Mr. Van Torp knew no more about Bayreuth than about Samarkand, beyond
the fact that at certain stated times performances of Wagner's operas
were given there with as much solemnity as great religious festivals,
and that musical people spoke of the Bayreuth season in a curiously
reverent manner. He would have been much surprised if any one had told
him that he often whistled fragments of _Parsifal_ to himself and
liked the sound of them; for he had a natural ear and a good memory,
and had whistled remarkably well when he was a boy.
The truth about this seemingly impossible circumstance was really very
simple. In what he called his cow-punching days, he had been for six
months in company with two young men who used to whistle softly
together by the hour beside the camp fire, and none of the other
'boys' had ever heard the strange tunes they seemed to like best, but
Van Torp had caught and remembered many fragments, almost
unconsciously, and he whistled them to himself because they gave him a
sensation which no 'real music' ever did. Extraordinary natures, like
his, are often endowed with unnoticed gifts and tastes quite unlike
those of most people. No one knew anything about the young men who
whistled Wagner; the 'Lost Legion' hides many secrets, and the two
were not popular with the rest, though they knew their business and
did their work fairly well. One of them was afterwards said to have
been killed in a shooting affray and the other had disappeared about
the same time, no one knew how, or cared, though Mr. Van Torp thought
he had recognised him once many years later. They were neither
Americans nor Englishmen, though they both spoke English well, and
never were heard to use any other language. But that is common enough
with emigrants to the United States and elsewhere. Every one who has
been to sea in an American vessel knows how the Scandinavian sailors
insist on speaking English amongst themselves, instead of their own
language.
Mr. Van Torp was fond of music, quite apart from his admiration for
the greatest living lyric soprano, and since it was his fancy to go to
Bayreuth in the hope of seeing her, he meant to hear Wagner's
masterpiece, and supposed that there would not be any difficulty about
such a simple matter, nor about obtaining the sort of rooms he was
accustomed to, in the sort of hotel he expected to find where so many
rich people went every other year. Any one who has been to the holy
place of the Wagnerians can imagine his surprise when, after infinite
difficulty, he found himself, his belongings and his man deposited in
one small attic room of a Bavarian tanner's house, with one
feather-bed, one basin and one towel for furniture.
'Stemp,' said Mr. Van Torp, 'this is a heathen town.'
'Yes, sir.'
'I suppose I'm thought close about money,' continued the millionaire,
thinking aloud, 'but I call five dollars a day dear, for this room,
don't you?'
'Yes, sir, I do indeed! I call it downright robbery. That's what I
call it, sir.'
'Well, I suppose they call it business here, and quite a good business
too. But I'd like to buy the whole thing and show 'em how to run it.
They'd make more in the end.'
'Yes, sir. I hope you will, sir. Beg pardon, sir, but do you think it
would cost a great deal?'
'They'd ask a great deal, anyway,' answered the millionaire
thoughtfully. 'Stemp, suppose you get me out some things and then take
a look around, while I try to get a wash in that--that tea-service
there.'
Mr. Van Torp eyed the exiguous basin and jug with some curiosity and
much contempt. Stemp, impassive and correct under all circumstances,
unstrapped a valise, laid out on the bed what his master might need,
and inquired if he wished anything else.
'There isn't anything else,' answered Mr. Van Torp, gloomily.
'When shall I come back, sir?'
'In twenty-five minutes. There isn't half an hour's wash in that
soup-plate, anyway.'
He eyed the wretched basin with a glance that might almost have
cracked it. When his man had gone, he proceeded to his toilet, such as
it was, and solaced himself by softly whistling as much of the 'Good
Friday' music as he remembered, little dreaming what it was, or that
his performance was followed with nervous and almost feverish interest
by the occupant of the next room in the attic, a poor musician who had
saved and scraped for years to sit at the musical feast during three
days.
'E sharp!' cried an agonised voice on the other side of the closed
door, in a strong German accent. 'I know it is E sharp! I know it!'
Mr. Van Torp stopped whistling at once, lowered his razor, and turned
a mask of soapsuds in the direction whence the sound came.
'Do you mean me?' he inquired in a displeased tone.
'I mean who whistles the "Good Friday" music,' answered the voice. 'I
tell you, I know it is E sharp in that place. I have the score. I
shall show you if you believe not.'
'He's mad,' observed Mr. Van Torp, beginning to shave again. 'Are you
a lunatic?' he asked, pausing after a moment. 'What's the matter with
you anyhow?'
'I am a musician, I tell you! I am a pianist!'
'It's the same thing,' said Mr. Van Torp, working carefully on his
upper lip, under his right nostril.
'I shall tell you that you are a barbarian!' retorted the voice.
'Well, that doesn't hurt,' answered Mr. Van Torp.
He heard a sort of snort of scorn on the other side and there was
silence again. But before long, as he got away from his upper lip with
the razor, he unconsciously began to whistle again, and he must have
made the same mistake as before, for he was interrupted by a deep
groan of pain from the next room.
'Not feeling very well?' he inquired in a tone of dry jocularity.
'Stomach upset?'
'E sharp!' screamed the wretched pianist.
Van Torp could hear him dancing with rage, or pain.
'See here, whoever you are, don't call names! I don't like it. See?
I've paid for this room and I'm going on whistling if I like, and just
as long as I like.'
'You say you make noises you like?' cried the infuriated musician.
'Oh, no! You shall not! There are rules! We are not in London, sir, we
are in Bayreuth! If you make noises, you shall be thrown out of the
house.'
'Shall I? Well, now, that's a funny sort of a rule for a hotel, isn't
it?'
'I go complain of you,' retorted the other, and Mr. Van Torp heard a
door opened and shut again.
In a few minutes he had done all that the conditions would permit in
the way of making himself presentable, and just as he left the room he
was met by Stemp, the twenty-five minutes being just over.
'Very good, sir. I'll do what I can, sir,' said the excellent man, as
Mr. Van Torp pointed to the things that lay about.
As he went out, he recognised the voice of his neighbour, who was
talking excitedly in voluble German, somewhere at the back of the
house.
'He's complaining now,' thought Mr. Van Torp, with something like a
smile.
He had already been to the best hotel, in the hope of obtaining rooms,
and he had no difficulty in finding it again. He asked for Madame da
Cordova. She was at home, for it was an off-day; he sent in his card,
and was presently led to her sitting-room. Times had changed. Six
months earlier he would have been told that there had been a mistake
and that she had gone out.
She was alone; a letter she had been writing lay unfinished on the
queer little desk near the shaded window, and her pen had fallen
across the paper. On the round table in the middle of the small bare
room there stood a plain white vase full of corn-flowers and poppies,
and Margaret was standing there, rearranging them, or pretending to do
so.
She was looking her very best, and as she raised her eyes and greeted
him with a friendly smile, Mr. Van Torp thought she had never been so
handsome before. It had not yet occurred to him to compare her with
Lady Maud, because for some mysterious natural cause the beautiful
Englishwoman who was his best friend had never exerted even the
slightest feminine influence on his being; he would have carried her
in his arms, if need had been, as he had carried the Tartar girl, and
not a thrill of his nerves nor one faster beat of his heart would have
disturbed his placidity; she knew it, as women know such things, and
the knowledge made her quite sure that he was not really the
coarse-grained and rather animal son of nature that many people said
he was, the sort of man to whom any one good-looking woman is much the
same as another, a little more amusing than good food, a little less
satisfactory than good wine.
But the handsome singer stirred his blood, the touch of her hand
electrified him, and the mere thought that any other man should ever
make her his own was unbearable. After he had first met her he had
pursued her with such pertinacity and such utter ignorance of women's
ways that he had frightened her, and she had frankly detested him for
a time; but he had learned a lesson and he profited by it with that
astounding adaptability which makes American men and women just what
they are.
Margaret held out her hand and he took it; and though its touch and
her friendly smile were like a taste of heaven just then, he pressed
her fingers neither too much nor too little, and his face betrayed no
emotion.
'It's very kind of you to receive me, Miss Donne,' he said quietly.
'I think it's very kind of you to come and see me,' Margaret answered.
'Come and sit down and tell me how you got here--and why!'
'Well,' he answered slowly, as they seated themselves side by side on
the hard green sofa, 'I don't suppose I can explain, so that you'll
understand, but I'll try. Different kinds of things brought me. I
heard you were here from Lady Maud, and I thought perhaps I might have
an opportunity for a little talk. And then--oh, I don't know. I've
seen everything worth seeing except a battle and _Parsifal_, and as it
seemed so easy, and you were here, I thought I'd have a look at the
opera, since I can't see the fight.'
Margaret laughed a little.
'I hope you will like it,' she said. 'Have you a good seat?'
'I haven't got a ticket yet,' answered Mr. Van Torp, in blissful
ignorance.
'No seat!' The Primadonna's surprise was almost dramatic. 'But how in
the world do you expect to get one now? Don't you know that the seats
for _Parsifal_ are all taken months beforehand?'
'Are they really?' He was very calm about it. 'Then I suppose I shall
have to get a ticket from a speculator. I don't see anything hard
about that.'
'My dear friend, there are no speculators here, and there are no
tickets to be had. You might as well ask for the moon!'
'I can stand, then. I'm not afraid of getting tired.'
'There are no standing places at all! No one is allowed to go in who
has not a seat. A week ago you might possibly have picked up one in
Munich, given up by some one at the last moment, but such chances are
jumped at! I wonder that you even got a place to sleep!'
'Well, it's not much of a place,' said Mr. Van Torp, thoughtfully.
'There's one room the size of a horsebox, one bed, one basin, one
pitcher and one towel, and I've brought my valet with me. I've
concluded to let him sleep while I'm at the opera, and he'll sit up
when I want to go to bed. Box and Cox. I don't know what he'll sit on,
for there's no chair, but he's got to sit.'
Margaret laughed, for he amused her.
'I suppose you're exaggerating a little bit,' she said. 'It's not
really quite so bad as that, is it?'
'It's worse. There's a lunatic in the next room who calls me E. Sharp
through the door, and has lodged a complaint already because I
whistled while I was shaving. It's not a very good hotel. Who is E.
Sharp, anyway? Maybe that was the name of the last man who occupied
that room. I don't know, but I don't like the idea of having a mad
German pianist for a neighbour. He may get in while I'm asleep and
think I'm the piano, and hammer the life out of me, the way they do.
I've seen a perfectly new piano wrecked in a single concert by a
fellow who didn't look as if he had the strength to kick a mosquito.
They're so deceptive, pianists! Nervous men are often like that, and
most pianists are nothing but nerves and hair.'
He amused her, for she had never seen him in his present mood.
'E sharp is a note,' she said. 'On the piano it's the same as F
natural. You must have been whistling something your neighbour knew,
and you made a mistake, and nervous musicians really suffer if one
does that. But it must have been something rather complicated, to have
an E sharp in it! It wasn't "Suwanee River," nor the "Washington Post"
either! Indeed I should rather like to know what it was.'
'Old tunes I picked up when I was cow-punching, years ago,' answered
Mr. Van Torp. 'I don't know where they came from, for I never asked,
but they're not like other tunes, that's certain, and I like them.
They remind me of the old days out West, when I had no money and
nothing to worry about.'
'I'm very fond of whistling, too,' Margaret said. 'I study all my
parts by whistling them, so as to save my voice.'
'Really! I had no idea that was possible.'
'Quite. Perhaps you whistle very well. Won't you let me hear the tune
that irritated your neighbour the pianist? Perhaps I know it, too.'
'Well,' said Mr. Van Torp, 'I suppose I could. I should be a little
shy before you,' he added, quite naturally. 'If you'll excuse me, I'll
just go and stand before the window so that I can't see you. Perhaps I
can manage it that way.'
Margaret, who was bored to the verge of collapse on the off-days,
thought him much nicer than he had formerly been, and she liked his
perfect simplicity.
'Stand anywhere you like,' she said, 'but let me hear the tune.'
Van Torp rose and went to the window and she looked quietly at his
square figure and his massive, sandy head and his strong neck.
Presently he began to whistle, very softly and perfectly in tune. Many
a street-boy could do as well, no doubt, and Mrs. Rushmore would have
called it a vulgar accomplishment, but the magnificent Primadonna was
too true a musician, as well as a singer, not to take pleasure in a
sweet sound, even if it were produced by a street-boy.
But as Mr. Van Torp went on, she opened her eyes very wide and held
her breath. There was no mistake about it; he was whistling long
pieces from _Parsifal_, as far as it was possible to convey an idea of
such music by such means. Margaret had studied it before coming to
Bayreuth, in order to understand it better; she had now already heard
it once, and had felt the greatest musical emotion of her life--one
that had stirred other emotions, too, strange ones quite new to her.
She held her breath and listened, and her eyes that had been wide open
in astonishment, slowly closed again in pleasure, and presently, when
he reached the 'Good Friday' music, her own matchless voice floated
out with her unconscious breath, in such perfect octaves with his high
whistling that at first he did not understand; but when he did, the
rough hard man shivered suddenly and steadied himself against the
window-sill, and Margaret's voice went on alone, with faintly breathed
words and then without them, following the instrumentation to the end
of the scene, beyond what he had ever heard.
Then there was silence in the room, and neither of the two moved for
some moments, but at last Van Torp turned, and came back.
'Thank you,' he said, in a low voice.
Margaret smiled and passed her hand over her eyes quickly, as if to
dispel a vision she had seen. Then she spoke.
'Do you really not know what that music is?' she asked. 'Really,
really?'
'Oh, quite honestly I don't!'
'You're not joking? You're not laughing at me?'
'I?' He could not understand. 'I shouldn't dare!' he said.
'You've been whistling some of _Parsifal_, some of the most beautiful
music that ever was written--and you whistle marvellously, for it's
anything but easy! Where in the world did you learn it? Don't tell me
that those are "old tunes" you picked up on a Californian ranch!'
'It's true, all the same,' Van Torp answered.
He told her of the two foreigners who used to whistle together in the
evenings, and how one was supposed to have been shot and the other had
disappeared, no one had known whither, nor had cared.
'All sorts of young fellows used to drift out there,' he said, 'and
one couldn't tell where they came from, though I can give a guess at
where some of them must have been, since I've seen the world. There
were younger sons of English gentlemen, fellows whose fathers were
genuine lords, maybe, who had not brains enough to get into the army
or the Church. There were cashiered Prussian officers, and Frenchmen
who had most likely killed women out of jealousy, and Sicilian
bandits, and broken Society men from New York. There were all sorts.
And there was me. And we all spoke different kinds of English and had
different kinds of tastes, good and bad--mostly bad. There was only
one thing we could all do alike, and that was to ride.'
'I never thought of you as riding,' Margaret said.
'Well, why should you? But I can, because I was just a common cow-boy
and had to, for a living.'
'It's intensely interesting--what a strange life you have had! Tell me
more about yourself, won't you?'
'There's not much to tell, it seems to me,' said Van Torp. 'From being
a cow-boy I turned into a miner, and struck a little silver, and I
sold that and got into nickel, and I made the Nickel Trust what it is,
more by financing it than anything else, and I got almost all of it.
And now I've sold the whole thing.'
'Sold the Nickel Trust?' Margaret was quite as much surprised as Lady
Maud had been.
'Yes. I wasn't made to do one thing long, I suppose. If I were, I
should still be a cow-boy. Just now, I'm here to go to _Parsifal_, and
since you say those tunes are out of that opera, I daresay I'm going
to like it very much.'
'It's all very uncanny,' Margaret said thoughtfully. 'I wonder who
those two men were, and what became of the one who disappeared.'
'I've a strong impression that I saw him in New York the other day,'
Van Torp answered. 'If I'm right, he's made money--doing quite well, I
should think. It wouldn't surprise me to hear he'd got together a
million or so.'
'Really? What is he doing? Your stories grow more and more
interesting!'
'If he's the fellow we used to call Levi Longlegs on the ranch, he's a
Russian now. I'm not perfectly sure, for he had no hair on his face
then, and now he has a beard like a French sapper. But the eyes and
the nose and the voice and the accent are the same, and the age would
about correspond. Handsome man, I suppose you'd call him. His name is
Kralinsky just at present, and he's found a whole mine of rubies
somewhere.'
'Really? I love rubies. They are my favourite stones.'
'Are they? That's funny. I've got an uncut one in my pocket now, if
you'd like to see it. I believe it comes from Kralinsky's mine, too,
though I got it through a friend of yours, two or three days ago.'
'A friend of mine?'
He was poking his large fingers into one of the pockets of his
waistcoat in search of the stone.
'Mr. Logotheti,' he said, just as he found it. 'He's discovered a
handsome young woman from Tartary or somewhere, who has a few rubies
to sell that look very much like Kralinsky's. This is one of them.'
He had unwrapped the stone now and he offered it to her, holding it
out in the palm of his hand. She took it delicately and laid it in her
own, which was so white that the gem shed a delicate
pomegranate-coloured light on the skin all round it. She admired it,
turned it over with one finger, held it up towards the window, and
laid it in her palm again.
But Van Torp had set her thinking about Logotheti and the Tartar girl.
She put out her hand to give back the ruby.
'I should like you to keep it, if you will,' he said. 'I shan't forget
the pleasure I've had in seeing you like this, but you'll forget all
about our meeting here--the stone may just make you remember it
sometimes.'
He spoke so quietly, so gently, that she was taken off her guard, and
was touched, and very much surprised to feel that she was. She looked
into his eyes rather cautiously, remembering well how she had
formerly seen something terrifying in them if she looked an instant
too long; but now they made her think of the eyes of a large
affectionate bulldog.
'You're very kind to want to give it to me,' she answered after a
moment's hesitation, 'but I don't like to accept anything so valuable,
now that I'm engaged to be married. Konstantin might not like it. But
you're so kind; give me any little thing of no value that you have in
your pocket, for I mean to remember this day, indeed I do!'
'I gave nothing for the ruby,' said Van Torp, still not taking it from
her, 'so it has no value for me. I wouldn't offer you anything that
cost me money, now, unless it was a theatre for your own. Perhaps the
thing's glass, after all; I've not shown it to any jeweller. The girl
made me take it, because I helped her in a sort of way. When I wanted
to pay for it she tried to throw it out of the window. So I had to
accept it to calm her down, and she went off and left no address, and
I thought I'd like you to have it, if you would.'
'Are you quite, quite sure you did not pay for it?' Margaret asked.
'If we are going to be friends, you must please always be very
accurate.'
'I've told you exactly what happened,' said Van Torp. 'Won't you take
it now?'
'Yes, I will, and thank you very much indeed. I love rubies, and this
is a beauty, and not preposterously big. I think I shall have it set
as it is, uncut, and only polished, so that it will always be itself,
just as you gave it to me. I shall think of the "Good Friday" music
and the Chimes, and this hideous little room, and your clever
whistling, whenever I look at it.'
'You're kind to-day,' said Mr. Van Torp, after a moment's debate as to
whether he should say anything at all.
'Am I? You mean that I used to be very disagreeable, don't you?' She
smiled as she glanced at him. 'I must have been, I'm sure, for you
used to frighten me ever so much. But I'm not in the least afraid of
you now!'
'Why should any one be afraid of me?' asked Van Torp, whose mere smile
had been known to terrify Wall Street when a 'drop' was expected.
Margaret laughed a little, without looking at him.
'Tell me all about the Tartar girl,' she said, instead of answering
his question.
She would not have been the thoroughly feminine woman she was--far
more feminine, in the simple human sense, than Lady Maud--if she had
not felt satisfaction in having tamed the formidable money-wolf so
that he fawned at her feet; but perhaps she was even more pleased, or
amused, than she thought she could be by any such success. The man was
so very much stronger and rougher than any other man with whom she had
ever been acquainted, and she had once believed him to be such a
thorough brute, that this final conquest flattered her vanity. The
more dangerous the character of the wild beast, the greater the merit
of the lion-tamer who subdues him.
'Tell me about this handsome Tartar girl,' she said again.
Van Torp told her Baraka's history, as far as he knew it from
Logotheti.
'I never heard such an amusing set of stories as you are telling me
to-day,' she said.
'That particular one is Logotheti's,' he answered, 'and he can
probably tell you much more about the girl.'
'Is she really very pretty?' Margaret asked.
'Well,' said Van Torp, quoting a saying of his favourite great man,
'for people who like that kind of thing, I should think that would be
the kind of thing they'd like.'
The Primadonna smiled.
'Can you describe her?' she asked.
'Did you ever read a fairy story about a mouse that could turn into a
tiger when it liked?' inquired the American in a tone of profound
meditation, as if he were contemplating a vision which Margaret could
not see.
'No,' said she, 'I never did.'
'I don't think I ever did, either. But there might be a fairy story
about that, mightn't there?' Margaret nodded, with an expression of
displeased interest, and he went on: 'Well, it describes Miss Barrack
to a T. Yes, that's what I call her. She's put "Barak" on her business
card, whatever that means in a Christian language; but when I found
out it was a girl, I christened her Miss Barrack. People have to have
names of some kind if you're going to talk about them. But that's a
digression. Pardon me. You'd like a description of the young person.
I'm just thinking.'
'How did you find out she was a girl?' Margaret asked, and her tone
was suddenly hard.
Mr. Van Torp was not prepared for the question, and felt very
uncomfortable for a moment. In his conversation with women he was
almost morbidly prudish about everything which had the remotest
connexion with sex. He wondered how he could convey to Margaret the
information that when he had been obliged to carry the pretended boy
across the room, he had been instantly and palpably convinced that he
was carrying a girl.
'It was a question of form, you see,' he said awkwardly.
'Form? Formality? I don't understand.' Margaret was really puzzled.
'No, no!' Mr. Van Torp was actually blushing. 'I mean his form--or her
form----'
'Oh, her figure? You merely guessed it was a girl in boy's clothes?'
'Certainly. Yes. Only, you see, he had a kind of fit--the boy did--and
I thought he was going to faint, so I picked him up and carried him to
a sofa, and--well, you understand, Miss Donne. I knew I hadn't got a
boy in my arms, that's all.'
'I should think so!' assented the Englishwoman--'I'm sure I should!
When you found out she was a girl, how did she strike you?'
'Very attractive, I should say; very attractive,' he repeated with
more emphasis. 'People who admire brunettes might think her quite
fascinating. She has really extraordinary eyes, to begin with, those
long fruity Eastern eyes, you know, that can look so far to the right
and left through their eyelashes. Do you know what I mean?'
'Perfectly. You make it very clear. Go on, please.'
'Her eyes--yes.' Mr. Van Torp appeared to be thinking again. 'Well,
there was her complexion, too. It's first-rate for a dark girl. Ever
been in a first-class dairy? Do you know the colour of Alderney cream
when it's ready to be skimmed? Her complexion's just like that, and
when she's angry, it's as if you squeezed the juice of about one red
currant into the whole pan of cream. Not more than one, I should
think. See what I mean?'
'Yes. She must be awfully pretty. Tell me more. Has she nice hair?
Even teeth?'
'I should think she had!' answered Mr. Van Torp, with even more
enthusiasm than he had shown yet. 'They're as small and even and white
as if somebody had gone to work and carved them all around half a new
billiard ball, not separate, you understand, but all in one piece.
Very pretty mouth they make, with those rather broiled-salmon-coloured
lips she has, and a little chin that points up, as if she could hold
her own. She can, too. Her hair? Well, you see, she's cut it short, to
be a boy, but it's as thick as a beaver's fur, I should say, and
pretty black. It's a silky kind of hair, that looks alive. You know
what I mean, I daresay. Some brunettes' hair looks coarse and dusky,
like horsehair, but hers isn't that kind, and it makes a sort of
reflection in the sun, the way a young raven's wing-feathers do, if
you understand.'
'You're describing a raving beauty, it seems to me.'
'Oh, no,' said the American innocently. 'Now if our friend Griggs, the
novelist, were here, he'd find all the right words and things, but I
can only tell you just what I saw.'
'You tell it uncommonly well!' Margaret's face expressed anything but
pleasure. 'Is she tall?'
'It's hard to tell, in men's clothes. Three inches shorter than I am,
maybe. I'm a middle-sized man, I suppose. I used to be five feet ten
in my shoes. She may be five feet seven, not more.'
'But that's tall for a woman!'
'Is it?' Mr. Van Torp's tone expressed an innocent indifference.
'Yes. Has she nice hands?'
'I didn't notice her hands. Oh, yes, I remember!' he exclaimed,
suddenly correcting himself. 'I did notice them. She held up that ruby
to the light and I happened to look at her fingers. Small, well-shaped
fingers, tapering nicely, but with a sort of firm look about them that
you don't often see in a woman's hands. You've got it, too.'
'Have I?' Margaret looked down at her right hand. 'But, of course,
hers are smaller than mine,' she said.
'Well, you see, Orientals almost all have very small hands and
feet--too small, I call them--little tiny feet like mice.'
Margaret's own were well-shaped, but by no means small.
'The girl is in London, you say?' Her tone made a question of the
statement.
'She was there two days ago, when I left. At least, she had been to
see me that very morning. Almost as soon as she was gone I went out,
and in the first shop I looked into I met Logotheti. It was Pinney's,
the jeweller's, I remember, for I bought a collar stud. We came away
together and walked some time, and he told me the Tartar girl's story.
I asked him to dine to-day, but I was obliged to leave town suddenly,
and so I had to put him off with a note. I daresay he's still in
London.'
'I daresay he is,' Margaret repeated, and rising suddenly she went to
the window.
Mr. Van Torp rose too, and thought of what he should say in taking his
leave of her, for he felt that he had stayed long enough. Strange to
say, too, he was examining his not very sensitive conscience to
ascertain whether he had said anything not strictly true, but he
easily satisfied himself that he had not. If all was fair in love and
war, as the proverb said, it was certainly permissible to make use of
the plain truth.
The Primadonna was still looking out of the window when the door
opened and her English maid appeared on the threshold. Margaret turned
at the sound.
'What is it?' she asked quietly.
'There's Mr. Van Torp's man, ma'am,' answered Potts. 'He wants to
speak to his master at once.'
'You had better tell him to come up,' Margaret answered. 'You may just
as well see him here without going all the way downstairs,' she said,
speaking to Van Torp.
'You're very kind, I'm sure,' he replied; 'but I think I'd better be
going anyway.'
'No, don't go yet, please! There's something else I want to say. See
your man here while I go and speak to Mrs. Rushmore. Send Mr. Van
Torp's man up, Potts,' she added, and left the room.
The American walked up and down alone for a few moments. Then the
impassive Stemp was ushered in by the maid, and the door was shut
again.
'Well?' inquired Mr. Van Torp. 'Has anything happened?'
'Yes, sir,' Stemp answered. 'They have turned us out of the house,
sir, and your luggage is in the street. Where shall I have it taken,
sir?'
'Oh, they've turned us out, have they? Why?'
'Well, sir, I'm afraid it's partly my fault, but there must be some
misunderstanding, for I'm quite sure I didn't whistle in your room,
sir.'
'So am I, Stemp. Quite sure. Go on. What happened?'
'Well, sir, you hadn't been gone more than ten minutes when somebody
knocked, and there was the landlord, if that's what he calls himself,
and a strange German gentleman with him, who spoke English. Rather
shabby-looking, sir, I thought him. He spoke most uncivilly, and said
I was driving him half crazy with my whistling. I said I hadn't
whistled, and he said I had, and the landlord talked German at me, as
it were, sir. I said again I hadn't whistled, and he said I had, the
shabby gentleman, I mean, speaking most uncivilly, sir, I assure you.
So when I saw that they doubted my word, I put them out and fastened
the door, thinking this was what you would have ordered, sir, if you'd
been there yourself, but I'm afraid I did wrong.'
'No, Stemp. You didn't do wrong.'
'Thank you, sir.'
'I suppose, though, that when you put them out they didn't exactly
want to go, did they?'
'No, sir, but I had no trouble with them.'
'Any heads broken?'
'No, sir, I was careful of that. I sent the landlord downstairs first,
as he was a fat man and not likely to hurt himself, and the shabby
gentleman went down on top of him quite comfortably, so he did not
hurt himself either. I was very careful, sir, being in a foreign
country.'
'What happened next? They didn't come upstairs again and throw you
out, I suppose.'
'No, sir. They went and got two of these German policemen with swords,
and broke into the room, and told me we must move at once. I didn't
like to resist the police, sir. It's sometimes serious. The German
gentleman wanted them to arrest me, so I offered to pay any fine there
was for having been hasty, and we settled for two sovereigns, which I
thought dear, sir, and I'd have gone to the police station rather than
pay it, only I knew you'd need my services in this heathen town, sir.
I'm highly relieved to know that you approve of that, sir. But they
said we must turn out directly, just the same, so I re-packed your
things and got a porter, and he's standing over the luggage in the
street, waiting for orders.'
'Stemp,' said Mr. Van Torp, 'I'd been whistling myself, before you
came in, and the lunatic in the next room had already been fussing
about it. It's my fault.'
'Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.'
'And it will be my fault if we have to sleep in a cab to-night.'
The door opened while he was speaking, and Margaret heard the last
words as she entered the room.
'I'm sorry,' she said, 'I thought you had finished. I could not help
hearing what you said about sleeping in a cab. That's nonsense, you
know.'
'Well,' said Mr. Van Torp, 'they've just turned us out of the one room
we had because I whistled _Parsifal_ out of tune.'
'You didn't whistle it out of tune,' Margaret answered, to Stemp's
great but well-concealed astonishment. 'I know better. Please have
your things brought here at once.'
'Here?' repeated Mr. Van Torp, surprised in his turn.
'Yes,' she answered, in a tone that forestalled contradiction. 'If
nothing else can be had you shall have this room. I can do without
it.'
'You're kindness itself, but I couldn't do that,' said Mr. Van Torp.
'Bring our things to this hotel, anyway, Stemp, and we'll see what
happens.'
'Yes, sir.'
Stemp disappeared at once, and his master turned to Margaret again.
'Nothing will induce me to put you to such inconvenience,' he said,
and his tone was quite as decided as hers had been.
She smiled.
'Nothing will induce me to let a friend of mine be driven from pillar
to post for a lodging while I have plenty of room to spare!'
'You're very, very kind, but----'
'But the mouse may turn into a tiger if you contradict it,' she said
with a light laugh that thrilled him with delight. 'I remember your
description of the Tartar girl!'
'Well, then, I suppose the hyæna will have to turn into a small woolly
lamb if you tell him to,' answered Mr. Van Torp.
'Yes,' laughed Margaret. 'Be a small, woolly lamb at once, please, a
very small one!'
'Knee-high to a kitten; certainly,' replied the millionaire
submissively.
'Very well. I'll take you with me to hear _Parsifal_ to-morrow, if you
obey. I've just asked Mrs. Rushmore if it makes any difference to
her, and she has confessed that she would rather not go again, for it
tires her dreadfully and gives her a headache. You shall have her
seat. What is it? Don't you want to go with me?'
[Illustration: "Margaret gazed at him in surprise while she might have
counted ten."]
Mr. Van Torp's face had hardened till it looked like a mask, he stared
firmly at the wall, and his lips were set tightly together. Margaret
gazed at him in surprise while she might have counted ten. Then he
spoke slowly, with evident effort, and in an odd voice.
'Excuse me, Miss Donne,' he said, snapping his words out. 'I'm so
grateful that I can't speak, that's all. It'll be all right in a
second.'
A huge emotion had got hold of him. She saw the red flush rise
suddenly above his collar, and then sink back before it reached his
cheeks, and all at once he was very pale. But not a muscle of his face
moved, not a line was drawn; only his sandy eyelashes quivered a
little. His hands were thrust deep into the pockets of his jacket, but
the fingers were motionless.
Margaret remembered how he had told her more than once that she was
the only woman the world held for him, and she had thought it was
nonsense, rather vulgarly and clumsily expressed by a man who was not
much better than an animal where women were concerned.
It flashed upon her at last that what he had said was literally true,
that she had misjudged an extraordinary man altogether, as many people
did, and that she was indeed the only woman in the whole world who
could master and dominate one whom many feared and hated, and whom
she had herself once detested beyond words.
He was unchanging, too, whatever else he might be, and, as she
admitted the fact, she saw clearly how fickle she had been in her own
likes and dislikes, except where her art was concerned. But even as to
that, she had passed through phases in which she had been foolish
enough to think of giving up the stage in the first flush of her vast
success.
While these thoughts were disturbing her a little, Mr. Van Torp
recovered himself; his features relaxed, his hands came out of his
pockets, and he slowly turned towards her.
'I hope you don't think me rude,' he said awkwardly. 'I feel things a
good deal sometimes, though people mightn't believe it.'
They were still standing near together, and not far from the door
through which Margaret had entered.
'It's never rude to be grateful, even for small things,' she answered
gently.
She left his side, and went again to the window, where she stood and
turned from him, looking out. He waited where he was, glad of the
moments of silence. As for her, she was struggling against a generous
impulse, because she was afraid that he might misunderstand her if she
gave way to it. But, to do her justice, she had never had much
strength to resist her own instinctive generosity when it moved her.
'Lady Maud told me long ago that I was mistaken about you,' she said
at last, without looking at him. 'She was right and I was quite
wrong. I'm sorry. Don't bear me any grudge. You won't, will you?'
She turned now, rather suddenly, and found him looking at her with a
sort of hunger in his eyes that disappeared almost as soon as hers met
them.
'No,' he answered, 'I don't bear you any grudge, I never did, and I
don't see how I ever could. I could tell you why, but I won't, because
you probably know, and it's no use to repeat what once displeased
you.'
'Thank you,' said Margaret, she scarcely knew why.
Her handsome head was a little bent, and her eyes were turned to the
floor as she passed him going to the door.
'I'm going to see the manager of the hotel,' she said. I'll be back
directly.'
'No, no! Please let me----'
But she was gone, the door was shut again, and Mr. Van Torp was left
to his own very happy reflections for a while.
Not for long, however. He was still standing before the table staring
at the corn-flowers and poppies without consciously seeing them when
he was aware of the imposing presence of Mrs. Rushmore, who had
entered softly during his reverie and was almost at his elbow.
'This is Mr. Van Torp, I presume,' she said gravely, inclining her
head. 'I am Mrs. Rushmore. You have perhaps heard Miss Donne speak of
me.'
'I'm very pleased to meet you, Mrs. Rushmore,' said the American,
bowing low. 'I've often heard Miss Donne speak of you with the
greatest gratitude and affection.'
'Certainly,' Mrs. Rushmore answered with gravity, and as she
established herself on the sofa she indicated a chair not far from
her.
It was only proper that Margaret should always speak of her with
affection and gratitude. Mr. Van Torp sat down on the chair to which
she had directed rather than invited him; and he prepared to be bored
to the full extent of the bearable. He had known the late Mr. Rushmore
in business; Mr. Rushmore had been a 'pillar' of various things,
including honesty, society, and the church he went to, and he had
always bored Mr. Van Torp extremely. The least that could be expected
was that the widow of such an estimable man should carry on the
traditions of her deeply lamented husband. In order to help her
politely to what seemed the inevitable, Mr. Van Torp mentioned him.
'I had the pleasure of knowing Mr. Rushmore,' he said in the proper
tone of mournfully retrospective admiration. 'He was sincerely
lamented by all our business men.'
'He was,' assented the widow, as she would have said Amen in church,
in the right place, and with much the same solemn intonation.
There was a moment's pause, during which the millionaire was trying to
think of something else she might like to hear, for she was Margaret's
friend, and he wished to make a good impression. He was therefore not
prepared to hear her speak again before he did, much less for the
subject of conversation she introduced at once.
'You know our friend Monsieur Logotheti, I believe?' she inquired
suddenly.
'Why, certainly,' answered Van Torp, brightening at once at the
mention of his rival, and at once also putting on his moral armour of
caution. 'I know him quite well.'
'Indeed? Have you known many Greeks, may I ask?'
'I've met one or two in business, Mrs. Rushmore, but I can't say I've
known any as well as Mr. Logotheti.'
'You may think it strange that I should ask you about him at our first
meeting,' said the good lady, 'but I'm an American, and I cannot help
feeling that a fellow-countryman's opinion of a foreigner is very
valuable. You are, I understand, an old friend of Miss Donne's, though
I have not had the pleasure of meeting you before, and you have
probably heard that she has made up her mind to marry Monsieur
Logotheti. I am bound to confess, as her dear mother's oldest friend,
that I am very apprehensive of the consequences. I have the gravest
apprehensions, Mr. Van Torp.'
'Have you really?' asked the millionaire with caution, but
sympathetically. 'I wonder why!'
'A Greek!' said Mrs. Rushmore sadly. 'Think of a Greek!'
Mr. Van Torp, who was not without a sense of humour, was inclined to
answer that, in fact, he was thinking of a Greek at that very moment.
But he abstained.
'There are Greeks and Greeks, Mrs. Rushmore,' he answered wisely.
'That is true,' answered the lady, 'but I should like your opinion, as
one of our most prominent men of business--as one who, if I may say
so, has of late triumphantly established his claim to respect.' Mr.
Van Torp bowed and waved his hand in acknowledgment of this high
praise. 'I should like your opinion about this--er--this Greek
gentleman whom my young friend insists upon marrying.'
'Really, Mrs. Rushmore----'
'Because if I thought there was unhappiness in store for her I would
save her, if I had to marry the man myself!'
Mr. Van Torp wondered how she would accomplish such a feat.
'Indeed?' he said very gravely.
'I mean it,' answered Mrs. Rushmore.
There was a moment's silence, during which Mr. Van Torp revolved
something in his always active brain, while Mrs. Rushmore looked at
him as if she expected that he would doubt her determination to drag
Logotheti to the matrimonial altar and marry him by sheer strength,
rather than let Margaret be his unhappy bride. But Mr. Van Torp said
something quite different.
'May I speak quite frankly, though we hardly know each other?' he
asked.
'We are both Americans,' answered the good lady, with a grand national
air. 'I should not expect anything but perfect frankness of you.'
'The truth is, Mrs. Rushmore, that ever since I had the pleasure of
knowing Miss Donne, I have wanted to marry her myself.'
'You!' cried the lady, surprised beyond measure, but greatly pleased.
'Yes,' said Mr. Van Torp quietly, 'and therefore, in my position, I
can't give you an unbiassed opinion about Mr. Logotheti. I really
can't.'
'Well,' said Mrs. Rushmore, 'I am surprised!'
While she was still surprised Mr. Van Torp tried to make some running,
and asked an important question.
'May I ask whether, as Miss Donne's oldest friend, you would look
favourably on my proposal, supposing she were free?'
Before Mrs. Rushmore could answer, the door opened suddenly, and she
could only answer by an energetic nod and a look which meant that she
wished Mr. Van Torp success with all her excellent heart.
'It's quite settled!' Margaret cried as she entered. 'I've brought the
director to his senses, and you are to have the rooms they were
keeping for a Russian prince who has not turned up!'