V
WILFUL MISSING
It was one o'clock in the morning before Whitaker allowed himself to bepersuaded; fatigue reenforced every stubborn argument of Peter Stark'sto overcome his resistance. It was a repetition of the episode of MaryLadislas recast and rewritten: the stronger will overcame theadmonitions of a saner judgment. Whitaker gave in. "Oh, have your ownway," he said at length, unconsciously iterating the words that had wonhim a bride. "If it must be...."
Peter put him to bed, watched over him through the night, and the nextmorning carried him on to New Bedford, where they superintended theoutfitting of Peter's yacht, the _Adventuress_. Beyond drawing heavilyon his bank and sending Drummond a brief note, Whitaker failed to renewcommunication with his home. He sank into a state of semi-apatheticcontent; he thought little of anything beyond the business of themoment; the preparations for what he was pleased to term his funeralcruise absorbed him to the exclusion of vain repinings or anxiety forthe welfare of his adventitious wife. Apparently his suddendisappearance had not caused the least ripple on the surface of life inNew York; the newspapers, at all events, slighted the circumstanceunanimously: to his complete satisfaction.
Within the week the _Adventuress_ sailed.
She was five months out of port before Whitaker began to be consciousthat he was truly accursed. There came a gradual thickening of theshadows that threatened to eclipse his existence. And then, one day asthey dined with the lonely trader of an isolated station in theD'Entrecasteaux Islands, he fell from his chair as if poleaxed. Heregained consciousness only to shiver with the chill of the wind that'sfanned by the wings of death. It was impossible to move him. The agoniesof the damned were his when, with exquisite gentleness, they lifted himto a bed....
Stark sailed in the _Adventuress_ before sundown of the same day,purposing to fetch a surgeon from Port Moresby. Whitaker said a lastfarewell to his friend, knowing in his soul that they would never meetagain. Then he composed himself to die quietly. But the followingmorning brought a hapchance trading schooner to the island, and with it,in the estate of supercargo, a crapulous Scotch gentleman who had been afamous specialist of London before drink laid him by the heels. Heperformed an heroic operation upon Whitaker within an hour, announced bynightfall that the patient would recover, and the next day sailed withhis ship to end his days in some abandoned Australian boozing-ken--asWhitaker learned in Sydney several months later.
In the same place, and at the same time, he received his first authenticnews of the fate of the _Adventuress_. The yacht had struck on anuncharted reef, in heavy weather, and had foundered almost immediately.Of her entire company, a solitary sailor managed to cling to a life-raftuntil picked up, a week after the wreck, by a tramp steamship on whosedecks he gasped out his news and his life in the same breaths.
Whitaker hunted up an account of the disaster in the files of a localnewspaper. He read that the owner, Peter Stark, Esq., and his guest, H.M. Whitaker, Esq., both of New York, had gone down with the vessel.There was also a cable despatch from New York detailing Peter Stark'ssocial and financial prominence--evidence that the news had been cabledHome. To all who knew him Whitaker was as dead as Peter Stark.
Sardonic irony of circumstance, that had robbed the sound man of lifeand bestowed life upon the moribund! Contemplation wrought like a toxicdrug upon Whitaker's temper, until he was raving drunk with the blackdraught of mutiny against the dictates of an Omnipotence capable of suchhideous mockeries of justice. The iron bit deep into his soul and leftcorrosion there....
"There is a world outside the one you know To which for curiousness 'Ell can't compare; It is the place where wilful missings go, As we can testify, for we are there."
Kipling's lines buzzed through his head more than once in the course ofthe next few years; for he was "there." They were years of suchvagabondage as only the South Seas countenance: neither unhappy nor verystrenuous, not yet scarred by the tooth of poverty. Whitaker had betweenfour and five thousand dollars in traveller's checks which he convertedinto cash while in Sydney. Memory of the wreck of the _Adventuress_ wasalready fading from the Australian mind; no one dreamed of challengingthe signature of a man seven months dead. And as certainly and asquietly as the memory, Whitaker faded away; Hugh Morten took his place,and Sydney knew him no more, nor did any other parts wherein he hadanswered to his rightful name.
The money stayed by him handsomely. Thanks to a strong constitution in atough body (now that its malignant demon was exorcised) he found it easyto pick up a living by one means or another. Indeed, he played manyparts in as many fields before joining hands with a young Englishman hehad grown to like and entering upon what seemed a forlorn bid forfortune. Thereafter he prospered amazingly.
In those days his anomalous position in the world troubled him verylittle. He was a Wilful Missing and a willing. The new life intriguedhim amazingly; he lived in open air, in virgin country, wresting afortune by main strength from the reluctant grasp of Nature. He was oneof the first two men to find and mine gold in paying quantities in theOwen Stanley country.... Now that Peter Stark was dead, the ties ofinterest and affection binding him to America were both few and slender.His wife was too abstract a concept, a shadow too vague in his memory,to obtrude often upon his reveries. Indeed, as time went on, he found itanything but easy to recall much about the physical appearance of thewoman he had married; he remembered chiefly her eyes; she moved mistilyacross the stage of a single scene in his history, an awkward,self-conscious, unhappy, childish phantasm.
Even the consideration that, fortified by the report of his death, shemight have married again, failed to disturb either his slumbers or hisdigestion. If that had happened, he had no objection; the tie that boundthem was the emptiest of forms--in his understanding as meaningless andas powerless to make them one as the printed license form they had beenforced to procure of the State of Connecticut. There had been neitherlove nor true union--merely pity on one side, apathy of despair on theother. Two souls had met in the valley of the great shadow, had paused amoment to touch hands, had passed onward, forever out of one another'sken; and that was all. His "death" should have put her in command of afair competence. If she had since sought and found happiness withanother man, was there any logical reason, or even excuse, for Whitakerto abandon his new and pleasant ways of life in order to return andshatter hers?
He was self-persuaded of his generosity toward the girl.
Casuistry of the Wilful Missing!...
It's to be feared he had always a hard-headed way of considering mattersin the light of equity as distinguished from the light of ethical orlegal morality. This is not to be taken as an attempt to defend the man,but rather as a statement of fact: even as the context is to be read asan account of some things that happened rather than as a morality....
When at length he did make up his mind to go Home, it wasn't because hefelt that duty called him; plain, everyday, human curiosity hadsomething to do with his determination--a desire to see how New York wasmanaging to get along without him--together with a dawning apprehensionthat there was an uncomfortable amount of truth in the antiquatedbromidiom about the surprising littleness of the world.
He was in Melbourne at that time, with Lynch, his partner. Havingprospered and laid by a lump of money, they had planned to finance theirholdings in the traditional fashion--that is, to let in other people'smoney to do the work, while they rested and possessed their souls anddrew dividends on a controlling interest. Capital in Melbourne hadproved eager and approachable; the arrangement they desired was quicklyconsummated; the day the papers were signed, Whitaker passed old friendsin the street. They were George Presbury and his wife--Anne Forsythethat was--self-evident tourists, looking the town over between steamers.Presbury, with no thought in his bumptious head of meeting Hugh Whitakerbefore the Day of Judgment, looked at and through him without a hint ofrecognition; but his wife was another person altogether. Whitaker couldnot be blind to the surprise and perplexity that shone in her
eyes, eventhough he pretended to be blind to her uncertain nod; long after hisback alone was visible to her he could feel her inquiring stare boringinto it.
The incident made him think; and he remembered that he was now a man ofindependent fortune and of newly idle hands as well. After prolongedconsideration he suddenly decided, told Lynch to look out for hisinterests and expect him back when he should see him, and booked forLondon by a Royal Mail boat--all in half a day. From London Mr. HughMorten crossed immediately to New York on the _Olympic_, landing in themonth of April--nearly six years to a day from the time he had left hisnative land.
He discovered a New York almost wholly new--an experience almostinevitable, if one insists on absenting one's self even for as little ashalf a decade. Intimations of immense changes were borne in uponWhitaker while the steamer worked up the Bay. The Singer Building was anunfamiliar sky-mark, but not more so than the Metropolitan Tower and theWoolworth. The _Olympic_ docked at an impressive steel-and-concretestructure, new since his day; and Whitaker narrowly escaped a row with ataxicab chauffeur because the fellow smiled impertinently when directedto drive to the Fifth Avenue Hotel.
A very few hours added amazingly to the catalogue of things that werenot as they had been: a list so extensive and impressive that he made uphis mind to maintain his incognito for a few days, until familiar withthe ways of his home. He was quick to perceive that he would even haveto forget most of the slang that had been current in his time, inaddition to unlearning all he had picked up abroad, and set himself withattentive ears pricked forward and an open mind to master the new,strange tongue his countrymen were speaking, if he were to make himselfintelligible to them--and them to him, for that matter.
So he put up at the Ritz-Carlton, precisely as any foreigner might beexpected to do, and remained Hugh Morten while he prowled around thecity and found himself. Now and again in the course of his wanderings heencountered well-remembered faces, but always without eliciting theslightest gleam of recognition: circumstances that only went to provehow thoroughly dead and buried he was in the estimation of his day andgeneration.
Nothing, indeed, seemed as he remembered it except the offerings in thetheatres. He sat through plays on three successive nights that sent himback to his hotel saddened by the conviction that the tastes of hisfellow-countrymen in the matter of amusements were as enduring asadamant--as long-enduring. Some day (he prophesied) New York would befinished and complete; then would come the final change--itsname--because it wouldn't be New York unless ever changing; and whenthat was settled, the city would know ease and, for want of somethingless material to occupy it, begin to develop a soul of its own--togetherwith an inclination for something different in the way of theatricalentertainment.
But his ultimate and utter awakening to the truth that his home hadoutgrown him fell upon the fourth afternoon following his return, when atotal but most affable gentleman presented himself to Whitaker'sconsideration with a bogus name and a genuine offer to purchase him adrink, and promptly attempted to enmesh him in a confidence game thathad degenerated into a vaudeville joke in the days when both of them hadworn knickerbockers. Gently but firmly entrusting the stranger to thecare of a convenient policeman, Whitaker privately admitted that he wasoutclassed, that it was time for him to seek the protection of hisfriends.
He began with Drummond. The latter, of course, had moved his offices; nodoubt he had moved them several times; however that may be, Whitaker hadleft him in quiet and contracted quarters in Pine Street; he found himindependently established in an imposing suite in the WoolworthBuilding.
Whitaker gave one of Mr. Hugh Morten's cards to a subdued office-boy."Tell him," he requested, "that I want to see him about a matterrelating to the estate of Mr. Whitaker."
The boy dived through one partition-door and reappeared by way ofanother with the deft certainty of a trained pantomime.
"Says t' come in."
Whitaker found himself in the presence of an ashen-faced man ofthirty-five, who clutched the side of his roll-top desk as if to savehimself from falling.
"Whitaker!" he gasped. "My God!"
"Flattered," said Whitaker, "I'm sure."
He derived considerable mischievous amusement from Drummond's patentstupefaction. It was all so right and proper--as it should have been. Heconsidered his an highly satisfactory resurrection, the sensation itcreated as complete, considered in the relation of anticipation tofulfilment, as anything he had ever experienced. Seldom does a scenepass off as one plans it; the other parties thereto are apt to spoilthings by spouting spontaneously their own original lines, thus cheatingone out of a crushing retort or cherished epigram. But Drummond playedup his part in a most public-spirited fashion--gratifying, to say theleast.
It took him some minutes to recover, Whitaker standing by and beaming.
He remarked changes, changes as striking as the improvement inDrummond's fortunes. Physically his ex-partner had gone off a bit; thesedentary life led by the average successful man of business in New Yorkhad marked his person unmistakably. Much heavier than the man Whitakerremembered, he wore a thick and solid air of good-natured prosperity.The hair had receded an inch or so from his forehead. Only his faceseemed as it had always been--sharply handsome and strong. Whitakerremembered that he had always somewhat meanly envied Drummond his goodlooks; he himself had been fashioned after the new order ofarchitecture--with a steel frame; but for some reason Nature, the masterbuilder, had neglected sufficiently to wall in and conceal the skeleton.Admitting the economy of the method, Whitaker was inclined to believethat the effect must be surprising, especially if encountered withoutwarning....
He discovered that they were both talking at once--furiously--and, notwithout surprise, that he had a great deal more enlightenment to impartto Drummond than he had foreseen.
"You've got an economical streak in you when it comes tocorrespondence," Drummond commented, offering Whitaker a sheet of paperhe had just taken from a tin document-box. "That's Exhibit A."
Whitaker read aloud:
"'DEAR D., I'm not feeling well, so off for a vacation. Burke has just been in and paid $1500 in settlement of our claim. I'm enclosing herewith my check for your share. Yours, H. M. W.'"
"Far be it from me to cast up," said Drummond; "but I'd like to know whythe deuce you couldn't let a fellow know how ill you were."
Whitaker frowned over his dereliction. "Don't remember," he confessed."I was hardly right, you know--and I presume I must have counted onGreyerson telling."
"But I don't know Greyerson...."
"That's so. And you never heard--?"
"Merely a rumour ran round. Some one--I forget who--told me that you andStark had gone sailing in Stark's boat--to cruise in the West Indies,according to my informant. And somebody else mentioned that he'd heardyou were seriously ill. More than that nothing--until we heard that the_Adventuress_ had been lost, half a year later."
"I'm sorry," said Whitaker contritely. "It was thoughtless...."
"But that isn't all," Drummond objected, flourishing another paper. "Seehere--Exhibit B--came in a day or so later."
"Yes." Whitaker recognized the document. "I remember insisting onwriting to you before we turned in that night."
He ran through the following communication:
"DEAR DRUMMOND: I married here, to-night, Mary Ladislas. Please look out for her while I'm away. Make her an allowance out of my money--five hundred a month ought to be enough. I shall die intestate, and she'll get everything then, of course. She has your address and will communicate with you as soon as she gets settled down in Town.
"Faithfully--
"HUGH MORTEN WHITAKER."
"If it hadn't been so much in character," commented Drummond, "I'd'vethought the thing a forgery--or a poor joke. Knowing you as well as Idid, however ... I just sat back to wait for word from Mrs. Whitaker."
"And you never heard, except that once!" said Whitaker thoughtfully.
"He
re's the sole and only evidence I ever got to prove that you had toldthe truth."
Drummond handed Whitaker a single, folded sheet of note-paper stampedwith the name of the Waldorf-Astoria.
"CARTER S. DRUMMOND, Esq., 27 Pine Street, City.
"DEAR SIR: I inclose herewith a bank-note for $500, which you will be kind enough to credit to the estate of your late partner and my late husband, Mr. Hugh Morten Whitaker.
"Very truly yours,
"MARY LADISLAS WHITAKER."
"Dated, you see, the day after the report of your death was publishedhere."
"But why?" demanded Whitaker, dumfounded. "_Why?_"
"I infer she felt herself somehow honour-bound by the monetaryobligation," said the lawyer. "In her understanding your marriage ofconvenience was nothing more--a one-sided bargain, I think you said shecalled it. She couldn't consider herself wholly free, even though youwere dead, until she had repaid this loan which you, a stranger, hadpractically forced upon her--if not to you, to your estate."
"But death cancels everything--"
"Not," Drummond reminded him with a slow smile, "the obligation of aperiod of decent mourning that devolves upon a widow. Mrs. Whitaker mayhave desired to marry again immediately. If I'm any judge of humannature, she argued that repayment of the loan wiped out everyobligation. Feminine logic, perhaps, but--"
"Good Lord!" Whitaker breathed, appalled in the face of this contingencywhich had seemed so remote and immaterial when he was merely HughMorten, bachelor-nomad, to all who knew him on the far side of theworld.
Drummond dropped his head upon his hand and regarded his friend withinquisitive eyes.
"Looks as though you may have gummed things up neatly--doesn't it?"
Whitaker nodded in sombre abstraction.
"You may not," continued Drummond with light malice, "have been sogenerous, so considerate and chivalric, after all."
"Oh, cut that!" growled Whitaker, unhappily. "I never meant to comeback."
"Then why did you?"
"Oh ... I don't know. Chiefly because I caught Anne Presbury's sharpeyes on me in Melbourne--as I said a while ago. I knew she'd talk--asshe surely will the minute she gets back--and I thought I might as wellget ahead of her, come home and face the music before anybody got achance to expose me. At the worst--if what you suggest has reallyhappened--it's an open-and-shut case; no one's going to blame the woman;and it ought to be easy enough to secure a separation or divorce--"
"You'd consent to that?" inquired Drummond intently.
"I'm ready to do anything she wishes, within the law."
"You leave it to her, then?"
"If I ever find her--yes. It's the only decent thing I can do."
"How do you figure that?"
"I went away a sick man and a poor one; I come back as sound as a bell,and if not exactly a plutocrat, at least better off than I ever expectedto be in this life.... To all intents and purposes I _made_ her apartner to a bargain she disliked; well, I'll be hanged if I'm going tohedge now, when I look a better matrimonial risk, perhaps: if she stillwants my name, she can have it."
Drummond laughed quietly. "If that's how you feel," he said, "I can onlygive you one piece of professional advice."
"What's that?"
"Find your wife."
After a moment of puzzled thought, Whitaker admitted ruefully: "You'reright. There's the rub."
"I'm afraid you won't find it an easy job. I did my best withoutuncovering a trace of her."
"You followed up that letter, of course?"
"I did my best; but, my dear fellow, almost anybody with a decentappearance can manage to write a note on Waldorf stationery. I made sureof one thing--the management knew nothing of the writer under either hermaiden name or yours."
"Did you try old Thurlow?"
"Her father died within eight weeks from the time you ran away. He lefteverything to charity, by the way. Unforgiving blighter."
"Well, there's her sister, Mrs. Pettit."
"She heard of the marriage first through me," asserted Drummond. "Yourwife had never come near her--nor even sent her a line. She could giveme no information whatever."
"You don't think she purposely misled you--?"
"Frankly I don't. She seemed sincerely worried, when we talked thematter over, and spoke in a most convincing way of her fruitlessattempts to trace the young woman through a private detective agency."
"Still, she may know now," Whitaker said doubtfully. "She may have heardsomething since. I'll have a word with her myself."
"Address," observed Drummond, dryly: "the American Embassy, Berlin....Pettit's got some sort of a minor diplomatic berth over there."
"O the devil!... But, anyway, I can write."
"Think it over," Drummond advised. "Maybe it might be kinder not to."
"Oh, I don't know--"
"You've given me to understand you were pretty comfy on the other sideof the globe. Why not let sleeping dogs lie?"
"It's the lie that bothers me--the living lie. It isn't fair to her."
"Rather sudden, this solicitude--what?" Drummond asked with opensarcasm.
"I daresay it does look that way. But I can't see that it's the decentthing for me to let things slide any longer. I've got to try to findher. She may be ill--destitute--in desperate trouble again--"
Drummond's eyebrows went up whimsically. "You surely don't mean me toinfer that your affections are involved?"
This brought Whitaker up standing. "Good heavens--no!" he cried. Hemoved to a window and stared rudely at the Post Office Building for atime. "I'm going to find her just the same--if she still lives," heannounced, turning back.
"Would you know her if you saw her?"
"I don't know." Whitaker frowned with annoyance. "She's six yearsolder--"
"A woman often develops and changes amazingly between the ages ofeighteen and twenty-four."
"I know," Whitaker acknowledged with dejection.
"Well, but what _was_ she like?" Drummond pursued curiously.
Whitaker shook his head. "It's not easy to remember. Matter of fact, Idon't believe I ever got one good square look at her. It was twilight inthe hotel, when I found her; we sat talking in absolute darkness, towardthe end; even in the minister's study there was only a green-shaded lampon the table; and on the train--well, we were both too much worked up, Ifancy, to pay much attention to details."
"Then you really haven't any idea--?"
"Oh, hardly." Whitaker's thin brown hand gesticulated vaguely. "She wastall, slender, pale, at the awkward age...."
"Blonde or brune?"
"I swear I don't know. She wore one of those funny knitted caps, tightdown over her hair, all the time."
Drummond laughed quietly. "Rather an inconclusive description,especially if you advertise. 'Wanted: the wife I married six years agoand haven't seen since; tall, slender, pale, at the awkward age; woreone of those funny knit--'"
"I don't feel in a joking humour," Whitaker interrupted roughly. "It's aserious matter and wants serious treatment.... What else have we got tomull over?"
Drummond shrugged suavely. "There's enough to keep us busy for severalhours," he said. "For instance, there's my stewardship."
"Your which?"
"My care of your property. You left a good deal of money and securitieslying round loose, you know; naturally I felt obliged to look after 'em.There was no telling when Widow Whitaker might walk in and demand anaccounting. I presume we might as well run over the account--though itis getting late."
"Half-past four," Whitaker informed him, consulting his watch. "Take toolong for to-day. Some other time."
"To-morrow suit you?"
"To-morrow's Sunday," Whitaker objected. "But there's no hurry at all."
Drummond's reply was postponed by the office boy, who popped in on theheels of a light knock.
"Mr. Max's outside," he announced.
"O the deuce!" The exclamation seemed to escape Drummond's lipsinvoluntar
ily. He tightened them angrily, as though regretting the lapseof self-control, and glanced hurriedly askance to see if Whitaker hadnoticed. "I'm busy," he added, a trace sullenly. "Tell him I've goneout."
"But he's got 'nappointment," the boy protested. "And besides, I toldhim you was in."
"You needn't fob him off on my account," Whitaker interposed. "We canfinish our confab later--Monday--any time. It's time for me to begetting up-town, anyway."
"It isn't that," Drummond explained doggedly. "Only--the man's a bore,and--"
"It isn't Jules Max?" Whitaker demanded excitedly. "Not little JulesMax, who used to stage manage our amateur shows?"
"That's the man," Drummond admitted with plain reluctance.
"Then have him in, by all means. I want to say howdy to him, if nothingmore. And then I'll clear out and leave you to his troubles."
Drummond hesitated; whereupon the office boy, interpreting assent,precipitately vanished to usher in the client. His employer laughed atrifle sourly.
"Ben's a little too keen about pleasing Max," he said. "I think he lookson him as the fountainhead of free seats. Max has developed into aheavy-weight entrepreneur, you know."
"Meaning theatrical manager? Then why not say so? But I might've guessedhe'd drift into something of the sort."
A moment later Whitaker was vigorously pumping the unresisting--indeedthe apparently boneless--hand of a visibly flabbergasted gentleman, whosuffered him for the moment solely upon suspicion, if his expressionwere a reliable index of his emotion.
In the heyday of his career as a cunning and successful promoter ofplays and players, Jules Max indulged a hankering for the picturesquelyeccentric that sat oddly upon his commonplace personality. The hat thathad made Hammerstein famous Max had appropriated--straight crown, flatbrim and immaculate gloss--bodily. Beneath it his face was small offeature, and fat. Its trim little mustache lent it an air ofconventionality curiously at war with a pince-nez which sheltered hisnear-sighted eyes, its enormous, round, horn-rimmed lenses sagging toone side with the weight of a wide black ribbon. His nose wasinsignificant, his mouth small and pursy. His short, round little bodywas invariably by day dressed in a dark gray morning-coat, white-edgedwaistcoat, assertively-striped trousers, and patent-leather shoes withwhite spats. He had a passion for lemon-coloured gloves of thinnest kidand slender malacca walking-sticks. His dignity was an awful thing, asingrained as his strut.
He reasserted the dignity now with a jerk of his maltreated hand, aswell as with an appreciable effort betrayed by his resentful glare.
"Do I know you?" he demanded haughtily. "If not, what the devil do youmean by such conduct, sir?"
With a laugh, Whitaker took him by the shoulders and spun him roundsmartly into a convenient chair.
"Sit still and let me get a _good_ look," he implored. "Think of it!Juley Max daring to put on side with me! The impudence of you, Juley!I've a great mind to play horse with you. How dare you go round thestreets looking like that, anyway?"
Max recovered his breath, readjusted his glasses, and resumed his stare.
"Either," he observed, "you're Hugh Whitaker come to life or a damnedoutrage."
"Both, if you like."
"You sound like both," complained the little man. "Anyway, you weredrowned in the Philippines or somewhere long ago, and I never waste timeon a dead one.... Drummond--" He turned to the lawyer with a vastlybusiness-like air.
"No, you don't!" Whitaker insisted, putting himself between the two men."I admit that you're a great man; you might at least admit that I'm alive one."
A mollified smile moderated the small man's manner. "That's a bargain,"he said, extending a pale yellow paw; "I'm glad to see you again, Hugh.When did you recrudesce?"
"An hour ago," Drummond answered for him; "blew in here as large as lifeand twice as important. He's been running a gold farm out in New Guinea.What do you know about that?"
"It's very interesting," Max conceded. "I shall have to cultivate him; Inever neglect a man with money. If you'll stick around a few minutes,Hugh, I'll take you up-town in my car." He turned to Drummond,completely ignoring Whitaker while he went into the details of someaction he desired the lawyer to undertake on his behalf. Then, havingtalked steadily for upwards of ten minutes, he rose and prepared to go.
"You've asked him, of course?" he demanded of Drummond, nodding towardWhitaker.
Drummond flushed slightly. "No chance," he said. "I was on the point ofdoing it when you butted in."
"What's this?" inquired Whitaker.
Max delivered himself of a startling bit of information: "He's going toget married."
Whitaker stared. "Drummond? Not really?"
Drummond acknowledged his guilt brazenly: "Next week, in fact."
"But why didn't you say anything about it?"
"You didn't give me an opening. Besides, to welcome a deserter from theGreat Beyond is enough to drive all other thoughts from a man's mind."
"There's to be a supper in honour of the circumstances, at the BeauxArts to-night," supplemented Max. "You'll come, of course."
"Do you think you could keep me away with a dog?"
"Wouldn't risk spoiling the dog," said Drummond. He added with atentative, questioning air: "There'll be a lot of old-time acquaintancesof yours there, you know."
"So much the better," Whitaker declared with spirit. "I've played deadlong enough."
"As you think best," the lawyer acceded. "Midnight, then--the BeauxArts."
"I'll be there--and furthermore, I'll be waiting at the church a weekhence--or whenever it's to come off. And now I want to congratulateyou." Whitaker held Drummond's hand in one of those long, hard gripsthat mean much between men. "But mostly I want to congratulate her. Whois she?"
"Sara Law," said Drummond, with pride in his quick color and the lift ofhis chin.
"Sara Law?" The name had a familiar ring, yet Whitaker failed torecognize it promptly.
"The greatest living actress on the English-speaking stage," Maxannounced, preening himself importantly. "My own discovery."
"You don't mean to say you haven't heard of her. Is New Guinea, then, soutterly abandoned to the march of civilization?"
"Of course I've heard--but I have been out of touch with such things,"Whitaker apologized. "When shall I see her?"
"At supper, to-night," said the man of law. "It's really in herhonour--"
"In honour of her retirement," Max interrupted, fussing with a gardeniaon his lapel. "She retires from the stage finally, and forever--shesays--when the curtain falls to-night."
"Then I've got to be in the theatre to-night--if that's the case," saidWhitaker. "It isn't my notion of an occasion to miss."
"You're right there," Max told him bluntly. "It's no small matter tome--losing such a star; but the world's loss of its greatestartist--_ah!_" He kissed his finger-tips and ecstatically flirted thecaress afar.
"'Fraid you won't get in, though," Drummond doubted darkly. "Everythingin the house for this final week was sold out a month ago. Even thespeculators are cleaned out."
"_Tut!_" the manager reproved him loftily. "Hugh is going to see SaraLaw act for the last time from my personal box--aren't you, Hugh?"
"You bet I am!" Whitaker asserted with conviction.
"Then come along." Max caught him by the arm and started for the door."So long, Drummond...."
The Destroying Angel Page 5