"Another strange face," Sarah remarked, looking after the butler who had
just brought in the coffee. "I thought you were one of those women,
Josephine, who always kept their servants."
"I do, as a rule," was the quiet reply, "only sometimes Henry
intervenes. If there is one thing that the modern servant dislikes, it
is sarcasm, and sarcasm is Henry's favourite weapon when he wants to be
really disagreeable. Generally speaking, I think a servant would rather
be sworn at."
"You seem to have made a clean sweep this time."
Josephine stirred her coffee thoughtfully.
"Henry has been having one of his bad weeks," she said. "He has been
absolutely impossible to every one. He threatened to give every servant
in the house notice, the other day, because his bell wasn't answered, so
I took him at his word. We've no one left except the cook, and she
declined to go. She has been with us ever since we were married. All the
same, I wouldn't have had any one but you and Jimmy to dinner to-night.
I wasn't at all sure how things would turn out. Besides, it isn't every
one I'd care to ask into this dungeon of a room."
"I was wondering why we were here, Josephine," Sarah remarked, looking
around her. "It used to be one of your hospital rooms, surely?"
Josephine nodded.
"The other rooms want turning out, dear. I knew you wouldn't mind."
There are women as well as men who have learnt the art of a sociable
silence. Josephine and Sarah finished their cigarettes and their coffee
in a condition of reflective ease. Then Sarah stood up and straightened
her hair in front of the mirror.
"Josephine," she announced, "I am going to marry Jimmy."
"You have really made up your minds at last, then?" her hostess enquired,
with interest.
"My dear," Sarah declared, "we've come to the conclusion that we
can't afford to remain single any longer. We are both spending far
too much money."
"I am sure I wish you luck," Josephine said earnestly. "I am very fond
of Jimmy."
"He is rather a dear."
"I wonder how you'll like settling down. It will be a very different
life for you."
"Of course," Sarah admitted with a sigh, "I hate giving up my
profession, but there is a sort of monotony about it when Jimmy insists
upon being my only fare."
"Is this the reason why Jimmy is making his great debut as a man of
affairs?" Josephine asked.
"Not exactly," Sarah replied. "As a matter of fact, that was rather a
bluff. His mother is so afraid of his starting in some business where
they'll get him to put some money in, that she has agreed to allow him a
couple of thousand a year until he comes in for his property, on
condition that he clears out of the City altogether."
"That seems quite decent of her. Where are you going to live?"
"In the bailiff's cottage on the Longmere estate, which will come to
Jimmy some day. Jimmy is going to take an interest in farming. So long as
it isn't his own farm, his mother thinks that won't hurt."
Josephine laughed softly.
"A bright old lady, his mother, I should think."
"Well, she has had the good sense to realise at last that I am the only
person likely to keep Jimmy out of mischief. He is such a booby
sometimes, and yet, somehow or other, you know, Josephine, I've never
wanted to marry anybody else. I don't understand why, but there it is."
"That's the right feeling, dear, so long as you're sure," Josephine
declared cheerfully.
Sarah rose suddenly to her feet, crossed the little space between them,
and crouched on the floor by her friend's chair.
"You've been such a brick to me, dear," she declared, looking up at her
fondly, "and I feel a perfect beast being so happy all the time."
Josephine let her fingers rest on the strands of soft, wavy hair.
"Don't be absurd, Sarah," she remonstrated. "Besides, things haven't been
quite so bad with me lately."
"You look different, somehow," her guest admitted, "as though you were
taking a little more interest in life. I've seen quite a wonderful light
in your eyes, now and then."
"Ridiculous!"
"It isn't ridiculous, and I'm delighted about it," Sarah went on. "You
must know, dear, that I am not quite an idiot, and I am too fond of you
not to notice any change."
"There is just one thing which does make a real change in a woman's
life," Josephine declared, her voice trembling for a moment, "and that is
when she finds that it really makes a difference to some one whether
she's miserable or not."
Sarah nodded appreciatively.
"I know you think I am only a shallow, outrageous little flirt sometimes,
Josephine," she said, "but I am not. I do know what you mean. Only I
don't think you help yourself to as much happiness from that knowledge as
you ought to, as you have a right to."
"What do you mean?" Josephine demanded half fearfully.
"Just what I say. I think he is simply splendid, and if any one cared for
me as much as he does for you, I'd--"
She stopped short and looked towards the door. Jimmy was peering in, and
behind him Lord Dredlinton.
"Eh? what's that, Sarah?" the former demanded. "You'd what?"
Sarah rose to her feet and resumed her place in her chair.
"I was trying to pull Josephine down from the clouds," she remarked.
Lord Dredlinton smiled across at her. There was an unpleasant
significance in his tone, as he answered, "Oh, it can be done, my dear
young lady." He paused and looked at her disagreeably, "but I am not
sure that you are the right person to do it."
The shadow had fallen once more upon Josephine's face. She had become
cold and indifferent. She ignored her husband's words. Lord Dredlinton
was looking around him in disgust.
"What on earth are we in this mausoleum for?" he demanded.
"Domestic reasons," Josephine answered, with her finger upon the bell.
"Have you men had your coffee?"
"We had it in the dining room," Jimmy assured her.
"I can't think why you hurried so," Sarah grumbled. "How dared you only
stay away a quarter of an hour, Jimmy! You know I love to have a gossip
with Josephine."
"Couldn't stick being parted from you any longer, my dear," the young man
replied complacently.
Sarah made a grimace.
"To be perfectly candid," Lord Dredlinton intervened, throwing away his
cigar and lighting a cigarette, "I am afraid it was my fault that we
came in so soon. Poor sort of host, eh, Jimmy? Fact is, I'm nervous
to-night. Every damned newspaper I've picked up seems to be launching
thunderbolts at the B. & I. And now this is the third day and there's
no news of Stanley."
"Every one seems to know about his disappearance," Jimmy remarked. "They
were all talking about it at the club to-day."
"What do they say?" Lord Dredlinton asked eagerly. "They all leave off
talking about it when I am round."
"Blooming mystery," the young man pronounced. "That's the conclusion
every one seems to arrive at. A chap I know, whose chauffeur pals up with
Rees' valet, told me that he's been having heaps of threatening letters
from fellows who'd got the knock over the B. & I. He seemed to think
they'd done him in."
Dredlinton shivered nervously.
"It's perfectly abominable," he declared. "Here we are supposed to have
the finest police system in the world, and yet a man can disappear from
his rooms in the very centre of London, and no one has even a clue as to
what has become of him."
"Looks bad," Jimmy acknowledged.
"I don't understand much about business affairs," Sarah remarked, "but
the B. & I. case does seem to be a remarkably unpopular undertaking."
Dredlinton kicked a footstool out of his way, frowning angrily.
"The B. & I. is only an ordinary business concern," he insisted. "We
have a right to make money if we are clever enough to do it. We speculate
in lots of other things besides wheat, and we have our losses to face as
well as our profits. I believe that fellow Wingate is at the bottom of
all this agitation. Just like those confounded Americans. Why can't they
mind their own business!"
"It isn't very long," Josephine remarked drily, "since we were rather
glad that America didn't mind her own business."
"Bosh!" her husband scoffed. "If English people are to be bullied and
their liberty interfered with in this manner, we might as well have lost
the war and become a German Colony."
"Don't agree with you, sir," Jimmy declared, with most unusual
seriousness. "I don't like the way you are talking, and I'm dead off the
B. & I. myself. I'd cut my connection with it, if I were you. Been
looking for trouble for a long time--and, great Scot, I believe they're
going to get it!"
"Damned rubbish!" Lord Dredlinton muttered angrily.
"Heavens! Jimmy's in earnest!" Sarah exclaimed, rising. "I am sure it's
time we went. We are overdue at his mother's, and one of my cylinders
is missing. Come on, Jimmy.--Good-by, Josephine dear! You'll forgive
us if we hurry off? I did tell you we had to go directly after dinner,
didn't I?"
"You did, dear," Josephine assented, walking towards the door with her
friend. "Come in and see me again soon."
There was the sound of voices in the hall. Lord Dredlinton started
eagerly.
"That's the fellow from Scotland Yard, I hope," he said. "Promised to
come round to-night. Perhaps they've news of Stanley."
The door was thrown open, and the new butler ushered in a tall, thin man
dressed in morning clothes of somewhat severe cut.
"Inspector Shields, my lord," he announced.