THE ENEMY
"I've sighted the Enemy," exclaimed Bobby Browne, coming up from
Neptune's Pool--the largest of the fountains. His wife and Lady
Deppingham were sitting in the cool retreat under the hanging garden.
"Would you care to have a peek at him?"
"I should think so," said his wife, jumping to her feet. "He's been on
the island three days, and we haven't had a glimpse of him. Come along,
Lady Deppingham."
Lady Deppingham arose reluctantly, stifling a yawn.
"I'm so frightfully lazy, my dear," she sighed. "But," with a slight
acceleration of speech, "anything in the shape of diversion is worth the
effort, I'm sure. Where is he?"
They had come to call the new American lawyer "The Enemy." No one knew
his name, or cared to know it, for that matter. Bowles, in answer to the
telephone inquiries of Saunders, said that the new solicitor had taken
temporary quarters above the bank and was in hourly consultation with
Von Blitz, Rasula and others. Much of his time was spent at the mines.
Later on, it was commonly reported, he was to take up his residence in
Wyckholme's deserted bungalow, far up on the mountain side, in plain
view from the château.
Life at the château had not been allowed to drag. The Deppinghams and
the Brownes confessed in the privacy of their chambers that there was
scant diplomacy in their "carryings-on," but without these indulgences
the days and nights would have been intolerable.
The white servants had become good friends, despite the natural disdain
that the trained English expert feels for the unpolished American
domestic. Antipathies were overlooked in the eager strife for
companionship; the fact that one of Mrs. Browne's maids was of Irish
extraction and the other a rosy Swede may have had something to do with
their admission into the exclusive set below stairs, but that is outside
the question. If the Suffolk maids felt any hesitancy about accepting
the hybrid combination as their equals, it was never manifested by word
or deed. Even the astute Antoine, who had lived long in the boulevards
of Paris, and who therefore knew an American when he saw one at any
distance or at any price, evinced no uncertainty in proclaiming them
Americans.
Miss Pelham, the stenographer from West Twenty-third Street, might have
been included in the circle from the first had not her dignity stood in
the way. For six days she held resolutely aloof from everything except
her notebook and her machine, but her stock of novels beginning to run
low, and the prospect of being bored to extinction for six months to
come looming up before her, she concluded to wave the olive branch in
the face of social ostracism, assuming a genial attitude of
condescension, which was graciously overlooked by the others. As she
afterward said, there is no telling how low she might have sunk, had it
not entered her head one day to set her cap for the unsuspecting Mr.
Saunders. She had learned, in the wisdom of her sex, that he was fancy
free. Mr. Saunders, fully warned against the American typewriter girl as
a class, having read the most shocking jokes at her expense in the comic
papers, was rather shy at the outset, but Britt gallantly came to Miss
Pelham's defence and ultimate rescue by emphatically assuring Saunders
that she was a perfect lady, guaranteed to cause uneasiness to no man's
wife.
"But I have no wife," quickly protested Saunders, turning a dull red.
"The devil!" exclaimed Britt, apparently much upset by the revelation.
But of this more anon.
* * * * *
Browne conducted the two young women across the drawbridge and to the
sunlit edge of the terrace, where two servants awaited them with
parasols.
"Isn't it extraordinary, the trouble one is willing to take for the
merest glimpse of a man?" sighed Lady Agnes. "At home we try to avoid
them."
"Indeed?" said pretty Mrs. Browne, with a slight touch of irony. It was
the first sign of the gentle warfare which their wits were to wage.
"There he is! See him?" almost whispered Browne, as if the solitary,
motionless figure at the foot of the avenue was likely to hear his voice
and be frightened away.
The Enemy was sitting serenely on one of the broad iron benches just
inside the gates to the park, his arms stretched out along the back, his
legs extended and crossed. The great stone wall behind him afforded
shelter from the broiling sun; satinwood trees lent an appearance of
coolness that did not exist, if one were to judge by the absence of hat
and the fact that his soft shirt was open at the throat. He was not more
than two hundred yards away from the clump of trees which screened his
watchers from view. If he caught an occasional glimpse of dainty blue
and white fabrics, he made no demonstration of interest or
acknowledgment. It was quite apparent that he was lazily surveying the
château, puffing with consistent ease at the cigarette which drooped
from his lips. His long figure was attired in light grey flannels; one
could not see the stripe at that distance, yet one could not help
feeling that it existed--a slim black stripe, if any one should have
asked.
"Quite at home," murmured her ladyship, which was enough to show that
she excused the intruder on the ground that he was an American.
"Mr. Britt was right," said Mrs. Browne irrelevantly. She was peering at
the stranger through the binoculars. "He is _very_ good-looking."
"And you from Boston, too," scoffed Lady Deppingham. Mrs. Browne
flushed, and smiled deprecatingly.
"Wonder what he's doing here in the grounds?" puzzled Browne.
"It's plain to me that he is resting his audacious bones," said her
ladyship, glancing brightly at her co-legatee. The latter's wife, in a
sudden huff, deliberately left them, crossing the macadam driveway in
plain view of the stranger.
"She's not above an affair with him," was her hot, inward lament. She
was mightily relieved, however, when the others tranquilly followed her
across the road, and took up a new position under the substitute clump
of trees.
The Enemy gave no sign of interest in these proceedings. If he was
conscious of being watched by these curious exiles, he was not in the
least annoyed. He did not change his position of indolence, nor did he
puff any more fretfully at his cigarette. Instead, his eyes were bent
lazily upon the white avenue, his thoughts apparently far away from the
view ahead. He came out of his lassitude long enough to roll and light a
fresh cigarette and to don his wide madras helmet.
Suddenly he looked to the right and then arose with some show of
alacrity. Three men were approaching by the path which led down from the
far-away stables. Browne recognised the dark-skinned men as servants in
the château--the major-domo, the chef, and the master of the stables.
"Lord Deppingham must have sent them down to pitch him over the wall,"
he said, with an excited grin.
"Impossible! My husband is hunting for sapphires in the ravine back
of--" She did not complete the sentence.
The Enemy was greeting the statuesque natives with a friendliness that
upset all calculations. It was evident that the meeting was prearranged.
There was no attempt at secrecy; the conference, whatever its portent,
had the merit of being quite above-board. In the end, the tall
solicitor, lifting his helmet with a gesture so significant that it left
no room for speculation, turned and sauntered through the broad gateway
and out into the forest road. The three servants returned as they had
come, by way of the bridle path along the wall.
"The nerve of him!" exclaimed Browne. "That graceful attention was meant
for us."
"He is like the polite robber who first beats you to death and then says
thank you for the purse," said Lady Deppingham. "What a strange
proceeding, Mr. Browne. Can you imagine what it means?"
"Mischief of some sort, I'll be bound. I admire his nerve in holding the
confab under our very noses. I'll have Britt interview those fellows at
once. Our kitchen, our stable and our domestic discipline are
threatened."
They hastened to the château, and regaled the resourceful Britt with the
disquieting news.
"I'll have it out of 'em in a minute," he said confidently. "Where's
Saunders? Where's Miss Pelham? Confound the girl, she's never around
when I want her these days. Hay, you!" to a servant. "Send Miss Pelham
to me. The one in pink, understand? Golden-haired one. Yes, yes, that's
right: the one who jiggles her fingers. Tell her to hurry."
But Miss Pelham was off in the wood, self-charged with the arousing of
Mr. Saunders; an hour passed before she could be found and brought into
the light of Mr. Britt's reflections. If her pert nose was capable of
elevating itself in silent disdain, Mr. Saunders was not able to emulate
its example. He was not so dazzled by the sunshine of her sprightly
recitals but that he could look sheep-faced in the afterglow of Britt's
scorn.
Britt, with all his clever blustering, could elicit no information from
the crafty head-servants. All they would say was that the strange sahib
had intercepted them on their way to the town, to ask if there were any
rooms to rent in the château.
"That's what he told you to say, isn't it?" demanded Britt angrily.
"Confounded his impudence! Rooms to rent!"
That evening he dragged the reluctant Saunders into the privacy of the
hanging garden, and deliberately interrupted the game of bridge which
was going on. If Deppingham had any intention to resent the intrusion of
the solicitors, he was forestalled by the startling announcement of Mr.
Britt, who seldom stood on ceremony where duty was concerned.
"Ladies and gentlemen," said Mr. Britt, calmly dropping into a chair
near by, "this place is full of spies."
"Spies!" cried four voices in unison. Mr. Saunders nodded a plaintive
apology.
"Yes, sir, every native servant here is a spy. That's what the Enemy was
here for to-day. I've analysed the situation and I'm right. Ain't I, Mr.
Saunders? Of course, I am. He came here to tell 'em what to do and how
to report our affairs to him. See? Well, there you are. We've simply got
to be careful what we do and say in their presence. Leave 'em to me.
Just be careful, that's all."
"I don't intend to be watched by a band of sneaks--" began Lord
Deppingham loftily.
"You can't help yourself," interrupted Britt.
"I'll discharge every demmed one of them, that's--"
"Leave 'em to me--leave 'em to me," exclaimed Britt impatiently. His
lordship stiffened but could find no words for instant use. "Now let me
tell you something. This lawyer of theirs is a smooth party. He's here
to look out for their interests and they know it. It's not to their
interest to assassinate you or to do any open dirty work. He is too
clever for that. I've found out from Mr. Bowles just what the fellow has
done since he landed, three days ago. He has gone over all of the
company's accounts, in the office and at the mines, to see that we, as
agents for the executors, haven't put up any job to mulct the natives
out of their share of the profits. He has organised the whole population
into a sort of constabulary to protect itself against any shrewd move we
may contemplate. Moreover, he's getting the evidence of everybody to
prove that Skaggs and Wyckholme were men of sound mind up to the hour of
their death. He has the depositions of agents and dealers in Bombay,
Aden, Suez and three or four European cities, all along that line. He
goes over the day's business at the bank as often as we do as agents for
the executors. He knows just how many rubies and sapphires were washed
out yesterday, and how much they weigh. It's our business, as your
agents, to scrape up everything as far back as we can go to prove that
the old chaps were mentally off their base when they drew up that
agreement and will. I think we've got a shade the best of it, even
though the will looks good. The impulse that prompted it was a crazy one
in the first place." He hesitated a moment and then went on carefully.
"Of course, if we can prove that insanity has always run through the two
families it--"
"Good Lord!" gasped Browne nervously.
"--it would be a great help. If we can show that you and Mrs.--er--Lady
Deppingham have queer spells occasionally, it--"
"Not for all the islands in the world," cried Lady Deppingham. "The
idea! Queer spells! See here, Mr. Britt, if I have any queer spells to
speak of, I won't have them treated publicly. If Lord Deppingham can
afford to overlook them, I daresay I can, also, even though it costs me
the inheritance to do so. Please be good enough to leave me out of the
insanity dodge, as you Americans call it."
"Madam, God alone provides that part of your inheritance--" began Britt
insistently, fearing that he was losing fair ground.
"Then leave it for God to discover. I'll not be a party to it. It's
utter nonsense," she cried scathingly.
"Rubbish!" asserted Mr. Saunders boldly.
"What?" exclaimed Britt, turning upon Saunders so abruptly that the
little man jumped, and immediately began to readjust his necktie.
"What's that? Look here; it's our only hope--the insanity dodge, I mean.
They've got to show in an English court that Skaggs and--"
"Let them show what they please about Skaggs," interrupted Bobby Browne,
"but, confound you, I can't have any one saying that I'm subject to fits
or spells or whatever you choose to call 'em. I don't have 'em, but even
if I did, I'd have 'em privately, not for the benefit of the public."
"Is it necessary to make my husband insane in order to establish the
fact that his grandfather was not of sound mind?" queried pretty Mrs.
Browne, with her calmest Boston inflection.
"It depends on your husband," said Britt coolly. "If he sticks at
anything which may help us to break that will, he's certainly insane.
That's all I've got to say about it."
"Well, I'm hanged if I'll pose as an insane man," roared Browne.
"Mr. Saunders hasn't asked _me_ to be insane, have you, Mr. Saunders?"
asked Lady Agnes in her sweetest, scorn.
"I don't apprehend--" began Saunders nervously.
"Saunders," said Britt, calculatingly and evenly, "next thing we'll have
to begin hunting for insanity in your family. We haven't heard anything
from you on this little point, Lord Deppingham."
"I don't know anything about Mr. Saunders's family," said Deppingham
stiffly. Britt looked at him for a moment, puzzled and uncertain. Then
he gave a short, hopeless laugh and said, under his breath:
"Holy smoke!"
He immediately altered the course of the discussion and harked back to
his original declaration that spies abounded in the château. When he
finally called the conference adjourned and prepared to depart, he
calmly turned to the stenographer.
"Did you get all this down, Miss Pelham?"
"Yes, Mr. Britt."
"Good!" Then he went away, leaving the quartette unconsciously depressed
by the emphasis he placed upon that single word.
The next day but one, it was announced that the Enemy had moved into the
bungalow. Signs of activity about the rambling place could be made out
from the hanging garden at the château. It was necessary, however, to
employ the binoculars in the rather close watch that was kept by the
interested aristocrats below. From time to time the grey, blue or
white-clad figure of the Enemy could be seen directing the operations of
the natives who were engaged in rehabilitating Wyckholme's "nest."
The château was now under the very eye of the Enemy.