IX

"I saw your friend Ronald Morelle today," said Moropulos, sending a

writhing ring of smoke to the ceiling. Sprawling on a big morris

chair, his slippered feet resting on the edge of a fender, he watched

the circle break against the ceiling. A pair of stained gray flannel

trousers, a silk shirt and a velvet coat that had once been a vivid

green; these and an immense green silk cravat, the color of which

showed through his beard, constituted his usual morning negligee.

Ambrose Sault, busy with the body of an unfinished safe, which in the

rough had come from the maker's hands that morning, released the

pressure of his acetylene lamp and removed his goggles before he

replied.

He was working in shirt and trousers, and his sleeves were rolled up,

displaying the rope-like muscles of his arm. He looked across to his

indolent companion and wiped the perspiration from his forehead.

"Mr. Ronald Morelle is neither a friend nor an acquaintance,

Moropulos. I don't think I have ever seen him. I have heard of him."

"You haven't missed much by not knowing him," said Moropulos, "but

he's a good-looking fellow."

He flicked the ash of his cigarette on to the tiled hearth. "Steppe

is still annoyed with me." Sault smiled to himself.

"You think he is justified? Perhaps. I was terribly drunk, but I

was happy. Some day, my dear brother, I shall get so drunk that even

you will not hold me. I move towards my apotheosis of intoxication

certainly and surely. Then I will be irresistible and I shall have

no fear of those brute arms of yours." He sucked at the cigarette

without speaking for a long time. Sault went back to his work.

"I have often wondered!" said Moropulos at last.

"What?"

"Whether it would have been better if I had followed the advice of my

head man that morning I pulled you aboard the sloop. You remember

Bob the Kanaka boy? He wanted to knock you on the head and drop you

overboard; you were too dangerous, he said. If a government boat had

picked us up and you had been found on board as well as--certain

other illicit properties, I should have had a double charge against

me. I said 'no' because I was sorry for you."

"Because you were afraid of me," said Sault calmly, "I knew you were

afraid when I looked into your eyes. Why do you speak of the islands

now--we haven't talked about the Pacific since I left the boat."

"I've been thinking about you," confessed Moropulos with a quick sly

glance at the man. "Do you realize how--not 'curious'--what is the

word?"

"Incurious!" suggested Sault, and Moropulos looked at him with

reluctant admiration.

"You are an extraordinary _hombre_, Sault. Merville says you have

the _vocabulaire_--that is English or something like it--of an

educated man. But to return--do you realize how incurious I am? For

example, I have never once asked you, in all our years of knowing one

another, why you killed that man?"

"Which man?"

Moropulos laughed softly. "Butcher! Have you killed so many? I

refer to the victim for whose destruction the French government sent

you to New Caledonia."

Sault stood leaning his back against the table his eyes fixed on the

floor. "He was a bad man," he said simply, "I tried to find another

way of--stopping him, but he was clever and he had powerful friends,

who were government officials. So I killed him. He hired two men to

wait for me one night. I was staying at a little hotel on the Plassy

Road. They tried to beat me because I had reported this man. Then I

knew that the only thing I could do was to kill him. I should do it

again."

Moropulos surveyed him from under his lowered brows. "You were lucky

to escape 'the widow', my friend," he said, but Ambrose shook his

head.

"Nobody was executed in those days; capital punishment had not been

abolished, but the Senate refused to vote the executioner his salary.

It had the same effect. I was lucky to go to New Caledonia. Cayenne

is worse."

"How long did you serve?"

"Eight years and seven months," was the reply.

Moropulos made a little grimace. "I would sooner die," he said and

lit another cigarette. Deep in thought he smoked until Ambrose made

a move to pick up his Crooke's glasses.

"Don't work. I hate to see you--and hate worse to hear you. What do

you think of Morelle?"

"I don't know him; I have heard about him. He is not a good man."

"What is a good man?" Moropulos demanded contemptuously. "He is a

lover of ladies, who isn't? He is a cur too. Steppe walks on him.

He is scared of Steppe but then everybody is, except you and I."

Ambrose smiled.

"Well, perhaps I am--he is such a gorilla. But you are not."

"Why should I be? I am stronger than he."

Moropulos looked at the man's bare arms. "Yes--I suppose it comes

down to that. The basis of all fear, is physical. When will the

safe be finished?"

"In a week. I am assembling the lock at home. I shall make it work

to five letters. The only word I can spell. I shouldn't have known

that, but I heard a man spell it once--on the ship that brought me

home. He was a steerage passenger and he used to take his little

child on the deck when it was fine, and the little one used to read

Scripture stories to him. When she came to a hard word, he spelled

it. I heard one word and never forgot it."

"I'll be glad when the thing is finished," the Greek meditated. "We

have a whole lot of papers that we never want to see the light of

day, Steppe and I. We could destroy them, but they may be useful,

correspondence that it isn't safe to keep and it isn't wise to burn.

You are an ingenious devil!"

In the Paddington directory, against "Moropulos, 49 Junction

Terrace," were the words, "mining engineer." It was a courtesy

status, for he had neither mined nor engineered. Probably the people

of Junction Terrace were too occupied with their own strenuous

affairs to read the directory. They knew him as one who at irregular

periods was brought home in the middle of the night singing noisily

in a strange language. Cicero's oration was Greek to Cassius; the

melodious gibberish of Mr. Moropulos was Greek to Junction Terrace,

though they were not aware of the fact. No. 49 was a gaunt, damp

house with a mottled face, for the stucco had peeled in patches and

had never been renewed. Moropulos bought it at a bargain price and

made no contingency allowance for delapidations. The windows of the

upper floors were dingy and unwashed. The owner argued that as he

did not occupy the rooms above, it would be wicked waste of money to

clean the windows. Similarly he dispensed with carpets in the hall

and on the stairs.

His week-ends he spent in more pleasing surroundings, for he had a

cottage on the borders of Hampshire where he kept hens and grew

cabbage-roses and on Sundays loafed in his garden, generally in his

pajamas, to the scandal of the neighborhood. He had a whimsical turn

of mind and named his cottage, "The Parthenon", and supported this

conceit by decorating his arcadian groves with plaster reproductions

of the great figures of mythology, such figures as Phidias and

Polycletus and Praxiteles chiselled. He added to this a wooden

pronaos which the local builder misguidedly surmised was intended for

the entrance to a new cinema. When they discovered that the erection

had no other purpose than to remind Moropulos of departed Hellenic

splendors, the grief of the villagers was pathetic.

Here he was kept, reluctantly, tidy. He owned a small American car

which supplied him the transportation he required, and made his

country home accessible. It was Friday, the day he usually left

town, but he had lingered on, hoping to see some tangible progress in

the construction of the safe.

"You never seem to get any further," he complained. "You have been

fiddling with that noisy lamp for two hours, and, so far as I can

see, you've done nothing. How long will it be before anything

happens?" and then before Sault could reply he went on: "Why don't

you come to my little Athens, Sault? You prefer to stay in town.

And you are a man of brains! Have you a girl here, eh?"

"No."

"Gee! What a time that fellow Ronnie must have! But they will catch

him some day--a mad father or a lunatic fiancé, and ping! There will

be Ronnie Morelle's brains on the floor, and the advocates pleading

the unwritten law!"

"You seem to know a lot about him?"

Moropulos ran his fingers through his beard and grinned at the

ceiling. "Yes--I can't know too much. We shall have trouble with

him. Steppe laughs at the idea. He has him bound to his heel--is

that the expression, no? Well, he has him like that! But how can

you bind a liar or chain an eel? His very cowardice is a danger."

"What have you to be afraid of?" asked Sault. "So far as I can make

out, you are carrying on an honest business. It must be, or the

doctor wouldn't be in it." His tone was sharp and challenging.

Moropulos had sufficient _nous_ not to accept that kind of challenge.

"I can understand that you have papers that you wish to keep in such

a way that nobody but yourselves can get at them. All businesses

have their secrets."

"Quite so," agreed the Greek and yawned.

"Ronnie will pay," he said, "but I am anxious that I should not be

asked to contribute to the bill. I have had a great deal of

amusement watching him. The other night I was in the park. I go

there because he goes. I know the paths he uses. And there came

with him a most pretty young lady. She did not know him."

"You guessed that?"

"I know, because later, when she complained, she did not know his

name. Ronnie!" he mused. "Now I tell you what I will undertake to

do. I will make a list, accurate and precise, of all his love

affairs. It will be well to know these, because there may come a day

when it will be good to flourish a weapon in this young man's face.

Such men marry rich women."

Sault was working and only muttered his reply. He was not then

interested in Ronnie Morelle.

X

He stayed on in the house long after Moropulos had dragged himself to

his room and had dressed for the journey. So absorbed was he in his

task that the Greek left without his noticing. At seven o'clock he

finished, put away his tools in a cupboard, threw a cloth over the

safe, and went out, locking the door behind him.

Both Steppe and Moropulos had urged him to live in the house, but

though he had few predilections that were not amenable to the

necessities of his friends, Sault was firm on this point. He

preferred the liberty which his lodgings gave him. Possibly he

foresaw the difficulties which might arise if he lived entirely with

the Greek. Moropulos had a vicious and an uncertain tongue; was

tetchy on some points, grotesquely so, on the question of Greek

decadence, although he had lived so long away from his native country

that English was almost his mother tongue. Sault could be tactful,

but he had a passion for truth, and the two qualities are often

incompatible.

A bus carried him to the end of the street where he lodged, and he

stopped at a store on the corner and bought a box of biscuits for

Christina. She was secretary and reader to him, and he repaid her

services with a library subscription and such delicacies as she asked

him to get for her. The subscription was a godsend to the girl, and

augmented, as it was, by an occasional volume which Evie was allowed

to bring from the store library by virtue of her employment, her days

were brightened and her dreams took a wider range than ever. The

driving force of learning is imagination. By imagination was

Christina educated.

Evie sometimes said that she did not understand one half of the words

that Christina used. To Mrs. Colebrook her daughter was an insoluble

enigma. She associated education with brain fever and ideas above

your station, and whilst she was secretly proud of the invalid's

learning, she regarded Christina's spinal trouble as being partly

responsible for the abnormality. Mrs. Colebrook believed in dreams

and premonitions and the sinister significance of broken picture

wires. It was part of her creed that people who are not long for

this world possess supernatural accomplishments. Therefore she eyed

Christina's books askance, and looked upon the extra library

subscription as being a wild flight in the face of Providence. She

expressed that view privately to Ambrose Sault.

"You have come at a propitious moment, Sault Effendi," said Christina

solemnly as he came in. "I have just been taking my last look at the

silvery Bosphorus. My husband, taking offense at a kiss I threw to

the handsome young sultan as he rose beneath my latticed window, has

decreed that tonight I am to be tied in a sack and thrown into the

dark waters!"

"Good gracious," said Ambrose. "You have been in trouble today,

Christina."

"Not very much. The journey was a lovely one. We went by way of

Bergen--and thank you ever so much for that old Bradshaw you got for

me. It was just the thing I wanted."

"Mr. Moropulos kindly gave it to me--yes--Bergen?"

"And then to Petrograd--the Czars were there, poor people--and then

to Odessa, and down the Black Sea in--oh, I don't know. It was a

silly journey today, Ambrose--I wasn't in the heart for a holiday."

"Is your back any worse?"

She shook her head. "No--it seems better. I nearly let myself dream

about getting well. Do you think that other idea is possible? We

can borrow a spinal carriage from the Institute but mother hasn't

much time, and besides, I couldn't get down those narrow stairs

without a lot of help. Yes--yes, yes! I know it is possible now.

But the chariot, dear Ambrose?"

"I've got it!" he chuckled at her astonishment, "it will come

tomorrow. It is rather like a motor-car for I have to find a garage

for it. In this tiny house there is no room. But I got it--no, it

didn't cost me a great deal. Dr. Merville told me where I could get

one cheap. I put new tires on and the springs are grand. Christina,

you will be--don't cry, Christina, please--you make me feel

terrible!" His agitation had the effect of calming her.

"There must be something in this room that makes people weep," she

gulped. "Ambrose--Evie is just worrying me to death."

"What is wrong?"

She shook her red head helplessly. "I don't know. She is

changed--she is old. She's such a kid, too--such a kid! If that man

hurts her," the knuckles of her clenched hand showed bone-white

through the skin, "I'll ask you to do what you did for mother,

Ambrose, give me strength for an hour--" her voice sank to a husky

whisper, "and I'll kill him--kill him--"

Sault sat locking and unlocking his fingers, his eyes vacant. "She

will not be hurt. I wish I were sure it was Ronald Morelle. Steppe

has only to lift his finger--"

They heard the sound of Mrs. Colebrook's heavy feet on the stairs and

Christina wondered why she was coming up. She had never interrupted

their little talks before.

"Somebody to see you, Christina, and I'm sure it is too kind of you,

miss, and please thank the doctor. I'll never be grateful enough for

what he did--"

Ambrose Sault got up slowly to his feet as Beryl came into the room.

"I wonder if you really mind my coming--I am Beryl Merville."

"It is very good of you, Miss Merville," said Christina primly. She

was ready to dislike her visitor; she hated the unknown people who

called upon her, especially the people who brought jelly and fruit

and last year's magazines. Their touching faith in the virtues of

calves'-foot and fruit as a panacea for human ills, their automatic

cheerfulness and mechanical good-humor, drove her wild. The church

and its women had given up Christina ever since she had asked, in

answer to the inevitable question: "Yes, there are some things I

want; I'd like a box of perfumed cigarettes, some marron glace and a

good English translation of 'Liaisons Dangereux'."

She loathed marron glace and scented tobacco was an abomination. Her

chief regret was that the shocked inquirer had never heard of

"Liaisons Dangereux". Christina only knew of its existence from a

reference in a literary weekly which came her way.

Beryl sensed the hidden antagonism and the cause. "I really haven't

come in a district visitor spirit," she said, "I'm not frightfully

sorry for you and I haven't brought you oranges--"

"Grapes," corrected Christina. "They give you appendicitis--mother

read that on the back page of 'Health Hints'. Sit down, Miss

Merville. This is Mr. Sault." She nodded to Ambrose.

"Mr. Sault and I are old acquaintances," she said. She did not look

at him. "I have to explain why I came at all. I know that you are

not particularly enthusiastic about stray visitors--nobody is. But

my father was talking about you at lunch today. He has never seen

you, but Mr. Sault has spoken about you and, of course, he does know

your mother. And father said: 'Why don't you go along and see her,

Beryl?' I said, 'She would probably be very annoyed--but I'll take

her that new long wordy novel that is so popular. I'm sure she'll

hate it as much as I."

"If it is 'Let the World Go', I'm certain I shall," said Christina

promptly, "but I'd love to read it. Let us sneer together." Beryl

laughed and produced the book.

It seemed an appropriate moment for Ambrose to retire and he went out

of the room quietly; he thought that neither of the girls saw him go,

but he was mistaken. Christina Colebrook was sensitive to his every

movement, and Beryl had really come to the house to see him.

On her way home she tried to arraign herself before the bar of

intelligence, but it was not until she was alone in her room that

night that she set forth the stark facts of her folly. She loved

Ronald Morelle, loved him with an intensity which frightened her;

loved him, although he was, according to all standards by which men

are judged, despicable. He was a coward, a liar, a slave to his

baser appetites. She had no doubt in her mind, when she faced the

truth, that the stories which had been told of him were true. The

East girl--the pretty parlormaid who had begun an action against him.

And yet there was something infinitely pathetic about Ronald Morelle,

something that made her heart go out to him. Or was that a case of

self-deception too? Was it not the beautiful animal she loved, the

sleek, lithe tiger--alive and vital and remorseless? To all that was

brain and spirit in her, he was loathsome. There were periods when

she hated him and was bitterly contemptuous of herself. And in these

periods came the soft voice of Ambrose Sault, whispering,

insinuating. That was lunacy, too. He was old enough to be her

father; was an illiterate workman, an ex-convict, a murderer; when

her father had told her he had killed a man she was neither shocked

nor surprised. She had guessed, from his brief reference to New

Caledonia, that he had lived on that island under duress. He must

have been convicted of some great crime; she could not imagine him in

any mean or petty rôle. A coarse-handed workman, shabby of

attire--it was madness to dream and dream of him as she did. And

dreams, so Freud had said, were the expressions of wishes

unfulfilled. What did she wish? She was prepared to answer the

question frankly if any answer could be framed. But she had no

ultimate wish. Her dreams of Ambrose Sault were unfinishable. Their

ends ran into unfathomable darkness.

"I wonder if he is very fond of that red-haired girl?" she asked her

mirror. Contemplating such a possibility she experienced a pang of

jealousy and hated herself for it.

Jan Steppe came back from Paris on the eve of her birthday. He

called at the house the next morning, before she was down, and

interviewed Dr. Merville; when Beryl went in to breakfast, two little

packages lay on her plate. The first was a diamond shawl pin.

"You are a dear, daddy!" She went round the table and kissed him.

"It is beautiful and I wanted one badly."

She hurried back to her place. Perhaps Ronnie had remembered--?