The Perils of Pauline

by Lawrence Fletcher

  CHAPTER XVI

  SOPHIE MCALLAN'S WEDDING

  A few days after their return from Montana Pauline sat reading by thelibrary window. They had come late to the country this Summer and thepark of Castle Marvin had had time to leave and bloom into uttersplendor. It was like a flowery kingdom in the Land of Faery, and asher eyes were lifted listlessly now and then from the printed page,they roamed over the garden which lay like some vast and radiantOriental rug in Nature's palace hall. The distant forest was thepalace wall, tapestried in green; its dome, a sky of tender blue; itslamp, the morning sun; its Prince, her Harry standing in the garden.

  "He should always stand in the garden," thought Pauline tenderly. "Theflowers are such a splendid foil for him."

  She shut her eyes in sheer satiety of beauty. Not even the shabby manmopping his hot forehead as he came along the road, marred thepicture. She was a little surprised to see him, a moment later,talking in an easy way with Harry but there was no false pride in herlover--brother and all men were his friends until they provedthemselves his enemies. All except Owen.

  The shabby man, holding his hat between his nervous hands, wasevidently an applicant for work. Harry pointed to the flower beds andthe rose trees with a nod of inquiry. The man assented vaguely. Andthey came on up the path together, making their way towards theservants' quarters over the garage. Harry paused at the window:

  "I have hired a new gardener, who does not know his own name," he saidas they passed on.

  Pauline turned back to the pages of the Cosmopolitan. A picture in anarticle on the motor races caught her eye and held it for some reasonthat she did not at first understand. It was a picture of a man inauto-racer's costume, with a helmet tight upon his head and the keenfeatures and daring eyes peculiar to those who live by peril. She hadstarted to read the caption when she was interrupted by Bemis bringingher letters. With a little flutter of pleasure, womanlike, she beganto read the letters from their postmarks before opening them. She hitupon one that brought a little peal of laughter from her, and sheopened it eagerly and read:

  "Walter and I want you and Harry to be with us at the wedding. Don'tfaint. We decided only yesterday, and it's going to be very quiet,with just the few people whom we can reach with informal notes likethis. You can motor over in an hour. Tell Harry our lions arrivedlast Thursday from Germany, and after the wedding the keeper willexhibit them. If Harry won't come to see me married, he'll come to seethe lions.

  "Yours in a flurry, Sophie McAllan."

  Pauline laughed again. It was like her unconventional chum, Sophie, toarrange her wedding with the same startling haste that had marked allthe breathless events of her life. The lions she mentioned weretypical of her original ideas. She had suddenly announced to herparents one day that she was tired of domestic animals and was going tokeep lions instead. And her amused and amazed father had not only beenforced to yield, but to keep his eye out all over Europe, Asia andAfrica for new bargains in well bred lions ever since.

  It was also typical of Sophie that she had selected from among all thedashing wooers; at her heels, Walter Trumwell, simple and sedate, whowas horrified by her pranks and shocked by her use of slang, but whoadored her with the devotion of a frightened puppy. Their engagementhad been long announced. It was only in its high-handed abruptnessthat the wedding was a surprise.

  Pauline dropped the letter on the table and hurried from the room tolook for Harry.

  He had head her first call and was coming in from the garage. Pausingat the door of the library, where he had last seen her, he narrowlyavoided a collision with Owen, who was hurrying out. The look ofcovert guilt on the secretary's face aroused his latent suspicion. ButOwen, quickly recovering himself, bowed, apologized and passed on.

  Harry stepped into the library. He saw the open letter on the table,looked at the envelope and saw that, he was included in the address.He read the letter, and the old look of trouble came into his eyes ashe turned to see if Owen were watching.

  As he stepped into the hall he saw the secretary leaving the house. Hestood in the doorway and watched Owen depart in his own machine, drivenby his own chauffeur, a sullen young fellow whom the other employeesheld in aversion.

  "He's up to something. I wonder what harm he could do at the McCallanwedding," muttered Harry, as he moved down the steps and out to wherethe new gardener was working. The man had been greatly improved as tocleanliness and clothes, but there was still the strange distant lookin his eyes as he got up from a flower bed to speak to Harry.

  Pauline, after circling the house in vain search of her brother, hadreturned to her unread letters and her magazine.

  As she lifted the latter from the table, the picture of the man inracing costume again struck her eye, and this time she read thecaption:

  "Ralph Palmer, whose skull was fractured in the Vanderbilt Cup Race andwho disappeared from a hospital six weeks ago."

  She studied the face again. It seemed the living likeness of one whomshe had seen dead. Suddenly her thoughts crystallized and she sprangup. She rushed again to the front door, carrying the magazine open andsaw Harry and the gardener talking on the path. She ran down to them.

  The gardener took off his hat, but Pauline looked at him with suchpiercing scrutiny that he hurried to resume his work. Harry, after abrief affectionate greeting, turned to give some last instructions,and, behind his back, Pauline stole another look at the magazine.

  "It is; I am sure it is," she said half aloud.

  Harry turned quickly. "What is, dear goddess of the garden?" he askedcheerily.

  Pauline closed the magazine abruptly.

  "Oh! I--I was dreaming," she answered, with a little nervous laugh.

  "You can't have a dream when you are one," he said, putting his armabout her waist as they moved back towards the house.

  "I have news," she exclaimed, remembering the wedding invitation."Sophie McCallan is to be married tonight--just like that--withouttelling till the last minute."

  "I read the letter in the library."

  "Did you tell Farrell to have the car ready?"

  "I will, dearest. But I am not sure that I can go."

  "But you must go."

  "I got a telegram this morning, and I must go into town."

  "To New York! Oh, Hairy, I simply hate your old business. Haven't wegot enough money without trying to make all there is in the world?Aren't we..."

  "No, not to New York--just into Westbury, Miss Firebrand. I must usethe wire direct to the office."

  "Absurd. Why don't you telephone your message?"

  "Code messages, dear. They can't be talked."

  "But you'll be back in time to go with me?"

  "I'll do my best. I'm starting directly. There's Farrell with themachine now."

  "But Farrell must get my car ready."

  "He will. Farrell isn't going with me."

  Her threats and pretty pleadings followed him as he drove away. ButHarry did not drive towards Westbury farther than the firstcrossroads. Instead, he swerved out across country towards Windywild,the great McCallan estate. Only a vague purpose moved him. Hissuspicions were groping. But he was forming dimly in his mind a planto keep Pauline away from the McCallan wedding. Premonition whisperedthat even among the nuptial gayeties there might be danger.

  On the crest of Winton's Hill, from which the road slopes down tobeautiful Windywild through parked forests, but from which the ramblingwhite villa, with its barns and garage can be seen in strikingbird's-eye view, Harry stopped his machine.

  To his far vision there was no unusual stir about the McCallan house,in spite of the wedding day. Owen's car was not at the gate nor in theyard, and he certainly would not have sent it to the garage if he weremaking a business visit to the manager of the estate.

  With a hateful sense of spying on the innocent and the sincere dread ofbeing met there by anyone--even by Owen--he was about to turnaround, go back and agree to take Pauline to the wedding
, when themovement of a figure through the distant garage yard made him stiffento attention and strain his gaze.

  In an instant he had whipped his binoculars from under the seat of therunabout and was staring through them at the establishment below. Afew moments afterwards he carefully replaced the glasses, and droveaway.

  Owen had left the Marvin place in haste, seemingly intent upon a directand important errand, but if any one had seen where the car stopped anhour later, both the haste and the errand would still have beenunexplained.

  They were in the loneliest stretch of woods a half mile beyond theMcCallan house when Owen leaned forward and said to his driver: "Youmay stop here."

  "Yes, sir," answered the young man with a respect that he showed to noone else. He drew the machine to the roadside and then asked: "Am I togo with you or stay here?"

  "Stay here," answered Owen. "But don't sit there lolling in the seat.We have broken down--you understand--and you will keep us brokendown and keep on mending the machine until I return."

  Owen, who was not averse to physical effort when his dearest object wasat stake, walked the half mile to Windywild rapidly. Unlike Harry's,Owen's plans were definite and fixed.

  He strode through the front gate but took his way immediately to thestable in front of which two grooms were currying a restless horse.

  "Hello, Simon," said Owen. "My car has broken down up the road here. Iwonder if you can help me out."

  "I guess so," said the groom, not very cheerfully.

  "We got plenty to do today as it is, Mr. Owen, with the weddin' partyon an' them gol blamed lions to look after."

  "Who talka da lions?" cried a grim voice, and, turning, Owen pretendedto see for the first time a short, heavy set man of the gypsy type,seated on a box at the stable door smoking a cigarette and evidentlyregarding all the world as the object of his personal hate.

  "Why, who is that man?" asked Owen of the groom in a tone ofcondescending interest. "Where have I seen him before?"

  "If ye ever saw him before, ye wouldn't want to see him again,"declared the groom. "He's Garcia, Miss Sophie's new lion tamer, but weain't had time to tame him yet. He's wild."

  The answer to this taunt was a rush from Garcia, who, uttering anunintelligible roar that might have done credit to one of his lions,sprang towards the groom. The latter took quick refuge behind thehorse.

  The man's fury made Owen step aside, too, but he looked on with anappreciative smile. As Garcia came back, growling, to his seat on thebox, the secretary stepped up to him and held out his hand.

  "Is it really you?" he said, the patronage in his voice offsetting thefamiliarity of his manner.

  "If it looks like me, it is me," snarled the Gypsy. "Him--overthere," he cried, pointing to the groom, "he donta looka like his ownface if I get him."

  "Come, old friend," said Owen in a low voice. "Don't you remember me?Don't you remember the Zoological Garden in Brussels and the lion thatbent a cage so easily one day that it killed Herr Bruner, of Berlin."

  The last words spoken almost in a whisper, had an electrical effectupon the lion tamer. He fairly writhed in his seat and cowered awayfrom Owen as from one who held a knife over his head.

  It was at this moment that Harry, looking from the hill, put away hisbinoculars and turned his car around.

  "Come, let's see the lions, may I?" asked Owen, cheerily ignoring theman's terror, secretly enjoying it.

  Without a word Garcia led the way into the stables.

  The lions, six in number, were quartered in box stalls rebuilt withheavy steel bars. They had been quiet, but the sight of a stranger setthem wild and their roaring thundered through the building.

  Garcia led Owen to farthest cage and stopped abruptly.

  "You after me?" he inquired, his nerve partially recovered.

  "Yes, but to help you, not to harm you, old friend."

  "You lie, I theenk. You tella the police of the leetle accident inBresseli--no?"

  "No, indeed; you are too useful a man to lose, Garcia. Besides, I needyou again."

  The gypsy held up his hands in refusal. "No," he whispered. "I havaone dead man's face here always." He pointed to his eyes. "I cry itaway; I go all over da world. I not forget. He not forget. He follame."

  Owen laughed. "Come, come," he said, "you are foolish. You hadnothing to do with that affair, except to loosen one little bar ever solittle. (Garcia groaned.) And it would be just as easy to leave say acage door open tonight while they're having the wedding."

  "You mean--?"

  "I mean only a little joke. Nobody will be hurt, I feel sure. Ofcourse, if any one should be, you could not be blamed. Come, I want aquick answer. If you won't do it, of course--you don't want anythingsaid about Brussels, do you, old friend?"

  The man uttered another cry.

  Owen drew money from his pocket. The man seized it greedily. If hewas to do the blackest of deeds, there was nothing in his conscience toprevent him from profiting.

  "Tonight--during the wedding, remember," said Owen. "I will give youthe signal. And, mind, you brute, if you don't do it, you know whatI'll do to you."

  A few moments later he was out chatting cheerily with the grooms. "I'mnot going to ask you to help me with the car, Simon," he said. "You'retoo crowded today, I see. I'll send Farrell up to the Hodgins Houseand wait for him. Good-day."

  He swung off down the road, greatly at peace with all the world. Hedid not even rebuke his chauffeur when he caught him loafing on thegrass.

  Harry and the household chauffeur, Farrell, were talking togetheroutside the garage and Harry was handing a $10 bill to Farrell, whogrinned broadly as he pocketed it. Owen saw nothing in this to causehim apprehension. Harry was always generous with the employees. Itwas well for Owen's plan that he should go to the wedding in sopleasant a mood.

  Pauline looked up from her book as Harry entered the library.

  "I'm so happy," she cried. "You are a darling boy to come home sosoon."

  He accepted her rewarding kiss gratefully.

  "Yes, I think it's all right," he said, "though there are some seriousmatters in hand at the office."

  The butler appeared at the door. "Farrell asks if he may have a wordwith you, Sir."

  "Farrell? Why, yes; let him come here."

  The chauffeur, cap in hand, stepped into the room.

  "Guess I got to take the big car to New York, Sir. I haven't got theparts to fix it, and I can't get them nowhere but in New York."

  "Very well; that's all right, Farrell."

  "But be back surely by four o'clock, Farrell," warned Pauline. "Youare the only driver I have."

  "Oh, I'll get back all right, Miss."

  But immediately after uttering these words in a tone of perfectrespect, Farrell committed an astonishing offense against the laws thatseparate servitor and employer. He caught the shimmer of a wink uponHarry's eye, and he had the audacity to return it.

  Three minutes afterwards Farrell did a stranger thing. Going directfrom the house to the telephone in the garage, he took up the receiverand called up the house. Owen, passing by, stopped spellbound, at thedoor, to hear these mandatory words spoken by the chauffeur to HarryMarvin, whose answering voice could actually be heard by Owen throughthe open window of the library.

  "Mr. Marvin, you are needed at your office. Come at once," phonedFarrell.

  He was grinning again as he came out of the garage, got into a machineand drove away. Owen gazed after him with puzzled, lowering brows.