The daylight dinner was over, and the large party was more or less
scattered about the drawing-room and the adjoining picture-gallery
in groups of three and four, mostly standing while they drank their
coffee, and continued or finished the talk begun at table.
By force of habit Margaret had stopped beside the closed piano, and
had seated herself on the old-fashioned stool to have her coffee. Lady
Maud stood beside her, leaning against the corner of the instrument,
her cup in her hand, and the two young women exchanged rather idle
observations about the lovely day that was over, and the perfect
weather. Both were preoccupied and they did not look at each other;
Margaret's eyes watched Logotheti, who was half-way down the long
room, before a portrait by Sir Peter Lely, of which he was apparently
pointing out the beauties to the elderly wife of the scientific peer.
Lady Maud was looking out at the light in the sunset sky above the
trees beyond the flower-beds and the great lawn, for the piano stood
near an open window. From time to time she turned her head quickly
and glanced towards Van Torp, who was talking with her father at some
distance; then she looked out of the window again.
It was a warm evening; in the dusk of the big rooms the hum of voices
was low and pleasant, broken only now and then by Van Torp's more
strident tone. Outside it was still light, and the starlings and
blackbirds and thrushes were finishing their supper, picking up the
unwary worms and the tardy little snails, and making a good deal of
sweet noise about it.
Margaret set down her cup on the lid of the piano, and at the slight
sound Lady Maud turned towards her, so that their eyes met. Each
noticed the other's expression.
'What is it?' asked Lady Maud, with a little smile of friendly
concern. 'Is anything wrong?'
'No--that is--' Margaret smiled too, as she hesitated--'I was going to
ask you the same question,' she added quickly.
'It's nothing more than usual,' returned her friend. 'I think it
has gone very well, don't you, these three days? He has made a good
impression on everybody--don't you think so?'
'Oh yes!' Margaret answered readily. 'Excellent! Could not be better!
I confess to being surprised, just a little--I mean,' she corrected
herself hastily, 'after all the talk there has been, it might not have
turned out so easy.'
'Don't you feel a little less prejudiced against him yourself?' asked
Lady Maud.
'Prejudiced!' Margaret repeated the word thoughtfully. 'Yes, I suppose
I'm prejudiced against him. That's the only word. Perhaps it's hateful
of me, but I cannot help it--and I wish you wouldn't make me own it to
you, for it's humiliating! I'd like him, if I could, for your sake.
But you must take the wish for the deed.'
'That's better than nothing!' Lady Maud seemed to be trying to laugh
a little, but it was with an effort and there was no ripple in her
voice. 'You have something on your mind, too,' she went on, to change
the subject. 'Is anything troubling you?'
'Only the same old question. It's not worth mentioning!'
'To marry, or not to marry?'
'Yes. I suppose I shall take the leap some day, and probably in the
dark, and then I shall be sorry for it. Most of you have!'
She looked up at Lady Maud with a rather uncertain, flickering smile,
as if she wished her mind to be made up for her, and her hands lay
weakly in her lap, the palms almost upwards.
'Oh, don't ask me!' cried her friend, answering the look rather than
the words, and speaking with something approaching to vehemence.
'Do you wish you had waited for the other one till now?' asked
Margaret softly, but she did not know that he had been killed in South
Africa; she had never seen the shabby little photograph.
'Yes--for ever!'
That was all Lady Maud said, and the two words were not uttered
dramatically either, though gravely and without the least doubt.
The butler and two men appeared, to collect the coffee cups; the
former had a small salver in his hand and came directly to Lady Maud.
He brought a telegram for her.
'You don't mind, do you?' she asked Margaret mechanically, as she
opened it.
'Of course,' answered the other in the same tone, and she looked
through the open window while her friend read the message.
It was from the Embassy in London, and it informed her in the briefest
terms that Count Leven had been killed in St. Petersburg on the
previous day, in the street, by a bomb intended for a high official.
Lady Maud made no sound, but folded the telegram into a small square
and turned her back to the room for a moment in order to slip it
unnoticed into the body of her black velvet gown. As she recovered her
former attitude she was surprised to see that the butler was still
standing two steps from her where he had stopped after he had taken
the cups from the piano and set them on the small salver on which he
had brought the message. He evidently wanted to say something to her
alone.
Lady Maud moved away from the piano, and he followed her a little
beyond the window, till she stopped and turned to hear what he had to
say.
'There are three persons asking for Mr. Van Torp, my lady,' he said
in a very low tone, and she noticed the disturbed look in his face.
'They've got a motor-car waiting in the avenue.'
'What sort of people are they?' she asked quietly; but she felt that
she was pale.
'To tell the truth, my lady,' the butler spoke in a whisper, bending
his head, 'I think they are from Scotland Yard.'
Lady Maud knew it already; she had almost guessed it when she had
glanced at his face before he spoke at all.
'Show them into the old study,' she said, 'and ask them to wait a
moment.'
The butler went away with his two coffee cups, and scarcely any one
had noticed that Lady Maud had exchanged a few words with him by the
window. She turned back to the piano, where Margaret was still sitting
on the stool with her hands in her lap, looking at Logotheti in the
distance and wondering whether she meant to marry him or not.
'No bad news, I hope?' asked the singer, looking up as her friend came
to her side.
'Not very good,' Lady Maud answered, leaning her elbow on the piano.
'Should you mind singing something to keep the party together while
I talk to some tiresome men who are in the old study? On these June
evenings people have a way of wandering out into the garden after
dinner. I should like to keep every one in the house for a quarter
of an hour, and if you will only sing for them they won't stir. Will
you?'
Margaret looked at her curiously.
'I think I understand,' Margaret said. 'The people in the study are
asking for Mr. Van Torp.'
Lady Maud nodded, not surprised that Logotheti should have told the
Primadonna something about what he had been doing.
'Then you believe he is innocent,' she said confidently. 'Even though
you don't like him, you'll help me, won't you?'
'I'll do anything you ask me. But I should think--'
'No,' Lady Maud interrupted. 'He must not be arrested at all. I know
that he would rather face the detectives than run away, even for a
few hours, till the truth is known. But I won't let him. It would
be published all over the world to-morrow morning that he had been
arrested for murder in my father's house, and it would never be
forgotten against him, though he might be proved innocent ten times
over. That's what I want to prevent. Will you help me?'
As she spoke the last words she raised the front lid of the piano,
and Margaret turned on her seat towards the instrument to open the
keyboard, nodding her assent.
'Just play a little, till I am out of the room, and then sing,' said
Lady Maud.
The great artist's fingers felt the keys as her friend turned away.
Anything theatrical was natural to her now, and she began to play very
softly, watching the moving figure in black velvet as she would have
watched a fellow singer on the stage while waiting to go on.
Lady Maud did not speak to Van Torp first, but to Griggs, and then to
Logotheti, and the two men slipped away together and disappeared. Then
she came back to Van Torp, smiling pleasantly. He was still talking
with Lord Creedmore, but the latter, at a word from his daughter, went
off to the elderly peeress whom Logotheti had abruptly left alone
before the portrait.
Margaret did not hear what Lady Maud said to the American, but it was
evidently not yet a warning, for her smile did not falter, and he
looked pleased as he came back with her, and they passed near the
piano to go out through the open window upon the broad flagged terrace
that separated the house from the flower-beds.
The Primadonna played a little louder now, so that every one heard the
chords, even in the picture-gallery, and a good many men were rather
bored at the prospect of music.
Then the Señorita da Cordova raised her head and looked over the grand
piano, and her lips parted, and boredom vanished very suddenly; for
even those who did not take much pleasure in the music were amazed by
the mere sound of her voice and by its incredible flexibility.
She meant to astonish her hearers and keep them quiet, and she knew
what to sing to gain her end, and how to sing it. Those who have not
forgotten the story of her beginnings will remember that she was a
thorough musician as well as a great singer, and was one of those
very few primadonnas who are able to accompany themselves from memory
without a false note through any great piece they know, from _Lucia_
to _Parsifal_.
She began with the waltz song in the first act of _Romeo and Juliet_.
It was the piece that had revealed her talent to Madame Bonanni, who
had accidentally overheard her singing to herself, and it suited her
purpose admirably. Such fireworks could not fail to astound, even if
they did not please, and half the full volume of her voice was more
than enough for the long drawing-room, into which the whole party
gathered almost as soon as she began to sing. Such trifles as having
just dined, or having just waked up in the morning, have little
influence on the few great natural voices of the world, which begin
with twice the power and beauty that the 'built-up' ones acquire in
years of study. Ordinary people go to a concert, to the opera, to a
circus, to university sports, and hear and see things that interest or
charm, or sometimes surprise them; but they are very much amazed if
they ever happen to find out in private life what a really great
professional of any sort can do at a pinch, if put to it by any strong
motive. If it had been necessary, Margaret could have sung to the
party in the drawing-room at Craythew for an hour at a stretch with no
more rest than her accompaniments afforded.
Her hearers were the more delighted because it was so spontaneous, and
there was not the least affectation about it. During these days no one
had even suggested that she should make music, or be anything except
the 'daughter of Lord Creedmore's old friend.' But now, apparently,
she had sat down to the piano to give them all a concert, for the
sheer pleasure of singing, and they were not only pleased with her,
but with themselves; for the public, and especially audiences, are
more easily flattered by a great artist who chooses to treat his
hearers as worthy of his best, than the artist himself is by the
applause he hears for the thousandth time.
So the Señorita da Cordova held the party at Craythew spellbound while
other things were happening very near them which would have interested
them much more than her trills, and her 'mordentini,' and her soaring
runs, and the high staccato notes that rang down from the ceiling as
if some astounding and invisible instrument were up there, supported
by an unseen force.
Meanwhile Paul Griggs and Logotheti had stopped a moment in the first
of the rooms that contained the library, on their way to the old study
beyond.
It was almost dark amongst the huge oak bookcases, and both men
stopped at the same moment by a common instinct, to agree quickly upon
some plan of action. They had led adventurous lives, and were not
likely to stick at trifles, if they believed themselves to be in
the right; but if they had left the drawing-room with the distinct
expectation of anything like a fight, they would certainly not have
stopped to waste their time in talking.
The Greek spoke first.
'Perhaps you had better let me do the talking,' he said.
'By all means,' answered Griggs. 'I am not good at that. I'll keep
quiet, unless we have to handle them.'
'All right, and if you have any trouble I'll join in and help you.
Just set your back against the door if they try to get out while I am
speaking.'
'Yes.'
That was all, and they went on in the gathering gloom, through the
three rooms of the library, to the door of the old study, from which a
short winding staircase led up to the two small rooms which Griggs was
occupying.
Three quiet men in dark clothes were standing together in the
twilight, in the bay window at the other side of the room, and they
moved and turned their heads quickly as the door opened. Logotheti
went up to them, while Griggs remained near the door, looking on.
'What can I do for you?' inquired the Greek, with much urbanity.
'We wished to speak with Mr. Van Torp, who is stopping here,' answered
the one of the three men who stood farthest forward.
'Oh yes, yes!' said Logotheti at once, as if assenting. 'Certainly!
Lady Maud Leven, Lord Creedmore's daughter--Lady Creedmore is away,
you know--has asked us to inquire just what you want of Mr. Van Torp.'
'It's a personal matter,' replied the spokesman. 'I will explain it to
him, if you will kindly ask him to come here a moment.'
Logotheti smiled pleasantly.
'Quite so,' he said. 'You are, no doubt, reporters, and wish to
interview him. As a personal friend of his, and between you and me,
I don't think he'll see you. You had better write and ask for an
appointment. Don't you think so, Griggs?'
The author's large, grave features relaxed in a smile of amusement as
he nodded his approval of the plan.
'We do not represent the press,' answered the man.
'Ah! Indeed? How very odd! But of course--' Logotheti pretended to
understand suddenly--'how stupid of me! No doubt you are from the
bank. Am I not right?'
'No. You are mistaken. We are not from Threadneedle Street.'
'Well, then, unless you will enlighten me, I really cannot imagine who
you are or where you come from!'
'We wish to speak in private with Mr. Van Torp.'
'In private, too?' Logotheti shook his head, and turned to Griggs.
'Really, this looks rather suspicious; don't you think so?'
Griggs said nothing, but the smile became a broad grin.
The spokesman, on his side, turned to his two companions and
whispered, evidently consulting them as to the course he should
pursue.
'Especially after the warning Lord Creedmore has received,' said
Logotheti to Griggs in a very audible tone, as if explaining his last
speech.
The man turned to him again and spoke in a gravely determined tone--
'I must really insist upon seeing Mr. Van Torp immediately,' he said.
'Yes, yes, I quite understand you,' answered Logotheti, looking at him
with a rather pitying smile, and then turning to Griggs again, as if
for advice.
The elder man was much amused by the ease with which the Greek had so
far put off the unwelcome visitors and gained time; but he saw that
the scene must soon come to a crisis, and prepared for action, keeping
his eye on the three, in case they should make a dash at the door that
communicated with the rest of the house.
During the two or three seconds that followed, Logotheti reviewed the
situation. It would be an easy matter to trick the three men into the
short winding staircase that led up to the rooms Griggs occupied, and
if the upper and lower doors were locked and barricaded, the prisoners
could not forcibly get out. But it was certain that the leader of the
party had a warrant about him, and this must be taken from him before
locking him up, and without any acknowledgment of its validity; for
even the lawless Greek was aware that it was not good to interfere
with officers of the law in the execution of their duty. If there had
been more time he might have devised some better means of attaining
his end than occurred to him just then.
'They must be the lunatics,' he said to Griggs, with the utmost calm.
The spokesman started and stared, and his jaw dropped. For a moment he
could not speak.
'You know Lord Creedmore was warned this morning that a number had
escaped from the county asylum,' continued Logotheti, still speaking
to Griggs, and pretending to lower his voice.
'Lunatics?' roared the man when he got his breath, exasperated out of
his civil manner. 'Lunatics, sir? We are from Scotland Yard, sir, I'd
have you know!'
'Yes, yes,' answered the Greek, 'we quite understand. Humour them,
my dear chap,' he added in an undertone that was meant to be heard.
'Yes,' he continued in a cajoling tone, 'I guessed at once that
you were from police headquarters. If you'll kindly show me your
warrant--'
He stopped politely, and nudged Griggs with his elbow, so that the
detectives should be sure to see the movement. The chief saw the
awkwardness of his own position, measured the bony veteran and the
athletic foreigner with his eye, and judged that if the two were
convinced that they were dealing with madmen they would make a pretty
good fight.
'Excuse me,' the officer said, speaking calmly, 'but you are under a
gross misapprehension about us. This paper will remove it at once, I
trust, and you will not hinder us in the performance of an unpleasant
duty.'
He produced an official envelope, handed it to Logotheti, and waited
for the result.
It was unexpected when it came. Logotheti took the paper, and as it
was now almost dark he looked about for the key of the electric
light. Griggs was now close to him by the door through which they had
entered, and behind which the knob was placed.
'If I can get them upstairs, lock and barricade the lower door,'
whispered the Greek as he turned up the light.
He took the paper under a bracket light on the other side of the room,
beside the door of the winding stair, and began to read.
His face was a study, and Griggs watched it, wondering what was
coming. As Logotheti read and reread the few short sentences, he was
apparently seized by a fit of mirth which he struggled in vain to
repress, and which soon broke out into uncontrollable laughter.
'The cleverest trick you ever saw!' he managed to get out between his
paroxysms.
It was so well done that the detective was seriously embarrassed; but
after a moment's hesitation he judged that he ought to get his warrant
back at all hazards, and he moved towards Logotheti with a menacing
expression.
But the Greek, pretending to be afraid that the supposed lunatic was
going to attack him, uttered an admirable yell of fear, opened the
door close at his hand, rushed through, slammed it behind him, and
fled up the dark stairs.
The detective lost no time, and followed in hot pursuit, his two
companions tearing up after him into the darkness. Then Griggs quietly
turned the key in the lock, for he was sure that Logotheti had
reached the top in time to fasten the upper door, and must be
already barricading it. Griggs proceeded to do the same, quietly and
systematically, and the great strength he had not yet lost served him
well, for the furniture in the room was heavy. In a couple of minutes
it would have needed sledge-hammers and crowbars to break out by the
lower entrance, even if the lock had not been a solid one.
Griggs then turned out the lights, and went quietly back through the
library to the other part of the house to find Lady Maud.
Logotheti, having meanwhile made the upper door perfectly secure,
descended by the open staircase to the hall, and sent the first
footman he met to call the butler, with whom he said he wished to
speak. The butler came at once.
'Lady Maud asked me to see those three men,' said Logotheti in a low
tone. 'Mr. Griggs and I are convinced that they are lunatics escaped
from the asylum, and we have locked them up securely in the staircase
beyond the study.'
'Yes, sir,' said the butler, as if Logotheti had been explaining how
he wished his shoe-leather to be treated.
'I think you had better telephone for the doctor, and explain
everything to him over the wire without speaking to Lord Creedmore
just yet.'
'Yes, sir.'
'How long will it take the doctor to get here?'
'Perhaps an hour, sir, if he's at home. Couldn't say precisely, sir.'
'Very good. There is no hurry; and of course her ladyship will be
particularly anxious that none of her friends should guess what has
happened; you see there would be a general panic if it were known that
there are escaped lunatics in the house.'
'Yes, sir.'
'Perhaps you had better take a couple of men you can trust, and pile
up some more furniture against the doors, above and below. One cannot
be too much on the safe side in such cases.'
'Yes, sir. I'll do it at once, sir.'
Logotheti strolled back towards the gallery in a very unconcerned way.
As for the warrant, he had burnt it in the empty fireplace in Griggs'
room after making all secure, and had dusted down the black ashes so
carefully that they had quite disappeared under the grate. After all,
as the doctor would arrive in the firm expectation of finding three
escaped madmen under lock and key, the Scotland Yard men might
have some difficulty in proving themselves sane until they could
communicate with their headquarters, and by that time Mr. Van Torp
could be far on his way if he chose.
When Logotheti reached the door of the drawing-room, Margaret was
finishing Rosina's Cavatina from the _Barbiere di Siviglia_ in a
perfect storm of fireworks, having transposed the whole piece two
notes higher to suit her own voice, for it was originally written for
a mezzo-soprano.
Lady Maud and Van Torp had gone out upon the terrace unnoticed a
moment before Margaret had begun to sing. The evening was still and
cloudless, and presently the purple twilight would pale under the
summer moon, and the garden and the lawns would be once more as bright
as day. The friends walked quickly, for Lady Maud set the pace and led
Van Torp toward the trees, where the stables stood, quite hidden from
the house. As soon as she reached the shade she stood still and spoke
in a low voice.
'You have waited too long,' she said. 'Three men have come to arrest
you, and their motor is over there in the avenue.'
'Where are they?' inquired the American, evidently not at all
disturbed. 'I'll see them at once, please.'
'And give yourself up?'
'I don't care.'
'Here?'
'Why not? Do you suppose I am going to run away? A man who gets out in
a hurry doesn't usually look innocent, does he?'
Lady Maud asserted herself.
'You must think of me and of my father,' she said in a tone of
authority Van Torp had never heard from her. 'I know you're as
innocent as I am, but after all that has been said and written about
you, and about you and me together, it's quite impossible that you
should let yourself be arrested in our house, in the midst of a party
that has been asked here expressly to be convinced that my father
approves of you. Do you see that?'
'Well--' Mr. Van Torp hesitated, with his thumbs in his waistcoat
pockets.
Across the lawn, from the open window, Margaret's voice rang out like
a score of nightingales in unison.
'There's no time to discuss it,' Lady Maud said. 'I asked her to sing,
so as to keep the people together. Before she has finished, you must
be out of reach.'
Mr. Van Torp smiled. 'You're remarkably positive about it,' he said.
'You must get to town before the Scotland Yard people, and I don't
know how much start they will give you. It depends on how long Mr.
Griggs and Logotheti can keep them in the old study. It will be neck
and neck, I fancy. I'll go with you to the stables. You must ride to
your own place as hard as you can, and go up to London in your
car to-night. The roads are pretty clear on Sundays, and there's
moonlight, so you will have no trouble. It will be easy to say here
that you have been called away suddenly. Come, you must go!'
Lady Maud moved towards the stables, and Van Torp was obliged to
follow her. Far away Margaret was singing the last bars of the waltz
song.
'I must say,' observed Mr. Van Torp thoughtfully, as they walked on,
'for a lady who's generally what I call quite feminine, you make a man
sit up pretty quick.'
'It's not exactly the time to choose for loafing,' answered Lady Maud.
'By the bye,' she added, 'you may as well know. Poor Leven is dead. I
had a telegram a few minutes ago. He was killed yesterday by a bomb
meant for somebody else.'
Van Torp stood still, and Lady Maud stopped with evident reluctance.
'And there are people who don't believe in Providence,' he said
slowly. 'Well, I congratulate you anyway.'
'Hush, the poor man is dead. We needn't talk about him. Come, there's
no time to lose!' She moved impatiently.
'So you're a widow!' Van Torp seemed to be making the remark to
himself without expecting any answer, but it at once suggested a
question. 'And now what do you propose to do?' he inquired. 'But I
expect you'll be a nun, or something. I'd like you to arrange so that
I can see you sometimes, will you?'
'I'm not going to disappear yet,' Lady Maud answered gravely.
They reached the stables, which occupied three sides of a square yard.
At that hour the two grooms and the stable-boy were at their supper,
and the coachman had gone home to his cottage. A big brown retriever
on a chain was sitting bolt upright beside his kennel, and began to
thump the flagstones with his tail as soon as he recognised Lady Maud.
From within a fox-terrier barked two or three times. Lady Maud opened
a door, and he sprang out at her yapping, but was quiet as soon as he
knew her.
'You'd better take the Lancashire Lass,' she said to Van Torp. 'You're
heavier than my father, but it's not far to ride, and she's a clever
creature.'
She had turned up the electric light while speaking, for it was dark
inside the stable; she got a bridle, went into the box herself, and
slipped it over the mare's pretty head. Van Torp saw that it was
useless to offer help.
'Don't bother about a saddle,' he said; 'it's a waste of time.'
He touched the mare's face and lips with his hand, and she understood
him, and let him lead her out. He vaulted upon her back, and Lady Maud
walked beside him till they were outside the yard.
'If you had a high hat it would look like the circus,' she said,
glancing at his evening dress. 'Now get away! I'll be in town on
Tuesday; let me know what happens. Good-bye! Be sure to let me know.'
'Yes. Don't worry. I'm only going because you insist, anyhow.
Good-bye. God bless you!'
He waved his hand, the mare sprang forward, and in a few seconds he
was out of sight amongst the trees. Lady Maud listened to the regular
sound of the galloping hoofs on the turf, and at the same time from
very far off she heard Margaret's high trills and quick staccato
notes. At that moment the moon was rising through the late twilight,
and a nightingale high overhead, no doubt judging her little self to
be quite as great a musician as the famous Cordova, suddenly began
a very wonderful piece of her own, just half a tone higher than
Margaret's, which might have distressed a sensitive musician, but did
not jar in the least on Lady Maud's ear.
Now that she had sent Van Torp on his way, she would gladly have
walked alone in the park for half an hour to collect her thoughts; but
people who live in the world are rarely allowed any pleasant leisure
when they need it, and many of the most dramatic things in real life
happen when we are in such a hurry that we do not half understand
them. So the moment that should have been the happiest of all goes
dashing by when we are hastening to catch a train; so the instant of
triumph after years of labour or weeks of struggling is upon us when
we are perhaps positively obliged to write three important notes
in twenty minutes; and sometimes, too, and mercifully, the pain of
parting is numbed just as the knife strikes the nerve, by the howling
confusion of a railway station that forces us to take care of
ourselves and our belongings; and when the first instant of joy, or
victory, or acute suffering is gone in a flash, memory never quite
brings back all the happiness nor all the pain.
Lady Maud could not have stayed away many minutes longer. She went
back at once, entered by the garden window just as Margaret was
finishing Rosina's song, and remained standing behind her till she
had sung the last note. English people rarely applaud conventional
drawing-room music, but this had been something more, and the Craythew
guests clapped their hands loudly, and even the elderly wife of the
scientific peer emitted distinctly audible sounds of satisfaction.
Lady Maud bent her handsome head and kissed the singer affectionately,
whispering words of heartfelt thanks.