Complete Works of F Marion Crawford

by F. Marion Crawford

  ‘What if Mrs. Rushmore comes in just as we are signing it?’ asked Margaret.

  ‘We’ll tell her, and ask her to witness our signatures,’ replied Van Torp without looking up. ‘I judge Mrs. Rushmore to have quite a knowledge of business.’

  ‘You seem able to write and talk at the same time,’ Margaret said, smiling.

  ‘Business talk, yes.’ The pen ran on swiftly. ‘There. That’s about all, I should say. Do you think you can read my writing? I don’t suppose you’ve ever seen it.’

  He turned the page round, and handed it to her. The writing was large and perfectly legible, but very different from the ‘commercial’ hand of most American business men. Any one word, taken at random, might have seemed unformed, at first sight, but the appearance of the whole was oddly strong and symmetrical. Margaret read the clauses carefully. She herself had already signed a good many legal papers in connexion with her engagements and her own small fortune, and the language was not so unfamiliar to her as it would have been to most women.

  ‘Shall I sign first?’ she asked, when she had finished. ‘My own name? Or my stage name?’

  ‘Your own name, please,’ said Van Torp without hesitation. ‘The others only binding in your profession, because you appear under it, and it’s your “business style.”’

  She wrote ‘Margaret Donne’ at the foot of the page in her large and rather irregular hand, and passed the paper back to Van Torp, who signed it. He waved the sheet slowly to and fro, to dry the ink.

  ‘It’s only a preliminary agreement,’ he said, ‘but it’s binding as far as it goes and I’ll attend to the rest. You’ll have to give me a power of attorney for my lawyer in New York. By the bye, if you decide to come, you can do that in Venice, where there’s a real live consul. That’s necessary. But for all matters of business herein set forth, we are now already “The Madame da Cordova and Rufus Van Torp Company, organised for the purpose of building an Opera-house in the City of New York and for giving public performances of musical works in the same, with a nominal capital hereafter to be agreed upon.” That’s what we are now.’

  He folded the sheet, returned it to his inner pocket and held out his hand in a cheerful, business-like manner.

  ‘Shall we shake hands on it?’ he asked.

  ‘By all means,’ Margaret answered readily, and their eyes met; but she drew back her hand again before taking his. ‘This is purely a matter of business between us,’ she said, ‘you understand that? It means nothing else?’

  ‘Purely a matter of business,’ answered Rufus Van Torp, slowly and gravely.

  CHAPTER XII

  ‘STEMP,’ SAID MR. Van Torp, ‘we must have something to eat on that yacht.’

  ‘Yes, sir. Quite so, sir.’

  Stemp, who could do anything, was clipping the millionaire’s thatch of sandy hair, on the morning after the transaction last described. Mr. Van Torp abhorred barbers and shaved himself, and in his less ‘prominent’ days he had been in the habit of cutting his own hair by using two looking-glasses. The result had rarely been artistic, and even Stemp was not what is described on some American signs as a tonsorial artist, but he managed to clip his master’s rough mane with neatness and precision, if not in the ‘Bond Street style.’

  ‘I mean,’ said Mr. Van Torp, explaining himself, ‘we must have something good to eat.’

  ‘Oh, I see, sir,’ answered Stemp, as if this were quite a new idea.

  ‘Well, now, do you suppose you can get anything to eat in Italy?’

  ‘Salmon-trout is very good there, sir, and quails are in season at the end of August. They are just going back to Egypt at this time of the year, sir, and are very fat. There’s Gorgonzola cheese, too, and figs and muscatel grapes are coming on. I think that’s all, sir.’

  ‘It’s not bad. How about chickens?’

  ‘Well, sir, the poultry in those parts is not much to boast of. An Italian fowl is mostly either a hawk or a butterfly. That’s my experience, sir, when I travelled there with the late Duke of Barchester, a few years ago. His Grace was most particular, sir, having a poor stomach, and nothing to occupy his mind after the Duchess died in a fit of rage, having thrown her wig at him, sir, they do say, and then fallen down in a fit which was quite awful to see, and ended as we all know.’

  ‘As far as I can see, you’d better go on to Venice, Stemp,’ said Mr. Van Torp, not interested in his man’s reminiscences. ‘You’d better go off to-night and tell Captain Brown to hurry up and get ready, because I’m bringing a party of friends down the day after to-morrow. And then you just scratch round and find something to eat.’

  ‘Yes, sir. I’ll telegraph to the caterers, and I think you’ll be satisfied, sir.’

  ‘There’s an American lady coming, who knows what’s good to eat, and likes it, and wants it, and means to get it, and you’ve got to find it for her somehow. I can live on hog and hominy myself. And I shan’t want you in the least. You’d better take most of my baggage with you anyway. Just leave my Tuxedo and a couple of suits, and some new flannel pants and a shirt-case, and take the rest. But don’t waste time over that either if you’ve got to catch the train, for the main thing’s to get there right away. You can go first-class, Stemp — you won’t be so done up.’

  ‘Thank you, sir.’

  A silence followed, during which the valet’s scissors made a succession of little chinking noises; from time to time he turned Mr. Van Torp’s head very gingerly to a slightly different position.

  ‘Stemp.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘You take a good look around that yacht, and decide about the state-rooms, before I come. This way. You give the best room to Miss Donne, and have a large bouquet of carnations on the table. See?’

  ‘Beg pardon, sir, but carnations are out of season.’

  ‘You get them just the same.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘And give the second-best room to her ladyship, Stemp, if there are not two alike, but be extra careful to see that everything’s comfortable. Lady Maud likes wood violets, Stemp. You get a handsome bouquet of them, and don’t tell me they’re out of season too, because you’ve got to get them, anyway, so it’s no use to talk.’

  ‘Yes, sir. I see, sir.’

  ‘And then you get the third-best room ready for Mrs. Rushmore, and you get some flowers for her too, out of your own head. Maybe she likes those roses with stems three feet long. Use your own judgment, anyway.’

  ‘Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.’

  Another silence followed, and the hair-cutting was finished. Mr. Van Torp glanced at himself in the glass and then turned to his valet.

  ‘Say, Stemp, I was thinking. Maybe that third bedroom’s not quite so good as the others, and the lady might feel herself sort of overlooked.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Well, I was thinking. If that’s the case, and it looks sort of second-class, you go out and get a man and have him gild it all around nicely so as to brighten it up. I guess she’ll think it’s all right if it’s gilt and the others aren’t. Some people are like that.’

  ‘I see, sir. Yes, sir. I’ll attend to it, sir. Will there be any more ladies and gentlemen, sir?’

  ‘There’s that Russian gentleman, Count Kralinsky. Put him at the other end of the ship, somewhere out of the way of the ladies. I suppose he’ll bring his valet, and there’ll be two or three maids. That’s all. Now don’t mind me any more, but just fly around, and don’t forget anything. Understand? We aren’t going to be in England or the States, where you can sit still and telephone for anything you’ve forgotten, from peanuts to a funeral. You’ll have to go full speed ahead in all directions if you’re going to wake things up.’

  Thereupon Mr. Van Torp sat down by the window to read the paper.

  His attention was arrested by a sensational ‘scare-head’ about a thief and a ruby worth fifty thousand dollars. Some disaffected colleague in London had known, or cleverly guessed, where the stone was that had been stolen from Mr
. Pinney’s, and had informed the police; the nice-looking young fellow who spoke like an English gentleman had walked directly into the arms of the plain-clothes man waiting for him on the pier in New York, the stone had been found sewn up in his waistcoat, and his pleasant career of liberty had ended abruptly in a cell.

  Mr. Van Torp whistled softly as he read the account a second time. Then he neatly cut the column out of the paper, folded it with great precision, smoothed it with care and placed it in his pocket-book next to a cheap little photograph of Madame da Cordova as ‘Juliet,’ which he had bought in a music-shop in New York the day after he had heard her for the first time, and had carried in his pocket ever since. He looked up to see what Stemp was doing, and as the man was kneeling before a box on the floor, with his back turned, he took out the rather shabby photograph and gazed at it quietly for fully thirty seconds before he put it back again.

  He took up the mutilated newspaper and looked up and down the columns, and among other information which he gathered in a few moments was the fact that Logotheti’s yacht had ‘passed Cape Saint Vincent, going east, owner and party on board.’ The previous telegram had not escaped him, and if he had entertained any doubts as to the destination of the Erinna, they vanished now. She was certainly bound for the Mediterranean. He remembered having heard that many steam yachts coming from England put into Gibraltar for coal and fresh provisions, coal being cheaper there than in French and Italian ports, and he thought it very probable that the Erinna would do the same; he also made some deductions which need not be explained yet. The only one worth mentioning here was that Logotheti would be likely to hear in Gibraltar that the ruby had been found and was on its way back to England, and that as he would know that Margaret would be anxious about it, since he had already given it to her, he would hardly let the occasion of communicating with her go by. As for writing from Gibraltar to any place whatsoever in the hope that a letter will arrive in less than a week, it is sheer folly. Mr. Van Torp had never tried it, and supposed it possible, as it looks, but he was tolerably sure that Logotheti would telegraph first, and had perhaps done so already, for the news of his passing Cape Saint Vincent was already twenty-four hours old.

  This was precisely what had happened. When Mr. Van Torp opened his door, he came upon Margaret and Mrs. Rushmore on the landing, on the point of going out for a walk, and a servant had just brought the Primadonna a telegram which she was reading aloud, so that the American could not help hearing her.

  ‘“Cruising till wanted,”’ she read quickly. ‘“Ruby found. Address, yacht Erinna, Naples.”’

  She heard Van Torp close his door, though she had not heard him open it, and turning round she found herself face to face with him. Her eyes were sparkling with anger.

  ‘Very sorry,’ he said. ‘I couldn’t help hearing.’

  ‘It’s of no consequence, for I should have told you,’ Margaret answered briefly.

  He argued well for himself from her tone and manner, but he chose to show that he would not force his company upon her just then, when she was in a visible rage, and instead of stopping to exchange more words he passed the two ladies hat in hand, and bowing rather low, after his manner, he went quietly downstairs.

  Margaret watched him till he disappeared.

  ‘I like that man,’ she said, as if to herself, but audibly. ‘I cannot help it.’

  Mrs. Rushmore was more than delighted, but had tact enough not to make any answer to a speech which had probably not been meant for her ears.

  ‘Perhaps,’ she said, ‘you would rather not go out just yet, my dear?’

  Margaret was grateful for the suggestion, and they turned back into their rooms.

  Meanwhile Van Torp had reached the door of the hotel, and found Lady Maud standing there with her parasol up, for the sun was streaming in.

  ‘I was waiting for you,’ she said simply, as soon as he reached her side, and she stepped out into the street. ‘I thought you would come down, and I wanted to speak to you, for I did not get a chance last night. They were both watching me, probably because they thought I was ill, and I had to chatter like a magpie to keep up appearances.’

  ‘You did it very well,’ Van Torp said. ‘If I had not seen your face at the window when I got out of the automobile yesterday, I shouldn’t have guessed there was anything wrong.’

  ‘But there is — something very wrong — something I can hardly bear to think of, though I must, until I know the truth.’

  They turned into the first deserted street they came to.

  ‘I daresay I can give a guess at what it is,’ Van Torp answered gravely. ‘I went to see him alone yesterday on purpose, before he started, and I must say, if it wasn’t for the beard I’d feel pretty sure.’

  ‘He had a beard when I married him, and it was like that — just like that!’

  Lady Maud’s voice shook audibly, for she felt cold, even in the sunshine.

  ‘I didn’t know,’ Van Torp answered. ‘That alters the case. If we’re not mistaken, what can I do to help you? Let’s see. You only had that one look at him, through the window, is that so?’

  ‘Yes. But the window was open, and it’s not high above the ground, and my eyes are good. He took off his hat when he said good-bye to you, and I saw his face as distinctly as I see yours. When you’ve been married to a man’ — she laughed harshly— ‘you cannot be easily mistaken about him, when you’re as near as that! That is the man I married. I’m intimately convinced of it, but I must be quite sure. Do you understand?’

  ‘Of course. If he’s really Leven, he’s even a better actor than I used to think he was. If he’s not, the resemblance is just about the most extraordinary thing! It’s true I only saw Leven three or four times in my life, but I saw him to look at him then, and the last time I did, when he made the row in Hare Court, he was doing most of the talking, so I remember his voice.’

  ‘There’s only one difficulty,’ Lady Maud said. ‘Some one else may have been killed last June. It may even have been the pickpocket who had stolen his pocket-book. Such things have happened, or do in books! But this is certainly the man you met in New York and who sold you the stone you gave me, is he not?’

  ‘Oh, certainly. And that was at the end of July, and Leven was killed late in June.’

  ‘Yes. That only leaves a month for him to have been to Asia — that’s absurd.’

  ‘Utterly, totally, and entirely impossible,’ asseverated Mr. Van Torp. ‘One of two things. Either this man is your husband, and if he is, he’s not the man who found the rubies in Asia. Or else, if he is that man, he’s not Leven. I wish that heathen girl had been here yesterday! She could have told in a minute. She’d better have been here anyway than cutting around the Mediterranean with that fellow Logotheti!’

  ‘Yes,’ Lady Maud answered gravely. ‘But about myself — if Leven is alive, what is my position — I mean — I don’t really quite know where I am, do I?’

  ‘Anybody but you would have thought of marrying again already,’ observed Mr. Van Torp, looking up sideways to her eyes, for she was taller than he. ‘Then you’d really be in a bad fix, wouldn’t you? The Enoch Arden thing, I suppose it would be. But as it is, I don’t see that it makes much difference. The man’s going under a false name, so he doesn’t mean to claim you as his wife, nor to try and get a divorce again, as he did before. He’s just going to be somebody else for his own good, and he’ll get married that way, maybe. That’s his business, not yours. I don’t suppose you’re going to get up in church and forbid the banns, are you?’

  ‘I would, like a shot!’ said Lady Maud. ‘So would you, I’m sure! Think of the other woman!’

  ‘That’s so,’ answered Van Torp without enthusiasm. ‘However, we’ve got to think about you and the present, and decide what we’ll do. I suppose the best thing is for me to put him off with some excuse, so that you can come on the yacht.’

  ‘Please do nothing of the sort!’ cried Lady Maud.

  ‘But I want you to com
e,’ objected her friend.

  ‘I mean to come. Do you think I am afraid to meet him?’

  Van Torp looked at her in some surprise, and not without admiration.

  ‘There isn’t anybody like you, anyway,’ he said quietly. ‘But there’s going to be a circus on that ship if he’s Leven,’ he added. ‘If he makes a fuss, I’ll read the Riot Act and lock him up.’

  ‘Oh, no,’ answered Lady Maud, who was used to Mr. Van Torp’s familiar vocabulary, ‘why need there be any trouble? You’ve not told him I am coming, you say. Very well. If he sees me suddenly after he has been on board a little while, he’ll certainly betray himself, and then I shall be sure. Leven is a man of the world— “was” or “is” — God knows which! But if it is he, and he doesn’t want to be recognised, he’ll behave as if nothing had happened, after the first moment of surprise. At least I shall be certain! You may wonder — I don’t know myself, Rufus — I wish you could help me!’

  ‘I will, as far as I can.’

  ‘No, you don’t know what I mean! There’s something in my life that I never quite told you, I can’t tell why not. There must be people who know it besides my mother — I don’t think my father ever did. Margaret has an idea of it — I let fall a few words one day. In one way, you and I have been so intimate for years — and yet — —’

  She stopped short, and the soft colour rose in her cheeks like a dawn. Van Torp looked down at the pavement as he walked.

  ‘See here,’ he said in a low voice, ‘you’d better not tell me. Maybe you’ll be sorry some day if you do.’

  ‘It would be the first time,’ she answered softly, ‘and I’ve often wished you knew everything. I mean to tell you now — just wait a moment.’

  They walked on; they were already in the outskirts of the dull little town. Van Torp did not again raise his eyes to her face, for he knew she would speak when she was ready. When she did, her voice was a little muffled, and she looked straight before her as he was doing. They were quite alone in the road now.