that Kerr."</p> + +<p>This finale failed to take Flora off her guard.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[Pg 179]</a></span> "At any rate, he is odd +enough to be genuine," she said with a gleam of malice.</p> + +<p>"Oh, no doubt of that," Clara mildly assented, "but genuine what?"</p> + +<p>"Why, gentleman at large," said Flora, and quickly wanted to recall it, +for Clara's glance seemed to give it a double significance. "I mean," +she added, "just one of those chronic travelers who have nothing else to +do, and whose way must be paved with letters of introduction"—she +floundered. "At least, that was the idea he gave of himself." She broke +off, doubly angry that she had tried to explain Kerr, and tried to +explain herself, when the circumstances required nothing of the sort. +She was sure Clara had not missed her nervousness, though Clara made no +sign. Her eyes only traveled a second time to Flora's hands, as if among +the flare of red and white jewels she was expecting to see another +color. To Flora's palpitating consciousness this look made a perfect +connection with Clara's next remark.</p> + +<p>"At least his manners are odd enough! There<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[Pg 180]</a></span> was a minute last night +when he was really quite startling."</p> + +<p>Flora felt a small, warm spot of color increasing in the middle of each +cheek. She drew a long breath, as if to draw in courage. Then Clara had +really seen! That smooth, blindish look of hers, last night, had seen +everything! And here she was owning up to it, and affably offering +herself as a confidante; and for what reason under the sun unless to +find out what it was that had so startled Kerr? Flora felt like crying +out, "If you only knew what that thing may be, you would never want to +come nearer to it!"</p> + +<p>"I am afraid he annoyed you, Flora."</p> + +<p>The girl looked into the kindly solicitude of Clara's face with a hard, +almost passionate incredulity. Was that really all Clara had supposed?</p> + +<p>"These Continentals," she went on, now lightly swaying to and fro in her +chair, "have singular notions of American women. They take us for +savages, my dear."</p> + +<p>"Then isn't it for us to show them that we are<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[Pg 181]</a></span> more than usually +civilized? I can't run away from him like a frightened little native."</p> + +<p>"Of course not; but that is where I come in; it's what I'm for—to get +rid of such things for you." That small, cool smile made Flora feel more +than ever the immature barbarian of her simile. Clara sat throwing the +protection of her superior knowledge and capability around her, like a +missionary garment; but Flora could have laughed with relief. Then Clara +merely supposed Kerr had been impertinent. Her little invasion had been +really nothing but pure kindness and protection; and Flora couldn't but +feel grateful for it. Last night she had thought herself so absolutely +alone; and here was a friend coming forward again, and stepping between +her and the thing above all others she was helpless about—the real +world.</p> + +<p>Clara had risen, and stood considering a moment with that same sweet, +impersonal eye which Flora found it hardest to comprehend.</p> + +<p>"What I mean," she explicitly stated, "is that if he should undertake to +carry out his prepos<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[Pg 182]</a></span>terous suggestion, and call this afternoon, I am +quite ready, if you wish, to take him off your hands."</p> + +<p>This last took Flora's breath away. It had not occurred to her that +Clara had overheard. It shocked her, frightened her; and yet Clara's way +of stating the fact, as if it were the most natural thing in the world, +made Flora feel that she herself was in the wrong to feel thus. For, +after all, Clara had been most tactful, most considerate and delicate in +conveying her knowledge, not hinting that Flora could have been in the +slightest degree responsible for Kerr's behavior; but simply sweetly +taking it for granted that they, of course, were banded together to +exclude this outlander. Under her sense of obligation, and what she felt +ought to be gratitude, Flora floundered for words.</p> + +<p>"You're very kind," she managed to get out; and that seemed to leave her +committed to hand Kerr over, tied hand and foot, when she wasn't at all +sure she wanted to.</p> + +<p>"Then shall I tell Mrs. Herrick that you will<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[Pg 183]</a></span> consider the house?" said +Clara, already in the act of departure. "She is to call to-day to go +into it with me more thoroughly. Thus far we've only played about the +edges."</p> + +<p>Her eyes strayed toward the dressing-table as she passed it, and as she +reached the door she glanced over the chiffonier. It was on the tip of +Flora's tongue to ask if she had mislaid something, when Clara turned +and smiled her small, tight-curled smile, as if she were offering it as +a symbol of mutual understanding. Curiously enough, it checked Flora's +query about the straying glances, and made her wonder that this was the +first time in their relation that she had thought Clara sweet.</p> + +<p>But there was another quality in Clara she did not lose sight of, and +she waited for the closing of a door further down the hall before she +drew the sapphire from under her pillow.</p> + +<p>With the knocking at the door her first act had been to thrust it there. +The feeling that it was going to be hard to hide was still her strongest +instinct about it; but the morning had dis<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[Pg 184]</a></span>sipated the element of the +supernatural and the horrid that it had shown her the night before. It +seemed to have a clearer and a simpler beauty; and the hope revived in +her that its beauty, after all, was the only remarkable thing about it.</p> + +<p>Her conviction of the night before had sunk to a shadowy hypothesis. She +knew nothing—nothing that would justify her in taking any step; and her +only chance of knowing more lay in what she would get out of Kerr; for +that he knew more about her ring than she, she was convinced. She was +afraid of him, yet, in spite of her fear, she had no intention of +handing him over to Clara. For on reflection she knew that Clara's offer +must have a deeper motive than mere kindness, and she had a most +unreasonable feeling that it would not be safe. She felt a little guilty +to have seemed to take her companion's help, while she left her so much +at sea as to the real facts. But, after all, it was Clara who had forced +the issue.</p> + +<p>She thought a good deal about Clara while<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[Pg 185]</a></span> she was dressing. A good many +times lately she had looked forward to the fall, the time of her +marriage, when their rather tense relationship would be ended. This +house in the country, which was to be her last little bachelor fling, +was to be Clara's last commission for her.</p> + +<p>Think how she would, she could but feel as if she were ungratefully +abandoning Clara. Clara had done so well by her in their three years +together! There surely must be immediately forthcoming for such a +remarkable person another large opportunity, and yet she couldn't help +recalling their first encounter in the particularly dull boarding-house +where Clara was temporarily shelved; where, nevertheless, she had not +conceded an inch of her class, nor a ray of her luster to circumstance. +This surprising luster was the gloss of her body, the quality of her +clothes and accessories, the way she traveled and the way she smiled. It +was the bloom of luxury she kept about her person through all her +varying surroundings. She had<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[Pg 186]</a></span> never to rise to the level of a new +position; she was there already; and she never came down.</p> + +<p>Flora knew it was for just her air of being ready that she had trusted +Clara, and for the three years of their association she had never failed +to find her companion ready wherever their common interests were +concerned. She had no reason for not trusting Clara now, except the +knowledge that, by her own approaching marriage, their interests would +be separated, and her feeling that Clara's prudence must already be by +way of looking out for itself alone.</p> + +<p>Yet Clara would do a kindness if it did not inconvenience her, and +surely this morning she had been kind. Still Flora felt she didn't want +to reveal anything until she was a little surer of her own position. +When she knew better where she stood she would know what she could +confide to Clara. Meanwhile, if there was any one to whom she could turn +now it would surely be Harry.</p> + +<p>Yet, if she did, what a lot of awkward explanations! She could not +return the sapphire<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[Pg 187]</a></span> without giving a reason, and what a thing to +explain—that she had not only worn it, but, in a freak, shown it to the +one of all people he most objected to.</p> + +<p>Nevertheless the most sensible thing clearly was to go through with it +and confess to Harry. Then she must communicate with him at once. +No—she would wait until after breakfast. There was plenty of time. Kerr +would not come until the afternoon. But after breakfast, she wondered if +it wouldn't be as well to ring him up at luncheon time? Then she would +be sure of finding him at the club.</p> + +<p>Meanwhile she dared not let the sapphire out of her grasp; and yet she +could not wear it on her hand. She had thought of the tear-shaped pouch +of gold which it was her custom to wear; but the slender length of chain +that linked it to her neck was too frail for such a precious weight. At +last she had fastened it around her neck on the strongest chain she +owned, and thus she carried it all the morning under her bodice with a +quieter mind than had been hers on the first day<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[Pg 188]</a></span> she had worn it, when +there had been nothing to explain her uneasiness.</p> + +<p>She was quite sure she was going to give back the sapphire to Harry, yet +she couldn't help picturing to herself what her meeting with Kerr would +have been, supposing she had decided differently. As the morning slipped +by she found herself doubting that he would come at all. Her attitude of +the night before had surely been enough to discourage any one. Yet if he +didn't come she knew that she would be disappointed.</p> + +<p>She was alone at luncheon, and in a dream. She glanced now and then at +the clock. She rose only ten minutes before the hour that Harry was in +the habit of leaving the club. She went up-stairs slowly and stopped in +front of the telephone. She touched the receiver, drew her hand back and +turned away. She shut the door of her own rooms smartly after her.</p> + +<p>She did not try to—because she couldn't—understand her own proceeding. +She merely sat, listening, as it seemed to her, for hours.</p> + +<p>But when at last Kerr's card was handed in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[Pg 189]</a></span> to her, it gave her a shock, +as if something which couldn't happen, and yet which she had all along +expected, had come to pass.</p> + +<p>In her instant of indecision Marrika had got away from her, but she +called the girl back from the door and told her to say to Mrs. Britton +that Mr. Kerr had called, but that Miss Gilsey would see him herself.</p> + +<p>She started with a rush. Half-way down the stairs she stopped, horrified +to find what her fingers were doing. They were closed around the little +lump that the ring made in the bosom of her gown, and she had not known +it. What if she had rushed in to Kerr with this extraordinary +manifestation? What if, while she was talking to him, her hand should +continue to creep up again and yet again to that place, and close around +the jewel, and make it evident, even in its hiding-place? The time had +come when she must even hide it from herself. And yet, to creep back up +the stair when she made sure Kerr must have heard her tumultuous +downward rush! It would never do to soundlessly retreat. She must<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[Pg 190]</a></span> go +back boldly, as if she had forgotten nothing more considerable than a +pocket handkerchief.</p> + +<p>Yet before she reached the top again she found herself going tiptoe, as +if she were on an expedition so secret that her own ears should not hear +her footsteps. But she went direct and unhesitating. It had come to her +all in a flash where she would put the sapphire. The little buttoned +pocket of her bath-robe. There it hung in the bath-room on one unvarying +peg, the most immovable of all her garments, safe from the excursions of +Marrika's needle or brushes, not to be disturbed for hours to come.</p> + +<p>She passed through her bedroom, through her dressing-room into the +bath-room. The robe was hanging behind the door. It took her a moment to +draw out the ring and disentangle its chain, and while she was doing +this she became aware of movings to and fro in her bedroom. She drew the +door half open, the better to conceal herself behind it, and at the same +time, through the widened crack of the jamb, to keep an eye on the +dressing-room, and hurried lest<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[Pg 191]</a></span> Marrika should surprise her. But +nevertheless she had barely slipped the ring into the little pocket and +refastened the flap, when Clara opened the bedroom door and stood +looking into the dressing-room.</p> + +<p>Flora experienced a sharp start of surprise, and then of wonder. Here +was Clara again seeking her out! Here she stood, brushed and polished, +and finished to a pitch of virtue, again taking Flora at a disadvantage, +hiding behind her own door. But at the least she was grateful that Clara +had not seen her. She stood a minute collecting herself. She wasn't +doing anything she need be ashamed of, or that she need explain, or that +need even awaken suspicion. But before she could take her courage in +both hands and come out of her retreat, Clara had reached the middle of +the dressing-room, and stood still.</p> + +<p>Her lifted veil made a fine mist above the luster of her eyes. She was +perfect to the tips of her immaculate white gloves, and she wore the +simple, sober look of a person who thinks himself alone. Then it wasn't +Flora, Clara was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[Pg 192]</a></span> looking for! She was looking all around—over the +surface of every object in the room. Presently she went up to the +dressing-table. She laid her gloved hands upon it, and looked at the +small objects strewn over its top. She took a step backward and opened +the top drawer. She reached into it, and delicately explored.</p> + +<p>Flora could see the white gloves going to and fro among her white +handkerchiefs, could see them find, open and examine the contents of her +jewel-box. And the only thing that kept her from shrieking out was the +feeling that this abominable thing which was being enacted before her +eyes couldn't be a fact at all.</p> + +<p>Clara took out an old pocket-book, shiny with years, shook from it a +shower of receipts, newspaper clippings, verses. She let them lie. She +took out a long violet box with a perfumer's seal upon it. It held a +bunch of dried violets. She took out a bonbonnière of gold filigree. It +was empty. A powder box, a glove box, a froth of lace, a handful of +jewelers' boxes, a jewel flung loose into the drawer. This she pounced +upon.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[Pg 193]</a></span> It was a brooch! She let it fall—turned to the chiffonier; +upended the two vases of Venetian glass, lifted the lids of jars and +boxes, finally came to the drawers. One by one she took them out, turned +the contents of each rapidly over, and left them standing, gaping white +ruffles and lace upon the floor. She took up daintily, in her white kid +fingers, slippers, shook them upside down. She opened the door of the +closet, and disappeared within. There was audible the flutterings of all +the distressed garments, with little busy pauses. Then Clara came out, +with her hat a little crooked; and stood in the middle of the room still +with her absorbed and sober face, looking over the gaping drawers, +pulled out and rifled, with their contents heaped up and streaming over +the floor.</p> + +<p>Her eye fell upon the waste basket. She turned it upside down, and +stooped over the litter. She gathered it up in her white gloves and +dropped it back. Then, for the first time, she glanced at the bath-room +door; stood looking at it, as if it had occurred to her to look in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[Pg 194]</a></span> +soap dish. Then she turned again to the room, to the dressing-table. She +put back the paste-board jewelers' boxes, the jeweled pin, the laces, +which she shook out and folded daintily, the glove and powder boxes, the +gold bonbonnière, the long violet box, the leather pocket-book,—each +deftly and unhesitatingly in the place from which she had taken it, and +all the heaps of white handkerchiefs.</p> + +<p>One by one she laid back in the chiffonier drawers, the garments, +properly and neatly folded, that she had so hastily snatched out of +them. The sun, streaming full into the room, caught gleams in her pale +hair, and struck blindingly upon the heaps of white around her, and made +two dazzling points of her gloved hands that moved as deftly as hands +uncovered. She slid back the last drawer into the chiffonier, and rose +from her knees, lightly dusting off the front of her gown; went to the +closet door and closed it. She stood before it a moment with a face +perplexed and thoughtful, then turned alertly toward the outer door. As +she passed the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[Pg 195]</a></span> mirror she looked into it, and touched her hat straight +again, but the action was subconscious. Clara wasn't thinking of it.</p> + +<p>Flora stood as if she were afraid to move, while Clara crossed her +bedroom, stopped, went on and closed the outer door behind her. And even +after that soft little concussion she stood still, burning, choking, +struggling with the overwhelming force of an affront whose import she +did not yet realize. Out in her sunny dressing-room all the outraged +furniture stood meek and in order, frauding the eye to believe that +nothing had happened! She felt she couldn't look things in the face a +moment longer. She hid her face in the folds of her dressing-gown.</p> + +<p>Why, she had thought that such things couldn't happen! She had thought +that people's private belongings, like their persons, were inviolable. +They all always talked, she had talked, about such things as if they +were mere nothings. They had talked about the very taking of the Crew +Idol as if it were a splendid joke! But she had not dreamed what such +things were like<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[Pg 196]</a></span> when they were near. When they were held up to you +naked they were like this! In the shame of it she could no more have +faced Clara than if she had surprised Clara naked.</p> + +<p>She snatched the ring out of the pocket of her gown and clutched it in +her hand. Was there no place in the world where she could be sure of +safety for this?</p> + +<p>With trembling fingers she fastened it again to the chain about her +neck. She thought of Kerr down-stairs waiting for her. Well, she would +rather keep it with her. Then, at least, she would know when it was +taken from her. Still in the fury of her outraged faith, she passed +through her violated rooms, and slowly along the hall and down the stairs.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[Pg 197]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XI" id="XI"></a>XI</h2> + +<h3>THE MYSTERY TAKES HUMAN FORM</h3> + +<p>He turned from the window where he had presented a long, drooping, +patient back, and his warm, ironic mirth—the same that had played with +her the first night—flashed out at sight of her. But after a moment +another expression mixed with it, sharpened it, and fastened upon her +with an incredulous intentness.</p> + +<p>She stood on the threshold, pale, and brilliant still in her blaze of +anger, equal, at last, to anything. Kerr, as he signaled to her with +every lineament of his enlivened face, his interest, his defiance, his +uncontrollability, was not the man of her imaginary conversations. He +was not here to be used and disposed of; but, as he came<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[Pg 198]</a></span> toward her, +the new admiration in his face was bringing her reassurance that neither +was she. The thought that her moment of bitter incredulity had made her +formidable gave her courage to fight even him, of whom she was so much +in awe; gave her courage even to smile, though she grew hot at the first +words he spoke.</p> + +<p>"You should not be brave and then run away, you know."</p> + +<p>She thought of her rush up the stairs again. "I had to go back to see +Mrs. Britton." (Oh, how she had seen her!)</p> + +<p>It seemed to Flora that everything she had been through in the last few +moments was blazoned on her face. But he only looked a little more +gravely at her, though his sardonic eye-brow twitched.</p> + +<p>"Ah, I thought you only ran back to hide in your doll's house."</p> + +<p>She laughed. Such a picture of her!</p> + +<p>"Well, at any rate, now I've come out, what have you to say to me?"</p> + +<p>"Now you've come out," he repeated, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[Pg 199]</a></span> looked at her this time with +full gravity, as if he realized finally how far she'd come.</p> + +<p>She had taken the chair in the light of the eastern windows. She lay +back in the cushions, her head a little bent, her hands interlaced with +a perfect imitation of quietude. The dull satin of her slender foot was +the only motion about her, but the long, slow rise and fall of her +breath was just too deep-drawn for repose.</p> + +<p>He looked down upon her from his height.</p> + +<p>"I'm sorry I frightened you last night," he said, "but I'm not sorry I +came, since you've seen me. You needn't have, you know, if you didn't +want to. You could have stayed in the doll's house; and there, I +suppose, you think I should never have found you—or <i>it</i> again?"</p> + +<p>He was silent a moment, leaning on the chair opposite, watching her with +knitted forehead, while her apprehension fluttered for what he should do +next. He had done away with all the amenities of meeting and attacked +his point with a directness that took her breath.</p> + +<p>"You know what I've come for," he said, "but<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[Pg 200]</a></span> now I'm here, now that I +see you, I wonder if there's something I haven't reckoned on." He looked +at her earnestly. "If you think I've taken advantage of you—if you say +so—I'll go away, and give you a chance to think it over."</p> + +<p>It would have been so easy to have nodded him out, but instead she half +put out her hand toward him. "No; stay."</p> + +<p>He gave her a quick look—surprise and approbation at her courage. He +dropped into a chair. "Then tell me about it."</p> + +<p>Flora's heart went quick and little. She held herself very still, afraid +in her intense consciousness lest her slightest movement might betray +her. She only moved her eyes to look up at him questioningly, suspending +acknowledgment of what he meant until he should further commit himself.</p> + +<p>"I mean the sapphire," he said. He waited.</p> + +<p>"Yes," she answered coolly. "I saw that it interested you last night, +but I couldn't think especially why. It's a beautiful stone."</p> + +<p>He laughed without a sound—shook noise<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[Pg 201]</a></span>lessly for a minute. "Meaning +that a gentleman shouldn't pounce upon any beautiful stone he may happen +to see?" He got up and moved about restlessly in the little space +between their two chairs. "Quite so; lay it to my being more than a +gentleman; lay it to my being a crack-brained enthusiast, a confounded +beauty worshiper, a vicious curio dealer, an ill-mannered ass! But"—and +he flashed around at her with a snap of his nervous fingers—"where did +you get it?"</p> + +<p>For the life of her she couldn't help her wave of color, but through it +all she clung to her festal smile. Sheer nervousness made it easy.</p> + +<p>"Well, suppose it was begged, borrowed, or—given to me? Suppose it came +from here or far away yonder? What's that to do with its beauty?" She +gave him question for question. "Did you ever see it before?"</p> + +<p>He never left off looking at her, looking at her with a hard inquiry, as +if she were some simple puzzle that he unaccountably failed to solve.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[Pg 202]</a></span>"That's rather neat, the way you dodge me," he said, dodging in his +turn. "But I don't see it <i>now</i>. You're not wearing it?"</p> + +<p>She played indifference with what a beating heart! "Oh, I only wear it +off and on."</p> + +<p>"Off and on!" His voice suddenly rang at her. "Off and on! Why, my good +woman, it's just two days you could have worn it at all!"</p> + +<p>She stood up—stood facing him. For a moment she knew nothing except +that her horrible idea was a fact. She had the eye of the Crew Idol, and +this man knew it! Yet the fact declared gave her courage. She could face +his accusal if only he could give the reason for it. But after a moment, +while they looked silently at each other, she saw he was not accusing +her. He was threatening her and beseeching her indulgence in the same +look. He opened his lips, hesitated, turned sharp about and walked away +from her.</p> + +<p>She watched him with increasing doubt. After saying so much, was he +going to say nothing more? She had a feeling that she had not heard<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[Pg 203]</a></span> the +worst yet, and when he turned back to her from the other end of the room +there was something so haggard, so harassed, so fairly guilty about him +that if she had ever thought of telling him the truth of how she came by +the ring she put it away from her now.</p> + +<p>But beneath his distress she recognized a desperate earnestness. There +was something he wanted at any cost, but he was going to be gentle with +her. She had felt before the potentiality of his gentleness, and she +doubted her power to resist it. She fanned up all the flame of anger +that had swept her into the room. She reminded herself that the greatest +gentleness might only be a blind; that there was nothing stronger than +wanting something very much, and that the protection of the jewel was +very thin. But when he stood beside her she realized he held a stronger +weapon against her than his gentleness, something apart from his +intention. She felt that in whatever circumstance, at whatever time she +should meet him he would make her feel thus—hot and cold, and happy for +the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[Pg 204]</a></span> mere presence of his body beside her. In a confusion she heard what +he was saying.</p> + +<p>He was speaking, almost coaxingly, as if to a child. "I understand," he +was saying. "I know all about it. It's a mistake. But surely you don't +expect to keep it now. It will only be an annoyance to you."</p> + +<p>She turned on him. "What could it be to you?"</p> + +<p>Kerr, planted before her, with his head dropped, looked, looked, looked, +as if he gave silence leave to answer for him what it would. It answered +with a hundred echoes ringing up to her from long corridors of +conjecture, half-articulated words breathing of how extraordinary the +answer must be that he did not dare to make. He looked her up and down +carefully, impersonally, with that air he had of regarding a rare +specimen, thoughtfully; as if he weighed such ephemeral substance as +chance.</p> + +<p>"What will you take for it?" he said at last.</p> + +<p>She was silent. With a sick distrust it came<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[Pg 205]</a></span> to her that it was the +very worst thing he could have said after that speaking silence.</p> + +<p>She stepped away from him. "This thing is not for sale."</p> + +<p>He stared at her with amazement; then threw back his head and laughed as +if something had amused him above all tragedy.</p> + +<p>"You are an extraordinary creature," he said, "but really I must have +it. I can't explain the why of it; only give the sapphire to me, and +you'll never be sorry for having done that for me. Whatever happens, you +may be sure I won't talk. Even if the thing comes out, you shan't be +mixed up in it." He had come near her again, and the point of his long +forefinger rested on her arm. She was motionless, overwhelmed with pure +terror, with despair. He was smiling, but there was a desperate +something about him, stronger than the common desire of possession, +terrifying in its intensity. She looked behind her. The thick glass of +the window was there, a glimpse of the empty street and the figure of a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[Pg 206]</a></span> +woman in a blowing green veil turning the corner.</p> + +<p>"Why not give it to me now," he urged, "since, of course, you can't keep +it? I could have it now in spite of you."</p> + +<p>Everything in her sprang up in antagonism to meet him. "I know what you +are," she cried, "but you shan't have it. You have no more right to it +than I. You can't get it away from me, and I shan't give it to you."</p> + +<p>He had grown suddenly paler; his eyes were dancing, fastened upon her +breast. His long hands closed and opened. She looked down, arrested at +the sight of her hand clenched just where her breath was shortest, over +the sapphire's hiding-place.</p> + +<p>He smiled. How easily she had betrayed herself! But she abated not a jot +of her defiance, challenging him, now he knew its hiding-place, to take +the sapphire if he could. But he did not move. And it came to her then +that she had been ridiculous to think for an instant that this man would +take anything from her by<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[Pg 207]</a></span> force. What she had to fear was his will at +work upon hers, his persuasion, his ingenuity. She thought of the purple +irises, and how he had drawn them toward him in the crook of his +cane—and her dread was lest he meant to overcome her with some subtlety +she could not combat. For that he was secret, that he was daring, that +he was fearless beyond belief, he showed her all too plainly, since here +he stood, condemned by his own evidence, alone, in the midst of her +household, within call of her servants, and had the sublime effrontery +to look at her with admiration, and, it occurred to her, even with a +little pity.</p> + +<p>The click of a moving latch brought his eyes from hers to the door.</p> + +<p>"Some one is coming in," he said in a guarded voice. It warned her that +her face showed too much, but she could not hope to recover her +composure. She hardly wanted to. She was in a state to fancy that a +secret could be kept by main force; and she turned without abatement of +her reckless mood and took her hand from<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[Pg 208]</a></span> where she had held it clenched +upon her breast and stretched it out to Mrs. Herrick.</p> + +<p>The lady had stood in the doorway a moment—a long-featured, whitish, +modeled face, draped in a dull green veil, a tall figure whose flowing +skirts of black melted away into the background of the hall—before she +came forward and met her hostess' hand with a clasp firm and ready.</p> + +<p>"I'm so glad to find you here," she said. She looked directly into +Flora's eyes, into the very center of her agitation. She held her +tremulous hand as if neither of these manifestations surprised her; as +if a young woman and a young man in colloquy might often be found in +such a state of mind.</p> + +<p>Flora's first emotion was a guilty relief that, after all, her face had +not betrayed Kerr. But she had no sooner murmured his name to Mrs. +Herrick, no sooner had that lady's gray eyes lighted upon him, than they +altered their clear confidence. The situation as reflected in Flora +looked naïve enough, but there was nothing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[Pg 209]</a></span> naïve about Kerr. The very +perfection of his coolness, there in the face of her burning agitation, +was appalling. Oh, why couldn't he see, Flora thought wildly, how it was +damning him—how it was showing him so practised, so marvelously equal +to any emergency, that his presence here among fleeces could be nothing +less than wolfish?</p> + +<p>Mrs. Herrick's face was taking on an expression no less than wary. What +he was, Mrs. Herrick could not dream. She could not even suspect what +Flora believed. But in the light of her terrible discovery Flora dared +not have him suspected at all. The chasms of distrust and suspicion that +had been opening between them she forgot. In a flash she was ready to +throw herself in front of this man, to cover him from suspicion, even +though by so doing she took it upon herself.</p> + +<p>Now, if she had ever in her life, she talked over the top of her +feelings; and though at first to her ears her voice rang out horribly +alone, presently Mrs. Herrick was helping her,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[Pg 210]</a></span> adding words to words. +It was the house they spoke of, the San Mateo house, the subject about +which Flora knew Mrs. Herrick had come to talk; but to Flora it was no +longer a subject. It was a barrier, a shield. In this emergency it was +the only subject large enough to fill the gap, and much as Flora had +liked the idea of it, she had never built the house so large, so vivid, +so wonderfully towering to please her fancy as she was doing now to +cover Kerr. With questions she led Mrs. Herrick on to spin out the +subject, to play it over with lights and shades, to beat all around it. +And all the while she knew that Kerr was watching her; watching her once +again in dubious admiration. It was a look that made Mrs. Herrick seem +ready at a movement of his to lay her hand on Flora in protection.</p> + +<p>The lady's clear gray eyes traveled between Flora's face and his. Under +their steady light there was a strange alertness, as if she sat there +ready enough to avert whatever threatened, but anxious to draw her +skirts aside from it, dis<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[Pg 211]</a></span>trusting the quality, hating to have come in +upon anything so dubious. When the hall door opened and closed she +listened as if for a deliverer; and when Clara appeared between the +portières she turned to her and met her with a flash of relief, as if +here at last was a safe quantity. Clara was still wearing her hat, with +the veil pushed up in a little mist above her eyes, and still had her +white gloves on. The sight of Mrs. Herrick's hand soliciting the clasp +of those gave Flora a curious sensation.</p> + +<p>She looked from one face to another, and last at Kerr's. She shut her +eyes an instant. Here was a thief. He was standing in her drawing-room +now. She had been talking with him. She opened her eyes. The fact +acknowledged had not altered the color of daylight. It was strange that +things—furniture and walls and landscape—should remain so stolidly the +same when such a thing had happened to her! For she had not only spoken +with a thief, but she had shielded him. It struck her grotesquely that +perhaps Mrs. Herrick's instinct was right,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[Pg 212]</a></span> after all. Wasn't Clara the +safest of the lot? Clara at least kept her gloves on, while she herself +was shamelessly arrayed on the side of disorder. She was clinging to a +piece of property that wasn't hers, and whatever way she dressed her +motives they looked too much of a piece with the operations of the +original miscreant.</p> + +<p>Flora saw the evil spirit of tragic-comedy. He fairly grinned at her.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[Pg 213]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XII" id="XII"></a>XII</h2> + +<h3>DISENCHANTMENT</h3> + +<p>Then this was the end of all romance? She must turn her back on the +charm, the power, the spell that had been wrought around her, and, +horror-struck, pry into her own mind to discover what lawless thing +could be in her to have drawn her to such a person, and to keep her, +even now that she knew the worst, unwilling to relinquish the thought of +him. His depravity loomed to her enormous; but was that all there was to +be said of him? Did his delicacy, his insight, his tempered fineness, +count for nothing beside it? Must their talks, their walking through the +trees, the very memory of his voice, be lost inspiration?</p> + +<p>She couldn't believe that this one spot could<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[Pg 214]</a></span> make him rotten +throughout. Her mind ran back into the past. She could not recall a +word, an action, or a glance of his that had shown the color of decay. +He had not even been insincere with her. He had come out with his +convictions so flatly that when she thought of it his nonchalance +appalled her. He had been the same then that he was now. But the thing +that was natural for him was impossible for her, and she had found it +out—that was all.</p> + +<p>Yet the mere consideration of him and his obsession as one thing was +intolerable. She curiously separated his act from himself. She thought +of it, not as a part of him, but as something that had invaded him—a +disease—something inimical to himself and others, that mixed the +thought of him with terrors, and filled her way with difficulties. Now +it was no longer a question of how to meet him, but of how she was not +to. It was not his strength she feared, but her own weakness where he +was concerned. Her tendency to shield him—she must guard against +that—and that disturbing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[Pg 215]</a></span> influence he exercised over her, too +evidently without intention. But he would be hard to avoid. This way and +that she looked for a way out of her danger, yet all the while she was +conscious that there was but one plain way of escape open to her. She +could give the sapphire back to Harry within the twenty-four hours.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[Pg 216]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XIII" id="XIII"></a>XIII</h2> + +<h3>THRUST AND PARRY</h3> + +<blockquote><p><span class="smcap">My Dear Flora</span>—I am going out early and shall not be back to +dinner.</p> + +<p class="right"><span class="smcap">Clara.</span></p></blockquote> + +<p>Flora let the little note fall as if she disliked the touch of it. She +was relieved to think she would not have to see Clara that day. It was +her desire never to see Clara again. If only they could part here and +now! How she wanted to shake the whole thing off her shoulders! How +foolish not to have gone to Harry when she had first made up her mind +to! For why, after all, make him any explanations? Suppose she should +just take the ring to him and say: "It gives me the shivers, Harry. +Let's take it back and get something else." If he didn't suspect the +sapphire already, he would never suspect it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[Pg 217]</a></span> from that. The worst he +could do would be to laugh, to tease, to tell her she could not live up +to her own romantic notions, since, after all, she had weakened and was +wanting the usual thing.</p> + +<p>But there had been times when she had thought that he did suspect the +sapphire. Well, if he did, giving it back to him would practically be +giving it back into public custody in the most decorous manner for a +properly bred young woman. And how beautifully it would extricate her +from her wretched situation! Logically, there was no fault to be found +with such a course. It was eminently sane and safe. Yet it still +appeared to her as if she were acting a coward's part. She was neither +frankly giving the jewel to the authorities with the proper information, +nor frankly handing it over to Kerr. But she was trying to slip it back +into the questionable nook from which it had been taken, and she grew +hot at the thought of how Kerr would despise her if he knew the craven +course she was meditating. She seemed to hear<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[Pg 218]</a></span> him saying, "I had +thought braver things of you."</p> + +<p>Of course, that was his way of expecting that she would give him the +ring. And she felt a sort of rage against him that he should want that, +and only that, so very much. Yet she didn't know what else she wanted +him to want. Every time she thought of Kerr she found herself growing +unreasonable; and she had to whip up her resolution with the hard facts +of the case to prevent herself from drifting over on to his side +completely.</p> + +<p>But did she really want Harry to rid her of the ring? She would get hold +of him first and then she would see what she would do.</p> + +<p>She stepped into the hall with all the confidence of one who has fully +made up her mind to carry matters with a high hand; but at the telephone +she hesitated. Calling him up at such an hour of the morning demanding +his attendance on such a fanciful errand—wouldn't he think it odd? No, +he would think it the most natural thing in the world for her to be so<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[Pg 219]</a></span> +flighty. Reassured, she gave the club number and stood waiting, +listening to the half-syllables of switched-off voices and the crossing +click, click, that was bringing her fate nearer to her. She heard some +one coming up the stairs and down the hall toward her. Marrika stood +stolid at her elbow.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Cressy," she pronounced.</p> + +<p>"Yes, yes," said Flora, with the club clamoring in her left ear.</p> + +<p>"He is down-stairs," said Marrika.</p> + +<p>Flora nearly let the receiver fall. Harry here? What a piece of luck! +But here on his own account, at such an hour—how extraordinary!</p> + +<p>"Hello, hello," persisted the club. "What's wanted?"</p> + +<p>"Why, I—" Flora stammered. "It's a mistake; never mind. I don't want +him now." She hoped that Harry had not heard her as he came in, since it +was his informal fashion to await her in the large entrance hall. She +didn't want to spoil the chance he had given her of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[Pg 220]</a></span> seeming offhand +about the ring. But the hall was empty, and as she descended the stairs +she amused herself with the fancy that Shima had had a vision, and that +she would still have to ring up the club and explain to the attendant +that, after all, she wanted Mr. Cressy.</p> + +<p>Then from the drawing-room threshold she caught sight of Harry standing +in the big bay window of the drawing-room, in the same spot where Kerr +had awaited her the afternoon before. Harry was tall and large and +freshly colored, and yet he did not fill the room to her as the other +man had done. He met her, kissed her, and she turned her head so that +his lips met her cheek close beside her ear. She did not positively +object to his kissing her on the lips, but her instinct was strong to +offer him her cheek. He had sometimes laughed at this, but now he +resented it. He insisted on his privilege, and she was passive to him, +conscious of less love in this than assertion of possession.</p> + +<p>"You are not going to Burlingame, are you?" she asked him with her first breath.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[Pg 221]</a></span>He looked down at her with a flushed and sulky air. "What difference +would that make to you? I am, as it happens, but I suppose you think +that's no reason for disturbing you so early." He was angry, but at +what, she wondered, with creeping uneasiness. He held her and caressed +her with a morose satisfaction, as if he had to make sure to himself +that she was really his, and she permitted it and abetted it with a +guile that astonished her.</p> + +<p>"What is the matter?" she urged. "Are things going crookedly at +Burlingame?"</p> + +<p>"Things are going as crooked as you please, but not at Burlingame. Sit +over there," he said, nodding toward the window-bench; "I want to talk +to you."</p> + +<p>Harry had the air of one about to scold, and certainly Flora thought if +anybody was carrying matters with a high hand, it wasn't herself; but +she didn't follow his direction. She continued to stand, while he, +sitting on the table's edge, drumming the top of his hat, gloomily regarded her.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[Pg 222]</a></span>"Well?" she persisted, troubled by this look of his, and this silence.</p> + +<p>"Look here," he began, "I have to be away a couple of days and I wish +you'd do me a favor."</p> + +<p>Flora's thought flew to the ring. Was he going to ask for it back, to +have it reset, as he had promised on the threshold of the goldsmith's +shop? Here might be the chance she had hoped for of getting rid of it. +She grasped at it before she had time to waver.</p> + +<p>"I wonder if it's the very favor I was going to ask of you."</p> + +<p>But he didn't take it up. He seemed hardly to hear her, as if his mind +was too much absorbed with quite another question—a question that the +next moment came out flat. "What was that Kerr doing here yesterday?"</p> + +<p>She was taken aback, so far had her apprehension of Harry's jealousy +slipped into the background in the last twenty-four hours. But her +consciousness that Harry was not behaving<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[Pg 223]</a></span> well, even for a jealous man, +made her take it up all the more lightly.</p> + +<p>"Why, he was calling, chatting, taking tea—what anybody else would do +from four to six. What in the world gave you the idea that he was doing +anything extraordinary?"</p> + +<p>"Well," he said, "you shouldn't do the sort of thing that makes you +talked about."</p> + +<p>"'That makes me talked about'?" It made her pause in front of him.</p> + +<p>"Why, yes, it isn't like you. It's never happened before. Look here. I +drop into the Bullers' yesterday; find Clara sidled up to the judge; +look around for you. 'Hello,' I say, 'where's Flora?' 'Oh,' says she, +'Flora's at home amusing Mr. Kerr.' 'Amusing Mr. Kerr!'" he repeated. +"That's a nice thing to hear."</p> + +<p>Flora went red. She walked down the room from him to give her suddenly +tumultuous heart time. However little he might guess the real trend of +her interview with Kerr, she couldn't hear him come near it without +appre<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[Pg 224]</a></span>hension. She was angry, helplessly angry at Harry that he had +taken this moment for his stupid jealousy. But she was more angry at +Clara, since such a speech on Clara's part wasn't carelessness. She had +meant it to work upon him, and here he stood, like the fine animal that +he was, smoldering with the suspicion of encroachment on his prey.</p> + +<p>She tried to laugh him out of it.</p> + +<p>"Why, Harry, I never saw you jealous before!"</p> + +<p>"It's all very well to say that—and you know I've never made a row +about the other Johnnies. I knew you didn't care for any of <i>them</i>."</p> + +<p>Her eyes narrowed and darkened.</p> + +<p>"And you take it for granted I care for Mr. Kerr?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, no, no!" He pushed his hand through his hair with an irascible +gesture. "But it's plain enough you like him—you women always like a +fellow that flourishes—but that's not the sort of man I care to see +hanging around my girl."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[Pg 225]</a></span>Flora stood leaning on the table, breathing a little hurriedly, feeling +rather as if she had been shaken. Harry, standing with his hands in his +pockets, looked not unlike the threatening image he had appeared in the +back of the goldsmith's shop.</p> + +<p>"Of course, the fellow can talk," he admitted, "and he has a manner. But +Lord knows where he comes from or who he is. Why, even the Bullers don't +know."</p> + +<p>Flora turned sharply on him. "Who told you that?"</p> + +<p>"The judge. He picked him up at the club."</p> + +<p>"Well," she kept it up, "some one had to introduce him there."</p> + +<p>Harry smiled. "You wouldn't care to bow to some of those club members."</p> + +<p>"Harry, do you know how you sound to me?" She was trembling at the +daring of what she was going to say. "You talk as if you knew something +against him."</p> + +<p>Her statement seemed to bring him up short. "No, no, I don't," he said hastily.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[Pg 226]</a></span>She made a little gesture of despair. How was she to count on Harry if +he was going to behave like this? How trust him when he was shuffling +so?</p> + +<p>She made one more bold stroke to make him speak out.</p> + +<p>"Harry, you <i>do</i> know something about him! I know you have seen him +before."</p> + +<p>"Why, yes, I've seen him before. But that's got nothing to do with it."</p> + +<p>He looked surprised that she should seem to accuse him of it, and she +wondered if he could have forgotten how he had denied it before.</p> + +<p>"And that isn't why you distrust him?"</p> + +<p>The devil's tattoo that he beat on his hat stopped.</p> + +<p>"I don't distrust him."</p> + +<p>"Well, dislike him, then. When was it that you saw him before?"</p> + +<p>"Isn't it enough for me to tell you that I don't want <i>you</i> to see him?"</p> + +<p>"Oh!" She turned away from him. Every nerve in her was in revolt. Then +he really<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[Pg 227]</a></span> wasn't going to tell her anything. He was keeping her out of +it as if she were a child. She had relied on him to return the ring. She +had counted upon his indifference and good nature. And he was neither +indifferent nor good-natured. All desire of even mentioning the ring to +him left her; and as to giving him her confidence—These hints that he +had thrown out about Kerr—they might be mere jealousy—but he might +have actual knowledge, knowledge that, with her own fitted to it, would +make for him a complete figure. She caught her breath at the thought of +how near she had come to actually betraying Kerr. Until that moment she +had not realized that through all her waverings her one fixed intention +had been not to betray him.</p> + +<p>Harry had risen and was buttoning his overcoat. "You know you're never +at home if you don't want to be," he said.</p> + +<p>She stood misleadingly drooping before him. But though her appearance +was passive enough for the most exacting lover her will had never<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[Pg 228]</a></span> been +in more vigorous revolt. She knew Harry was taking her weariness for +acquiescence, and she let him take it so. She even followed him into the +hall, and with a vague idea of further propitiation, nodded away Shima +and opened the door for him herself.</p> + +<p>The fog was a chasm of white outside. Harry turned on the brink of it. +"By the way, where's Clara?"</p> + +<p>"Why, do you want to see her? She'll be out all day. She's dining with +the Willie Herricks."</p> + +<p>"No, I don't want to see her, but, by the way, she's not dining with the +Willie Herricks; she's dining with the Bullers. I heard her make the +engagement yesterday."</p> + +<p>"Oh, no, Harry, I'm sure you're mistaken."</p> + +<p>"Well, it doesn't matter. All I want to know is, why did you show that +ring to Clara before it was set?"</p> + +<p>She was genuinely aghast. "I didn't," she flashed. "What made you think +I had?"</p> + +<p>He shrugged. "Well, she asked me where<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[Pg 229]</a></span> we got it. I don't see why women +always talk those things over." He was looking at her inquiringly.</p> + +<p>"Well, I haven't," she said quickly. "Have you?"</p> + +<p>He looked out upon the fog. "Told her where we got it, do you mean? No, +I just chaffed her. I'd look out, if I were you. She strikes me as +damned curious." He stood a moment on the threshold, looking from Flora +to the chasm of fog outside, as if he were choosing between two chances. +"I think I'll take that ring this morning," he said slowly.</p> + +<p>The deliberate words came to her with a shock. But in the moment, while +she looked into Harry's moody face, she realized how impossible to make +a scene over what must still be maintained as a trivial matter betwixt +them—the mere resetting of a jewel; what should she do to put him off? +She looked up at him, and saw with relief that his face was turned from +her to the fog, as if he had forgotten her. Then, still with averted +head, as if he addressed the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[Pg 230]</a></span> whiteness, or himself,—"No," he +determined, "I won't. I'll take it when I come back." He pulled himself +together with an effort, with a smile. "That is," he turned to her, "if +you're in no great hurry about the setting? Very well, then. In a day or +two."</p> + +<p>He plunged away into the fog. A few rods from the door he disappeared, +but she could still hear his footsteps growing thinner, lighter, passing +away in the whiteness.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[Pg 231]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XIV" id="XIV"></a>XIV</h2> + +<h3>COMEDY CONVEYS A WARNING</h3> + +<p>She stood where he had left her in the open doorway, with the damp eddy +of the fog blowing on her. She had had a narrow escape; but after the +first fullness of her relief there returned upon her again the weight of +her responsibility. There was no slipping out of it now, and it was +going to be worse than she had imagined. So much had come out in the +last half-hour that she felt bewildered by it. What Harry had let slip +about Clara alarmed her. What in the world was Clara about? With one +well-aimed observation she had stirred up Harry against Kerr and against +Flora herself. And meanwhile she was running after the Bullers. Twice in +two days, if Harry was not mistaken, and she was even nearing another engagement.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[Pg 232]</a></span>After all her fruitless mousings, Clara had too evidently got on the +scent of something at last. How much she knew or guessed as yet, Flora +could not be sure, but certainly, now, she couldn't let Clara go. For +that would be turning adrift a dangerous person with a stronger motive +than ever for pursuing her quest, and the opportunity for pursuing it +unobserved, out of Flora's sight. Clara was at it even now, and the only +consolation Flora had was that Harry, at least, would not play into her +hands.</p> + +<p>For Harry had a special secret interest of his own. The last ten minutes +of their interview had made that plain. His manner, when he had declared +his intention of taking the ring, had been anything but the manner of a +care-free lover merely concerned with pleasing his lady. Then they were +all of them racing each other for the same thing—the thing she held in +her possession; and whether she feared most to be felled by a blow from +Harry, or hunted far afield by Kerr, or trapped by Clara, she could not +tell. She stood hesitating, looking out into the obscurity<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[Pg 233]</a></span> of the fog, +as if she hoped to read the answer there. Presently she returned to the +fact that Shima was waiting to close the door. Half-way across the hall +she paused again, looking thoughtfully down the rose-colored vista of +the drawing-room, and up at the broad black march of the stair. Vague +mysteries peered at her from every side. Which should she flee from? +Which walk boldly up to and dispel?</p> + +<p>She went up-stairs slowly. She stood in her dressing-room absently +before the mirror. She touched the hard, unyielding stone of the ring +under the thin bodice of her gown. She recalled the morning when she had +gone to get it, before anything had happened and the lure of life had +been so exquisite. Now that it had come near—if this indeed were life +that she was laboring in—it was steep and crabbed, like the brown hills +in summer, far off, like velvet, to climb, plowed ground and stubble.</p> + +<p>And yet she didn't wish herself back, but only forward. Now she had no +leisure to imagine, to pretend, to enjoy, only the breath<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[Pg 234]</a></span>less sense +that she must get forward. The chattering clock on her mantel warned her +of the passing time and set her hurrying into her walking-gown, her hat, +her gloves, as if the object of her errand would only wait for her a +moment longer. When, for the second time, she opened the house door, she +didn't hesitate. She descended into the white fog that covered all the +city.</p> + +<p>Above her the stone façade of her house loomed huge and pinkish in the +mist. Her spirits rose with the feeling that she was going adventuring +again, leaving that house where for the last two days she had awaited +events with such vivid apprehensions. She hurried fast down the damp, +glistening pavement, seeing long, dim gray faces of houses glimmer by, +seeing figures come toward her through the fog, grow vivid, pass, and +hearing at intervals the hoarse, lonely voice of the fog-horn at "The +Heads" reaching her over many intervening hills. She did not feel sure +what she should do at the end of her journey or what awaited her there. +She knew herself a most unpractised hunter, she,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[Pg 235]</a></span> who, all her life, had +been the most artful of quarries. A quarry she was still, but in this +chase she had to come out and stalk the facts in order to see which way +to run; if, she told herself in her exhilaration, she decided to run at +all.</p> + +<p>She turned in at the low gate of imitation grill in front of an enormous +wooden mansion, with towers and cupolas painted all a chill slate gray, +with fuchsias, purple and red, clambering up the front. She rang, and +was admitted into a hall, ornate and very high, with a wide staircase +sweeping down into the middle of it.</p> + +<p>The maid looked dubiously at Flora and thought Miss Buller was not at +home, but would see. Flora turned into the room on her left and sat down +among the Louis Quinze sofas and potted palms with a feeling that Miss +Buller was at home, and, for one reason or another, preferred not to be +seen. She waited apprehensively, wondering whether Ella was not seeing +the world-in-general, or had really specified against herself. Could it +be that Ella<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[Pg 236]</a></span> was one of those women whom Harry had alluded to as +running after Kerr? In the short twenty-four hours every individual help +she had counted upon had seemed to draw away from her—Kerr, whose +understanding she had been so sure of; Clara, whose propriety had never +failed; Harry, whose comfortable good nature she had so taken for +granted! It seemed as if the sapphire, whose presence she was never +unconscious of, for all she wore it out of sight, had a power like the +evil eye over these people. But if it could turn such as Ella against +her, why, the Brussels carpet beneath her might well open and let her +down to deeper abysses than Judge Buller's wine-cellar.</p> + +<p>She started nervously at the step of the maid returning. The message +brought was unexpected. "Miss Buller says will you please walk +up-stairs?"</p> + +<p>Flora was amazed. That invitation would have been odd enough at any +time, for she and Ella were hardly on such intimate footing. But now she +was ushered up the majestic stair, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[Pg 237]</a></span> from the majestic upper hall +abruptly into a wild little cluttered sewing-room, and thence into a +wilder but more spacious bedroom, large curtains at the windows, large +roses on the carpet, and over all objects in the room a clutter of +miscellaneous articles, as if Ella's band-boxes, bureaus, and +work-baskets habitually refused to contain themselves.</p> + +<p>From the midst of this Ella confronted her, still in her "wrapper" and +with the large puff of her hair a little awry. Under it her face was +curiously pink, a color deepening to the tip of her nose and puffing out +under her eyes.</p> + +<p>"Well, Flora," she greeted her guest. "You were just the person I wanted +to see. Sit down. No, not there—that's my bird of paradise feather! Oh, +no, not there—that's the breakfast. Well, I guess you'll have to sit on +the bed."</p> + +<p>Flora swept aside the clothes that streamed across it and throned +herself on the edge of the high, white plateau of Ella's four-poster. +Ella, for all her eager greeting, looked upon her<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[Pg 238]</a></span> friend doubtfully, +and Flora recognized in herself a similar hesitation, as if each were +trying to make out, without asking, what thoughts the other harbored.</p> + +<p>"I was afraid I shouldn't see you at all," Flora began at last.</p> + +<p>"Well, you wouldn't if it hadn't happened to be you," said Ella +paradoxically. "Look at me; did you ever see such a sight?"</p> + +<p>"You don't look very well," Flora cautiously admitted. "Why, Ella, +you've been crying!"</p> + +<p>"Yes, I've been crying," said Ella, mopping her nose, which still showed +a tendency to distil a tear at its tip. "And it's perfectly awful to me +to think you've been living so long in the same house with her."</p> + +<p>Flora murmured breathlessly, "What in the world do you mean?"</p> + +<p>"If you don't know, I certainly ought to tell you. I mean Clara," said +Ella distinctly.</p> + +<p>Flora, sitting up on the edge of the high bed with the tips of her +little shoes hardly touching the floor, looked at Ella fascinated,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[Pg 239]</a></span> her +lips a little apart. Ella had so exactly pronounced her own secret +thought of Clara. She was breathless to know what had been Clara's +performance at the Bullers'.</p> + +<p>"Of course I've always known she was like that," said Ella, leaning back +in her chair with an air of resignation. "She's always getting +something. It's awful. It was the same even when we were at +boarding-school. I suppose she never did have enough money, though her +people were awfully nice; but she worked us all for invitations and +rides in our carriages, and I remember she got lots through Lillie +Lewis' elder brother, and he thought she was going to marry him, but she +didn't. She married Lulu Britton's father; and I guess she worked him +until he went under and they found there really was no money. So she's +been living on people ever since." Ella rocked gloomily.</p> + +<p>"But she does it so nicely," Flora suggested. She still had the feeling +that it was not decent to own up to these most secret facts of people's failings.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[Pg 240]</a></span>"Oh, yes, she's a perfect wonder," Ella admitted grudgingly; "look at +what she's done for you!" Ella's gesticulation was eloquent of how much +that had been. "But don't you imagine she cares about you any more than +she cares about me!" Ella began to cry again. "You were an awfully good +thing for her, Flora, and now that you're going to be married she's got +to have something else. But I do think she might have taken somebody +besides papa."</p> + +<p>Flora gasped. "'Taken!' Ella, what do you mean?"</p> + +<p>"I mean married," said Ella.</p> + +<p>"'Married!'" For the time Flora had become a helpless echo.</p> + +<p>"Oh, not yet," Ella defiantly nodded. "Not while there's anything left +of me."</p> + +<p>Flora stammered. "Oh, Ella, no. Oh, Ella, are you sure?" She felt a +hysterical impulse to giggle.</p> + +<p>"Sure?" Miss Buller cried. "I should think<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[Pg 241]</a></span> so! Why, she's simply making +a dead set for him."</p> + +<p>This dénouement, this climax to her somber expectations, struck Flora as +something wildly and indecently ridiculous. "Why, but it's impossible!" +she protested, and began helplessly to laugh.</p> + +<p>"Well, I'd like to know why?" Ella snapped. "I'm sure papa is twice as +rich as old Britton was, and twice as easy." She went off into sobs +behind her handkerchief.</p> + +<p>"Oh, don't, Ella, don't cry!" Flora begged, petting the large expanse of +heaving shoulders. "I didn't mean anything. I was just silly. Of course +it may be that she wants to marry him. But she never has before—at +least, I mean, I don't believe she wants to now. What makes you think +she does? What has she done?"</p> + +<p>"Well," Ella burst out, "why is she coming here all the time, when she +never used to, and petting papa? Why does she bother to be so agreeable +to me when she never was before?<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[Pg 242]</a></span> Why does she make me ask her to +dinner, when I don't want to?"</p> + +<p>Each question knocked on Flora's brain to the accompaniment of Ella's +furious rocking. She could not answer them, and Ella's explanation, +absurd as it seemed, coming on top of her high expectations, wasn't +impossible. It was like Clara to have more than one iron in the fire; +but when Flora remembered the passionate intentness with which Clara had +demolished the order of her room, she couldn't believe that Clara would +pause in the midst of such pursuit to pounce on Judge Buller.</p> + +<p>"Oh, Ella," Flora sympathetically urged, "I don't believe there's really +any danger. And surely, even if she meant it, Judge Buller wouldn't +be—"</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes, he would," Ella cut her short. "Why, when she came yesterday +he was just going out, and she went for him and made him stop to tea. +Think of it—papa stopping to tea! And he was as pleased as Punch to +have her make up to him. He hasn't the least idea of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[Pg 243]</a></span> what she's after. +Papa isn't used to ladies. He's always just lived with me."</p> + +<p>This astonishing statement looking at Flora through Ella's unsuspecting +eyes had nevertheless a pathos of its own. It conjured up a long vista +of harmonious existence which the two, the daughter and the father, had +made out of their mutual simplicity, and their mutual gusto for the +material comforts which came comfortably.</p> + +<p>"But I'll tell you one thing," Ella ended, still rocking vigorously; "if +she comes here to-night to dinner when she knows I don't want her I +shall tell her what I think of her, before she leaves this house! See if +I don't."</p> + +<p>"Don't do that, Ella," Flora entreated, "that would be awful." She was +certain that such an interview would only end in Clara's making Ella +more ridiculous than she was already. "Let me speak to her. I don't mind +at all," she declared bravely, and in a manner truly, though she was +fully aware that speaking to Clara would be anything but a treat.</p> + +<p>"Oh, would you?" said Ella eagerly. "I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[Pg 244]</a></span> really would be awfully obliged. +I hated to ask you, Flora, but I thought perhaps you might be able +to—to, well, perhaps be able to do something," she ended vaguely. "Do +you think you could?"</p> + +<p>"I'll speak to Clara to-night," said Flora heroically, "or to-morrow," +she added; "I'm afraid I won't see her to-night."</p> + +<p>"Well, I'll let you know if it makes any difference," said Ella +hopefully.</p> + +<p>Flora knew that nothing either of them could say would make any +difference to Clara, or turn her from the thing she was pursuing; but by +speaking she might at least find out if Judge Buller himself were really +her object. And Ella's wail of assured calamity, "Papa has always been +so happy with me," touched her with its absurd pathos.</p> + +<p>She kissed Ella's misty cheek at parting. It wasn't fair, she thought +remorsefully, for people like the Bullers to be at large on the same +planet with people like Clara—and herself—and—and like—Her thoughts +ran off into the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[Pg 245]</a></span> fog. At least, thank heaven, it was the judge Clara +was trailing and not Kerr.</p> + +<p>The bells and whistles of one o'clock were making clangor as she ran up +the steps of her house again. In the hall Shima presented her with a +card. She looked at it with a quickening pulse. "Is he waiting?"</p> + +<p>"No, madam. Mr. Kerr has gone. He waited half an hour."</p> + +<p>Down went her spirits again. Yet surely after their last interview she +ought not to be eager to meet him again. "In the morning," she thought, +"and waited half an hour. How he must have wanted to see me!" She didn't +know whether she liked that or not. "When did he come?"</p> + +<p>"At eleven o'clock."</p> + +<p>At this she was frightened; he had missed Harry by less than half an +hour.</p> + +<p>"He waited all that time alone?"</p> + +<p>"No. Mr. Cressy came."</p> + +<p>Flora felt a cold thrill in her nerves. Then Harry had come back! What +had he come for?</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[Pg 246]</a></span>"He also would wait," the Japanese explained.</p> + +<p>Flora gasped. "They waited together!"</p> + +<p>The Japanese shook his head. "They went away together."</p> + +<p>She didn't believe her ears. "Mr. Kerr went away with Mr. Cressy?"</p> + +<p>The Japanese seemed to revolve the problem of mastery. "No, Mr. Cressy +accompanied Mr. Kerr." He had made a delicate oriental distinction. It +put the whole thing before her in a moment. Harry had been the +resistant, and the other with his brilliant initiative attacking, always +attacking when he should have been hiding, had carried him off. "What +had he done, and how had he managed, when Harry must have had such +pressing reasons for wanting to stay?" Ah, she knew only too well Kerr's +exquisite knowledge of managing; but why must he make such a reckless +exposure of himself? Did he suppose Harry was to be managed? Had he no +idea where Harry stood in this affair? In pity's name, didn't he know +that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[Pg 247]</a></span> Harry had seen him before—had seen him under circumstances of +which Harry wouldn't talk? They were circumstances of which she knew +nothing, and yet from that very fact there was left a horrible +impression in her mind that they had been of a questionable character.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[Pg 248]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XV" id="XV"></a>XV</h2> + +<h3>A LADY IN DISTRESS</h3> + +<p>She had returned, ready for pitched battle with Clara, and on the +threshold there had met her the very turn in the affair that she had +dreaded all along—the setting of Kerr and Harry upon each other.</p> + +<p>These were two whom she had kept apart even in her mind—the man to whom +she was pledged, with whom she had supposed herself in love, and the man +for whom she was flying in the face of all her traditions. She had not +scrutinized the reason of her extraordinary behavior; not since that +dreadful day when the vanishing mystery had taken positive form in him +had she dared to think how she felt about Kerr. She had only acted, +acted; only asked herself what to do next, and never why; only taken his +cause<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[Pg 249]</a></span> upon herself and made it her own, as if that was her natural +right. She could hardly believe that it was she who had let herself go +to this extent. All her life she had been docile to public opinion, +buxom to conventions, respectful of those legal and moral rules laid +down by some rigid material spirit lurking in mankind. But now when the +moment had come, when the responsibility had descended upon her, she +found that these things had in no way persuaded her. They were not vital +enough for her proposition. They had no meaning now—no more than proper +parlor furniture for a castaway on a desert island.</p> + +<p>Then this was herself, a creature too much concerned with the primal +harmonies of life to be impressed by the modulations her decade set upon +them. This was that self which she had obscurely cherished as no more +real than a fairy; but at Kerr's acclamation it had proclaimed itself +more real than flesh and blood, and Kerr himself the most real thing in +all her life.</p> + +<p>Then what was Harry? The bland implacable<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[Pg 250]</a></span> pronouncement of Shima had +summoned him up to stand beside Kerr more clearly than her own eyes +could have shown him. Surely she was giving to Kerr what belonged to +Harry, or else she had already given to Harry what ought to have been +Kerr's. That was her last conclusion. It was horrible, it was hopeless, +but it was not untrue. It had crept upon her so softly that it had taken +her unawares. She was appalled at the unreason of passion. Unsought by +him, unclaimed, in every common sense a stranger to him—how could she +belong to him? And yet of that she was sure by the way he had unveiled +her the first night, by the way he had quickened her dreaming into life. +As many times as she had fancied what love was like she had never +dreamed it could be like this. It was mockery that she could be +concerned for one who only wanted of her—plunder. Yet it was so. She +was as tremblingly concerned for his fate as if she owned his whole +devotion; and his fate at this moment, she was convinced, was in Harry's hands.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[Pg 251]</a></span>Kerr, with his brilliant initiative, might carry him off, but Kerr was +still the quarry. For had not Harry, from the very beginning, known +something about him? Hadn't he at first denied having seen him before, +and then admitted it? Hadn't he dropped hints and innuendoes without +ever an explanation? She remembered the singular fact of the Embassy +ball, twice mentioned, each time with that singular name of Farrell +Wand. And to know—if that <i>was</i> what Harry knew—that a man of such +fame was in a community where a ring of such fame had disappeared—what +further proof was wanted?</p> + +<p>Then why didn't Harry speak? And what was going on on his side of the +affair? Harry's side would have been her side a few days before. Now, +unaccountably, it was not. Nor was Kerr's side hers either. She was +standing between the two—standing hesitating between her love of one +and her loyalty to the other and what he represented. The power might be +hers to tip the scales Harry held, either to Kerr's undoing, or to his +protection. At least she<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[Pg 252]</a></span> thought she might protect him, if she could +discover Harry's secret. Her special, authorized relation to him—her +right to see him often, question him freely—even cajole—should make +that easy. But she shrank from what seemed like betrayal, even though +she did not betray him to Kerr by name.</p> + +<p>Then, on the other hand, she doubted how much she could do with Harry. +She wasn't sure how far she was prepared to try him after that scene of +theirs. She had no desire to pique him further by seeing too much of +Kerr. On her own account she wanted for the present to avoid Kerr. He +roused a feeling in her that she feared—a feeling intoxicating to the +senses, dazzling to the mind, unknitting to the will. How could she +tell, if they were left alone together for a long enough space of time, +that she might not take the jewel from her neck, at his request, and +hand it to him—and damn them both? If only she could escape seeing him +altogether until she could find out what Harry was doing, and what she must do!</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[Pg 253]</a></span>Meanwhile, there was her promise to Ella. She recalled it with +difficulty. It seemed a vague thing in the light of her latest +discovery, though she could never meet Clara in disagreement without a +qualm. But she made the plunge that evening, before Clara left for the +Bullers', while she was at her dressing-table in the half-disarray which +brings out all the softness and the disarming physical charm of women. +From her low chair Flora spoke laughingly of Ella's perturbation. Clara +paused, with the powder puff in her hand, while she listened to Flora's +explanation of how Ella feared that some one might, after all these +years, be going to marry Judge Buller. Who this might be she did not +even hint at. She left it ever so sketchy. But the little stare with +which Clara met it, the amusement, the surprise, and then the shortest +possible little laugh, were guarantee that Clara had seen it all. She +had filled out Flora's sketch to the full outline, and pronounced it, as +Flora had, an absurdity. But though Clara had laughed she had gone away +with her delicate<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[Pg 254]</a></span> brows a little drawn together, as if she'd really +found more than a laugh, something worth considering, in Ella's state of +mind.</p> + +<p>Flora was left with the uneasy feeling that perhaps she had unwittingly +delivered Ella into Clara's hands; that Ella, too, was in danger of +becoming part of Clara's schemes. Danger seemed to be spreading like +contagion. It was borne in upon her that from this time forward dangers +would multiply. That nothing was going to be easier, but everything +infinitely harder, to the end; and now was the time to act if ever she +hoped to make way through the tangle.</p> + +<p>She heard the wheels of Clara's departing conveyance. Now was her chance +for an interview with Harry. She spent twenty minutes putting together +three sentences that would not arouse his suspicions. She made two +copies, and sent them by separate messengers, one to his rooms, one to +the club, with orders they be brought back if he was not there to +receive them. Then—the miserable business of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[Pg 255]</a></span> waiting in the large +house full of echoes and the round ghostly globes of electric lights, +with that thing around her neck for which—did they but know of it—half +the town would break in her windows and doors.</p> + +<p>The wind traveled the streets without, and shook the window-casings. She +cowered over the library fire, listening. The leaping flames set her +shadow dancing like a goblin. A bell rang, and the shadow and the flame +gave a higher leap as if in welcome of what had arrived. She went to the +library door. In the glooms and lights outside Shima was standing, and +two messengers. It was odd that both should arrive at once. She stepped +back and stood waiting with a quicker pulse. Shima entered with two +letters upon his tray. She had a moment's anxiety lest both her notes +had been brought back to her, but no—the envelope which lay on top +showed Harry's writing. She tore it open hastily. Harry wrote that he +would be delighted, and might he bring a friend with him; a bully fellow +whom he wanted her to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[Pg 256]</a></span> meet? He added she might send over for some girl +and they could have a jolly little party.</p> + +<p>Flora looked at this communication blankly. Was Harry, who had always +jumped at the chance of a tête-à-tête, dodging her? In her astonishment +she let the other envelope fall. She stooped, and then for a moment +remained thus, bent above it. The superscription was not hers. The note +was not addressed to Harry, but to her, and in a handwriting she had +never seen before!</p> + +<p>Again the peal of the electric bell. Shima appeared with a third +envelope. This time it was her own note returned to her. With the +feeling she was bewitched she took up the mysterious letter from the +floor and opened it. She read the strange handwriting:</p> + +<blockquote><p>May I see you, anywhere, at any time, to-night?</p> + +<p class="right"><span class="smcap">Robert Kerr</span>.</p></blockquote> + +<p>It was as if Kerr himself had entered the room, masked and muffled +beyond recognition, and then, face to face with her, let fall his +disguise. She gazed at the words, at the signa<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[Pg 257]</a></span>ture, thrilled and +frightened. She looked at Harry's note, hesitated; caught a glimpse +between the half-open doors of the two messengers waiting stolidly in +the hall. Waiting for answers! Answers to such communications! She made +a dash for the table where were pens and ink and on one sheet scrawled:</p> + +<p>"Certainly. Bring him," appending her initials; on the other the word +"Impossible," and her full name. Then she hurried the letters into +Shima's hands, lest her courage should fail her—lest she should regret +her choice.</p> + +<p>"Anywhere, at any time, to-night," she repeated softly. Why, the man +must be mad! Yet she permitted herself a moment of imagining what might +have been if her answers had been reversed.</p> + +<p>But no, she dared not meet Kerr's impetuous attacks yet. First she must +get at Harry. And how was that to be managed if he insisted on +surrounding himself with "a jolly little party?"</p> + +<p>She found a moment that evening in which to ask him to walk out to the +Presidio with her<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[Pg 258]</a></span> the next morning. But he was going to Burlingame on +the early train. He was woefully sorry. It was ages since he had had a +moment with her alone, but at least he would see her that evening. She +had not forgotten? They were going to that dinner—and then the +reception afterward? Her suspicion that he was deliberately dodging +wavered before his boyish, cheerful, unconscious face. And yet, +following on the heels of his tendency to question and coerce her, this +reticence was amazing. The next day would be lost with Harry beyond +reach—twelve hours while Kerr was at the mercy of chance, and she was +at the mercy of Kerr.</p> + +<p>His tactics did not leave her breathing space. She felt as the lilies +wavering just beyond his reach. She remembered his ingenuity. She +thought of the blows of his cane. Lucky for her she was not rooted like +the lilies! The only safety was in keeping beyond his reach.</p> + +<p>Yet when his card was brought up to her the next morning she looked at +the printed name as wistfully as if it had been his face. It cost<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[Pg 259]</a></span> an +effort to send down the cold fiction that she was not at home, and she +could not deny herself the consolation of leaning on the baluster of the +second landing, and listening for his step in the hall below. But there +was no movement. Could it be possible he was waiting for her to come in? +Hush! That was the drawing-room door. But instead of Kerr, Shima +emerged. He was heading for the stair with his little silver tray and +upon it—a note. Oh, impudence! How dared he give her the lie, by the +hand of her own butler! She stood her ground, and Shima delivered the +missive as if it were most usual to find one's mistress beflounced in +peignoir and petticoats, hanging breathless over the baluster.</p> + +<p>"Take that back," she said coldly, "and tell him that I am out; and, +Shima,"—she addressed the man's intelligence—"make him understand it."</p> + +<p>She watched the note departing. How she longed to call Shima back and +open it! There was a pause—then Kerr emerged from the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[Pg 260]</a></span> drawing-room. As +he crossed the hall he glanced up at the stair and as much as was +visible of the landing. He hadn't taken Shima's word for it, after all!</p> + +<p>The vestibule door closed noiselessly after him, the outer door shut +with a heavy sound. Yet before that sound had ceased to vibrate, she +heard it shut again. Was he coming back? There was a presence in the +vestibule very vaguely seen through the glass and lace of the inner +door. Her heart beat with apprehension. The door opened upon Clara.</p> + +<p>Flora precipitately retreated. She was more disturbed than relieved by +the unexpected appearance. For Clara must have seen Kerr leave the +house. Three times now within three days he had been found with her or +waiting for her. She wondered if Clara would ask her awkward questions. +But Clara, when she entered Flora's dressing-room a few moments later +with the shopping-list, instead of a question, offered a statement.</p> + +<p>"I don't like that man," she announced.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[Pg 261]</a></span>"Who?"</p> + +<p>"That Kerr. I met him just now on the steps. Don't you feel there is +something wrong about him?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, I don't know," said Flora vaguely.</p> + +<p>Clara gave her a bright glance.</p> + +<p>"But you weren't at home to him."</p> + +<p>"I'm not at home to any one this morning," Flora answered evasively, +feeling the probe of Clara's eyes. "I'm feeling ill. I'm not going out +this evening either. I think I'll ring up Burlingame and tell Harry." It +was in her mind that she might manage to make him stay with her while +Clara went on to the reception.</p> + +<p>"Burlingame! Harry!" Clara echoed in surprise. "Why, he's in town. I saw +him just now as I was coming up."</p> + +<p>"Are you sure?"</p> + +<p>"Yes. He was walking up Clay from Kearney. I was in the car."</p> + +<p>"Why that—that is—" Flora stammered in her surprise. "Then something +must have kept him," she altered her sentence quickly. But<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">[Pg 262]</a></span> though this +seemed the probable explanation she did not believe it. Harry walking +toward Chinatown, when he had told her distinctly he would be in +Burlingame! She thought of the goldsmith shop and there returned to her +the memory of how Harry and the blue-eyed Chinaman had looked when she +had turned from the window and seen them standing together in the back +of the shop.</p> + +<p>"You do look ill," Clara remarked. "Why don't you stay in bed, and not +try to see any one?"</p> + +<p>Flora murmured that that was her intention, but she was far from +speaking the truth. She only waited to make sure of Clara's being in her +own rooms to get out of the house and telephone to Harry.</p> + +<p>It was not far to the nearest booth, a block or two down the +cross-street. She rang, first, the office. The word came back promptly +in his partner's voice. He had gone to Burlingame by the early train. It +was the same at the club. He must be in town, then, on secret<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">[Pg 263]</a></span> business. +She left the apothecary's and, with serious face, walked on down the +street, away from her house. She was thinking that now she knew Harry +had lied to her. And it was the second time. But perhaps it was just +because he thought her innocent that he was keeping her so in the dark. +Suppose she should tell him flatly what she had found out about him +to-day?</p> + +<p>She walked rapidly, in her excitement, turning the troubling question +over in her mind. She did not realize how far she had gone until some +girl she knew, passing and nodding to her, called her out of her +reverie. She was almost in front of the University Club. A few blocks +more and she would be in the shopping district. She hesitated, then +decided that it would be better to walk a little further and take a +cross-town car.</p> + +<p>A group of men was leaving the club. Two lingered on the steps, the +other coming quickly out. At sight of him, she averted her face, and, +hurrying, turned the corner and walked down a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264">[Pg 264]</a></span> block. Her heart was +beating rapidly. What if he had seen her! She looked about—there was no +cab in sight—the best thing to do was to slip into one of the crowded +shops, full of women, and wait until the danger had passed. Once inside +the door of the nearest, she felt herself, with relief, only one of a +horde of pricers, lookers and buyers. She felt as if she had lost her +identity. She went to the nearest counter and asked for veils. Partly +concealed behind the bulk of the woman next her, she kept her eye on the +door. She saw Kerr come in. How absurd to think that she could escape +him! She turned her back and waited a moment or two, still hoping he +might pass her by. Then, she heard his voice behind her:</p> + +<p>"Well, this is luck!"</p> + +<p>She was conscious of giving him a limp hand. He sat down on the vacant +stool next her, laughing.</p> + +<p>"You are a most remarkably fast walker," he observed.</p> + +<p>"I had to buy a veil," Flora murmured.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_265" id="Page_265">[Pg 265]</a></span>"Has it taken you all the morning?"</p> + +<p>She could see she had not fooled him.</p> + +<p>"I had a great many other things to do." She was resolved not to admit +anything.</p> + +<p>"No doubt, but I wanted to see you very much last night, and again this +morning. I may see you this evening, perhaps?" He was grave now. She saw +that he awaited her answer in anxiety.</p> + +<p>"But—" she hesitated just a moment too long before she added, "I'm +going out this evening."</p> + +<p>She started nervously to rise.</p> + +<p>"Wait," he said in a voice that was audible to the shop-girl, "your +package has not come."</p> + +<p>She looked at him helplessly, so attractive and so inimical to her. He +swung around, back to the counter, and lowered his voice. "Did you know +I called upon you yesterday morning, also?" he asked.</p> + +<p>She nodded.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Cressy and I waited for you together. Did he mention it to you?"</p> + +<p>"No." Her lips let the word out slowly.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_266" id="Page_266">[Pg 266]</a></span>"That's a reticent friend of yours!" The exclamation, and the truth of +it, put her on her guard.</p> + +<p>"I can't discuss him with you," she said coldly.</p> + +<p>"Yet no doubt you have discussed me with him?"</p> + +<p>"Never!"</p> + +<p>"You haven't told him anything?" The incredulity, the amazement of his +face put before her, for the first time, how extraordinary her conduct +must seem. What could he think of her? What construction would he put +upon it? She blushed, neck to forehead, and her voice was scarcely +audible as she answered "No."</p> + +<p>But at that small word his whole mood warmed to her. "Why, then," he +began eagerly, "if Cressy doesn't know—"</p> + +<p>"Oh, but he—" Flora stopped in terror of herself. "I can't talk of him, +I must not. Don't ask me!" she implored, "and please, please don't come +to my house again!"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_267" id="Page_267">[Pg 267]</a></span>He gave his head a puzzled, impatient shake. "Then where <i>am</i> I to see +you?"</p> + +<p>"In a few days—perhaps to-morrow—I will let you know." She rose. She +had her package now. She was getting back her courage. There was no +further way of keeping her.</p> + +<p>But he followed her closely through the crowd to the door. "Yes," he +said quickly under his breath, "in a few days, perhaps to-morrow, as +soon as you get rid of it, you won't mind meeting me! What are you +afraid of? Surely not me?"</p> + +<p>She was, but hotly denied it.</p> + +<p>"I am not afraid of you. I am afraid of them!"</p> + +<p>"Of them!" He peered at her. "What are you talking about now?"</p> + +<p>Ah, she had said too much! She bit her lip. They had reached the corner, +and the gliding cable car was approaching. She turned to him with a last +appeal.</p> + +<p>"Don't ask me anything! Don't come with me! Don't follow me!"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_268" id="Page_268">[Pg 268]</a></span>Not until she was safely inside the car did she dare look back at him. +He was still on the corner, and he raised his hat and smiled so +reassuringly that she was half-way home before she realized that, in +spite of all she had urged upon him, he had not committed himself to any +promise. And yet, she thought in dismay, he had almost made her give +away Harry's confidence. She was seeing more and more clearly that this +was the danger of meeting him. He always got something out of her and +never, by chance, gave her anything in return. If he should seek her +to-night she dared not be at home! Any place would be safer than her own +house. It would be better to fulfil her engagement and go to the +reception with Clara and Harry. That was a house Kerr did not know.</p> + +<p>It was awkward to have to announce this sudden change of plan after her +pretenses of the morning, but of late she had lived too constantly with +danger for Clara's lifted eyebrows to daunt her. The mere trivial act of +being dressed each day was fraught with danger. To<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_269" id="Page_269">[Pg 269]</a></span> get the sapphire off +her person before Marrika should appear; to put it back somehow after +Marrika had done; to shift it from one place to another as she wore +gowns cut high or low—and every moment in fear lest she be discovered +in the act! This was her daily manœuver. To-night she clasped the +chain around her waist beneath her petticoats. But Marrika's sensitive +fingers, smoothing over, for the last time, the close-fitting front of +the gown, felt the sapphire, fumbled with it, and tried to adjust it +like a button.</p> + +<p>"That is all right," Flora said quickly. "Nothing shows." Was it always +to make itself known, she thought uneasily, no matter how it was hid?</p> + +<p>She was ready early, in the hope that Harry might come, as he had been +wont to do, a little before the appointed hour. But he turned up without +a moment to spare. Clara was down-stairs in her cloak when he appeared. +There was no chance for a word at dinner. But if she could not manage it +later in the wider field<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_270" id="Page_270">[Pg 270]</a></span> of the reception, why, then she deserved to +fail in everything.</p> + +<p>But she found, upon their arrival that even this was going to be hard to +bring about. For she was immediately pounced upon—first, by Ella +Buller.</p> + +<p>"Why, Flora," at the top of her voice, "where have you been all these +days!" Then in a hot whisper, "Did you speak to her? It hasn't done one +bit of good."</p> + +<p>"I think you are mistaken," Flora murmured. "But be careful, and let me +know—" She had only time for that broken sentence before she was +surrounded; and other voices took up the chorus.</p> + +<p>She was getting to be a perfect hermit.</p> + +<p>She was forgetting all her old friends.</p> + +<p>And a less kindly voice in the background added, "Yes, for new ones."</p> + +<p>She realized with some alarm that though she had forgotten her public, +it had kept its eye on her. She answered, laughing, that she was keeping +Lent early, and allowed herself to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_271" id="Page_271">[Pg 271]</a></span> be drifted about through the crowd +by more or less entertaining people, now and then getting glimpses of +Harry, tracking him by his burnished brown head, waiting her opportunity +to get him cornered. At last she saw him making for the smoking-room. +Connecting this with the drawing-room where she stood was a small red +lounging-room, walls, floor and furniture all covered with crimson +velvet. It had a third door which communicated indirectly with the +reception-rooms, by means of a little hall. She was near that hall, and +it would be the work of a moment to slip by way of it into the red room +and stop Harry on his way through. She had not played at such a game +since, as a child, she had jumped out on people from dark closets, and +Harry was as much astonished as she could remember they had been. He was +cutting the end of a cigar and he all but dropped it.</p> + +<p>"What in the world are you doing here alone?" He spoke peevishly. "I +don't see how a crowd of men can leave such a bundle of fascination at large!"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_272" id="Page_272">[Pg 272]</a></span>She made him a low courtesy and said she was preventing him from doing +so.</p> + +<p>"It's very good of you, and you are very pretty, Flora," he admitted +with a grudging smile, "but I've got to see a man in there." His eyes +went to the door of the smoking-room whence was audible a discussion of +voices, and among them Judge Buller's basso. She was between Harry and +the door. Laughingly, he made as if to put her aside, when the door +through which she had entered opened again sharply; and Kerr came in.</p> + +<p>"Forgive me. I followed you," he began. Then he saw Harry. +"I—ha—ha—I've been hunting for you, Cressy, all the evening!"</p> + +<p class="center"><a name="image_on_272.jpg" id="image_on_272.jpg"></a><img src="images/image_on_272.jpg" width='455' height='700' alt="Forgive me, I followed you." /></p> + +<h3><span class="smcap">"Forgive me, I followed you."</span></h3> + +<p>Harry accepted the statement with a cynical smile. It was too evidently +not for him Kerr had been hunting, and after the first stammer of +embarrassment, the Englishman made no attempt to conceal his real +intentions. His words merely served him as an excuse not to retreat.</p> + +<p>"This is a good place to sit," he said, push<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_273" id="Page_273">[Pg 273]</a></span>ing forward a chair for +Flora. She sank into it, wondering weakly what daring or what danger had +brought him into a house where he was not known, to seek her. He sat +down in the compartment of a double settee near her. Harry still stood +with a dubious smile on his face. The look the two men exchanged +appeared to her a prolongment of their earnest interrogation in the +picture gallery; but this time it struck her that both carried it off +less well. Harry, especially, bore it badly.</p> + +<p>"Did you say you were looking for me?" he remarked. "Well, Buller's been +looking for <i>you</i>. He wants to know about some Englishman that they're +trying to put up at the club."</p> + +<p>"How's that? Oh, yes! I remember." Kerr shrugged. "Never heard of him at +home, and can't vouch for every fellow who comes along, just because he +is English."</p> + +<p>"Quite so!" said Harry, with a straight look at Kerr that made Flora +uncomfortable.</p> + +<p>"But Judge Buller has already vouched for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_274" id="Page_274">[Pg 274]</a></span> that man," she said quickly, +"so he must be all right."</p> + +<p>Kerr inclined his head to her with a smile.</p> + +<p>"Buller is easily taken in," said Harry calmly. Under the direct, the +insolent meaning of his look Flora felt her face grow hot—her hands +cold. Harry could sit there taunting this man, hitting him over another +man's back, and Kerr could not resent it. He could only sit—his head a +little canted forward—looking at Harry with the traces of a dry smile +upon his lips.</p> + +<p>She thought the next moment everything would be declared. She sprang up, +and, with an impulse for rescue, went to the door of the smoking-room. +"Judge Buller," she called.</p> + +<p>There was a sudden cessation of talk; a movement of forms dimly seen in +the thick blue element; and then through wreaths of smoke, the judge's +face dawned upon her like a sun through fog.</p> + +<p>"Well, well, Miss Flora," he wanted to know,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_275" id="Page_275">[Pg 275]</a></span> "to what bad action of +mine do I owe this good fortune?"</p> + +<p>She retreated, beckoning him to the middle of the room. "You owe it to +the bad action of another," she said gaily. "Your friends are being +slandered."</p> + +<p>Harry made a movement as if he would have stopped her, and the +expression of his face, in its alarm, was comic. But she paid no heed. +She laid her hand on Harry's arm. "Mr. Kerr is just about to accuse us +of being impostors," she announced. She had robbed the situation of its +peril by gaily turning it exactly inside out.</p> + +<p>The judge blinked, puzzled at this extraordinary statement. Harry was +disconcerted; but Kerr showed an astonishment that amazed her—a concern +that she could not understand. He stared at her. Then he laughed rather +shakily as he turned to her with a mock gallant bow.</p> + +<p>"All women impose upon us, madam. And as for Mr. Cressy"—he fixed Harry +with a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_276" id="Page_276">[Pg 276]</a></span> look—"I could not accuse him of being an impostor since we have +met in the sacred limits of of St. James'."</p> + +<p>The two glances that crossed before Flora's watchful eyes were keen as +thrust and parry of rapiers. Harry bowed stiffly.</p> + +<p>"I believe, for a fact, we did <i>not</i> meet, but I think I saw you there +once—at some Embassy ball."</p> + +<p>The words rang, to Flora's ears, as if they had been shouted from the +housetops. In the speaking pause that followed there was audible an +unknown hortatory voice from the smoking-room.</p> + +<p>"I tell you it's a damn-fool way to manage it! What's the good of twenty +thousand dollars' reward?" Flora clutched nervously at the back of her +chair. She seemed to see the danger of discovery piling up above Kerr +like a mountain.</p> + +<p>The judge chuckled. "You see what you saved me from. They've been at it +hammer and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_277" id="Page_277">[Pg 277]</a></span> tongs all the evening. Every man in town has his idea on +that subject."</p> + +<p>"For instance, what is that one?" Kerr's casual voice was in contrast to +his guarded eyes.</p> + +<p>The judge looked pleased. "That one? Why, that's my own—was, at least, +half an hour ago. You see, about that twenty-thousand-dollar +proposition—" They moved nearer him. They stood, the four, around the +red velvet-covered table, like people waiting to be served. "The trouble +is right here," said the judge, emphasizing with blunt forefinger. "The +crook has a pal. That's probable, isn't it?"</p> + +<p>Harry nodded. Flora felt Kerr's eyes upon her, but she could not look at +him.</p> + +<p>"And we see the thing is at a deadlock, don't we? Well, now," the judge +went on triumphantly, "we know if any one person had the whole ring it +would be turned in by this time. That is the weak spot in the reward +policy. They didn't reckon on the thing's being split."</p> + +<p>"Split? No, really, do you think that pos<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_278" id="Page_278">[Pg 278]</a></span>sible?" Kerr inquired, and +Flora caught a glimmer of irony in his voice.</p> + +<p>"Well, can you see one of those chaps trusting the other with more than +half of it?" The judge was scornful. "And a fellow needs a whole ring if +he is after a reward." He rolled his head waggishly. "Oh, I could have +been a crook myself!" he chuckled, but his was the only smiling face in +the party.</p> + +<p>For Kerr's was pale, schooled to a rigid self-control.</p> + +<p>And Harry's was crimson and swollen, as if with a sudden rush of blood. +His twitching hands, his sullen eyes, responded to Judge Buller's last +word as if it had been an accusation.</p> + +<p>"It makes me damned sick, the way you fellows talk—as if it was the +easiest thing in the world to—" He broke off. It was such a tone, +loose, harsh and uncontrolled, as made Flora shrink.</p> + +<p>As if he sensed that movement in her, he turned upon her furiously.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_279" id="Page_279">[Pg 279]</a></span>"Well, are we going to stand here all night?" He took her by the arm.</p> + +<p>She felt as if he had struck her. Buller was staring at him, but Kerr +had opened the door through which she had entered, and now, turning his +back upon Harry, silently motioned her out.</p> + +<p>She had a moment's fear that Harry's grasp, even then, wouldn't let go. +Indeed, for a moment he stood clutching her, as if, now that his rage +had spent itself, she was the one thing he could hold to. Then she felt +his fingers loosen. He stood there alone, looking, with his great bulk, +and his great strength, and his abashed bewilderment, rather pathetic.</p> + +<p>But that aspect reached her dimly, for the fear of him was uppermost. +Her arm still burned where he had grasped it. She moved away from him +toward the door Kerr had opened for her. She passed from the light of +the crimson room into the dark of the passage. Some one followed her and +closed the door.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_280" id="Page_280">[Pg 280]</a></span> Some one caught step with her. It was Kerr. He bent +his dark head to speak low.</p> + +<p>"I don't know why you did it, you quixotic child, but you must not +expose yourself in this way, for any reason whatsoever."</p> + +<p>The light of the crowded rooms burst upon them again.</p> + +<p>"Oh," she turned to him beseechingly, "can't you get me away?"</p> + +<p>"Surely." His manner was as if nothing had happened. His smile was +reassuring. "I'll call your carriage, and find Mrs. Britton."</p> + +<p>When Flora came down from the dressing-room she found Clara already in +the carriage, and Kerr mounting guard in the hall. As he handed her in, +Clara leaned forward.</p> + +<p>"Where is Mr. Cressy?" she inquired.</p> + +<p>"He sent his apologies," Kerr explained. "He is not able to get away +just now."</p> + +<p>Clara could not control a look of astonishment. As the carriage began to +move and Kerr's face disappeared from the square of the window, she +turned to Flora.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_281" id="Page_281">[Pg 281]</a></span>"Have you and Harry quarreled over that man?"</p> + +<p>Flora's voice was low. "No. But Harry—Harry—" she stammered, hardly +knowing how to put it, then put it most truly: "Harry is not quite +himself to-night."</p> + +<p>Flora lay back in the carriage. She was dimly aware of Clara's presence +beside her, but for the moment Clara had ceased to be a factor. The +shape that filled all the foreground of her thought was Harry. He loomed +alarming to her imagination—all the more so since, for the moment, he +had seemed to lose his grip. That was another thing she could not quite +understand. That burst of violent irritation following, as it had, Judge +Buller's words! If Kerr had been the speaker it would have been natural +enough, since all through this interview Harry's evident antagonism had +seemed strained to the snapping point.</p> + +<p>But poor Judge Buller had been harmless enough. He had been merely +theorizing. But—wait! She made so sharp a movement that Clara<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_282" id="Page_282">[Pg 282]</a></span> looked +at her. The judge's theory might be close to facts that Harry was +cognizant of.</p> + +<p>For herself she had had no way of finding out how the sapphire had got +adrift. But hadn't Harry? Hadn't he followed up that singular scene with +the blue-eyed Chinaman by other visits to the goldsmith's shop? Why, +yesterday, when he was supposed to be in Burlingame, Clara had seen him +in Chinatown. The idea burst upon her then. Harry was after the whole +ring. He counted the part she held already his, and for the rest he was +groping in Chinatown; he was trying to reach it through the +imperturbable little goldsmith. But he had not reached it yet—and she +could read his irritation at his failure in his violent outburst when +Judge Buller so innocently flung the difficulties in his face. She knew +as much now as she could bear. If Harry did not suspect Kerr, it would +be strange. But—Harry waiting to make sure of a reward before he +unmasked a thief! It was an ugly thought!</p> + +<p>And would he wait for the rest now—now<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_283" id="Page_283">[Pg 283]</a></span> that the situation was so +galling to him? Might not he just decide to take the sapphire, and with +the evidence of that, risk his putting his hand on the "Idol" when he +grasped the thief?</p> + +<p>The carriage was stopping. Clara was making ready to get out. She braced +herself to face Clara, in the light, with a casual exterior—but when +she had reached her own rooms she sank in a heap in the chair before her +writing-table, and laid her head upon the table between her arms.</p> + +<p>In her wretchedness she found herself turning to Kerr. How stoically he +had endured it all, though it must have borne on him most heavily! How +kind he had been to her! He had not even spoken of himself, though he +must have known the shadows were closing over his head. Any moment he +might be enshrouded. If it came to a choice between having him taken and +giving him the blue jewel, she wondered which she would do.</p> + +<p>In the gray hours of the morning she wrote him. She dared not put the +perils into words,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_284" id="Page_284">[Pg 284]</a></span> but she implied them. She vaguely threatened; and +she implored him to go, avoiding them all, herself more than any; and, +quaking at the possibility that he might, after all, overcome <i>her</i>, she +declared that before he went she would not see him again. She closed +with the forbidding statement that whether he stayed or went, at the end +of three days she would make a sure disposal of the ring. She put all +this in reckless black and white and sent it by the hand of Shima. Then +she waited. She waited, in her little isolation, with the sapphire +always hung about her neck, waited with what anticipation of marvelous +results—avowals, ideal farewells, or possibly some incredible +transformation of the grim face of the business. And the answer was silence.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_285" id="Page_285">[Pg 285]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XVI" id="XVI"></a>XVI</h2> + +<h3>THE HEART OF THE DILEMMA</h3> + +<p>There is, in the heart of each gale of events, a storm center of quiet. +It is the very deadlock of contending forces, in which the individual +has space for breath and apprehension. Into this lull Flora fell panting +from her last experience, more frightened by this false calm than by the +whirlwind that had landed her there. Now she had time to mark the echoes +of the storm about her, and to realize her position. Her absorption had +peopled the world for her with four people at most. Now she had time to +look at the larger aspect.</p> + +<p>From the middle of her calm she saw many inexplicable appearances. She +saw them everywhere, from the small round of Clara's movement to the +larger wheel of the public aspect.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_286" id="Page_286">[Pg 286]</a></span> Clara was taking tea with the +Bullers, and the papers had ceased to mention the Crew Idol.</p> + +<p>It had not even been a nine days' wonder. It had not dwindled. It had +simply dropped from head-lines to nothing; and after the first murmur of +astonishment at this strange vanishing, after a little vain conjecture +as to the reason of it, the subject dropped out of the public mouth. The +silence was so sudden it was like a suppression. To Flora it shadowed +some forces working so secretly, so surely, that they had extinguished +the light of publicity. They must be going on with concentrated and +terrible activity in cycles, which perhaps had not yet touched her.</p> + +<p>So, seeing Major Purdie among the crowd at some one's "afternoon" where +she was pouring tea, she looked up at his cheerful face and high bald +dome with a passionate curiosity. He knew why the press had been +extinguished, and what they were doing in the dark. She knew where the +sapphire was—and where the culprit was to be found. And to think that +they could tell each other, if they would, each a tale the other would<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_287" id="Page_287">[Pg 287]</a></span> +hardly dare believe. Amazing appearances! How far away, how foreign from +the facts they covered! But Major Purdie had the best of it. He at least +was doing his duty. He was standing stiffly on one side, while she +hesitated between, trying desperately to push Kerr out of sight before +she dared uncover the jewel. But he wouldn't move. In spite of all she +had done, he wouldn't.</p> + +<p>Across the room that very afternoon she caught the twinkle of his +resisting smile. He had had her letter then for two days, and still he +had come here, though he'd been bidden to stay away; though he had been +warned to keep away from all places where she, or these people around +her, might find him; though he had been implored to go, finally, as far +away as the round surface of the world would let him.</p> + +<p>By what he had heard and seen in the red room that night, he must know +her warning had not been ridiculous. And there was another threat less +apparent on the face of things, but evident enough to her. It was the +change in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_288" id="Page_288">[Pg 288]</a></span> Clara after she had begun her attack on the Bullers, her +appearance of being busy with something, absorbed with, intent upon, +something, which, if she had not secured it yet, at least she had well +in reach. And that thing—suppose it had to do with the Crew Idol; and +suppose Clara should play into Harry's hands!</p> + +<p>For Kerr's escape Flora had been holding the ring, fighting off events, +and yet all the while she had not wanted to lose the sight of him. Well, +now, when she had made up her mind finally to resign herself to the +dreariness of that, might he not at least have done his part of it and +decently disappeared? So much he might have done for her. Instead of +smiling at her across crowded tea-rooms, and obliquely glancing at her +down decorous dinner-tables, and with the same fatal facility he had +displayed in getting at her, now keeping away from her, out of all +possible reach.</p> + +<p>He was playing her own trick on her, but her chances for getting at him +again were fewer than his had been with her. She could not be<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_289" id="Page_289">[Pg 289]</a></span>siege him +in his abode; and in the places where they met, large houses crowded +with people, the eye of the world was upon her. For how long had she +forgotten it—she who had been all her life so deferential toward it! +Even now she remembered it only because it interfered with what she +wanted to do.</p> + +<p>For the eye of her small society was very keenly upon Kerr. She +realized, all at once, that he had become a personage; and then, by +smiles, by lifted eyebrows, by glances, she gathered that her name was +being linked with his. She was astonished. How could their luncheon +together at the Purdies', their words that night in the opera box, their +few minutes' talk in the shop, have crystallized into this gossip? It +vexed her—alarmed her, how it had got about when she had seen him so +seldom, had known him scarcely more than a week. It was simply in the +air. It was in her attitude and in his, but how far it had gone she did +not dream, until in the dense crowd of some one's at-home she caught the +words of a young girl. The voice was so sweet<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_290" id="Page_290">[Pg 290]</a></span> and so prettily modulated +that at its first notes Flora turned involuntarily to glimpse the +speaker, a slender creature in a delicate mist of muslin, with an +indeterminate chin and the cheek of a pale peach.</p> + +<p>"Just think," Flora heard her saying, "he went to see her three times in +two days, but to-day, did you notice, he wouldn't look at her until she +went up and spoke to him. I don't see how a girl can! Harry Cressy—"</p> + +<p>She moved away and the words were lost. Flora looked after her. For the +moment she felt only scorn for the creatures who had clapped that +interpretation upon her great responsibility. These people around her +seemed poor indeed, absorbed only in petty considerations, and seeing +everything down the narrow vista of the "correct." Her eyes followed the +young girl's course through the room, easy to trace by her shining blond +head, and the unusual deliciousness of her muslin gown. She stopped +beside two women, and with a certain sense of pleasure and embarrassment +Flora recognized one of them—Mrs. Herrick.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_291" id="Page_291">[Pg 291]</a></span> She caught the lady's eye +and bowed. Mrs. Herrick smiled, with a gracious inclination in which her +graceful shoulders had a part.</p> + +<p>It gave Flora the sense Mrs. Herrick's presence always brought her, of +protection, or security, and the possibility of friendship finer than +she had ever known. She started forward. But Mrs. Herrick, presenting +instantly her profile, drew the young girl's hand through her arm and +moved away.</p> + +<p>Flora winced as if she had received a blow. The other people who had +heard the same gossip of her had been, on account of it, all the more +amused, and anxious to talk to her. But Mrs. Herrick, though she bowed +and smiled, did not want her too near her daughter; perhaps, herself, +would have preferred not to speak to her.</p> + +<p>She felt herself judged—judged from the outside, it is true—but still +there was justice in it. She had been flying in the face of custom, +ignoring common good behavior, in short, sticking to her own convictions +in defiance of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_292" id="Page_292">[Pg 292]</a></span> world's. And she must pay the penalty—the loss of +the possibility of such a friend.</p> + +<p>But it was hard, she thought, to pay the price without getting the thing +she had paid for. It was more like a gamble in which she had staked all +on a chance. And never had this chance appeared more improbable to her +than now. For if Kerr valued the ring more than he valued his safety, +what argument was left her? She thought—if only she had been a +different sort of woman—the sort with whom men fall in love—ah, then +she might have been able to make one further appeal to him—one that +surely would not have failed.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_293" id="Page_293">[Pg 293]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XVII" id="XVII"></a>XVII</h2> + +<h3>THE DEMIGOD</h3> + +<p>On the third day she opened her eyes to the sun with the thought: Where +is he? From the windows of her room she could see the two pale points +and the narrow way of water that led into the western ocean. Had he +sailed out yonder west into the east, into that oblivion which was his +only safety, for ever out of her sight? Or was he still at hand, +ignoring warning, defying fate? "What difference can that make to me +now?" she thought, "since whether he is here or yonder I've come to the +end."</p> + +<p>She drew out the sapphire and held it in her hand. The cloud of events +had cast no film over its luster, but she looked at it now without +pleasure. For all its beauty it wasn't worth what they<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_294" id="Page_294">[Pg 294]</a></span> were doing for +it. Well, to-day they were both of them to see the last of it. To-day +she was going to take it to Mr. Purdie to deliver it into his hands, to +tell him how it had fallen into hers in the goldsmith's shop—all of the +story that was possible for her to tell. For the rest, how she came to +fix suspicion on the jewel, he might think her fanciful or morbid. It +didn't matter as long as the weary thing was out of her hands. It +couldn't matter!</p> + +<p>She had made it out all clear in her mind that this was the right thing +to do. It hadn't occurred to her she had made it out only on the +hypothesis of Kerr's certainly going. It had not occurred to her that +she might have to make her great moral move in the dark; or, what was +worse, in the face of his most gallant resistance. In this discouraging +light she saw her intention dwindle to the vanishing point, but the +great move was just as good as it had been before—just as solid, just +as advisable. Being so very solid, wouldn't it wait until she had time +to show him that she really meant what she said, sup<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_295" id="Page_295">[Pg 295]</a></span>posing she ever had +a chance to see him again? The possibility that at this moment he might +actually have gone had almost escaped her. She recalled it with a +disagreeable shock, but, after all, that was the best she could hope, +never to see him again! She ought to be grateful to be sure of that, and +yet if she were, oh, never could she deprive him of so much beauty and +light by her keeping of the sapphire as he would then have taken away +from her!</p> + +<p>She would come down then, indeed, level with plainest, palest, hardest +things—people and facts. Her romance—she had seen it; she had had it +in her hands, and it had somehow eluded her. It had vanished, +evaporated. It had come to her in rather a terrific guise, presented to +her on that night at the club by the first debonair wave of the man's +hand; and now he might have gone out through that white way into the +east, taking back her romance as the fairy takes back his unappreciated +gift.</p> + +<p>She leaned and looked through the thin veil of her curtains at the +splendid day. It was one<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_296" id="Page_296">[Pg 296]</a></span> of February's freaks. It was hot. The white +ghost of noon lay over shore and sea. Beneath her the city seemed to +sleep gray and glistening. The tops of hills that rose above the +up-creeping houses were misted green. Across the bay, along the northern +shore, there was a pale green coast of hills dividing blue and blue. +Ships in the bay hung out white canvas drying, and the sky showed whiter +clouds, slow-moving, like sails upon a languid sea. Beneath her, +directly down, through hanging darts of eucalyptus leaves, hemmed with +high hedges, the oval of her garden showed her a pattern like a Persian +carpet. Roofs sloped beyond it, and beyond these the diagram of streets +and houses, and empty unbuilt grassy lots.</p> + +<p>She looked down upon all, as lone and lonely as a deserted lady in a +tower, lifted above these happy, peaceful things by her strange +responsibility. Her thoughts could not stay with them; her eyes traveled +seaward. She parted the curtains and, leaning a little out, looked +westward at the white sea gate.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_297" id="Page_297">[Pg 297]</a></span>A whistle, as of some child calling his mate, came sweetly in the +silence. It was near, and the questing, expectant note caught her ear. +Again it came, sharper, imperative, directly beneath her. She looked +down; she was speechless. There was a sudden wild current of blood in +her veins. There he stood, the whistler, neither child nor bird, but the +man himself—Kerr, looking up at her from the gay oval of her garden. +She hung over the window-sill. She looked directly down upon him, +foreshortened to a face, and even with the distance and the broad glare +of noon between them she recognized his aspect—his gayest, of diabolic +glee. There lurked about him the impish quality of the whistle that had +summoned her.</p> + +<p>"Come down," he called.</p> + +<p>All sorts of wonders and terrors were beating around her. He had +transcended her wildest wish; he had come to her more openly, more +daringly, more romantically than she could have dreamed. All the +amazement of why and how he had braved the battery of the windows of +her<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_298" id="Page_298">[Pg 298]</a></span> house was swallowed up in the greater joy of seeing him there, +standing in his "grays," with stiff black hat pushed off his hot +forehead, hands behind him, looking up at her from the middle of +anemones and daffodils.</p> + +<p>"Come down," he called again, and waved at her with his slim, glittering +stick. How far he had come since their last encounter, to wave at and +command her, as if she were verily his own! She left the window, left +the room, ran quickly down the stair. The house was hushed; no passing +but her own, no butler in the hall, no kitchen-maid on the back stair. +Only grim faces of pictures—ancestors not her own—glimmered +reproachful upon her as she fled past. Light echoes called her back +along the hall. The furniture, the muffling curtains, her own reflection +flying through the mirrors, held up to her her madness, and by their +mute stability seemed to remind her of the shelter she was +leaving—seemed to forbid.</p> + +<p>She ran. This was not shelter; it was prison. He was rescue; he was +light itself. The only<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_299" id="Page_299">[Pg 299]</a></span> chance for her was to get near enough to him. +Near him no shadow lived. The thing was to get near enough. She rushed +direct from shadow into light. She came out into the sun, into the +garden with its blaze of wintry summer, its whispering life and the free +air over it. The man standing in the middle of it, for all his pot hat +and Gothic stick, was none the less its demigod waiting for her, +laughing. He might well laugh that she who had written that unflinching +letter should come thus flying at his call; but there was more than +laughter, there was more than mischief in him. The high tide of his +spirits was only the sparkle of his excitement. It was evident that he +was there with something of mighty importance to say.</p> + +<p>Was it that her letter had finally touched him? Had he come at last to +transcend her idea with some even greater purpose? She seemed to see the +power, the will for that and the kindness—she could not call it by +another word—but though she was beseeching him with all her silent +attitude to tell her instantly what the great<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_300" id="Page_300">[Pg 300]</a></span> thing was, he kept it +back a moment, looking at her whimsically, indulgently, even tenderly.</p> + +<p>"I have come for you," he said.</p> + +<p>"Oh, for me!" she murmured. Surely he couldn't mean that! He was simply +putting her off with that.</p> + +<p>"I mean it, I mean it," he assured her. "This doesn't make it any less +real, my getting at you through a garden. Better," he added, "and sweet +of you to make the duller way impossible."</p> + +<p>She took a step back. It had not been play to her; but he would have it +nothing else. He, too, stepped back and away from her.</p> + +<p>"Come," he said, and behind him she saw the lower garden gate that +opened on the grassy pitch of the hill, swinging idle and open. The +sight of him about to vanish lured her on, and as he continued to walk +backward she advanced, following.</p> + +<p>"Oh, where?" she pleaded.</p> + +<p>"With me!" Such a guaranty of good faith he made it!</p> + +<p>She tried to summon her reluctance.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_301" id="Page_301">[Pg 301]</a></span>"But why?"</p> + +<p>"We'll talk about it as we go along." His hand was on the gate. "We +can't stop here, you know. She'll be watching us from the window."</p> + +<p>Flora glanced behind her. The windows were all discreetly draped—most +likely ambush—but that he should apprehend Clara's eyes behind them! +Ah, then, he did know what he was about! He saw Clara as she did. She +would almost have been ready to trust him on the strength of that alone. +Still she hung back.</p> + +<p>"But my things!" she protested. She held up her garden hat. "And my +gown!" She looked down at her frail silk flounces. Was ever any woman +seen on the street like this!</p> + +<p>"Oh, la, la, la," he cut her short. "We can't stop to dress the part. +You'll forget 'em."</p> + +<p>She smiled at him suddenly, looked back at the house, put on her +hat—the garden hat. The moment she had dreaded was upon her. In spite +of her warning reason, in spite of everything, she was going with him.</p> + +<p>Beyond the looming roofs as they descended<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_302" id="Page_302">[Pg 302]</a></span> the hill she saw white sails +sink out of sight. All the little panorama upon which she had looked +down sprang up around her, large and living. He whistled to the car as +he helped her down the last steep pitch, whistled and waved, and they +ran for it. No time for back-looking, no time now for a faint heart. +Before she knew they were fairly crowded into the narrow front seat, and +the long street was running up to them and streaming by.</p> + +<p>This was never the car one went out the front door to take. This creaked +and crawled low, taking the corners comfortably, past houses with all +their windows blinking recognition. Hadn't it passed them so for twenty +years? Old houses in long gardens, and little houses creeping back +behind their yards, not yet encroached upon by fresher ties of living. +Past all these and gliding down under high, ragged banks, green grass +above with wooden stairways straggling up their naked faces; past these +again; past lower levels; past little gray and cluttered houses; past +loaded carts of vegetables; past<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_303" id="Page_303">[Pg 303]</a></span> children playing shrilly, bearing down +always on the green square of the plaza wide, worn and foreign, and the +Greek church "domed" with blue and yellow, bearing down as if it had +fairly determined to make its course straight through this stable +center. Then in the very shadow it swerved aside to clatter off in quite +another direction along a wider street with whiter shops, and more +glittering windows with gilded letters flashing foreign names, with more +marked and brilliant colors moving in the crowd, with a clearer stamp on +all of Latin living.</p> + +<p>Then suddenly for them the sliding panorama ceased. The car had stopped +and they had left it, and were standing upon the corner of a still +street that came down from the high hills behind them and crossed the +car-track and climbed again a little way to curve over into the sky. +Dingy houses two blocks above them stood silhouetted against the blue. +They were walking upward toward this horizon, leaving color and motion +behind them. With every step the street grew more empty, lonely and +colorless. Many<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_304" id="Page_304">[Pg 304]</a></span> of the windows that glimmered at them, passing, were +the blank windows of empty houses. Were they taking this way, this +curious roundabout out-of-the-world way, of dropping over into the +shipping which lay under the hill? For all she knew this might really be +his notion, for since they had left the garden gate, though they had +looked together at the light and color of the pictures moving past their +eyes, they had not exchanged a word.</p> + +<p>But all at once he stopped at the intersection of two dusty streets, and +his eyes veered down the four perspectives like a voyageur taking his +soundings. Elegant as ever and odd enough, yet he wasn't any odder here +at the jumping off place of nowhere than he had appeared in the box at +the theater, or in the picture gallery. She had the clear impression all +at once that he wasn't too odd for anything.</p> + +<p>"Here we are!" he said, and indicated with his glittering stick straight +before them a little house. It was low, as if it crouched against the +wind, faded and beaten by the sun to the drab<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_305" id="Page_305">[Pg 305]</a></span> of the rock itself, and +made so secret with tight-drawn curtains that it seemed to have shut +itself up against the world for ever. She wavered. She wasn't afraid of +herself out here, out-of-doors under the sky, but she was afraid that +those four walls might shut out her new unreasoning joy, might steal +away his new tenderness, and bring her back face to face with the same +ugly fact that had confronted her in her drawing-room.</p> + +<p>"Oh, no," she said, and put her hands behind her with a determination +that she wasn't going to move.</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes," he said, but he didn't smile. He looked at her quite gravely, +reproachfully, and the touch of his fingers on her arm was fine, was +delicate, as if to say, "I wouldn't harm you for the world."</p> + +<p>She blushed a slow, painful crimson. She hadn't meant that. She hadn't +even thought of it; but, since he had, there was nothing for it but to +go in. The door shut behind her sharply, with a click like a little +trap; and she breathed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_306" id="Page_306">[Pg 306]</a></span> such an atmosphere, flat, faint and stale, the +mere ghost of some fuller, more fragrant flavor. In the little anteroom +where they stood, whose faded ceiling all but brushed their heads, and +in the larger little room beyond the Nottingham lace curtains, prevailed +a mild shabbiness, a respectable decay. Curtains and table-cloths alike +showed a dull and tempered whiteness as if the shadow of time had fallen +dim across the whole. The little restaurant seemed left behind in the +onward march of the city, and its faded, kindly face was but a shadow of +what had been of the vigor and flourish of bourgeois Spain thirty years +before. There was no one eating at the little tables, no one sitting +behind the high cash-desk in the anteroom. Not a stir of human life in +all the place.</p> + +<p>"Hello," said Kerr among the tables looking around him, "we've caught +them asleep." He rapped on the wall with his cane. Flora peered at him +between the curtains, all her fascinated apprehension of what was to +follow plain upon her face. "Shall it be a giant or dwarf?" he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_307" id="Page_307">[Pg 307]</a></span> asked +her. "There's nothing I won't do for you, you know."</p> + +<p>The door opened and a little girl with a long black braid and purple +apron came in.</p> + +<p>"A dwarf," cried Flora. She laughed with a quick relaxing of her +strained nerves. It might almost have been the truth from that old +little swarthy face and sedate demeanor that hardly noticed them. The +child walked gravely up to the desk and mounting to the high stool +struck a faint-voiced bell.</p> + +<p>"There," said Kerr, "ends formality. Now let the real magic begin!"</p> + +<p>"Not black magic," Flora took up his fancy.</p> + +<p>He had drawn out a chair for her. "That depends on you. I'm not the +magic maker. I have no talisman."</p> + +<p>She felt the conscious jewel burn in her possession. She looked up +beseechingly at him, but he only laughed, and, with a swing, lifted the +chair a little off the ground as he set her up to the table, as if to +show how easily he could put forth strength. There was nothing defiant +in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_308" id="Page_308">[Pg 308]</a></span> him. He was taking her with him—taking her upon the wings of his +high spirits; but mischievously, obstinately, he would not show her +where the flight was leading, nor let her listen to anything but the +rustling of those wings. He was determined to make holiday, whatever was +to follow. For the glimpse of blue through the dim window might be the +Bay of Naples; and, ah! Chianti. Perhaps the sort one gets down Monte +Video way, where France fades into Italy—perhaps, at least if her kind +fancy could get the better of the reality. In Sicily there were just +such table-cloths as these, and just such fat floor-shaking contadini to +wait upon you. And look now at the purple one behind the desk—child or +gnome—feet not touching the floor—centuries of Italy in her face. Oh, +calculation, indifference!</p> + +<p>"She wouldn't care if you jumped up and threw me out of the window," he +affirmed. "That's why this hole is so harmless. Oh, isn't that harmless? +What's more harmless than to let one alone? There's only one dangerous +thing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_309" id="Page_309">[Pg 309]</a></span> here," he grinned and let her take her choice of which.</p> + +<p>She came straight at it.</p> + +<p>"You know I can't let you alone."</p> + +<p>He laughed. "Well, isn't that why we're here at last—that you may +dictate your terms?"</p> + +<p>"I have. Didn't you get my letter?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, indeed I did. Haven't I obeyed it? Haven't I kept away from your +house? Have I tried to approach you?"</p> + +<p>"Haven't you, though?" she threw at him accusingly.</p> + +<p>"Ah," he deprecated, "you came to me. I was down in the garden."</p> + +<p>She looked at him through his persiflage wistfully, searchingly. "But +there were other things in that letter."</p> + +<p>"There were?" He regarded her with grave surprise. Oh, how she +mistrusted his gravity! "Why, to be sure there were things—things that +you didn't mean—one thing above all others you couldn't mean, that you +want me to drop<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_310" id="Page_310">[Pg 310]</a></span> out when the game is half done, to slink away and leave +it all like this—abandon you and my Idol so to each other! My dear, for +what do you take me?"</p> + +<p>She burst out. "But can't you see the danger?"</p> + +<p>He met it quietly.</p> + +<p>"Certainly. I have been seeing nothing else but the danger—to you. Do +you think I've been idle all these days? Every line I have followed has +ended in that. It's brought me finally to this." The gesture of his hand +included their predicament and the dingy little room. "You'll really +have to help me, after all."</p> + +<p>"Oh, haven't I tried to? That is why I wrote. Don't you see your own +danger at all?"</p> + +<p>"No, but I'd like to." He leaned toward her, brows lifted to a quizzical +peak.</p> + +<p>"Oh, I can't tell you," she despaired. "But somehow I shall have to make +you go."</p> + +<p>"That will be easy," he said. Leaning back, nursing his chin in his +hand, he watched her with a gloomy sort of brooding. "You know what it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_311" id="Page_311">[Pg 311]</a></span> +is I'm waiting for. You know I won't go without it." His words came +sadly, but doggedly, with a grim finality, as if he gave himself up to +the course he was following as something he knew was inevitable. The +faintness of despair came over her. Only the narrow table was between +them, yet all at once, with the mention of the ring, he seemed a long +way off. What was this terrible obsession that outweighed every other +consideration with him? How get at it? How get through it? Or was it +between them for ever?</p> + +<p>"Do you care for it so very much?" she asked him, trembling but valiant.</p> + +<p>"I care so very much," he repeated slowly, and after a moment of wonder: +"Why, don't you?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, not for that," she cried sharply. "Not for the sapphire!"</p> + +<p>He stared. She had startled him clean out of his brooding. "In Heaven's +name, for what, then?"</p> + +<p>Oh, she could never tell him it was for him!<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_312" id="Page_312">[Pg 312]</a></span> In her distress and +embarrassment she looked all ways.</p> + +<p>His quick white finger touched her on the wrist. "For Cressy?"</p> + +<p>The abrupt stern note of his question startled her. She held herself +stiff and still for a moment, then: "For every one in this wretched +business. I have to."</p> + +<p>"Ah," he sighed out the satisfaction of his long uncertainty, "then +Cressy <i>is</i> in it."</p> + +<p>"No, I didn't mean that—you mustn't think it—I can't discuss him with +you!" She was hot to recapture her fugitive admission.</p> + +<p>"Don't let that disturb you. You haven't given him away to me. I had all +I'm likely to get from the man himself."</p> + +<p>"He—he told you?" she faltered.</p> + +<p>"He told me nothing. Don't you know that he misdoubts me? I got it out +of him, by sleight of hand—where we had met before. Has he never told +you anything of that morning when we left your house together?"</p> + +<p>"Never." The admission cost her an effort.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_313" id="Page_313">[Pg 313]</a></span>He mused at her. "As I said, he told <i>me</i> nothing, but it occurred to me +when he came in that we might be there on the same errand."</p> + +<p>She paled. "You mean—?"</p> + +<p>"I mean I thought it might be safer all around that you should not see +him that morning; so I got him away. He hasn't asked you for it since?"</p> + +<p>"The sapphire?" she faltered. "No!" The more her instinct warned that it +had been the jewel Harry had returned for, the more she repudiated the +idea to Kerr.</p> + +<p>"Why should you think he came for that? What has he to do with it?" she +murmured.</p> + +<p>"My God! how you do champion him!" He leaned forward sharply across the +table. "What is this man to you?"</p> + +<p>He was going too far. He had no right to that question. "The man I have +promised to marry." Her hot look, her cold manner defied him to command +her here. Yet for a moment, leaning forward with his clenched hands on +the table, he looked ready to spring up and force her<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_314" id="Page_314">[Pg 314]</a></span> words back on +her. The next he let it go and dropped back in his chair again.</p> + +<p>"Quite so," he said. "But I didn't believe it." He stared at her with a +dull, profound resentment. "Yet it's most possible; since it isn't the +sapphire it would be that." He mused. "But, you extraordinary woman, why +on earth—" he broke off, still looking at her, looking with a +persistent, sharp, studying eye, as if she were the most puzzling and, +it came to her gradually, the most dubious thing on earth. He was verily +a magician, a worker of black magic; for under the spell of his eyes she +felt herself turning into something horrible. However innocent she was +in intention, the ugly appearance was covering her.</p> + +<p>"Then what are you doing here with the ring on you?" he demanded +solemnly. "Why are you dealing with me? What do you think you'll get out +of it? Good God! women are hideous! How can you betray the man you +love?"</p> + +<p>"Oh," she cried, with a wail of horror. She stood up trembling and pale. +"I don't—I don't—I don't!<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_315" id="Page_315">[Pg 315]</a></span> I've kept it from them. I'm standing +against them all. I shall never give it to them. When have I ever +betrayed you?"</p> + +<p>He drew back, away from her, as if to ward off her meaning, but she +leaned toward him, her hands flung out, holding herself up to him for +all she meant. He got up slowly and the creeping tide of red, dusky and +violent, rising over his face, swelling his features, darkening his +eyes, hung before her like a banner of shame.</p> + +<p>"I didn't know, I didn't know," he repeated in a low voice. His eyes +were on the ground. Then, with a sharp motion, as if merely standing in +front of her was unendurable, "Oh, Lord!" he said, and, turning, walked +from her toward the window. He went precipitately, as if he meant to go +through it, but he only leaned against it and stood motionless; and from +her side of the table, trembling, breathless, she watched his stricken +silhouette black upon the gray, fading light.</p> + +<p>The knowledge of how far she had gone, of how much she had betrayed +herself, swelled and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_316" id="Page_316">[Pg 316]</a></span> swelled before her mind until it seemed to fill +her life, but she looked at it hardily and unabashed. All the decencies +in the world should sink before he thought her a traitor. She came +softly up beside him.</p> + +<p>"Don't be sorry for what I told you."</p> + +<p>"I'm not," he said. His voice sounded muffled. He did not look at her, +only held out his arm in a mute sign to her to come. She felt it around +her, but it was a mere symbol of protection. It lay limp on her +shoulder, and he continued to stare through the window at the street. +"I'm not sorry for what you said," he repeated slowly. "I'm glad; but, +child, I wish it wasn't true."</p> + +<p>"Don't, don't!" she besought him, "for I don't."</p> + +<p>He gave her a look. "That's beautiful of you, but"—and he turned to the +window again and spoke to himself—"it puts an awful face on my +business. All along you've made me think for you, and of you, more than +you deserve, more than I can afford." The stare she gave this forced out +of him a reluctant smile. "Why,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_317" id="Page_317">[Pg 317]</a></span> didn't you know it? Do you think I +couldn't have had the sapphire that first night I saw it on your hand, +if it hadn't been—well, for the way I thought of you? I fancied you +knew that then." He made a restless movement. His arm fell from her +shoulder. "There's been only one thing to do from the first," he said, +"and I don't see my way to it."</p> + +<p>"Oh, don't take it! Leave it!" she pleaded. "Leave it with me! What does +it matter so much? A jewel! If only you would leave it and go away from +me!"</p> + +<p>He whirled on her. "In Heaven's name, a fine piece of logic! Leave the +sapphire to people who can make no better use of it than I? Leave you to +go on with this business and marry this Cressy? Even suppose you gave me +the sapphire, I couldn't let you do that!"</p> + +<p>"If I gave you the sapphire," Flora said, "oh, he wouldn't marry me +then!" She couldn't tell how this had come to her, but all at once it +was clear, like a sign of her complete failure; but Kerr only wondered +at her distress.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_318" id="Page_318">[Pg 318]</a></span>"Well, if you don't want to marry him, what do you care?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, I don't, I don't care for that." She sank back listlessly in her +chair again. She couldn't explain, but in her own mind she knew that if +she lost the sapphire she would so lose in her own esteem; so fail at +every point that counted, that she would never be able to see or be seen +in the world again as the same creature. Even to Kerr—even to him to +whom she would have yielded she would have become a different thing. She +realized now she had staked everything on the premise that she wouldn't +have to yield; and now it began to appear to her that she would. His +weakness was appearing now as a terrible strength, a strength that +seemed on the point of crushing her, but it could never convince her. +That strength of his had brought her here. Was it to happen here, that +strange thing she had foreseen, the end of her? Was it here she was to +lose the sapphire, and him?</p> + +<p>She looked vaguely around the room, at the most impassive aspect of the +place, as at a place<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_319" id="Page_319">[Pg 319]</a></span> she never expected to leave; the darkening +windows, the fast-shut door, the child leaning on the desk, watching +them with sharp, incurious eyes—this would be her niche for ever. She +would be left for ever with the crusts and the dregs. And Kerr's figure +in the twilight seemed each time it moved to be on the point of +vanishing into the grayness. He moved continually up and down the narrow +spaces between the tables. He troubled the dry repose of the place. +Sometimes he looked at her, studying, questioning, undecided. Once he +stopped, as if just there an idea had arrested him. He looked at her, as +if, she thought, he were afraid of her. Then for long moments he stood +looking blankly, steadily out of the window. He did not approach her. He +seemed to avoid her, until, as though he had come at last to his +decision, he walked straight up to her and stood above her. She rose to +meet him. He was smiling.</p> + +<p>"Don't you know that you could easily get rid of me?" he demanded. +"Cressy would be too glad to do it for you; and there are more ways<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_320" id="Page_320">[Pg 320]</a></span> +than one that I could get the sapphire from you, if I could face the +idea of it—but really, really we care too much for each other. There's +only one way out for you and me and the sapphire. I'll take you both."</p> + +<p>Her clenched hands opened and fell at her sides. A great wave of +helplessness flowed over her. Her eyes, her throat filled up with a rush +of blinding tears. She put out her hands, trying to thrust him off, but +he took the wrists and held them apart, and held her a moment helpless +before him.</p> + +<p>"Oh, no," she whispered.</p> + +<p>"But I love you."</p> + +<p>Her head fell back. She looked at him as if he had spoken the +incredible.</p> + +<p>"I love you," he repeated, "though God knows how it has happened!"</p> + +<p>The blood rushed to her heart.</p> + +<p>He was drawing her nearer.</p> + +<p>She felt his breath upon her face; she saw the image of herself in his +eyes. She started to herself on the edge of danger, and made a strug<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_321" id="Page_321">[Pg 321]</a></span>gle +to release her wrists. He let them go. She sank down into her chair.</p> + +<p>"Why not? Why won't you go with me?" she heard him say again, still +close beside her.</p> + +<p>"I can't, I can't!" She clung to the words, but for the moment she had +forgotten her reasons. She had forgotten everything but the wonderful +fact that he loved her. He was there within reach, and she had only to +stretch out her hand, only to say one word, and he would cut through the +ranks of her perplexities and terrors, and carry her away.</p> + +<p>"Why not, if you love me?" he insisted. "Are you afraid of those people? +Are you afraid of Cressy? He shall never come near you."</p> + +<p>She shook her head. "No, it isn't that."</p> + +<p>He stooped and looked into her face. "Then what keeps you?"</p> + +<p>She looked up slowly.</p> + +<p>"My honor."</p> + +<p>"Your honor!" For a moment her answer seemed to have him by surprise. He +mused, and again it came dreamily back to her that he was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_322" id="Page_322">[Pg 322]</a></span> looking at +her across a vast difference no will of hers could ever bridge.</p> + +<p>"Don't you see what I am?" she murmured. "Can't you imagine where I +stand in this hideous business? It's my trust. I'm on their side; and, +oh, in spite of everything, I can't make myself believe in giving it to +you!"</p> + +<p>He pondered this very gravely.</p> + +<p>"Yes, I can see how you might feel that way. But is the feeling really +yours? Are you sure they haven't put it on you? Might not my honor do as +well for you, if you were mine?" It struck her she had never connected +him with honor, and he read her thought with a flash of humor. +"Evidently it hasn't occurred to you that I have an honor."</p> + +<p>She looked at him sadly. "In spite of everything I'm on the other side. +I belong to them."</p> + +<p>"You belong to me." His hand closed on hers. "Mine is the only honor you +have to think of. Can't you trust that I am right? Can't you see it +through my eyes? Can't you make yourself all mine?" His arm was around +her now,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_323" id="Page_323">[Pg 323]</a></span> holding her fast, but she turned her face away, and his kisses +fell only on her cheek and hair.</p> + +<p>"Oh," she cried, "if only I could!"</p> + +<p>"Don't you love me?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes, but that makes me see, all the more, the dreadful difference +between us."</p> + +<p>"You silly child, there is no difference, really."</p> + +<p>"Ah, yes, you know it as well as I. You were afraid of it, too. All that +long time you were walking around you were wondering whether you dared +to take me."</p> + +<p>He denied her steadily, "Never!"</p> + +<p>She loved him for that gallant denial, for she knew he had been afraid, +horribly afraid, more afraid than she was now; but that strange quality +of his that gave to a double risk a double zest had set him all the +hotter on this resolution.</p> + +<p>He sat for some long moments thoughtfully looking straight before him. +She, glancing at his profile, white and faintly glimmering in the +twilight, thought it looked sharp, absorbed and set. She could see his +great determination grow<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_324" id="Page_324">[Pg 324]</a></span>ing there in the gloom between them, looming +and overshadowing them both.</p> + +<p>"I see," he said at last. "I'll simply have to take you in spite of it." +He turned around to her, and reached his hands down through the dusk. +She was being drawn up into arms which she could not see. Her hands were +clasped around a neck, her cheek was against a face which she had never +hoped to touch. Her reason and her fears were stifled and caught away +from her lips with her breath. She was giving up to her awful weakness. +She was giving up to the power of love. She was letting herself sink +into it as she would sink into deep water. The sense of drowning in this +profound, unfathomable element, of shutting her eyes and opening her +arms to it, was the highest she had ever touched; but all at once the +memory of what she was leaving behind her, like a last glimpse of sky, +swept her with fear. She made a desperate effort to rescue herself +before the waters quite closed over her head.</p> + +<p>She pulled herself free. Without his arms<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_325" id="Page_325">[Pg 325]</a></span> around her for the first +moment she could hardly stand. She took an uncertain step forward; then +with a rush she reached the white curtains. They flapped behind her. She +heard Kerr laugh, a note, quiet, caressing, almost content. It came from +the gloom like a disembodied voice of triumph. Her rush had carried her +into the middle of the anteroom. At this last moment was there to be no +miracle to save her? There was no rescue among these dumb walls and +closed-up windows. The purple child gave her a sharp, bird-like glance, +as if the most that this wild woman could want was "change." Flora +looked behind her and saw Kerr, who had put aside the curtains and was +standing looking at her. He was bright and triumphant in that twilight +room. He was not afraid of losing her now. He knew in that one moment he +had imprisoned her for ever! She saw him approaching, but though all her +mind and spirit strained for flight, something had happened to her will. +It tottered like her knees.</p> + +<p>He stooped and picked up an artificial rose,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_326" id="Page_326">[Pg 326]</a></span> which had fallen from her +hat, and put it into her hand. A moment, with his head bent, he stood +looking into her face, but without touching her.</p> + +<p>"Sit down over there," he said, and pointed toward a chair against the +wall. She went meekly like a prisoner. He spoke to the child in the +purple apron, who was still sitting behind the desk. He put some money +on the cash-desk in front of her. It was gold. It shone gorgeously in +the dull surrounding, and the child pounced upon it, incredulous of her +luck. Then he turned, crossed the room, soundlessly opened the door, and +went out into the violet dark of the street.</p> + +<p>The child furtively tested her coin, biting it as if to taste the +glitter, and Flora waited, lost, given up by herself, passively watching +for the room to be filled again with his presence. He was back after a +long minute, and this time took up his stand at the door, where, pushing +aside the tight-drawn curtain a little, from time to time he looked out +into the street. Sometimes his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_327" id="Page_327">[Pg 327]</a></span> eyes followed the cracks of the +plastered wall, sometimes he studied the floor at his feet; every moment +she saw he was alert, expectantly watching and waiting; and though he +never looked at her sitting behind him, she felt his protection between +her and the darkening street. She sat in the shadow of it, feeling it +all around her, claiming her as it would claim her henceforth, from, the +world. A ghost of light glimmered along the curtains of the window, and +stopped, quivering, in the middle of the curtained door. Then he turned +about and beckoned her. Sheer weakness kept her sitting. He went to her, +took her face between his hands, and looked into it long and intently.</p> + +<p>"You don't want to go!" The words fell from his lips like an accusal. +His sudden realization of what she felt held him there dumb with +disappointment. "You have won me," her look was saying, "and yet I have +immediately become a worthless thing, because I am going; and I don't +believe in going." She felt she had failed him—how cruelly, was written +in his face. But it was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_328" id="Page_328">[Pg 328]</a></span> only for a moment that she made him hesitate. +The next he shook himself free.</p> + +<p>"Well, come," he said.</p> + +<p>She felt that all doors would fly open at his bidding. She felt herself +swept powerless at his will with all the yielding in her soul that she +had felt in her body when his arms were around her. He had taken her by +the hand—he was leading her out into the gusty night, where all lights +flared—the gas-lights marching up the street over the hill into the +unknown, and the lights gleaming at her like eyes in the dark bulk of +the carriage waiting before the door. It all glimmered before her—a +picture she might never see again—might not see after she passed +through the carriage door that gaped for her. The will that had swept +her out of the door was moving her beyond her own will, as it had moved +her that morning in the garden, beyond all things that she knew. There +was no feeling left in her but the despair of extreme surrender.</p> + +<p>She found herself in the carriage. She saw his face in the carriage door +as pale as anger,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_329" id="Page_329">[Pg 329]</a></span> yet not angry; it was some bigger thing that looked +at her from his eyes. He looked a long while, as if he bade her never to +forget this moment. Then, "I'll give you twenty-four hours," he said. +"This man will take you home." He shut the carriage door—shut it +between them. Before she had gathered breath he had straightened, fallen +back, raised his hat, and the carriage was turning. Flora thrust her +head, straw hat and ribbons out of the window.</p> + +<p>"Oh, I love you!" she called to him. She sank back in the cushions and +covered her face with her hands.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_330" id="Page_330">[Pg 330]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XVIII" id="XVIII"></a>XVIII</h2> + +<h3>GOBLIN TACTICS</h3> + +<p>For a little she kept her face hidden, shutting out the present, +jealously living with the wonderful thing that had happened to her. It +was as wonderful as anything she had dreamed might come when she had +written him that letter. And if she needed any proof of his love, she +had had it in the moment when he had let her go. There he had +transcended her hope. She felt lifted up, she felt triumphant, though +the triumph had not been hers. It was all his; he had saved her from her +own weakness; his was the miracle. How he shone to her! The dark, +swaying hollow of the carriage seemed still full of his presence, full +of his hurried whispering; and again she seemed to see him standing +outside the window in the deep blue evening holding out his hands to her +cry of "I love you!"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_331" id="Page_331">[Pg 331]</a></span>He had been wonderful in a way she had not expected. He had shown her so +beautifully that he could be reached in spite of his obsession. Might +not she hope to touch him just a little further? Was there any height +now that he might not rise to? She seemed to see the possible end of it +all shaping itself out of his magnanimity. She seemed to see him finally +relinquishing his passion for the jewel, and his passion for her for the +sake of something finer than both. She had seen it foreshadowed in what +he had done this day—having them both in his hands, he had put them +away from him. Yet in that action she knew there had been no finality. +She had touched him, but she had not convinced him, and as long as he +was unconvinced he would be at her again in some other way.</p> + +<p>Her hands dropped from her face, and she confronted the fact drearily. +"No," she thought, "he never gives up what he wants."</p> + +<p>She looked out of the window. The flickers of gas-lamps fell +intermittently through it upon her. Her queer vehicle was rattling +crazily—jolting<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_332" id="Page_332">[Pg 332]</a></span> as if every spring were at its last leap. She was out +of the quiet, blue street. Montgomery Avenue, with its lights, its +glittering gilt names and Latin insignia, was traveling by on either +side of her. The voice of the city was growing louder in her ears, the +crowd on the pavement increased. At intervals the carriage dipped +through glares of electric lights that illuminated its interior in a +flash broader than day—the ragged cushions, the raveled tassels, the +limp-swinging shutters, and, glimmering in the midst, wild and +disheveled, herself in all the little wavy mirrors. She sat looking out +at the maze of moving lights and figures without seeing them, intent on +an idea that was growing clearer, larger, moment by moment in her mind.</p> + +<p>Kerr's appearance in her garden—his capture of her—had not been the +fantastic freak it had seemed. He had had his purpose. He had taken her +out of her environment; he had carried her beyond succor or menace just +that he might carry them both so much further and faster through their +differences. They had not<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_333" id="Page_333">[Pg 333]</a></span> reached the point of agreement yet, but might +they not on some other ground, where they could be unchallenged? It +seemed to her if she could only meet him on her own ground for +once—instead of for ever on Clara's or Harry's—only meet him alone, +somewhere beyond their reach, it might be accomplished, it might be +brought to the end she so wished. Yet where to go to be rid of Clara and +Harry, the two so closely associated with every fact of her life?</p> + +<p>The hack, which had been moving along at a rapid pace, slowed now to a +walk among the thickening traffic, and from a mere moving mass the crowd +appeared as individuals—a stream of dark figures and white faces. Her +eyes slipped from one to another. Here one stood still on the lamp-lit +corner, looking down, with lips moving quickly and silently. It was +strange to see those rapid, eager, moving lips with no sound from them +audible. Then her eyes were startled by something familiar in the +figure, though the direct down-glare of the ball of light above him +distorted the features with shadows. She pressed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_334" id="Page_334">[Pg 334]</a></span> her face against the +window-glass in palpitating doubt. It was Harry.</p> + +<p>She cowered in the corner of the carriage. In a moment the risks of her +situation were before her. Had he seen her? Oh, no, at least not yet. He +had been too intent on whomever he was talking to. She peered to make +sure that he was still safely on the street corner. He was just +opposite, and now that the eddy of the crowd had left a little clear +space around him she saw with whom he was talking. It was a small, very +small, shabby, nondescript man—possibly only a boy, so short he seemed. +His back was toward her. His clothes hung upon him with an odd +un-Anglo-Saxon air. He was foreign with a foreignness no country could +explain—Italian, Portuguese, Greek—whatever he was, he was a strange +foil to Harry, so bright and burnished.</p> + +<p>The hack was turning. She realized with dismay that it was turning sharp +around that very corner where they stood. Suppose Harry should chance to +glance through its window and see Flora Gilsey sitting trembling within. +The<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_335" id="Page_335">[Pg 335]</a></span> hack wheezed and cramped, and all at once she heard it scrape the +curb. Then she was lost! She looked up brave in her desperation, ready +to meet Harry's eyes. She saw the back of his head. For a moment it +loomed directly above her, then it moved. He was separating from his +companion. With one stride he vanished out of the square frame of the +window, and there remained full fronting her, staring in upon her, the +face of his companion.</p> + +<p>Back flashed to her memory the goldsmith's shop—dull hues and odors all +at once—and that wide unwinking stare that had fixed her from the other +side of the counter. The blue-eyed Chinaman! In the glare of white +light, in his terrible clearness and nearness, she knew him instantly.</p> + +<p>The hack plunged forward, the face was gone. But she remained nerveless, +powerless to move, frozen in her stupefaction, while her vehicle pursued +its crazy course. It was clattering up Sutter Street toward Kearney, +where at this hour the town was widest awake, and the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_336" id="Page_336">[Pg 336]</a></span> crowd was a crowd +she knew. At any instant people she knew might be going in and out of +the florists' shops and restaurants, or passing her in carriages. And +what of Flora Gilsey in her morning dress and garden hat, in a +night-hawk of a Telegraph Hill hack, flying through their midst like a +mad woman? They were the least of her fears. She had forgotten them. The +only thing that remained to her was the memory of Harry and the +blue-eyed Chinaman together on the street corner.</p> + +<p>She had been given a glimpse of that large scheme that Harry was +carrying forward somewhere out of her sight—such a glimpse as Clara had +given her in the rifling of her room, as Ella had shown in her +hysterical revelation. Again she felt the threat of these ominous signs +of danger, as a lone general at a last stand with his troops clustered +at his back sees in front, and behind, on either side of him, the +glitter of bayonets in the bushes.</p> + +<p>She was in the midst of the tangled traffic of Kearney Street. Swimming +lights and crowds<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_337" id="Page_337">[Pg 337]</a></span> were all around her. She peered forth cautiously upon +it. She saw a florid face, a woman, she knew casually—and there her +eyes fastened, not for the woman's brilliant presence, but for what she +saw directly in front of it, thrown into relief upon its background—a +short and shabby figure, foreign, equivocal, reticent, the figure of a +blue-eyed Chinaman.</p> + +<p>He was standing still while the crowd flowed past him. This time he was +alone. He seemed to be waiting, yet not to watch, as if he had already +seen what he was expecting and knew that it must pass his way. It was +uncanny, his reappearance, at a second interval of her route, standing +as if he had stood there from the first, patient, expectant, motionless. +It was worse than uncanny.</p> + +<p>All at once an idea, wild and illogical enough, jumped up in her mind. +Couldn't this miserable vehicle that was lumbering like a disabled bug +move faster and rattle her on out of reach of the glare, the publicity, +the threat of discovery, and, above all, of her discomforting notion?<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_338" id="Page_338">[Pg 338]</a></span> +She breathed out relief as the carriage dipped into the comparative +quiet again, and she felt herself being driven on and up a gently rising +street between block-apart, lone gas-lamps. She thrust her face as far +out of the window as she dared, looking back at the lights and traffic +which were drifting behind her. At this distance she could single out no +one figure from the crowd, and no figure which could possibly be that of +the blue-eyed Chinaman was moving up the street behind her. There only +remained a disquieting memory of him on the corner with Harry. Together +they made a combination, to her mind, threatening to the man she loved, +for whom she so desperately feared.</p> + +<p>If ever she had felt herself helpless, it was in this moment passing +along the half-lit, half-empty city street. By what she knew, by what +she wore around her neck, she was separated from all peace-abiding +citizens—she was outlawed. Every closed door and shaded window (so many +she had opened or looked out of!) now seemed shut and shaded against her +for ever.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_339" id="Page_339">[Pg 339]</a></span> Night and the reticent gray city, averting their eyes, let +her slip through unregarded.</p> + +<p>She was passing that section of large, old-fashioned mansions, cupolaed, +towered, indistinct at the top of their high, broad steps, or back among +the trees of their gardens. Along the front of one stretched a high +hedge of laurestinas black as a ribbon of the night, capacious of +shadows; and it seemed to Flora that all at once a shadow detached +itself. She looked with a start. It flashed along the pavement—if +shadow it were—running head down with a strange, scattering movement of +arms and legs, yet seeming to make such speed that for a moment it kept +abreast of the cab. She could see no features, no lineament of this +strange thing to recognize, yet instantly she knew what it must be—what +she had feared and thought impossible. She thrust her head far out and +addressed the driver.</p> + +<p>"Go as fast as you can, faster! and I'll give you twice what he gave +you." The words rang so wildly to her own ears that she half expected<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_340" id="Page_340">[Pg 340]</a></span> +the driver to peer down like an old bird of prey from his perch and +demand her reason. But he made no sound or sign. It may have been that +in his time he had heard even wilder requests than hers. He only sent +his whip cracking forward to the ears of the lean horse, and the cab +began to rattle like a mad thing.</p> + +<p>Flora leaned back with a sigh of relief. The mere sensation of being +borne along at such a rate, the sight of houses, lamp-posts, even people +here and there, flitting away from the eye, unable to interrupt her +course, or even to glimpse her identity, gave her a feeling of safety. +The more she was getting into the residence part of the city, the more +deserted the streets, the closer shut the windows of the houses, the +more it seemed to her as if the night itself covered and abetted her +flight. So swiftly she went it was only a wonder how the cab held +together. She had never traveled more rapidly in her light and silent +carriage. Now they whirled the corner and plunged at the steep rise of a +cross street. Just above, over the crown of the hill, she saw the sky, +moon<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_341" id="Page_341">[Pg 341]</a></span>less, blackish, spattered with stars. Then against it a little +fluttering shape like a sentinel wisp—the only living thing in sight. +It was incredible, impossible, horrible that he should be there, in +front of her, waiting for her, who had driven so fast—too fast, it had +seemed, for human foot to follow. By what unimaginable route had he +traveled? She was ready to believe he had flown over the housetops. And +above all other horrors, why was he pursuing her?</p> + +<p>The carriage was abreast the Chinaman now, and immediately he took up +his trot, for a little while keeping up, dodging along between light and +shadow, presently falling behind. At intervals she heard the patter, +patter, patter of his footsteps following; at intervals she lost the +sound, and shadows would engulf the figure, and she would wait in a +panic for its reappearance. For she knew it was there somewhere, on one +side of the street or the other. But, oh, not to see it! To expect at +any moment it might start up again—Heaven knew where, perhaps at her +very carriage window. Her<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_342" id="Page_342">[Pg 342]</a></span> unconscious hand was doubled to a fist upon +her breast, fast closed upon the sapphire.</p> + +<p>With all her body braced, she leaned and looked far backward, and far +forward, and now for a long time saw nothing. The distance was empty. +The glare of arc-lights showed her the shadows of her own progress—the +shadow of her vehicle shooting huge and misshapen now on the cobbles, +now along a blank wall, wheels, body and driver, all lurching like one; +now heaped on each other, now tenuously drawn out, now twisting +themselves into shapes the mind could not account for. For here, +whirling the corner, the carriage seemed to wave an arm, and now between +the wheels, fast twinkling, she saw a pair of legs. She leaned and +looked, so mesmerized with this grotesque appearance that it scarcely +troubled her that all the way down the last long hill she knew it must +be that a man was running at her wheel.</p> + +<p>The warm lights of her house were just before her, offering succor, +stiffening courage. It would be but a dash from the door of the cab to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_343" id="Page_343">[Pg 343]</a></span> +her own door. There was no second course, once the cab stopped. She felt +that to lurk in its gloom would mean robbery, perhaps death. She thought +without fear, but with an intense calculation. Her hand held the door at +swing as the cab drew up. Before it should stop she must leap. She +gathered her skirts and sprang—sprang clean to the sidewalk. The steps +of her house rushed by her in her upward flight. Her bell pealed. She +covered her eyes.</p> + +<p>For the moment before Shima opened the door there was nothing but +darkness and silence. She had never been so glad of anything in her life +as of the kind, astute, yellow face he presented to her distressed +appeal.</p> + +<p>"Shima," she panted, "pay the cab; and if there's any one else there say +that I'll call the police—no, no, send him away." There was no question +or hesitation in Shima's obedience. Through the glass of the door she +watched him descend upon his errand, until he disappeared over the edge +of the illumination of the vestibule. She waited, dimly aware of voices +going<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_344" id="Page_344">[Pg 344]</a></span> on beyond the curtains of the drawing-room, but all her listening +power was concentrated on the silence without—a silence that remained +unbroken, and out of which Shima returned with the same imperturable +countenance.</p> + +<p>"He wants ten dollars."</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes, give him anything," Flora gasped. If that was all the Chinaman +had followed her for! But her relief was momentary, for instantly Shima +was back again.</p> + +<p>"I gave him ten dollars, the cabman."</p> + +<p>Now she gasped indeed. "Oh, the cabman! But the other one!" For an +instant Shima seemed to hesitate; glancing past her shoulder as if there +was something that he doubted behind her. Then as she still hung on his +answer he brought it out in a lowered voice.</p> + +<p>"Madam, there was no one else there."</p> + +<hr /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_345" id="Page_345">[Pg 345]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XIX" id="XIX"></a>XIX</h2> + +<h3>THE FACE IN THE GARDEN</h3> + +<p>With her hand at her distressed forehead she turned, and saw, between +the curtains of the drawing-room, Harry, and behind him Clara, looking +out at her with faces of amazement, and she fancied, horror. Harry came +straight for her.</p> + +<p>"Why, you poor child, what's happened to you?"</p> + +<p>She gave him a look. She couldn't forget their scene in the red room, +but the mixture of apprehension and real concern in his face went far +toward melting her. She might even have told him something, at least a +part of the truth, but for that other standing watching her from the +drawing-room door. With Clara, there was nothing for it but to ignore +her disordered hair,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_346" id="Page_346">[Pg 346]</a></span> her hat in her hand, her ruffle torn and trailing +on the floor.</p> + +<p>She put on a splendid nonchalance, as if it were none of their business. +"Oh, I am sorry if I kept you waiting."</p> + +<p>It was Clara who spoke to her, past Harry's blank astonishment. "Why, we +don't mind waiting a few moments more while you dress."</p> + +<p>"I shan't have to dress." Such a statement Flora felt must amaze even +Shima, waiting like an image on the threshold of the dining-room. But if +these people were waiting to be amazed she felt herself equal to amazing +them to the top of their expectations.</p> + +<p>"Oh, but at least go up and let Marrika give you some pins," Clara +protested, hurrying forward as if fairly to drive her.</p> + +<p>"Thank you, no, this will do," Flora said. On one point she was quite +clear. She wasn't going to leave those two together for a moment to +discuss her plight; not till she could first get at Harry alone. Then +and there she turned to the mirror and with her combs began to catch<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_347" id="Page_347">[Pg 347]</a></span> +back and smooth the disorder of her hair, seeing all the while Clara's +reflection hovering perturbed and vigilant in the background of her own.</p> + +<p>While her hands were busy seeming to accommodate Clara, her mind was +marshaled to Clara's outwitting. The only thing to do was to tell +nothing. Let Clara spend her time in guessing. Unless by some wild +chance she had seen Kerr in the garden she couldn't come near the truth +of what had happened. But what was to be done with Harry? Harry was too +close to her to be ignored. Her attitude toward him had undergone a +change. In the moment in the red room, when she had seen him break the +one feeling that had held her to him, the feeling of awe and respect had +evaporated. She felt that it was quite impossible now for them to go on +on the same footing; yet, as long as she kept the sapphire she must +somehow manage to keep up an appearance of it. She must tell him +something.</p> + +<p>At that dreadful dinner, where she sat a con<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_348" id="Page_348">[Pg 348]</a></span>scious frustrater of these +two silent ones, glancing at Harry's face, she knew that if she didn't +attack she would be attacked by him. It was here in the midst of the +noiseless passings of Shima, watching Harry's suspicious glances +flashing across the table at her strange disorder, that the idea +occurred to her of a way out of it. She was bold enough to try a daring +thrust at the mystery. If ever a hunter was to be led off on a false +scent, Harry was that one. She was amazed at the sudden, fearless +impulse that had sprung up in her. She wasn't even afraid to say to him +under Clara's nose, "Harry, I want you to myself after dinner. Come up +into the garden study."</p> + +<p>He was very willing to follow her. She thought she detected in his +alacrity something more than curiosity or concern. It seemed almost as +if Harry was ashamed of that scene in the red room, and anxious to make +it up with her. He even tried before they had reached the head of the +stairs. "Oh, Flora—I say, Flora, I—"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_349" id="Page_349">[Pg 349]</a></span>But an explanation between them was the last thing she wanted just then. +She fairly ran, leaving him panting in the wake of her airy skirts.</p> + +<p>For the first time since the thing began Clara was left out completely. +Flora knew she was even left out of a possibility of listening at the +keyhole. For the bright, tight, little room into which Harry followed +her was approached by a square entry and a double door. The room itself +overhung the garden as a ship's deck overhangs the sea. Leather books +and long red curtains were the note of it. She and Harry had often been +here together before. Harry had made love to her here, and she had found +it pleasurable enough. But the fact that she could recall it now with +distaste made this familiar surrounding seem strange, and they +themselves strangest of all.</p> + +<p>He hadn't got his breath. He had hardly shut the door on them before she +began. "Well, something has happened." She had his attention. His other +purpose was arrested. "Oh,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_350" id="Page_350">[Pg 350]</a></span> something extraordinary. I would have told +you on the spot, only I thought you would rather Clara didn't know it."</p> + +<p>"I?" That left him staring. "What have I to do with it?"</p> + +<p>At this she gave him a long look. "It was through you he ever had the +chance of seeing me. I mean the blue-eyed Chinaman. He has followed me +all the evening. He followed me here to the very door." Flora's array of +facts fell so fast, so hard, so pointed, that for a moment they held him +speechless in the middle of the room.</p> + +<p>Any fleeting suspicion she might have had of his complicity in the +Chinaman's pursuit vanished. He showed plain bewilderment. For a moment +he was more at sea than herself. The next she saw the shadow of a +thought so disturbing that it sharpened his ruddy face to harshness. He +stepped toward her. "What did he say to you?" He loomed directly above +her, threatening.</p> + +<p>"Nothing. He didn't say anything. But I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_351" id="Page_351">[Pg 351]</a></span> know he followed me quite to +the house, for I saw his shadow all the way down the hill."</p> + +<p>Harry still breathed quickly. "Where—how did he come across you?"</p> + +<p>She'd been prepared for that question.</p> + +<p>"I was driving down Sutter Street and he saw me at the carriage window."</p> + +<p>Harry stood tense, poised, catching everything as she tossed it off; +then as if all at once he felt the full weight of the burden, "Lord!" he +said, and let himself down heavily into a chair. It was plain in his +helpless stare that he knew exactly what it all meant. Laying her hands +on the high chair-arms, leaning down so that she could look into his +face, Flora made her thrust.</p> + +<p>"What do you think he wants?" she gently asked. It was as if she would +coax it out of him. His answer was correspondingly low and soft.</p> + +<p>"It's that damned ring."</p> + +<p>She heard her secret fear spoken aloud with such assurance that she +waited, certain at the next moment Harry's voice would people the +si<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_352" id="Page_352">[Pg 352]</a></span>lence with all the facts that had so far escaped her. But when, after +a moment of looking before him he did speak, he went back to the +beginning, which they both knew.</p> + +<p>"You know he didn't want to part with it in the first place."</p> + +<p>"Yes, yes; but he did," Flora insisted.</p> + +<p>"Well," he answered quickly, "but that was before—" He caught himself +and went on with a scarcely perceptible break: "He may have had a better +offer for it since."</p> + +<p>He couldn't have put it more mildly, and yet that temperate phrase +brought back to her in a flash a windy night full of raucous voices and +the great figures in the paper that had covered half a page—the reward +for the Crew Idol. Could it be that—that sum so overwhelming to human +caution and human decency which Harry had cloaked by his grudging phrase +"some better offer"? What else could he mean? And what else could the +blue-eyed Chinaman mean by his strange pursuit of her?</p> + +<p>"Some one must have wanted it awfully,"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_353" id="Page_353">[Pg 353]</a></span> Flora tried again, keeping step +with his mild admission.</p> + +<p>Harry covered her with an impressive stare. "There's something queer +about that ring," he nodded to her. He was going to tell her at last! +She gazed at him in expectation, but presently she realized that nothing +more was coming. He had stopped at the beginning. She tried to urge him +on.</p> + +<p>"Queer, what do you mean?" She was feigning surprise.</p> + +<p>He looked at her cautiously. "Why, you must have noticed it yourself +when we were at the shop. And now, to-night, his having followed you."</p> + +<p>She could see him hesitate, choosing his words. She knew well enough her +own fear of saying too much—but, what was Harry afraid of? Did he +suspect her feeling for Kerr? Was that why he was holding back, leaving +out, giving her the small, expurgated version of what he knew. She tried +again, making it plainer.</p> + +<p>"You think the ring is something he ought<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_354" id="Page_354">[Pg 354]</a></span> not to have had; something +that belongs somewhere else?"</p> + +<p>He looked away from her, around the room, as if to pick up his answer +from some of the corners. "Well, anyway, it's lucky we waited about that +setting," he said with quick irrelevance. "If you're going to be annoyed +in this way you'd better let me have it."</p> + +<p>Why hadn't she thought of that! It was what any man might say, after +hearing such a story as hers, yet it was the last thing she had thought +of, and the last thing she wanted.</p> + +<p>"Oh, leave it with me," she quavered, "at least till you're sure!"</p> + +<p>"Oh, no!" He gave his head a quick, decided shake. "If something should +come out you wouldn't want to be mixed up in it."</p> + +<p>"Then why not give it back to the Chinaman?" she tried him.</p> + +<p>"Oh, that's ridiculous." He was in a passion. His darkening eyes, his +swelling nostrils, his aspect so out of proportion to her mild and +almost playful suggestion, frightened her. He<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_355" id="Page_355">[Pg 355]</a></span> saw it and instantly his +mood dropped to mere irritation. "Oh, Flora, don't make a scene about +it. This thing has been on my mind for days—the thought that you had +the ring. I was afraid I had no business to let you have it in the first +place, and what you've told me to-night has clean knocked me out. I +don't know what I'm saying. Come, let me have it; and if there's +anything queer about the business, at least we'll get it cleared up."</p> + +<p>But, smiling, she retreated before him.</p> + +<p>"Why, Flora," he argued, half laughing, but still with that dry end of +irritation in his voice, "what on earth do you want to keep the thing +for?"</p> + +<p>By this time she backed against the window, and faced him. "Why, it's my +engagement ring."</p> + +<p>He looked at her. She couldn't tell whether he was readiest to laugh or +rage.</p> + +<p>"You gave it to me for that," she pleaded. "Why shouldn't I keep it, +until you give me a real reason for giving it up? If you really know<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_356" id="Page_356">[Pg 356]</a></span> +anything, why don't you tell me?" She was sure she had him there; but he +burst out at last:</p> + +<p>"Well, for a fact, I know it is stolen!" He leaned toward her; and his +arms, still flung out with the hands open as argument had left them, +seemed to her frightened eyes all ready for her, ready with his last +argument, his strength.</p> + +<p>Once before she had feared herself face to face with the same threat in +the eyes and body of another man, but here, her only fear was lest Harry +should get the sapphire away from her. His doing so would dash down no +ideal of him. It was mere physical terror that made her tremble and +raise her hand to her breast. Instantly she saw how she had betrayed the +sapphire again. He had taken hold of her wrist, and, twist as she might, +he held it, horribly gentle.</p> + +<p>She pressed back against the glass until she felt it hard behind her.</p> + +<p>"Harry," she whispered, "if you care anything, if you ever want me for +yours, you'll take your hands away." She meant it; she was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_357" id="Page_357">[Pg 357]</a></span> sincere in +that moment, for all she shrank from him. Her body and mind would not +have been too great a price to give him for the sapphire.</p> + +<p>But these he seemed to set aside as trivial. These he expected as a +matter of course; he was going to have that other thing, too—the thing +she had clung to as a man clings to life; and that now, parting from, +she would give up not without a struggle as sharp as that with which the +body gives up breath. She wrestled. He seemed all hands. He put aside +her struggles, her pleadings, as if they were thistle-down.</p> + +<p>Then all at once she felt his arm around her neck. She couldn't move her +body. She could only turn her head from his hot breath. For a moment he +held her, and yet another moment; and then, terrified at what this +strange immobility might mean, she raised her eyes and saw he was not +looking at her. Though he held her fast he was not conscious of her. +Straight over her head he looked, through the window and down, into the +garden. Her eyes followed. It lay beneath, the wonder of its morning +aspect all<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_358" id="Page_358">[Pg 358]</a></span> blanched and dim. She saw the silhouette of rose branches in +black on the sky. She saw the flowers and bushes all one dull tone. But +in the midst of them the oval of the path shone white; and there, as in +the afternoon, standing, looking upward, was the dark figure of a man.</p> + +<p>Her heart gave a great leap. Just so she'd been summoned once before +that day, but what infernal freak had fetched him back to repeat that +dangerous sally, and brought him finally into his enemy's grasp? She +tried to make a gesture to warn him, and just there Harry released her, +dropped her so that she half fell upon the window-seat, and made a dash +across the room for the light. In a moment they were in darkness. In a +moment, to Flora pressed against the window, the garden sprang clear, +and on the formless figure below the face appeared, white in the +starlight looking up. She cried out in wonder. It was not Kerr. It was +the blue-eyed Chinaman.</p> + +<p>After her haunted drive, after her escape, after Shima's search, he was +there, still inex<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_359" id="Page_359">[Pg 359]</a></span>orably there; small, diminished by the great façade of +the house, but looking up at it with his calm eye, surveying it, +measuring its height, numbering its doors, trying its windows. Harry was +beside her again. He was tugging frantically at the window. It resisted. +She saw his hands trembling while he wrestled with it. Then it went +shrieking up and he leaned out.</p> + +<p>"What do you want?" he called, and, though he used no name, Flora saw he +knew with whom he was speaking. The Chinaman stood immobile, lifting his +round, white face, whose mouth seemed to gape a little. Harry leaned far +out and lowered his voice.</p> + +<p>"Go away, Joe! Don't come here; never come here!" There was a quiver in +his voice. Anger or apprehension, or both, whatever his passion was, for +the moment it overwhelmed him, and as the Chinaman stood unmoved, +unmoving, at his commands, Harry turned sharp from the window and dashed +out of the room. Flora heard him running, running down the stairs. She +hung there breathless, waiting to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_360" id="Page_360">[Pg 360]</a></span> see him meet the motionless figure; +but while she looked and waited that motionless figure suddenly took +life. It moved, it turned, it flitted, it mixed with shadows, became a +shadow; and then there was nothing there.</p> + +<p>Nothing was there when Harry burst out of the garden door and stood +staring in the empty oval. How distracted, how violent he looked, balked +of his prey! He was stalking the garden, beating the bushes, walking up +and down. All at once he stopped and raised a white baffled face to her +window. She shrank away. <i>She</i> was in peril of Harry now. He knew her no +longer innocent. She had held the ring against him in the face of the +fact he had told her it was stolen. And he must guess her motive. He +must suspect her now.</p> + +<p>In her turn she ran, up and up a twisted side stair, shortest passage to +her own rooms. At least lock and key could keep her safe for the next +few hours. After that she must think of something else.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_361" id="Page_361">[Pg 361]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XX" id="XX"></a>XX</h2> + +<h3>FLIGHT</h3> + +<p>By five o'clock in the morning she was already moving softly to and fro, +so softly as not to rouse the sleeping Marrika. By seven her lightest +bag was packed, herself was bathed, brushed, dressed even to hat and +gloves, and standing at her window with all the listening alert look of +one in a waiting-room expecting a train. She was watching for the city +to begin to stir; watching for enough traffic below in the streets to +make her own movement there not too noticeable. Yet every moment she +waited she was in terror lest her fate should take violent form at last +and assail her in the moment of escape. She listened for a foot +ascending to her room with a message from Clara demanding an au<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_362" id="Page_362">[Pg 362]</a></span>dience. +She listened for the peal of the electric bell under Harry's hasty +hand—Harry, arrived even at this unwarranted hour with Heaven knew what +representative of law to force the sapphire from her.</p> + +<p>But all her household was still unstirring when at last she went, soft +step after step, down the broad and polished stair and across the empty +hall. She went quiet, direct, determined, not at all as she had fled on +her other perilous enterprise only yesterday. She shut the outer door +after her without a sound and with great relief breathed in the fresh +and faintly smoky air of morning.</p> + +<p>She walked quickly. The windows of her house still overlooked her, and +her greatest terror was that some voice, some appearance, out of that +house, might command her return. The street was nearly empty. A maid +scrubbing down steps looked after her sharply, and she wondered if she +had been recognized. She had no intention of keeping to this street, or +even taking a car and traveling down its broad, gray<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_363" id="Page_363">[Pg 363]</a></span> and gleaming vista +of formal houses and formal gardens that she knew and that knew her so +well. It was a cross-town car bound for quite another locality that she +climbed aboard. It was filled only with mechanics and workmen with picks +and shovels. She sat crowded elbow to elbow among odors of stale +tobacco, stale garlic, stale perspiration, and looking straight before +her through the car window watched the aspect of the city, still gray, +grow less gleaming and formal and finally quite dirty, and quite, quite +dull.</p> + +<p>This was all as she had intended, very much in the direction of her +errand, and safe. But in Market Street the car-line ended, and she was +turned out again in this broad artery of commerce where she was in +danger of meeting at any moment people she knew. She made straight +across the thoroughfare to its south side, turned down Eighteenth and in +a moment was hidden in Mission Street.</p> + +<p>Now really the worst danger of detection was over. She saw no reason why +a woman with<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_364" id="Page_364">[Pg 364]</a></span> a small hat and a hand-bag should not pass for a +school-teacher. Indeed, the men did let her go at that, but the +women—women with shawls over their heads, and women with uncovered +heads and ear-rings in their ears, and thin, weak-eyed women with bags +in their hands—the teachers themselves, one of whom she hoped to pass +for—all stared at her. It didn't matter much, she thought, whether they +thought her queer or not since they couldn't stop her.</p> + +<p>She went, glancing at windows as she passed, looking for a place where +she could go to breakfast. She turned into the first restaurant that +offered, and after a hasty glance around it to be sure no one lurked +there that might betray her she subsided into the clatter with relief. +It was one more place to let time pass in, for it would be full two +hours before she could fulfil her errand. She stayed as long as she +dared, drinking two cups of the hideous coffee; stayed while many came +and went, until she felt the proprietor noticing her. That revived her +consciousness of the possible dangers still between<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_365" id="Page_365">[Pg 365]</a></span> her and the end she +held in view. She had heard of people being arrested for suspicious +conduct. She didn't feel sure in what this might consist, but surely +such an appearance could be avoided by walking fast and seeming to know +exactly where one was going.</p> + +<p>It was ten o'clock in the morning, three hours since she had left her +house and a most reasonable time of daylight, when Flora turned out of +the flatness of "south of Market Street" and began to mount a +slow-rising hill. It was a wooden sidewalk she followed flanking a +wood-paved street, and these, with the wooden fences and dusty cypress +hedges and the houses peering over them upon her looked worn, battered +and belonging all to the past. None the less it bore traces of having +been a dignified past, and farther up on the crown of the hill among +deep-bosomed trees, two or three large mansions wore the gravely +triumphant aspect of having been brought successfully from a past empire +into a present with all their traditions and mahogany complete. Upward +toward these Flora<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_366" id="Page_366">[Pg 366]</a></span> was looking. Her breath was short from fast +climbing. Her cheeks under her thin veil were hot and bright.</p> + +<p>As she neared the hilltop she glanced at a card from her chatelaine, +consulting the address upon it. Then anxiously she scanned the +house-fronts. It was not this one, nor this; but the square white +mansion she came to now stood so far retired at the end of its lawn that +she could not make out the number. As she peered a young girl came down +the steps between the dark wings of the cypress hedge, a slim, fair, +even-gaited creature dressed for the street and drawing on her gloves. +As she passed Flora made sure she had seen her before. There was +something familiar in the carriage of the girl's head and hands; +something also like a pale reflection of another presence. Pale as it +was, it was enough to reassure her that this was the house she wanted.</p> + +<p>She ascended the steps beneath the arch of cypress and immediately found +herself entering an atmosphere quieter even than that of the little<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_367" id="Page_367">[Pg 367]</a></span> +street below. It was quiet with the quiet of protectedness, as if some +one brooding, vigilant care encircled it, defending it against all +inroads of violent action and thought. It had been long since any young +girl had carried such a heart of passionate hopes and fears up this +mossed path between these peaceful flower-beds.</p> + +<p>This appearance of the place began to bring before Flora the full +enormity and impertinence of her errand, but though her heart beat on +her side as loud as the brass knocker upon the door, she had no mind for +turning back.</p> + +<p>A high, cool, darkly gleaming interior, mellow with that precious tint +of time which her own house so lacked, received her. And here, as well +as out of doors, all the while she sat waiting she felt that protected +peace was still the deity of the place. To Flora's eager heart time was +streaming by, but the tall clock facing her measured it out slowly. Its +longest golden finger had pointed out five minutes before the sweeping +of a skirt coming down the hall brought her to her feet.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_368" id="Page_368">[Pg 368]</a></span>Mrs. Herrick came in hatless, a honeysuckle leaf caught in her gray +crown of hair, geraniums in her hand. Flora had never seen her so +informal and so gay.</p> + +<p>"I would have asked you to come out into the garden, except that it's so +wet, and there's no place to sit," she said.</p> + +<p>Flora apologized. "I knew if I came at this hour I should interrupt you, +but really there was no help for it." She glanced down at her satchel. +"I had to go this morning, and before I went I had to see you about the +house. I'm going down to look at it and—and to stop a while."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Herrick hesitated, deprecated. "But you know Mrs. Britton wasn't +satisfied with the price I asked."</p> + +<p>"Oh," said Flora promptly, "but I shall be perfectly satisfied with it, +and I want to take possession at once."</p> + +<p>The positive manner in which she waved Clara out of her way brought up +in Mrs. Herrick's face a faint flash of surprise; but it was gone in an +instant, supplanted by her question<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_369" id="Page_369">[Pg 369]</a></span>ing puzzled consideration of the +main proposition.</p> + +<p>"Oh, I hope you haven't come to tell me you want it changed," she +protested. "You know it's quite absurd in places—quite terrible indeed. +It's 1870 straight through, and French at that; but even such whims +acquire a dignity if they've been long cherished. You couldn't put in or +take out one thing without spoiling the whole character."</p> + +<p>"But I don't want to change it, I want it just as it is," Flora +explained. "It isn't about the house itself I've come, it's about going +down there. You see there are—some people, some friends of mine. I +haven't promised them to show the house, but I have quite promised +myself to show it to them, and they are only here for a few days more. +They are going immediately." She was looking at Mrs. Herrick all the +while she was telling her wretched lie, and now she even managed to +smile at her. "I thought how lovely it would be if you could go there +with me. I should like so very much to be in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_370" id="Page_370">[Pg 370]</a></span> it first with you, to have +you go over it with me and tell me how to take care of it, as it's +always been done. I should hate to do it any disrespect."</p> + +<p>Her hostess smiled with ready answer. "Of course I will go down. I +should be glad, but it must be in a day or two. Indeed, perhaps it would +be better for you to have your people first, and I can come down, say +Monday afternoon or Tuesday."</p> + +<p>Flora faced this unexpected turn of the matter a little blankly. "Ah, +but the trouble is I can't go down alone."</p> + +<p>It was Mrs. Herrick's turn to look blank. "But Mrs. Britton?"</p> + +<p>"Mrs. Britton isn't going with me; she can't."</p> + +<p>"I see." Mrs. Herrick with a long, soft scrutiny seemed to be taking in +more than Flora's mere words represented. "And you wouldn't put it off +until she can?"</p> + +<p>"I couldn't put it off a moment," Flora ended with a little breathless +laugh. "I do so wish<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_371" id="Page_371">[Pg 371]</a></span> you would come down with me this morning, for I +must go, and you see I can't go alone."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Herrick, sitting there, composed, in her cool, flowing, white and +violet gown with the red flowers in her lap, still looked at Flora +inquiringly. "But aren't there some women in your party old enough to +make it possible and young enough to take pleasure in it?"</p> + +<p>Flora shook her head. "Oh, no," she said. Her house of cards was +tottering. She could not keep up her brave smiling. She knew her +distress must be plain. Indeed, as she looked at Mrs. Herrick she saw +the effect of it. Gaiety still looked at her out of that face, but the +warmth, the spontaneity were gone; and the steady eyes, if anything so +aloof could be suspicious, surely suspected her.</p> + +<p>Her heart sank. If only she had told the truth—even so much of it as to +say there was something she could not tell. What she had said was +unworthy not only of herself but of the end she was so desperately +holding out for. Now in the lucid gaze confronting her she knew<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_372" id="Page_372">[Pg 372]</a></span> all her +intentions were taking on a dubious color, stained false, like her +words, under the dark cloud of her own misrepresentation. Yet they were +not false, she knew. Her motives, the end she was struggling for, were +as austere as truth itself. She could not give up without one bold +stroke to clear them of this accusation.</p> + +<p>"Do you think there's anything queer about it?" she faltered.</p> + +<p>"Queer?" To Flora's ears that sounded the coldest word she had ever +heard. "I hardly think I understand what you mean."</p> + +<p>"I mean is it that you think there's more in what I'm asking of you than +I have said?" The two looked at each other and before that flat question +Mrs. Herrick drew back a little in her chair.</p> + +<p>"I have no right to think about it at all," she said.</p> + +<p>"Well, there is," Flora insisted. "There's a great deal more. I am +sorry. I should have told you, but I was afraid. I don't know why<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_373" id="Page_373">[Pg 373]</a></span> I was +afraid of you, except that in this matter I've grown afraid of every +one. It's true that there may be people going down—at least, a person. +But it isn't, as I let you think it, a house party at all. It's for +something, something that I can't do any other way—something," she had +a sudden flash of insight, "that, if I could tell you, you would believe +in, too."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Herrick's look had faded to a mere concentrated attention. "You +mean that there is something you wish to do for whoever is going down?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, something I must do," Flora insisted.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Herrick considered a moment. "Why can't he do it for himself?" she +threw out suddenly.</p> + +<p>It made Flora start, but she met it gallantly. "Because he won't. I +shall have to make him."</p> + +<p>"You!" For a moment Flora knew that she was preposterous in Mrs. +Herrick's eyes—and then that she was pathetic. Her companion was +looking at her with a sad sort of humor.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_374" id="Page_374">[Pg 374]</a></span> "My dear, are you sure that +that is your responsibility?"</p> + +<p>Flora's answering smile was faint. "It seems as strange to me as it +seems absurd to you, but I think I have done something already."</p> + +<p>"Are you sure, or has he only let you think so? We have all at some time +longed, or even thought it was our duty, to adjust something when it +would have been safer to have kept our hand off," Mrs. Herrick went on +gently.</p> + +<p>"Oh, safer," Flora breathed. "Oh, yes; indeed, I know. But if something +had been put into your hands without your choice; if all the life of +some one that you cared about depended on you, would you think of being +<i>safe</i>?" Flora, leaning forward, chin in hand, with shining eyes, seemed +fairly to impart a reflection of her own passionate concentration to the +woman before her.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Herrick, so calm in her reposeful attitude, calm as the old +portrait on the wall behind her, none the less began to show a curious +sparkle of excitement in her face. "If I were<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_375" id="Page_375">[Pg 375]</a></span> sure that person's life +<i>did</i> depend on me," she measured out her words deliberately. "But that +so seldom happens, and it is so hard to tell."</p> + +<p>"But if you were sure, sure, sure!" Flora rang it out certainly.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Herrick in her turn leaned forward. "Ah, even then it would depend +on him. And do you think you can make a man do otherwise than his +nature?"</p> + +<p>"You think I should fail?" Flora took it up fearlessly. "Well, if I do, +at least I shall have done my best. I shall have to have done my best or +I can never forgive myself."</p> + +<p>"I see," Mrs. Herrick sighed. "But it sounds to me a risk too great for +any reward that could come of its success." She thought. "If you could +tell me more." Then, as Flora only looked at her wistfully and silently: +"Isn't there some one you can confide in? Not Mrs. Britton?"</p> + +<p>"Clara? Oh, no; never!" Flora startled Mrs. Herrick with the passionate +repudiation.</p> + +<p>"But could not Mr. Cressy—" and with that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_376" id="Page_376">[Pg 376]</a></span> broken sentence several +things that Mrs. Herrick had been keeping back looked out of her face.</p> + +<p>Flora answered with a stare of misery. "I know what you must be +thinking—what you can not help thinking," she said, "that the whole +thing is unheard-of—outrageous—especially for a girl so soon to—to +be—" She caught her breath with a sob, for the words she could not +speak. "But there is nothing in this disloyal to my engagement, even +though I can not speak of it to Harry Cressy; and nothing I hope to gain +for myself by what I am trying to do. If I succeed it will only mean I +shall never see him—the other one—again."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Herrick rose, in her turn beseeching. "Oh, I can't help you go into +it! It is too dubious. My dear, I know so much better than you what the +end may mean."</p> + +<p>"I know what the end may mean, and I can't keep out of it."</p> + +<p>"But I can not go with you." There was a stern note in Mrs. Herrick's voice.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_377" id="Page_377">[Pg 377]</a></span>Flora looked around the room, the sunny windows, the still shadows, the +tall, monotonous clock, as if this were the last glimpse of peace and +protection she would ever have. She rose and put out her hand.</p> + +<p>"I'm afraid I didn't quite realize how much I was asking of you. You +have been very good even to listen to me. It's right, I suppose, that I +should go alone."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Herrick looked at her in dismay. "But that is impossible!" Then, as +Flora turned away, she kept her hand. "Think, think," she urged, "how +you will be misunderstood."</p> + +<p>"Oh, I shall have to bear that—from the people who don't know."</p> + +<p>"Yes, and even from the one for whom you are spending yourself!"</p> + +<p>Flora gave her head a quick shake. "He understands," she said.</p> + +<p>"My dear, he is not worth it."</p> + +<p>Flora turned on her with anger. "You don't know what he is worth to me!"</p> + +<p>Mrs. Herrick looked steadily at this unan<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_378" id="Page_378">[Pg 378]</a></span>swerable argument. Her hold on +Flora's hand relaxed, but she did not quite release it. Her brows drew +together. "You are quite sure you must go?"</p> + +<p>Flora nodded. She was speechless.</p> + +<p>"Did Mrs. Britton know you were coming to me?"</p> + +<p>"No. She doesn't even know that I am going out of town. She must not," +Flora protested.</p> + +<p>"Indeed she must. You must not place yourself in such a false position. +Write her and tell her you are going to San Mateo with me."</p> + +<p>"Oh, if you would!" Tears sprang to Flora's eyes. "But will you, even if +I can't tell you anything?"</p> + +<p>"I shall not ask you anything. Now write her immediately. You can do it +here while I am getting ready."</p> + +<p>She had taken authoritative command of the details of their expedition, +and Flora willingly obeyed her. She was still trembling from the stress +of their interview, and she blinked back<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_379" id="Page_379">[Pg 379]</a></span> tears before she was able to +see what she was writing.</p> + +<p>It had all been brought about more quickly and completely than she had +hoped, but it was in her mind all the while she indited her message to +Clara, that Kerr, for whom it had been accomplished, was not yet +informed of the existence of the scheme, or the part of guest he was to +play. Yet she was sure that if she asked he would be promptly there. She +wrote to him briefly:</p> + +<blockquote><p>At San Mateo, at the Herricks'. I want you there to-night. I have +made up my mind.</p></blockquote> + +<p>As she was sealing it she started at a step approaching in the hall. She +had wanted to conceal that betraying letter before Mrs. Herrick came +back. She glanced quickly behind her, and saw standing between the +half-open folding doors, the slim figure of a girl—slimmer, younger +even than the one who had passed her at the gate, but like her, with the +same large eyes, the same small indeterminate chin. Just at the chin the +likeness to Mrs. Herrick failed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_380" id="Page_380">[Pg 380]</a></span> with the strength of her last +generation—but the eyes were perfect; and they gazed at Flora +wondering. With the sixth sense of youth they recognized the enactment +of something strange and thrilling.</p> + +<p>Another instant and Mrs. Herrick's presence dawned behind her +daughter—and her voice—"Why, child, what are you doing there?"—and +her hands seemed apprehensive in their haste to hurry the child away, as +if, truly, in this drawing-room, for the first time, something was dangerous.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_381" id="Page_381">[Pg 381]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XXI" id="XXI"></a>XXI</h2> + +<h3>THE HOUSE OF QUIET</h3> + +<p>The day which had dawned so still and gloomy was wakening to something +like wildness, threatening, brightening, gusty, when they stepped out of +the train upon the platform of the San Mateo station. Clouds were piling +gray and castle-like from the east up toward the zenith, and dark +fragments kept tearing off the edges and spinning away across the sky. +But between them the bright face of the sun flashed out with double +splendor, and the thinned atmosphere made the sky seem high and far, and +all form beneath it clarified and intense.</p> + +<p>There upon the narrow platform Mrs. Herrick hesitated a moment, looking +at Flora. "What train do you want to meet?" she asked.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_382" id="Page_382">[Pg 382]</a></span>Flora stood perplexed. "I hardly know. You see I can't tell how soon my +letter would reach—would be received."</p> + +<p>"Then we would better meet them all," the elder woman decided.</p> + +<p>They drove away into the face of the wet, fresh wind and flying drops of +rain. Flora, leaning back in the carriage, looked out through the window +with quiet eyes. The spirited movement of the sky, the racing of its +shadows on the grass, the rolling foliage of the trees, seen tempestuous +against flying cloud, were alike to her consoling and inspiring. She had +never felt so free as now, driving through the fitful weather, nor so +safe as with this companion who was sitting silent by her side. She was +driving away from all her complications. She was retreating to a fresh +stronghold, where her conflict would be a duel hand to hand, and where +the outside forces, which had harassed her and threatened ignobly to +down her antagonist with a stab in the back, could be held at bay.</p> + +<p>Already she was looking toward the house<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_383" id="Page_383">[Pg 383]</a></span> which she had never seen as +her own kindly castle; and the generous opening of its gate—old granite +crowned with rose of sharon—did not disappoint her. The house was +hidden in the swelling trees, but the drive winding beneath them gave +glimpses through of lawns, of roses wreathing scarletly the old gray +fountain basin, of magnolia and acacia, doubly delicate and white and +fragile beneath the thunderous sky.</p> + +<p>The house, when finally it loomed upon them, with its irregular roofs +topped by curious square turrets, with its tremendous ground floor +rambling away in wings on every side, with its deep upper and lower +verandas, looked out upon by a multitude of long French windows, seemed +too large, too strangely imposing for a structure of wood. But whatever +of original ugliness had been there was hidden now under a splendid +tapestry of vines, and Flora, looking up at the rose and honeysuckle +that panoplied its front, felt her throat swell for sheer delight.</p> + +<p>For a moment after they had left the carriage they stood together in the +porte-cochère,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_384" id="Page_384">[Pg 384]</a></span> looking around them. Then half wistfully, half +humorously, Mrs. Herrick turned to Flora. "I do hope you won't want to +buy it!"</p> + +<p>"Oh, I'm afraid I shall," Flora murmured, "that is, if—" She left her +sentence hanging, as one who would have said "if I come out of this +alive," and Mrs. Herrick, with a quick start of protection, laid her +hand on Flora's arm.</p> + +<p>"If you must," she said lightly, "if you do buy it, then at least I +shall know it is in good hands."</p> + +<p>Flora gave her a look of gratitude, not so much for the slight kindness +of her words as for the great kindness of her attitude in thus so +readily resuming the first assumption on which her presence there had +been invited. That was the house itself.</p> + +<p>It was plain to Flora from the moment she set foot over the threshold +that the house was to be no mean ally of theirs, but Mrs. Herrick was +making it help them doubly in their hard interval of waiting. Alone +together with unspoken, unspeakable things between them—things<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_385" id="Page_385">[Pg 385]</a></span> that +for mere decency or honor could not be uttered—with nothing but these +to think of, nothing but each other to look at, they must yet, in sheer +desperation and suspense, have inevitably burst out with question or +confession, had not the great house been there to interpose its +personality. And the way Mrs. Herrick was making the most of that! The +way immediately, even before she had shown anything, she began to +revivify the spirit of the place, as the two women stood with their hats +not yet off in the room that was to be Flora's, talking and looking out +upon the lawn!</p> + +<p>With her silences, with her expressive self as well as with her words, +Mrs. Herrick was reanimating it all the while they lunched and rested, +still in the upper-rooms overlooking the garden. And later, when they +made the tour of the house, she began unwinding from her memory +incidents of its early beginnings, pieces of its intimate, personal +history, as one would make a friend familiar to another friend. And +these past histories and the rooms themselves were leading<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_386" id="Page_386">[Pg 386]</a></span> Flora away +out of her anxious self, were soothing her prying apprehensions, were +giving her a detachment in the present, till what she so anticipated lay +quiescent at the back of her brain.</p> + +<p>But it was there. And now and then, when in a gust of wind the lights +and shadows danced on the dim, polished floors, it stirred; and at the +sound of wheels on the drive below it leaped, and all her fears again +were in her face. At such moments the two women did look deeply at each +other, and the suspense, the premonition, hovered in Mrs. Herrick's +eyes. It was as unconscious, as involuntary, as Flora's start at the +swinging of a door; but no question crossed her lips. She let the matter +as severely alone as if it had been a jewel not her own. Yet, it came to +Flora all at once that here, for the first time, she was with one to +whom she could have revealed the sapphire on her neck and yet remain +unchallenged.</p> + +<p>"Ah, you're too lovely!" she burst out at last. "It is more than I +deserve that you should<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_387" id="Page_387">[Pg 387]</a></span> take it all like this, as if there really +wasn't anything." The elder lady's eyes wavered a little at the plain +words.</p> + +<p>"I'm too deeply doubtful of it to take it any other way," she said.</p> + +<p>"That is why I feel most guilty," Flora explained. "For dragging you +into it and then—bringing it into your house." She glanced around at +the high, quiet, damasked room. "Such a thing to happen here!"</p> + +<p>"Ah, my dear,"—Mrs. Herrick's laugh was uncertain—"the things that +have happened here—the things that have happened and been endured and +been forgotten! and see," she said, laying her hand on one of the walls, +"the peace of it now!"</p> + +<p>Flora wondered. She seemed to feel such distances of life extending yet +beyond her sight as dwindled her, tiny and innocent.</p> + +<p>"It isn't what happens, but the way we take it that makes the +afterward," Mrs. Herrick added.</p> + +<p>The thought of an afterward had stood very<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_388" id="Page_388">[Pg 388]</a></span> dim in Flora's mind, and +even now that Mrs. Herrick's words confronted her with it she couldn't +fancy what it would be like. She couldn't imagine her existence going on +at all on the other side of failure.</p> + +<p>"But suppose," she tremulously urged, "suppose there seemed only one way +to take what had happened to you, and that way, if it failed, would +leave you no afterward at all, no peace, no courage, nothing."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Herrick's eyes fixed her with their deep pity and their deeper +apprehension. "There are few things so bad as that," she said slowly, +"and those are the ones we must not touch."</p> + +<p>Flora paused a moment on the brink of her last plunge. "Do you think +what I am going to do is such a thing as that?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, my poor child, how do I know? I hope, I pray it is not!" Her +fingers closed on Flora's hand, and the girl clung to the kind grasp. It +was a comfort, though it could not save her from the real finality.</p> + +<p>In spite of the consciousness of a friendly<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_389" id="Page_389">[Pg 389]</a></span> presence in the house her +fears increased as the afternoon waned, and her thoughts went back to +what she had left behind her, and forward to what might be coming—the +one person whom she so longed for, and so dreaded to see. He might be on +his way now. He might at this moment be hurrying down the hedged lane +from the station; and when he should come, and when they two were face +to face, there would be no other "next time" for them. Everything was +crystalizing, getting hard. Everything was getting too near the end to +be malleable any more. It was her last chance to make him relinquish his +unworthy purpose; perhaps his last chance to save himself from +captivity. She found she hadn't a thing left unsaid, an argument left +unused. What could she do that she had not done before, except to show +him by just being here, accessible and ready to serve him at any risk, +how much she cared? Could his generosity resist that?</p> + +<p>Beyond the fact of getting him away safe she didn't think. Beyond that +nothing looked<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_390" id="Page_390">[Pg 390]</a></span> large to her, nothing looked definite. The returning of +the sapphire itself seemed simple beside it, and the fact that her +position in the matter might never be explained of no importance.</p> + +<p>Now while every moment drew her nearer her greatest moment she grew more +absent, more strained, more restless, more intently listening, more +easily starting at the lightest sound; until, at last, when the late day +touched the rooms with fiery sunset colors, her friend, watchful of her +changing mood, ready at every point to palliate circumstance, drew her +out into the garden.</p> + +<p>The wind, which had fallen with approaching evening, was only a whisper +among the trees. The greenish-white bodies of statues in the shrubbery +glowed ruddy. Gathering their skirts from the grass that glittered with +the drops of the last shower, arm in arm the two women walked down the +broad central gravel drive between ribbon beds of flowers. From here +numerous paths paved with white stone went wandering under snowball +trees and wild apple,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_391" id="Page_391">[Pg 391]</a></span> losing themselves in shrubbery. But one made a +clear turn across the lawn for the rose-garden, where in the midst a +round pool of water lay like a flaming bit of the sunset sky. Among the +bushes red and rose and white, the elder woman in her black, the younger +in her gown more glowing, with a veil over her hair, walked, and, +loitering, looked down into the water, seeing their faces reflected, +and, behind, the tangled brambles and the crimson sky. They did not +speak, but at last their companionship was peaceful, was perfect. The +only sounds were the sleepy notes of birds and that faint, high whisper +of the tree tops on an evening that is not still.</p> + +<p>Loud and shrill and shriller and more piercing, from the west wing of +the house, overhanging the garden, the sound reached them—an alarum +that set Flora's heart to leaping. Startled apart, they listened.</p> + +<p>"Would that be—is that for you?"</p> + +<p>"I think it's for me."</p> + +<p>The words came from them simultaneously, and almost at the same instant +Flora had started<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_392" id="Page_392">[Pg 392]</a></span> across the lawn. The sight of an aproned maid coming +out on the veranda and peering down the garden set her running fleetly.</p> + +<p>"It's a telephone for Miss Gilsey," the girl said.</p> + +<p>"Oh, thank you," Flora panted.</p> + +<p>She knew so well the voice she had expected at the other end of the wire +that the husky, boyish note which reached her, attenuated by distance, +struck her with dismay and disappointment.</p> + +<p>"Ella, oh, yes; yes; Ella." What was she saying? Ella was using the +telephone as if it were a cabinet for secrets.</p> + +<p>"Clara told me you were down there," she was explaining. "I saw her this +morning, yes. Well,"—and she could hear Ella draw in her breath—"I'm +so relieved! I thought you'd be, too, to know. I <i>was</i> perfectly right. +She was after him."</p> + +<p>Flora faltered, "After whom?" There flashed through her mind more than +one person that, by this time, Clara might possibly be after.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_393" id="Page_393">[Pg 393]</a></span>"Why, after papa, of course!" Ella's injured surprise brought her back +to the romance of Judge Buller. Her voice rose in sheer bewilderment. +"Well?"</p> + +<p>Ella's voice rose triumphantly. "I got it out of her myself. I just came +right out to her at last. She seemed awfully surprised that I knew; but +she owned up to it, and what do you think? I bought her off!"</p> + +<p>"Bought her off?" Flora cried. Each fact that Ella brought forth seemed +to her more preposterous than the last.</p> + +<p>"Why, yes, it's too ridiculous; what do you think she wanted?"</p> + +<p>At that question Flora's heart seemed fairly to stand still. That was +the very question she had been asking herself for days, and asking in +vain.</p> + +<p>Ella's voice was coming to her faint as a voice from another world. "She +wanted that little, little picture—that picture of the man called +Farrell Wand. Don't you remember, papa mentioned it at supper that +evening at the club?<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_394" id="Page_394">[Pg 394]</a></span> Isn't it funny she remembered it all this time? +Well, she wanted it dreadfully, but Harry wanted it, too, and papa said +he had promised it to Harry; but I got it first and gave it to her." +Ella's voice ended on a high note of triumph.</p> + +<p>Flora's, if anything, rose higher in despair. "Oh, Ella!"</p> + +<p>"Doesn't it seem ridiculous," Ella argued, "that if she really wanted +him she'd give him up for that?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, no—I mean yes," Flora stammered. "Yes, of course! thank you, Ella, +very much—very much." The last words were hardly audible. The receiver +fell jangling into its bracket, and Flora leaned against the wall by the +telephone and closed her eyes.</p> + +<p>For a moment all she could see was Clara with that little, little +picture. How well she could remember how Clara had looked that night of +the club supper!</p> + +<p>From the moment Judge Buller had spoken of the picture, how all three of +them had<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_395" id="Page_395">[Pg 395]</a></span> changed, Clara and Kerr and Harry. Everything that had seemed +so phantasmal then, everything she had put down as a figment of her own +imagination, had meant just this plain fact. All three of them had +wanted the picture. For his own reason Kerr had turned aside from the +chase, but Harry had stood with it to the last, and now, when finally +the prize had been assured to him, Clara had it!</p> + +<p>At this moment she had it in her hand. At this moment she knew what was +the aspect of the figure in the picture, whether it showed a face, and, +if a face, whose. Flora's hands opened and closed. "Oh," she whispered +to the great silence of the great house awaiting him; "where is he? Why +isn't he here?"</p> + +<p>All those terrible things which might be happening beyond her reach +processioned before her. Had Clara already snapped the trap of the law +upon Kerr? And if she hadn't yet, what could be done to hold her off? +Flora turned again to the telephone. Slowly she took down the receiver +and gave into the bright<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_396" id="Page_396">[Pg 396]</a></span> mouthpiece of the instrument the number of her +own house.</p> + +<p>Presently the voice of Shima spoke to her. Mrs. Britton had gone out to +dinner.</p> + +<p>"Tell her, Shima," Flora commanded, "tell her to come down on the +earliest train." She hesitated, then finished in a firm voice. "Tell her +not to do anything until she has seen me."</p> + +<p>Shima would tell her—but Mrs. Britton had been out all day. He did not +know when she would be back.</p> + +<p>The words sounded ominous in Flora's ears. She turned away. Was +everything to be finished just as she had light enough to move, but +before she had a chance?</p> + +<p>The sound of spinning wheels on the drive startled her to fresh hope, +and sent her hurrying down the stair. It was the phaëton returning from +the last train. Through the open door she saw the figure of Mrs. Herrick +expectant on the veranda. Then the carriage came into the porte-cochère +and passed. With a rush she reached the veranda, and stood there looking +after it. She<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_397" id="Page_397">[Pg 397]</a></span> wouldn't believe her eyes—she couldn't—that it had +returned again empty.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Herrick's voice was asking her, "What shall we do? Shall we serve +dinner now, or wait a little longer?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, it's no use," Flora murmured, "he won't come to-night. He'll never +come." She drooped against the tall porch pillar.</p> + +<p>"My poor child!" Mrs. Herrick took her passive hand. If she read in the +profound discouragement of Flora's face that something more had +transpired than a mere non-appearance, she did not show it, but waited, +alert and quiet, while they gazed together out over the darkening +garden.</p> + +<p>It was the time of twilight when the sky is so much brighter than the +earth. Across the lawns between the bushes from hedge to hedge the veil +of the obscuring light was coming in; and through it the avenue of +willows marched darkly. Their leaves moved a little. Flora watched the +ripple of their tops, clear on the bright sky, and deeper down among +mysterious<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_398" id="Page_398">[Pg 398]</a></span> branches there was a sense of movement where the eyes could +not see. There was a curious flick, flick, flicker—a progression, a +passing from the far dark end of the willow avenue toward where it met +the vista of the drive. Flora's eyes, absently, involuntarily, followed +the movement. She felt Mrs. Herrick's hand suddenly close on hers.</p> + +<p>"Is some one coming?"</p> + +<p>They clung to each other, peering timorously down the drive. A little +gust of wind took the garden, and before the trees had ceased to tremble +and whiten a man had emerged from their shadow and was advancing upon +them up the middle of the drive.</p> + +<p>Flora's heart leaped at sight of him. All her impulse was to fly to meet +him, but she felt Mrs. Herrick's hand tighten upon her wrist as if it +divined her madness.</p> + +<p>His light stick aswing in his hand, his step free and incautious as +ever, gray and slender and seeming to look more at the ground than at +them, the two women watched him drawing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_399" id="Page_399">[Pg 399]</a></span> near. His was the seeming of a +quiet guest at the quietest of house parties. To meet him Flora saw she +must meet him on the high ground of his reserve. As he came under the +light of the porte-cochère his look, his greeting, his hand, were first +for Mrs. Herrick.</p> + +<p>"We were afraid we had missed you altogether," said she.</p> + +<p>"It was I who somehow missed your carriage, was hardly expecting to be +expected at such an hour."</p> + +<p>Flora watched them meeting each other so gallantly with a trembling +compunction. Mrs. Herrick, who trusted her, was giving her hand in +sublime ignorance. It was vain that Flora told herself she had given +warning. She knew she had thrown the softening veil of her spiritual +crisis over the ugly material fact. Had she said, "I want you to uphold +me while I meet a thief whom I love and wish to protect. He's +magnificent in all other ways except for this one obsession," she knew +Mrs. Herrick simply would have cried, "Impossible, outrageous!" Yet<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_400" id="Page_400">[Pg 400]</a></span> +there they stood together, and as Flora looked at them she could not +have told which was of the finer temper. Kerr's bearing was so unruffled +that it seemed as if he had flown too high to feel the storm Flora was +passing through. But when he turned toward her, in spite of himself, +there was eagerness in his manner. He looked questioningly at her, as if +no time had intervened, as if a moment before he had said to her through +the carriage window, "I will give you twenty-four hours," and now her +time had come to speak.</p> + +<p>Only the thought that time was crowding him into a bag's end gave her +courage to vow she would speak that night. Yet not now, while they stood +just met in the deepening dusk, in the sweet breath of the early +flowers; nor later when they passed in friendly fashion, the three of +them, through fairy labyrinths of arch and mirror, into the long, high, +glistening room, whose round table, spread, seemed dwarfed to mushroom +height; nor yet, while this semblance of companionship was between them, +and the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_401" id="Page_401">[Pg 401]</a></span> great proportions of the place lifting oppression, left them as +unconscious of walls and roof as though they were met in the open. The +clock twice marked the passing hour. She had never heard Mrs. Herrick +speak so flowingly nor Kerr listen so well, placing his questions nicely +to draw out the thread of her theme. Yet Flora guessed his thought must +be fixed on their approaching moment, as hers was—on the moment when +they should be ready to quit the table and Mrs. Herrick would leave them +to themselves.</p> + +<p>It was the appearance of the aproned maid that broke their unity. The +last course was on the table, the last taste of its pungent fruit +essence on their tongues—and what was the girl's errand now? The eye of +her mistress was inquiring.</p> + +<p>"Some one has come, Mrs. Herrick." The woman's proper formula seemed to +fail her. She looked as if she had been frightened.</p> + +<p>"Some one?" Mrs. Herrick showed asperity. "What name?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_402" id="Page_402">[Pg 402]</a></span>"He is coming in." As she spoke the girl shrank a little to one side.</p> + +<p>With his long coat open, hanging from the armpits, with ruffled hair, +and lips apart, and from breathlessness a little smiling, Harry appeared +in the doorway. Kerr leaned forward. Mrs. Herrick did not move. She was +facing the last arrival and she was smiling more flexibly, more +naturally, than Harry; but it was Flora who found the first word.</p> + +<p>"You! I—I thought it was Clara." She was struggling for nonchalance, +for poise, at this worst blow, so unexpected.</p> + +<p>"Clara won't be down," Harry said, advancing. "How d'ye do, Mrs. +Herrick? How d'ye do, Kerr?"</p> + +<p>"How d'ye do?" said the Englishman, without rising.</p> + +<p>Flora gripped the arms of her chair to keep from springing up in sheer +nervous terror. A possible purpose in Harry's coming, that even Mrs. +Herrick's presence would not defer, shot through her mind. Was he alone? +Or were<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_403" id="Page_403">[Pg 403]</a></span> there others—men here for a fearful purpose—waiting beyond in +the hall? But Harry had turned his back upon the door behind him with a +finality that declared whatever danger had come into the house was +complete in his presence.</p> + +<p>"I've dined, thanks," he said, but, stripping off his greatcoat, +accepted a chair and the glass of cordial Mrs. Herrick offered him. The +ruddy, hard quality of his face, were it divested of its present smile, +Flora thought, might well have frightened the maid; but, for all that, +it was not so implacable as Kerr's face confronting it. The look with +which he met the intrusion had a quality more bitter than the challenge +of an antagonist, more jealous than a mere lover's; and that bitterness, +that jealousy which was between them came out stingingly through their +small pleasantness. It could not be, Flora thought in terror, that Mrs. +Herrick intended to leave these two enemies to each other! Mrs. Herrick +had risen; and Flora, following, saw both men, also uprisen, hang +hesitatingly, as<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_404" id="Page_404">[Pg 404]</a></span> if unready to be deserted; yet with well-filled +glasses, and newly smoking tobacco, both were caught.</p> + +<p>Then Kerr, with a quick dash of his hand, picked up his glass. "Let us +be Continental," he begged, and followed close at Flora's side. Without +moving his lips Kerr was speaking. "What does this mean?"</p> + +<p>She sensed the anger in his smothered voice, but she dared not look at +him.</p> + +<p>"I have no idea; but I will see you."</p> + +<p>"When?"</p> + +<p>Her answer leaped to her mind and her lips at the same moment.</p> + +<p>"In the rotunda when the house is quiet."</p> + +<p>Harry had followed leisurely in their wake. The flush of haste had +subsided in his face, and when the four regrouped themselves in the +high, darkly-paneled room, among the low lights, Flora remarked his +extraordinary composure. Bitter he might be; but all the nervousness, +suspicion, uneasiness, that he had shown of late had<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_405" id="Page_405">[Pg 405]</a></span> vanished. There +was a tremendous confidence about him, the confidence of the player who +holds cards that must win the game, and sits back waiting for his +moment.</p> + +<p>But she was ready to laugh at him in his security. He had underestimated +his opponent. In spite of him she was to have her meeting with Kerr! +Harry had waited too long to prevent that, whatever he might do +afterward. In this inspired moment she felt herself touching conquering +heights which before she had only touched in imagination. She felt +enough power in herself to move even such a mountain of obstinacy as +Kerr. She stole a look at him—a look of glad intelligence. He +understood as if she had spoken. They were to meet, while all the house +slept fast, to meet for his great renunciation. Then, in the morning, +when Harry was ready with whatever move he was holding back, Kerr would +be gone. There would be no Kerr—but she must not think of that! She +glanced at him again in the thick of the talk,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_406" id="Page_406">[Pg 406]</a></span> and caught his eye upon +her, puzzled, and, she thought, with a glimmer of doubt.</p> + +<p>She smiled; and smiled again at the ease with which she reassured him, +merely by looking at him. He should see, in the end, how true she could +be!</p> + +<p>He was talking tremendously, flinging off fireworks of words, but she +was curiously aware that Mrs. Herrick and Harry were looking more at her +than at Kerr. She felt herself the dominant spirit. She saw them +acknowledge it, swept along by the high tide of her mood that was rising +to meet her great decisive moment. Yet on the surface the strong pulse +of it appeared as ripples—words, smiles, gay gestures, laughter—rising +like the last bubble on a wave's crest. She was not consciously acting; +she was inspired by the power of what she concealed and must conceal. +And when she left them it was like a triumphant exit; almost it seemed +to her as if she might hear their applause following her.</p> + +<p>In the room where, some eight hours before, she and Mrs. Herrick had +talked, Flora waited,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_407" id="Page_407">[Pg 407]</a></span> fully dressed. It had been early when they had +separated. The strain of the four together had been terrific; and she +was still feeling it, though an hour had passed. She was feeling that, +now her situation was upon her, she was alone. Mrs. Herrick could only +be near her, not with her, and Kerr was still an unknown +quantity—except that he was fire.</p> + +<p>And there was Harry, with his terrible certainty, and no apparent thing +to account for it. It could not be there were men in the house without +the servants remarking it; but in the garden? She peered out upon it. +Only tree shadows moved upon the lawn. Nothing glimmered in the walks or +drives. The solitude held her like an enchantment. She listened for the +small sounds in the house to cease, for the lights in the lower story to +go out, proclaiming all the servants were in bed. Even after the +stillness she waited—waited to be sure it was the long stillness.</p> + +<p>Finally she crept to the door and opened it boldly wide.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_408" id="Page_408">[Pg 408]</a></span>She stood where she was upon the threshold trembling in a cruel fright. +A gas-jet burning far up at the end of the hall, threw a dim light down +the pale, pinkish, naked vista, void of furniture, window or curtain; +and, leaning against the blank wall almost opposite her door, and +directly facing her, was Harry.</p> + +<p>Without speaking they looked at each other. He was fully dressed, but +lacking his shoes, as she noted in the acuteness of her startled senses. +The furtive suggestion of those shoeless feet struck her with +horror—formless, unreasoning. It was like an evil dream to find him +there, stolen to her door in the night, waiting outside it without a +sound, looking her steadily, hardily in the eye without a word.</p> + +<p>She tried to speak, but, with terror sobbing in her throat, the words +failed. She made a step forward with a crazy impulse to rush past him.</p> + +<p>He straightened, with a quick movement toward her. She recoiled before +him, precipitately retreated, closed the door, shot the bolt,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_409" id="Page_409">[Pg 409]</a></span> and +leaned, for faintness, against the wall. She expected each moment to +hear him tap. She neither heard a knock nor the sound of soft, departing +feet. He was still there! He was on guard! He had had good reason for +his terrible certainty! He had foreseen what her plan might be, and she +knew he would no more let her get past him down the hall than the +turnkey will let the wretched prisoner escape.</p> + +<p>The last flicker of her courage died at that thought. All her fine +exultation was beaten out by the fact of the brute force outside her +door. She could not get to Kerr now. Cowering behind her door she could +only fancy him waiting for her in the rotunda while the moments +lengthened into hours, each moment distrusting her more.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_410" id="Page_410">[Pg 410]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XXII" id="XXII"></a>XXII</h2> + +<h3>CLARA'S MARKET</h3> + +<p>All night she sat awake huddled under her greatcoat in the chilly +darkness. She could not lie down, she could not close her eyes. At long +intervals she heard the tread of unshod feet along the hall, and then +she held her breath lest at her slightest stir they approach her door. +Why, since he wanted the sapphire, hadn't he tried to get it from her +when he had had her unawares, upon her threshold with the house asleep? +It began to seem to her as if he were waiting, as if he were forced to +wait, for some appointed moment. She knew if it were his moment it would +be hers, too, as long as she had the sapphire upon her. She recalled +fearfully the moment when she had crouched against the window with her +hand pro<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_411" id="Page_411">[Pg 411]</a></span>tecting the jewel, and Harry's hand grasping her wrist. He +would know well enough where to find it now. Oh, the restless +unconcealable thing! Where could she hide it?</p> + +<p>She took the pear-shaped pouch that swung always before her on her long +gold chain. She had repudiated that hiding-place before, but now the +more obvious the better—now that both men supposed she carried the +jewel far hidden out of sight. Without moving from the bed where she was +crouched, cramped and cold, she made the exchange, leaving the chain +still around her neck, dropping the jewel into the pouch, where it would +swing free, so carelessly dangling as to be beyond suspicion, but never +beyond the reach of her hand.</p> + +<p>It was a pale, splendid dawning full of clouds when she feel asleep.</p> + +<p>Broad sunlight filled her room when she was awakened by a knocking at +her door. She sprang from the bed and went to it. She was not to be come +in upon by any unwelcome visitor. But it was Mrs. Herrick; and Flora, +with a murmur of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_412" id="Page_412">[Pg 412]</a></span> relief, since this was the one person she did want to +see, drew her inside.</p> + +<p>"Why, my child, you haven't slept, at least not properly." Mrs. Herrick +herself looked anxious and weary. "I've come to tell you that Mrs. +Britton is here. She came an hour ago."</p> + +<p>"Where is she?"</p> + +<p>"In the breakfast-room with Mr. Cressy."</p> + +<p>"Oh," Flora cried, "you know I didn't expect them. I didn't want them. +It wasn't for them I asked you to come."</p> + +<p>"But can't you tell me what it is you're afraid of?" the other urged. +"Between us can't we prevent it? Is there nothing I can do to help you?"</p> + +<p>"Ah, if you knew how much you have already helped me by just being +here."</p> + +<p>Her companion laughed a little. "Can't I do something more active than +that?"</p> + +<p>Flora pondered. "Where is Mr. Kerr?"</p> + +<p>"In the garden, in the willow walk."</p> + +<p>"Do you think you can manage that the others don't get at him?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_413" id="Page_413">[Pg 413]</a></span>"I can; if he doesn't want to get at them," Mrs. Herrick replied. +"Against a man like that, my dear," she aimed it gravely at Flora, "one +can do nothing."</p> + +<p>But Flora had no answer for the warning. "I must see Clara immediately," +she said.</p> + +<p>"But not without breakfast," Mrs. Herrick protested. "I will send you up +something. Remember that <i>she</i> never abuses herself, so she's always +fresh—and so she's always equal to the occasion."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Herrick went. Flora looked into the mirror. Almost for the first +time in ten days she thought of her appearance. If it was, as Mrs. +Herrick said, a factor of success, something must be done for it, for it +was dreadful. The best she could do revived a pale replica of the vivid +creature who had been wont to regard her from her glass. Yet her black +gown, thin and trailing far behind her, and her hair wound high, by very +force of their contrasted color gave her a real brilliance as they gave +her a seeming height. But she descended to the break<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_414" id="Page_414">[Pg 414]</a></span>fast-room with +trepidation, and stood a full minute before the door gathering courage +to go in.</p> + +<p>When she did open it, it was so suddenly that both occupants faced her +with a start. They were standing close together, and between them, on +the glare of the white table-cloth, lay a little heap of gold. As they +peered at her she saw that both were highly excited, but in Clara it +showed like a cold sparkle; in Harry it gloomed like a menace. His hand +hovered, clenched, above the money in a panic of irresolution; then, as +if with an involuntary relax of nerves, opened and let fall one last +piece of gold. Like a flash the whole disappeared in a sweep of Clara's +hand. It passed before Flora's eyes like a prestidigitator's trick, so +rapid as to seem unreal, and left her staring. Harry gave Clara a look, +half suspicious, half entreating; and then, to Flora's astonishment, +turned away without a word to either of them.</p> + +<p>Clara stood still, even after the door had closed upon Harry, and oddly, +and rather horridly, she wore the same aspect she had worn<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_415" id="Page_415">[Pg 415]</a></span> the day when +she had looked intently and absorbedly upon the rifled contents of +Flora's room.</p> + +<p>"Good morning," she said, and, pushing up her little misty veil, sat +down with her back to the deserted breakfast table, and waited meekly, +like one who has been summoned.</p> + +<p>"I am very glad you've come," Flora said. Her wits were still all +a-flutter from the appearance of that little heap of gold. She came +forward and stood in Harry's place. She was face to face with the person +and the question, but before the great import of it, and before the +marble front of Clara's patience, she felt helpless. There was silence +in the room, perfect silence in the garden; but moving along the hedged +walk all at once she saw the flutter of Mrs. Herrick's gown, and then in +profile Kerr beside her. The sight of him gave her her proper +inspiration. She turned upon Clara.</p> + +<p>"What are you going to do with the picture of Farrell Wand?"</p> + +<p>For the first time she saw Clara startled. Her lips parted, and the +breath that came and went<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_416" id="Page_416">[Pg 416]</a></span> between them was audible. But she was herself +again before she spoke. "Do with it? Why I don't know." Her fingers +drummed the table.</p> + +<p>"Whatever you do," Flora began, "please, oh, please don't do anything +immediately."</p> + +<p>Clara's eyebrows rose like graceful swallows. "You seem to anticipate +pretty clearly what I <i>am</i> going to do."</p> + +<p>"I suppose you're going to do what any one would who had a clue, and +could bring a person to justice," Flora candidly responded. "But if ever +I have made anything easy for you, Clara, won't you this time make it +easy for me? I'm not asking you to give up the picture, I'm only asking +you to wait."</p> + +<p>Clara nodded toward the window, through which Kerr could still be seen +with Mrs. Herrick. "On account of him?"</p> + +<p>"On account of him."</p> + +<p>For the first time Clara smiled. It crept out upon her face, as it were +involuntarily, but she sat there smiling in contemplation for quite ten +seconds. At last, "You want me to suppress my<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_417" id="Page_417">[Pg 417]</a></span> information? My dear +Flora, don't you think you want me to do more than is honest?"</p> + +<p>"Honest!" Flora cried. The words sounded hideous to her on Clara's +tongue; and yet what right had she, she thought with shame, to judge of +Clara's honesty when she herself was leagued with a thief? "Clara," she +said humbly, before this upholder of the right, "I can't pretend I'm not +suppressing things. I've only asked you to see me before you do anything +more. Now, you've come. Will you tell me one thing—did you bring the +picture with you?"</p> + +<p>Clara weighed it. "Well, if I did—"</p> + +<p>This was the considering Clara, and Flora realized whatever she could +expect from her she couldn't expect mercy. It was another thing she must +appeal to.</p> + +<p>"Clara," she urged, "wait three days, and you shall have the whole of +it. You have only the picture now. You shall have the jewel, too. Then +you can get the reward and still be—honest."</p> + +<p>She let the word fall into the silence fearfully,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_418" id="Page_418">[Pg 418]</a></span> as if she were afraid +Clara might detect its sneer. But this time Clara neither smiled nor +frowned.</p> + +<p>"It isn't the reward I'm thinking about. That's really very little, +considering."</p> + +<p>"Twenty thousand dollars!"</p> + +<p>"Would that be much to you?"</p> + +<p>"No," Flora admitted; "at least I mean I could pay it."</p> + +<p>"Well, then," Clara triumphed, "why, the picture alone, if it's worth +anything, is worth more than that." With a bird-like lifting of the head +she gave a sidelong interrogative glance.</p> + +<p>Flora, for a moment, steadily returned the look. It was coming over her +what Clara meant; a meaning so simple it was absurd she had not thought +of it before—so hateful that it was all she could do to face it. She +felt a tightness in her throat that was not tears. Shame and anger +contended in her. Oh, for the power to have refused that shameful +bargain—to have scorned it! She turned away. She closed her eyes. In +her mind she saw the figure of Kerr moving quietly about the winding +walks with Mrs. Her<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_419" id="Page_419">[Pg 419]</a></span>rick. She faced sharply about. "What is it worth to +you?"</p> + +<p>Clara put her off with the last sweet meekness of her cleverness. +"Whatever it's worth to you—and him."</p> + +<p>Flora was in command of herself now. "There are some things I can not +set a price on. If this is what you have come down for, we are simply +waiting for you to name it." She looked over Clara's head. She had stood +abashed when Clara had put on the majesty of right, but now it was Clara +herself who was abashed, not at the thing itself, but at the fact of +having to utter it. She sat grasping one of her gloves in her doubled +fist; and, leaning forward, with her eyes like jewels in her little pale +face and the white aura of her veil, waited as if she thought that by +some silent agency of understanding Flora would presently take up a pen +and write the desired figure in her check-book.</p> + +<p>But Flora stood inexorable, straight and black, crowned with her helmet +of gleaming hair; and, with her hands behind her, looked over<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_420" id="Page_420">[Pg 420]</a></span> Clara's +head through the window into the garden. She would not help Clara gloss +over this ugly fact.</p> + +<p>A curious grimace distorted Clara's features, as if with an effort she +gulped something bitter, and then into the silence her voice fell—a +gasp, a breath—"Fifty thousand."</p> + +<p>All sums had become the same to Flora, even her year's income. As if she +were verily afraid Clara might take it back, she turned precipitately to +a writing-table. But Clara had risen, and though still pale, in a +measure she seemed to have recovered herself.</p> + +<p>"Wait. I can't give it to you now. I will meet you here in two hours and +bring the picture. You can let me have it then."</p> + +<p>"Oh, two hours!" Flora objected.</p> + +<p>But Clara was firm. "No, I can't bring it sooner. It will make no +difference in your affair." She was panting in her excitement. "In two +hours you shall have the picture here. I promise you."</p> + +<p>Flora wondered. Depth below depth! She<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_421" id="Page_421">[Pg 421]</a></span> could never seem to get to the +bottom of this business. There was only one thing she could count on, +and that was Clara's impeccable honor in living up to a bargain. Flora +sealed that bargain now. She held out her fluttering slip of paper, +still wet with ink.</p> + +<p>"Very well, in two hours—but take this now. I would rather you did."</p> + +<p>Clara reached the tips of her fingers, touched the paper—and then it +was no longer in Flora's hand, and Clara was walking from her across the room.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_422" id="Page_422">[Pg 422]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XXIII" id="XXIII"></a>XXIII</h2> + +<h3>TOUCHE</h3> + +<p>Left alone, Flora glanced rapidly around her. Now for a sally, now for a +dash straight for Kerr. The shortest way was what she wanted. Opening +doors lately had led to too many surprises. She pushed aside the long +curtains and stepped out through the French window upon the veranda. +Rapidly her eyes swept the garden. Far down between the gray, slim +branches of willows at last she made out the flutter of a skirt. She +sighed relief to think Mrs. Herrick still at her post, and began to +hurry down the broad unshaded drive. Her steps sounded loud on the +gravel, and presently to her excited ears they sounded double. Then she +realized the truth. Some one else was walking behind her. She thought by +not looking over her<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_423" id="Page_423">[Pg 423]</a></span> shoulder she could avoid stopping; but in a moment +Harry's voice hailed her. It was still far enough behind for her to hope +she could ignore it. She swept on as if she had not heard. Once around +the turn of the drive, she would be in sight of succor. She could trust +to Mrs. Herrick to manage Harry. She made a little rush around the loop +and looked down the long vista of the willows.</p> + +<p>A hundred yards distant she saw the two standing. Kerr presented his +back, and with his head a little canted forward seemed to listen, +absorbed in his companion. But that companion was a smaller figure than +Mrs. Herrick, and her veil made an aura of filmy white around her face. +The sight of her was enough to stop Flora short, and in that instant +Harry, making a cut across the flower-beds, caught up with her. He +stopped as abruptly as she, and gazed with a dismay that surpassed her +own. For an instant she thought he was about to make a dash down the +walk for them. Then he caught Flora's hand and pulled her back. There +was no help for it, she thought.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_424" id="Page_424">[Pg 424]</a></span> Her other hand crept downward +stealthily and gathered up her swinging pouch of gold. Trembling, she +let him drag her back, but when they faced each other behind the plumes +and swords of a great pampas clump she was shocked at the emotion in his +face; and as if what he had just seen had given the last touch, his +voice had risen a key, and between every half-dozen words it broke for +breath.</p> + +<p>"Look here, Flora," he began; "I know you've been trying to give me the +slip ever since night before last. I frightened you then. I didn't mean +to, but you had no business to keep the ring after what I told you. No, +I'm not going to touch you," as she shrank back against the pampas +swords, "but I want you to give it to me, yourself, right here and now."</p> + +<p>She looked up into his face, burning fiery in the sun beating down on +his bare head. "No, no, Harry; I shan't give it to you. Last time I said +I would give it to you for a good reason, but now I wouldn't give it to +you for anything."</p> + +<p>"You don't know what you're doing," he cried.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_425" id="Page_425">[Pg 425]</a></span>"I do; I know as well as you that this is a part of the Crew Idol. I've +known it all along, and when the time comes I'm going to give it myself +to Mr. Purdie, but not until that time."</p> + +<p>Harry passed his hand over his face with an inarticulate sound. Then, +"You will ruin us!" he choked.</p> + +<p>"I shall tell the truth, whatever comes," she exulted. To tell the truth +and keep on telling it—that, in her passion of relief at speaking out +at last, was all she wanted! But Harry fell back. He changed +countenance. He recovered himself.</p> + +<p>"Look here, Flora; if you do I'm going to leave you. I'm going to leave +you to what you've chosen."</p> + +<p>She met it steadily. "I'm glad you say so. I've been thinking for days +that it would be better so."</p> + +<p>"Have you?" he said in a low voice, looking at her earnestly. "Of +course, I know the reason of that. I meant it to be different, but now +there's no help. I—"</p> + +<p>With a motion too quick for her to escape he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_426" id="Page_426">[Pg 426]</a></span> stooped and kissed her +lightly. To that moment she had pitied him, but his touch she loathed. +She thrust him away with both hands. He turned. Without speaking, +without looking at her again he walked away. She watched him with a +desperate feeling of being abandoned, of losing something powerful and +valuable. The faint, thin screech of a locomotive from a station far +down the line made him pause, and turn, and gaze under his hand in the +strong sun. So for a moment she saw him, a lowering, peering figure +moving away from her over the lawn between broad flower-beds. Then he +disappeared among the shrubbery.</p> + +<p>This encounter, that had stopped her in full open field, had not been +the fatal thing she had feared. It had been a peril met that nerved her +to a higher courage. Now she could walk gallantly to the most uncertain +moment of her life. Between the glimmering willows down the long still +avenue she passed, her flowing draperies borne backwards as by +triumphant airs. The<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_427" id="Page_427">[Pg 427]</a></span> wind of her approach seemed to reach the two still +far in front of her.</p> + +<p>They turned and watched her drawing nearer, and before she had quite +reached them Kerr stretched out his hand as if to help her over a last +rough place, and drew her toward him and held her beside him with his +fingers lightly clasped around her wrist. She saw that he looked pale, +worn, as he had not been last night, and, what struck her most +strangely, angry. The hand that held hers shook with the violent pulse +that was beating in it. He turned to Clara.</p> + +<p>"Will you pardon us, Mrs. Britton?" Then after another patient moment, +"Miss Gilsey has something to say to me." Still he made no motion to +move away, and at last Clara seemed to understand what was expected of +her. She flushed, and in the middle of that color her eyes flashed +double steel. For the first time in Flora's memory she was at a loss. +She passed them without a word.</p> + +<p>Kerr looked after the little brilliant figure,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_428" id="Page_428">[Pg 428]</a></span> moving daintily away +through sun and shadow, with deep disgust in his face. But when he +turned to Flora disgust lifted to high severity. It was she who appeared +the guilty one, and he the accuser.</p> + +<p>"Why didn't you come, last night?"</p> + +<p>"I couldn't. <i>He</i> was there, Harry, outside my door."</p> + +<p>"In God's name! What did you tell him?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing. We did not speak—but I couldn't get past him!" The suspicion +in his face was more than she could bear. "You must believe me—for, if +you don't, we're both lost!"</p> + +<p>He had her by both wrists, now, and gently made her face him. "I have +believed in you to the extent of coming alone to a place I know nothing +of, because you wanted me. Now that I am here, what is it you have to +say to me?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, nothing more than I have said before," she pleaded; "only that, ten +times more earnestly."</p> + +<p>"You extraordinary child!" At first, he was pure amazement. "You've +brought me so far,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_429" id="Page_429">[Pg 429]</a></span> you've come so far yourself—you've got us both here +in such danger, to tell me only this? How could you be so mad—so +cruel?"</p> + +<p>She had locked her hands in front of her until the nails showed white +with the pressure. "It was more dangerous there than here. You don't +know what has happened since I saw you. And I thought if you and I could +only be alone together, without the fear of <i>them</i> always between us, I +could show you, I could persuade you—" Before his look she broke down. +"Well—you see, they followed us—they're here."</p> + +<p>"Grant it, they are." He seemed to laugh at them. "You have still your +chance. Give everything to me and I can save you still."</p> + +<p>"'Save <i>me</i>?' Oh, nothing could happen to me so terrible as having you +break my heart like this! If I should give the sapphire to you I should +lose you—even the thought of you—for ever. Nothing could ever be right +with us again! Won't you—" she pleaded, "won't you go?" and lifting her +hands, taking his face between them, "Won't you, because I love you?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_430" id="Page_430">[Pg 430]</a></span>He stood steady to this assault, and smiled down upon her. "Without you +and without it I will not budge. Come now, this is the end. I never +meant to do another thing."</p> + +<p>She covered her face with her hands.</p> + +<p>"Come, come." His voice was urging her, now very gentle. "It's more for +your sake than for the jewel now." And his arm around her shoulders was +gently forcing her to walk beside him not toward the drive, but away +into the tree-grown sheltered wing of the garden. By interlacing paths, +from the tremulous gray willows under the somber, clashing eucalyptus +spears, under dark wings of cypress they were moving. She was bracing in +every nerve against the unnerving of his presence.</p> + +<p>It had been always so. Even across the distance of a room the mere sight +of him had had for her the power to summon those wild spirits of the +soul and body that turn reason to a vapor. And now so close, with his +arm around her, that same power she had felt when she saw him first, the +power that had made her come out and be<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_431" id="Page_431">[Pg 431]</a></span> herself then, the power that +had overwhelmed her in the little restaurant, was leagued against her +again to make her do this one more thing, which she wouldn't do. Never, +never! Despairing, she wondered that such an evil motive could have such +strength.</p> + +<p>"Where have you got it now?" she heard him asking, and she pointed +downward toward where the pouch at her knee was swinging to and fro. +"Take it up, then," and like a hypnotized creature she gathered it into +her hand. But, once she had it, she held it clenched against him.</p> + +<p>"You're going to give it to me," he prompted, "aren't you?—aren't you?" +and looking steadily in her face his hand shut softly on her wrist, and +held out her clenched hand in front of her. And still they walked, +slowly. Like a pendulum the long gold chain swung from her clenched +fingers. To the tree-top birds they seemed as quiet as two lovers +speaking of their wedding-day. She felt her tension give way in this +quiet—her hand relax.</p> + +<p>"Dearest." The word brought up her eyes to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_432" id="Page_432">[Pg 432]</a></span> his with a start of +tenderness. "Open it," he said, and her hand, involuntarily, sprung the +pouch wide. They stared together into it. The little hollow golden shell +was empty.</p> + +<p>For a moment it held her incredulous. Then, faint and sick, all the +foundations of her faith reeling, she slowly raised her eyes to him in +accusation. She was not ready for the terrible sternness in his.</p> + +<p>"Have you lied to me?" he asked in a low voice. "Have you given it to +Cressy?"</p> + +<p>"No, no, no!" she cried in horror. "It was there! I put it there myself +this morning!" They looked at each other now equally sincere and aghast.</p> + +<p>"But you have seen him; you've been near him?" he demanded.</p> + +<p>She gasped out the whole truth. "This morning! He left me. He kissed +me."</p> + +<p>"Then, my God, where is he?" He gave a wide glance around him. Then +raising his voice, "Stay where you are!" he commanded, and began to run +from her through the trees.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_433" id="Page_433">[Pg 433]</a></span>She stood with her hand to her breast, with the empty pouch spinning in +front of her, hearing him crashing in the shrubbery. Then, in sudden +panic at finding herself alone, she fled back down the willow avenue, +and burst out on the broad drive in full view of the house.</p> + +<p>Kerr was not in sight, but there was a tremor of disturbance where all +had been still. Clara's face appeared at one of the upper windows and +looked down into the garden. Then Mrs. Herrick came down the stairs, +and, showing an anxious profile as she passed the door, hurried away +along the lower hall. There was a flutter in the servants' quarter, and +from a side door the coachman appeared hatless, in his shirt sleeves, +and ran toward the stable. All the people of the house seemed to be +running to and fro, but she didn't see Harry. This struck her with +unreasoning terror. She fled up the drive, and Clara's small face at the +window watched her.</p> + +<p>As she came into the hall she heard Kerr's voice. He was at the +telephone speaking names she had never heard in sentences whose meaning<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_434" id="Page_434">[Pg 434]</a></span> +was too much for her stunned senses to take in; but none the less while +she listened the feeling crept over her that there was some strange +revolution taking place in him. It might be transformation; it might be +only a swift increase of his original power. Whatever it was, he seemed +to her superhuman. The house was full of him—full of his rapid +movement, his ringing orders. If he knew that the sapphire was gone, +what was the meaning of this bold command? Was he, knowing all lost, +plunging gallantly into the clutches of his enemies? Or was this only a +blind, a splendid piece of effrontery to cover his too long delayed +retreat? She sat like a jointless thing on the fauteuil in the large +hall, and all at once saw him in front of her.</p> + +<p>She looked at his hat, his overcoat, his slim, glittering stick—all +symbols of departure.</p> + +<p>"Wait here," he said, and turned away.</p> + +<p>She watched his shadow dance across the flagging, and as it slipped over +the threshold she thought dully that now the sapphire was gone every one +was going from her.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_435" id="Page_435">[Pg 435]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XXIV" id="XXIV"></a>XXIV</h2> + +<h3>THE COMIC MASK</h3> + +<p>She listened to the sound of wheels, first rattling loud on the gravel, +slowly growing fainter. Then stillness was with her again, and +inanition. She looked around and up, and had no start at seeing Clara's +small face watching her over the gallery of the rotunda. It seemed to +her that appearance was natural to her existence now, like her shadow. +She looked away. When she raised her eyes again Clara was coming down +the stairs, and even at that distance Flora saw she carried something in +her hand—something flat and small and wrapped in a filmy bit of paper.</p> + +<p>Out of the chaos of her feeling rose the solitary thought—the picture +which she had bought that morning, the picture of Farrell Wand. She<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_436" id="Page_436">[Pg 436]</a></span> +watched it drawing near her with wonder. She sat up trembling. She had a +great longing and a horror to tear away the filmy paper and see Kerr at +last brutally revealed. She could not have told afterward whether Clara +spoke to her. She was conscious of her pausing; conscious of the faint +rustle of her skirt passing; conscious, finally, that the small swathed +square was in her hand.</p> + +<p>She tore the tissue paper through. She held a photograph, a mounted +kodak print. She made out the background to be sky and water and the +rail of a ship with silhouettes of heads and shoulders, a jungle of +black; and in the middle distance caught in full motion the single +figure of a man, back turned and head in profile. He was moving from her +out of the picture, and with the first look she knew it was not Kerr.</p> + +<p>Her first thought was that there had been a trick played on her! But +no—across the bottom of the picture, in Judge Buller's full round hand, +was written, "Farrell Wand boarding the <i>Loch Ettive</i>." She held it high +to the light. Clara<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_437" id="Page_437">[Pg 437]</a></span> had been faithful to her bargain. It was the +picture that had deceived her. She studied it with passionate +earnestness. She did not know the bearded profile; but in the burly +shoulders, in the set and swing of the body in motion, more than all in +the lowering, peering aspect of the whole figure, she began to see a +familiar something. She held it away from her by both thin edges, and +that aspect swelled and swelled in her startled eyes, until suddenly the +figure in the picture seemed to be moving from her, not up a gang-plank, +but through a glare of sun over grass between broad beds of flowers.</p> + +<p>She was faint. She was going to fall. She caught at the chair to save +herself, and still she was dropping down, down, into a gulf of spinning +darkness. "Oh, Harry!" she whispered, and let her head roll back against +the arm of the fauteuil.</p> + +<p class="tbrk"> </p> + +<p>With a dim sense of rising through immeasurable distances back to light +she opened her eyes. She saw Mrs. Herrick's face, and as this<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_438" id="Page_438">[Pg 438]</a></span> was +connected in her mind with protection she smiled.</p> + +<p>"Do you feel better?" Mrs. Herrick asked her. Then she opened her eyes +wide and saw the walls and the high-arched ceiling of the hall directly +above her, knew herself lying on the floor, saw above her the figure of +Clara standing with a bottle of salts, and then remembered; and, with a +moan, buried her face in Mrs. Herrick's lap. "Oh, no, no, no; don't +bring me back; I don't want to come back!"</p> + +<p>Their voices sounding high above her were speaking. Mrs. Herrick said: +"What is that?" Then Clara murmured. Then there was the light rustling +of paper. Flora moved her hand.</p> + +<p>"Give it to me; I want it." She felt the stiff little square of +cardboard between her fingers, and closed them around it fast.</p> + +<p>After a little she went up-stairs holding tight to the baluster with one +hand and to Mrs. Herrick with the other. After a little of sitting on +the edge of her bed she lay down, still holding to Mrs. Herrick. She +felt as though some cord<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_439" id="Page_439">[Pg 439]</a></span> within her had been drawn tight, too tight to +endure, and every moment she hoped it would snap and set her free.</p> + +<p>"You don't think I'm mad, do you?" she asked. Her friend earnestly +disclaimed it. "Then things are," Flora said, "everything. Oh, oh!" The +memory overwhelmed her. "He took me there as if by chance! He gave the +sapphire to me for my engagement ring. Oh, dreadful! Oh, poor Harry!"</p> + +<p>All that afternoon and all night she slept fitfully, starting up at +intervals, trembling at nameless horrors—the glittering goldsmith's +shop, the Chinaman, the great eye of the sapphire, and, worst of all, +Harry's face, always the same calm, ruddy, good-natured, +innocent-looking face that had led her to the goldsmith's shop, that had +smiled at her, falling under the spell of the sapphire, that had +covered, all those days, God knew what ravages of stress and strain, +until the man had finally broken. That face appeared and reappeared +through the flashing terrors of her dreams like the presiding genius<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_440" id="Page_440">[Pg 440]</a></span> of +them all. Finally, drifting into complete repose, she slept far into the +morning.</p> + +<p>She wakened languid and weak. She lay looking about the room, and, like +a person recovering after a heavy blow, wondering what had happened. +Then her hand, as with her first waking thought it had done for the last +week, went to the locket chain around her neck. Oh, yes, yes; she had +forgotten. The sapphire was gone. Gone by fraud, gone at a kiss for ever +with Harry—no, with Farrell Wand.</p> + +<p>For Harry was not Harry; and Kerr was not Farrell Wand. He was indeed an +unknown quantity. Since she had found Harry she had lost both Kerr's +name and his place in her fairy-tale. She had seen his very demeanor +change before her eyes. Indeed, her hour had come without her knowing +it. The spell had been snapped which had made him wear the semblance of +evil. His sinister form was dissolving; but what was to be his identity +when finally he stood before her restored and perfect? If he were not +the thief whom she had struggled so to shield, why,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_441" id="Page_441">[Pg 441]</a></span> then he was that +very strength of law and right which, for his sake, she had betrayed.</p> + +<p>She sat up quickened with humiliation. The thing was not a tragedy, it +was a grotesque. Blushing more and more crimson, struggling with strange +mingled crying and laughter, she slipped out of the bed, and, still in +her nightgown, ran down the hall, and knocked on Mrs. Herrick's door, +until the dismayed lady opened it.</p> + +<p>"I thought it was he," Flora gasped. "I thought it was he who had taken +the ring! Why didn't he tell me? Why did he keep it secret? I would have +done anything to have saved it for him, and I let Harry get it! Oh, +isn't it cruel? Isn't it pitiful? Isn't it ridiculous?"</p> + +<p>Mrs. Herrick, who, for the last thirty-six hours, had so departed from +her curriculum of safety, and courageously met many strange appearances, +now was to hear stranger facts. For Flora had let go completely, and +Mrs. Herrick, without hinting at hysterics, let her laugh, let her cry, +let her tell piece by piece, as she could,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_442" id="Page_442">[Pg 442]</a></span> the story of the two men, +from the night when Kerr had spoken so strangely at the club on the +virtues of thieves to the moment when, in the willow walk, they +discovered that the jewel was gone. Clara's part in the affair, and the +price she had exacted, even in this unnerved moment, Flora's instinct +withheld, to save Mrs. Herrick the last cruelest touch. But for the +rest—she let Mrs. Herrick have it all—and under the shadow of the grim +facts the two women clung together, as if to make sure of their own +identities.</p> + +<p>"I don't even know who he is," Flora said faintly.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Herrick gave her a quick glance. She had not a moment's hesitation +as to whom the "he" meant. "You will have to ask him when he comes."</p> + +<p>"Do you think he will come back?"</p> + +<p>Mrs. Herrick had the heart to smile.</p> + +<p>"But think of what I have done. I have lost him the sapphire, and he +loves it—loves it as much as he does me."</p> + +<p>Again the glance. "Did he tell you that?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_443" id="Page_443">[Pg 443]</a></span>Flora nodded. The other seemed intently to consider. "He will come +back," she declared.</p> + +<p>Upheld by her friend's assurance, Flora found the endurance necessary to +spend the day, an empty, stagnant day, in moving about a house and +garden where a few hours ago had passed such a storm of events. She +reviewed them, lived them over again, but without taking account of +them. Her mind, that had worked so sharply, was now in abeyance. She +lived in emotion, but with a tantalizing sense of something unexplained +which her understanding had not the power to reach out to and grasp. For +a day more she existed under the same roof with Clara, for Clara stayed +on.</p> + +<p>At first it seemed to Flora extraordinary that she dared, but presently +it began to appear how much more extraordinary it would have been if +Clara had promptly fled. By waiting a discreet length of time, as if +nothing had happened, she put herself indubitably on the right side of +things. Indeed, when one thought, had she ever been legally off it?</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_444" id="Page_444">[Pg 444]</a></span>That was the very horror. Clara had simply turned the situation over and +seen its market value, and how enormously she had made it pay! Flora +herself had paid; and she had seen the evidence that Harry had paid, +paid for his poor little hour of escape which a mere murderer might have +granted him in pity. Yet Clara could walk beside them, meet them at +dinner with the same smooth face, chat upon the terrace with the +unsuspecting Mrs. Herrick, and even face Flora in a security which had +the appearance of serenity, since she knew that nothing ever would be +told. At every turn in the day's business Flora kept meeting that placid +presence; and it was not until the end of the day that she met it primed +for departure. Flora was with Mrs. Herrick, and Clara, coming to seek +them out, had an air of casual farewell. The small, sweet smile she +presented behind her misty veil, the delicate white-gloved hand she +offered were symbols of enduring friendship, as if she were leaving them +only for a few hours; as if, when Flora returned to town, she would find +Clara waiting<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_445" id="Page_445">[Pg 445]</a></span> for them in the house. But Flora knew it was only Clara's +wonderful way. This uprising and departure were her last.</p> + +<p>Now all her waiting was for Kerr's returning. She did not know how she +should face him, but she wanted him. A telegram came an hour before him, +came to Mrs. Herrick announcing him; and then himself, driven up on the +high seat of the cart, just as daylight was closing. She and Mrs. +Herrick had walked half-way out toward the rose garden; and, seeing them +there, he stopped the cart in the drive, leaped down and ran across the +grass. Both hurried to meet him. The three encountered like friends, +like intimates, with hand-clasps and hurried glances searching each +other's faces.</p> + +<p>"Did you save it?" Flora asked.</p> + +<p>He looked at Mrs. Herrick, hesitating.</p> + +<p>"You can tell, she knows," Flora assured him.</p> + +<p>"No, I haven't saved it—not so far," he said. He had taken off his hat +and the strong light showed on his face lines of fatigue and anxiety. +"He gave me the slip—no trace of him. No one<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_446" id="Page_446">[Pg 446]</a></span> saw him come into the +city; nothing turned up in the goldsmith's shop. His friend, the +blue-eyed Chinaman, has dropped out of sight. I haven't made it public," +he glanced at Flora—"but our men think he's gone out by the water +route—Lord knows in what or where! He must have had this planned for +days." He didn't look at Flora now. He turned his communication +carefully on Mrs. Herrick. "There were seven vessels sailed, that day, +and all were searched; but there are ways of smuggling opium, and why +not men?"</p> + +<p>They were walking toward the house. Kerr looked up at the window where, +a short time before, Clara's face had looked down upon the confusion in +the garden.</p> + +<p>"Is that paid woman still here?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, no; she's gone." Flora looked at him warningly. But Mrs. Herrick +had caught his tone. "Why shouldn't she be?" she demanded with delicate +asperity.</p> + +<p>Kerr had dropped his monocle. "Because, in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_447" id="Page_447">[Pg 447]</a></span> common decency, she +couldn't. She sold Cressy to me for a good round sum."</p> + +<p>Flora and Mrs. Herrick exchanged a look of horror.</p> + +<p>"I'd suspected him," said Kerr. "I knew where I'd seen him, but I +couldn't be sure of his identity till she showed me the picture."</p> + +<p>"What picture?" cried Flora.</p> + +<p>"The picture Buller mentioned at the club that night: Farrell Wand, +boarding the <i>Loch Ettive</i>. Don't you remember?" He spoke gently, as if +afraid that a hasty phrase in such connection might do her harm. Now, +when he saw how white she looked, he steadied her with his arm. "We +won't talk of this business any more," he said.</p> + +<p>"But I must talk of it," Flora insisted tremblingly. "I don't even know +what you are."</p> + +<p>For the first time he showed apologetic. He looked from one to the other +with a sort of helpless simplicity.</p> + +<p>"Why, I'm Chatworth—I'm Crew; I'm the chap that owns the confounded thing!"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_448" id="Page_448">[Pg 448]</a></span>To see him stand there, announced in that name, gave the tragic farce +its last touch. Flora had an instant of panic when flight seemed the +solution. It took all her courage to keep her there, facing him, +watching, as if from afar off, Mrs. Herrick's acknowledgment of the +informal introduction.</p> + +<p>"I came here, quietly," he was saying, "so as to get at it without +making a row. Only Purdie, good man! knew—and he's been wondering all +along why I've held so heavy a hand on him. We'll have to lunch with +them again, eh?" He turned and looked at Flora. "And make all those +explanations necessitated by this lady's wonderful sense of honor!"</p> + +<p>It was here, somewhere in the neighborhood of this sentence of doubtful +meaning, that Mrs. Herrick left them. In looking back, Flora could never +recall the exact moment of the departure. But when she raised her eyes +from the grass where they had been fixed for what seemed to her eternity +she found only Kerr—no, Chatworth—standing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_449" id="Page_449">[Pg 449]</a></span> there, looking at her with +a grave face.</p> + +<p>"Eh?" he said, "and what about that honor of yours? What shall we say +about it, now that the sapphire's gone and no longer in our way?"</p> + +<p>She was breathing quick to keep from crying. "I told you that day at the +restaurant."</p> + +<p>"Yes, yes; you told me why you kept the sapphire from me, but"—he hung +fire, then fetched it out with an effort—"why did you take it in the +first place?"</p> + +<p>She looked at him in clear astonishment. "I didn't know what it was."</p> + +<p>"You didn't!"</p> + +<p>It seemed to Flora the whole situation was turning exactly inside out. +The light that was breaking upon her was more than she could bear. "Oh," +she wailed, "you couldn't have thought I meant to take it!"</p> + +<p>"Then if you didn't," he burst out, "why, when I told you what it was, +didn't you give it to me?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_450" id="Page_450">[Pg 450]</a></span>The cruel comic muse, who makes our serious suffering ridiculous, had +drawn aside the last curtain. Flora felt the laughter rising in her +throat, the tears in her eyes.</p> + +<p>"You guessed who I was," he insisted, advancing, "at least what I +represented."</p> + +<p>She hid her face in her hands, and her voice dropped, tiny, into the +stillness.</p> + +<p>"I guessed you were Farrell Wand."</p> + +<hr /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_451" id="Page_451">[Pg 451]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XXV" id="XXV"></a>XXV</h2> + +<h3>THE LAST ENCHANTMENT</h3> + +<p>The tallest eucalyptus top was all of the garden that was touched with +sun when Flora came out of the house in the morning. She stood a space +looking at that little cone of brightness far above all the other trees, +swaying on the delicate sky. It was not higher lifted nor brighter +burnished than her spirit then. Shorn of her locket chain, her golden +pouch, free of her fears, she poised looking over the garden. Then with +a leap she went from the veranda to the grass and, regardless of dew, +skimmed the lawn for the fountain and the rose garden.</p> + +<p>There she saw him—the one man—already awaiting her. He stood back to +back with a mossy nymph languishing on her pedestal, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_452" id="Page_452">[Pg 452]</a></span> Flora hoped by +running softly to steal up behind him, and make of the helpless marble +lady a buffer between their greetings. But either she underestimated the +nymph's bulk, or forgot how invariably direct was the man's attack; for +turning and seeing her, without any circumvention, with one sweep of his +long arm, he included the statue in his grasp of her. With a laugh of +triumph he drew her out of her concealment.</p> + +<p>To her the splendor of skies and trees and morning light melted into +that wonderful moment. For the first time in weary days she had all to +give, nothing to fear or withhold. She was at peace. She was ready to +stop, to stand here in her life for always—here in the glowing garden +with him, and their youth. But he was impatient. He did not want to +loiter in the morning. He was hot to hurry on out of the present which +was so mysterious, so untried to her, as if these ecstasies had no +mystery to him but their complete fulfilment. He filled her with a +trembling premonition of the undreamed-of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_453" id="Page_453">[Pg 453]</a></span> things that were waiting for +her in the long aisle of life.</p> + +<p>"Come, speak," he urged, as they paced around the fountain. "When am I +to take you away?"</p> + +<p>She hung back in fear of her very eagerness to go, to plunge head over +ears into life in a strange country with a stranger. "Next month," she +ventured.</p> + +<p>"Next month! why not next week? why not to-morrow?" he declared with +confidence. "Who is to say no? I am the head of my house and you have no +one but me. To be sure, there is Mrs. Herrick—excellent woman. But she +has her own daughters to look out for, and," he added slyly, "much as +she thinks of you, I doubt if she thinks you a good example for them. As +for that other, as for the paid woman—"</p> + +<p>"Oh, hush, hush!" Flora cried, hurt with a certain hardness in his +voice; "I don't want to see her. I shall never go near her! And Harry—"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_454" id="Page_454">[Pg 454]</a></span>"I wasn't going to speak of him," said Chatworth quickly.</p> + +<p>"I know," she answered, "but do you mind my speaking of him?" They had +sat down on the broad lip of the fountain basin. He was looking at her +intently. "It is strange," she said, "but in spite of his doing this +terrible thing I can't feel that he himself is terrible—like Clara."</p> + +<p>"And yet," he answered in a grave voice, "I would rather you did."</p> + +<p>She turned a troubled face. "Ah, have you forgotten what you said the +first night I met you? You said it doesn't matter what a man is, even if +he's a thief, as long as he's a good one."</p> + +<p>At this he laughed a little grudgingly. "Oh, I don't go back on that, +but I was looking through the great impartial eye of the universe. +Whereas a man may be good of his kind, he's only good in his kind. Tip +out a cat among canaries and see what happens. My dear girl, we were the +veriest birds in his paws! And notice that it isn't moral law—it's +instinct. We<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_455" id="Page_455">[Pg 455]</a></span> recognize by scent before we see the shape. You never knew +him. You never could. And you never trusted him."</p> + +<p>"But," she interrupted eagerly, "I would have done anything for you when +I thought you were a thief."</p> + +<p>"Anything?" he caught her up with laughter. "Oh, yes, anything to haul +me over the dead line on to your side. That was the very point you made. +That was where you would have dropped me—if I had stuck by my kind, as +you thought it, and not come over to yours."</p> + +<p>She saw herself fairly caught. She heard her mental process stated to +perfection.</p> + +<p>"But if you hadn't felt all along I was your kind, if you hadn't had an +idea that I was a stray from the original fold, you would never have +wanted to go in for me," he explained it.</p> + +<p>Flora had her doubts about the truth of this. For a time she had been +certain of his belonging to the lawless other fold, and at times she +would have gone with him in spite of it, but this last knowledge she +withheld. She withheld<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_456" id="Page_456">[Pg 456]</a></span> it because she could make out now, that, for all +his seeming wildness, he had no lawless instincts in himself. +Generations of great doing and great mixing among men had created him, a +creature perfectly natural and therefore eccentric; but the same +generations had handed down from father to son the law-abiding instinct +of the rulers of the people. He could be careless of the law. He was +strong in it. In his own mind he and the law were one. His perception of +the relations of life was so complete that he had no further use for the +written law; and Farrell Wand's was so limited that he had never found +the use for it. Lawless both; but—the two extremes. They might seem to +meet—but between those two extremes, between a Chatworth and a Farrell +Wand—why, there was all the world's experience between!</p> + +<p>She raised her eyes and smiled at him in thinking of it, but the smile +faltered and she drew away. They were about to be disturbed. Beyond the +rose branches far down the drive she saw a figure moving toward them at +a slow, un<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_457" id="Page_457">[Pg 457]</a></span>certain pace, looking to and fro. "See, there's some one +coming."</p> + +<p>"Oh, the gardener!" he said as one would say "Oh, fiddlesticks!"</p> + +<p>The gardener had been her first thought. But now she rose uneasily, +since she saw it was not he, asking herself, "Who else, at such an +hour?"</p> + +<p>By this time Chatworth, still seated, had caught sight of it. "Hello," +he said, "what sort of a thing is that?"</p> + +<p>It was a short, shabby, nondescript little figure, shuffling rapidly +along the winding walk between the rose bushes. Now they saw the top of +his round black felt hat. Now only a twinkling pair of legs. Now, around +the last clump of bushes he appeared full length, and, suddenly dropping +his businesslike shuffle, approached them at a languid walk.</p> + +<p>Flora grasped Chatworth's arm in nervous terror. "Tell him to go," she +whispered; "make him go away."</p> + +<p>The blue-eyed Chinaman was planted before<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_458" id="Page_458">[Pg 458]</a></span> them stolidly, with the +curious blind look of his guarded eyes blinking in his withered face. He +wore for the first time the blouse of his people, and his hands were +folded in his sleeves.</p> + +<p>"Who's this?" said Chatworth, appealing to Flora.</p> + +<p>At this the Chinaman spoke. "Mr. Crew," he croaked.</p> + +<p>The Englishman, looking from the Oriental to Flora, still demanded +explanations with expostulating gesture.</p> + +<p>"It is the man who sold us the sapphire," she whispered; and "Oh, what +does he want of you?"</p> + +<p>"Eh?" said Chatworth, interrogating the goldsmith with his monocle. +"What do you want?"</p> + +<p>The little man finished his long, and, what had seemed his blind, stare; +then dived into his sleeve. He drew forth a crumpled thing which seemed +to be a pellet and this he proceeded to unfold. Flora crept cautiously +forward, loath to come near, but curious, and saw him spread out and +hold up a roughly torn triangle of news<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_459" id="Page_459">[Pg 459]</a></span>paper. She gave a cry at sight +of it. Across the top in thick black type ran the figures $20,000.</p> + +<p>Chatworth pointed a stern forefinger. "What is it?" he said, though by +his tone he knew.</p> + +<p>The Chinaman also pointed at it, but cautious and apologetic. "Twenty +thousand dollar. You likee twenty thousand dollar?" He waited a moment. +Then, with a glimmer as of returning sight, presented the alternative. +"You likee god?—little joss?—come so?" And with his finger he traced +in the air a curve of such delicate accuracy that the Englishman with an +exclamation made a step toward him. But the Chinaman did not move. +"Twenty thousand dollar," he stated. It sounded an impersonal statement, +but nevertheless it was quite evident this time to whom it applied.</p> + +<p>The Englishman measured off his words slowly as if to an incomplete +understanding, which Flora was aware was all too miraculously quick. +"This little god, this ring—do you know where it is? Can you take me to +it?"</p> + +<p>The goldsmith nodded emphatically at each<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_460" id="Page_460">[Pg 460]</a></span> word, but when all was said +he only reiterated, "Twenty thousand dollar."</p> + +<p>Chatworth gave Flora an almost shamefaced glance, and she saw with a +curious twinge of jealousy that he was intensely excited. "Might as well +have a pot-shot at it," he said; and sitting down on the edge of the +fountain and taking out his check-book, rested it on his knee and wrote. +Then he rose; he held up the filled-in slip before the Chinaman's eyes.</p> + +<p>"Here," he said, "twenty thousand dollars." He held the paper well out +of the little man's reach. "Now," he challenged, "tell me where it is?"</p> + +<p>Into the goldsmith's eyes came a lightning flash of intelligence, such +as Flora remembered to have seen there when Farrell Wand, leaning on the +dusty counter, had bidden him go and bring something pretty. He seemed +to quiver a moment in indecision. Then he whipped his hand out of his +sleeve and held it forth palm upward. This time it was Chatworth who +cried out. The thing that lay on the goldsmith's palm Flora<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_461" id="Page_461">[Pg 461]</a></span> had never +seen, though once it had been described to her—"a bit of an old gold +heathen god, curled around himself, with his head of two yellow +sapphires and a big blue stone on top."</p> + +<p>There it blazed at her, the jewel she had carried in her bosom, that she +had hidden in her pouch of gold, and that had vanished from it at the +touch of a magic hand, now cunningly restored to its right place in the +forehead of the Crew Idol, crowning him with living light.</p> + +<p>Speechless they looked together at the magic thing. They had thought it +far at sea; and as if at a wave of a genii's wand it was here before +them flashing in the quiet garden.</p> + +<p>With an effort Chatworth seemed to keep himself from seizing on ring and +man together. He looked searchingly at the goldsmith and seemed on the +point of asking a question, but, instead, he slowly held out his hand. +He held it out cup-fashion. It shook so that Flora saw the Chinaman +steady it to drop in the ring. Then, folding his check miraculously +small, enveloping it in the ragged piece of newspaper, the little man<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_462" id="Page_462">[Pg 462]</a></span> +turned and shuffled from them down the gravel walk.</p> + +<p>Chatworth stood staring after him with his Idol in his palm. Then, +turning slow eyes to Flora, "How did he come by this?" he asked, as +sternly as if he demanded it of the mystery itself.</p> + +<p>"He had it, from the very first." The pieces of the puzzle were flashing +together in Flora's mind. "That first time Harry left the exhibit he +took it there."</p> + +<p>"But the blue sapphire?" Chatworth insisted.</p> + +<p>"Harry," Flora whispered, "Harry gave it up to him."</p> + +<p>"Gave it up to him!" Chatworth echoed in scorn.</p> + +<p>But she had had an inspiration of understanding. "He had to—for money +to get off with. He gave Clara all he had so that she would let him get +away. Poor thing!" she added in a lower breath, but Chatworth did not +hear her. He had taken the Idol in his thumb and finger, and, holding it +up in the broadening light,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_463" id="Page_463">[Pg 463]</a></span> looked fixedly at it with the passionate +incredulity with which one might hold and look at a friend thought dead. +She watched him with her jealous pang increasing to a greater feeling—a +feeling of being separated from him by this jewel which he loved, and +which had grown to seem hateful to her, which had shown itself a breeder +of all the greedy passions. She came softly up to him, and, lifting her +hand, covered the Idol.</p> + +<p>He turned toward her in wonder.</p> + +<p>"Ah, you love it too much," she whispered.</p> + +<p>"That's unworthy of you," he reproached her. "I have loved you more; and +that in spite of what I believed of you, and what this means to me. To +me, this ring is not a pretty thing seen yesterday. It is the symbol of +my family. It is the power and pride of us, which our women have worn on +their hands as they have worn our honor in their hearts. It is part of +the life of my people and now it has made itself part of our life, of +yours and mine. Shall I ever forget how starkly you held it for the sake +of my honor,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_464" id="Page_464">[Pg 464]</a></span> even against myself? Should I ever have known you without +it?" He put the ring into her hand, and, smiling with his old dare, held +it over the fountain. "Now, if you want to, drop it in." He released her +hand and turned to leave her to her will.</p> + +<p>For a moment she stood with power in her hands and her eyes on his +averted head. Then with a little rush she crossed the space between +them. "Here, take it! You love it! I want you to keep it! but I can't +forget the dreadful things it has made people do. It makes me afraid."</p> + +<p>In spite of his smiling he seemed to her very grave. "You dear, silly +child! The whole storm and trouble of life comes from things being in +the wrong place. This has been in the wrong place and made mischief."</p> + +<p>"Like me," she murmured.</p> + +<p>"Like you," he agreed. "Now we shall be as we should be. Give me your +hand."</p> + +<p>He drew off all the rings with which she had once tried to dim the +sparkle of the sapphire, and, dropping them into his pocket like so +much dross, slipped on the Idol that covered her third finger in a +splendid bar from knuckle to joint. Holding her by just the tip of that +finger, leaning back a little, he looked into her eyes, and she, looking +back, knew that it wedded them once for all.</p> + +<p class="tbrk"> </p> + +<p class="center">THE END</p> + +<hr /> +<h2><a name="ADVERTISEMENTS" id="ADVERTISEMENTS"></a>ADVERTISEMENTS</h2> + +<hr class="smler" /> + +<h3>BOOKS ON NATURE STUDY BY</h3> + +<h2>CHARLES G. D. ROBERTS</h2> + +<p class="center">Handsomely bound in cloth. Price, 75 cents per volume, postpaid.</p> + +<p><b>THE KINDRED OF THE WILD. A Book of Animal Life. With illustrations by +Charles Livingston Bull.</b></p> + +<p>Appeals alike to the young and to the merely youthful-hearted. Close +observation. Graphic description. We get a sense of the great wild and +its denizens. Out of the common. Vigorous and full of character. The +book is one to be enjoyed; all the more because it smacks of the forest +instead of the museum. John Burroughs says: "The volume is in many ways +the most brilliant collection of Animal Stories that has appeared. It +reaches a high order of literary merit."</p> + +<p><b>THE HEART OF THE ANCIENT WOOD. Illustrated.</b></p> + +<p>This book strikes a new note in literature. It is a realistic romance of +the folk of the forest—a romance of the alliance of peace between a +pioneer's daughter in the depths of the ancient wood and the wild beasts +who felt her spell and became her friends. It is not fanciful, with +talking beasts; nor is it merely an exquisite idyl of the beasts +themselves. It is an actual romance, in which the animal characters play +their parts as naturally as do the human. The atmosphere of the book is +enchanting. The reader feels the undulating, whimpering music of the +forest, the power of the shady silences, the dignity of the beasts who +live closest to the heart of the wood.</p> + +<p><b>THE WATCHERS OF THE TRAILS. A companion volume to the "Kindred of the +Wild." With 48 full page plates and decorations from drawings by Charles +Livingston Bull.</b></p> + +<p>These stories are exquisite in their refinement, and yet robust in their +appreciation of some of the rougher phases of woodcraft. "This is a book +full of delight. An additional charm lies in Mr. Bull's faithful and +graphic illustrations, which in fashion all their own tell the story of +the wild life, illuminating and supplementing the pen pictures of the +authors."—<i>Literary Digest.</i></p> + +<p><b>RED FOX. The Story of His Adventurous Career in the Ringwaak Wilds, and +His Triumphs over the Enemies of His Kind. With 50 illustrations, +including frontispiece in color and cover design by Charles Livingston +Bull.</b></p> + +<p>A brilliant chapter in natural history. Infinitely more wholesome +reading than the average tale of sport, since it gives a glimpse of the +hunt from the point of view of the hunted. "True in substance but +fascinating as fiction. It will interest old and young, city-bound and +free-footed, those who know animals and those who do not."—<i>Chicago +Record-Herald.</i></p> + +<h3>GROSSET & DUNLAP, Publishers,——New York</h3> + +<hr class="smler" /> + +<h2>FAMOUS COPYRIGHT BOOKS</h2> + +<h3>IN POPULAR PRICED EDITIONS</h3> + +<p class="center">Re-issues of the great literary successes of the time, library size, +printed on excellent paper—most of them finely illustrated. Full and +handsomely bound in cloth. Price, 75 cents a volume, postpaid.</p> + +<p><b>NEDRA, by George Barr McCutcheon, with color frontispiece and other +illustrations by Harrison Fisher.</b></p> + +<p>The story of an elopement of a young couple from Chicago, who decide to +go to London, travelling as brother and sister. Their difficulties +commence in New York and become greatly exaggerated when they are +shipwrecked in mid-ocean. The hero finds himself stranded on the island +of Nedra with another girl, whom he has rescued by mistake. The story +gives an account of their finding some of the other passengers, and the +circumstances which resulted from the strange mix-up.</p> + +<p><b>POWER LOT, by Sarah P. McLean Greene. Illustrated.</b></p> + +<p>The story of the reformation of a man and his restoration to +self-respect through the power of honest labor, the exercise of honest +independence, and the aid of clean, healthy, out-of-door life and +surroundings. The characters take hold of the heart and win sympathy. +The dear old story has never been more lovingly and artistically told.</p> + +<p><b>MY MAMIE ROSE. The History of My Regeneration, by Owen Kildare. +Illustrated.</b></p> + +<p>This <i>autobiography</i> is a powerful book of love and sociology. Reads +like the strangest fiction. Is the strongest truth and deals with the +story of a man's redemption through a woman's love and devotion.</p> + +<p><b>JOHN BURT, by Frederick Upham Adams, with illustrations.</b></p> + +<p>John Burt, a New England lad, goes West to seek his fortune and finds it +in gold mining. He becomes one of the financial factors and pitilessly +crushes his enemies. The story of the Stock Exchange manipulations was +never more vividly and engrossingly told. A love story runs through the +book, and is handled with infinite skill.</p> + +<p><b>THE HEART LINE, by Gelett Burgess, with halftone illustrations by Lester +Ralph, and inlay cover in colors.</b></p> + +<p>A great dramatic story of the city that was. A story of Bohemian life in +San Francisco, before the disaster, presented with mirror-like accuracy. +Compressed into it are all the sparkle, all the gayety, all the wild, +whirling life of the glad, mad, bad, and most delightful city of the +Golden Gate.</p> + +<h3>GROSSET & DUNLAP, Publishers,——New York</h3> + +<hr class="smler" /> + +<h2>FAMOUS COPYRIGHT BOOKS</h2> + +<h3>IN POPULAR PRICED EDITIONS</h3> + +<p class="center">Re-issues of the great literary successes of the time, library size, +printed on excellent paper—most of them finely illustrated. Full and +handsomely bound in cloth. Price, 75 cents a volume, postpaid.</p> + +<p><b>CAROLINA LEE. By Lillian Bell. With frontispiece by Dora Wheeler Keith.</b></p> + +<p>Carolina Lee is the Uncle Tom's Cabin of Christian Science. Its keynote +is "Divine Love" in the understanding of the knowledge of all good +things which may be obtainable. When the tale is told, the sick healed, +wrong changed to right, poverty of purse and spirit turned into riches, +lovers made worthy of each other and happily united, including Carolina +Lee and her affinity, it is borne upon the reader that he has been +giving rapid attention to a free lecture on Christian Science; that the +working out of each character is an argument for "Faith;" and that the +theory is persuasively attractive.</p> + +<p>A Christian Science novel that will bring delight to the heart of every +believer in that faith. It is a well told story, entertaining, and +cleverly mingles art, humor and sentiment.</p> + +<p><b>HILMA, by William Tillinghast Eldridge, with illustrations by Harrison +Fisher and Martin Justice, and inlay cover.</b></p> + +<p>It is a rattling good tale, written with charm, and full of remarkable +happenings, dangerous doings, strange events, jealous intrigues and +sweet love making. The reader's interest is not permitted to lag, but is +taken up and carried on from incident to incident with ingenuity and +contagious enthusiasm. The story gives us the <i>Graustark</i> and <i>The +Prisoner of Zenda</i> thrill, but the tale is treated with freshness, +ingenuity, and enthusiasm, and the climax is both unique and satisfying. +It will hold the fiction lover close to every page.</p> + +<p><b>THE MYSTERY OF THE FOUR FINGERS, by Fred M. White, with halftone +illustrations by Will Grefe.</b></p> + +<p>A fabulously rich gold mine in Mexico is known by the picturesque and +mysterious name of <i>The Four Fingers</i>. It originally belonged to an +Aztec tribe, and its location is known to one surviving descendant—a +man possessing wonderful occult power. Should any person unlawfully +discover its whereabouts, four of his fingers are mysteriously removed, +and one by one returned to him. The appearance of the final fourth +betokens his swift and violent death.</p> + +<p>Surprises, strange and startling, are concealed in every chapter of this +completely engrossing detective story. The horrible fascination of the +tragedy holds one in rapt attention to the end. And through it runs the +thread of a curious love story.</p> + +<h3>GROSSET & DUNLAP, Publishers,——New York</h3> + +<hr class="smler" /> + +<h2>MEREDITH NICHOLSON'S<br />FASCINATING ROMANCES</h2> + +<p class="center">Handsomely bound in cloth. Price, 75 cents per volume, postpaid</p> + +<p><b>THE HOUSE OF A THOUSAND CANDLES. With a frontispiece in colors by Howard +Chandler Christy.</b></p> + +<p>A novel of romance and adventure, of love and valor, of mystery and +hidden treasure. The hero is required to spend a whole year in the +isolated house, which according to his grandfather's will shall then +become his. If the terms of the will be violated the house goes to a +young woman whom the will, furthermore, forbids him to marry. Nobody can +guess the secret, and the whole plot moves along with an exciting zip.</p> + +<p><b>THE PORT OF MISSING MEN. With illustrations by Clarence F. Underwood.</b></p> + +<p>There is romance of love, mystery, plot, and fighting, and a breathless +dash and go about the telling which makes one quite forget about the +improbabilities of the story; and it all ends in the old-fashioned +healthy American way. Shirley is a sweet, courageous heroine whose +shining eyes lure from page to page.</p> + +<p><b>ROSALIND AT REDGATE. Illustrated by Arthur I. Keller.</b></p> + +<p>The author of "The House of a Thousand Candles" has here given us a +bouyant romance brimming with lively humor and optimism; with mystery +that breeds adventure and ends in love and happiness. A most +entertaining and delightful book.</p> + +<p><b>THE MAIN CHANCE. With illustrations by Harrison Fisher.</b></p> + +<p>A "traction deal" in a Western city is the pivot about which the action +of this clever story revolves. But it is in the character-drawing of the +principals that the author's strength lies. Exciting incidents develop +their inherent strength and weaknesses, and if virtue wins in the end, +it is quite in keeping with its carefully-planned antecedents. The N. Y. +<i>Sun</i> says: "We commend it for its workmanship—for its smoothness, its +sensible fancies, and for its general charm."</p> + +<p><b>ZELDA DAMERON. With portraits of the characters by John Cecil Clay.</b></p> + +<p>"A picture of the new West, at once startlingly and attractively true. * +* * The heroine is a strange, sweet mixture of pride, wilfulness and +lovable courage. The characters are superbly drawn; the atmosphere is +convincing. There is about it a sweetness, a wholesomeness and a +sturdiness that commends it to earnest, kindly and wholesome +people."—<i>Boston Transcript.</i></p> + +<h3>GROSSET & DUNLAP, Publishers,——New York</h3> + +<hr class="smler" /> + +<h3>BRILLIANT AND SPIRITED NOVELS</h3> + +<h2>AGNES AND EGERTON CASTLE</h2> + +<p class="center">Handsomely bound in cloth. Price, 75 cents per volume, postpaid.</p> + +<p><b>THE PRIDE OF JENNICO. Being a Memoir of Captain Basil Jennico.</b></p> + +<p>"What separates it from most books of its class is its distinction of +manner, its unusual grace of diction, its delicacy of touch, and the +fervent charm of its love passages. It is a very attractive piece of +romantic fiction relying for its effect upon character rather than +incident, and upon vivid dramatic presentation."—<i>The Dial.</i> "A +stirring, brilliant and dashing story."—<i>The Outlook.</i></p> + +<p><b>THE SECRET ORCHARD. Illustrated by Charles D. Williams.</b></p> + +<p>The "Secret Orchard" is set in the midst of the ultra modern society. +The scene is in Paris, but most of the characters are English speaking. +The story was dramatized in London, and in it the Kendalls scored a +great theatrical success.</p> + +<p>"Artfully contrived and full of romantic charm * * * it possesses +ingenuity of incident, a figurative designation of the unhallowed scenes +in which unlicensed love accomplishes and wrecks faith and +happiness."—<i>Athenaeum.</i></p> + +<p><b>YOUNG APRIL. With illustrations by A. B. Wenzell.</b></p> + +<p>"It is everything that a good romance should be, and it carries about it +an air of distinction both rare and delightful."—<i>Chicago Tribune.</i> +"With regret one turns to the last page of this delightful novel, so +delicate in its romance, so brilliant in its episodes, so sparkling in +its art, and so exquisite in its diction."—<i>Worcester Spy.</i></p> + +<p><b>FLOWER O' THE ORANGE. With frontispiece.</b></p> + +<p>We have learned to expect from these fertile authors novels graceful in +form, brisk in movement, and romantic in conception. This carries the +reader back to the days of the bewigged and beruffled gallants of the +seventeenth century and tells him of feats of arms and adventures in +love as thrilling and picturesque, yet delicate, as the utmost seeker of +romance may ask.</p> + +<p><b>MY MERRY ROCKHURST. Illustrated by Arthur E. Becher.</b></p> + +<p>"In the eight stories of a courtier of King Charles Second, which are +here gathered together, the Castles are at their best, reviving all the +fragrant charm of those books, like <i>The Pride of Jennico</i>, in which +they first showed an instinct, amounting to genius, for sunny romances. +The book is absorbing * * * and is as spontaneous in feeling as it is +artistic in execution."—<i>New York Tribune.</i></p> + +<h3>GROSSET & DUNLAP, Publishers,——New York</h3> + +<hr class="smler" /> + +<h2>FAMOUS COPYRIGHT BOOKS</h2> + +<h3>IN POPULAR PRICED EDITIONS</h3> + +<p class="center">Re-issues of the great literary successes of the time, library size, +printed on excellent paper—most of them finely illustrated. Full and +handsomely bound in cloth. Price, 75 cents a volume, postpaid.</p> + +<p><b>THE CATTLE BARON'S DAUGHTER. A Novel. By Harold Bindloss. With +illustrations by David Ericson.</b></p> + +<p>A story of the fight for the cattle-ranges of the West. Intense interest +is aroused by its pictures of life in the cattle country at that +critical moment of transition when the great tracts of land used for +grazing were taken up by the incoming homesteaders, with the inevitable +result of fierce contest, of passionate emotion on both sides, and of +final triumph of the inevitable tendency of the times.</p> + +<p><b>WINSTON OF THE PRAIRIE. With illustrations in color by W. Herbert +Dunton.</b></p> + +<p>A man of upright character, young and clean, but badly worsted in the +battle of life, consents as a desperate resort to impersonate for a +period a man of his own age—scoundrelly in character but of an +aristocratic and moneyed family. The better man finds himself barred +from resuming his old name. How, coming into the other man's +possessions, he wins the respect of all men, and the love of a +fastidious, delicately nurtured girl, is the thread upon which the story +hangs. It is one of the best novels of the West that has appeared for years.</p> + +<p><b>THAT MAINWARING AFFAIR. By A. Maynard Barbour. With illustrations by E. +Plaisted Abbott.</b></p> + +<p>A novel with a most intricate and carefully unraveled plot. A naturally +probable and excellently developed story and the reader will follow the +fortunes of each character with unabating interest * * * the interest is +keen at the close of the first chapter and increases to the end.</p> + +<p><b>AT THE TIME APPOINTED. With a frontispiece in colors by J. H. Marchand.</b></p> + +<p>The fortunes of a young mining engineer who through an accident loses +his memory and identity. In his new character and under his new name, +the hero lives a new life of struggle and adventure. The volume will be +found highly entertaining by those who appreciate a thoroughly good story.</p> + +<h3>GROSSET & DUNLAP, Publishers,——New York</h3> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Coast of Chance, by +Esther Chamberlain and Lucia Chamberlain + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE COAST OF CHANCE *** + +***** This file should be named 20445-h.htm or 20445-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/0/4/4/20445/ + +Produced by Alicia Williams, Martin Pettit and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +http://gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at +http://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at http://pglaf.org + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit http://pglaf.org + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. +To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + http://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + + +</pre> + +</body> +</html> diff --git a/20445-h/images/image_on_000.jpg b/20445-h/images/image_on_000.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..2166eb8 --- /dev/null +++ b/20445-h/images/image_on_000.jpg diff --git a/20445-h/images/image_on_012.jpg b/20445-h/images/image_on_012.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..aa4a9e8 --- /dev/null +++ b/20445-h/images/image_on_012.jpg diff --git a/20445-h/images/image_on_086.jpg b/20445-h/images/image_on_086.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..a8863ad --- /dev/null +++ b/20445-h/images/image_on_086.jpg diff --git a/20445-h/images/image_on_272.jpg b/20445-h/images/image_on_272.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..7d86a32 --- /dev/null +++ b/20445-h/images/image_on_272.jpg diff --git a/20445-h/images/image_on_cover.jpg b/20445-h/images/image_on_cover.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..e04ff95 --- /dev/null +++ b/20445-h/images/image_on_cover.jpg |
