“Where’s Sacharissa?” demanded Mr. Carr, sonorously.
“Here, dad,” said his oldest daughter, strolling calmly into the hall, hands still linked loosely behind her.
“Why haven’t you got your hat and furs on?” demanded her father.
“Because I’m not going, dad,” she said sweetly.
The family eyed her in amazement.
“Not going?” shouted her father, in a mellow bellow. “Yes, you are! Not going! And why the dickens not?”
“I really don’t know, dad,” she said listlessly. “I don’t want to go.”
Her father waved both pudgy arms furiously. “Don’t you feel well? You look well. You are well. Don’t you feel well?”
“Perfectly.”
“No, you don’t! You’re pale! You’re pallid! You’re peaked! Take a tonic and lie down. Send your maid for some doctors — all kinds of doctors — and have them fix you up. Then come to Tuxedo with your maid to-morrow morning. Do you hear?”
“Very well, dad.”
“And keep out of that elevator until it’s fixed. It’s likely to do anything. Ferdinand,” to the man at the door, “have it fixed at once. Sacharissa, send that maid of yours for a doctor!”
“Very well, dad!”
She presented her cheek to her emphatic parent; he saluted it explosively, wheeled, marshaled the family at a glance, started them forward, and closed the rear with his own impressive person. The iron gates clanged, the door of the opera bus snapped, and Sacharissa strolled back into the rococo reception room not quite certain why she had not gone, not quite convinced that she was feeling perfectly well.
For the first few minutes her face had been going hot and cold, alternately flushed and pallid. Her heart, too, was acting in an unusual manner — making sufficient stir for her to become uneasily aware of it.
“Probably,” she thought to herself, “I’ve eaten too many chocolates.” She looked into the large gilded box, took another and ate it reflectively.
A curious languor possessed her. To combat it she rang for her maid, intending to go for a brisk walk, but the weight of the furs seemed to distress her. It was absurd. She threw them off and sat down in the library.
A little while later her maid found her lying there, feet crossed, arms stretched backward to form a cradle for her head.
“Are you ill, Miss Carr?”
“No,” said Sacharissa.
The maid cast an alarmed glance at her mistress’ pallid face.
“Would you see Dr. Blimmer, miss?”
“No.”
The maid hesitated:
“Beg pardon, but Mr. Carr said you was to see some doctors.”
“Very well,” she said indifferently. “And please hand me those chocolates. I don’t care for any luncheon.”
“No luncheon, miss?” in consternation.
Sacharissa had never been known to shun sustenance.
The symptom thoroughly frightened her maid, and in a few minutes she had Dr. Blimmer’s office on the telephone; but that eminent practitioner was out. Then she found in succession the offices of Doctors White, Black, and Gray. Two had gone away over New Year’s, the other was out.
The maid, who was clever and resourceful, went out to hunt up a doctor. There are, in the cross streets, plenty of doctors between the Seventies and Eighties. She found one without difficulty — that is, she found the sign in the window, but the doctor was out on his visits.
She made two more attempts with similar results, then, discovering a doctor’s sign in a window across the street, started for it regardless of snowdrifts, and at the same moment the doctor’s front door opened and a young man, with a black leather case in his hand, hastily descended the icy steps and hurried away up the street.
The maid ran after him and arrived at his side breathless, excited:
“Oh, could you come — just for a moment, if you please, sir! Miss Carr won’t eat her luncheon!”
“What!” said the young man, surprised.
“Miss Carr wishes to see you — just for a — —”
“Miss Carr?”
“Miss Sacharissa!”
“Sacharissa?”
“Y-yes, sir — she — —”
“But I don’t know any Miss Sacharissa!”
“I understand that, sir.”
“Look here, young woman, do you know my name?”
“No, sir, but that doesn’t make any difference to Miss Carr.”
“She wishes to see me!”
“Oh, yes, sir.”
“I — I’m in a hurry to catch a train.” He looked hard at the maid, at his watch, at the maid again.
“Are you perfectly sure you’re not mistaken?” he demanded.
“No, sir, I — —”
“A certain Miss Sacharissa Carr desires to see me? Are you certain of that?”
“Oh, yes, sir — she — —”
“Where does she live?”
“One thousand eight and a half Fifth Avenue, sir.”
“I’ve got just three minutes. Can you run?”
“I — yes!”
“Come on, then!”
And away they galloped, his overcoat streaming out behind, the maid’s skirts flapping and her narrow apron flickering in the wind. Wayfarers stopped to watch their pace — a pace which brought them to the house in something under a minute. Ferdinand, the second man, let them in.
“Now, then,” panted the young man, “which way? I’m in a hurry, remember!” And he started on a run for the stairs.
“Please follow me, sir; the elevator is quicker!” gasped the maid, opening the barred doors.
The young man sprang into the lighted car, the maid turned to fling off hat and jacket before entering; something went fizz-bang! snap! clink! and the lights in the car were extinguished.
“Oh!” shrieked the maid, “it’s running away again! Jump, sir!”
The ornate, rococo elevator, as a matter of fact, was running away, upward, slowly at first. Its astonished occupant turned to jump out — too late.
“P-push the third button, sir! Quick!” cried the maid, wringing her hands.
“W-where is it!” stammered the young man, groping nervously in the dark car. “I can’t see any.”
“Cr-rack!” went something.
“It’s stopped! It’s going to fall!” screamed the maid. “Run, Ferdinand!”
The man at the door ran upstairs for a few steps, then distractedly slid to the bottom, shouting:
“Are you hurt, sir?”
“No,” came a disgusted voice from somewhere up the shaft.
Every landing was now noisy with servants, maids sped upstairs, flunkeys sped down, a butler waddled in a circle.
“Is anybody going to get me out of this?” demanded the voice in the shaft. “I’ve a train to catch.”
The perspiring butler poked his head into the shaft from below:
“‘Ow far hup, sir, might you be?”
“How the devil do I know?”
“Can’t you see nothink, sir?”
“Yes, I can see a landing and a red room.”
“‘E’s stuck hunder the library!” exclaimed the butler, and there was a rush for the upper floors.
The rush was met and checked by a tall, young girl who came leisurely along the landing, nibbling a chocolate.
“What is all this noise about?” she asked. “Has the elevator gone wrong again?”
Glancing across the landing at the grille which screened the shaft she saw the gilded car — part of it — and half of a perfectly strange young man looking earnestly out.
“It’s the doctor!” wailed her maid.
“That isn’t Dr. Blimmer!” said her mistress.
“No, miss, it’s a perfectly strange doctor.”
“I am not a doctor,” observed the young man, coldly.
Sacharissa drew nearer.
“If that maid of yours had asked me,” he went on, “I’d have told her. She saw me coming down the
steps of a physician’s house — I suppose she mistook my camera case for a case of medicines.”
“I did — oh, I did!” moaned the maid, and covered her head with her apron.
“The thing to do,” said Sacharissa, calmly, “is to send for the nearest plumber. Ferdinand, go immediately!”
“Meanwhile,” said the imprisoned young man, “I shall miss my train. Can’t somebody break that grille? I could climb out that way.”
“Sparks,” said Miss Carr, “can you break that grille?”
Sparks tried. A kitchen maid brought a small tackhammer — the only “‘ammer in the ‘ouse,” according to Sparks, who pounded at the foliated steel grille and broke the hammer off short.
“Did it ‘it you in the ‘ead, sir?” he asked, panting.
“Exactly,” replied the young man, grinding his teeth.
Sparks ‘oped as ‘ow it didn’t ‘urt the gentleman. The gentleman stanched his wound in terrible silence.
Presently Ferdinand came back to report upon the availability of the family plumber. It appeared that all plumbers, locksmiths, and similar indispensable and free-born artisans had closed shop at noon and would not reopen until after New Year’s, subject to the Constitution of the United States.
“But this gentleman cannot remain here until after New Year’s,” said Sacharissa. “He says he is in a hurry. Do you hear, Sparks?”
The servants stood in a helpless row.
“Ferdinand,” she said, “Mr. Carr told you to have that elevator fixed before it was used again!”
Ferdinand stared wildly at the grille and ran his thumb over the bars.
“And Clark” — to her maid— “I am astonished that you permitted this gentleman to risk the elevator.”
“He was in a hurry — I thought he was a doctor.” The maid dissolved into tears.
“It is now,” broke in the voice from the shaft, “an utter impossibility for me to catch any train in the United States.”
“I am dreadfully sorry,” said Sacharissa.
“Isn’t there an ax in the house?”
The butler mournfully denied it.
“Then get the furnace bar.”
It was fetched; nerve-racking blows rained on the grille; puffing servants applied it as a lever, as a battering-ram, as a club. The house rang like a boiler factory.
“I can’t stand any more of that!” shouted the young man. “Stop it!”
Sacharissa looked about her, hands closing both ears.
“Send them away,” said the young man, wearily. “If I’ve got to stay here I want a chance to think.”
After she had dismissed the servants Sacharissa drew up a chair and seated herself a few feet from the grille. She could see half the car and half the man — plainer, now that she had come nearer.
He was a young and rather attractive looking fellow, cheek tied up in his handkerchief, where the head of the hammer had knocked off the skin.
“Let me get some witch-hazel,” said Sacharissa, rising.
“I want to write a telegram first,” he said.
So she brought some blanks, passed them and a pencil down to him through the grille, and reseated herself.
VII
THE INVISIBLE WIRE
In Which the Telephone Continues Ringing
When he had finished writing he sorted out some silver, and handed it and the yellow paper to Sacharissa.
“It’s dark in here. Would you mind reading it aloud to me to see if I’ve made it plain?” he asked.
“Certainly,” said Sacharissa; and she read:
MRS. DELANCY COURLAND,
Tuxedo.
I’m stuck in an idiotic elevator at 1008-1/2 Fifth Avenue. If I don’t appear by New Year’s you’ll know why. Be careful that no reporters get hold of this.
KILLIAN VAN K. VANDERDYNK.
Sacharissa flushed deeply. “I can’t send this,” she said.
“Why not?” demanded the young man, irritably.
“Because, Mr. Vanderdynk, my father, brother-in-law, married sister, and three younger sisters are expected at the Courlands’. Imagine what effect such a telegram would have on them!”
“Then cross out the street and number,” he said; “just say I’m stuck in a strange elevator.”
She did so, rang, and a servant took away the telegram.
“Now,” said the heir apparent to the Prince Regency of Manhattan, “there are two things still” possible. First, you might ring up police headquarters and ask for aid; next, request assistance from fire headquarters.”
“If I do,” she said, “wouldn’t the newspapers get hold of it?”
“You are perfectly right,” he said.
She had now drawn her chair so close to the gilded grille that, hands resting upon it, she could look down into the car where sat the scion of the Vanderdynks on a flimsy Louis XV chair.
“I can’t express to you how sorry I am,” she said. “Is there anything I can do to — to ameliorate your imprisonment?”
He looked at her in a bewildered way.
“You don’t expect me to remain here until after New Year’s, do you?” he inquired.
“I don’t see how you can avoid it. Nobody seems to want to work until after New Year’s.”
“Stay in a cage — two days and a night!”
“Perhaps I had better call up the police.”
“No, no! Wait. I’ll tell you what to do. Start that man, Ferdinand, on a tour of the city. If he hunts hard enough and long enough he’ll find some plumber or locksmith or somebody who’ll come.”
She rang for Ferdinand; together they instructed him, and he went away, promising to bring salvation in some shape.
Which promise made the young man more cheerful and smoothed out the worried pucker between Sacharissa’s straight brows.
“I suppose,” she said, “that you will never forgive my maid for this — or me either.”
He laughed. “After all,” he admitted, “it’s rather funny.”
“I don’t believe you think it’s funny.”
“Yes, I do.”
“Didn’t you want to go to Tuxedo?”
“I!” He looked up at the pretty countenance of Sacharissa. “I did want to — a few minutes ago.”
“And now that you can’t your philosophy teaches you that you don’t want to?”
They laughed at each other in friendly fashion.
“Perhaps it’s my philosophy,” he said, “but” I really don’t care very much.... I’m not sure that I care at all.... In fact, now that I think of it, why should I have wished to go to Tuxedo? It’s stupid to want to go to Tuxedo when New York is so attractive.”
“Do you know,” she said reflectively, “that I came to the same conclusion?”
“When?”
“This morning.”
“Be-before you — I — —”
“Oh, yes,” she said rather hastily, “before you came — —”
She broke off, pink with consternation. What a ridiculous thing to say! What on earth was twisting her tongue to hint at such an absurdity?
She said, gravely, with heightened color: “I was standing by the window this morning, thinking, and it occurred to me that I didn’t care to go to Tuxedo.... When did you change your mind?”
“A few minutes a — that is — well, I never really wanted to go. It’s jollier in town. Don’t you think so? Blue sky, snow — er — and all that?”
“Yes,” she said, “it is perfectly delightful in town to-day.”
He assented, then looked discouraged.
“Perhaps you would like to go out?” he said.
“I? Oh, no.... The sun on the snow is bad for one’s eyes; don’t you think so?”
“Very.... I’m terribly sorry that I’m giving you so much trouble.”
“I don’t mind — really. If only I could do something for you.”
“You are.”
“I?”
“Yes; you are being exceedingly nice to me. I am afra
id you feel under obligations to remain indoors and — —”
“Truly, I don’t. I was not going out.”
She leaned nearer and looked through the bars: “Are you quite sure you feel comfortable?”
“I feel like something in a zoo!”
She laughed. “That reminds me,” she said, “have you had any luncheon?”
He had not, it appeared, after a little polite protestation, so she rang for Sparks.
Her own appetite, too, had returned when the tray was brought; napkin and plate were passed through the grille to him, and, as they lunched, he in his cage, she close to the bars, they fell into conversation, exchanging information concerning mutual acquaintances whom they had expected to meet at the Delancy Courlands’.
“So you see,” she said, “that if I had not changed my mind about going to Tuxedo this morning you would not be here now. Nor I.... And we would never have — lunched together.”
“That didn’t alter things,” he said, smiling. “If you hadn’t been ill you would have gone to Tuxedo, and I should have seen you there.”
“Then, whatever I did made no difference,” she assented, thoughtfully, “for we were bound to meet, anyway.”
He remained standing close to the grille, which, as she was seated, brought his head on a level with hers.
“It would seem,” he said laughingly, “as though we were doomed to meet each other, anyway. It looks like a case of Destiny to me.”
She started slightly: “What did you say?”
“I said that it looks as though Fate intended us to meet, anyhow. Don’t you think so?”
She remained silent.
He added cheerfully: “I never was afraid of Fate.”
“Would you care for a — a book — or anything?” she asked, aware of a new constraint in her voice.
“I don’t believe I could see to read in here.... Are you — going?”
“I — ought to.” Vexed at the feeble senselessness of her reply she found herself walking down the landing, toward nowhere in particular. She turned abruptly and came back.
“Do you want a book?” she repeated.
“Oh, I forgot that you can’t see to read. But perhaps you might care to smoke.”
“Are you going away?”
“I — don’t mind your smoking.”
He lighted a cigarette; she looked at him irresolutely.
Works of Robert W Chambers Page 467