Premonitions of spring started the annual social exodus; because in the
streets of Ascalon and in the busy ways of Gath spring becomes summer
over night and all Philistia is smitten by the sun.
And all the meanness and shabbiness and effrontery of the monstrous
city, all its civic pretence and tarnished ostentation are suddenly
revealed when the summer sun blazes over Ascalon. Wherefore the daintier
among the Philistines flee--idler, courtier, dangler and squire of
dames--not to return until the first snow-flakes fall and the gray veil
of November descends once more over the sorry sham of Ascalon.
Out of the inner temple, his ears still ringing with the noise of the
drones, Quarren had gone forth. And already, far away in the outer
sunshine, he could see real people at work and at play, millions and
millions of them--and a real sky overhead edging far horizons.
He began real life once more in a bad way, financially; his money being
hopelessly locked up in Tappan-Zee Park, a wooded and worthless tract of
unimproved land along the Hudson which Quarren had supposed Lester
Caldera was to finance for him.
Recently, however, that suave young man had smilingly denied making any
such promise to anybody; which surprised and disconcerted Quarren who
had no money with which to build sewers, roads, and electric plants.
And he began to realise how carelessly he had drifted into the
enterprise--how carelessly he had drifted into everything and past
everything for the last five years.
After a hunt for a capitalist among and outside his circle of friends
and acquaintances he began to appreciate his own lunacy even more
thoroughly.
Then Lester Caldera, good-naturedly, offered to take the property off
his hands for less than a third of what he paid Sprowl for it; and as
Quarren's adjoining options were rapidly expiring he was forced to
accept. Which put the boy almost entirely out of business; so he closed
his handsome office downtown and opened another in the front parlour of
an old and rather dingy brown-stone house on the east side of Lexington
Avenue near Fiftieth Street and hung out his sign once more over the
busy streets of Ascalon.
RICHARD STANLEY QUARREN
Real Estate
Also he gave up his quarters at the Irish Legation to the unfeigned
grief of the diplomats domiciled there, and established himself in the
back parlour and extension of the Lexington Avenue house, ready at all
moments now for business or for sleep. Neither bothered him excessively.
He wrote no more notes to Strelsa Leeds--that is, he posted no more,
however many he may have composed. Rumours from the inner temple
concerning her and Langly Sprowl and Sir Charles Mallison drifted out
into the real world every day or so. But he never went back to the
temple to verify them. That life was ended for him. Sometimes, sitting
alone at his desk, he fancied that he could almost hear the far laughter
of the temple revels, and the humming of the drones. But the roar of the
street-car, rushing, grinding through the steel-ribbed streets of
Ascalon always drowned it, and its far seen phantom glitter became a
burning reality where the mid-day sun struck the office sign outside his
open window.
Fate, the ugly jade, was making faces at him, all kinds of faces. Just
now she wore the gaunt mask of poverty, but Quarren continued to ignore
her, because to him, there was no real menace in her skinny grin, no
real tragedy in what she threatened.
Real tragedy lay in something very different--perhaps in manhood awaking
from ignoble lethargy to learn its own degeneracy in a young girl's
scornful eyes.
All day long he sat in his office attending to the trivial business that
came into it--not enough so far to give him a living.
In the still spring evenings he retired to his quarters in the back
parlour, bathed, dressed, looking out at the cats on the back fences.
Then he went forth to dine either at the Legation or with some one of
the few friends he had cared to retain in that magic-lantern world which
he at last had found uninhabitable--a world in which few virile men
remain very long--fewer and fewer as the years pass on. For the gilding
on the temple dome is peeling off; and the laughter is dying out, and
the hum of the drones sounds drowsy like unreal voices heard in summer
dreams.
"It is the passing of an imbecile society," declaimed Westguard--"the
dying sounds of its meaningless noise--the first omens of a silence
which foretells annihilation. Out of chaos will gradually emerge the
elements of a real society--the splendid social and intellectual
brotherhood of the future----"
"See my forthcoming novel," added Lacy, "$1.35 net, for sale at all
booksellers or sent post-paid on receipt of----"
"You little fashionable fop!" growled Westguard--"there's a winter
coming for all butterflies!"
"I've seen 'em dancing over the snow on a mild and sunny day," retorted
Lacy. "Karl, my son, the nobly despairing writer with a grouch never yet
convinced anybody."
"I don't despair," retorted Westguard. "This country is getting what it
wants and what it deserves, ladled out to it in unappetising gobs. Year
after year great incoming waves of ignorance sweep us from ocean to
ocean; but I don't forget that those very waves also carry a constantly
growing and enlightened class higher and higher toward permanent
solidity.
"Every annual wave pushes the flotsam of the year before toward the
solid land. The acquaintance with sordid things is the first real
impulse toward education. Some day there will be no squalor in the
land--neither the physical conditions in our slums nor the arid
intellectual deserts within the social frontiers."
"But the waves will accomplish that--not your very worthy novels," said
Lacy, impudently.
"If you call me 'worthy' I'll bat you on the head," roared Westguard,
sitting up on the sofa where he had been sprawling; and laughter, loud
and long, rattled the windows in the Irish Legation.
The May night was hot; a sickly breeze stirred the curtains at the open
windows of Westguard's living room where the Legation was entertaining
informally.
Quarren, Lacy, O'Hara, and Sir Charles Mallison sat by the window
playing poker; the Earl of Dankmere, perched on the piano-stool, was
mournfully rattling off a string of melodies acquired along Broadway;
Westguard himself, flat on his back, occupied a leather lounge and
dispensed philosophy when permitted.
"You know," said Lacy, dealing rapidly, "you're only a tin-horn
philosopher, Karl, but you really could write a good story if you tried.
Get your people into action. That's the game."
O'Hara nodded. "Interestin' people, in books and outside, are always
doin' things, not talkin'," he said--"like Sir Charles quietly drawin'
four cards to a kicker and sayin' nothin'."
"--Like old Dankmere, yonder, playing 'Madame Sherry' and not trying to
tell us why human beings enjoy certain sounds known as harmonies, but
just keeping busy beating the box----"
"--Like a pretty woman who is contented to be as attractive and cunnin'
as she can be, and not stoppin' to explain the anatomy of romantic love
and personal beauty," added O'Hara.
"--Like----"
"For Heaven's sake give me a stack of chips and shut up!" shouted
Westguard, jumping to his feet and striding to the table. "Everybody on
earth is competent to write a book except an author, but I defy anybody
to play my poker hands for me! Come on, Dankmere! Let's clean out this
complacent crowd!"
Lord Dankmere complied, and seated himself at the table, anxiously
remarking to Quarren that he had come to America to acquire capital, not
to spend it. Sir Charles laughed and dealt; Westguard drew five cards,
attempted to bluff Quarren's full hand, and was scandalously routed.
Again the cards were dealt and O'Hara bet the limit; and the Earl of
Dankmere came back with an agonised burst of chips that scared out Lacy
and Sir Charles and left Quarren thinking.
When finally the dust of combat blew clear of the scene Dankmere's
stacks were nearly gone, and Quarren's had become symmetrical
sky-scrapers.
Lacy said to Dankmere: "Now that you've learned how to get poor quickly
you're better prepared for the study of riches and how to acquire 'em.
Kindly pass the buck unless your misfortunes have paralysed you."
"The whole country," said his lordship, "is nothing but one gigantic
poker game. I sail on the next steamer. I'm bluffed out."
"Poor old Dankmere," purred Lacy, "won't the ladies love you?"
"Their demonstrations," said the Earl, "are not keeping me awake
nights."
"Something keeps Quarren awake nights, judging by his transom light. Is
it love, Ricky?"
A slight colour mounted to Quarren's thin cheeks, but he answered
carelessly: "I read late sometimes.... How many cards do you want?"
Sir Charles Mallison turned his head after a moment and looked at
Quarren; and meeting his eye, said pleasantly: "I only want one card,
Quarren. Please give me the right one."
"Which?"
"The Queen of Hearts."
"Dealer draws one also," said the young fellow.
Sir Charles laid down his hand with a smile:
"Did _you_ fill?" he asked Quarren as everybody else remained out.
"I don't mind showing," said Quarren sorting out his cards, faces up.
"Which end?" inquired O'Hara.
"An interior." And he touched the Queen of Hearts, carelessly.
"Crazy playing and lunatic's luck," commented Lacy. "Dankmere, and you,
too, Sir Charles, you'd better cut and run for home as fast as your
little legs can toddle. Quarren is on the loose."
Sir Charles laughed, glanced at Quarren, then turned to Dankmere.
"It's none of my business," he said, "but if you really are in the
devilish financial straits you pretend to be, why don't you square up
things and go into trade?"
"Square things?" repeated the little Earl mournfully; "will somebody
tell me how? Haven't I been trying out everything? Didn't I back a
musical comedy of sorts? Didn't I even do a turn in it myself?"
"That's what probably smashed it," observed O'Hara.
"He did it very well," laughed Sir Charles.
"Dankmere ought to have filled his show full of flossy flappers,"
insisted Lacy. "Who wants to see an Earl dance and sing? Next time I'll
manage the company for you, Dankmere----"
"There'll be no next time," said Dankmere, scanning his cards. "I'm done
for," he added, dramatically, letting his own ante go.
"You've lost your nerve," said Quarren, smiling.
"And everything else, my boy!"
"What's the matter with the heiresses, anyway?" inquired O'Hara
sympathetically.
"The matter is that I don't want the sort that want me. Somebody's
ruined the business in the States. I suppose I might possibly induce a
Broadway show-girl----"
The little Earl got up and began to wander around, hands in his pockets,
repeating:
"I'd make a pretty good actor, in spite of what O'Hara said. It's the
only thing I like anyway. I can improvise songs, too. Listen to this
impromptu, you fellows":
And he bent over the piano, still standing, and beat out a jingling
accompaniment:
"I sigh for the maiden I never have seen,
I'll make her my countess whatever she's been--
Typewriter, manicure, heiress or queen,
Aged fifty or thirty or lovely eighteen,
Redundant and squatty, or scraggy and lean,
Generous spendthrift or miserly mean--
I sigh for the maiden I never have seen
Provided she's padded with wads of Long Green!"
Still singing the air he picked up a silk hat and walking-stick and
began to dance, rather lightly and gracefully, his sunken, heavy-lidded
eyes fixed nonchalantly on space--his nimble little feet making no sound
on the floor as he swung, swayed, and capered under the electric light
timing his agile steps to his own singing.
Loud applause greeted him; much hand-clapping and cries of "Good old
Dankmere! Three cheers for the British peerage!"
Sir Charles looked slightly bored, sitting back in his chair and waiting
for the game to recommence. Which it did with the return of the Earl who
had now relieved both his intellect and his legs of an accumulated and
Terpischorean incubus.
"If I was a bigger ass than I am," said the Earl, "I'd go into
vaudeville and let my creditors howl."
"Did they really send you over here?" asked O'Hara, knowing that his
lordship made no bones about it.
"They certainly did. And a fine mess I've made of it, haven't I? No
decent girl wants me--though why, I don't know, because I'm decent
enough as men go. But your newspapers make fun of me and my title--and I
might as well cut away to Dankmere Tarns and let 'em pick my carcass
clean."
"What's Dankmere Tarns?" asked O'Hara.
"Mine, except the mortgages on it."
"Entailed?"
"Naturally."
"Kept up?"
"No, shut up."
"What sort of a gallery is that of yours at Dankmere Tarns?" inquired
Sir Charles, turning around.
"How the devil do I know," replied his lordship fretfully. "I don't know
anything about pictures."
"Are there not some very valuable ones there?"
"There are a lot of very dirty ones."
"Don't you know their value?"
"No, I don't. But I fancy the good ones were sold off long ago--twenty
years ago I believe. There was a sale--a lot of rubbish of sorts. I
took it for granted that Lister's people cleaned out everything worth
taking."
"When you go back," said Sir Charles, "inspect that rubbish again.
Perhaps Lister's people overlooked enough to get you out of your
financial difficulties. Pictures that sold for £100 twenty years ago
might bring £1,000 to-day. It's merely a suggestion, Dankmere--if you'll
pardon it."
"And a good one," added O'Hara. "I know a lot of interestin' people and
they tell me that you can sell any rotten old picture over here for any
amount of money. Sting 'em, Dankmere. Get to 'em!"
"You might send for some of your pictures," said Lacy, "and have a shot
at the auction-mad amateur. He's too easy."
"And pay duty and storage and gallery hire and auction fees!--no,
thanks," replied the little Earl, cautiously. "I've burnt my bally
fingers too often in schemes."
"I've a back room behind my office," said Quarren. "You can store them
there if you like, without charge."
"Besides, if they're genuine, there will be no duty to pay," explained
Sir Charles.
Dankmere sucked on his cigar but made no comment; and the game went on,
disastrously for him.
Quarren said casually to Sir Charles:
"I suppose you will be off to Newport, soon."
"To-morrow. When do you leave town?"
"I expect to remain in town nearly all summer."
"Isn't that rather hard?"
"No; it doesn't matter much," said the boy indifferently.
"Many people are already on the wing," observed Lacy.
"The Calderas have gone, I hear, and the Vernons and Mrs. Sprowl," added
O'Hara.
"I suppose the Wycherlys will open Witch-Hollow in June," said Quarren
carelessly.
"Yes. Are you asked?"
"No."
"Doubtless you will be," said Sir Charles. "Jim Wycherly is mad about
aviation and several men are going to send their biplanes up and try 'em
out."
"I'm goin'," announced O'Hara.
Quarren drew one card, and filled his house. Sir Charles laid aside his
useless hand with a smile and turned to Quarren:
"Mrs. Leeds has spoken so often and so pleasantly of you that I have
been rather hoping I might some day have the opportunity of knowing you
better. I am very glad that the Legation asked me to-night."
Quarren remained absolutely still for a few moments. Then he said:
"Mrs. Leeds is very generous in her estimate of me."
"She is a woman of rare qualities."
"Of unusual qualities and rare charm," said Quarren coolly.... "I think,
Karl, that I'll make it ten more to draw cards. Are you all staying in?"
* * * * *
Before the party broke up--and it was an early one--Lord Dankmere turned
to Quarren.
"I'll drop in at your office, if I may, some morning," he said. "May I?"
"It will give me both pleasure and diversion," said Quarren laughing.
"There is not enough business in my office to afford me either. Also
you are welcome to send for those pictures and store them in my back
parlour until you can find a purchaser."
"It's an idea, isn't it?" mused his lordship. "Now I don't suppose you
happen to know anything about such rubbish, do you?--pictures and that
sort. What?"
"Why--yes--I do, in a way."
"The devil you do! But then I've always been told that you know
something about everything----"
"Very, very little," said Quarren, laughing. "In an ignorant world
smatterings are reverenced. But the fashionable Philistine of yesterday,
who used to boast of his ignorance regarding things artistic and
intellectual, is becoming a little ashamed of his ignorance----"
Dankmere, reddening, said bluntly:
"That applies to me; doesn't it?"
"I beg your pardon!--I didn't mean it that way----"
"You're right, anyway. I'm damnably ignorant.... See here, Quarren, if I
send over for some of those pictures of mine, will you give me your
opinion like a good fellow before I make a bally ass of myself by
offering probable trash to educated people?"
"I'll tell you all I know about your pictures, if that is what you
mean," said Quarren, much amused.
They shook hands as Sir Charles came up to make his adieux.
"Good-bye," he said to Quarren. "I'm off to Newport to-morrow. And--I--I
promised to ask you to come with me."
"Where?"
"Mrs. Sprowl told me to bring you. You know how informal she is."
Quarren, surprised, glanced sharply at Sir Charles. "I don't believe she
really wants me," he said.
"If she didn't she wouldn't have made me promise to bring you. She's
that sort, you know. Won't you come? I am sure that Mrs. Leeds, also,
would be glad to see you."
Quarren looked him coolly and unpleasantly in the eyes.
"Do you really believe that?" he asked, almost insolently.
Sir Charles reddened:
"She asked me to say so to you. I heard from her this morning; and I
have fulfilled her request."
"Thank her for me," returned Quarren, level-eyed and very white.
"Which means?" insisted Sir Charles quietly.
"Absolutely nothing," said Quarren in a voice which makes enemies.
* * * * *
The following day Sir Charles left for Newport where Mrs. Sprowl had
opened "Skyland," her villa of pink Tennessee marble, to a lively party
of young people of which Strelsa Leeds made one. And once more,
according to the newspapers, her engagement to Sir Charles was expected
to be announced at any moment.
When Quarren picked up the newspapers from his office desk next morning
he found the whole story there--a story to which he had become
accustomed.
But the next day, the papers repeated the news. And it remained, for the
first time, uncontradicted by anybody. All that morning he sat at his
desk staring at her picture, reproduced in half-tones on the first page
of every newspaper in town--stared at it, and at the neighbouring
likeness of Sir Charles in the uniform of his late regiment; read once
more of Strelsa's first marriage with all its sequence of misery and
degradation; read fulsome columns celebrating her beauty, her
popularity, her expected engagement to one of the wealthiest Englishmen
in the world.
[Illustration: "Once more, according to the newspapers, her engagement
to Sir Charles was expected to be announced."]
He read, also, all about Sir Charles Mallison, V.C.--the long record of
his military service, his wealth and the dignified simplicity of his
life. He read about his immense popularity in England, his vast but
unostentatious charities, his political and social status.
To Quarren it all meant nothing more definite than a stupid sequence of
printed words; and he dropped his blond head into both hands and gazed
out into the sunshine. And presently he remembered the golden dancer
laughing at him from under her dainty mask--years and years ago: and
then he thought of the woman whose smooth young hands once seemed to
melt so sweetly against his--thought of her gray eyes tinged with
violet, and her hair and mouth and throat--and her cheek faintly
fragrant against his--a moment's miracle--and then, the end----
He made a quick, aimless movement as though impatiently escaping sudden
pain; cleared his sun-dazzled eyes and began, half blindly, to turn over
his morning's letters--circulars, bills, business matters--and suddenly
came upon a letter from her.
For a while he merely gazed at it, incredulous of its reality.
Then he opened the envelope very deliberately and still, scarcely
convinced, unfolded the scented sheaf of note-paper:
"DEAR MR. QUARREN,
"At Mrs. Sprowl's suggestion I wrote to Sir Charles asking him to
be kind enough to bring you with him when he came to 'Skyland.'
"Somehow, I am afraid that my informality may have offended you;
and if this is so, I am sorry. We have been such good friends that
I supposed I might venture to send you such a message.
"But perhaps I ought to have written it to you instead--I don't
know. Lately it seems as though many things that I have done have
been entirely misunderstood.
"It's gray weather here, and the sea looks as though it were
bad-tempered; and I've been rather discontented, too, this
morning----
"I don't really mean that. There is a very jolly party here.... I
believe that I'm growing a little tired of parties.
"Molly has asked me to Witch-Hollow for a quiet week in June, and
I'm going. She would ask you if I suggested it. Shall I? Because,
since we last met, once or twice the thought has occurred to me
that perhaps an explanation was overdue. Not that I should make any
to you if you and I meet at Witch-Hollow. There isn't any to
make--except by my saying that I hope to see you again. Will you be
content with that admission of guilt?
"I meant to speak to you again that day at the Charity affair, only
there were so many people bothering--and you seemed to be so
delightfully preoccupied with that pretty Cyrille Caldera. I really
had no decent opportunity to speak to you again without making her
my mortal enemy--and you, too, perhaps.
"May I dare to be a little friendly now and say that I would like
to see you? Somehow I feel that even still I may venture to talk to
you on a different plane and footing from any which exists between
other men and me. You were once so friendly, so kind, so nice to
me. You have been nice--_always_. And if I seem to have acquired
any of the hardness, any of the cynical veneer, any of the
fashionable scepticism and unbelief which, perhaps, no woman
entirely escapes in my environment, it all softens and relaxes and
fades and seems to slip away as soon as I begin to talk to
you--even on this note-paper. Which is only one way of saying,
'Please be my friend again!'
"I sometimes hear about you from others. I am impressively informed
that you have given up all frivolous social activity and are now
most industriously devoting yourself to your real-estate business.
And I am wondering whether this rather bewildering _volte-face_ is
to be permanent.
"Because I see no reason for anybody going to extremes. Between the
hermit's cell and the Palace of Delights there is a quiet and happy
country. Don't you know that?
"Would you care to write to me and tell me a little about yourself?
Do you think it odd or capricious of me to write to you? And are
you perhaps irritated because of my manners which must have seemed
to you discourteous--perhaps rude?
"I know of course that you called on me; that you telephoned; that
you wrote to me; and that I made no response.
"And I am going to make no explanation. Can your friendship, or
what may remain of it, stand the strain?
"If it can, please write to me. And forgive me whatever injustice I
have seemed to do you. I ask it because, although you may not
believe it, my regard for you has never become less since the night
that a Harlequin and a golden dancer met in the noisy halls of old
King Carnival.... Only, the girl who writes you this was younger
and happier then than I think she ever will be again.
"Your friend--if you wish--
"STRELSA LEEDS."
He wrote her by return mail:
"MY DEAR MRS. LEEDS,
"When a man has made up his mind to drown without any more fuss, it
hurts him to be hauled out and resuscitated and told that he is
still alive.
"If you mean, ultimately, to let me drown, do it now. I've been too
miserable over you. Also, I was insulting to Sir Charles. He's too
decent to have told you; but I was. And I can't ask his pardon
except by mending my manner toward him in future.
"I'm a nobody; I haven't any money; and I love you. That is how the
matter stands this day in May. Let me know the worst and I'll drown
this time for good and all.
"Are you engaged to marry Sir Charles?
"R. S. QUARREN."
By return mail came a note from her:
"Can you not care for me and still be kind to me, Mr. Quarren? If
what you say about your regard for me is true--but it is certainly
exaggerated, anyway--should not your attitude toward me include a
nobler sentiment? I mean friendship. And I know whereof I speak,
because I am conscious of a capacity for it--a desire for it--and
for you as the object of it. I believe that, if you cared for it, I
could give you the very best of me in a friendship of the highest
type.
"It is in me to give it--a pure, devoted, lofty, untroubled
friendship, absolutely free of lesser and material sentiments. Am I
sufficiently frank? I want such a friendship. I need it. I have
never before offered it to any man--the kind I mean to give you if
you wish.
"I believe it would satisfy you; I am convinced that yours would
satisfy me. You don't know how I have missed such a friendship in
you. I have wanted it from the very beginning of our acquaintance.
But I had--problems--to solve, first; and I had to let our
friendship lie dormant. Now I have solved my perplexities, and all
my leisure is for you again, if you will. Do you want it?
"Think over what I have written. Keep my letter for a week and then
write me. Does my offer not deserve a week's consideration?
"Meanwhile please keep away from deep water. I do not wish you to
drown.
"STRELSA LEEDS.
"P. S.--Lord Dankmere is here. He is insufferable. He told Mrs.
Sprowl that you and he were going into the antique-picture
business. You wouldn't think of going into anything whatever with
a man of that sort, would you? Or was it merely a British jest?"
He wrote at once:
"I have your letter and will keep it a week before replying.
But--are you engaged?"
She answered:
"The papers have had me engaged to Barent Van Dyne, to Langly
Sprowl, to Sir Charles. You may take your choice if you are
determined to have me engaged to somebody. No doubt you think my
being engaged would make our future friendship safer. I'll attend
to it immediately if you wish me to."
Evidently she was in a gay and contrary humour when she wrote so
flippantly to him. And he replied in kind and quite as lightly. Then, at
the week's end he wrote her again that he had considered her letter, and
that he accepted the friendship she offered, and gave her his in return.
She did not reply.
He wrote her again a week later, but had no answer. Another week passed,
and, slowly into his senses crept the dread of deep waters closing
around him. And after another week he began to wonder, dully, how long
it would take a man to drown if he made no struggle.
Meanwhile several dozen crates and packing cases had arrived at the
Custom House for the Earl of Dankmere; and, in process of time were
delivered at the real-estate office of R. S. Quarren, littering his
sleeping quarters and office and overflowing into the extension and
backyard.
[Illustration: "All stacked up pell-mell in the back yard and regarded
in amazement by the neighbours."]
It was the first of June and ordinarily hot when Lord Dankmere and
Quarren, stripped to their shirts and armed with pincers, chisels and
hammers, attacked the packing cases in the backyard, observed from the
back fences by several astonished cats.
His lordship was not expert at manual labour; neither was Quarren; and
some little blood was shed from the azure veins of Dankmere and the
ruddier integument of the younger man as picture after picture emerged
from its crate, some heavily framed, some merely sagging on their
ancient un-keyed stretchers.
There were primitives on panels, triptychs, huge canvases in frames
carved out of solid wood; pictures in battered Italian frames--some
floridly Florentine, some exquisitely inlaid on dull azure and
rose--pictures in Spanish frames, Dutch frames, English frames, French
frames of the last century; portraits, landscapes, genre, still
life--battle pictures, religious subjects, allegorical canvases,
mythological--all stacked up pell-mell in the backyard and regarded in
amazement by the neighbours, and by two young men who alternately smoked
and staunched their wounds under the summer sky.
"Dankmere," said Quarren at last, "did your people send over your entire
collection?"
"No; but I thought it might be as well to have plenty of rubbish on hand
in case a demand should spring up.... What do they look like to you,
Quarren--I mean what's your first impression?"
"They look all right."
"Really?"
"Certainly. They seem to be genuine enough as far as I can see."
"But are they otherwise any good?"
"I think so. I'll go over each canvas very carefully and give you my
opinion for what it's worth. But, for Heaven's sake, Dankmere, where are
we going to put all these canvases?"
"I suppose," said the Earl gloomily, "I'll be obliged to store what you
haven't room for. And as I gradually grow poorer and poorer the day will
arrive when I can't pay storage; and they'll sell 'em under my nose at
auction, Quarren. And first I know the papers will blossom out with: 'A
Wonderful Rembrandt discovered in a junk-shop! Ancient picture bought
for five dollars and pronounced a gem by experts! Lucky purchaser
refuses a hundred thousand dollars cash!'"
Quarren laughed and turned away into the house; and Dankmere followed,
gloomily predicting his own approaching financial annihilation.
From his office Quarren telephoned a picture dealer to send men with
heavy wire, hooks, ladders and other paraphernalia; then he and Dankmere
made their toilets, resumed their coats, and returned to the sunny
office to await events.
After a few moments the Earl said abruptly:
"Would you care to go into this venture with me, Quarren?"
"I?" said Quarren, surprised.
"Yes. Will you?"
"Why, I have my own business, Dankmere----"
"Is it enough to keep you busy?"
"No--not yet--but I----"
"Then, like a good fellow, help me sell these damned pictures. I haven't
any money to offer you, Quarren, but if you'll be willing to hang the
pictures around your office here and in the back parlour and the
extension, and if you'll talk the merry talk to the lunatics who may
come in to look at 'em and tell 'em what the bally pictures are and fix
the proper prices--why--why, I'll make any arrangement with you that you
please. Say a half interest, now. Would that be fair?"
"Fair? Of course! It's far too liberal an offer--but I----"
"It's worth that to me, Quarren--if you can see your way to helping me
out----"
"But my help isn't worth half what these pictures might very easily
bring--even at public auction----"
"Why not? I'd have to pay an auctioneer, an expert to appraise them--an
art dealer to hang them in his gallery for a couple of weeks--either
that or rent a place by the year. The only way I can recompense you for
your wall space, for talking art talk to visitors, for fixing prices, is
to offer you half of what we make. Why not? You pay a pretty stiff rent
here, don't you? You also pay a servant. You pay for heat and light,
don't you? So if you'll turn this floor into a combination gallery of
sorts--art and real estate, you see--we'll go into business, egad! What?
The Dankmere galleries! What? By gad I'll have a sign made to hang out
there beside your shingle--only I'm afraid you'll have to pay for it,
Quarren, and recompense yourself after we sell the first picture."
"But, Dankmere," he protested, very much amused, "I don't want to become
a picture dealer."
"What's the harm? Take a shot at it, old chap! A young man can't collect
too many kinds of experience. Take me for example!--I've sold dogs and
hunters on commission, gone shares in about every rotten scheme anybody
ever suggested to me, financed a show, and acted in it--as you
know--and, by gad!--here I am now a dealer in old masters! Be a good
fellow and come in with me. What?"
"I don't really know enough about antique pictures to----"
"What's the odds! Neither do I! My dear sir, we must lie like gentlemen
for the honour of the Dankmere gallery! What? Along comes a chap walking
slowly and painfully for the weight of the money in his pockets--'Ho!'
says he--'a genuine Van Dyck!' 'Certainly,' you say, very coldly. And,
'How much?' says he, shivering for fear he mayn't get it. 'Three hundred
thousand dollars,' you say, trying not to yawn in his face----"
Quarren could no longer control his laughter: Dankmere blinked at him
amiably.
"We'll hang them anyhow, Dankmere," he said. "As long as there is so
little business in the office I don't mind looking after your pictures
for you----"
"Yours, too," urged the Earl.
"No; I can't accept anything----"
"Then it's all off!" exclaimed Dankmere, turning a bright red. "I'm
blessed if I'll accept charity!--even if I am hunting heiresses. I'll
marry money if I can, but I'm damned if I hold out a tin cup for
coppers!"
"If you feel that way," began Quarren, very much embarrassed, "I'll do
whatever would make you feel comfortable----"
"Half interest or it's all off! A Dankmere means what he says--now and
then."
"One-third interest, then----"
"A half!--by gad! There's a good fellow!"
"No; one-third is all I'll accept."
"Oh, very well. It may amount to ten dollars--it may amount to ten
thousand--and ten times that, perhaps. What?"
"Perhaps," said Quarren, smiling. "And, if you're going out, Dankmere,
perhaps you had better order a sign painted--anything you like, of
course. Because I'm afraid I couldn't leave these pictures here
indefinitely and we might as well make plans to get rid of some of them
as soon as possible."
"Right-o! I'm off to find a painter. Leave it to me, Quarren. And when
the picture-hangers come, have them hung in a poor light--I mean the
pictures--God knows they need it--the dimmer the light the better. What?
Take care of yourself, old chap. There's money in sight, believe me!"
And the lively little Earl trotted out, swinging his stick and setting
his straw hat at an angle slightly rakish.
No business came to the office that sunny afternoon; neither did the
picture-hangers. And Quarren, uneasy, and not caring to leave Dankmere's
ancestral collection of pictures in the back yard all night lest the
cats and a possible shower knock a little superfluous antiquity into
them, had just started to go out and hire somebody to help him carry the
canvases into the basement, when the office door opened in his very face
and Molly Wycherly came in, breezily.
"Why, Molly!" he exclaimed, surprised; "this is exceedingly nice of
you----"
"Oh, Ricky, I'm glad to see you! But I don't want to buy a house or sell
one or anything. I'm very unhappy--and I'm glad to see you----"
She pressed his hand with both her gloved ones; he closed the door and
returned to the office; and she seated herself on top of his desk.
"You dear boy," she said; "you are thin and white and you don't look
very happy either. Are you?"
"Why, of course I'm happy----"
"I don't believe it! Anyway, I was passing, and I saw your shingle
swinging, and I made the chauffeur stop on the impulse of the moment....
How are you, Ricky dear?"
"First rate. You are even unusually pretty, Molly."
"I don't feel so. Strelsa and I came into town for the afternoon--on the
most horrid kind of business, Ricky."
"I'm sorry----"
"You will be sorrier when you hear that about all of Strelsa's money was
in that miserable Adamant Trust Company which is causing so much
scandal. You didn't know Strelsa's money was in it, did you?"
"No," he said gravely.
"Isn't it dreadful? The child doesn't know whether she will ever get a
penny or not. Some of those disgusting men have run away, one shot
himself--you read about it!--and now they are trying to pretend that the
two creatures they have arrested are insane and irresponsible. I don't
care whether they are or not; I'd like to kill them. How does their
insanity concern Strelsa? For three weeks she hasn't known what to
think, what to expect--and even her lawyers can't tell her. I hate
lawyers. But _I_ think the chances are that her pretty house will be for
sale before long.... Wouldn't it be too tragic if it came into your
office----"
"Don't say such things, Molly," he said, bending his head over the desk
and fumbling with his pen.
"Well, I knew you'd be sympathetic. It's a shame--a crime!--it's
absolutely disgusting the way that men gamble with other people's money
and cheat and lie and--and--oh, it's a perfectly rotten world and I'm
tired of it!"
"Where is Mrs. Leeds?" he asked in a low voice.
"At Witch-Hollow--in town for this afternoon to see her stupid lawyers.
They don't do anything. They say they can't just yet. They're lazy
or--something worse. That's my opinion. We go out on the five-three
train--Strelsa and I----"
"Is she--much affected?"
"No; and that's the silly part of it. It would simply wreck me. But she
hasn't wept a single tear.... I suppose she'll have to marry, now--"
Mrs. Wycherly glanced askance at Quarren, but his face remained gravely
expressionless.
"Ricky dear?"
"Yes."
"I had a frightful row, on your account, with Mrs. Sprowl."
"I'm sorry. Why?"
"I told her I was going to ask you and Strelsa to Witch-Hollow."
Quarren said calmly:
"Don't do it then, Molly. There's no use of your getting in wrong with
Mrs. Sprowl."
Mrs. Wycherly laughed:
"Oh, I found a way around. I asked Mrs. Sprowl and Sir Charles at the
same time."
"What do you mean?" he said, turning a colourless face to hers.
"What I say. Ricky dear, I suppose that Strelsa _will_ have to marry a
wealthy man, now--and I believe she realises it, too--but I--I _wanted_
her to marry you, some day----"
He swung around again, confronting her.
"You darling!" he said under his breath.
Mrs. Wycherly's lip trembled and she dabbed at her eyes.
"I wish I could express my feelings like Mrs. Sprowl, but I can't," she
said naïvely. "Sir Charles will marry her, now; I know perfectly well he
will--unless Langly Sprowl----"
Quarren drew his breath sharply.
"Not that man," she said.
"God knows, Ricky. He's after Strelsa every minute--and he can make
himself agreeable. The worst of it is that Strelsa does not believe what
she hears about him. Women are that way, often. The moment the whole
world pitches into a man, women are inclined to believe him a
martyr--and end by discrediting every unworthy story concerning him....
I don't know, but I think it is already a little that way with
Strelsa.... He's a clever brute--and oh! what a remorseless man!... I
said that once to Strelsa, and she said very warmly that I entirely
misjudged him.... I wish Mary Ledwith would come back and bring things
to a crisis--I do, indeed."
Quarren said, calmly;
"You don't think Mrs. Leeds is engaged to Sprowl, do you?"
"No.... I don't think so. Sometimes I don't know what to think of
Strelsa. I'm certain that she was not engaged to him four weeks ago when
she was at Newport."
Quarren gazed out into the sunlit street. It was just four weeks ago
that her letters ceased. Had she stopped writing because of worry over
the Adamant Trust? Or was there another reason?
"I suppose," said Molly, dabbing at her eyes, "that Strelsa can't pick
and choose now. I suppose she's got to marry for sordid and sensible and
material reasons. But if only she would choose Sir Charles--I think I
could be almost reconciled to her losing you----"
Quarren laughed harshly.
"An irreparable loss to any woman," he said. "I doubt that Mrs. Leeds
survives losing me."
"Ricky! She cares a great deal for you! So do I. And Strelsa _does_ care
for you----"
"Not too rashly I hope," he said with another disagreeable laugh.
"Oh, that isn't like you, Ricky! You're not the sneering, fleering nasty
kind. If you are badly hurt, take it better than that----"
"I can't!" he said between set teeth. "I care for her; she knows it. I
guess she knows, too, that what she once said to me started me into what
I'm doing now--working, waiting, living like a dog--doing my best to
keep my self-respect and obtain hers--" He choked, regained his
self-control, and went on quietly:
"Why do you think I dropped out of everything? To try to develop
whatever may be in me--so that I could speak to her as an equal and not
as the court jester and favourite mountebank of the degenerate gang she
travels with----"
"Ricky!"
"I beg your pardon," he said sullenly.
"I am not offended, you poor boy.... I hadn't realised that you were so
much in love with her--so deeply concerned----"
"I have always been.... She knows it...." He cleared his eyes and turned
a dazed gaze on the sunny street once more.
"If I could--" he stopped; a hopeless look came into his eyes. Then he
slowly shook his head.
"Oh, Ricky! Ricky! Can't you do something? Can't you make a lot of money
very quickly? You see Strelsa has simply got to marry money. Be fair; be
just to her. A girl can't exist without money, can she? You know that,
don't you?"
"I've heard your world say so."
"You know it's true!"
"I don't know what is true. I don't know truth from falsehood. I suppose
that love requires money to keep it nourished--as roses require
manure----"
"Ricky!"
"I'm speaking of _your_ world----"
"My world! The entire world knows that money is necessary--except
perhaps a silly sentimentalist here and there----"
"Yes, there are one or two--here and there," he said. "But they're all
poor--and prejudiced."
Molly applied her handkerchief to her eyes, viciously.
"I hope _you_ are not one, Ricky. I'm sure I'm not fool enough to expect
a girl who has been accustomed to everything to be contented without
anything."
"There's her husband as an asset."
"Oh, my dear, don't talk slush!"
"--And--children--perhaps."
"And no money to educate them! You dear boy, there is nothing to
do--absolutely nothing--unless it's based on money. You know it; I know
it. People without it are intolerable--a nuisance to everybody and to
themselves. What could Strelsa find in life without the means to enjoy
it?"
"Nothing--perhaps.... But I believe I'll ask her."
"She'll tell you the truth, Ricky. She's an unusually truthful woman....
I must go downtown. Strelsa and I are lunching"--she reddened--"with
Langly.... His aunt would kill me if she heard of it.... I positively do
not dare ask Langly to Witch-Hollow because I'm so deadly afraid of that
fat old woman!... Besides, I don't want him there--although--if Strelsa
_has_ to marry him----"
She fell silent and thoughtful, reflecting, perhaps, that if Strelsa was
going to take Langly Sprowl, her own country house might as well have
the benefit of any fashionable and social glamour incident to the
announcement.
Then, glancing at Quarren, her heart smote her, and she flushed:
"Come up to Witch-Hollow, Ricky dear, and get her to elope with you if
you can! Will you?"
"I'll come to Witch-Hollow if you ask me."
"That's ducky of you. You _are_ a good sport, Ricky--and always were! Go
on and marry her if you can. Other women have stood it.... And, I know
it's vulgar and low and catty of me--but I'd love to see Mrs. Sprowl
blow up--and see that hatchet-faced Langly disappointed--yes, I would,
and I don't care what you think! Their ancestors were common people, and
Heaven knows why a Wycherly of Wycherly should be afraid of the
descendants of Dutch rum smugglers!"
Quarren looked up with a weary smile.
"But you are afraid," he said.
"I am," admitted Molly, furiously; and marched out.
As he put her into her car he said:
"Write me if you don't change your mind about asking me to
Witch-Hollow."
"No fear," said the pretty little woman; "and," she added, "I hope you
make mischief and raise the very dickens all around. I sincerely hope
you do!"
"I hope so, too," he said with the ghost of a smile.
[Illustration: "A fortnight later Strelsa wrote to Quarren for the first
time in nearly two months."]