The next day, Mrs. Vanderstein, busy with a watering-can among the pots
of roses that during the season adorned her balcony, and keeping a sharp
look-out on the entrance to Fianti's opposite, was disappointed not to
catch another glimpse of Prince Felipe of Targona whom she thought every
minute to see issue from beneath the portico.
"What can keep him indoors on so fine a day?" she asked herself
repeatedly, for again the sun smote down on the city out of a cloudless
azure.
Having spent the hour immediately after luncheon in this vain
expectancy, at the imminent risk of both sunstroke and indigestion, she
began to despair of her hopes ever being fulfilled, and went back into
the drawing-room, where she threw herself dejectedly into a chair.
"If this weather goes on," she said to Barbara, "we might run over to
Dieppe for a few days."
Mrs. Vanderstein was very much in the habit of making sudden excursions
to the other side of the Channel; whenever she was bored at home she
would dash off at a moment's notice to Dieppe or Ostend.
Barbara enjoyed these trips, but sometimes wished Mrs. Vanderstein would
not make up her mind to depart quite at the last minute, as she nearly
always did. It was awkward occasionally to have only half an hour given
one in which to pack.
"Will you go to-day?" she asked, with a shade of anxiety in her voice.
"Oh, I don't know," Mrs. Vanderstein answered wearily. "I daresay I
may."
Barbara walked over to the open window.
"There's Madame Justine coming out of Fianti's," she remarked presently.
"Really?" said Mrs. Vanderstein, getting up and going to Barbara's side.
"I wonder what she can have been doing there?"
Madame Querterot was hurrying along the pavement, bag in hand. She
looked up at the balcony and made a little smiling bow in response to
Mrs. Vanderstein's friendly nod. Then she rounded a corner and was out
of sight.
"What a good kind face she has," Mrs. Vanderstein said as she turned
back into the house. "It would cheer up anyone, that delightful smile.
It always does me good to see Madame Justine."
"I can't think why you like her so much," said Barbara, as she also came
back into the room. "I don't think she looks particularly nice."
"Ah, Barbara," said Mrs. Vanderstein, "at your age you are no judge
of character. Now I know a good woman when I see one, and I do admire
that one. Look at the way she works day and night to support her idle,
ungrateful daughter."
"I don't suppose she's so ungrateful as her mother makes out," said
Barbara. She seemed determined to see no good in poor Madame Querterot.
In the cool of the afternoon the two ladies drove in the Park and
visited one or two of the houses of their friends. It was past six when
they returned home, and for once the masseuse was waiting for them.
She came forward as Mrs. Vanderstein entered, and her manner showed
some excitement. In the background hovered Amélie, who would have died
sooner than allow Madame Querterot to remain alone in her mistress'
room, hinting darkly, if vaguely, to the other servants that mysterious
and terrible results would have to be expected if such a liberty were
accidentally permitted.
"Oh, madame," cried Madame Querterot, "I have such amusing news. At all
events I hope that you will laugh and not be offended if I repeat it to
you."
"What is it, Madame Justine?"
"Figure to yourself, madame, that this morning I received a
summons--but, madame," said Madame Querterot, checking herself on a
sudden and casting a look of scarcely veiled malice towards the other
occupants of the bedroom, "what I have to tell you is of a nature
somewhat private. Is it possible that you permit that I speak with you
alone?"
"Yes," said Mrs. Vanderstein; "why not, if you wish. Amélie, I will
ring when I want you, please. Barbara, do you mind going away till I
call you? Thanks so much. I must hear this amusing story of Madame
Justine's."
Barbara and the maid lost no time in obeying, and left the room; but
while the one did so with alacrity, her pride preventing her from
showing any curiosity, even for a moment, as to what Madame Querterot
might have to relate, Amélie was at no pains to conceal the dislike,
almost amounting to hatred, which shone in her eyes as she fixed them
in an angry stare on her compatriot before she slowly moved towards the
door. Some day she hoped to be revenged on this woman, this odious,
talkative bourgeoise, for the way in which she had wormed herself, if
not into her mistress' confidence, at all events into such familiar
impertinent terms with her; when, if Mrs. Vanderstein could but be
brought to feel about her, in her bones, as Amélie felt, she would
recognise her for a person to whom an honest woman, let alone a lady at
all _comme il faut_, would scorn to address herself.
Her rage and indignation continued to augment as the minutes passed and
no bell summoned her back to her duties. Though no fonder of work than
her fellows, Amélie's whole soul rose in revolt against the idea that
she could be dispensed with. And when at last, after an hour's waiting,
both she and Miss Turner were recalled to the bedroom, one of them at
least re-entered it with murderous feelings in her heart, which she
vented by making faces at the masseuse behind the ladies' backs and
vowing to herself that the day of vengeance could not be much longer
delayed.
As for Barbara, she was struck immediately she returned to her friend
by a suppressed excitement, a restlessness of manner, which seemed to
betray that there had been something of personal interest in Madame
Querterot's confidences. She did not like, however, to ask what the
Frenchwoman had had to tell in private, and as Mrs. Vanderstein did not
volunteer any information, but was very silent all the evening, fully
occupied apparently with her own thoughts, Barbara was not sorry when
bedtime came.
"Do you still think of running over to Dieppe?" she asked, as she said
good night.
"To Dieppe!" cried her friend, "good gracious, no! I have all kinds of
engagements, and you have forgotten that my box is taken for the gala
performance of the opera on Monday. I shall certainly stay in London for
the present!"
Clearly Mrs. Vanderstein had forgotten the half-formed intention of the
afternoon.
Well, that would not prevent her changing her mind again, thought
Barbara, and they might be off across the Channel in a day or two in
spite of to-night's decision.
But days elapsed and no more was said on the subject. Every evening saw
Madame Querterot arrive as usual; but now there was always a private
interview between her and Mrs. Vanderstein, which left that lady flushed
and smiling.
Barbara could not imagine what was happening to cause all these changes.
She disliked Madame Querterot and vaguely resented the secret that she
felt was being kept from her. Why should Mrs. Vanderstein have secrets
with this horrid little Frenchwoman and leave her out in the cold? How
could she allow the woman's familiarity? Barbara was both piqued and
disgusted at the whole trend of the matter.
On Sunday they walked in the Park with a certain Mrs. Britterwerth, a
friend of Mrs. Vanderstein.
After a day or two of clouds and rain, during which people shivered and
said it was like winter, the weather had cleared again to the radiant
brightness which distinguished that summer from those preceding and
following it. The Park was gay with light dresses and brilliant coloured
parasols. The flowers, too, were at their best--the rain had come at the
right moment for them and the beds were a vision of beauty--but they
received scanty attention, as usual, people flocking to the other side
of the road, where, to tell the truth, it was very pleasant on the green
lawns beneath the trees.
The three ladies strolled up and down in the shade. Mrs. Vanderstein
called it taking exercise, and did it once a week for the sake of her
figure. Mrs. Britterwerth was really stout and would gladly have sat
down after a turn or two, but was not allowed to by her more energetic
friend.
"Consider, my dear, what a lot of good it does us," said Mrs.
Vanderstein.
Here, presently, they were joined by Joseph Sidney, and soon Barbara
found herself walking on ahead with him, while the two others followed
them at a little distance.
She had not seen him since the night at Covent Garden, and she noticed
with concern that he looked worn and worried.
"I saw that Averstone did no good," she said, as soon as they were out
of earshot.
"No," said Sidney shortly.
"Did you back him?" she asked, and knew the answer before he spoke.
"Oh yes," he said, "I backed him all right. He'd have won, I daresay, if
I hadn't spoilt his chance with my rotten luck."
Barbara walked on in silence for a minute.
"I'm sorry," she said at length. "It was my fault. I gave you the tip."
"Nonsense," he answered almost roughly. "Your money's gone too."
"Did you lose much last week?" she asked abruptly.
"So much," he replied, "that it's no good trying to hide it from you.
It's bound to come out in a few days. The truth is that I've lost every
penny my uncle left me and every sixpence I had before. Worse than that!
I've lost money I can't pay, and I shall not only have to leave the
regiment, but----" he broke off bitterly and slashed with his stick at
the grass. "Well, you know what it means," he finished lamely.
"Oh, it can't be as bad as that!" cried Barbara. "Tell Mrs. Vanderstein.
She will help you. How I wish I had some money!"
"Do you think she would help me?" asked Sidney. "She would let me
blow my brains out first. You don't realise, perhaps, what a violent
prejudice she has against betting. Look at this letter. I got it the
day after I saw you at the opera." He pulled from his pocket a large
sheet of blue writing paper on which Barbara at once recognised Mrs.
Vanderstein's unmistakable handwriting.
"MY DEAR JOSEPH," it ran,
"I hope there is no truth in what I hear about your betting on
race-horses. It is a practice I deplore with all my heart and I should
be very sorry to see you descend to such unprincipled depths. Without
entering upon a long dissertation, I must tell you that, unless you
henceforward sever all connection with bookmakers and their kind, I
shall think it my duty to depart from your uncle's wishes and leave my
money away from you altogether. It pains me to write like this and I
trust it is unnecessary, but it is best to have things understood.
"Your affectionate aunt,
"RUTH VANDERSTEIN."
Barbara read the letter in horror-struck silence.
"That's the sort of help I should get from her," said Sidney, as she
gave it back to him.
"Something must be done," she repeated dully; "can't you borrow from
some one?"
"I've been losing steadily for three years," replied the young man,
"and I had to go to the money-lenders long ago. I can't get another
penny from them. It's rather funny if you think of how my uncle made his
money, isn't it? But perhaps you don't know," he went on hastily, seeing
the blank look on Barbara's face. "So that's how it is," he started
afresh. "It's all up with me, you see. I'm absolutely done for unless
I can get £10,000 by next week. I'm pretty desperate, I can tell you.
There's nothing I wouldn't do to get the money."
He spoke in emphatic tones, and several of the passing crowd turned
their heads to see who it was who so loudly published the unfortunate
state of his financial affairs. Sidney was quick to realise the
attention he was attracting, and lowered his voice to a more
confidential pitch. Neither he nor his companion specially remarked
one among those who glanced up at them on hearing the outspoken words,
a small spare man with a clean-shaven face and brown hair fading to a
premature greyness. Nor if they had done so would either of them have
recognised in this correctly dressed, spick and span Londoner, whose
well-fitting morning coat and patent leather boots so exactly resembled
those worn by Sidney himself and nearly every smart young man to be
met with in the Park that day, the well-known private detective, Mr.
Gimblet, the man most dreaded by the criminal class of the entire
kingdom.
Walking at a more rapid pace than they, he was in the act of overtaking
the couple as they strolled along, when something in Sidney's voice, a
note of despairing recklessness more than the words themselves that he
uttered, aroused his interest and wakened his ever ready curiosity. He
continued to walk on without slackening his speed, and did not look back
until he had advanced some fifty yards. Then he hesitated, loitered a
moment, and finally sat down on one of the green chairs, which stood
conveniently unoccupied, just before Sidney and Barbara strolled
unconcernedly by.
Before they had passed, Gimblet had made a quick survey of the young
man's face, on which signs of worry and anxiety were very plainly to be
noted.
"I wonder who it is," he thought; and continued, when they had gone on,
to gaze meditatively after the young people.
In his turn he failed to observe two ladies who came up in the opposite
direction to that in which his head was turned. Mrs. Vanderstein
observed his intent expression as she approached, and following the
direction of his eyes murmured to her friend:
"Do you see that man staring at Barbara? He looks quite moonstruck. She
attracts a great deal of attention. Such a dear girl, I don't know what
I should do without her."
"You are so good to her," murmured her companion. "The question
is rather, what would she do without you? But she is certainly an
attractive young person, especially to men. I wonder that you are not
afraid to let that delightful nephew of yours see so much of her."
To Barbara, walking mechanically by Sidney's side, it seemed suddenly as
if some strange darkness hung over the face of nature. The lightness of
heart with which she had gone forth out of the house, the high spirits
natural to her that constituted the only legacy of any value which
she had inherited from her father, deserted her now to make place for
distress on the young man's account. Nor was it only at the thought of
the trouble that had fallen on him that she recoiled horror-struck and
that the sunlight took on a quality of gloom, which made the present
hour such a dismal one and those of the future to appear encircled in
a dusk that deepened, as it receded, till it merged into that utter
obscurity over whose boundaries Joe seemed already to be slipping and
vanishing. It was the effect of his disaster on her own life that
chiefly terrified and shocked her. What would she do without the only
man friend of anything like her own age whom she knew in London and
whose tastes so much resembled her own? She would hear no more sporting
gossip, be cut off from her one remaining link with the racing world.
What would she do without him if he disappeared as he threatened? What
would she do without the only person in the world she cared to see? The
only person in the world she cared for.... The knowledge came to her
suddenly like a revelation and she stumbled for a moment in her walk as
she realised with a flash of self-comprehension the full meaning of her
dread.
In that instant she saw and realised that to lose Joe Sidney would be,
for her, to lose all.
He, occupied in a recital of his troubles, noticed nothing beyond his
own almost unconscious relief in speaking at length of the worries he
had for so long kept to himself. It was a comfort to have so sympathetic
a listener.
Still, not much comfort could be extracted even from that, with the
crisis in his life so real and so near at hand, and he was soon
repeating his earlier assertions that it was no use talking, and that
there was no hope for him of anything but absolute ruin.
"Your aunt. She must, oh, she must help you!" Barbara heard herself
saying again.
Again Sidney shook his head.
"You don't understand her. She will act in accordance with her ideas.
We Jews----"
"You are not a Jew!" Her voice was indignant.
"My mother was a Jewess. You don't suppose I am ashamed of it? We Jews
have stronger convictions--opinions--principles--call them what you
like--than Christians are in the habit of hampering themselves with. We
are more apt, I should say, to live up to our theories. My aunt looks
on gambling as the most deadly of sins. Where you or I perceive a green
track and a few bookies, she sees, I do believe, a personage with horns
and a tail, brandishing a pitchfork. I'm not at all sure she isn't
right. I am at least quite sure that if I could get out of this mess
I'd never go near a race-course or have so much as a look at the odds
again as long as I lived. It's not much use saying that now, is it? But
believe me, help from Aunt Ruth is out of the question. You may scratch
it. This is the end of all for me. I shall just have to go. Drop out, as
many better men have had to do before me."
"Oh don't talk like that," cried Barbara. She had pulled herself
together, and was thinking clearly and rapidly. "Listen to me. If
you can't go to Mrs. Vanderstein with the truth, can't you go to her
with"--she hesitated--"something else?"
"A lie," said Joe bluntly. "I don't wonder you think I'd not be above
a lie if it could save me. But can you suggest one with which I could
go to her and ask for £10,000? If you can, let's hear it, for goodness'
sake. But of course you can't. She's not an absolute fool!" He laughed
again, a short, hard laugh.
"You don't know Mrs. Vanderstein as well as I do, though you are a
relation," said Barbara. "She has weak points, you know. At least she
has one weakness. I wonder if you know what it is?"
They had come to the Corner and paused by the rails. Instinctively
Barbara turned about, looking to see if Mrs. Vanderstein were within
earshot.
"Why, look at her now," she cried.
Sidney, too, turned, and followed the direction of her gaze.
His aunt and her friend had reached a point some fifty yards behind
them. Mrs. Vanderstein's face was radiant. A rosy colour dyed her
cheeks. Her eyes sparkled, when for a moment she lifted them and glanced
in the direction of the roadway. But for the most part they seemed to be
modestly cast down and Mrs. Vanderstein appeared interested solely in
the toes of her shoes; these, though of the most pleasing aspect, did
not entirely justify the delight the lady seemed to feel in them. She
may, perhaps, have been wondering whether or no they touched the ground,
for so lightly did she tread that a mere spectator might have felt very
grave doubts on the subject. She looked, indeed, to be walking upon air.
Even Sidney, unobservant as he commonly was of the expressions of people
to whom he was not at the moment talking, could not help noticing her
unusual demeanour. Indeed she looked the incarnation of happiness.
"What's the matter with her?" he asked, turning again to the girl beside
him.
For answer she made a movement of her hand towards the road.
"Do you see that?" she inquired.
There was very little traffic in the Park on that Sunday evening. A
motor or two rolled through, but they were few and far between. Joe saw
nothing remarkable or that could, to his thinking, in any way account
for his aunt's strange looks. One carriage only was driving by, a
barouche occupied by an elderly lady and three foreign-looking men.
There was nothing about them to attract attention.
"What in the world is there to see?" he said, in bewilderment.
"In that carriage are Prince Felipe of Targona and his mother," said
Barbara, "and Mrs. Vanderstein gets as excited as that whenever she sees
any kind of a Royal personage. I don't think," she added truthfully,
"that I ever saw her show it quite so plainly, but you can see the
effect they have on her. Royalty is what really interests her most in
life. You wouldn't believe how much she is thrilled by it. It is an
infatuation, almost a craze."
"I had no notion she was like that," said Joe, with an air of some
disgust. "I should never have thought she was such a frightful snob."
"I don't think it is snobbishness with Mrs. Vanderstein," said Barbara.
"It's more a sort of romanticness. But I don't suppose you understand.
The point is that there's nothing she wouldn't do to meet any kind of
a little princeling. And if she once met him, there's nothing he could
ask she wouldn't give. After all," she went on in an argumentative tone,
"she ought not to let you be ruined. I am sure Mr. Vanderstein never
would have. And £10,000 is really so little to her. Why, her pearls
alone are worth far more. What does a sum like that matter? It's only
four or five hundred a year. She wouldn't miss it a bit."
"I daresay," said Sidney, "but I don't see what good that does me."
"Have you got a friend you can trust who would stretch a point to help
you?"
"Not a decimal point as far as cash is concerned. In other ways, I
daresay I have got one or two. They'd help me all right, poor chaps, if
they'd got any money themselves."
"It's not money. I mean some one who would take a little trouble."
"Oh yes, I think I can raise one of that sort. For that matter," said
Sidney, "if you don't mind my calling you a friend, I think no one could
want a better one. It's no end good of you to be so sympathetic and let
me bore you with my rotten affairs."
The girl turned away her face.
"Of course I am a friend," she said, "but you will want a man, if my
idea is any good. Now listen, I have got a plan."
Barbara hesitated. She was very conscious that the idea which had come
to her was not one which would commend itself to Joe. A few hours before
she would have scornfully rejected the suggestion that she herself
could ever be brought to tolerate such an expedient, but now everything
was changed and all her convictions of right and wrong were shaken and
tottering, if not entirely swept aside by the fear of the imminent
danger to the man she loved. Her one feeling now was that at any cost
the peril must be averted, and the question of the moment was how to
represent her design in such terms as would prevail on him to see in it
a path that a man might conceivably follow and yet retain some remnant
of self-esteem.
Very carefully, choosing her words with deliberation, she disclosed to
Sidney the plan that to her seemed to offer the only chance of setting
his affairs in order. As she expected, he refused at first to entertain
the idea at all; undismayed, she returned to the attack and persisted,
with Jesuitical reasonings and syllogisms, in showing him that in the
method she proposed lay his only hope of obtaining the necessary money.
Very slowly and reluctantly he allowed himself to be persuaded. No one
could have listened for half an hour to Barbara's cajolements without
giving way.
At the first sign of his weakening she redoubled her efforts, and as she
talked, refusing to allow herself to be discouraged by Joe's objections
and the difficulties he pointed out, he gradually succumbed to her
wheedling, and once he had thrust his scruples into the background
became nearly as enthusiastic as she was herself.
Before they parted the plan was worked out in every point. It remained
but to take the faithful necessary friend of Joe's into their
confidence. This, Joe told her, had better be a subaltern in his
regiment, by name Baines, luckily in London at the present moment.
"As long," he said with a return to former doubts, "as old Baines is
equal to the job. There's not much he'd stick at, though."
"Yes," said Barbara, and was silent a minute during which the
difficulties of carrying out her plan successfully seemed to swarm
around her with quite a new vigour. "If anything should turn up," she
faltered, "to make this idea impossible, you will try telling Mrs.
Vanderstein the truth, won't you? It is a chance, after all."
"Well, it can't make things worse, I suppose," he agreed. "I hope
it won't come to that. I don't think it will now; but if it does, I
promise, if it pleases you, that I will make a clean breast of it to
her."
"Thank you," she murmured; and then as they turned, "there she is now,
making signs that we should go back."