How much more anxious she'd be to keep on the same line if it came to
saving herself from the Chair! You can make your mind easy about your
friend Mrs. Sands. I won't say a word against her. You love her. You may
be right, I may be wrong. I'm growing humble. I don't set my judgment
against yours, even though I know some things about the lady which it's
probable you don't know. But she's been good to you. That makes all the
difference to me. She's to be saved from the consequences of things
which--you'll never hear from my lips. Saved she shall be if it depends
at all on yours ever. But you've done so much that little more remains."
"Then you'll give her the papers?"
"The papers you returned to me that Sunday night?"
"It wasn't I who returned them. I don't know who did send them. It's the
greatest mystery! But if you love me, you'll hand them back."
O'Reilly looked grave. "I love you," he said, "more than I ever thought
it was in me to love, though I had an idea it might go hard with me when
my time came. But I gave the papers to Heron, whose property they
were--and are. I was only keeping them for him because he had reason to
think they weren't safe in his possession."
"John Heron!" Clo echoed. A thought had suddenly started out from the
background of her mind, pushing in front of her fears for Beverley.
"Yes, of course, he's a friend of yours! But he's in worse danger than
his papers ever were. From things they said, I believe Pete came East on
purpose to kill him. Of course, there were the papers to get as well.
But he wanted to kill John Heron. It was Chuff who ordered him to get
the papers. Pete had some grudge of his own against Mr. Heron, so he
made a good catspaw. When Pete was killed, Chuff had to find someone
else to do the job. I don't know John Heron, and never saw him in my
life, so I----"
"There you're mistaken," O'Reilly broke in. "Did you notice any one
coming out of a room next to my suite when you were letting yourself in
with my key which you had--er--found?"
"Yes!" cried Clo. "A beautiful woman in a black dress with gorgeous
jewellery; and a tall man with reddish hair and beard and--Oh, eyes!
Great dark eyes that looked at me in a strange way. I felt them in my
spine."
"That was the first time you saw John Heron, the man his enemies still
call the Oil Trust King--though thanks to Roger Sands they daren't call
him that out aloud. The second time must have been in Heron's own room.
But you shall judge for yourself. He'd been downstairs with his wife. He
went up to his rooms again for something, and in the hall outside his
own door--which he'd just unlocked--he fell down in a sort of fainting
fit. Well, putting two and two together, after you told me your
adventure creeping along the ledge from my window to his, it occurred to
me that there'd been just cause for the seizure. I didn't think Heron
was the man to keel over in a faint, even for a thing like that. All the
same, seeing that ghostly vision would account for his attack."
"I understand," said Clo. "I saw he was flabbergasted. But that first
time at the door, when he was with his wife, he didn't look at me as if
I were a stranger. It was as if he knew me, and almost fell over himself
to see me again. That was the feeling I had, but I was--a little
excited."
"Most girls would have been corpses!"
"I felt like a live coal. But we mustn't let the gang make a corpse of
Mr. Heron, must we? Let's warn him. Where are we, anyhow?"
"Same house you were in. Doctor said it wouldn't be safe to move you. We
disinfected the best we could in a hurry, and he extracted the bullet
from your poor little shoulder. Thank God, I was in time, or there might
have been another bullet or two, that couldn't be extracted! You're all
right now, or will be with a little rest, and we'll get you into a
nursing home. As for Heron, he and his wife have gone to Narragansett.
That's close to Newport, you know, where Mrs. Sands is."
"Angel in Newport already! Then the pearls--but I told Ellen Blackburne
to take them there if she had to. Do you think she will?"
"Sure! She'll catch the first train."
"No. She won't do that. She thinks of her mother before everything. But
the ball's not till to-morrow. Angel won't need the pearls till then.
Oh, if I could be sure she'll get them! I can't rest till I'm sure. I
must go to Newport. I must."
"When you're strong enough."
"I'm strong enough now. Is it late?"
"Getting on toward evening. You were a long time coming to yourself.
Presently the doctor will say whether you can be moved to-night to that
nursing home."
"If I can be moved to a nursing home I can be moved to Newport. Tell the
doctor I shall burst if I can't go."
"You may tell him yourself."
"I _must_ go. I must know if all goes right with the pearls. I must know
if it's better or worse for Angel that Stephen's dead."
"Stephen's dead!"
"Yes. Did you know him?"
"I know of him. He is----"
"Don't tell me. She mightn't want me to hear. I haven't heard anything
except that Kit and Churn talked about his having died, and said Angel
had been cheated."
"By Jove, I begin to see light."
"Now you see why I must go to her? And you've forgotten maybe what I
told you about Mr. Heron. If he's near Newport, I----"
"Look here, darling, if the doctor says you can be taken there
to-morrow--oh, in time to arrive before the famous ball--let's say in a
comfortable motor car, travelling slowly, banked up on cushions, will
you go as my wife?"
Clo stared as if O'Reilly had broken into some strange language which he
expected her to understand. "Your wife?"
"Well--don't you expect to marry me? That's what happens when a girl and
a man love each other."
"Oh--some day--if you're sure you really want an ignorant little girl
like me, brought up in an orphan asylum, who's worked in a shop and
hasn't a penny in the world--except a dollar or two left of Mrs. Sands'
money. A long time from now, when you've thought about it----"
"I've thought of nothing else since we met and parted, and I realized
that you were my life and soul. If you can make up your mind to 'some
day,' it might just as well be to-morrow. Don't you want to console me
for the loss of the only other thing, besides you, I've ever wanted with
all my heart? You do if you love me. The dear old house that was my
father's! You know, when you sent up your name at the Dietz as Miss
O'Reilly, I believed you were my cranky cousin Theresa, come to tell me
she'd changed her mind about selling the house. Why, you owe it to me,
if you care, to make up for that. Your Angel's husband has bribed
Theresa to sell to him. The place has passed away from me forever. But
if you'll marry me to-night I shan't care. In the joy of being
husband--and nurse--to the bravest and dearest mouse in the world I'll
forget everything and be the happiest man on God's earth."
"People don't get married at a few hours' notice."
"Don't they? How long have you lived in the United States, my Irish
colleen?"
"Months. Over a year. But I never discussed marriage."
"I'm jolly glad you didn't. But you'll hear of nothing else till the
knot's tied. We do things quickly over here."
Then the door opened, and the doctor came in.
XXXVII
THE TELEGRAM
Roger Sands had hardly known himself for many days. His wife had read
him aright. At times he was purposely cruel. At times he did wish to see
how much she could bear and not break. Yet if she had broken, he felt
that he could not have helped seizing her in his arms and forgiving her.
While he dressed that night he hoped that she would send for him, or
come to him, and confess that the pearls were gone, that she had given
them to O'Reilly, whom she had once loved, and whom she loved no more.
But she neither sent nor came. She was bluffing it out to the last. He
might have known she would do that, although he had taken her to her
room to give her one more chance to repent. At half-past seven he was
ready, but he waited quietly ten minutes. Then he went to his door,
meaning--as he said to himself roughly--to "get the thing over." But he
paused with his hand on the knob. He thought that he heard a woman's
voice saying: "May I come in?"
His muttered comment upon one of his and Beverley's guests, whom he
supposed the intruder to be, was far from flattering. Perhaps, however,
it would be well not to find his wife alone. He would give Beverley a
few minutes more, to be sure that her dress was on, before he went to
interrupt the chorus of mutual admiration; but no woman's presence
should prevent him from asking the question he meant to ask--"Where are
your pearls?"
At exactly eight minutes to eight Roger ceased his restless tramp up and
down the room, and stopped again at the door. Before he could open it,
however, there was a light tap--a tap like Beverley's in happier days.
"Can she mean, after all, to tell me the truth?" he wondered; and he
heard his voice saying mechanically, "Come in."
Beverley came in; Roger's room was full of light, and as his wife
entered she faced it. She glittered from head to foot like an ice maiden
under a blazing sun. She wore a wreath of diamond roses; round her waist
was a girdle of diamonds with long tasselled ends; on her white satin
shoes were diamond buckles; and over her bare, white neck, her young
gauze-enfolded bosom, hung the rope of the queen's pearls.
"I thought you were coming in to see me dressed?" she said calmly. "Did
you forget?"
For answer Roger stared. He stepped back into the room, and let Beverley
shut the door. She stood before him smiling, though, if he had analyzed
her smile, he would have said that it was sad. "How do you think I
look?" she asked, when he did not speak. "I hope you're not
disappointed?"
"You have had those pearls copied!" he flung at her.
Beverley blushed bright crimson. She understood instantly what he meant
and thought, but she had not gone through tortures and been relieved at
the last moment to be beaten down now.
"What do you mean?" she asked, her eyes steady, her head up.
"You thought I didn't know. But I have known from the first. I found out
by accident. I always hoped you'd some day tell me the truth. This is a
cowardly thing you've done."
Beverley was again ivory pale. "Are you a judge of pearls, Roger?" she
coldly inquired.
"Yes," he said.
She lifted the rope over her head and thrust it, against his will, into
his hands. "Make any test you wish, and decide whether these are the
pearls you gave me or an imitation."
Hardly knowing what he did, he walked to a table, on which stood a tall
lamp that gave a brilliant light. Beverley watched him. There was no
emotion whatever on her face. After a moment he spoke: "These are
genuine pearls," he admitted, after a heavy silence. "And I have reason
to believe from certain marks that they are the pearls I bought for you,
the queen's pearls. If you give me your word, that since I put them into
your hands you did not part with them to Justin O'Reilly, as I have
believed, I will beg your forgiveness on the knees of my soul. I will
confess to you--as I once expected you to confess to me."
"Hush! There's someone at the door!" Beverley cut him short.
It was Léontine who knocked, and paused on the threshold. "Will Madame
have the kindness to step into the hall," she asked. As her mistress
moved toward her, she retired, and it was not until they both stood at
some distance from the door that the Frenchwoman spoke.
"I beg Madame's pardon for disturbing her," she apologized, "but I dare
not delay. The lady, Mees Blackburne, if that is her name, was about to
start back to town, but remembered a commission she had been given at
the apartment; to bring a telegram for me. I opened it, to find that for
me there is no sense. I know no Stephen; but----"
"Stephen!" Beverley gasped the name, and snatched from the woman's hand
an open telegram she held. She read it, and then without a word or cry,
collapsed in a dead faint. With a shriek of fear Léontine tried to catch
the swaying figure; but the best she could do was to break the fall.
When Roger reached the door it was to find Beverley in a white heap on
the floor with the Frenchwoman kneeling by her side. He caught his wife
up, and, carrying her back into his room, laid her on the bed.
"Let everybody be told that dinner will be delayed half an hour," he
said, and shut the door in Léontine's face. She snatched the dropped
telegram and whisked off to obey the master's command.
XXXVIII
WHO IS STEPHEN?
As Roger stood looking down at Beverley she opened her eyes.
"Stephen is dead!" she muttered. "Stephen--is dead."
"Who is Stephen?" Roger asked shortly.
"Oh, Roger!" she appealed to him, breaking into sobs. "My poor Stephen!
I shall never see him again. All my sacrifices--in vain!"
"Who is Stephen?" Roger repeated.
She held up her arms, without answering his questions. "Roger--comfort
me!" she wept.
And for all his life, no matter how many years he may live, Roger Sands
will be glad that he did not hold back from Beverley then. Without
another word he clasped her tightly, while she cried against his cheek.
Both had forgotten that there were guests, that this was the "big night"
which all the newspapers were talking about; that already dinner was
late, and people wondering; that the "ball" was to begin at ten-thirty,
and that the Russian dancers who were to open it, as the great
"surprise," would soon be in the house.
When Beverley had sobbed until exhaustion came, she spoke, in a tiny
voice, like that of a tired little girl: "Because Stephen is--safe, I
can tell you everything now. Will you listen, Roger, until the end,
whether you can forgive me or no?"
"Yes," Roger answered. "But just this before you begin! I love you so
much, Beverley, that if there's something to forgive it's forgiven
already."
"Stephen was my brother," she said, "the one person who belonged to me
after father died. Mother I don't remember. She came of a high Russian
family who were sent to Siberia as political prisoners. She was only
sixteen, and father saved her by making her his wife. I was named 'Olga'
after her. But for that dreadful journey from Albuquerque I had to have
some name that wouldn't give me away when my ticket was bought. Stephen
and I were called Bevan, because father used that name for his business
in Russia, but his own name was Beverley. For travelling that day I was
'Miss B. White.' Once I'd told you I was Beverley, I had always to be
Beverley for you.
"Stephen--or Stephan, his Russian name--and I, were born in Russia,
where father superintended an immense tract of oil wells for Mr. Heron.
When my father was killed in an explosion (I was fourteen and Stephen
twelve) Mr. Heron felt it his duty to look after our future. He had just
married at that time. You must know Mrs. Heron well enough to understand
that she wouldn't like to have two half-grown-up children thrust upon
her. Why, she used to be jealous even of her husband's first wife, an
Irish girl, who died years and years ago, in Ireland! It seems Mr. Heron
hadn't told her about his old love story. She came across a picture of
him taken with the girl, and some letters from people Mr. Heron had
employed to search for his wife, whom he had quarrelled with and left. I
was staying at their house when Dolores discovered the photograph and
letters. She rushed into the room where I was with Mr. Heron. He had to
seize her hands to keep her from tearing the picture in pieces; and he
held them while he told her his sad story. He'd been visiting Ireland,
it seemed, years before, and met a girl, very poor but very lovely, and
married her when they'd known each other a few weeks. It seemed the girl
had been engaged to someone else; and that someone took a cruel revenge
on Heron. By a plot which he confessed afterward when it was too late,
he made it appear that the girl had been his mistress. The evidence was
so strong Heron could hardly help believing, so he came back to America
and tried to forget. Years after the other man, dying of typhoid,
confessed to a priest that he had lied, and forged letters. The priest
wrote to Heron. But the poor, deserted girl was dead, and all that Heron
could learn when he dashed back to Ireland to find her was that a baby
girl had been born a few months after he left his wife. He tried for
years to trace the child, but could not. And it was only after he'd
given up all hope that he married Dolores Moreno. I think Mr. Heron felt
tender over us children because of his lost little one. After leaving us
in Russia at school for a while, and a year in England, to learn the
language better than we knew it, another year in France and another in
Italy (in families whom he paid to educate and take care of us) he must
have had a longing to see what we were like. He and Dolores, his wife,
came abroad, and brought us back to America with them, much against
Dolores' will, I know. I was nearly eighteen, and I realized the first
minute we met that Dolores was going to hate me. We went straight to a
house near Albuquerque, which belongs to Mrs. Heron. Her brother Louis
always lived there. He was an invalid, you know; about a year younger
than Dolores; something wrong with his heart, and almost a
hunchback--but oh, what a handsome face! When he took a violent fancy to
me her one thought was to get me out of his way. Louis had money of his
own. He was rich, and I suppose Dolores was afraid I might try to marry
him, as I hadn't a penny. It was bad enough for her that Mr. Heron
should have a tenderness for me, because of his lost child; but that
Louis should love me was more than she could stand. I was sent to a
boarding-school, and when I was twenty I began to teach. Dolores didn't
like Stephen, either. She grudged every penny her husband spent for us.
"Mr. Heron used his influence, and got Stephen work in Los Angeles as a
reporter on a newspaper, when he was only eighteen. He was tall and
handsome, and could pass for two years older at least. I was very
unhappy at this time, for I'd begun to worry about Stephen. I was sure
he was keeping some secret from me. But I found out nothing till the
crash came. Oh, Roger, it was horrible. He'd fallen under the influence
of those anarchists--those dynamiters, who had been terrorizing all
America for years. They'd persuaded him that they were noble reformers.
Poor Stephen was a useful tool. He never did any of the dynamiting with
his own hands, but he used to make bombs, and carry them from place to
place, and take letters it wasn't thought safe to send through the post.
It was the blowing-up of the _Times_ buildings in Los Angeles and all
those innocent men being killed that sickened him, he confessed
afterward, when at last he opened his heart to me. But he was too deep
in to free himself. It's now two years ago that the break happened, and
all our life collapsed--Stephen's and mine.
"Some of the old lot he'd worked with were left--men who had managed to
keep clear and never be suspected when William Burns, the detective, was
fighting the Macnamaras and their gang. Only one or two who'd been under
suspicion wriggled out from Burns' clutches. A man named Carl Schmelzer
was the cleverest. He went abroad, and was supposed to die in Germany.
But he didn't die. By that time they were engaged in new enterprises, as
the old ones were too risky; but they always pretended to be working for
Labour against Capital. John Heron was their target two years ago. The
war cry was that he was the master, a tyrant, a plutocrat, ruthlessly
crushing the weak. The Comrades knew our history--Stephen's and
mine--and they tried to inflame Stephen against Mr. Heron because he'd
failed to do for us what our father's services and death merited. But
they made a big mistake when they ordered my brother to dynamite a
railway bridge, just as a train with Heron's private car was due to pass
over it. He refused, and threatened to warn Heron unless they abandoned
all their schemes against him. That gave the gang a fearful fright. They
thought their one chance of safety was to suppress Stephen. A friend of
his who lived at Home Colony warned him that there was a plot to kill
him. He came straight to me and told me the whole story. Neither of us
had much hope. We thought the Comrades were sure to get him in the end.
Then a wonderful thing happened. The train Stephen took, after his visit
to me, was wrecked. Everybody in the car with Stephen was killed except
himself. An idea came to Stephen. He put a silver cigarette-case with
his name on it into the pocket of a man burnt past recognition--a man of
about his own size. Then he crept away and hid for many days. When he
hoped it might be fairly safe, he wrote to me, knowing I mourned for him
as dead. He asked if I'd risk going with him to Russia to begin a new
life there under another name. Of course I said 'Yes.'
"I left the school, and some jewellery I had kept us going for a while
till there was a ship we could take for Japan, and so get back to
Russia. We'd have to sail from San Francisco, so presently we went to
Oakland, travelling at night by local trains. We hoped in that way we
should not be seen by any one we knew.
"Whether someone did see us or not, I can't tell. Anyhow, from the day
Stephen left me to buy our cabins on the ship I've never seen him again.
He was kidnapped by the gang; and then began my martyrdom. They gave me
a week of suspense. Then I got a letter. It told me that Stephen had
been caught and would be punished by death for his treachery unless I'd
agree to buy his life. I was warned that if I went to the police, it
would be known to them, and Stephen instantly killed. If I consented to
bargain I must put a 'personal' in a San Francisco paper, saying
'Steve's sister says yes'; in that case an appointment would be made
with a man who would tell me what to do to save Stephen.
"Of course, I obeyed. Next day the same paper told 'Steve's Sister'
where to go for instructions, and at what time. I think the man who met
me must have been Schmelzer himself, just back from Europe. He had the
authoritative manner Stephen had spoken of, and a great deal of gesture.
He didn't give himself any name then, but afterward I knew him as
Cheffinsky. To save my brother I had only to get a bundle of papers
which were in the possession of John Heron. They were at Albuquerque in
Mrs. Heron's house. Heron kept them there because he believed no one
would suspect; but a spy the 'Comrades' had hired to act as a gardener
there overheard a conversation, and knew the hiding-place. Unfortunately
he couldn't put his hand on the papers without killing a man to get at
them. For me, it would be simple, because Louis Moreno was in love with
me. Louis had charge of the papers, and would let me see them if I
treated him the right way. How Cheffinsky found out about Louis and me I
never heard; perhaps from Stephen. I was given a day to think the matter
over. Then there was to be another meeting in the same place. When I
went to the rendezvous for the second time--it was in a park--I hadn't
made up my mind. But, oh, Roger, the wretch showed me a snapshot of
Stephen in a room, with a rope round his neck, standing on tiptoe. The
rope was fastened to a ring in the ceiling, where a chandelier had been.
If Stephen had dropped from fatigue he would have choked to death. 'Six
hours a day of this medicine,' Cheffinsky said, 'till you've handed us
the papers we want.'
"I promised to go to Albuquerque and get them. What the papers were I
wasn't told. Afterward I heard more about them--from Louis himself. The
day of the second meeting in the park I was given directions what to do,
but they were changed in a hurry. The Comrades got warning to 'clear
out' and go East as quick as they could. A telegram reached me only a
few hours before I was to start for Albuquerque. It said, 'Delay
journey. Writing,' and a letter came the same night to the quiet little
boarding-house where I stayed. My brother had been taken East, where I
should meet him when I handed over the papers. I was told what train to
take to Albuquerque, and what train to leave in: the Santa Fé Limited. I
was to find reservations on board for 'Miss B. White.' At Chicago I was
to get out of the train and find a man waiting for me. You know all
about that, and what happened. There was money in the letter of
instructions, enough to see me through to Chicago, otherwise I couldn't
have started. What I had was almost all gone. Oh, I can hardly bear to
think of that day, and what I went through--before I met _you_."
"Don't think of it--don't go on if you'd rather not," Roger begged.
But Beverley wished to go on.