‘What a pity!’ said the Duchess.
‘My dear Mr Parker,’ exclaimed a pretty little American blonde, with an accent like a beatified banjo, ‘so your niece has entered for the nuptial stakes.’
‘I know nothing about it,’ replied the great social despot. ‘I…I hope they are engaged.’
Lashbridge’s comment was that it seemed to him a mésalliance. ‘A girl like that,’ he said, ‘could have married anybody. Nobody ever marries a K.C.’
‘No,’ exclaimed the Duke of Quinton, ‘because K.C.s are always married. I believe they marry before they become K.C.s. I think they have to by the etiquette of their profession. In fact, I understand,’ he added, ‘that no man could ever become a K.C. unless he was married to a solicitor’s daughter.’
‘Oh, that’s quite an exploded idea,’ interposed the Hon. Otho Trigg, who was a pupil in Willie Campbell’s chambers. ‘Solicitors don’t have elderly ugly daughters nowadays. They have elderly ugly sons, whom they teach the tricks of the trade in their offices, and then send them to the Bar to take the bread out of our mouths. Still, Harding is an awfully good sort, and he’s got a very good practice.’
The Duchess put up her lorgnette and critically examined the couple.
‘Do you know,’ she said, ‘they don’t look as though they were engaged. They look as if they were on their honeymoon.’
And the Duchess, as usual, was right.
In the cosy, red-carpeted hall with marble pillars Miriam and George Harding sat drinking their coffee. The table was near the door.
As the Duchess, accompanied by ‘Bee’ Plymborough, neared Miriam, she rose, and although the Duchess made a noticeable effort to avoid her, yet her eyes were magnetically drawn towards the handsomest woman in the room.
‘My dear Duchess,’ she exclaimed, ‘I want to introduce my fiancé to you.’
Instantly the Duchess’s eyes glanced at the girl’s left hand. The engagement finger performed its duty satisfactorily.
There was a touch of a regretful verdict of Not Guilty as she said:
‘I’m so glad. Let me congratulate you both. I have heard so much of you, Mr Harding. In fact, I once actually heard you in the Divorce Court and I said, oh, I forget now what I said, but something that I thought was quite worthy of the Sporting Times, only the next time I saw Lieut.-Col. Newnham Davis it had quite gone out of my head. Can’t you remember what it was, “Bee”?’
‘Bee’ could, for the simple reason that she herself had been responsible for the scenario of the ‘witticism’. After a particularly brilliant piece of cross-examination by the K.C. she had said to the Duchess:
‘Never you let the Duke retain that Mr Harding.’ But she feigned forgetfulness.
The Duchess turned to Mr Parker:
‘My dear Mr Parker, I do trust that you will forgive me for being before you in congratulating your dear niece?’
Mr Parker could forgive anything to any Duchess.
‘But surely,’ said Miriam, ‘you saw the paragraph in the Daily Mail? The announcement will not be made in the Morning Post until tomorrow, but the Daily Mail always gets hold of things before they happen.’
‘It often gets hold of things that are never going to happen,’ chimed in the Duchess.
For the last two or three days the Daily Mail had been in evil odour with Mr Parker. He had sent to the office explicit details of his movements. But it had declined to print the fact that he had walked in the Park on the Tuesday, or perhaps the more interesting fact that he had not walked in the Park on Wednesday.
‘And when is the wedding to be?’ asked ‘Bee’ Plymborough.
Mr Parker produced his engagement-book from his pocket.
‘I am disengaged on the 19th of next month,’ he said.
Harding smiled.
‘I’m afraid the wedding will not be…for some time at least.’
‘And, judging by the look in their eyes,’ the Duchess whispered to ‘Bee’ Plymborough, ‘I don’t see why they should be in any hurry.’
CHAPTER XXVIII
DISAPPOINTMENT
THE next day, as he was returning from the Temple, he caught sight of the contents bill of the Pall Mall Gazette. On it appeared:
SIR CLIFFORD OAKLEIGH’S ULTIMATUM
So Clifford was issuing ultimata, was he? Eagerly he bought the paper. The news, startling news, was to the effect that the eminent surgeon would undertake the Emperor’s case, but only on condition that he came to Harley Street.
How would the Emperor receive that? How would the public receive that? It seemed to him that this was a unique act of impertinence. What had come over Clifford lately? Was it not rumoured that he had been commanded to proceed to Badschwerin and that he had deliberately disobeyed? It could not be on the ground of money, for naturally the Emperor would offer him any fee. Besides, Clifford was not of a grasping nature. He felt an acute desire to see his old friend. Presumably he would find him at Harley Street. He got into a cab.
There was much business with his card. The butler maintained that Sir Clifford was too much occupied to see him. He pleaded for five minutes, and as he entered the library the great man’s watch was in his hand.
‘Five minutes,’ he said, ‘if you have come to see me about myself. Five years if it’s anything to do with you. No, no,’ he added quickly, ‘you’re not ill: not even love-sick.’ Then he smiled.
‘You know?’ exclaimed Harding, in surprise.
‘Oh, yes, I know,’ was the answer, accompanied by a hand-shake, ‘and I wish you every sort of happiness.’ With a curious look in his eyes he continued, ‘I shall be able to spare time to come to your wedding, George, and I shall not insist on the nuptials being celebrated in my house.’
Harding laughed.
‘That is extraordinary modest, for you.’ Clifford turned away impatiently.
‘Of course, I know what you’ve come about.’ And he rambled on. ‘An Emperor’s life is the same as anybody else’s life. I’ve only got a certain amount of time to devote to the curing of patients. It takes some time to cure a patient, not so long as it takes to try a case, of course, but then a human life is not so important as litigation, is it? Anyhow, I am in a position to make my own terms, and I shall make them or I won’t do a deal. I can’t spare the time to go to Badschwerin. It’s impossible for me to go to Badschwerin.’
‘But it is possible for you to vanish.’
The other flashed at him:
‘In Heaven’s name, isn’t it possible for you to attend to your own business? If the Emperor wants to be cured, let him come here and he will be cured. If he doesn’t want to come here, let him remain in Badschwerin and die: that is if he has got cancer. I don’t know that he has got cancer; but, at any rate, the German doctors have certified that he has got cancer. That being the case I am prepared to cure him. Whether the German doctors will be prepared to certify that he has been cured or not, I don’t know. Possibly, for the sake of their reputations, they may find it necessary to let him die…of cancer.’
‘You really think that they…?’
‘Look here,’ said Clifford, earnestly. ‘In these matters of high politics, complicated with disease, anybody may do anything. I know what I can do, and I’m going to do it in the way that is safest for my reputation. If you’re defending a woman, say for murder, who has been unfaithful to her husband, would you make arrangements to have the case tried by a judge who is a puritanical crank? No. You look after your reputation. I look after mine.’
Calmly Harding gave him the lie. He did not speak as though he were jesting.
‘Clifford,’ he said, ‘your reputation has nothing whatever to do with it. Your action is governed simply and solely by some new interest that has come into your life.’
‘That closes the matter,’ answered the other, his hands tight clenched. ‘You are my oldest friend. But, my God, this is too much for friendship. You can leave the house, please.’ There was a sinister glare in his eyes as he added, ‘And I don
’t think it is necessary for you to consult further with Reggie Pardell as to my habits.’
The K.C. stammered:
‘My dear Clifford, you don’t mean to say that after all these years we’re going to have a serious row?’
The other’s face relaxed.
‘I really don’t know,’ he replied. ‘Can’t you let me lead my own life?…I’m helping you to lead yours.’
As the barrister walked away from the house, he pondered on these words: ‘I am helping you to lead your life.’ What did he mean? How was Clifford helping him to lead his life? Clifford was so strange that he felt it would scarcely matter to him at all if he never saw him again. The only person who was helping him to lead his life was Miriam. He would go and see Miriam. Perhaps she would dine with him and go to the theatre. He knew no greater happiness than going out at night with her.
Disappointment met him at 69 Pembroke Street.
Miss Clive was not at home.
When would Miss Clive be at home?
The butler did not know.
Would she be at home for dinner?
No, she was out of town.
Where was she staying?
The butler did not know.
Impatiently he turned away. Miriam would certainly have to mend her ways. He would compel her to account for her movements.
Then he walked indignantly to his club, and by way of consolation played Bridge and lost money.
CHAPTER XXIX
REGGIE LOSES HIS JOB
HE returned to South Audley Street in a bad temper, and found Reggie Pardell waiting for him in the library.
Reggie was smoking a cigar in a noticeably despondent manner.
‘My dear chap,’ he said, ‘I’ve been waiting for you two hours. However, your cigars are excellent.’
‘So Clifford allows you out in the daytime now, does he? You don’t have to do any work at all, apparently.’
‘I’ve finished work. I’ve retired from work. I doubt whether I shall ever do another stroke of work in my life.’
Harding raised his eyebrows.
‘Come into a fortune?’
‘No. Got the chuck.’
‘The chuck? When?’
‘Just now. Clifford sent round for me to Harley Street, paid me a month’s wages, and dismissed me from his service.’
‘Phew! Did he give any reason?’
‘No reason.’
‘Did you ask for one?’
‘What in the name of common sense is the good of asking a man like Clifford for anything?’
‘Has he got another…servant?’
Mysteriously Reggie replied:
‘I don’t think he’s going to have another servant.’
‘Do you mean to say,’ inquired the barrister, ‘that he’s going to sleep there alone?’
Reggie shrugged his shoulders. ‘There’s nothing too absurd for Clifford Oakleigh to do. He is the most mysterious man I’ve ever come across. And, upon my soul, he gets worse and worse. I can’t make head or tail of this case, can you?’
Harding lit a cigar and threw himself on to a sofa.
‘My dear Reggie, I’m completely baffled. At first when you told me the story of his lying dead in his house and I found that the body had disappeared, it struck me that you had gone mad. But now I think that he has gone mad.’
Reggie shook his head with determination.
‘You’re wrong there. Completely wrong. No one has ever been saner than Clifford. Do you fancy that you detect anything odd about him? His manners are exactly as they always are.’
‘Yes, yes, I admit that there is nothing odd in his manners, but there is something extraordinarily strange in the things he does and the life he leads.’
‘Don’t make any mistake, George. We are face to face with a unique problem.’
For a moment the K.C. paused. ‘You know it’s a most astounding thing,’ he said at length, ‘that the twentieth century is the century of mysteries. Murders are committed and the murderers are never traced; people disappear and civilisation is powerless to discover them; a man behaves in a manner which is inexplicable by the ordinary rules that govern the behaviour of the sane, yet that man is not mad. Within the last few days in my small circle two phenomenal things have occurred. One is the behaviour of Clifford and the other is the disappearance of my clerk’s daughter.’
‘There’s a third,’ interposed Reggie.
‘A third?’
‘And it’s perhaps even more extraordinary than the other two. You’ve fallen in love.’
Harding laughed.
The other continued:
‘Has the possibility of these three extraordinary things being connected struck you?’
‘Of course not, man.’
But Reggie persisted:
‘Think. It is not impossible that they should be connected…these three events entirely out of the common should take place in your environment within a few days.’
‘Reggie, you’re a fool,’ said the other, impatiently.
‘How can the disappearance of Mingey’s daughter have anything to do with me? How can an extraordinary death that was not death in King Street be connected either with Miss Mingey or myself?’
Then Reggie recalled the episode of his meeting with the servant next door; of the interview with Nellie in the public-house.
The K.C. pooh-poohed the idea.
‘The whole facts of the case make it extremely unlikely that there is anything in the girl’s story. My dear man,’ he added impatiently, ‘what could be the motive? Why should Clifford, an habitually temperate man, suddenly take to drink and be fetched away from his house by the ugly daughter of a barrister’s clerk? Of course, the girl made a mistake. You know how quick some people are at seeing likenesses that don’t exist. For instance, the other day a man told me I was like that ass Robinson the whisker-crank. Or again, it is quite possible that the girl lied. Experience teaches us that directly the police offer a reward the liars come out of their shells. There are lots of people of a low type of intellect who would sell their souls to have their pictures in a Sunday paper. You know the sort of thing—“Picture of Nellie So-and-So, the last person who saw the vanished girl”.’
Reggie yawned.
‘Where are we going to dine?’ he asked, as though tired of the subject.
‘We?’ inquired Harding in surprise.
‘Oh, yes,’ said the other, calmly. ‘I forgot that I didn’t tell you I’m staying with you.’
‘The deuce you are!’
‘Yes. My dear chap, I’m doing this simply and solely to please you. Now that you’re engaged, you’ll want someone to whom you can talk with complete self-abandonment about Miss Clive. Don’t be afraid of boring me. I give you carte blanche.’
Harding frowned.
Reggie reproached him. ‘My dear fellow, that isn’t the way to receive a favour. But don’t think that I’m putting myself out. I shall be quite comfortable in your spare bedroom. My things are up there, and there’s everything I want.’
‘You’ve got the devil’s own cheek. You talk about not being put out. I’m not sure that you won’t be.’
Suddenly he remembered that Miriam was away from town, so Reggie’s presence would not seriously inconvenience him.
‘Well,’ he said, after a minute’s thought. ‘I can put you up for two or three days, but I may have to turn you out at a moment’s notice.’
For two days Reggie remained in South Audley Street, and Harding seemed to exhibit a certain pleasure in talking about the girl he loved. This was his first love affair, and he showed infantile joy in describing the charms of Miss Clive. He did not, however, tell him of the anxiety which her peculiar absences caused. They were sitting in the library, discussing the usual topic just before dinner.
The telephone bell rang.
‘Yes, I’m Mr Harding…And you?’ A smile of delight came over his face. ‘Oh, it’s you, darling, is it?’
‘Don’t mind me,’ said Reg
gie in a whisper. ‘All this sort of thing is chestnuts to me.’
‘Will I take you out to dinner tonight and a play afterwards? Certainly.’
‘Three is company,’ interposed Reggie, ‘two is merely compromising. I can easily come.’
‘Keep quiet,’ growled Harding.
‘…All right, darling…I’ll fetch you at seven-thirty…All right, if you prefer it…Fetch me in the motor seven-thirty. Till then good-bye, dearest…Wait a minute. Where have you been? Curse! She’s rung off.’
He looked at his watch.
‘Well, Reggie, I’m awfully glad you’ve enjoyed yourself here.’ He reflected for a moment. ‘Do you know, if I were you I think I should go to 78 Half Moon Street. A butler who used to be with Lashbridge has got very good rooms. I don’t think you could do better than 78 Half Moon Street.’
Reggie knew that his visit had come to an end. Disappointed though he was, he felt that he could not further foist himself upon his friend, who was telephoning to a library for a box.
‘People have caught awful chills in boxes that were not properly filled. Two are practically lost in a box.’
‘Confound you, shut up!’ roared the K.C.
Then he relented.
‘Oh, yes, if you like, come to the box. But I’m hanged if I ask you to dinner.’
‘All right, old chap, I’ll come. But I think you’re deucedly inhospitable.’
CHAPTER XXX
AN UNFORTUNATE MEETING
RADIANTLY beautiful she looked, seated in the motor, nestling, a fluffy mass of pink chiffon and lace, against the fawn leather upholstery.
As the car sped silently towards the Savoy he put his arm round her and kissed her tenderly.
‘My darling,’ he murmured, ‘how good of you to let me take you out.’
He felt that her heart was throbbing against his chest as she answered:
‘My dearest, I couldn’t wait. I was longing for you.’
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