For the twentieth time Miss Eleanor Byrd peered out of the second story
front window, and turned back with a sigh to where her aunt sat in the
soft glow of the lamp.
“What can he want, auntie? What can he want?” she repeated, also for
the twentieth time.
The elder Miss Byrd did not speak for an instant. “I hope he doesn’t
want _anything_,” she burst out at last. “I wish you had never written
to him. It is bad enough that your sister should be connected with that
awful paper of his--”
“Now, auntie!” Nellie’s eyes danced. “Now, auntie, did you ever see a
copy of the Gazette in your life? Honestly, now?”
Miss Byrd flushed--a lovely pink flush, like that of a Dresden
shepherdness grown old. “Of course not,” she answered indignantly. “Of
course not. Your grandfather would never allow me to read papers of
that sort--”
“Of what sort, auntie,” innocently.
“Of _that_ sort,” returned Miss Byrd decisively. “It’s terrible that
Lillian should write for it. No one who conducts a paper like that
can be a gentleman! Look what the President has said about him! He
has branded him as undesirable--undesirable--and my own niece writes
to such a man. And he ventures to telegraph--telegraph--to make an
appointment with her.”
Nellie laughed softly. She began to say something; then jumped up and
ran to the window and peered out behind the edge of the blind. An
instant later she came back.
“Another false alarm, auntie!” she said. “Maybe you’re going to have
your wish, and he won’t come at all. But”--she paused and suddenly
dropped on her knees beside the elder woman’s chair. “Dear auntie,” she
murmured, softly. “I’m sorry! I’m so sorry to grieve you. I know you
don’t approve of what Lillian is doing--”
“Nellie!” Miss Lee’s tone was shocked.
“Oh! It’s true, auntie. You’re always thinking that gentlewomen don’t
do such things and yet you are always perfectly certain that Lilly must
be a gentlewoman because she is a Byrd. Well! auntie! Neither Lilly
nor I are gentlewomen. We may be ladies--I hope we are--but we’re not
gentlewomen. There are no gentlewomen in these days. They went out of
existence with crinoline--except where they survive in such delightful
creatures as you. No gentlewoman earns her own living, and Lilly and I
have got to earn ours. Times have changed, auntie, dear! This branch of
the Byrd family is poor, dead poor. Lilly threw herself into the breach
and is making lots of money, while I barely starve along. I’m tired of
it, and if Mr. McNew wants my services, he can have them, at a price.”
A twinkle came into the girl’s eyes. “I hope he won’t want me to go
a-burgling, and then tell what it feels like,” she finished.
“Nellie!”
“Oh! I was only joking, you dear old thing!”
“I know, dear!” returned the older lady, plaintively. “But do you think
it’s quite proper to jest on such subjects? I can’t bear to think of
such a thing. Oh! if you--” She broke off as the front bell rang,
loudly and insistently.
Nellie Byrd sprang to her feet.
“It’s they,” she cried, darting to the door. Then she came back. “Dear
auntie!” she breathed. “It’s all right. Don’t worry.” Then she tripped
down the stairs to admit her visitors.
McNew entered first--a big rough-looking man with a pointed beard.
“Miss Byrd?” he questioned.
“Yes! You are Mr. McNew, I suppose. Won’t you come in?”
Mr. McNew strode in. “This is Mr. Risdon, Miss Byrd,” he explained. “He
tries to run the Gazette’s Washington office.”
Miss Byrd’s eyes rested kindly on the correspondent. “I know Mr. Risdon
by sight,” she explained. “No one could be a social secretary in
Washington without knowing him. My sister Lillian has written me about
him, too. Won’t you sit down, gentlemen?”
“Thank you!” Risdon drew forward a chair and the three disposed
themselves.
McNew wasted no time in preliminaries. He was a busy man, and had no
time to spare.
“Miss Byrd,” he began, as soon as he was seated. “Some time ago I
received an application from you for work? Do you still want it?”
Miss Byrd nodded. “Very much,” she said. “I hope you have some for me.”
“That depends! Your sister has done very good work for the Gazette.
Risdon here suggested sending her to South America. He and she both
fooled me; they got me to send her for one thing, and they arranged
for her to do another. But she’s done both very well.”
“I’m glad!”
“That’s one reason why I’m inclined to give you a chance. I am told
that you speak German fluently, Miss Byrd.”
Nellie nodded. “About as well as I do English,” she declared.
“Very good! If you will apply tomorrow to Senator Pratt--you know his
address--he will engage you as his daughter’s social secretary at
twenty-five dollars a week. The Gazette will pay you forty dollars
more.”
Nellie Byrd’s pale face bloomed with sudden vivid color. McNew staring
at her, read her thoughts, and smiled grimly. He enjoyed startling
people.
“What’s the matter?” he demanded.
Nellie’s color receded, leaving her pale. She looked at McNew
thoughtfully, apparently trying to fathom him.
“I hoped you could give me a chance to try something besides acting
as social secretary,” she syllabled, slowly. “But beggars mustn’t be
choosers. I understand the twenty-five dollars, but why the forty. What
service do I render the Gazette when I am acting as social secretary
for Senator Pratt.”
McNew watched the light coming and going behind the girl’s clear blue
eyes. “For the forty dollars,” he answered, slowly. “I wish you to
watch and report to me every act of the Countess del Ouro Preto, who is
spending the winter with Miss Pratt? Will you do it?”
“No!” If Nellie Byrd was disappointed, she concealed the fact well. Her
voice came as calm as ever. “You are mistaken in me, Mr. McNew. I am
not a spy.”
“Why not?” McNew shot the question at her. “Why not? Why not? Tell me
why not.”
“It is not honorable.”
“Honorable! Honorable! Was Nathan Hale dishonorable? Was Major Andree
dishonorable?”
Miss Byrd shook her head. “They were soldiers. What they did they
did for their country. That fact glorified their acts. They were not
newspaper spies.”
McNew hitched his chair forward. His eyes glowed. “Miss Byrd,” he said,
slowly. “In watching the Countess del Ouro Preto you will probably be
doing a service to your country scarcely less than that of a spy in
a war. You will not be risking death, but you will be risking your
social standing, which you would probably lose if it became known that
you were a Gazette spy. I have reason to believe that the countess
is the channel of communication between the German and the Japanese
Ambassadors in a plot to humiliate the United States--perhaps to
involve it in war. I want to know the truth; I want to know it in order
to get an exclusive story for the Gazette. But I want still more to
know it for the sake of the United States. The Monroe doctrine--But
Risdon will explain that to you.”
Miss Byrd turned to Risdon while McNew leaned back and watched the
changes flit over her delicate face as the younger man talked. A new
shade of earnestness, altogether charming, crept over it toward the end.
Risdon went over the situation as he understood it to exist. He told of
the petition of the Ouro Pretos to the Emperor and its supposed result;
of the rebellion that broke out shortly afterwards in Brazil; of the
visit (reported by a Gazette correspondent) of the Countess to Japan;
of her return to the United States and of her alleged conferences
with the Japanese and German ambassadors; and called attention to the
growing excitement in California growing out of the strike and boycott
that was being enforced against the Japanese restaurants, and out of
the denial of public school privileges to the Japanese in San Francisco.
McNew broke in. “Your sister,” he said, “has sent some incendiary yarns
from Brazil--which I have not printed. Yesterday she cabled the worst
of all. She’s on her way home now, by the way.”
Nellie’s eyes brightened. “Oh! is she?” she cried. “I’m so glad. I
didn’t know.”
“Nobody knew. Risdon here didn’t know till he heard me tell you. And
it’s just as well to talk about it. It mightn’t do any harm and again
it might. She’s coming on the same ship with Ouro Preto!”
“Oh!” Miss Byrd’s tones were significant and not altogether approving.
But McNew settled back in his chair. “Go on, Risdon,” he ordered.
Risdon resumed. “There really isn’t much more to say,” he declared.
“Altogether the circumstances are very suspicious. Singly they amount
to nothing, together they may amount to a good deal. The countess is a
very clever woman, and we believe that she is the mainspring of the
plot and is doing some very important work in connection with it in
this country, and we want to find out what this work is.”
Miss Byrd had followed the argument closely. “And then?” she
questioned, calmly, when Risdon finished.
“Then we will print it. It will be a great scoop for the Gazette, of
course. But it may also mean salvation for the country.”
“And,” broke in McNew, “You don’t want to run away with the idea that
you are betraying your employer. Old Pratt will know what your errand
in his house is.”
“Oh!” Miss Byrd’s face cleared. “That changes the case,” she conceded.
“Of course! You see Risdon here got scared, and wired a lot of stuff
last night that brought me down to Washington in a hurry. I saw Pratt
this morning and reasoned with him. He’s willing enough to oblige the
Gazette, Pratt is. Besides, he had his suspicions already. Pratt’s no
fool, you understand. No fool ever gets to be United States Senator
nowadays. Pratt’s got the far west idea of women, and he doesn’t
understand the type of the countess. She doesn’t understand him either,
however. So it’s a stand off. The upshot is that he agreed to my
terms. He won’t discuss it with you, though! To him you will be his
daughter’s social secretary and nothing else, and you’ve got to attend
to your duties as such; what else you may do he doesn’t care. Now--Will
you do it?”
McNew rose, and Miss Byrd did so also. “Yes,” she said, slowly. “I will
do it!”
“Good! Then the first thing you have to do is to forget that you know
German.”