Abraham Kelly was as shrewd and polished as he was hard: a lawyer such
as only New England can produce. He liked the Chinese Minister, and his
Chinese Excellency liked and trusted Kelly.
Miss Hamilton never had met him, but she knew of him—every one did, for
he was a national asset—and she knew him by sight; for the stern and
upright old man was an inveterate theater-goer, and rarely missed a
first night, sitting through tragedy and comedy with equal grimness, and
insisting, at the fall of every curtain, that there never had been and
never would be but one playhouse of merit: the Boston Museum—never an
artist to compare with Annie Clarke and Baron and Warren and Mrs.
Vincent, and never a play to equal “The Angel of Midnight.”
Emmeline was puzzled when his card was brought to her, but after a
moment she said, “Yes—I’ll see him.”
Perhaps Uncle Silas had died and had left her most of his money—most
sensible of him, if he had, for she’d make better use of it than ever
Reg would. Perhaps Uncle Silas had, and Mr. Kelly had come to tell her
of her legacy. She’d wear deep mourning for her uncle, of course, if
he’d left her a lot—half or more. She loved white, and white was
Chinese mourning she knew. For, if Miss Hamilton knew less than nothing
of China, it was not because she had not read feverishly a large number
of books telling of that country and its people.
But surely her father or mother would have telegraphed, if old Uncle
Silas was dead. No—she was afraid it couldn’t be that. Well, she’d said
he could come up—and she might as well see him, no matter what it was.
She went to the window and arranged herself there in an Oriental
languorous attitude.
She thought that the light from the window and the background of purple,
dragon-embroidered curtains, with a candle-lantern of jangling glass
beads hanging between them, suited her well.
And Emmeline was looking her best today. Excitement was tinging her thin
face with almost a girlish and pretty rose, and her pale eyes were
sparkling. She was hoping so much from the paragraph in the paper of
which several copies—blue penciled—lay about the room conspicuously.
The paragraph was in just as she’d wished. And out of one copy of the
paper she’d cut it, and she was wearing it now in the jade locket over
her heart! She was hoping everything from Sên King-lo’s chivalry! The
Chinese were so chivalrous—all the best authorities said so, and a man
who had spent a week in Shanghai had told her once that it was perfectly
true, and even a Presbyterian missionary friend of her father’s to whom
she had repeated it had made no reply.
At the sound of hoofs she turned her face to the window, to see, who was
riding by; she didn’t ride herself, she thought it too mannish, and she
didn’t enjoy it—but she always liked to watch men who rode. And though
she never yet had seen him pass her window, there was always a chance
that it might be. . . .
It was. And a bitter look rushed into her eyes. For Sên King-lo was
speaking to Ivy Gilbert, and Ivy was laughing back at him—neither
paying any undue attention to the horses they rode.
Emmeline watched them out of sight—neither looked up at her window—and
she turned back with a paler face as Kelly came into the room. He bowed,
and then he coughed. The clouds of smoke from the many clustering
joss-sticks had smote him, throat and nose.
Emmeline motioned to him languorously. “Pray be seated, Mr. Kelly.”
The lawyer threw a searching glance across the remarkable room and bowed
his thanks. The inlaid stool did not attract him, and there was nothing
else to sit on—if it was intended for seating purposes. That the
cushions on the floor were so intended did not cross his mind—a shrewd
and versatile mind, but adamantly New-Englandish.
“I shall detain you but a moment, Madam,” he said, still standing. “My
client, Mr. Sên King-lo——”
“Oh, but you must sit down.” Emmeline rushed at him, and caught his arm
in almost caressing fingers.
Abraham Kelly bowed and backed and extracted his broadcloth dexterously.
“Mr. Sên King-lo has seen with great distress and grave indignation the
paragraph which you, I observe, also have seen.” He pointed a lean
fore-finger at the blue-marked sheet on the nearest cocktail table. “He
has instructed me to express to you his deepest concern that you, a lady
whom he scarcely knows, should have been libeled so scurrilously in the
intolerable journalistic falsehood.” Emmeline sighed sentimentally. “The
base and unfounded insinuation will be withdrawn, contradicted and
apologized for in tomorrow’s issue. I already have seen the editor and
the proprietor and myself dictated the contradiction and the apology.
But my client wishes me to express to you his indignation and regret. If
we can find the original culprit, I am instructed to push the case to
the severest limit our laws provide, unless—_unless_ you, Madam, would
prefer, for obvious reasons, that the matter be dropped and we all rest
satisfied with the withdrawal and apology. It is for you to decide.”
“I should like to see Mr. Sên himself about it first,” Emmeline said
sentimentally.
“That I fear will be impossible now,” the lawyer replied regretfully.
“Having put the matter in my hands, my client cannot speak on the matter
except through me. We lawyers are sticklers, you know, and the Chinese
are punctilious—and none more so than Mr. Sên King-lo.”
“Nonsense!” Emmeline snapped. “I insist upon seeing Mr. Sên about it.”
“Impossible,” the lawyer told her tersely.
“I shall write to him,” Miss Hamilton insisted sulkily. “Mr. Sên himself
and I will decide what we are going to do about it. I had a right to be
consulted _before_ you went to the paper—not after. It’s as much my
affair as Mr. Sên’s. And I don’t propose to be left out of it. I shall
telephone the newspaper at once.”
Kelly bowed.
“And I shall write to King-lo,” she repeated hysterically.
“And he will hand your note to me to answer,” the lawyer told her
smoothly.
“Show a woman’s letter—her personal letter—to _you_! He couldn’t!”
“Pardon me; he would have to. And I have seen many women’s personal
letters.” He smiled a little.
“I shall mark it ‘Private,’ ” the girl almost hissed.
The lawyer bowed. But hard as he was—all buckram and broadcloth and
relentless procedure—he was sorry for the unstrung pallid creature
facing him. He had diagnosed her as Dr. Ray had—as quickly and
convincedly. Lawyers see as much, perhaps, of that complex as physicians
do—even in New England.
“You will let me know—when you have considered it—your decision as to
whether we are to ferret out, as we undoubtedly can, the originator of
the false and abominable falsehood, or to let that part of it drop. Our
only wish is to spare you further annoyance.”
“I’ll let Mr. Sên know,” Miss Hamilton answered haughtily. “You are not
my lawyer. I’ll choose my own lawyer, if I want one.”
Kelly bowed.
“I insist—” she began hotly; but Abraham Kelly had bowed himself out.
Emmeline stood for several moments where he’d left her, limp with rage,
her thin breast heaving painfully, her clenched hands raised above her
head.
As his footsteps died away, she threw herself face downwards on her
cushions, and broke into hard, tearless sobs, her nervous fingers
picking convulsively at the pillows’ silks and tinsels.
Sên King-lo’s chivalry had failed her. And he was riding with Ivy
Gilbert!
But she scorned her defeat. She was not through yet, and she’d throw her
dice again.