PERDITA'S TALISMAN
Perdita Hepworth had entered the room, with Eugene Gresham just a step
or two behind her, and, after a glance in the direction of Maud Carmine
and her husband, had moved toward the little group on the balcony.
Gresham was used to any amount of attention and admiration, but the
adulatory interest which he may have merited and had, in fact, grown to
regard as his due, was always conspicuously lacking when he appeared
with Perdita.
"The picture gallery is the chosen spot," she announced as if bearing
some intelligence for which they had long been waiting, "and the
sittings are to be begun at once. I remember when I first knew Maud
Carmine, she said to me, 'Fancy what it must be like to have your
portrait painted by Eugene Gresham!'" Her low laughter rang with a sort
of triumphant amusement. "'Dear child,' I answered, 'I have had my
portrait painted by him so many times that there would be no novelty
whatever in the experience.' You know," to Mrs. Hewston, who looked
faintly puzzled, "'Gene and I have always known each other." She looked
over at Gresham who was seated on the arm of a chair talking to Maud
Carmine and Hepworth. "Has Maud been playing for Cresswell?" she asked
suddenly. "He is so fond of her music."
"Yes, she has been playing delightfully," answered Mrs. Wilstead, "and
she looks charming to-night. Maud who was always regarded as an ugly
duckling has suddenly become a swan."
"Ah, why not?" said Perdita carelessly. "Maud hadn't the faintest idea
how to make the most of herself. She gave the effect of hard lines and
angles, and hair and eyes and skin all cut from the same piece, a dingy
dust color. Like every other woman of that type she has a perfect
passion for mustard colors and hard grays. Ugh!" she shivered. "The only
thing to do with Maud was to make her realize that she must look odd and
mysterious, you know. That was all. Oh, she is beckoning to me. They
want something."
She crossed the room with that grace of bearing which nature had
bestowed upon her and with the added poise and assurance gained within
the last two years. She still gave the effect of extreme simplicity in
dress but it was retained as by a miracle, for although she wore no
jewels her white gown was of the most exquisite and costly lace. But her
head was undeniably carried a trifle higher than usual, and a very close
observer might have read boredom in her eyes, defiance in her chin,
rebellion in her shoulders. As she turned from the little group on the
balcony, she bit her lip irritably, before she again composed her
features to the conventional smile of hostess-like cordiality.
Alice Wilstead followed her with puzzled eyes.
"It is very difficult to understand a beauty," she said plaintively to
Martin.
"Put it more correctly," as he blew a cloud of smoke. "Say, it's
difficult to understand a woman."
"But I do not find it so," she smiled. "I'm one myself. I'm on to all
our various vagaries, but Dita Hepworth puzzles me. Look at this house.
There are effects here in decoration, so beautiful and unusual that
every one says Eugene Gresham directed them. I know he did not. Look at
Maud Carmine, and yet Dita herself usually wears the plainest of gowns."
"I must confess," said Martin, "that I do not follow you."
"Perhaps not," she mused, then with more animation. "Come, Wallace, tell
me exactly how she impresses you."
"That is easy," he replied. "She is one of the prettiest women I ever
saw in my life."
"Ah, of course," in annoyance, "but I didn't mean that. That is no
impression of character."
"Mm," he pondered. "It isn't much of one, no."
Alice leaned back in her chair. "I seem to discern depths in her that
the rest of you refuse to see. You stop at her beauty and are content
with never a peep beneath the surface."
Martin tossed his cigarette over the railing into the garden. "Frankly,
I think that you are searching for something that isn't there," he said
abruptly. "The gods never bestow all their gifts on one person. Since
you profess to know your own self so well you should realize that women
so very pretty as Mrs. Hepworth are rarely clever. Why should they be?
It is enough of an excuse for existence that they are beautiful."
"It is indeed," growled Hewston, who had been absorbed in sulky
meditation for some time. "I'd be contented if I thought she had enough
head on her shoulders to keep straight and not involve good old Hepworth
in God knows what."
Wallace laughed. "I'll lay you a wager, Mrs. Wilstead," he whispered,
tapping her fan with his finger-tips, "that the way things are going now
there will be a split in the Hepworth household within three months."
"Do not say it," she cried quickly. "I can not bear to think of such a
thing."
"I'll give you heavy odds, too," he went on cynically, leaning forward
to regard the group at the piano. "I'll make it a bracelet against a box
of cigars, provided I'm allowed to choose the brand of cigars."
"You might as well put in another provision then," she retorted,
"provided I am allowed to choose the bracelet. My taste in ornaments,
dear Wallace, is both unique and expensive. I like only odd jewelry."
"Odd jewelry! That is an old fad of yours, Alice," said Hepworth's voice
behind her.
She started slightly, she had not noticed his approach. "And your own,"
she smiled up at him. "Have you secured any new amulets lately,
Cresswell?"
"Yes, one. It is a beauty, a scarab. I must show it to you; also
another, a carved bloodstone set in very curiously wrought iron. I got
that from a Gipsy woman. It is an old Romany talisman."
"Do let us see them," pleaded Mrs. Hewston.
"Certainly, I shall be delighted to. Excuse me a few moments. I will get
the box myself. Naturally I would not trust it to the servants." He
smiled at his weakness.
"Naturally," said Hewston. "Come, let us all get into the drawing-room
to look at them. It is beginning to rain anyway."
It was only a few moments before Hepworth returned bearing a large,
black leather box. He placed it on a table just under the light and then
choosing a key from a ring, fitted it into the lock.
"I hold one key," he said to the group pressing about him as he lifted
the lid, "and Perdita the other. That is in case she may want to wear
any of these trinkets."
Alice Wilstead had been looking at Mrs. Hepworth at the moment her
husband entered the room and she alone had noticed that Dita started
violently when her eyes had fallen on the box and that all the rich
color had fled her cheek, leaving her, for a second or two, white as a
ghost.
The box held a series of trays, each padded and velvet lined and upon
these were fastened Cresswell Hepworth's noted collection of amulets.
Most of these talismans were very ancient, many of them revealed the
most beautiful workmanship. All of them were distinctive. Each one,
almost without exception, had a history, strange, romantic or sinister,
and these were all duly catalogued, but it was never necessary for
Hepworth to refer to this written history. He had not only the symbolic
significance of his favorite toys, but also the vicissitudes through
which they had passed, at his finger ends.
The top trays held scarabs, one of the most remarkable collections of
them extant, commemorating certain mighty and fallen dynasties; or this
reign or that of remote Egyptian rulers long crumbled to dust, and
Hepworth lifted them lovingly from their trays and turning them deftly
in his fingers explained their histories and expatiated on their beauty.
Beneath the scarabs lay the jade talismans exquisitely carved and handed
down from distant centuries. The hearts that had once beat beneath them
had long been dust, but the talismans, with no stain of time upon them
to dim their luster, would still serve as emblems of good luck to future
generations. Then there were quaint amber charms preserving the warmth
and flooding radiance of the sunlight that sparkles on sea foam in their
depths, and opals delicately clouded with mystery, their "hearts of fire
bedreamed in haze," carbuncles, jasper and hyacinth, all in their time
the almost priceless possessions of their owners because of the mystic
significance attaching to them. And then there were trays containing a
somewhat heterogeneous collection of old pieces of beaten silver and
iron with odd characters on them, representing periods of even greater
antiquity than scarab or jade.
These amulets were in many instances the memorials of bitter feuds and
hot duels, fought on the moment, at the gleam of a talisman which both
contestants claimed. More than one had been hastily rifled from the
dead, and more than one had been bestowed by a great lady on an untitled
lover of empty purse to aid him in winning fame and fortune.
"By the way, Alice," said Hepworth suddenly, "you have seen Dita's
amulet, have you not? It is almost, if not quite the gem of the
collection."
"No, I have never seen it," Mrs. Wilstead's whole piquant face was alive
with interest. "But I have heard of it. It was through it that you met,
was it not?"
Dita nodded. The color had come back to her face. "It was that old
talisman he was really interested in," she said. "I always tell him he
married me to get it."
Hepworth laughed. "It is well worth any one's interest. It has been in
her family for generations, and there are all sorts of legends and
traditions connected with it. It is said to give his heart's desire to
whomever possesses it, isn't it, Dita?"
"More than that," she replied, a little strangely, or at least so it
seemed to Alice Wilstead. "He to whom it is given--and it can not be
bought or bartered, it must always be bestowed--must sooner or later
reveal himself in his true character, either his baseness or his
nobility."
"Fascinating!" cried the women in chorus. "What is it like?"
"It is a square of crystal set in silver and gold. About the silver is
twined one of those old Celtic chains which can only be seen with a
microscope, where the links are so tiny that we have no instruments
delicate enough to fasten them together and which were believed to have
been made by the fairies. And now for a sight of it."
He was about to lift the next tray, when Dita laid a detaining hand on
his arm. "It isn't there, Cresswell," she said in a quick, low voice.
As if he had not heard her or had not taken in the full import of her
words, he laid the tray carefully upon the table, disclosing the one
beneath. Like the others, it too was full of curious amulets, but one
space was empty. Perdita's talisman was indeed missing.
"Why, Dita!" he exclaimed. "You did not mention to me--"
She shot a quick, unmistakable glance at Gresham. "Didn't I?" she
interrupted before he could go further. "It's being mended."
"Ah, those antique bits, they are always coming to pieces, at least I
know mine are," said Mrs. Wilstead with hasty fluency. "But, Cresswell,
there is still another tray, and I must see its contents before I go
home."
"Make it a month," said Martin in her ear. "I said three, didn't I?"