CHAPTER XIII
Langdon Jesse maintained a bachelor apartment in London the year round.When he arrived there, about a fortnight after his turbulent scene withMrs. Treharne and his signally unsuccessful attempt at an _entente_ withBlythe, he found everything in order, quite as he had left it the yearbefore. Gaskins, factotum and general overseer of the bachelorapartments, of which there were three tiers, Jesse's being the second,was a little more bald and fat, but he still rubbed his hands as a markof subservience and cocked his head to one side in a bird-like way whileengaged in conversation with his supposititious superior. He had arespectful but earnest complaint to make of one of Jesse's New Yorkcronies, a man engaged in the somewhat tempestuous task of drinkinghimself to death, who had occupied Jesse's apartment for a month duringthe spring; for it was Jesse's habit to extend the use of his Londonlodging, which was desirable mainly on account of its highly privilegedcharacter, to those of his intimates who happened to be in London whilehe himself was in New York.
"'E was more than 'arf-seas hover hall the time, sir," Gaskins toldJesse, lamentingly, "which of course was 'is privilege, but 'e did give'isself some 'orrid bumps when 'e come 'ome along o' three or four o'mornings. Hi'm afraid 'e would 'ave killed 'iself, sir, falling hagainstthe furniture, 'ad I not been living on the premises hand come hup handgot 'im straightened hout hin bed. Hand, sir, when Hi didn't come hup,'e would halways go to sleep in the bath-tub with 'is clothes on. Aswift goer, sir, but killing 'isself; killing 'isself fast."
Jesse laughed. He was tolerant enough of the idiosyncrasies of hisintimates, and this one, the "swift goer," had been of use to him in NewYork as a sort of organizer and major domo of revelries.
Jesse's apartment was on one of the quiet squares of Curzon Street, setamid a row of other houses given over to the accommodation of stationaryand transient bachelors who found the restraints of London hotelsirksome. It was beautifully appointed, even to the culinary departmentwhich Jesse himself only used on the occasions when he entertainedcompanies of roystering Americans and their companions, who were usuallymore or less photographed figurantes from the musical comedies. Hisbreakfast was brought to him from the Gaskins menage in the basement,and he dined here, there and everywhere--not infrequently at the Savoy.
It had not taken Jesse long, following his arrival in London, toascertain that Louise and Laura were at the Savoy. He had, in fact,within an hour after his arrival, caused a telephone canvass to be madeof the London hotels mainly patronized by Americans during the touringseason to gain this information. Now, lounging about his apartment whilehis Japanese man unpacked his things, he began upon the devising of amethod whereby he might again meet Louise. He had been reluctantlyforced to abandon the idea that by this time she might have "altered herprejudice" against him and might therefore be at least passively willingto meet him upon the plane of ordinary acquaintanceship, thus giving himan opportunity to exercise his fascinations upon her.
But he had not the least intention of abandoning his besiegement ofLouise Treharne--even if the besiegement had to be turned into anambuscade. He had come to London, leaving New York at a time when themarket was setting strongly against him, solely with this purpose in hismind. He furnished himself with plenty of excuses for the deliberationwith which he undertook this particular quest. It was his induratedhabit to doubt the continence of all women; and he made no exception ofLouise Treharne. The fact that she had scarcely been out of school amonth when he had first met her did not in the least serve to give herimmunity from such a doubt in Jesse's mind. His single guide in suchappraisals of women was his own experience with them, and hisexperience, he told himself, embodied plenty of parallels to the case ofLouise Treharne. Why should she be immune from a furtiveness, and theindulgences thereof, which he had so often studied at first hand? Whyshould she be less clever at dissimulation than many others he hadknown?
He had not the least doubt that he was right in this view. He sought tomake himself believe that otherwise he would be entirely willing topermit Louise to go her way. But, being right, then it was intolerablethat she should have flouted him--_him!_--as she had. It was a girlish,immature prejudice. He had not had sufficient opportunity to gain herbetter will. Her treatment of him had sorely touched his vanity as amoulder of women to his purposes. The circumstances of his meeting withher had deprived him of a fair chance. She was young, beautiful, and, hefelt sure, superbly secretive. He had not the least intention ofsupinely yielding to her foolish belief--it could not be other thanthat--that she disliked him.
But how to proceed?
No problem, having to do with what he would have called his diversions,had ever before so daunted him. Laura, to begin with, was a stumblingblock in his path. Laura, with whom he had a perfunctoryacquaintanceship extending over several years, had pointedly cut him,not once, but frequently, since the newspapers had flared with accountsof the one disreputable affair concerning him which had leaked out. Heknew very well that there was not the least possible chance for him toregain even a nodding plane with Laura Stedham. And she was the barrierbetween himself and Louise Treharne. They were rarely, he felt sure, outof each other's company. If Laura were out of the way, and he couldreach Louise alone, there would, he felt, be a chance. It wasunimaginable that Louise would, in such a case, be unresponsive to theallurements of his wealth, his power proceeding from wealth, hispersonality--Jesse felt so absolutely certain of this that he smiledwhen a vague doubt of it passed through his mind.
He had won many aloof women by bestowing upon them magnificent gifts.But he knew perfectly well that this method would not do with LouiseTreharne. Whatever else she might be, there was, he felt, not a particleof greed in her. There had even been times when Jesse had not scrupledto effect his designs by putting forth the pretence that his devotionstended in but one direction--the altar. How to employ even this finalmethod to engage the attention of a woman whose eyes, he very well knew,would flame with scorn of him even if she found herself accidentally inhis presence?
For several hours, while Mutsu, his Japanese valet, went forward withthe unpacking, Jesse strode up and down his apartment, going over thisproblem as he would have calculated the chances and mischances of amarket campaign.
It was inevitable that Jesse, at the end of his study of the problem,should have reached but one conclusion: it must be an ambuscade.
Having reached this conclusion, he measured the risk and sought toforecast the aftermath. Everything was in his favor. In the situationwhich he meditated bringing about, he knew that, in case anything wentwrong, the man's word would be worth that of a thousand women, no matterhow exalted their reputations. And more than likely, he calmly figured,there would be no aftermath at all. Entrapped, and perceiving nopossibility of escape Louise would acknowledge her finely-actedfurtiveness to him, and, like all women who used furtiveness as ascreen, would make the best of the situation--which was all that Jessedesired.
The salient feature of the plan which rapidly took form in his mindconsisted in discovering when Louise and Laura should be out of eachother's company, even for a short time. Jesse, not in the least balkingat the idea of setting a deliberate trap because he knew that he wouldhold the advantage no matter what the outcome, applied himself to thesolution of this by no means minor difficulty. The sight of the silent,busy Mutsu, industriously stowing his master's gear in dressers andclosets, furnished Jesse with a suggestion.
He would give his Japanese man a vigil at the Savoy. The vigil might bea tedious as it was sure to be a delicate one, but Mutsu was bothpatient and discreet. He was a studious but alert man-boy ofindeterminate age, as is characteristic of Japanese males under fifty,who had been employed as a club attendant in New York for several yearsand thus had added to his natural gift for discretion. He had been withJesse for more than a year, always doing more than was ever asked ofhim, but studiously refraining from indicating whether he entertainedany personal liking for his employer--which is another trait of acertain type of Japanese in their relatio
nships with Occidentals.
Jesse spent a concentrated half hour in minutely instructing Mutsu as towhat he desired of him. The valet was to go to the Savoy on the morrow,and, by liberally tipping the doorman at the ladies' entrance, or thecarriage-opener, or whomsoever among the hotel's menials he found themost pliable or knowing, have Mrs. Laura Stedham and Miss LouiseTreharne, American ladies who were guests of the hotel, pointed out tohim when they should make their appearance, as they no doubt would inthe course of the day, either for driving or walking. Miss Treharnewould be the younger of the two. After having familiarized himself withthe personal exteriors of these ladies, Mutsu was to keep vigil, onwhatever pretext he might invent, in or around the hotel, until such atime as he should see the older of the two American ladies leaving thehotel alone. Whenever that should happen, the valet was instantly totelephone to Jesse at the Curzon Street apartment. The watch on themovements of the two ladies was not to terminate until Mrs. Stedhamshould leave the hotel unaccompanied by Miss Treharne, no matter howmany days of waiting should be required before such a thing occurred.
Mutsu nodded and exhibited his dental smile when Jesse had finished hisinstructions. He understood the instructions perfectly, without, ofcourse, in the least guessing at the purpose back of them.
Jesse made no mistake in appraising his Japanese man's acuteness at suchwork. Within less than two hours after ingratiating himself, by the useof unostentatiously distributed backsheesh, with certain of the Savoy'sflunkeys, Matsu had had Laura and Louise pointed out to him as they leftthe hotel and entered a taxicab. He fixed their faces on his mentalrecording tablets, and called up Jesse on the telephone and told him ofhis progress.
Thenceforward, for several days, the wiry little Japanese valet hoveredabout the ladies' entrance of the Savoy, forestalling suspicion as tothe purpose of his loitering by the bestowal of liberal _pourboires_upon such of the flunkeys as were in a position to notice the constancyof his vigil.
Jesse kept to his Curzon Street apartment during the day, ever on thealert for a telephone message from his valet. He chafed under thenecessity--as he deemed it--which kept him indoors throughout thedaylight hours and only permitted of his prowling about London at night.But he possessed a sort of Luciferian determination in the pursuit ofsuch a purpose as that upon which he was now engaged; to the successfulaccomplishment of which he would have passed his days in a cellar ifthat had been one of the requirements of the game.
* * * * *
Laura had many friends, English and American, in London whom shereceived and called upon informally. She cared nothing for the"functionizing" of the Anglo-American social season in London, but shekeenly enjoyed the unceremonious gayeties of little groups of friends.She laughingly declared that she had "trained" the people she liked to"drop in" upon her in London in the American manner of neighborliness;and she enjoyed "showing off," as she expressed it, "the beautiful MissTreharne, from the States," as some of the chatty London weeklies hadalluded to Louise. She liked to junket about, too, with Louise; andthere was no lack of agreeable men keen to take them on day-long motortours through the country, attach them for merry afternoons to houseboatparties, and so on. For her part, Louise enjoyed the contrast affordedby the shy diffidence of the young Englishmen whom she met to theexuberant breeziness of Laura's American men friends in London.
One afternoon--it was ten days after Jesse's arrival in London--Laurasuggested to Louise, at luncheon, that, as they had a "clean slate" forthe remainder of the daylight hours for the first time in a long while,a tour among the shops, including a visit to the American departmentstore just then established in London, might fill in a part of the timeagreeably.
"But I am not insisting upon your going with me, dear," said Laura. "Iknow your lack of keenness for shopping in London, and I don't blameyou, considering how the tradespeople here try to positively _make_ onebuy things one doesn't want. So you can very easily escape on the pleathat you have letters to write, or that you are tired and want to restup for the theatre tonight, and I shan't be in the least miffed."
"I'll make it the letter-writing plea, then, Laura," said Louise, "andcling to the truth in spite of the temptation you offer me to fib. Ireally have a lot of letters to write."
Laura went away in a taxicab directly after luncheon, saying that shewould not be gone more than three hours, and Louise, at the desk in thesitting room of their suite, began a letter to her father, from whom,forwarded by John Blythe, she had lately received a long andaffectionate letter, expressing his anxiety to see her and the hope thathe might so arrange his business affairs as to permit of his visitingNew York late in the Autumn.
About half an hour after she had begun writing the telephone bell rang.
"His this Miss Tre'arne?" Louise heard a man's voice, "but Mrs. Stedhamsays that you are that of an upper servant," in the telephone.
"Yes, I am Miss Treharne--what is it?" she replied.
"Begging pardon, Miss Tre'arne," went on the man's voice, "but Mrs.Stedham says that you are not to be halarmed. Mrs. Stedham, Miss, wastaken slightly ill in a taxicab--nothing serious, Miss, she hasks me tohassure you--and she is now with Mrs. 'Ammond, at Number Naught-FourteenCurzon Street. Mrs. Stedham, Miss, hinsists that you be not halarmed,and wishes you to come to 'er at Mrs. 'Ammond's at once. This is Mrs.'Ammond's butler that is speaking."
"Tell Mrs. Stedham, please, that I shall come at once," said Louise,instantly aroused by the thought that something serious might havehappened to Laura. "What is the number and street again, please? And youare sure Mrs. Stedham has had no accident or is not seriously ill?"
"It is Naught-Fourteen Curzon Street, Miss Tre'arne," came the reply,"hand Mrs. Stedham 'erself hasks that you be hassured that she is onlyslightly hindisposed."
"I shall be there immediately, please tell her," said Louise, making apencilled note of the address.
Very uneasy, Louise put on her hat and long pongee coat with flutteringfingers. She felt that something serious must have happened to deflectLaura from a shopping tour to the home of a woman friend. She had notheard Laura allude to any woman friend in London named Mrs. Hammond, butthat consideration did not linger more than an instant in her mind, forLaura no doubt had many London friends of whom she had not chanced tospeak.
Within less than five minutes after receiving the telephoned summons,Louise was on her way in a taxicab to the address in Curzon Street. Shewas pale and in a tremor of uneasiness when the taxicab pulled up at thecurb of a neat three-story house near the end of a row of similarhouses.
So perturbed was she by the thought that she had not been told theentire truth as to what had happened to Laura that she scarcely noticedthe bald, bland Gaskins when he opened the door for her and said "MissTre'arne?"
"Yes, yes," hastily replied Louise. "Where is Mrs. Stedham?"
"If you please, Miss, Hi shall conduct you," said Gaskins, inured byyears of experience to the sort of deception he was practising; and hesoftly padded up the thickly-carpeted stairs in advance of her. Closelyfollowed by Louise, who paid hardly any attention at all to thesurroundings in her trepidation as to how she might find Laura, Gaskinsquietly opened the front side door of the second floor apartment andheld it open for her. Louise stepped into the room, and Gaskins, notentering himself, closed the door after her. She did not of coursenotice the click which denoted that the closed door was fitted with aspring lock. Afterwards Louise remembered having thought it odd thatGaskins did not follow her into the room to announce her, instead of sosuddenly effacing himself.
Louise quickly saw that there was nobody in the charmingly arrangedroom--partly study, partly living room--in which she found herself. Alsoshe noticed that it was distinctively a man's room. Wondering, but notyet affected by any fear, she made a few steps toward the portieres atthe rear of the room.
She was about to reach out a hand to draw the portieres side, when theyparted; and Langdon Jesse confronted her. He was trig in a big,overweight way in his loungin
g suit of grey; but the pallor ofexcitement had overspread his naturally waxy face, and his attempt atthe debonair manner was proclaimed to be a mere assumption by thetrembling of his hands and the huskiness of his voice when he spoke.
Louise had never swooned in her life. Now, however, at this apparitionof the one human being she had ever learned to loathe, she pressed onehand to her forehead and another to her heart and swayed slightly. Shefeared that she would fall; but the thought rocketed through her mindthat if she yielded to the almost overpowering physical weakness of themoment she would be at his mercy. By an effort of will which sheafterwards remembered with wonderment, she steadied herself as if by theprocess of actually forcing her blood to flow evenly. She permitted herhands to fall to her sides and regarded Jesse with an appearance ofcalmness. In that clash of eyes, Jesse, after a very few seconds of it,turned his head away on pretence of motioning Louise to a chair. Theimpalement of her gaze was beyond his endurance.
Louise paid no attention to his arm-waved invitation to be seated, butstood in the spot where she had stopped when the first sight of him hadalmost sent her reeling. She regarded him steadily, almostincredulously; an expression of incredulity that such a thing could be.
"It is unpardonable, of course, Miss Treharne," said Jesse, with aclearing of the throat in an attempt to sweep away his huskiness. "Butmy madness to see you, the hopelessness of trying to see you, alone, inany other way--" He brought his sentence to a finish with a gesturemeant to emphasize the excusableness of his position.
"Therefore you have sought to entrap me?" said Louise, with no trace ofscorn in her tone; her contempt for him was quite beyond such amanifestation of loathing; she asked the question as if reallyastonished to discover that a man would do such a thing.
"What other method could I employ save a sort of strategy?" askedJesse, evading her gaze. "Knowing that I was under the ban of yourunreasonable dislike, that you would refuse to receive me, and wretched,despairing, under the constant castigation of your prejudice--what elsecould I do? What else could any man do who found himself in a state ofdesperation from his love for a woman?"
"Say anything but that, I beg of you," replied Louise, experiencing asurge of disgust at the man's effrontery in professing love in such asituation. "I have no reason to expect anything savoring of manlinessfrom you, of course; but you might at least spare yourself thehumiliation--if you can be humiliated--of seeming ridiculous."
"I expected harsh words from you, which, of course, is tantamount toconfessing that I deserve them," said Jesse. "But I think we shall havea better understanding. Won't you be seated?"
"I would have credited you for knowing better than to ask me that,"replied Louise. She stepped to the door by which she had entered, triedthe knob, and of course found that the door was locked. Jesse, watchingher, gradually resumed his attempt at the debonair manner. All of theodds were in his favor in this adventure. He could not see where hestood a chance to lose. Therefore, according to the smooth argument ofcowardice, there was no reason, he considered, why he should continuehis air of deference.
"You did not suppose that, having been to somewhat adroit pains to getyou here, I would make it so easy for you to walk out without, at least,a little interchange of ideas?" he asked her, with coolly lifting brows,when she turned from the door.
She noticed his change of tone, and was conscious that she preferred itto his manner of fawning self-exculpation.
"Make your mind easy as to that. I have told you that I expect nothingwhatever of you that befits a man," she replied with a coldness of tonefrom which he inwardly recoiled far more than if she had poured out uponhim an emotional torrent of rebuke.
For a moment Jesse, studying her, was visited by the suggestion thatperhaps, after all, Louise Treharne was wearing no mask; that she wasreally that anomaly--as he would have viewed such a one--a woman who waswhat she professed to be. But he quickly dismissed this prompting assomething out of the question. She was merely a proficient in the art ofacting, and she was employing her mimetic talent to the utmost uponhim--thus he argued it out with himself. Moreover, he decided to giveexpression to his belief, as being calculated sooner to bring her to therealization that he had her measured.
"Listen, Louise," he said to her, thus calling her without evenattempting to make his tone apologetic; he leaned his elbows on the backof a leather chair and forced himself to look directly at her as hespoke: "It is idle for you to seek to delude me. It might do if I werenot nearly twice your age and had not had about five thousand times yourexperience. As the matter stands, it is simply absurd. At least give mecredit for having cut my wisdom teeth as to women. You portray the partyou assume with me very well. I'll have to say that for you. But, seeingthat I have penetrated to the heart of the comedy, why protract theplay?"
Louise disdained to attempt to have him believe that she did notunderstand him. But she was so riven by the shamefulness of hisimputation that she could not have found words to reply to him if shehad wanted to.
"Why not give me a chance to make good with you, Louise?" went on Jessein a tone of arguing familiarity, coming from behind the leather chairand advancing toward her. He accepted her silence for wavering, or atleast a willingness to listen to the sort of a presentation he hadstarted. "You know that I am devilishly fond of you, else I would nothave gone to all this trouble to get you here. Of course you may call ita trap and all that sort of penny-dreadful rot; but what other way hadI to see you? You've scarcely been out of my mind since first I met youat Judd's--I should say, at your mother's house. I've been stark ravingabout you--am yet; and that's the truth. Why can't we be bully goodfriends? Your little pretenses are all very engaging and that sort ofthing, and do you credit, of course, but you see I have penetrated them.Well, then, why can't we hit it off? You don't know how good I'll be toyou if you look at the thing in the sensible way. The first time I sawyou I heard them hail you as Empress Louise. Well, I'll see to it thatyou have the adornment and the investiture of an Empress. Well, is it abargain, Louise? Will you shake hands on it?"
He was very close to where she stood by this time, having continued toadvance toward her as he spoke. A sudden flush had appeared on hisfeatures, and his enunciation was choppy, muffled, indistinct from thehuskiness of passion.
"Don't come any closer to me than you are," she said to him when, withinan arm's length of her, he stopped and held out his hand to bind thepact his words had attempted to frame. She spoke quietly, stood herground, looked straight at him, and placed her hands behind her back."And allow me to say this: I feel sure no coward of your kind ever yetescaped some sort of retribution. You will repent what you have said tome. But you will repent far more if you put your hands upon me. Willyou open this door and let me go?"
She looked her innocence, her perfect purity, as she stood before him.But Jesse was blind to what even the most ordinary, uncultivated manmight have seen at a glance. His prominent, protrusive eyes had becomebloodshot, and, instead of breathing, he was almost gasping.
"So you're going to keep on your white domino of pretense, eh?" hesneered. "Open the door? Do you think I'm going to let you treat me asif I were some credulous cub just turned loose from school? Open thedoor? Don't, for Heaven's name, take me for an imbecile!"
Suddenly he reached forward and twined his arms about her waist andcrushed her to him, making for her lips. She gave no outcry, but,raising her right forearm, pressed it under his chin, thus holding hishead back and keeping his face from hers. But he did not relax hispowerful embrace. Louise strove with all of her unusual woman's strengthto break his hold upon her, but his hands were clasped back of her, andher exertions only caused the two of them to sway and change ground; andhis embrace remained that of a python.
"You might as well drop this damned ground-and-lofty business and behaveyourself like a sensible girl, you know," panted Jesse, speaking in achoked tone because her forearm remained wedged under his chin. "You'regame, and all that sort of thing, and you're all kinds of a goodactres
s, too; but, by God, you're not quite clever enough to pull thewool over my eyes! You're Antoinette Treharne's daughter, and you'resome other things besides that I don't exactly know the details of buthave a pretty good guess at; and you're going to rest quiet in thesearms today, if you never do again!"
They struggled back and forth, Louise, quite conscious that she stood inthe greatest peril she was ever likely to know, holding her own with astrength which Jesse, even in the madness of the moment, told himselfwas almost preternatural in a young, slender woman.
"You are simply wasting your strength, you know," Jesse went on, puttingforth all of the power of his arms and holding her so close to him thatfor a moment she could not move. "I have no taste for this sort ofschoolboy and schoolgirl tugging and hauling. But you force me to it.You haven't a chance on earth of getting out of here, even if I releaseyou--which I shall, as soon as I have taken a little harmless toll ofyour lips. Now, are you going to be sensible and quit this idioticbusiness?"
Louise did not answer him. She had said no word, made no plea, since hehad seized upon her. She knew that words would be useless, and she couldnot have framed a beseeching phrase to address to him had she tried. Shewas taking her chance, doing all she could to make the chance better.But she could not and would not implore him to release her. She thoughtof screaming; but, remembering how the man who had conducted herupstairs had let her into the room and then obliterated himself, shereasoned it out, even in the intensity of the struggle, that this man nodoubt was a flunky accomplice who would pay no attention to herscreaming. Nevertheless she did decide that, as a last resort, she wouldscream, taking the chance that whomsoever happened to be on the floorbeneath or the one above might come to her assistance.
She had relaxed a little, for rest, as he spoke to her, and, catchingher off her guard, Jesse suddenly put forth all of his power and swungher, slipping and almost falling as he did so, partly through theportieres from which he had emerged when she came in.
When the portieres thus were thrust apart, Louise saw, standing in themiddle of the room which they screened off, a surprised-looking,somewhat scowling little Japanese. Jesse caught sight of Mutsu at thesame instant that Louise did.
"What the devil are you doing here?" Jesse demanded of the valet. "Getout and stay out till this evening, do you hear?"
Mutsu first lowered his head, then shook it with a most decidednegative. His lips were pulled back from his teeth; mutiny shone allover him.
"What you do?" he demanded of Jesse, falling into a pidgin vernacularwhich he rarely used except when excited. "She no like to be crushed inembrace? She is of an innocence. She is of an honorable. I saw that atSavoy Hotel when first I see her. Why you no let go?"
"Get out of here, I say, you damned chattering monkey!" Jesse raged athim, relaxing his hold upon Louise, and leaping at the little Japanese.
Mutsu, retreating not an inch, met the charge of his employer withlowered head, and when Jesse thrust out a hand to grab him the Japanese,revealing a perfect adeptness at jiu-jitsu which Jesse never had knownhe possessed, seized the thrust-out hand between both of his own sinewyones; and in an instant Jesse's face was drawn with pain. Then theJapanese made a sudden dart behind Jesse, pulling back the hand to whichhe still clung and the arm to which it was attached in such a way thatthe big, bulky man could not move without breaking the arm; he felt thetendons stretching to the breaking point as it was.
"Now you go, Miss innocent honorable lady," said Mutsu, without visibleexcitement, to Louise. "Go through next back room and out door there. Isee you at Savoy tonight after I get fired-dismissed from valet positionhere."
Jesse, his face red with the torture of the accomplished jiu-jitsuing hewas receiving, stormed at and cursed the Japanese in fo'c'sle terms ashe saw Louise pass toward the rear door the Japanese had indicated. Shenodded affirmatively to Mutsu when he told her that he would be at theSavoy that evening to see that she had arrived there safely; then shepassed through the rear door leading into the hall, went down thethickly-padded stairs without awakening the bald and bland Gaskins, whodozed in a hall chair; and had the luck to hail a taxicab almost infront of the house.
* * * * *
Laura was at the hotel, and in a panic of worriment about Louise, whenthe girl got back. Louise told Laura what had happened in a few words,then fainted, falling back heavily upon a couch, for the first time inher life--after the danger was all over, with the usual femininewhimsiness.
That night the following cable message to John Blythe was flashed underthe sea:
"Come immediately. You are needed here. LAURA."
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