Mrs. Dan dallied with Bob, displaying all the artifices of an old
campaigner. Of course, she had no idea how easy it might be for her to
learn all she wanted to. She could not know he was like a barrel or
puncheon of information and that all she had to do was to pull the plug
and let information flow out. She regarded Bob more in the light of a
safety vault; the bishop’s interruption had put him on his guard and she
would have to get through those massive outer-doors of his reserve,
before she could force the many smaller doors to various boxes full of
startling facts.
It was a fine tableful of people, of which they were a part. Wealth,
beauty, brains and brawn were all there. An orchestra played somewhere.
Being paid performers you didn’t see them and as distance lends
enchantment to music, on most occasions, the result was admirable.
Delicate orchids everywhere charmed with their hues without exuding that
too obtrusive perfume of commoner flowers. Mrs. Ralston was an orchid
enthusiast and down on the Amazon she kept an orchid-hunter who,
whenever he found a new variety, sent her a cable.
So Mrs. Dan started on orchids with Bob. She hadn’t the slightest
interest in orchids, but she displayed a simulated interest that sounded
almost like real interest. Mrs. Dan hadn’t practised on society, or had
society practise on her, all these years for nothing. She could get that
simulated-interested tone going without any effort. But Bob’s attention
wandered, and he gazed toward Miss Gerald who occupied a place quite a
distance from him.
Mrs. Dan, failing to interest Bob on orchids, now took another tack. She
sailed a conversational course on caviar. Men usually like things to
eat, and to talk about them, especially such caviar as this. But Bob
eyed the almost priceless Malasol as if it were composed of plain,
ordinary fish-eggs. He didn’t even enthuse when he took a sip of Moselle
that matched the Malasol and had more “bouquet” than the flowers. So
Mrs. Dan, again altering her conversational course, sailed merrily
before the wind amid the breeze of general topics and gay light
persiflage. She was at her best now. There wasn’t anything she didn’t
know something about. She talked plays, operas and amusements which
gradually led her up to roof gardens. She took her time, though, before
laying the bowsprit of her desires straight in the real direction she
wished to go. She knew she could proceed cautiously and circumspectly,
that there was no need for hurry; the meal would be fairly prolonged.
Mrs. Ralston’s dinners were elaborate affairs; there might even be a few
professional entertainment features between courses.
“And speaking about roof gardens,” went on Mrs. Dan, looking any way
save at Bob, “I believe you were telling me, only this afternoon, how
you and dear Dan were finally driven to them as a last resort. Poor Dan!
So glad to hear he could get a breath of fresh air in that stuffy old
town! Just hated to think of him confined to some stuffy old office. Men
work too hard in our strenuous, bustling country, don’t you think so?
And then they break down prematurely. I’ve always told Dan,” she rattled
on, “to enjoy himself—innocently, of course.” She paused to take
breath. “Don’t you think men work too hard in America, Mr. Bennett?” she
repeated.
“Sometimes,” said Bob.
She gave him a quick look. Perhaps she was proceeding rather fast,
though Bob didn’t look on his guard. “As I told you, I adore roof
gardens. But you were telling me you men were not alone. What harm!” she
gurgled. “Some people,” talking fast, “are so prudish. I’m sure we’re
not put in the world to be that. Don’t you agree?”
“Of course,” said Bob absently. He didn’t like the way that fellow down
on the other side of the table was gazing into Miss Gwendoline’s eyes.
“I beg your pardon. I—I don’t think I caught that.”
“We were saying there were some wom—ladies with you,” said Mrs. Dan
quickly. Too quickly! She strove to curb her precipitancy. “You
remember? You told me?” Her voice trailed off, as if it were a matter of
little interest.
“Did I?” Bob caught himself up with a jerk. He felt now as if he were a
big fish being angled for, and gazed at her with sudden apprehension.
The lady’s, mien however, was reassuring.
“Of course,” she laughed. “Don’t you remember?”
“I believe I did say something of the kind.” Slowly. He had had to.
“Surely you don’t deny now?” she continued playfully.
“No.” He had not spared himself. He couldn’t spare Dan. The lady’s
manner seemed to say: “_I_ don’t care a little bit.” Anyhow, the evening
in question had passed innocently, if frivolously, enough. No harm would
come to Dan in consequence. And again Bob’s interest floated elsewhere.
He noticed Miss Gwendoline did not seem exactly averse to letting that
fellow by her side gaze into her eyes. Confound the fellow! He had one
of those open honest faces. A likable chap, too! One of the
Olympian-game brand! A weight-putter, or hammer-thrower, or something of
the kind. Bob could have heaved considerable of a sledge himself at that
moment.
“Of course, boys will be boys,” prattled Mrs. Dan at his side, just in
the least stridently. “I suppose you sat down and they just happened
along and sat down, too! You couldn’t very well refuse to let them,
could you? That wouldn’t have been very polite?” She hardly knew what
she was saying herself now. Though a conversational general, on most
occasions, her inward emotion was now running apace. It was almost
beating her judgment in the race. She tried to pull herself together.
“Why, in Paris, doing the sights at the Jardin or the Moulin Rouge, or
the Casino de Paris, every one takes it or them—these chance
acquaintances—as a matter of course. _Pour passer le temps!_ And why
not?” With a shrug and in her sprightliest manner. “So the ladies in
this instance, as you were saying, came right up, too, and—?”
She paused. That was crude—clumsy—even though she rattled it off as if
without thinking. She was losing all her finesse. But again, to her
surprise, the fish took the bait. She did not know Bob’s
predicament—that _he_ couldn’t finesse.
“Yes, they came up,” said Bob reluctantly, though pleased that Mrs. Dan
appeared such a good kind of fellow.
“Show-girls?” asked the lady quickly.
“Well—ah!—two of them were.”
“Two? And what were the others?”
Bob again regarded the lady apprehensively, but her expression was
eminently reassuring. It went with the music, the bright flowers and the
rest of the gay scene. Mrs. Dan’s smile was one of unadulterated
enjoyment; she didn’t seem displeased at all. Must be she wasn’t
displeased! Perhaps she was like some of those model French wives who
aren’t averse at all to having other ladies attentive to their husbands?
Mrs. Dan had lived in Paris and might have acquired with a real accent
an accompanying broad-mindedness of character. That might be what made
the dear old commodore act so happy most of the time, and so juvenile,
too! Mrs. Dan _looked_ broad-minded. She had a broad face and her figure
was broad—very! At the moment she seemed fairly to radiate
broad-mindedness and again Bob felt glad—on the commodore’s account. He
had nothing to feel glad about, himself, with that confounded
hammer-thrower—
“Who were the others, did you say?” repeated Mrs. Dan, in her most
broad-minded tone.
She seemed only talking to make conversation and looked away
unconcernedly as she spoke. Lucky for Dan she was broad-minded—that
they had once been expatriates together! Even if she hadn’t been,
however, Bob would have had to tell the truth.
“Who were the others?” he repeated absently, one eye on Miss Gerald.
“Oh, they were ‘ponies.’”
“‘Ponies,’” said the lady giving a slight start and then recovering. “I
beg your pardon, but—ah—do you happen to be referring to the
horse-show?”
“Not at all,” answered Bob. “The ponies I refer to,” wearily, “are not
equine.” These technical explanations were tiresome. At that moment he
was more concerned with the hammer-thrower, who had evidently just
hurled a witticism at Miss Gerald, for both were laughing. Would that
Bob could have caught the silvery sound of her voice! Would he had been
near enough! Across the table, the little dark thing threw him a few
consolatory glances. He had almost forgotten about her. Miss Dolly’s
temperamental eyes seemed to say “Drink to me only with thine eyes,” and
Bob responded recklessly to the invitation. The little dark thing seemed
the only one on earth who was good to him. He drank to her with his
eyes—without becoming intoxicated. Then she held a glass to her lips
and gazed at him over it. He held one to his and did likewise. He should
have become doubly intoxicated, but he didn’t. He set down his glass
mournfully. Miss Gerald noticed this sentimental little byplay, but what
Bob did was, of course, of no moment to her.
“Ponies, Mr. Bennett? And not equine?” Mrs. Dan with difficulty
succeeded in again riveting Bob’s wandering attention. “Ah, of course!”
Her accents rising frivolously. “How stupid of me!” Gaily. “You mean the
kind that do the dancing in the musical shows.” And Mrs. Dan glanced a
little furtively at her right.
But on that side the good bishop was still expounding earnestly to the
lady he had brought in. He was not in the least interested in what Mrs.
Dan and Bob were saying. He was too much concerned in what he was saying
himself. At Bob’s left sat the young lady who had been his partner at
tennis in the afternoon but she, obviously, took absolutely no interest
in Bob now. He had a vague recollection of having been forced to say
something in her hearing, earlier in the day, that had sounded almost as
bad as his tennis-playing had been. Truth, according to the
philosophers, is beautiful. Only it doesn’t seem to be! This young lady
had turned as much of the back of a bare “cold shoulder” on Bob at the
table as she could. In fact, she made it quite clear Mrs. Dan could have
the young man entirely to herself. So Mrs. Dan and Bob were really as
alone, for confidential conversational purposes, as if they had been
secluded in some retired cozy-corner.
“Two show-girls and two ponies!” Mrs. Dan went on blithely. “That made
one apiece.” With a laugh. “Who got the ponies?”
“Clarence got one.”
“And Dan?”
Bob nodded. He had to, it was in the contract. The lady laughed again
right gaily.
“Dan always did like the turf,” she breathed softly. “So fond of the
track, or anything equine.”
For the moment Bob became again almost suspicious of her, she was _such_
a “good fellow”! And Bob wasn’t revengeful; because he had suffered
himself he didn’t wish the commodore any harm. Of course it would be
rather a ghastly joke on the commodore if Mrs. Dan wasn’t such a “good
fellow” as she seemed. But Bob dismissed that contingency. He was
helpless, anyway. He was no more than a chip in a stream. The current of
Mrs. Dan’s questions carried him along.
“And what did the pony Dan got, look like?”
“I think she had reddish hair.”
“How lurid! I suppose you all had a few ponies with the ponies?”
Jocularly.
“Yes,” said the answering-machine.
“I suppose the ponies had names? They usually do,” she rattled on.
“Yes. They had names, of course.”
“What was Dan’s called?”
The orchestra was playing a little louder now—one of those wild
pieces—a rhapsody!
“Don’t know her real name.”
“Her stage name, then?”
“Not sure of that!” Doubtfully.
“But Dan _must_ have called her something?” With a gay little laugh.
“Yes.” Bob hesitated. In spite of that funereal feeling, he couldn’t
suppress a grin. “He called her Gee-gee.”
“Gee-gee!” almost shrieked the lady. Then she laughed harder than ever.
She was certainly a good actress. At that moment she caught Mrs.
Clarence Van Duzen’s eye; it was coldly questioning.
“And what did the pony Clarence got, look like?” Mrs. Dan had passed the
stage of analyzing or reasoning clearly. She didn’t even ask herself why
Bob wasn’t more evasive. She didn’t want to know whether it was that
“good-fellow” manner on her part that had really deceived him into
unbosoming the truth to her, or whether—well, he had been drinking too
much? He held himself soberly enough, it is true, but there are strong
men who look sober and can walk a chalk line, when they aren’t sober at
all. Bob might belong to that class. She thought she had detected
something on his breath when he passed on the links and he might have
been “hitting it up” pretty hard since, on the side, with some of the
men. In “vino veritas”! But whether “vino,” or denseness on his part,
she was sure of the “veritas.” Instinct told her she had heard the
truth.
“And Clarence’s pony—did she have red hair, too?” She put the question
in a different way, for Bob was hesitating again.
“No.”
“What was its hue?”
“Peroxide, I guess.” Gloomily.
“Is that all you remember?” Mrs. Dan now was plying questions
recklessly, regardlessly, as if Bob were on the witness-stand and she
were state prosecutor.
“About all. Oh!—her nose turned up and she had a freckle.”
“How interesting!” Mrs. Dan’s laugh was rather forced, and she and Mrs.
Clarence again exchanged glances, but Bob didn’t notice. “And what was
she called?” Breathing a little hard.
“Gid-up,” said Bob gravely.
“‘Gid-up’!” Again the lady almost had a paroxysm, but whether or not of
mirth, who shall say. “Gee-gee and Gid-up!” Her broad bosom rose and
fell.
“Telegram, sir!” At that moment Bob heard another voice at his elbow.
Across the table the man with the monocle was gazing at him curiously.