Archie learned from Baring, who brought up his breakfast, that the
Governor had left the house.
"It was our orders to take good care of you, sir; if there's any way we
can serve you--"
"A morning paper; that will be all, thank you. I shall be going out
presently."
"Very good, sir. The master thought it likely you would spend the day
out. He will hardly be in himself before six."
Here again was an opportunity to abandon the Governor, but keen now for
new experiences and sensations, Archie dismissed the idea. The appeal of
the Governor's sister had imposed a new burden upon him, and the
Governor's voluble prattle about fate and the inevitable drawing of
destiny had impressed him. He could depart for Banff and take the chance
of never being molested for any of his crimes, but to do this would be
cowardice, just that fear of his fate that Isabel had twitted him
about.
He chose a stick with care from a rack at the front door, walked to the
Avenue and turned determinedly cityward, walking jauntily. Beyond
Forty-second Street he passed several acquaintances, who nodded, just as
the Governor had predicted, little dreaming that he was a reckless
criminal, a man with an _alias_ and a fortnight's record that would make
a lively story for the newspapers.
He was rather disappointed that no one followed him, no hand was clapped
on his shoulder. He reached Madison Square unwearied, wondering whether
the obliteration of his moral sense had destroyed also his old fears
about his health. He climbed to the front seat of a bus and rode up the
Avenue, a conspicuous figure.
He grinned as he saw seated in the upper window of the most conservative
of all his clubs one of his several prosperous uncles, an old gentleman
who for years was to be found in that same spot at this same hour of the
day.
Having sufficiently exposed himself to the eyes of the world he
determined to eat luncheon in the park restaurant. His appetite demanded
an amount of food that he would have been incapable of consuming a month
earlier, and having given his order he surveyed the pavilion tranquilly.
Women and children were the chief patrons, with a sprinkling of
sightseers resting from their contemplation of the city's wonders.
He watched idly a young woman with two children who occupied a table
directly in his line of vision. He was sure she was their mother, and
not a governess; she was smartly dressed, and her manner with the
youngsters was charming. She occasionally glanced about nervously, and
he detected several times a troubled look in her face. The children
chattered gaily, but it was evidently with an effort that she answered
their questions or entered into their talk. Children always interested
him, and the boy was a handsome little fellow, but it was the girl who
held Archie's attention, first as the embodiment of the beauty and
innocence of youth, and then with a perplexed sense that he had seen her
before. She suddenly turned toward him, her fair curls tumbling about
her shoulders, and glanced idly across the pavilion. The fine oval face,
the eyes dancing with merriment at something her brother had directed
her attention to, sent his thoughts flying to Bailey Harbor. As though
consciously aiding his memory, she fell into the relaxed pose so happily
caught by the photograph, with the same childish archness and
captivating smile.
Their luncheon had just been served and he continued to inspect them
with a deepening conviction that the woman was Mrs. Congdon and these
the children mentioned in the telegram he had found tucked under the
plate of the Bailey Harbor house. The resemblance between the young
woman and the child with the roguish smile was unmistakable. She might
on occasion present the same smiling countenance, though in unguarded
moments a tense, worried look came into her face, and she continued her
anxious survey of her neighbors.
It was a dispiriting thought that there under his eyes, so close that
the babble of the children occasionally reached him across the
intervening tables, was the family of the man he had shot.
Their ignorance of that dark transaction gave him little comfort, nor
was there any extenuation of his sin in the fact that the wife had fled
to escape from her husband's brutality. He tried to console himself with
the reflection that the thing had a ludicrous side. He might walk over
to Mrs. Congdon and say: "Pardon me, madam, but it may interest you to
know that I shot your husband at Bailey Harbor and you have nothing
further to fear from him. I am unable to state at the moment whether the
wound was a mortal one, but from my knowledge of your family affairs I
judge that you would hardly be grieved if you never saw him again."
He was shocked at his own levity. The thing was not in any aspect a
laughing matter. Amid other experiences he had freed himself for a few
days of the thought of Putney Congdon lying dead in a lonely cleft of
the Maine rocks, but meeting the man's family in this fashion was almost
as disconcerting as a visit from Congdon's ghost.
The Congdons had eaten their meal hurriedly and were already paying
their check. He watched them move away toward the interior of the park,
marked their direction and chose a parallel course with a view to
keeping them in sight.
Occasionally he caught glimpses of the children dancing ahead of their
mother. The remote paths she chose for the ramble confirmed his
suspicion that she was on guard against the threatened seizure of the
youngsters by their father, and having been driven from Bailey Harbor
was now in town to formulate her plans for the future, or perhaps only
whiling away the hours until she could escape to some other place in the
country. Unable to argue himself out of a feeling that Mrs. Congdon's
troubles were no affair of his he was beset by the fear that he might be
doomed for the rest of his life to follow them, to view them from afar
off, never speaking to them, but led on by the guilty knowledge that he
was a dark factor in their lives.
He became so engrossed that he lost track of them for a time; then a
turn of the path brought him close upon them. Mrs. Congdon was sitting
on a bench under a big elm and the children were joyously romping on the
lawn in front of her, playing with a toy balloon to which a bit of bark
had been fastened. They would toss it in the air and jump and catch it
while the weight prevented its escape. A gust of wind caught it as
Archie passed and drove it across his path, while the children with
screams of glee pursued it. The string caught under his hat brim and he
seized it just as the girl, outdistancing her brother, plunged into him.
"Edith!" called the mother, rising quickly. "Children, you mustn't go
into the path. There's plenty of room here for you to play."
"The wind was a little too much for you that time!" laughed Archie, as
the children, panting from their run, waited for the restoration of
their plaything. He measured the buoyancy of the balloon against the
ballast, and let go of it with a little toss that seemed to free it,
then he sprang up and caught it amid their excited cries.
The little girl curtsied as he put the string in her hand.
"Thank you very much!" they chorused.
Mrs. Congdon had walked a little way toward the path but now that the
children were again scampering over the lawn she paused and made a
slight, the slightest, inclination of the head as Archie lifted his hat
and continued on his way.
Edith was the name used in the telegram he had found in the Bailey
Harbor house, and this coupled with his closer view of the child
disposed of Archie's last hope that after all it might not be Mrs.
Congdon and her children he had stumbled upon. She had no business to
throw herself across his path, he fumed. The appearance of Putney
Congdon's father at Cornford had shaken him sufficiently, but that he
should be haunted by the man's wife and children angered him. He wanted
to fly from the park and hide himself again in his room at the
Governor's house, but he was without will to leave. The decent thing for
him to do was to take the first train for Bailey, and begin diligent
search for Putney Congdon, dead or alive. He had no right to assume that
the man's serious injury or death would be any consolation to the wife
and children. And the quarrel between husband and wife might have been
only a tiff, something that would have been adjusted without further
bitterness but for his interference. There was no joy in the fate that
kept continually bringing his crime to his attention. Thoroughly
miserable, he threw himself upon a bench and lapsed into gloomy
meditations. The light-hearted laughter of the children--Putney
Congdon's children--was borne to him fitfully to add to his
discomfiture, but he was held to the spot. There was something weirdly
fascinating in their propinquity, and in the thought that he alone of
all men on earth could ever tell them just what had happened in their
house when their father went there to search for them.
He sat half an hour pensively, noting an occasional pedestrian or the
flash of a motor that rolled through the unfrequented driveway. But for
the hum of the cars the deep calm of a June afternoon lay upon the
landscape.
Then a piercing scream, the shrill cry of a child in terror, brought him
to his feet.
"Help! Help! Oh, Edith! _Edith!_"
The cries sent him at a run toward the place in which he had left the
Congdons.
Rounding a curve in the path he saw a man rushing down the road with
Edith in his arms. The mother was racing after him, while the little boy
lay wailing where he had fallen in his frantic effort to follow. In the
distance stood a car, with a woman waiting beside the open door.
Archie redoubled his pace, passed Mrs. Congdon and gained the car as the
man with the child in his arms jumped into it. The woman, who had
evidently been acting as watcher, stumbled as she attempted to spring in
after them and delayed flight for an instant. The door slammed viciously
on Archie's arm as he landed on the running board. The car was moving
rapidly and a man's voice bade the driver hurry. Within the child's
screams were suddenly stifled, the door swung open for an instant and a
blow, delivered full in the face, sent Archie reeling into the road.
When he gained his feet Mrs. Congdon stood beside him moaning and
wringing her hands. A mounted policeman rode upon the scene, listened
for an instant to Archie's explanations and, sounding his whistle, set
off after the car at a gallop. A dozen of the park police were on the
spot immediately, followed by a crowd of excited spectators. Mrs.
Congdon had fainted and several women were ministering to her. The
little boy, sobbing plaintively, tried to answer the questions of the
sergeant who took charge and despatched men in every direction to search
for the kidnapers and send the alarm through the city.
Archie's nose bled from the rap in the face and his back ached where he
had struck the earth. The sergeant plied him with questions which he
answered carefully, knowing that in all the circumstances of his having
loitered in the vicinity he might not unnaturally be suspected of
complicity. When his name was asked, he answered promptly.
"John B. Wright, Boston; stopping at the Hotel Ganymede."
"Business?"
"Broker, Nanonet Building, Boston."
These items officially written down, he described truthfully how he had
first seen the woman and her children in the pavilion, the subsequent
walk, and the episode of the balloon. He pointed out just where he had
been sitting when the screams attracted his attention.
"This is a serious case and you will be wanted as a witness," said the
officer. "You didn't know these people--never saw them before?"
"No. I had come to the park to kill time until four o'clock, when I have
an engagement at the Plaza Hotel."
The officer noted carefully his description of the woman who had
assisted in the kidnaping and such meager facts as he was able to give
as to the man who had carried off the little girl under the very eyes
of her mother.
The sergeant glanced at Archie's ruddy handkerchief and grinned.
"Guess that let's you out! You didn't get the number of the taxi? That
would help a little."
"There wasn't time for that. I was trying to hang on till help came, but
this smash in the face spoiled that."
To the jostling crowd anxious to hear his story Archie was a hero, or
very nearly one. He heard their murmurs of admiration as he described
the manner in which he had attempted to board the car. There were
enormous hazards in the whole situation and every consideration of
personal security demanded that he leave the park at once, but Mrs.
Congdon was now recovering, and he was reluctant to abandon her and the
frightened boy to the mercies of the park police and staring spectators.
She had recovered sufficiently to tell her story, and to Archie's relief
corroborated his own version in a manner to dispose of any question as
to his innocence.
The woman's composure struck Archie as remarkable and her replies to the
officer's questions were brief and exact. Several times she appealed to
him for confirmation on some point, and he edged closer and stood beside
her defensively. Her inquisitor had neglected to ask her name and
address in his eagerness for information as to the appearance of the
kidnapers. Her reply gave Archie a distinct shock.
"Mrs. George W. Kendall, 117 E. Corning Street, Brooklyn."
"Have you been threatened in any way? Have you any enemy who might have
attempted to steal the child?"
"Nothing of the kind. I brought the children to the park just for an
outing and with no thought that anything so horrible could happen."
It was incredible that any one could lie with so convincing an air. He
was satisfied that she was Mrs. Putney Congdon, and that the child she
had called Edith was the original of the photograph he had seen at
Bailey Harbor. And the stealing of the child was in itself but the
actual carrying out of her husband's threat. He knew far too much about
the Congdons for his own peace of mind, but he was unwilling to desert
her in her perplexities. When the owners of several machines offered to
take her home, she glanced about uncertainly and her eyes falling upon
him seemed to invite his assistance.
"Pardon me, but if I can serve you in any way--"
"Thank you," she said with relief. "I must get away from this; it's
unbearable."
He put her and the boy into a taxi, whose driver had been early on the
scene, and drove away with them, with a final promise to the sergeant to
report later at the park station.
"Brooklyn!" he ordered.
For a few minutes she was busy comforting the child and Archie deep in
thought turned to meet the searching gaze of her gray eyes.
"You are a gentleman; I am sure of that; and I feel that I can trust
you."
That the wife of a man he had tried to kill and possibly had slain
should be paving the way for confidences, gave him a bewildered sense of
being whisked through some undiscovered country where the impossible
had become the real.
"I'm in a strange predicament, and I'm forced to ask your help. The name
and address I gave the police were fictitious. I know it has a queer
look; but I had to do it. I know perfectly well who carried away my
little girl. The man and woman you saw at the car were servants employed
by my father-in-law, who cordially dislikes me. There had been
trouble--"
With a shrug she expressed her impatience of her troubles, and bent over
the boy who was demanding to be taken to Edith.
"You'll see Edith soon, dear, so don't trouble any more," she said
kindly.
Having quieted the child, she returned to her own affairs, glancing out
to note the direction of the car. She had done some quick thinking in
making her decision to hide her identity from the police. There was
fight in her eyes and Archie realized that he had to do with a woman of
spirit. He waited eagerly for a hint as to her plans.
"Of course I'm not going to Brooklyn," she said, as the taxi swung into
Fifth Avenue. "Please tell the man to drive to the Altmore, ladies'
entrance. I'll walk through to the main door and take another taxi. I
mean to lose myself," she went on, after Archie had given the
instructions. "I have every intention of keeping away from policemen and
reporters, but there's no reason why you should bother any further. I'm
only sorry your name had to be brought into it. The moment they find
I've deceived them they'll be after you for further information, and I
regret that exceedingly. I wish to avoid publicity and keep my domestic
affairs out of the newspapers; but this of course will only center
attention the more on you. If there's anything I could do--"
"You needn't bother about that at all," replied Archie with a reassuring
smile. "The name and address I gave were both false."
"You mean that really!"
"I mean that; just that! My reasons are of importance to no one but
myself, and have nothing to do with the loss of your child, I assure
you. I give you my word that neither the police nor the reporters will
ever find me. I know nothing about you and of course it is quite
unnecessary for me to know."
"Thank you; you are very kind," she murmured.
It struck him as highly amusing that he should be conspiring with the
wife of a gentleman he had shot. In every aspect it was ridiculous and
not since boyhood had he felt so much like giggling. And Mrs. Congdon
was wonderful; it was a delight to be the repository of the confidences
of so handsome a young matron and one who met so difficult a situation
so courageously. They were both liars; both were practising a deceit
that could hardly fail to bring them under sharp scrutiny if they should
be caught.
Women were far from being the simple creatures he had believed them to
be. The heart of woman was a labyrinth of mystery. Mrs. Congdon,
altogether lovely and bearing all the marks of breeding, had lied quite
as convincingly as Sally Walker. The ways of Isabel were beyond all
human understanding; and yet her contradictions only added to her charm.
Isabel's agitation over the affairs of the Congdons led him close to the
point of mentioning her name to note its effect upon Mrs. Congdon, but
to do this might be an act of betrayal that would only confirm Isabel's
opinion of him as a stupid, meddlesome person. Nothing was to be gained
by attempting to hasten the culmination of the fate that flung him about
like a chip on a turbulent stream. Fiends and angels might be battling
for his soul, and Lucifer might take him in the end, but meanwhile he
was having a jolly good time.
He looked at her covertly and they laughed with the mirth of children
planning mischief in secret.
"The little girl," he ventured; "you are not apprehensive about her?"
"Not in the slightest. My father-in-law is most disagreeably eccentric,
but he is very fond of my children. It was quite like him to attempt to
carry off the little girl, always a particular pet of his. I was
shocked, of course, when it happened. I thought I should be safe in the
park for a few hours until I could catch a train. I meant to put the
children quite out of my husband's way. I didn't know he was in town; in
fact, I don't know now that he is or anything about him. But he's
undoubtedly in communication with his father. It's rather a complicated
business, you see."
It was much more complex than she knew, and not, all things considered,
a laughing matter. He spent an uncomfortable moment pondering a
situation which he viewed with the mingled joy and awe of a child
watching the fire in a fuse approach a fire-cracker.
"I shall be glad to assist you if I can aid you in any way. You will try
to recover the child--?" he suggested.
"It's generous of you to offer, but I think you had better keep out of
it. Of course I shall have Edith back; you may be sure of that."
"You have some idea of where they are taking her--?"
"No, I really haven't. But she will be safe, though I hate to think of
her being subjected to so hideous an experience. It's rather odd, as I
think of it, that my husband didn't personally try to take the child
from me."
This, uttered musingly, gave Archie a perturbed moment. But the car had
reached the Altmore. He lifted out the boy and accompanied them to the
door.
"Thank you, very much," she said in a tone that dismissed him.
Archie drove to another hostelry for a superficial cleaning up,
explaining to the brush boy who scraped the oily mud from his trousers
that he had been in an automobile accident. He rode downtown in the
subway, strolled past the skyscraper in which his office was situated
and returned to the Governor's house feeling on the whole well pleased
with himself.