Margaret knew by this time that Logotheti was really very much in love;
she was equally sure that she was not, and that when she encouraged him
she was yielding to a rather complicated temptation that presented
elements of amusement and of mild danger. In plain English, she was
playing with the man, though she guessed that he was not the kind of
man who would allow himself to be played with very long.
There are not many young women who could resist such a temptation under
the circumstances, and small blame to them. Margaret had done nothing
to attract the Greek and was too unsophisticated to understand the
nature of her involuntary influence over him. He was still young, he
was unlike other men and he was enormously rich; a little familiarity
with him had taught her that there was nothing vulgar about him below
the surface, and he treated her with all the respect she could exact
when she chose to put herself in his power. The consequence was that as
she felt nothing herself she sometimes could not resist making little
experiments, just to see how far he would run on the chain by which she
held him. Besides, she was flattered by his devotion.
It was not a noble game that she was playing with him, but in real life
very few young men and women of two-and-twenty are 'noble' all the
time. A good many never are at all; and Margaret had at least the
excuse that the victim of her charms was no simple sensitive soul with
morbid instincts of suicide, like the poor youth who cut his throat for
Lady Clara Vere de Vere, but a healthy millionaire of five-and-thirty
who enjoyed the reputation of having seen everything and done most
things in a not particularly well-spent life.
Besides, she ran a risk, and knew it. The victim might turn at any
moment, and perhaps rend her. Sometimes there was a quick glance in the
almond-shaped eyes which sent a little thrill of not altogether
unpleasant fear through her. She had seen a woman put her head into a
wild beast's mouth, and she knew that the woman was never quite sure of
getting it out again. That was part of the game, and the woman probably
enjoyed the sensation and the doubt, since playing for one's life is
much more exciting than playing for one's money. Margaret began to
understand the lion-tamer's sensations, and not being timid she almost
wished that her lion would show his teeth. She gave herself the luxury
of wondering what form his wrath would take when he was tired of being
played with.
He was already approaching that point, on the day when Lushington was
looking out for him on the road through the Fausses Reposes woods. When
they were well away from the city, he slackened his speed as usual and
began to talk.
'I wish,' he said, 'that you would sometimes be in earnest. Won't you
try?'
'You might not like it,' Margaret answered, carelessly. 'For my part, I
sometimes wish that you were not quite so much in earnest yourself!'
'Do I bore you?'
'No. You never bore me, but you make me feel wicked, and that is very
disagreeable. It is inconsiderate of you to give me the impression that
I am a sort of Lorelei, coolly luring you to your destruction! Besides,
you would not be so easily destroyed, after all. You are able to take
care of yourself, I fancy.'
'Yes. I think my heart will be the last of me to break.' He laughed and
looked at her. 'But that is no reason why you should try to twist my
arms and legs off, as boys do to beetles.'
'I wish I could catch a boy doing it!'
'You may catch a woman at it any day. They do to men what boys do to
insects. Cruelty to insects or animals? Abominable! Shocking! There is
the society, there are fines, there is prison, to punish it! Cruelty to
human beings? Bah! They have souls! What does it matter, if they
suffer? Suffering purifies the spirit for a better life!'
'Nonsense!'
'That is easily said. But it was on that principle that Philip burned
the Jews, and they did not think it was nonsense. The beetles don't
think it funny to be pulled to pieces, either. I don't. A large class
of us don't, and yet you women have been doing it ever since Eve made a
fool and a sinner of the only man who happened to be in the world just
then. He was her husband, which was an excuse, but that's of no
consequence to the argument.'
'Perhaps not, but the argument, as you call it, doesn't prove anything
in particular, except that you are calling me names!' Margaret laughed
again. 'After all,' she went on, 'I do the best I can to be--what shall
I say?--the contrary of disagreeable! You ask me to let you take me to
my rehearsals, and I come day after day, risking something, because you
are disguised. I don't risk much, perhaps--Mrs. Rushmore's disapproval.
But that is something, for she has been very, very good to me and I
wouldn't lose her good opinion for a great deal. And you ask me to
lunch with you, and I come--at least, I've been twice to your house,
and I've lunched once. Really, if you are not satisfied, you're hard to
please! We've hardly known each other a month.'
'During which time I've never had but one idea. Don't raise your
beautiful eyebrows as if you didn't understand!' He spoke very gently
and smiled, though she could not see that.
'You've no idea how funny that is!' laughed Margaret.
'What?'
'If you could see yourself, and hear yourself at the same time! With
those goggles, and your leather cap and all the rest, you look like the
Frog Footman in _Little Alice_--or the dragon in _Siegfried_!
It does very well as long as you are disagreeable, but when you speak
softly and throw intense expression into your voice'--she mimicked his
tone--'it's really too funny, you know! It's just as if Fafnir were to
begin singing "Una furtiva lacrima" in a voice like Caruso's! Siegfried
would go into convulsions of laughter, instead of slitting the dragon's
throat.'
'I wasn't trying to be picturesque just then,' answered Logotheti,
quite unmoved by the chaff. 'I was only expressing my idea. I've known
you about a month. The second time we met, I asked you to marry me, and
I've asked you several times since. As you can't attribute any
interested motive to my determination----'
'Eh?'
'I said, to my determination----'
'Determination? How that sounds!'
'It sounds very like what I mean,' answered Logotheti, in an
indifferent tone.
'But really, how can you "determine" to marry me, if I won't agree?'
'I'll make you,' he replied with perfect calm.
'That sounds like a threat,' said Margaret, her voice hardening a
little, though she tried to speak lightly.
'A threat implies that the thing to be done to the person threatened is
painful or at least disagreeable. Doesn't it? I'm only a Greek, of
course, and I don't pretend to know English well! I wish you would
sometimes correct my mistakes. It would be so kind of you!'
'You know English quite as well as I do,' Margaret answered. 'Your
definition is perfect.'
'Oh! Then would it be painful, or disagreeable to you, to marry me?'
Margaret laughed, but hesitated a moment.
'It's always disagreeable to be made to do anything against one's
will,' she answered.
'I'm sorry,' said Logotheti coolly, 'but it can't be helped.'
She was not quite sure how it would be best to meet this uncompromising
statement, and she thought it wiser to laugh again, though she felt
quite sure that at the moment there was that quick gleam in his eyes,
behind the goggles, which had more than once frightened her a little.
But he was looking at the road again, and a moment later he had put the
car at full speed along a level stretch. That meant that the
conversation was at an end for a little while. Then an accident
happened.
A straight rush up an easy incline towards a turning ahead, and the
deep note of the horn; round the corner to the right, close in; the
flash of a bicycle coming down on the wrong side, and swerving
desperately; a little brittle smashing of steel; then a man sprawling
on his face in the road as the motor car flew on.
Logotheti kept his eyes on the road, one hand went down to the levers
and the machine sprang forward at forty miles an hour.
'Stop!' cried Margaret. 'Stop! you've killed him!'
Full speed. Fifty miles an hour now, on another level stretch beyond
the turn. No sign of intelligence from Logotheti. Both hands on the
wheel.
'Stop, I say!' Margaret's voice rang out clear and furious.
Logotheti's hands did not move. Margaret knew what to do. She had often
been in motor cars and had driven a little herself. She was strong and
perfectly fearless. Before Logotheti saw what she was going to do, she
was beside him, she had thrown herself across him and had got at the
brake and levers. He was too much surprised to make any resistance; he
probably would not have tried to hinder her in any case, as he could
not have done so without using his strength. The car was stopped in a
few seconds; he had intuitively steered it until it stood still.
'How ridiculous!' he exclaimed. 'As if one ever stopped for such a
thing!'
Margaret's eyes flashed angrily and her answer came short and sharp.
'Turn back at once,' she said, and she sat down beside him on the front
seat.
He obeyed, for he could do nothing else. In running away from the
accident, he had simply done what most chauffeurs do under the
circumstances. His experience told him that the man was not killed,
though he had lain motionless in the road for a few moments. Logotheti
had seen perfectly well that the car had struck the hind wheel of the
bicycle without touching the man's body. Moreover, the man had been on
the wrong side of the road, and it was his fault that he had been run
into. Logotheti had not meant to give him a chance to make out a case.
But now he turned back, obedient to Margaret's command. Before she had
stopped the car it had run nearly a mile from the scene of the
accident. When it reached the spot again, coming back at a more
moderate pace, nearly five minutes had elapsed. She found the man
leaning against the rail fence that followed the outer curve of the
turning. It was the man they had so often met on the other road, in his
square-toed kid boots and ill-fitting clothes; it was Edmund
Lushington, with his soft student's hat off, and his face a good deal
scratched by the smashing of his tortoise-shell-rimmed spectacles. They
had been tied behind with a black string, and the rims of them, broken
in two, hung from his ears. His nose was bleeding profusely, as he
leaned against the fence, holding his head down. He was covered with
mud, his clothes were torn, and he was as miserable, damaged and
undignified a piece of man as ever dreaded being taken at disadvantage
by the idol of his affections. He would have made a pact with the
powers of evil for a friendly wall or a clump of trees when he saw the
car coming back. There was nothing but the fence.
The car stopped close beside him. He held his handkerchief to his nose,
covering half his face as he looked up.
'Are you hurt, Monsieur?' Margaret asked anxiously in French.
'On the contrary, Mademoiselle,' Lushington answered through the
handkerchief, and it sounded as if he had a bad cold in the head.
'I am afraid----' Margaret began, and then stopped suddenly, staring at
him.
'You were on the wrong side of the road, Monsieur,' said Logotheti in
an assertive tone.
'Perfectly,' assented Lushington, holding his nose and turning half
away.
'Then it was your fault,' observed Logotheti.
'Precisely,' admitted the other. 'Pray don't stop. It's of no
consequence!'
But he had betrayed himself unconsciously, in the most natural way. His
spectacles were gone, and by covering the lower part of his face with
his handkerchief he had entirely concealed the very great change made
by shaving his beard and moustache. While he and Logotheti had been
speaking, Margaret had scrutinised his features and had made sure of
the truth. Then she believed that she would have recognised him by his
voice alone. Between the emotion that followed the accident and the
extreme anxiety his position caused him, the perspiration stood in
beads on his forehead. Margaret smiled maliciously, for she remembered
how often they had passed him on the road, and realised in an instant
that he had disguised himself to watch her doings. He should pay for
that.
'You look hot,' she observed in English, fixing her eyes on him
severely.
He blushed to the roots of his hair, though he had been rather pale.
Logotheti, whose only preoccupation hitherto had been to get away as
soon as possible, now stared at him, too. Margaret's tone and her
sudden change to the use of English did the rest. He recognised
Lushington, but remembered that he himself was completely disguised in
his chauffeur's dress and mask; so he said nothing.
Lushington writhed under Margaret's eyes for a moment; but then his
English courage and coolness suddenly returned, the colour subsided
from his face and his expression hardened, as far as the necessary
handkerchief permitted her to see it.
'Yes,' he said, 'I'm Lushington. I can only repeat that the accident
happened by my fault. I'm used to taking the left side in England and I
lost my head. Monsieur Logotheti need not have run away, for it would
never have occurred to me to make a complaint.'
He looked straight at Logotheti's goggles as he spoke, and Margaret
began to feel uncomfortable.
'I supposed that you had recognised me,' observed the Greek coldly.
'That is, no doubt, why you have taken the trouble to disguise yourself
and watch me of late.'
'That was the reason,' answered Lushington, facing his adversary, but
conscious that the necessity for holding his nose put him at a
disadvantage as to his dignity.
'It was very well done,' said the Greek with gravity. 'I should never
have known you.'
'Your own disguise is admirable,' answered the Englishman, with cool
politeness. 'If I had not seen you without your mask the other day I
should not have recognised you.'
'Shall we go on?' inquired Logotheti, turning to Margaret.
'No,' she answered, rather sharply. 'Are you hurt?' she inquired,
looking at Lushington again.
He was busy with his nose, which he had neglected for a few moments. He
shook his head.
'I won't leave him here in this state,' Margaret said to Logotheti.
The Greek made a gesture of indifference, but said nothing. Meanwhile
Lushington got so far as to be able to speak again.
'Please go on,' he said. 'I can take care of myself, thank you. There
are no bones broken.'
Logotheti inwardly regretted that his adversary had not broken his
neck, but he had tact enough to see that he must take Margaret's side
or risk losing favour in her eyes.
'I really don't see how we can leave you here,' he said to Lushington.
'Your bicycle is smashed. I had not realised that. I'll put what's left
of it into the car.'
He jumped out as he spoke, and before Lushington could hinder him he
had hold of the broken wheel. But Lushington followed quickly, and
while he held his nose with his left hand, he grabbed the bicycle with
the other. It looked as if the two were going to try which could pull
harder.
'Let it alone, please,' said Lushington, speaking with difficulty.
'No, no'! protested Logotheti politely, for he wished to please
Margaret. 'You must really let me put it in.'
'Not at all!' retorted Lushington. 'I'll walk it to Chaville.'
'But I assure you, you can't!' retorted the Greek. 'Your hind wheel is
broken to bits! It won't go round. You would have to carry it!'
And he gently pulled with both hands.
'Then I'll throw the beastly thing away!' answered Lushington, who did
not relinquish his hold. 'It's of no consequence!'
'On the contrary,' objected Logotheti, still pulling, 'I know about
those things. It can be made a very good bicycle again for next to
nothing.'
'All the better for the beggar who finds it!' cried the Englishman.
'Throw it over the fence!'
'You English are so extravagant,' said the Greek in a tone of polite
reproach, but not relinquishing his hold.
'Possibly, but it's my own bicycle, and I prefer to throw it away.'
Margaret had watched the contest in silence. She now stepped out of the
car, came up to the two men and laid her hands on the object of
contention. Logotheti let go instantly, but Lushington did not.
'This is ridiculous,' said Margaret. 'Give it to me!'
Lushington had no choice, and besides, he needed his right hand for his
nose, which was getting the better of him again. He let go, and
Margaret lifted the bicycle into the body of the car herself, though
Logotheti tried to help her.
'Now, get in,' she said to Lushington. 'We'll take you as far at the
Chaville station.'
'Thank you,' he answered. 'I am quite able to walk.'
He presented such a lamentable appearance that he would have hesitated
to get into the car with Margaret even if they had been on good terms.
He was in that state of mind in which a man wishes that he might vanish
into the earth like Korah and his company, or at least take to his
heels without ceremony and run away. Logotheti had put up his glasses
and shield, over the visor of his cap, and was watching his rival's
discomfiture with a polite smile of pity. Lushington mentally compared
him to Judas Iscariot.
'Let me point out,' said the Greek, that if you won't accept a seat
with us, we, on our part, are much too anxious for your safety to leave
you here in the road. You must have been badly shaken, besides being
cut. If you insist upon walking, we'll keep beside you in the car. Then
if you faint, we can pick you up.'
'Yes,' assented Margaret, with a touch of malice, 'that is very
sensible.'
Lushington was almost choking.
'Do let me give you another handkerchief,' said Logotheti,
sympathetically. 'I always carry a supply when I'm motoring--they are
so useful. Yours is quite spoilt.'
A forcible expression rose to Lushington's lips, but he checked it, and
at the same time he wondered whether anybody he knew had ever been
caught in such a detestable situation. But Anglo-Saxons generally
perform their greatest feats of arms when they are driven into a corner
or have launched themselves in some perfectly hopeless undertaking. It
takes a Lucknow or a Balaclava to show what they are really made of.
Lushington was in a corner now; his temper rose and he turned upon his
tormentors. At the same time, perhaps under the influence of his
emotion, his nose stopped bleeding. It was scratched and purple from
the fall, but he found another handkerchief of his own and did what he
could to improve his appearance. His shoulders and his jaw squared
themselves as he began to speak and his eyes were rather hard and
bright.
'Look here,' he said, facing Logotheti, 'we don't owe each other
anything, I think, so this sort of thing had better stop. You've been
going about in disguise with Miss Donne, and I have been making myself
look like some one else in order to watch you. We've found each other
out and I don't fancy that we're likely to be very friendly after this.
So the best thing we can do is to part quietly and go in opposite
directions. Don't you think so?'
The last question was addressed to Margaret. But instead of answering
at once she looked down and pushed some little lumps of dry mud about
with the toe of her shoe, as if she were trying to place them in a
symmetrical figure. It is a trick some young women have when they are
in doubt. Lushington turned to Logotheti again and waited for an
answer.
Now Logotheti did not care a straw for Lushington, and cared very
little, on the whole, whether the latter watched him or not; but he was
extremely anxious to please Margaret and play the part of generosity in
her eyes.
'I'm very sorry if anything I've said has offended you,' he said in a
smooth tone, answering Lushington. 'The fact is, it's all rather funny,
isn't it? Yes, just so! I'm making the best apology I can for having
been a little amused. I hope we part good friends, Mr. Lushington? That
is, if you still insist on walking.'
Margaret looked up while he was speaking and nodded her approbation of
the speech, which was very well conceived and left Lushington no
loophole through which to spy offence. But he responded coldly to the
advance.
'There is no reason whatever for apologising,' he said. 'It's the
instinct of humanity to laugh at a man who tumbles down in the street.
The object of our artificial modern civilisation is, however, to cloak
that sort of instinct as far as possible. Good morning.'
After delivering this Parthian shot he turned away with the evident
intention of going off on foot.
None of the three had noticed the sound of horses' feet and a light
carriage approaching from the direction of Versailles. A phaeton came
along at a smart pace and drew up beside the motor. Margaret uttered an
exclamation of surprise, and the two men stared with something
approaching to horror. It was Mrs. Rushmore, who had presumably taken a
fancy for an airing as the day had turned out very fine. The coachman
and groom had both seen Margaret and supposed that something had
happened to the car.
Before the carriage had stopped Mrs. Rushmore had recognised Margaret
too, and was leaning out sideways, uttering loud exclamations of
anxiety.
'My dear child!' she cried. 'Good heavens! An accident! These dreadful
automobiles! I knew it would happen!'
Portly though she was, she was standing beside Margaret in an instant,
clasping her in a motherly embrace and panting for breath. It was
evidently too late for Logotheti to draw his glasses and shield over
his face, or for Lushington to escape. Each stood stock-still,
wondering how long it would be before Mrs. Rushmore recognised him, and
trying to think what she would say when she did. For one moment, it
seemed as if nothing were going to happen, for Mrs. Rushmore was too
much preoccupied on Margaret's account to take the slightest notice of
either of the others.
'Are you quite sure you're not hurt?' she inquired anxiously, while she
scrutinised Margaret's blushing face. 'Get into the carriage with me at
once, my dear, and we'll drive home. You must go to bed at once!
There's nothing so exhausting as a shock to the nerves! Camomile tea,
my dear! Good old-fashioned camomile tea, you know! There's nothing
like it! Clotilde makes it to perfection, and she shall rub you
thoroughly! Get in, child! Get in!'
Quick to see the advantage of such a sudden escape, Margaret was
actually getting into the carriage, when Mrs. Rushmore, who was
kindness itself, remembered the two men and turned to Logotheti.
'I will leave you my groom to help,' she said, in her stiff French.
Then her eyes fell on Lushington's blood-stained face, and in the same
instant it flashed upon her that the other man was Logotheti. Her jaw
dropped in astonishment.
'Why--good gracious--how's this? Why--it's Monsieur Logotheti himself!
But you'--she turned to Lushington again 'you can't be Mr.
Lushington--good Lord--yes, you are, and in those clothes, too.
And--what have you done to your face?'
As her surprise increased she became speechless, while the two men
bowed and smiled as pleasantly as they could under the circumstances.
'Yes, I'm Lushington,' said the Englishman. 'I used to wear a beard.'
'My chauffeur was taken ill suddenly,' said the Greek without a blush,
'and as Miss Donne was anxious to get home I thought there would be no
great harm if I drove the car out myself. I had hoped to find you in so
that I might explain how it had happened, for, of course, Miss Donne
was a little--what shall I say?--a little----'
He hesitated, having hoped that Margaret would help him out. After
waiting two or three seconds, Mrs. Rushmore turned on her.
'Margaret, what were you?' she asked with severity. 'I insist upon
knowing what you were.'
'I'm sure I don't know,' Margaret answered, trying to speak easily, as
if it did not matter much. 'It was very kind of Monsieur Logotheti, at
all events, and I'm much obliged to him.'
'Oh, and pray, what has happened to Mr. Lushington?' inquired Mrs.
Rushmore.
'I was on the wrong side of the road, and the car knocked me off my
bicycle,' added Lushington. 'They kindly stopped to pick me up. They
thought I was hurt.'
'Well--you are,' said Mrs. Rushmore. 'Why don't you get into the
automobile and let Monsieur Logotheti take you home?'
As it was not easy to explain why he preferred walking in his battered
condition, Lushington said nothing. Mrs. Rushmore turned to her groom,
who was English.
'William,' she said, 'you must have a clothes-brush.'
William had one concealed in some mysterious place under the box.
'Clean Mr. Lushington, William,' said the good lady.
[Illustration: "'Clean Mr. Lushington, William,' said the good lady."]
'Oh, thank you--no--thanks very much,' protested Lushington.
But William, having been told to clean him, proceeded to do so, gently
and systematically, beginning at his neck and proceeding thence with
bold curving strokes of the brush, as if he were grooming a horse.
Instinctively Lushington turned slowly round on his heels, while he
submitted to the operation, and the others looked on. They had ample
time to note the singular cut of his clothes.
'He used to be always so well dressed!' said Mrs. Rushmore to Margaret
in an audible whisper.
Lushington winced visibly, but as he was not supposed to hear the words
he said nothing. William had worked down to the knees of his trousers,
which he grasped firmly in one hand while he vigorously brushed the
cloth with the other.
'That will do, thank you,' said Lushington, trying to draw back one
captive leg.
But William was inexorable and there was no escape from his hold. He
was an Englishman, and was therefore thorough; he was a servant, and he
therefore thoroughly enjoyed the humour of seeing his betters in a
pickle.
'And now, my dear,' said Mrs. Rushmore to Margaret, 'get in and I'll
take you home. You can explain everything on the way. That's enough,
William. Put away your brush.'
Margaret had no choice, since fate had intervened.
'I'm very much obliged to you,' she said, nodding to Logotheti; 'and I
hope you'll be none the worse,' she added, smiling at Lushington.
Mrs. Rushmore bent her head with dignified disapproval, first to one
and then to the other, and got into the carriage as if she were
mounting the steps of a throne. She further manifested her displeasure
at the whole affair by looking straight before her at the buttons on
the back of the coachman's coat after she had taken her seat. Margaret
got in lightly after her and she scarcely glanced at Logotheti as the
carriage turned; but her eyes lingered a little with an expression that
was almost sad as she met Lushington's. She was conscious of a reaction
of feeling; she was sorry that she had helped to make him suffer, that
she had been amused by his damaged condition and by his general
discomfiture. He had made her respect him in spite of herself, just
when she had thought that she could never respect him again; and
suddenly the deep sympathy for him welled up, which she had taken for
love, and which was as near to love as anything her heart had yet felt
for a man.
She knew, too, that it was really her heart, and nothing else, where he
was concerned. She was human, she was young, she was more alive than
ordinary women, as great singers generally are, and Logotheti's
ruthless masculine vitality stirred her and drew her to him in a way
she did not quite like. His presence disturbed her oddly and she was a
little ashamed of liking the sensation, for she knew quite well that
such feelings had nothing to do with what she called her real self. She
might have hated him and even despised him, but she could never have
been indifferent when he was close to her. Sometimes the mere touch of
his hand at meeting or parting thrilled her and made her feel as if she
were going to blush. But she was never really in sympathy with him as
she was with Lushington.
'And now, Margaret,' said Mrs. Rushmore after a silence that had lasted
a full minute, 'I insist on knowing what all this means.'
Margaret inwardly admitted that Mrs. Rushmore had some right to insist,
but she was a little doubtful herself about the meaning of what had
happened. If it meant anything, it meant that she had been flirting
rather rashly and had got into a scrape. She wondered what the two men
were saying now that they were alone together, and she turned her head
to look over the back of the phaeton, but a turn of the road already
hid the motor car from view.
Meanwhile Mrs. Rushmore's face showed that she still insisted, and
Margaret had to say something. As she was a truthful person it was not
easy to decide what to say, and while she was hesitating Mrs. Rushmore
expressed herself again.
'Margaret,' said she, 'I'm surprised at you. It makes no difference
what you say. I'm surprised.'
The words were spoken with a slow and melancholy intonation that might
have indicated anything but astonishment.
'Yes,' Margaret remarked rather desperately, 'I don't wonder. I suppose
I've been flirting outrageously with them both. But I really could not
foresee that one would run over the other and that you would appear
just at that moment, could I? I'm helpless. I've nothing to say. You
must have flirted when you were young. Try to remember what it was
like, and make allowance for human weakness!'
She laughed nervously and glanced nervously at her companion, but Mrs.
Rushmore's face was like iron.
'Mr. Rushmore,' said the latter, alluding to her departed husband,
'would not have understood such conduct.'
Margaret thought this was very probable, judging from the likenesses of
the late Ransom Rushmore which she had seen. There was one in
particular, an engraving of him when he had been president of some big
company, which had always filled her with a vague uneasiness. In her
thoughts she called him the 'commercial missionary,' and was glad for
his sake and her own that he was safe in heaven, with no present
prospect of getting out.
'I'm sorry,' she said, without much contrition. 'I mean,' she went on,
correcting herself, and with more feeling, 'I'm sorry I've done
anything that you don't like, for you've been ever so good to me.'
'So have other people,' answered the elder woman with an air of mystery
and reproof.
'Oh yes! I know! Everybody has been very kind--especially Madame
Bonanni.'
'Should you be surprised to hear that the individual who bought out Mr.
Moon and made you independent, did it from purely personal motives?'
Margaret turned to her quickly in great surprise.
'What do you mean? I thought it was a company. You said so.'
'In business, one man can be a company, if he owns all the stock,' said
Mrs. Rushmore, sententiously.
'I don't understand those things,' Margaret answered, impatient to know
the truth. 'Who was it?'
'I hardly think I ought to tell you, my dear. I promised not to. But I
will allow you to guess. That's quite different from telling, and I
think you ought to know, because you are under great obligations to
him.'
'You don't mean to say----' Margaret stopped, and the blood rose slowly
in her face.
'You may ask me if it was one of those two gentlemen we have just left
in the road,' said Mrs. Rushmore. 'But mind, I'm not telling you!'
'Monsieur Logotheti!' Margaret leaned back and bit her lip.
'You've made the discovery yourself, Margaret. Remember that I've told
you nothing. I promised not to, but I thought you ought to know.'
'It's an outrage!' cried Margaret, breaking out. 'How did you dare to
take money from him for me?'
Mrs. Rushmore seemed really surprised now, though she did not say she
was.
'My dear!' she exclaimed, 'you would not have had me refuse, would you?
Money is money, you know.'
The good lady's inherited respect for the stuff was discernible in her
tone.
'Money!' Margaret repeated the word with profound contempt and a good
deal of anger.
'Yes, my dear,' retorted Mrs. Rushmore severely. 'Yes, money. It is
because your father and mother spoke of it in that silly, contemptuous
way that they died so poor. And now that you've got it, take my advice
and don't turn up your nose at it.'
'Do you suppose I'll keep it, now that I know where it comes from? I'll
give it back to him to-day!'
'No, you won't,' answered Mrs. Rushmore, with the conviction of
certainty.
'I tell you I will!' Margaret cried. 'I could not sleep to-night if I
knew that I had money in my possession that was given me--given me like
a gift--by a man who wants to marry me! Ugh! It's disgusting!'
'Margaret, this is ridiculous. Monsieur Logotheti came to see me and
explained the whole matter. He said that he had made a very good
bargain and expected to realise a large sum by the transaction. Do you
suppose that such a good man of business would think of making any one
a present of a hundred thousand pounds? You must be mad! A hundred
thousand pounds is a great deal of money, Margaret. Remember that.'
'So much the better for him! I shall give it back to him at once!'
Mrs. Rushmore smiled.
'You can't,' she said. 'You've never even asked me where it is, and
while you are out of your mind, I shall certainly not tell you. You
seem to forget that when I undertook to bring suit against Alvah Moon
you gave me a general power of attorney to manage your affairs. I shall
do whatever is best for you.'
'I don't understand business,' Margaret answered, 'but I'm sure you
have no power to force Monsieur Logotheti's money upon me. I won't take
it.'
'You have taken it and I have given a receipt for it, my dear, so it's
of no use to talk nonsense. The best thing you can do is to give up
this silly idea of going on the stage, and just live like a lady, on
your income.'
'And marry my benefactor, I suppose!' Margaret's eyes flashed. 'That's
what he wants--what you all want--to keep me from singing! He thought
that if he made me independent, I would give it up, and you encouraged
him! I see it now. As for the money itself, until I really have it in
my hands it's not mine; but just as soon as it is I'll give it back to
him, and I'll tell him so to-day.'
The carriage rolled through the pretty woods of Fausses Reposes, and
the sweet spring breeze fanned Margaret's cheeks in the shade. But she
felt fever in her blood and her heart beat fast and angrily as if it
were a conscious creature imprisoned in a cage. She was angry with
herself and with every one else, with Logotheti, with Mrs. Rushmore,
with poor Lushington for making such a fool of himself just when she
was prepared to like him better than ever. She was sure that she had
good cause to hate every one, and she hated accordingly, with a good
will. She wished that she might never spend another hour under Mrs.
Rushmore's roof, that she might never see Logotheti again, that she
were launched in her artistic career, free at last and responsible to
no one for her actions, her words or her thoughts.
But Mrs. Rushmore began to think that she had made a mistake in letting
her know too soon who had bought out Alvah Moon, and she wondered
vaguely why she had betrayed the secret, trying to account for her
action on the ground of some reasonably thought-out argument, which was
quite impossible, of course. So they both maintained a rather hostile
silence during the rest of the homeward drive.