Every one knows that there are palaces in Fifth Avenue which contain
no one of social note, while there are houses no wider than step
ladders in the side streets for admission to which one would give one’s
eye-teeth. The Lees’ was of this type.
At ten o’clock on the evening of the twenty-second, the groom came
out of the area gate. He knew, and the Lees knew, that no one would
be going home for an hour, but he obeyed his orders to be on hand at
that time in order to open the carriage doors, and generally speed
the parting guest. He had already unrolled the red carpet down the
entire length of the steps, and was walking up and down, debating
whether he could squeeze in another five minutes for an extra plate
of ice-cream (the cook was his aunt), when his attention was attracted
to an approaching figure. It was that of a tall man in not ill fitting
blue serge clothes, but, though the month was March, and a cold March
at that, he seemed to feel no embarrassment over the fact that he wore
a Panama hat of large, of almost blatant, variety. The groom counted
up--at least two months before such a head-gear was even permissible.
He had never supposed that such ignorant human beings existed.
At this point his scorn was changed to surprise by observing that the
barbarian was actually ascending the Lees’ step, treading lightly upon
the red carpet. The butler opened the door promptly with smiling grace.
He had observed Miss Lewis among the guests, and knew her maid--a
vivacious French-woman. His manner grew sterner when a stranger in a
Panama hat asked for Mr. Lee. His gaze, starting at the Panama hat,
sank slowly to the newcomer’s feet, noting on the way the pair of
saddle-bags so casually held.
“Mr. Lee is entertaining friends at dinner,” he said coldly.
“Still eating at ten o’clock?” returned the stranger.
“No, sir. The gentlemen have just joined the ladies in the
drawing-room.”
“Tell Mr. Lee I should like to see him,” said the other, and stepped,
without invitation, inside the door. Plimpton, who in the natural
course of his profession had become something of a judge of men, looked
at the stranger critically, and came to the conclusion he was not a
thief. Further than this he refused to go.
“What name shall I say?” he inquired, and was confirmed in his fears
when the stranger answered,
“No name. Say I have a message from his son.”
Plimpton bowed very slightly. Be sure he knew all about the scandal
about Mr. Robert. His curiosity was so much aroused that a weaker man
would have mounted the stairs with a quickened tread. Not Plimpton. He
rose grandly from step to step like a swimmer breasting slow waves.
Arrived at the top, he stood a minute in the doorway, fixing his
employer with his eye, as one who would say, “Yes, it is true that I
have important news, but do not be alarmed; you are in safe hands.”
The next moment he was herding Mr. Lee downstairs like a faithful
sheep-dog.
Mr. Lee paused two steps from the bottom, and stood looking down at the
newcomer. He was a tall man, and the two steps gave him extra height,
so that in his close evening clothes he appeared almost gigantic.
“You wished to see me, sir?” he said politely.
“You have a son in South America, Mr. Lee?”
The old man bowed.
“A man about my age and height?”
“Not quite so tall, I think, sir.”
Vickers was silent. He had hoped the suggestion would be sufficient.
He looked at the old man steadily. There was no recognition in the
eyes. Vickers felt half tempted to throw over the whole game. It was
indeed a mad one. He contemplated reporting the death of Lee, and going
away. Then something in the face of Plimpton, peering over his master’s
shoulder, encouraged him. Plimpton had guessed. Plimpton would believe
him. He hazarded a bold stroke.
“Don’t you know me, father?”
The old man caught hold of him with a cry.
“My dear Robert! My dear son! To think of my not knowing you. But how
you have changed! You have changed immensely.”
“Ten years do change a fellow.”
“Ten years, my boy? You keep no count. It will be twelve in June.”
Even at seventy Mr. Lee must have retained some love of the dramatic,
for he insisted on taking Vickers upstairs, and entered the
drawing-room leaning on his arm, and saying suavely,
“Ladies, I want to introduce my son to you.”
Vickers had been away from home for seven years, and in that time the
highest type of feminine beauty which he had seen had been little
round-faced Rosita, with her coarse muslins and cotton lace. And
now he suddenly found himself the center of interest to a group of
half a dozen women, to whose natural beauty care, taste, fashion,
and money had added everything that could adorn. Their soft shining
dresses, their pretty necks and arms, their endless jewels dazzled him.
He thought of his own little party--of Ascencion’s efforts, of the
phonograph, of the macaw.
The room, too, was incredibly warm and bright and luxurious in his
eyes. The Lees prided themselves on its simplicity. It was more of a
library, Nellie always said, than a drawing-room. But on Vickers, who
had lived seven years with tiled floors and stucco walls, the dark red
hangings, the shaded lamps, the books, the heavy rugs, made a profound
impression.
Even in the first excitement, his prudence and his curiosity alike
suggested the importance of at once discovering the identity of Nellie.
His eye fell on Mrs. Raikes, sleek, dark, well bred as a fox terrier.
She was the most cordial of the little group. Again his glance turned
to an exuberant blonde, who stood with large blue eyes fixed upon him.
Every man has it in him to admire an exuberant blonde. He wondered
rather hopefully if it could be she.
“I am so glad to see you, Mr. Lee,” Mrs. Raikes was saying. “I had
heard of you, but I had begun to think you were mythical, like King
Arthur.”
“Why not say like all great heroes?”
The little group of women about him smiled. Only, he noticed the men
stood apart--the men, and one girl, who had never moved from a sofa in
the corner.
Vickers turned and looked at her, and as he did so, Mrs. Raikes
exclaimed:
“What a shame it is! We have monopolized him so that his own cousin has
not had a chance to speak to him. Come, Nellie, we’ll make room for
you.”
Thus challenged Nellie rose very slowly, and Vickers’s eyes rested on
her long slim figure, and immobile little face.
“Why did not you cable, Bob?” she said.
He had on his voyage home imagined every possible sort of meeting
between them--meetings which ranged from frenzied reproaches to
caresses, but he had not imagined just this.
Even the rest of the company seemed to feel it was an inadequate
greeting to a cousin who had been away twelve years, and they turned
with some amusement to catch Vickers’s answer.
“I did not cable,” he said good-temperedly, “because I had neither the
time nor the price.”
There seemed to be no answer to this, and Nellie attempted none. Her
eyebrows went up a little, and she returned to her sofa. Mrs. Raikes
hastily followed her to say good-night.
“I suppose we must leave you to a family reunion,” she said, and added,
lowering her voice: “Such a nice prodigal, Nellie. If I were you, I
should fall in love with him at once.”
Nellie’s eyes dwelt on her cousin with an amusement worse than anger.
“I don’t think I shall ever fall in love with Bob,” she answered, and
Emmons, who was sitting beside her, could not repress a slight sniff of
contempt.
Mrs. Raikes approached her host.
“Good-night, Mr. Lee. Thank you for such a pleasant after-dinner
surprise. Good-night, Mr. Robert Lee. Will you come and dine with me
some night? I always keep a fatted calf on hand.”
Vickers laughed. “Don’t you think I’ll get it at home?” he asked.
“Well, you know, Nellie is the housekeeper,” They both glanced at the
girl’s impassive countenance, and smiled at each other. They, at
least, were going to be friends.
Even after the guests were gone, and the three stood alone on the
hearth-rug, Nellie remained silent.
Vickers could not resist saying lightly:
“You don’t seem very glad to see me, Nellie.”
“On the contrary,” she answered, with meaning. “Don’t sit up too late
talking to Bob, Uncle Robert,” and with the curtest of nods she was
gone.
He turned to Mr. Lee and observed with some bitterness that Nellie’s
manner was not very cordial.
The old man shook his head. “No,” he said; “I was afraid you would
notice it. You must not expect too much of Nellie. She is a good girl,
but she has not a warm heart.”
“She has an attractive face,” said Vickers.
It was after midnight before Vickers found himself alone; he had sent
the servants to bed, and was standing a minute in the act of turning
out the lights. Plimpton had shown him--as one who bestows the freedom
of the city--where the switch was to be found.
His brain still reeled with the success of his venture--a new name, a
northern home, an affectionate old father, and--above all--New York
under so friendly a guise. He was no reader of the social items in
the newspapers. Names which had become familiar to half the country
meant nothing to him; but there had been something about the people
he had seen that evening which could not be mistaken by a man of
any perception--a certain elegance and courage which together make
the faults and virtues of good society. He had never in his wildest
dreams imagined Nellie a woman of this type. He had hoped she would be
pretty, but he hardly knew whether or not he was pleased to find this
cool, perfectly appointed creature, with a full face like a boy, and
a profile like an Italian saint. What bonds or barriers were there
between them? And if such existed, was he ever to know them? He thought
of her letter. “If it was on my account that you went, you need not
have gone.” What did it mean? Had there been coquetry on her part? Had
there been brutality on Lee’s?
And as he wondered he looked up and found himself face to face with her.
She had changed her elaborate evening dress for a scarcely less
elaborate dressing-gown. She came in, sat down opposite him, crossed
her legs, showing a pair of red-heeled bedroom slippers, and said
briskly,
“Well, Bob?”
He attempted to respond with a smile that should be as non-committal as
her words, but finding that she continued to stare at him he said,
“You were not very cordial in your greeting, Nellie.”
At this she laughed as if he were making the best joke in the world,
and as if she were most fittingly replying to it when she said, “Ah,
but you see I was so surprised.”
“Did not you know that I would come back?”
“So little that I can still hardly realize it.”
Again the doubt crossed his mind whether or not she believed in his
identity with her cousin.
“It is incomprehensible to me why you did come,” she went on
reflectively.
He answered truthfully: “Because I wanted to. Heavens, how I wanted to!”
“I am glad to hear it,” she returned. “I am glad you acted on a whim
rather than from a belated sense of duty, for otherwise it might seem
rather ungracious for me to say what I am going to say.”
There was something slightly sinister in her tone, but his curiosity
had reached such a point that he forgot to be alarmed.
“Go on,” he said.
“I have done your work for twelve years, Bob, and I don’t mean to do it
another instant.”
“Done my work?”
She went on with the utmost deliberation. She made not the smallest
emotional appeal. Vickers had never heard a woman speak more calmly.
“I see that you think that I ought to have been grateful for a home.
I wasn’t grateful. I have worked my passage. It was not desire for a
home that has kept me here year after year, but a thing perhaps you
don’t know very much about, Bob--a sense of duty. At this moment I have
no idea whether your father is a ruined man, or whether his mind is
slightly unhinged on the subject of money. He will not cut down the
household in the smallest particular, and yet there are times when I
can not get enough money from him to pay the servants’ wages. It is not
an easy task, Bob, and such as it is I make it over to you.”
He glanced at the room--at her own extravagant clothes.
“Do you mean to say--” he began, but she interrupted him.
“Don’t pretend to be surprised. As if I had not written to you often
enough, as long as I had any hope you would come back.”
“I never got your letters.”
“Odd, for you always cashed my checks.”
Vickers was silent. His experiment began to look less promising. It
irked him inexpressibly to be obliged to bear such a tone from any one,
more especially a woman. If Lee’s villainy had been on a larger scale
he could have supported it better.
“You have got to stay at home, Bob,” she said firmly.
He could not help smiling. “It does not sound so alarming,” he answered.
“You don’t suppose I meant stay and be idle?” she asked. “No, we don’t
think idleness agrees very well with you, Bob. You are beginning work
on Monday.”
Her tone as well as her words irritated him. “I shall begin to look for
something to do,” he said gravely. “And perhaps I shall find something
to help the family resources out.”
“You need not look about. Your place is waiting for you. Mr. Emmons has
very kindly offered to make you a clerk in his office.”
He laughed. “I think I can do a little better than that,” he said.
“You are hardly in a position to choose. The family resources have had
enough of your higher finance, Bob. You must take what is offered to
you.”
“It does not attract me--to be Mr. Emmons’s clerk.”
“I am sorry to hear it, but you must do as I tell you, remember.”
“Nellie,” he said, standing in front of the elegant and autocratic
creature, “does it occur to you that a man may change in twelve years?”
“It does not seem to me that you are essentially different, unless
perhaps in your appearance, which I really think has improved a little.”
“Thanks for the compliment. But I am changed to this extent--you can
not dictate to me as you seem to imagine you can. I shall work, because
I happen to prefer it, but I shall work how, when, and for whom I
please.”
She shook her head and smiled. “How like you that is, Bob--to imagine
that fine talking will help you. You will have to do as I say.”
“If you were a man I should call that a threat.”
“Oh, it is a threat. Don’t you understand of what?”
“No.”
“That if you make any effort to shirk the clerkship--if you don’t
behave well in it, even--I shall have you arrested.”
Vickers, who had just sunk into a chair, appreciating that the
conversation was likely to be a long one, sprang up. Did she then know
his story? Had she recognized him from the first? He made no effort to
conceal that her threat alarmed him.
“Arrested for what?” he asked.
“For stealing everything that I had in the world, Bob,” she returned
almost conversationally.