Lady Clifton-Wyatt, like many another woman, was kept in order by the
presence of men. She knew that the least charming of attributes in
masculine eyes are the female feline, the gift and art of claws.
Men can be catty, too--tom-catty, yet contemptibly feline when they
are not on their good behavior. There are times when the warning,
"Gentlemen, there are ladies present," restores them to order as
quickly as the entrance of a teacher turns a school-room of young
savages into an assembly of young saints.
The women in Mrs. Prothero's drawing-room could not hear any of the
words the men mixed with their smoke, but they could hear now and then
a muffled explosion of laughter of a quality that indicated what had
provoked it.
The women, too, were relieved of a certain constraint by their
isolation. They seemed to enjoy the release. It was like getting their
minds out of tight corsets. They were not impatient for the men--as
some of the men may have imagined. These women were of an age where
they had something else to think of besides men. They had careers to
make or keep among women as well as the men among men.
The servants kept them on guard till the coffee, tobacco, and liqueurs
were distributed. Then recess was declared. Marie Louise found herself
on a huge tapestried divan provided with deep, soft cushions that held
her like a quicksands. On one side of her was the mountainous Mrs.
Dyckman resembling a stack of cushions cased in silk; on the other was
Mildred Tait Fargeton, whose father had been ambassador to France.
Marie Louise listened to their chatter with a frantic impatience.
Polly was heliographing ironic messages with her eyes. Polly was
hemmed in by the wife of a railroad juggler, who was furious at the
Administration because it did not put all its transportation problems
in her husband's hands. She would not have intrusted him with the
buying of a spool of thread; but that was different.
Mrs. Prothero was monopolized by Lady Clifton-Wyatt. Marie Louise
could see that she herself was the theme of the talk, for Mrs.
Prothero kept casting startled glances Marie-Louise-ward, and Lady
Clifton-Wyatt glances of baleful stealth.
Marie Louise had proved often enough that she was no coward, but
even the brave turn poltroon when they fight without a sense of
justification. Her pride told her that she ought to cross over to Lady
Clifton-Wyatt and demand that she speak up. But her sense of guilt
robbed her of her courage. And that oath she had given to Mr.
Verrinder without the least reluctance now loomed before her as the
greatest mistake of her life. Her sword and shield were both in pawn.
She gave herself up for lost and had only one hope, that the men would
not come in--especially that Ross Davidge would not come in in time to
learn what Lady Clifton-Wyatt was so eager to publish. She gave Mrs.
Prothero up for lost, too, and Polly. But she wanted to keep Ross
Davidge fond of her.
Then in a lull Mrs. Prothero spoke up sharply:
"I simply can't believe it, my dear. I don't know that I ever saw a
German spy, but that child is not one. I'd stake my life on it."
"And now the avalanche!" thought Marie Louise.
The word "spy" was beginning to have more than an academic or
fictional interest to Americans, and it caught the ear of every person
present.
Mrs. Dyckman and Mme. Fargeton sat up as straight as their curves
permitted and gasped:
"A German spy! Who? Where?"
Polly Widdicombe sprang to her feet and darted to Mrs. Prothero's
side.
"Oh, how lovely! Tell me who she is! I'm dying to shoot a spy."
Marie Louise sickened at the bloodthirstiness of Polly the insouciante.
Mrs. Prothero tried to put down the riot of interest by saying:
"Oh, it's nothing. Lady Clifton-Wyatt is just joking."
Lady Clifton-Wyatt was at bay. She shot a glance at Marie Louise and
insisted:
"Indeed I'm not! I tell you she is a spy."
"Who's a spy?" Polly demanded.
"Miss Webling," said Lady Clifton-Wyatt.
Polly began to giggle; then she frowned with disappointment.
"Oh, I thought you meant it."
"I do mean it, and if you'll take my advice you'll be warned in
time."
Polly turned, expecting to find Marie Louise showing her contemptuous
amusement, but the look she saw on Marie Louise's face was disconcerting.
Polly's loyalty remained staunch. She hated Lady Clifton-Wyatt anyway,
and the thought that she might be telling the truth made her a little
more hatable. Polly stormed:
"I won't permit you to slander my best friend."
Lady Clifton-Wyatt replied, "I don't slahnda hah, and if she is yaw
best friend--well--"
Lady Clifton-Wyatt hated Polly and was glad of the weapon against her.
Polly felt a sudden terrific need of retorting with a blow. Men had
never given up the fist on the mouth as the simple, direct answer to
an insult too complicated for any other retort. She wanted to slap
Lady Clifton-Wyatt's face. But she did not know how to fight. Perhaps
women will acquire the male prerogative of the smash in the jaw along
with the other once exclusive masculine privileges. It will do them no
end of good and help to clarify all life for them. But for the present
Polly could only groan, "Agh!" and turn to throw an arm about Marie
Louise and drag her forward.
"I'd believe one word of Marie Louise against a thousand of yours,"
she declared.
"Very well--ahsk hah, then."
Polly was crying mad, and madder than ever because she hated herself
for crying when she got mad. She almost sobbed now to Marie Louise,
"Tell her it's a dirty, rotten lie."
Marie Louise had been dragged to her feet. She temporized, "What has
she sai-said?"
Polly snickered nervously, "Oh, nothing--except that you were a German
spy."
And now somewhere, somehow, Marie Louise found the courage of
desperation. She laughed:
"Lady Clifton-Wyatt is notori--famous for her quaint sense of humor."
Lady Clifton-Wyatt sneered, "Could one expect a spy to admit it?"
Marie Louise smiled patiently. "Probably not. But surely even you
would hardly insist that denying it proves it?"
This sophistry was too tangled for Polly. She spoke up:
"Let's have the details, Lady Clifton-Wyatt--if you don't mind."
"Yes, yes," the chorus murmured.
Lady Clifton-Wyatt braced herself. "Well, in the first place Miss
Webling is not Miss Webling."
"Oh, but I am," said Marie Louise.
Lady Clifton-Wyatt gasped, "You don't mean to pretend that--"
"Did you read the will?" said Marie Louise.
"No, of course not, but--"
"It says there that I was their daughter."
"Well, we'll not quibble. Legally you may have been, but actually you
were their adopted child."
"Yis?" said Marie Louise. "And where did they find me? Had you
heard?"
"Since you force me to it, I must say that it is generally believed
that you were the natural daughter of Sir Joseph."
Marie Louise was tremendously relieved by having something that she
could deny. She laughed with a genuineness that swung the credulity
all her way. She asked:
"And who was my mother--my natural mother, could you tell me? I really
ought to know."
"She is believed to have been a--a native of Australia."
"Good Heavens! You don't mean a kangaroo?"
"An actress playing in Vienna."
"Oh, I am relieved! And Sir Joseph was my father--yes. Do go on."
"Whether Sir Joseph was your father or not, he was born in Germany and
so was his wife, and they took a false oath of allegiance to his
Majesty. All the while they were loyal only to the Kaiser. They worked
for him, spied for him. It is said that the Kaiser had promised to
make Sir Joseph one of the rulers over England when he captured the
island. Sir Joseph was to have any castle he wanted and untold
wealth."
"What was I to have?" Marie Louise was able to mock her. "Wasn't I to
have at least Westminster Abbey to live in? And one of the crown
princes for a husband?"
Lady Clifton-Wyatt lost her temper and her bearings.
"Heaven knows what you were promised, but you did your best to earn
it, whatever it was."
Mrs. Prothero lost patience. "Really, my dear Lady Clifton-Wyatt, this
is all getting beyond me."
Lady Clifton-Wyatt grew scarlet, too. She spoke with the wrath of a
Tisiphone whipping herself to a frenzy. "I will bring you proofs. This
creature was a paid secret agent, a go-between for Sir Joseph and the
Wilhelmstrasse. She carried messages. She went into the slums of
Whitechapel disguised as a beggar to meet the conspirators. She
carried them lists of ships with their cargoes, dates of sailing,
destinations. She carried great sums of money. She was the paymaster
of the spies. Her hands are red with the blood of British sailors and
women and children. She grew so bold that at last she attracted the
attention of even Scotland Yard. She was followed, traced to Sir
Joseph's home. It was found that she lived at his house.
"One of the spies, named Easling or Oesten, was her lover. He was
caught and met his deserts before a firing-squad in the Tower. His
confession implicated Sir Joseph. The police raided his place. A
terrific fight ensued. He resisted arrest. He tried to shoot one of
our police. The bullet went wild and killed his wife. Before he could
fire again he was shot down by one of our men."
The astonishing transformations the story had undergone in its transit
from gossip to gossip stunned Marie Louise. The memory of the reality
saddened her beyond laughter. Her distress was real, but she had
self-control enough to focus it on Lady Clifton-Wyatt and murmur:
"Poor thing, she is quite mad!"
There is nothing that so nearly drives one insane as to be accused of
insanity.
The prosecutrix almost strangled on her indignation at Marie Louise's
calm.
"The effrontery of this woman is unendurable, Mrs. Prothero. If you
believe her, you must permit me to leave. I know what I am saying. I
have had what I tell you from the best authority. Of course, it may
sound insane, but wait until you learn what the German secret agents
have been doing in America for years and what they are doing now."
There had been publication enough of the sickening duplicity of
ambassadors and attachés to lead the Americans to believe that
Teutonism meant anything revolting. Mrs. Prothero was befuddled at
this explosion in her quiet home. She asked:
"But surely all this has never been published, has it? I think we
should have heard of it here."
"Of course not," said Lady Clifton-Wyatt. "We don't publish the
accounts of the submarines we sink, do we? No more do we tell the
Germans what spies of theirs we have captured. And, since Sir Joseph
and his wife were dead, there would have been no profit in publishing
broadcast the story of the battle. So they agreed to let it be known
that they died peacefully or rather painfully in their beds, of
ptomaine poisoning."
"That's true," said Mrs. Prothero. "That's what I read. That's what
I've always understood."
Now, curiously, as often happens in court, the discovery that a
witness has stumbled on one truth in a pack of lies renders all he has
said authentic and shifts the guilt to the other side. Marie Louise
could feel the frost of suspicion against her forming in the air.
Polly made one more onset: "But, tell me, Lady Clifton-Wyatt, where
was Marie Louise during all this Wild West End pistol-play?"
"In her room with her lover," snarled Lady Clifton-Wyatt. "The
servants saw her there."
This threw a more odious light on Marie Louise. She was not merely a
nice clean spy, but a wanton.
Polly groaned: "Tell that to Scotland Yard! I'd never believe it."
"Scotland Yard knows it without my telling," said Lady Clifton-Wyatt.
"But how did Marie Louise come to escape and get to America?"
"Because England did not want to shoot a woman, especially not a
young woman of a certain prettiness. So they let her go, when she
swore that she would never return to England. But they did not trust
her. She is under observation now! Your home is watched, my dear Mrs.
Widdicombe, and I dare say there is a man on guard outside now, my
dear Mrs. Prothero."
This sent a chill along every spine. Marie Louise was frightened out
of her own brief bravado.
There was a lull in the trial while everybody reveled in horror. Then
Mrs. Prothero spoke in a judicial tone.
"And now, Miss Webling, please tell us your side of all this. What
have you to say in your own behalf?"
Marie Louise's mouth suddenly turned dry as bark; her tongue was like
a dead leaf. She was inarticulate with remembrance of her oath to
Verrinder. She just managed to whisper:
"Nothing!"
It sounded like an autumn leaf rasping across a stone. Polly cried out
in agony:
"Marie Louise!"
Marie Louise shook her head and could neither think nor speak. There
was a hush of waiting. It was broken by the voices of the men
strolling in together. They were utterly unwelcome. They stopped and
stared at the women all staring at Marie Louise.
Seeing Davidge about to ask what the tableau stood for, she found
voice to say:
"Mr. Davidge, would you be so good as to take me home--to Mrs.
Widdicombe's, that is. I--I am a little faint."
"Delighted! I mean--I'm sorry--I'd be glad," he stammered, eager to be
at her service, yet embarrassed by the sudden appeal.
"You'll pardon me, Mrs. Prothero, for running away!"
"Of course," said Mrs. Prothero, still dazed.
He bowed to her, and all round. Marie Louise nodded and whispered,
"Good night!" and moved toward the door waveringly. Davidge's heart
leaped with pity for her.
Lady Clifton-Wyatt checked him as he hurried past her.
"Oh, Mr. Davidge, I'm stopping at the Shoreham. Won't you drop in and
have a cup of tea with me to-morrow at hahf pahst fah?"
"Thank you! Yes!"