THE MORNING AFTER
RAY BENNETT woke with a groan. His temples were splitting, his tongue
was parched and dry. When he tried to lift his aching head from the
pillow he groaned again, but with an effort of will succeeded in
dragging himself from the bed and staggering to the window. He pushed
open a leaded casement and looked out upon the green of Hyde Park, and
all the time his temples throbbed painfully.
Pouring a glass of water from a carafe, he drank greedily, and, sitting
down on the edge of the bed, his head between his hands, he tried to
think. Only dimly did he recall the events of the night before, but he
was conscious that something dreadful had happened. Slowly his mind
started to sort out his experiences, and with a sinking heart he
remembered he had struck his father! He shuddered at the recollection,
and then began a frantic mental search for justification. The vanity of
youth does not readily reject excuses for its own excesses, and Ray was
no exception. By the time he had had his bath and was in the first
stages of dressing, he had come to the conclusion that he had been very
badly treated. It was unpardonable in him to strike his father—he must
write to him expressing his sorrow and urging his condition as a reason
for the act. It would not be a crawling letter (he told himself) but
something dignified and a little distant. After all, these quarrels
occurred in every family. Parents were temporarily estranged from their
children, and were eventually reconciled. Some day he would go to his
father a rich man. . . .
He pursed his lips uneasily. A rich man? He was well off now. He had an
expensive flat. Every week crisp new banknotes came by registered post.
He had the loan of a car—how long would this state of affairs continue?
He was no fool. Not perhaps as clever as he thought he was, but no fool.
Why should the Japanese or any other Government pay him for information
they could get from any handbook available to all and purchasable for a
few shillings at most booksellers?
He dismissed the thought—he had the gift of putting out of his mind
those matters which troubled him. Opening the door which led into his
dining-room, he stood stock-still, paralysed with astonishment.
Ella was sitting at the open window, her elbow on the ledge, her chin in
her hand. She looked pale, and there were heavy shadows under her eyes.
“Why, Ella, what on earth are you doing here?” he asked. “How did you
get in?”
“The porter opened the door with his pass-key when I told him I was your
sister,” she said listlessly. “I came early this morning. Oh,
Ray—aren’t you . . . aren’t you ashamed?”
He scowled.
“Why should I be?” he asked loudly. “Father ought to have known better
than tackle me when I was lit up! Of course, it was an awful thing to
do, but I wasn’t responsible for my actions at the time. What did he
say?” he asked uncomfortably.
“Nothing—he said nothing. I wish he had. Won’t you go to Horsham and
see him, Ray?”
“No—let it blow over for a day or two,” he said hastily. He most
assuredly had no anxiety to meet his father. “If . . . if he forgives me
he’ll only want me to come back and chuck this life. He had no right to
make me look little before all those people. I suppose you’ve been to
see your friend Gordon?” he sneered.
“No,” she said simply, “I have been nowhere but here. I came up by the
workmen’s train. Would it be a dreadful sacrifice, Ray, to give up
this?”
He made an impatient gesture.
“It isn’t—this, my dear Ella, if by ‘this’ you mean the flat. It is my
work that you and father want me to give up. I have to live up to my
position.”
“What is your work?” she asked.
“You wouldn’t understand,” he said loftily, and her lips twitched.
“It would have to be very extraordinary if I could not understand it,”
she said. “Is it Secret Service work?”
Ray went red.
“I suppose Gordon has been talking to you,” he complained bitterly. “If
that fellow sticks his nose into my affairs he is going to have it
pulled!”
“Why shouldn’t he?” she asked.
This was a new tone in her, and one that made him stare at her. Ella had
always been the indulgent, approving, excusing sister. The buffer who
stood between him and his father’s reproof.
“Why shouldn’t he?” she repeated. “Mr. Gordon should know something of
Secret Service work—he himself is an officer of the law. You are either
working lawfully, in which case it doesn’t matter what he knows, or
unlawfully, and the fact that he knows should make a difference to you.”
He looked at her searchingly.
“Why are you so interested in Gordon—are you in love with him?” he
asked.
Her steady eyes did not waver, and only the faintest tinge of pink came
to the skin that sleeplessness had paled.
“That is the kind of question that a gentleman does not ask in such a
tone,” she said quietly, “not even of his sister. Ray, you are coming
back to daddy, aren’t you—to-day?”
He shook his head.
“No. I’m not. I’m going to write to him. I admit I did wrong. I shall
tell him so in my letter. I can’t do more than that.”
There came a discreet knock on the door.
“Come in,” growled Ray. It was his servant, a man who came by the day.
“Will you see Miss Bassano and Mr. Brady, sir?” he asked in a hoarse
whisper, and glanced significantly at Ella.
“Of course he’ll see me,” said a voice outside. “Why all this
formality—oh, I see.”
Lola Bassano’s eyes fell upon the girl seated by the window.
“This is my sister—Ella, this is Miss Bassano and Mr. Brady.”
Ella looked at the petite figure in the doorway, and, looking, could
only admire. It was the first time they had met face to face, and she
thought Lola was lovely.
“Glad to meet you, Miss Bennett. I suppose you’ve come up to roast this
brother of yours for his disgraceful conduct last night. Boy, you were
certainly mad! It _was_ your father, Miss Bennett?”
Ella nodded, and heard with gratitude the sympathetic click of Lew
Brady’s lips.
“If I’d been near you, Ray, I’d have beaten you. Too bad, Miss Bennett.”
A strange coldness came suddenly to the girl—and a second before she
had glowed to their sympathy. It was the suspicion of their insincerity
that chilled her. Their kindness was just a little too glib and too
ready. Brady’s just a little too overpowering.
“Do you like your brother’s flat?” asked Lola, sitting down and
stretching her silk-covered legs to a patch of sunlight.
“It is very—handsome,” said Ella. “He will find Horsham rather dull
when he comes back.”
“Will he go back?” Lola flashed a smile at the youth as she asked the
question.
“Not much I won’t,” said Ray energetically. “I’ve been trying to make
Ella understand that my business is too important to leave.”
Lola nodded, and now the antagonism which Ella in her charity was
holding back came with a rush.
“What is the business?” she asked.
He went on to give her a vague and cautious exposition of his work, and
she listened without comment.
“So if you think that I’m doing anything crooked, or have friends that
aren’t as straight as you and father are, get the idea out of your head.
I’m not afraid of Gordon or Elk or any of that lot. Don’t think I am.
Nor is Brady, nor Miss Bassano. Gordon is one of those cheap detectives
who has got his ideas out of books.”
“That’s perfectly true, Miss Bennett,” said Lew virtuously. “Gordon is
just a bit too clever. He’s got the idea that everybody but himself is
crook. Why, he sent Elk down to cross-examine your own father! Believe
me, I’m not scared of Gordon, or any——”
_Tap . . . tap . . . tappity . . . tap._
The taps were on the door, slow, deliberate, unmistakable. The effect on
Lew Brady was remarkable. His big body seemed to shrink, his puffed face
grew suddenly hollow.
_Tap . . . tap . . . tappity . . . tap._
The hand that went up to Brady’s mouth was trembling. Ella looked from
the man to Lola, and she saw, to her amazement, that Lola had grown pale
under her rouge. Brady stumbled to the door, and the sound of his heavy
breathing sounded loud in the silence.
“Come in,” he muttered, and flung the door wide open.
It was Dick Gordon who entered.
He looked from one to the other, laughter in his eyes.
“The old Frog tap seems to frighten some of you,” he said pleasantly.