E Phillips Oppenheim

by The Wicked Marquis

  David Thain smiled grimly.

  "I shall be careful," he promised.

  CHAPTER IV

  The Marquis devoted the remainder of that afternoon, as he did most others, to paying a call. Very soon indeed after David Thain's departure, he left the house, stepped into the motor-car which was waiting for him, and, with a little nod to the chauffeur which indicated his indulgence in a customary enterprise, drove off towards Battersea. Here he descended before a large block of flats overlooking the gardens, stepped into the lift and, without any direction to the porter, was let out upon the sixth floor. He made his way along the corridor to a little mahogany front door, on which was a brass plate inscribed with the name of Miss Marcia Hannaway. He rang the bell and was at once admitted by a very trim parlourmaid, who took his hat and cane, and ushered him into a remarkably pleasant little sitting room. A woman, seated before a typewriter, held out two ink-stained hands towards him with a little laugh.

  "I've been putting a ribbon in," she confessed. "Did you ever see such a mess! Please make yourself comfortable while I go and wash."

  The Marquis glanced with a slight frown at the machine, and, taking her wrists, stooped down and kissed them lightly.

  "My dear Marcia," he expostulated, "is this necessary!"

  She shook her head with a droll smile.

  "Perhaps if it were," she confessed, "I should hate to do it. There's a Nineteenth Century on the sofa. You can read my article."

  She hurried out of the room, from which she was absent only a very few moments. The Marquis, with a finger between the pages of the review which he had been reading, looked up as she re-entered. She was a woman of nameless gifts, of pleasant if not unduly slim figure. Her forehead was perhaps a little low, her eyes brilliant and intelligent, her mouth large and exceedingly mobile. She was not above the allurements of dress, for her house gown, with its long tunic trimmed with light fur, was of fashionable cut and becoming. Her fingers, cleansed now from the violet stains, were shapely, almost elegant. She threw herself into an easy chair opposite her visitor, and reached out her hand for a cigarette.

  "Well," she asked, "and how has the great trial ended?"

  "Adversely," the Marquis confessed.

  "You foolish person," she sighed, lighting the cigarette and throwing the match away. "Of course you were bound to lose, and I suppose it's cost you no end of money."

  "I believe," he admitted, a little stiffly, "that my lawyers are somewhat depressed at the amount."

  She smoked in silence for a moment.

  "So he will go back to Mandeleys. It is a queer little fragment of life. What on earth does he want to do it for?"

  "Obstinacy," the Marquis declared,—"sheer, brutal, ignorant obstinacy."

  "And the boy?" she asked, pursuing her own train of thought. "Have you heard anything of him?"

  "Nothing. To tell you the truth, I have made no enquiries. Beyond the fact that it seems as though, for the present, Richard Vont will have his way, I take no interest in either of them."

  She nodded thoughtfully.

  "If only we others," she sighed, "could infuse into our lives something of the marvellous persistence of these people whom in other respects we have left so far behind!"

  "My dear Marcia," he protested, "surely, with your remarkable intelligence, you can see that such persistence is merely a form of narrow-mindedness. Your father has shut in his life and driven it along one narrow groove. To you every day brings its fresh sensation, its fresh object. Hence—coupled, of course, with your natural gifts—your success. The person who thinks of but one thing in life must be indeed a dull dog."

  "Very excellent reasoning," she admitted. "Still, to come back to this little tragedy—for it is a tragedy, isn't it?—have you any idea what he means to do when he gets to Mandeleys?"

  "None at all!"

  "Let me see," she went on, "it is nineteen years ago last September, isn't it?—nineteen years out of the middle of his life. Will he sit in the garden and brood, I wonder, or has he brought back with him some scheme of mediaeval revenge?"

  "There was a time," the Marquis reflected, "when several of my Irish tenants used to shoot at me every Saturday night from behind a hedge. It was not in the least a dangerous operation, and I presume it brought them some relief. With Vont, however, things would be different. I remember him distinctly as a most wonderful shot."

  "Psychologically," Marcia Hannaway observed, "his present action is interesting. If he had shot you or me in his first fit of passionate resentment, everything would have been in order, but to leave the country, nurse a sullen feeling of revenge for years, and then come back, seems curious. What shall you do when you see him sitting in his garden?"

  "I shall address him," the Marquis replied. "I fear that his long residence in such a country as America will have altered him considerably, but it is of course possible that the instincts of his class remain."

  "How feudal you are!" she laughed.

  The Marquis frowned slightly. Although this was the one person in the world whom he felt was necessary to him, who held a distinct place in his very inaccessible heart, there were times when he entertained a dim suspicion that she was making fun of him. At such times he was very angry indeed.

  "In any case," he said, "we will not waste our time in speculating upon this man's attitude. I am still hoping that I may be able to devise means to render his occupancy of the cottage impossible."

  "I should like to hear about the boy."

  "If," the Marquis promised, "I find Vont's attitude respectful, I will make enquiries."

  "When are you going to Mandeleys?" she asked.

  "I am in no hurry to leave London," he replied.

  "When you go," she told him, "I have made up my mind to take a little holiday. I thought even of going to the South of France."

  The lines of her companion's forehead were slightly elevated.

  "My dear Marcia," he protested gently, "is that like you? The class of people who frequent the Riviera at this time of the year—"

  She laughed at him delightfully.

  "Oh, you foolish person!" she interrupted. "If I go, I shall go to a tiny little boarding house, or take a villa in one of the quiet places—San Raphael, perhaps, or one of those little forgotten spots between Hyères and Cannes. Phillis Grant would go with me. She isn't going to act again until the autumn season."

  Her visitor's expression was a little blank.

  "In the case of your departure from London," he announced, in a very even but very forlorn tone, "I will instruct Mr. Wadham to make a suitable addition to your allowance. At the same time, Marcia," he added, "I shall miss you."

  His words were evidently a surprise to her. She threw away her cigarette and came and sat on the sofa by his side.

  "Do you know, I believe you would," she murmured, resting her hand upon his. "How queer!"

  "I have never concealed my affection for you, have I?" he asked.

  This time the laugh which broke from her lips was scarcely natural.

  "Concealed your affection, Reginald!" she repeated. "How strangely that sounds! But listen. You said something just now about my allowance. If I allude to it in return, will you believe that it is entirely for your sake?"

  "Of course!"

  She rose from her chair and, crossing the room, rummaged about her desk for a moment, produced a letter, and brought it to him. The Marquis adjusted his horn-rimmed eyeglass and read:

  Dear Madam:

  We feel that some explanation is due to you with regard to the non-payment for the last two quarters of your allowance from our client, the Marquis of Mandeleys. We have to inform you that for some time past we have had no funds in our possession to pay this allowance. We informed his lordship of the fact, some time back, but in our opinion his lordship scarcely took the circumstance seriously. We think it better, therefore, that you should communicate with him on the subject.

  Faithfully yours,

  WADHAM, SON AND DICKSON.r />
  The Marquis deliberately folded up the letter, placed his eyeglass in his pocket, and sat looking into the fire. There was very little change in his face. Only Marcia, to whom he had been the study of a lifetime, knew that so far as suffering was possible to him, he was suffering at that moment.

  "You mustn't think it matters," she said gently. "You know my last novel was quite a wonderful success, and for that article in the Nineteenth you were looking at, they gave me twenty guineas. I am really almost opulent. Still, I thought it was better for you to know this. The same thing might refer to other and more important matters, and you know, dear, you are rather inclined to walk with your head in the air where money matters are concerned."

  "You have been very considerate, but foolishly so, my dear Marcia," he declared. "This matter must be put right at once. I fear that a younger element has obtruded itself into the firm of Wadham, an element which scarcely grasps the true position. I will see these people, Marcia."

  "You are not to worry about it," she begged softly. "To tell you the truth—"

  Marcia was a brave woman, and the moment had come up to which she had been leading for so long, which for many months, even years, had been in her mind. And when it came she faltered. There was something in the superb, immutable poise of the man who bent a little courteously towards her, which checked the words upon her lips.

  "It will be no trouble to me, Marcia, to set this little affair right," he assured her. "I am only glad that your circumstances have been such that you have not been inconvenienced. At the same time, is it entirely necessary for you to manipulate that hideous machine yourself?" he enquired, inclining his head towards the typewriter.

  "There are times," she confessed, "when I find it better. Of course, I send a great deal of my work out to be typed, but my correspondence grows, and my friends find my handwriting illegible."

  "I have never found it difficult," he remarked.

  "Well, you've had a good many years to get used to it," she reminded him.

  His hand rested for a moment upon her shoulder. He drew her a little towards him. She suddenly laughed, leaned over and kissed him on both cheeks, and jumped up. The trim little parlourmaid was at the door with tea.

  "Yes," she went on, "you have learned to read my handwriting, and I have learned how you like your tea. Just one or two more little things like that, and life is made between two people, isn't it? Shall I tell you what I think the most singular thing in the world?" she went on, pausing for a moment in her task. "It is fidelity to purpose—and to people, too, perhaps. In a way there is a quaint sort of distinction about it, and from another point of view it is most horribly constraining."

  "I interrupted you this afternoon, I imagine," he observed, "in the construction of some work of fiction."

  "Oh, no!" she replied. "What I write isn't fiction. That's why it sells. It's truth, you see, under another garb. But there the fact remains—that I shouldn't know how to make tea for another man in the world, and you wouldn't be able to read the letters of any other woman who wrote as badly as I do."

  "The fact," he remarked, "seems to me to be a cause for mutual congratulation."

  She stooped down to place a dish of muffins on a heater near the fire, graceful yet as a girl, and as brisk.

  "I can't imagine," she declared, "why it is that my sex has acquired the reputation for fidelity. I am sure we crave for experience much more than men."

  The Marquis helped himself to a muffin and considered the point. There were many times when Marcia's conversation troubled him. He was by no means an ill-read or unintellectual man, only his studies of literature had been confined to its polished and classical side, the side which deals so much with living and so little with life.

  "Are you preparing for a new work of fiction, Marcia," he asked, "or are you developing a fresh standpoint?"

  "Dear friend," she declared, lightly and yet with an undernote of earnestness, "how can I tell? I never know what I am going to do in the way of work. I wish I could say the same about life. Now I am going to ask you a great favour. I have to attend a small meeting at my club, at the other end of Piccadilly, at half-past five. Would you take me there?"

  "I shall be delighted," he answered, a little stiffly.

  She went presently to put on her outdoor clothes. The Marquis was disappointed. He realised how much he had looked forward to that quiet twilight hour, when somehow or other his vanity felt soothed, and that queer weariness which came over him sometimes was banished. He escorted Marcia to the car when she reappeared, however, without complaint.

  "I see your name in the papers sometimes, Marcia," he observed as he took his place by her side, "in connection with women's work. Of course, I do not interfere in any way with your energies. I should not, in whatever direction they might chance to lead you. At the same time, I must confess that I have noticed with considerable pleasure that you have never been publicly associated with this movement in favour of Woman's Suffrage."

  She nodded.

  "I should like a vote myself," she admitted simply, "but when I think of the number of other women who would have to have it, and who don't yet look at life seriously at all, I think we are better as we are. Is it my fancy," she went on, a little abruptly, "or are you really troubled about the return of—of Richard Vont?"

  "As usual, Marcia," he said, "you show a somewhat extraordinary perception where I am concerned. I am, as you know, not subject to presentiments, and I have no exact apprehension of what the word fear may mean. At the same time, you are right. I do view the return of this man with a feeling which you, as a novelist, might be able to analyse, but which I, as a layman, unused to fresh sentiments, find puzzling. You remember what a famous Frenchman wrote in his memoirs, suddenly, across one blank page of his journal—'To-day I feel that a great change is coming.'"

  She smiled reassuringly.

  "Personally," she told him, "I believe that it is just the call of England to a man who lived very near the soil—her heart. I think he wants the smell of spring flowers, the stillness of an English autumn, the winds of February in the woods he was brought up in. It is a form of heart-sickness, you know. I have felt it myself so often. It is scarcely possible that after all these years he is still nursing that bitter hatred of us both."

  The car had reached the great building in which Marcia's club was situated. The Marquis handed her out.

  "I trust that you are right," he remarked. "You will allow me to leave the car for you?"

  She shook her head.

  "There are so many women here with whom I want to talk," she said. "I may even stay and dine. And would you mind not coming until Wednesday? To-morrow I must work all day at an article which has to be typed and catch the Wednesday's boat for America."

  "Exactly as you wish," he assented.

  She waved her hand to him and ran lightly up the steps. The Marquis threw himself back in his car and hesitated. The footman was waiting for an address, and his august master was suddenly conscious that the skies were very grey, that a slight rain was falling, and that there was nowhere very much he wanted to go.

  The man waited with immovable face.

  "To—the club."

  CHAPTER V

  Messrs. Wadham, Son and Dickson were not habited in luxury. Theirs was one of those old-fashioned suites of offices in Lincoln's Inn, where the passages are of stone, the doors of painted deal, and a general air of bareness and discomfort prevails. The Marquis, who was a rare visitor, followed the directions of a hand painted upon the wall and found himself in what was termed, an enquiry office. A small boy tore himself away with apparent regret from the study of a pile of documents, and turned a little wearily towards the caller.

  "I desire," the Marquis announced, "to see Mr. Wadham, Senior, or to confer at once with any member of the firm who may be disengaged."

  The small boy was hugely impressed. He glanced at the long row of black boxes along the wall and a premonition of the truth began to dawn upon him. />
  "What name, sir?" he enquired.

  "The Marquis of Mandeleys."

  The office boy swung open a wicket gate and pointed to the hard remains of a horsehair stuffed easy-chair. The Marquis eyed it curiously—and remained standing. His messenger thereupon departed, exhibiting a rare and unlegal haste. He returned breathless, in fact, from his mission, closely followed by Mr. Wadham, Junior.

  "This is quite an honour, your lordship," the latter said, hastily withdrawing his hand as he became aware of a certain rigidity in his visitor's demeanour. "My father is disengaged. Let me show you the way to his room."

  "I should be obliged," the Marquis assented.

  Mr. Wadham, Senior, was an excellent replica of his son, a little fatter, a little rosier and a little more verbose. He rose from behind his desk and bowed twice as his distinguished client entered. The Marquis indicated to Mr. Wadham, Junior, the chair upon which he proposed to sit, and waited while it was wheeled up to the side of the desk. Then he withdrew his gloves in leisurely fashion and extended his hand to the older man, who clasped it reverently.

  "Your lordship pays us a rare honour," Mr. Wadham, Senior, observed.

  "I should have preferred," the Marquis said, with some emphasis, "that circumstances had not rendered my visit to-day necessary."

  The head of the firm nodded sympathetically.

  "You will bear in mind," he begged, "our advice concerning these recent actions."

  "Your advice was, without doubt, legally good," his visitor replied, "but it scarcely took into account circumstances outside the legal point of view. However, I am not here to discuss those actions, which I understand are now finally disposed of."

  "Quite finally, I fear, your lordship."

  "I find myself," the Marquis continued sternly, "in the painful position of having to prefer a complaint against your firm."