The Window at the White Cat

by Mary Roberts Rinehart

  CHAPTER XIV

  A WALK IN THE PARK

  The funeral occurred on Monday. It was an ostentatious affair, with along list of honorary pall-bearers, a picked corps of city firemen inuniform ranged around the casket, and enough money wasted in floralpillows and sheaves of wheat tied with purple ribbon, to have given allthe hungry children in town a square meal.

  Amid all this state Margery moved, stricken and isolated. She went tothe cemetery with Edith, Miss Letitia having sent a message that, havingnever broken her neck to see the man living, she wasn't going to do itto see him dead. The music was very fine, and the eulogy spoke of thispatriot who had served his country so long and so well. "Following theflag," Fred commented under his breath, "as long as there was anappropriation attached to it."

  And when it was all over, we went back to Fred's until the Fleming housecould be put into order again. It was the best place in the world forMargery, for, with the children demanding her attention and applauseevery minute, she had no time to be blue.

  Mrs. Butler arrived that day, which made Fred suspicious that Edith'splan to bring her, far antedated his consent. But she was there when wegot home from the funeral, and after one glimpse at her thin face andhollow eyes, I begged Edith to keep her away from Margery, for that dayat least.

  Fortunately, Mrs. Butler was exhausted by her journey, and retired toher room almost immediately. I watched her slender figure go up thestairs, and, with her black trailing gown and colorless face, she was anembodiment of all that is lonely and helpless. Fred closed the doorbehind her and stood looking at Edith and me.

  "I tell you, honey," he declared, "_that_ brought into a cheerful homeis sufficient cause for divorce. Isn't it, Jack?"

  "She is ill," Edith maintained valiantly. "She is my cousin, too, whichgives her some claim on me, and my guest, which gives her more."

  "Lady-love," Fred said solemnly, "if you do not give me the key to thecellarette, I shall have a chill. And let me beg this of you: if I everget tired of this life, and shuffle off my mortality in a lumber yard,or a political club, and you go around like that, I shall haunt you. Iswear it."

  "Shuffle off," I dared him. "I will see that Edith is cheerful andhappy."

  From somewhere above, there came a sudden crash, followed by theannouncement, made by a scared housemaid, that Mrs. Butler had fainted.Fred sniffed as Edith scurried up-stairs.

  "Hipped," he said shortly. "For two cents I'd go up and give her a goodwhiff of ammonia--not this aromatic stuff, but the genuine article. Thatwould make her sit up and take notice. Upon my word, I can't think whatpossessed Edith; these spineless, soft-spoken, timid women are leecheson one's sympathies."

  But Mrs. Butler was really ill, and Margery insisted on looking afterher. It was an odd coincidence, the widow of one state treasurer and theorphaned daughter of his successor; both men had died violent deaths,in each case when a boiling under the political lid had threatened toblow it off.

  The boys were allowed to have their dinner with the family that evening,in honor of Mrs. Butler's arrival, and it was a riotous meal. Margerygot back a little of her color. As I sat across from her, and watchedher expressions change, from sadness to resignation, and even graduallyto amusement at the boys' antics, I wondered just how much she knew, orsuspected, that she refused to tell me.

  I remembered a woman--a client of mine--who said that whenever she satnear a railroad track and watched an engine thundering toward her, shetortured herself by picturing a child on the track, and wonderingwhether, under such circumstances, she would risk her life to save thechild.

  I felt a good bit that way; I was firmly embarked on the case now, and Itortured myself with one idea. Suppose I should find Wardrop guilty, andI should find extenuating circumstances--what would I do? Publish thetruth, see him hanged or imprisoned, and break Margery's heart? Or keepback the truth, let her marry him, and try to forget that I had had ahand in the whole wretched business?

  After all, I decided to try to stop my imaginary train. Prove Wardropinnocent, I reasoned with myself, get to the bottom of this thing, andthen--it would be man and man. A fair field and no favor. I suppose myproper attitude, romantically taken, was to consider Margery'sengagement ring an indissoluble barrier. But this was not romance; I wasfighting for my life happiness, and as to the ring--well, I am of theopinion that if a man really loves a woman, and thinks he can make herhappy, he will tell her so if she is strung with engagement rings to theends of her fingers. Dangerous doctrine? Well, this is not propaganda.

  Tuesday found us all more normal. Mrs. Butler had slept some, and verycommendably allowed herself to be tea'd and toasted in bed. The boyswere started to kindergarten, after ten minutes of frenzied cap-hunting.Margery went with me along the hall when I started for the office.

  "You have not learned anything?" she asked cautiously, glancing back toEdith, at the telephone calling the grocer frantically for the Mondaymorning supply of soap and starch.

  "Not much," I evaded. "Nothing definite, anyhow. Margery, you are notgoing back to the Monmouth Avenue house again, are you?"

  "Not just yet; I don't think I could. I suppose, later, it will have tobe sold, but not at once. I shall go to Aunt Letitia's first."

  "Very well," I said. "Then you are going to take a walk with me thisafternoon in the park. I won't take no; you need the exercise, and Ineed--to talk to you," I finished lamely.

  When she had agreed I went to the office. It was not much after nine,but, to my surprise, Burton was already there. He had struck up anacquaintance with Miss Grant, the stenographer, and that usually frigidperson had melted under the warmth of his red hair and his smile. Shewas telling him about her sister's baby having the whooping-cough, whenI went in.

  "I wish I had studied law," he threw at me. "'What shall it profit a manto become a lawyer and lose his own soul?' as the psalmist says. I likethis ten-to-four business."

  When we had gone into the inner office, and shut out Miss Grant and thewhooping-cough, he was serious instantly.

  "Well," he said, sitting on the radiator and dangling his foot, "I guesswe've got Wardrop for theft, anyhow."

  "Theft?" I inquired.

  "Well, larceny, if you prefer legal terms. I found where he sold thepearls--in Plattsburg, to a wholesale jeweler named, suggestively,Cashdollar."

  "Then," I said conclusively, "if he took the pearls and sold them, assure as I sit here, he took the money out of that Russia leather bag."

  Burton swung his foot rhythmically against the pipes.

  "I'm not so darned sure of it," he said calmly.

  If he had any reason, he refused to give it. I told him, in my turn, ofCarter's escape, aided by the police, and he smiled. "For a suicide it'scausing a lot of excitement," he remarked. When I told him the littleincident of the post-office, he was much interested.

  "The old lady's in it, somehow," he maintained. "She may have beenlending Fleming money, for one thing. How do you know it wasn't herhundred thousand that was stolen?"

  "I don't think she ever had the uncontrolled disposal of a dollar in herlife."

  "There's only one thing to do," Burton said finally, "and that is, findMiss Jane. If she's alive, she can tell something. I'll stake myfountain pen on that--and it's my dearest possession on earth, next tomy mother. If Miss Jane is dead--well, somebody killed her, and it'stime it was being found out."

  "It's easy enough to say find her."

  "It's easy enough to find her," he exploded. "Make a noise about it;send up rockets. Put a half-column ad in every paper in town, or--betterstill--give the story to the reporters and let them find her for you.I'd do it, if I wasn't tied up with this Fleming case. Describe her, howshe walked, what she liked to eat, what she wore--in this case what shedidn't wear. Lord, I wish I had that assignment! In forty-eight hoursshe will have been seen in a hundred different places, and one of themwill be right. It will be a question of selection--that is, if she isalive."

  In spite of his airy tone, I knew he was ser
ious, and I felt he wasright. The publicity part of it I left to him, and I sent a specialdelivery that morning to Bellwood, asking Miss Letitia to say nothingand to refer reporters to me. I had already been besieged with them,since my connection with the Fleming case, and a few more made nodifference.

  Burton attended to the matter thoroughly. The one o'clock edition of anafternoon paper contained a short and vivid scarlet account of MissJane's disappearance. The evening editions were full, and while vague asto the manner of her leaving, were minute as regarded her personalappearance and characteristics.

  To escape the threatened inundation of the morning paper men, I left theoffice early, and at four o'clock Margery and I stepped from a hill carinto the park. She had been wearing a short, crepe-edged veil, but onceaway from the gaze of the curious, she took it off. I was glad to seeshe had lost the air of detachment she had worn for the last three days.

  "Hold your shoulders well back," I directed, when we had found anisolated path, "and take long breaths. Try breathing in while I countten."

  She was very tractable--unusually so, I imagined, for her. We swungalong together for almost a half-hour, hardly talking. I was contentmerely to be with her, and the sheer joy of the exercise after herenforced confinement kept her silent. When she began to flag a little Ifound a bench, and we sat down together. The bench had been latelypainted, and although it seemed dry enough, I spread my handkerchief forher to sit on. Whereupon she called me "Sir Walter," and at the familiarjest we laughed like a pair of children.

  I had made the stipulation that, for this one time, her father's deathand her other troubles should be taboo, and we adhered to itreligiously. A robin in the path was industriously digging out a worm;he had tackled a long one, and it was all he could manage. He took theavailable end in his beak and hopped back with the expression of one whosets his jaws and determines that this which should be, is to be. Theworm stretched into a pinkish and attenuated line, but it neither brokenor gave.

  "Horrid thing!" Margery said. "That is a disgraceful, heartlessexhibition."

  "The robin is a parent," I reminded her. "It is precisely the same asFred, who twists, jerks, distorts and attenuates the English language inhis magazine work, in order to have bread and ice-cream and jelly cakefor his two blooming youngsters."

  She had taken off her gloves, and sat with her hands loosely clasped inher lap.

  "I wish some one depended on me," she said pensively. "It's a terriblething to feel that it doesn't matter to any one--not vitally,anyhow--whether one is around or not. To have all my responsibilitiestaken away at once, and just to drift around, like this--oh, it'sdreadful."

  "You were going to be good," I reminded her.

  "I didn't promise to be cheerful," she returned. "Besides my father,there was only one person in the world who cared about me, and I don'tknow where she is. Dear Aunt Jane!"

  The sunlight caught the ring on her engagement finger, and she flushedsuddenly as she saw me looking at it. We sat there for a while sayingnothing; the long May afternoon was coming to a close. The paths beganto fill with long lines of hurrying home-seekers, their day in office orfactory at an end.

  Margery got up at last and buttoned her coat. Then impulsively she heldout her hand to me.

  "You have been more than kind to me," she said hurriedly. "You havetaken me into your home--and helped me through these dreadful days--andI will never forget it; never."

  "I am not virtuous," I replied, looking down at her. "I couldn't helpit. You walked into my life when you came to my office--was it only lastweek? The evil days are coming, I suppose, but just now nothing mattersat all, save that you are you, and I am I."

  She dropped her veil quickly, and we went back to the car. The prosaicworld wrapped us around again; there was a heavy odor of restaurantcoffee in the air; people bumped and jolted past us. To me they wereonly shadows; the real world was a girl in black and myself, and thegirl wore a betrothal ring which was not mine.