"I—can't—can't do it," she gulped out.
"Can't do it!" He stared at her, amazed. "Say, do you realize what you're passing up?"
"I can't do it," repeated Mrs. De Peyster.
"Why?" he demanded.
She did not reply.
He stood up, smiling again. "I won't argue with you; it's bigger than anything you ever pulled off—so big, I guess it stuns you; I'll just let the matter soak in, and put up its own argument. You'll come in, all right," he continued confidently, "for you need money, and I'm the party that can supply you. And to make certain that you don't get the money elsewhere, I'll just take along this vault of the First National Bank as security"—with which he slipped Mrs. De Peyster's pearl pendant into his pocket. "Now, think the matter over, girls. I'll be back in half an hour. So-long for the present."
The door closed behind him.
Mrs. De Peyster gazed wildly after him. The plan "soaked in," as he had said it would; and as it soaked in, her horror grew. She saw herself becoming involved, helpless to prevent it, in the plan Mr. Pyecroft considered so delectable; she saw herself later publicly exposed as engaged in this scheme to defraud herself; she could hear all New York laughing. Her whole being shivered and gasped. Of all the plans ever proposed to a woman—!
And all the weeks and months this Mr. Pyecroft would be hovering about her!...
Despairingly she sat upright.
"Matilda, we can't stay in the same house with that man."
"Oh, ma'am," breathed the appalled Matilda, "of course not!"
"We've got to leave! And leave before he comes back!"
"Of course, ma'am," cried Matilda. And then: "But—but where?"
"Anywhere to get away from him!"
"But, ma'am, the money?" said Matilda who had handled Mrs. De Peyster's petty cash account for twenty years, and whose business it had been to think of petty practicalities. "We've only got twenty-three cents left, and we can't possibly get any more soon, and no one will take us in without money or baggage. Don't you see? We can't stay here, and we can't go any place else."
This certainly was a dilemma. The two gazed at each other, their faces momently growing more ghastly with helplessness. Then suddenly Mrs. De Peyster leaned forward, with desperate decision.
"Matilda, we shall go back home!"
"Go home, ma'am?" cried Matilda.
"There's nothing else we can do. I'll slip into my sitting-room, lock the door, and live there quietly—and Jack will never know I'm in the house."
"But, ma'am, won't that be dangerous?"
"Danger is comparative. Anything is better than this!"
"Just as you say; I suppose you're right, ma'am." And then with an hysterical snuffle: "But oh, ma'am, I wish I knew how this thing was ever going to turn out!"
Five minutes later the two twin figures of somberness, their veils down, stole stealthily down the stairs and out into the night.
The two dark figures, giving a glance through the rain in either direction, stole down beneath the stately marble steps of No. 13 Washington Square, and Matilda unlocked the servants' door. They slipped inside; the door was cautiously relocked. Breathless, they stood listening. A vast, noble silence pervaded the great house. They flung their arms about each other, and thus embraced tottered against the wall; and Mrs. De Peyster relaxed in an unspeakable relief.
MATILDA UNLOCKED THE SERVANTS' DOORMATILDA UNLOCKED THE SERVANTS' DOOR
Home again! Her own home! Odorless of pot-roasts and frying batter-cakes. The phrase was rather common and sentimental—but, in truth, this was "home, sweet home."
And free of that unthinkable Mr. Pyecroft!
While Mrs. De Peyster leaned there in the blackness, gathering strength, her mind mounted in sweet expectancy to her suite. Only a few minutes of soft treading of stairways—certainly they could avoid arousing Jack—and she would be locked in her comfortable rooms. A cautious bath! Clean clothes! Her own bed! All of the luxuries she had been so long denied!
Cautiously they crept through the basement hallway;cautiously crept up the butler's stairs and turned off through the door into the great hall of the first floor; cautiously they crept up to the drawing-room floor and trod ever so softly over woven treasures of the Orient, through the spacious ducal gloom. One more flight, then peace, security. With unbreathing care, Mrs. De Peyster set foot upon the first step of her journey's end.
And then, suddenly, the servants' bell burst into ringing. And there was a terrific hammering against the servants' door and also against the door in the boarding.
"Matilda—what's that?" breathed Mrs. De Peyster.
"M—maybe the police saw us come in," breathed Matilda.
They did not pause for discussion. Discarding caution, they plunged frantically and noisily up the stairs; until from out of the overhead blackness descended a voice:—
"Stop! Or I'll shoot!"
It was Jack's voice.
They stopped.
"Who are you?" the voice demanded.
They clung to each other, wordless.
"Who are you?" repeated Jack.
Their voices were still palsied. They heard his feet begin determinedly to descend. Mrs. De Peyster loosed her grip on Matilda's arm and vanished noiselessly downward.
"Speak up there," commanded Jack, "or I'll fire on the chance of getting you in the dark."
"It's only me, Mr. Jack," trembled Matilda.
"What, Matilda!" cried Jack; and from above, like an echo transposed an octave higher, sounded another, "What, Matilda!"
"Yes, Mr. Jack. Yes, ma'a—yes, Mary."
"But where the devil have you been?" exclaimed Jack, coming to her side.
Mary had also hurried down to her. "Matilda, the way you ran away from us!"
"I got a—er—sudden message. There was no time—"
"Never mind about explaining now," interrupted Jack. "Go down and stop that racket before they break in the doors. And thank God you're here just in time, Matilda! You're just the person to do it: housekeeper, caretaker. But be careful if they're reporters. Now, hurry."
Jack and Mary scuttled back to the haven of upstairs, and Matilda shivered down through the blackness. As she passed through the lower hall, a hand reached out of the dark and touched her. She managed not to cry out.
"Don't let them know about me!" implored Mrs. De Peyster.
"I'll—I'll do my best, ma'am," quavered Matilda, and glided weakly on.
When she opened the servants' door, a dripping policeman caught her arm. "Down here, Bill," hecalled to the man battering at the door above; and a minute later two officers were inside, and the door was closed, and a light was flashing in Matilda's face.
"Now, old girl," said the first officer, tightly gripping her arm and giving it that twist which if a policeman does not give an arm he is no policeman, "what's your little game, eh?"
"I—I live here, sir. I'm the housekeeper."
"Now don't try to put that over on us. You know you ain't."
"You must be new policemen, in this neighborhood," trembled Matilda, "or you'd know I am."
"We may be new cops, but we don't fall for old stuff like that. I was talkin' to Mrs. De Peyster's coachman only yesterday. He told me the housekeeper wasn't here no more. So better change your line o' dope. Where's the other one?"
"Wha—what other one?"
"The one what come in here with you."
"I'm the only person in the house," Matilda tried to declare valiantly.
"Drop it!" said the officer. "Didn't the boss tell us to keep our eyes on these here millionaires' closed houses; all kinds o' slick crooks likely to clean 'em out. An' didn't we see two women come in this house,—hey, Bill?"
"Sure—I was a block off, but I seen 'em plain as day," said Bill.
"So I guess," again the twist that proved him a policeman, "you'd better lead us to your pal."
He pushed her before him, lighting the way with his flash-lantern, up stairways and back into the dining-room, where she turned on the one shaded electric bulb that had been left connected. In Matilda all hope was gone; resistance was useless; fate had conquered. And when the officer again demanded that she bring forth her accomplice, she dumbly and obediently made search; and finally brought Mrs. De Peyster forth from the china closet.
The officer pulled up Mrs. De Peyster's veil, and closely scanned her features; which, to be just to the officer, were so distorted that they bore little semblance to the Mrs. De Peyster of her portraits.
"Recognize her, Bill?" he queried.
"Looks a bit like the pictures of Chicago Sal," said Bill. "But I ain't ever handled her. I guess she ain't worked none around New York."
"Well, now," said the officer, with policial jocularity, "since you two ladies already got your hats on, I guess we'll just offer you our arms to the station."
Mrs. De Peyster gave Matilda a look of frenzied appeal. But Matilda needed not the spur of another's desperation. For herself she saw a prison cell agape.
"But I tell you I'm Matilda Simpson, Mrs. De Peyster's housekeeper!"
"If so, who's the other mourner?" inquired the humorous policeman. "And what's she doin' here?"
"She's—she's"—and then Matilda plunged blindly at a lie—"she's my sister." And havingstarted, she went on: "My sister Angelica, who lives in Syracuse. She's come to visit me awhile."
The officer grinned. "Well, Matilda and Angelica, we'll give you a chance to tell that to the lieutenant. Come on."
"But I tell you I'm Matilda Simpson!" cried Matilda. She was now thinking solely of her own imminent disgrace. Inspiration came to her. "You say you talked to William, the coachman. He'll tell you who I am. There's the bell—ring for him!"
The officer scratched his chin. Then he eyed his co-laborer meditatively.
"Not a bad idea, Bill. There's a chance she may be on the level, and there'd be hell to pay at headquarters if we got in bad with any of these swells. No harm tryin'."
He pressed a big thumb against the bell Matilda had indicated.
They all sat down, the two officers' oilskins guttering water all over Mrs. De Peyster's Kirmanshah rug and parquet floor. But Mrs. De Peyster was unconscious of this deluge. She gave Matilda a glance of reproachful dismay; then she edged into the dimmest corner of the dusky room and turned her chair away from the door through which this new disaster was about to stalk in upon her, and unnoticed drew down her veil.
There was a long, sickening wait. Plainly William had gone to bed, and had to dress before he could answer the bell.
At length, however, William appeared. He started at sight of the four figures; then his gaze fastened on Matilda and grew hard. Mrs. De Peyster tried to collapse within herself.
"Friend," said the officer, "here's a lady as says she's Matilda Simpson, Mrs. De Peyster's housekeeper. How about it?"
"She is," William affirmed coldly.
"The devil!" said the officer; and then in a low voice apart to the other: "Lucky we didn't go no further—hey, Bill?" And again to William: "Miss Simpson says this other lady is her sister, visitin' her from Syracuse. Can you identify her?"
William did not alter a line in his face.
"Miss Simpson has a sister living near Syracuse. I have never seen her. I cannot identify her."
"H'm," said the officer.
"Is that all?" asked William.
"Yes, that'll do. Thanks."
With a cold blighting glare at Matilda, William withdrew.
"Well, ladies," said the officer with ingratiating pleasantness, "I'm mighty glad it's all right. If you have occasion, Miss Simpson, to speak o' this here little incident to Mrs. De Peyster when she gets back from Europe, just explain it as due to over-zealousness, if you don't mind—desire to safeguard her interests. D'you get me? Headquarters is awful sensitive to kicks from you rich people; and the boss comes down on you like a ton o' bricks. It'll bemighty kind o' you. Good-night. Don't bother to come down with us. I noticed it was a spring lock. We can let ourselves out."
When the two policemen were out of the room, Mrs. De Peyster and Matilda collapsed into each others' arms and their bodies sank limply forward from their chairs upon the dining-table. "Matilda, what an escape!" shivered Mrs. De Peyster; and she lay there, gathering breath, regathering strength, regathering poise, while the officers' steps grew dimmer and more dim. She was palpitant, yet able to think. Certainly it had been a narrow escape. But that danger was now over. There now remained only the feat of getting into her room, unnoticed by Jack. This they could manage when they were certain that Jack and Mary were asleep.
Relief, hope, courage once more began to rise within her.
Then suddenly she sat upright. Footsteps were sounding below—growing nearer—heavy footsteps—what sounded like more than two pairs of footsteps. She sat as one palsied; and before she could recover strength or faculties, there in the doorway were the two policemen. And with them was a gentleman in a cap and tan summer overcoat buttoned to the chin.
The gentleman was the Reverend Mr. Pyecroft; and the Mr. Pyecroft they had first seen: bland, oh, so bland, with that odd, elderish look of his.
"Met him goin' down the servants' steps as wewere goin' out, and he asked us—" the officer was beginning.
But Mr. Pyecroft was already crossing toward Matilda, smiling affectionately.
"My dear Matilda!" He kissed her upon the cheek. "I arrived in New York very unexpectedly less than half an hour ago, and could not delay coming to see you. How are you, sister?"
"Wha—what?" stammered Matilda.
Mr. Pyecroft with his bland affectionate smile crossed to Mrs. De Peyster, slipped an arm across her shoulders and kissed her veil somewhere about the forehead. "And how are you, dear sister?" he inquired with deep concern.
Mrs. De Peyster gasped and stiffened.
"You ladies don't seem very glad to see him," put in the officer. "When we told him about you two bein' sisters, he said he was your brother. Is he?"
"Of course I am," Mr. Pyecroft answered pleasantly. "They weren't expecting me; therefore this very natural surprise which you observe. Of course, I am your brother, am I not?"—patting Mrs. De Peyster's arm with the appearance of affection, and then closing on it warningly.
Mrs. De Peyster nodded her head.
"Matilda," turning to her, in frank fraternal fashion, "you might tell these officers that I am not only your brother, but in fact the only brother you have. That is true, isn't it, sister?"
"Yes," gulped Matilda.
"Well," said the officer, "since everything is all right, we'll be leavin' you. But, believe me, this is certainly some sudden family reunion."
When they had gone Mr. Pyecroft calmly removed cap and overcoat and stood forth in his clericals. Again he wore the youngish face of their interview of an hour before. Mrs. De Peyster watched him in sickening fear. What was he going to do? Surely he must now know her identity!
He smiled at them amiably.
"Well, my dears, so you tried to give me the slip. I rather thought you'd bear watching, so I followed you. And when I saw the officers come out without you I knew you had successfully entertained them with some sort of plausible explanation."
His gaze fixed on Matilda. "So, my dear sister, you're really the housekeeper here." He shook his head chidingly. "And the usual crook of a housekeeper, eh—trying to make a safe clean-up while her mistress is away. You're deeper than I thought, Matilda. I understand the whole affair now. You and our sister Angelica had already been planning some kind of a game similar to the one I suggested. I just happened to think of the same thing. I don't blame you a lot for not wanting to take me into the game; it was quite natural for you to want all there is in it for yourselves. Not the least hard feeling in the world, my dears. But, of course,"—apologetically,—"you could hardly expect me to give up a rich thing like this, could you?"
His easy, familiar, ironic talk had brought Mrs. De Peyster one large item of relief. Evidently he didn't suspect who she was—yet.
"What are you going to do?" she managed to ask.
"Stay right here with you, my sisters, and in due time we'll go ahead with our game as per previous specifications." He surveyed the high, paneled dining-room, sumptuous, distinguished even in the semi-dusk. "Cozy little flat, eh, my dears?"
Suddenly that wide mouth of his slipped up to one side, and he laughed in exultant, impish glee.
"Say, isn't this the funniest ever! Beats my plan a mile. We'll make ourselves at home—hang out together for the summer in Mrs. De Peyster's own house,—her own house,—and when we hear she's coming back we vacate and then do our little act of buying out the stores in Lady De Peyster's name. Was there ever such a lark!" For a moment his low laugh of wild glee cut off his speech. "What's more, it's the safest place in the world for us. Nobody'd ever think of our being here!"
Mrs. De Peyster stared at Matilda, Matilda stared at Mrs. De Peyster.
"And it's just what I needed," continued Mr. Pyecroft in amicable confidence. "I just had a tip that the police were closing in on me, and I had to disappear quick. An hour ago, I'd never have dreamed of falling into such a safe little retreat as this. Luck favors the deserving."
Mrs. De Peyster gazed at him, faint.
"And of course, Matilda," he went on, "if, say, any of the neighbors happen to drop in for a cup of tea and see me, or if the police should manage to trail me here,—and they may, you know,—of course, Matilda, you'll speak right up and say I'm your dear brother."
At that moment it was beyond either of them to speak right up.
"Remember, my dears, that we're all crooks together," he prompted in a soft voice, that had a steely suggestion beneath it. "And in case you fail to stand by me it would give me very great pain—very great pain, I assure you—to have to blow on you."
Matilda gulped, blinked her eyes, and looked helplessly at Mrs. De Peyster. Mr. Pyecroft turned to the latter.
"Of course, Angelica, dear, you're going to stand by me?"
Mrs. De Peyster hesitated, then breathed a barely audible "Yes."
"And you, Matilda, who were always my favorite sister, you, too, will stand by me?"
"Yes," breathed Matilda.
"Ah," said Mr. Pyecroft, in a moved tone, "such family loyalty is truly touching. I foresee a most pleasant summer."
He nodded at the two with an air of deep fraternal affection. And again he gazed with satisfaction about the spacious apartment, indicative of numberless other rooms of corresponding comfort.
His eyes came back to them.
"And now, Matilda, my dear," he resumed, with his pleasant smile, "in the event we spoke of,—neighbors or police dropping in, you know,—in such a case I suppose I ought to be prepared with a correct history of myself. To begin with, might I inquire what our name is?—our family name, I mean."
"Simpson."
"Simpson. Ah, yes; very good. Matilda Simpson—Angelica Simpson—and, let us say, Archibald Simpson. And where was I born, Matilda?"
"You weren't ever born," protested Matilda with frightened indignation.
"Now don't be facetious or superfluous, sister dear," he said soothingly. "Granted for the sake of argument I wasn't ever born. But where might I have been born?"
"I was born near Albany."
"Near Albany is perfectly agreeable to me," saidMr. Pyecroft. "And how many are there in our family?"
"Just Angelica and me."
"Then there really is an authentical Angelica?"
"Yes."
"Excellent. And our parents?"
"They died when I was a child."
"I'm grieved, indeed, to learn of it," said Mr. Pyecroft. "But I'll admit it simplifies matters; there's less to remember. Angelica, our sister here, who is also visiting you, lives near Syracuse I understood some one to say. Married or single?"
"Married," Matilda choked out.
"Her married name?"
"Jones."
"Angelica Simpson Jones. Good. Very euphonious. And how many little nieces and nephews am I the happy uncle of?"
"She—she has no children."
"That's too bad, for I have a particular fondness for children," sorrowed Mr. Pyecroft. "Still, that also simplifies matters, lessening considerably the percentage of chances for regrettable lapses of memory."
He pursued his genealogical inquiries into all possibly useful details. And then he sat meditative for a while, gazing amiably about his family circle. And it was while they were all thus sitting silent, in what in the dim light of the one shaded electric bulb might have seemed to an observer the silence of intimacy,that Jack, who had slipped cautiously downstairs, walked in, behind him Mary.
"Matilda, what's this mean?" he demanded, with a bewildered look. "We've been wondering why you didn't come upstairs."
Mrs. De Peyster turned in her chair, and held her breath, like one beneath the guillotine. Matilda arose, shaking.
"Who's this man, Matilda?" Jack continued.
"He—ah—er—he's—"
"And, pray, Matilda, who is this?" politely inquired the arisen Mr. Pyecroft, blandly assuming command of the situation.
"Who am I? Well, you certainly have nerve—" the astounded Jack was beginning.
"He's Mr. Jack," Matilda put in. "Jack De Peyster."
"Ah, young Mr. De Peyster!" Mr. Pyecroft's eyebrows went up slightly and a shrewd light flashed into his rounded eyes and was at once gone, and again his face was blandly clerical. "It is, indeed, a pleasure to meet you, Mr. De Peyster. And, pray, who is this?" with a suave gesture toward Mary.
"That, sir, is my wife!" Jack announced, stiff with anger.
Again Mr. Pyecroft's eyes flashed shrewdly, and again were clerically rounded.
"My dear sir, that is, indeed, surprising. I have seen no public notice of your marriage. And I watch the marriage announcements quite closely—whichis rather natural, for, if I may be permitted to mention it, I myself am frequently called upon to perform the holy rites." His face clouded with what seemed a painful suspicion. "I trust, sir, that you are really married?"
"Why, damn you—"
"Sir, you must not thus address the cloth!" sternly interposed Mr. Pyecroft. "It is our duty to speak frankly, and to make due inquiry into the propriety of such relations. However, since you say so, I am sure the affair is strictly correct." His voice softened, became nobly apologetic. "No harm has been meant, and if any offense has been felt, I assure you of my deepest regrets."
"See here, who the devil are you?" demanded Jack.
Mr. Pyecroft turned to Matilda.
"Matilda, my dear, will you kindly tell young Mr. De Peyster who I am."
Matilda seemed about to choke. "He's—he's my—my brother."
"Your brother!" exclaimed Jack, "I didn't know you had a brother. You never spoke of one."
"Which was entirely natural," said Mr. Pyecroft, with an air of pious remorse. "Matilda has been ashamed to speak of me. To be utterly frank—and it is meet that one who has been what I have been should be humble and ready to confess—for many years I was the black sheep of the family, my name unmentioned. But sometime since I was snatched abrand from the burning; I have remained silent about myself until I could give to my family, which had properly disowned me, a long record to prove my reformation. I am now striving by my devotion to make some amends for my previous shortcomings."
Jack stared incomprehensibly at this unexpected clerical brother of Matilda's, with his unquenchable volubility. Mr. Pyecroft gazed back with appropriate humility, yet with a lofty self-respect.
Jack turned away with a shrug, and pointed at the dark figure of Mrs. De Peyster.
"And who is that, Matilda?"
"That, sir," put in Mr. Pyecroft quickly, easily, to forestall any blunder by the hapless Matilda—and deftly interposing himself between Jack and Mrs. De Peyster, "that is our sister."
"The one who lives in Syracuse?"
"Yes; and she is indisposed," said Mr. Pyecroft. "Our sister Angelica Simpson Jones," he elaborated. "Matilda is the eldest, I am the youngest; there are just us three children."
"And might I ask, Matilda, without intending discourtesy," said Jack, eyeing Mr. Pyecroft with disfavor, "how long your brother and sister intend to remain?"
"Matilda invited us for the summer," said Mr. Pyecroft apologetically.
"For the summer!" repeated Jack in dismay. Then he spoke to Matilda, caustically: "I supposeit's all right, Matilda, but has it been your fixed custom, when we've been away for the summer, to fill the house with your family?"
"Please, Mr. Jack, please," imploringly began Matilda, and could utter nothing further.
"Great God!" Jack burst out in exasperation. "Not that I'd object ordinarily to your relatives being here, Matilda. But running this place just now as a hotel, who knows but it may let out the fact that we're here!"
Mr. Pyecroft's eyebrows went up—ever so little.
"Ah, I understand. You wish your presence in the house to be a secret."
"Of course! Hasn't Matilda told you?"
"I only just arrived. She hasn't had time. But of course she would have done so. You are—ah"—his tone was delicate—"evading the police?"
"The police! We don't care a hang about the police, though, of course, we don't want them to know. It's the infernal reporters we care about."
"The reporters?" softly pursued Mr. Pyecroft.
"Yes, but one reporter in particular—a beast by the name of Mayfair, I've had a tip that he suspects something; already he's tried to get into the house as a gas-meter inspector."
At the mention of that indomitable, remorseless, undeceivable newsgatherer, Mayfair, and the possibility of his gaining entrance into the house, Mrs. De Peyster experienced a new shudder.
"What would be the harm if Mr. Mayfair did getin?" Imperceptibly prodded Mr. Pyecroft. "He would merely write a piece about you for his paper."
"And his confounded piece, or the main facts in it, would be cabled to Europe!"
"Ah, I think I see," said Mr. Pyecroft. "Mrs. De Peyster would read about your marriage in the Paris 'Herald' or some other European paper. You do not wish your mother to know of your marriage—yet."
"I supposed Matilda had already told you that," said Jack.
"Ah, so that is why you are here in hiding," said Mr. Pyecroft, very softly, chiefly to himself; and his eyes had another momentary flash, only brighter than any heretofore, and his mouth twitched upward, and he pleasantly rubbed his hands.
At that moment, from the stairway, came the sound of descending steps. Jack and Mary appeared undisturbed. Mr. Pyecroft became taut, though no one could have observed a change, Mrs. De Peyster quivered with yet deeper apprehension. Would the trials and tribulations and Pharaonic plagues never cease descending on her!
Matilda gazed wildly at Jack. "Who's that?" she quavered.
"Only Uncle Bob," Jack answered carelessly.
Only Uncle Bob! Mrs. De Peyster, in her dim corner, tried to shrivel up into yet darker obscurity. Breathlessly she felt herself upon the precipitous edge of ultimate horror. For Judge Harvey—JudgeHarvey of all persons—to be the one to discover her amid her humiliating circumstances!
Dimly she heard Jack talk on, explaining in casual tone: "You know, Matilda, Uncle Bob has always had the general oversight of the house when it's been closed during summers; and he's always made it his business to drop in occasionally to see that everything's all right. I got him word we were here, and he dropped in this evening to call on us—and along came this awful rain and we coaxed him to stay the night. Uncle Bob and you are lucky, Matilda, you can both come and go without arousing any suspicion."
Only the Judge!... Yet, for all her horror, a new phase of the general predicament filtered into such consciousness as she now possessed. Judge Harvey, irate purchaser of autograph letters, and Mr. Pyecroft,aliasThomas Preston, profuse producer of the same, were under the same roof and were about to meet. What would happen when they came face to face?—for she remembered now that a bad likeness of Thomas Preston had several times appeared in the papers. She turned her head toward the doorway and peered through her veil, waiting.
When Judge Harvey entered, Mr. Pyecroft started. Upon the instant he had recognized Judge Harvey. But the next moment Mr. Pyecroft was himself. Jack gave the necessary introductions, the one to Angelica Simpson Jones at long distance, and gave a brief explanation of the presence of the twoguests. During this while Judge Harvey repeatedly glanced at Mr. Pyecroft, a puzzled look on his countenance.
"Excuse me, Mr. Simpson," he remarked presently, "but your face seems elusively familiar to me. I seem to know it, yet I cannot place it. Haven't I met you somewhere?"
"Perhaps you were a lay delegate to the recent Episcopal Convention in New York?" politely suggested Mr. Pyecroft.
"No. I did not even attend any of the sessions."
"Then, of course, it could not have been there that you saw me," said Mr. Pyecroft.
"Perhaps it will come to me," said Judge Harvey.
"Perhaps," said Mr. Pyecroft.
Mrs. De Peyster, for all her personal apprehension, could but marvel at this young man of the sea who had fastened himself upon her back. Most amazing of all, he seemed to like the taste of his danger.
"Judge Harvey, Mr. De Peyster was remarking when you came in," Mr. Pyecroft continued without permitting a lull, "that he wished his presence in this house to remain unknown. Also I had just told him and his young wife that my earlier years were given over to a life for which I have been trying to atone by good works. Now I have a very humiliating further confession to make to you all. Recently there has been—may I call it a recrudescence?—an uncontrollable recrudescence of my former regrettableself. For a disastrous moment the Mr. Hyde element in me, which I thought I had stifled and cast out, arose and possessed me. In brief, I have been guilty of an error which the police consider serious; in fact, the police are this moment searching for me. So you see, I am in the same situation as Mr. De Peyster: I prefer my whereabouts to remain unknown. Since we are in each other's hands, and it is in our power each to betray the other, shall we not all, as aquid pro quo, agree to preserve Mr. De Peyster's and my presence in this house a secret? For my part, I promise."
"I'm willing," said Jack.
"And I," said Mary. "Anyhow, I never get a chance to tell, for I haven't been out of this house once."
"And you, Judge Harvey? You will—ah—protect me?"
Judge Harvey bit the end of his mustache. "I don't like this bargaining over a matter of justice. But—for Jack's sake, yes."
"Thank you, Judge Harvey," Mr. Pyecroft said in a soft, grateful voice, and with a slight, dignified bow.
Mrs. De Peyster drew a deep breath. He certainly was a cool one.
"There's something that's just been occurring to me," spoke up Jack. "It's along of that infernal reporter Mayfair who's snooping around here. He's likely to get in here any time. If he were to find mehere alone, there'd be nothing for him to write about. It's finding me here, married, that will give him one of his yellow stories, and that will put mother next. Matilda, since you already have so large a family visiting you, I suppose you wouldn't mind taking on one more and saying that Mary here was something or other of yours—say a niece?"
"Oh, that would be delicious" laughed Mary.
"Why, Mr. Jack,—I! I—" The flustered Matilda could get out no more.
"Mr. Simpson, couldn't you say she was your daughter?" queried Jack.
"I would be only too delighted to own her as such," said Mr. Pyecroft. "But I am not married and I am obviously too young. However,"—moving closer to Mrs. De Peyster,—"our sister Angelica is married, and I am sure it will be a great pleasure to her to claim Mrs. De Peyster as her daughter. Angelica, my dear, of course you'll do it?"
Mrs. De Peyster sat rigid, voiceless.
"What's the matter?" asked Mary, in deep concern.
"Our sister probably did not hear, she is slightly deaf," Mr. Pyecroft explained. He bent over Mrs. De Peyster, made a trumpet of one hand, and raised his voice. "Angelica, if any other person comes into the house, you are to say that young Mrs. De Peyster is your daughter. You understand?"
Mrs. De Peyster nodded.
"And of course you'll say it?"
For a moment Mrs. De Peyster was again rigid. Then slowly she nodded.
The spirit of the masquerade seized upon Mary. "Oh, mother dear,—what a comfort to have you!" she cried with mischievous glee; and arms wide as if for a daughterly embrace she swept toward Mrs. De Peyster.
Mrs. De Peyster shriveled back. She stopped living. In another moment—
But the Reverend Mr. Pyecroft,aliasArchibald Simpson,aliasThomas Preston,aliasGod knows what else, stepped quickly between her and the on-coming Mary, and with an air of brotherly concern held out an intercepting hand.
"No excitement, please. The doctor's orders."
"Is it anything serious?" Mary asked anxiously.
"We hope not," in a grave voice. "It is chiefly nervous exhaustion due to a period of worry over a trying domestic situation."
"That's too bad!" Very genuine sympathy was in Mary's soft contralto. "But if she's unwell, she ought to have more air. Why don't you draw up that heavy veil?"
"S-s-h! Not so loud, I beg you. If she heard you speak of her veil, it would pain her greatly. You see," Mr. Pyecroft unhesitatingly went on in a low, compassionate tone, "our sister, while trying to light a gasoline stove—It was a gasoline stove, was it not, Matilda?"
"Ah—er—ye-yes," corroborated Matilda.
"A gasoline stove, yes," continued the grave voice of Mr. Pyecroft. "It was during the very first year after her marriage. The explosion that followed disfigured her face frightfully. She is extremely sensitive; so much so that she invariably wears a heavy veil when she goes out of her own house."
"Why, how terrible!" cried Mary.
"Yes, isn't it! All of our family have felt for poor Angelica most deeply. And furthermore, she is sensitive about her deafness—which, I may add, was caused by the same accident. And her various misfortunes have made her extremely shy, so the less attention that is paid to her, the happier the poor creature is."
Mary withdrew among the others. Slowly Mrs. De Peyster returned once more to life. She hardly knew how she had escaped, save that it had been through some miracle of that awful Mr. Pyecroft's amazing tongue.
"By the way, Matilda," she heard Mary remark, "did you read in to-night's papers about Mrs. De Peyster's voyage? You know she landed to-day."
"No, ma'—Mary," said Matilda.
"The paper said she was so ill all the way across that she wasn't able to leave her stateroom once." Mary's voice was very sympathetic. "Why, she was so ill she couldn't leave the boat until after dark, hours after all the other passengers had gone."
"I never knew mother to be seasick before," said Jack, in deep concern.
Judge Harvey said nothing, but his fine, handsome face was disturbed. Jack noted the look, and, suddenly catching the Judge's hand, said with a burst of boyish frankness:—
"Uncle Bob, you're worried more than any of us! You know I've always liked you like a father—and—and here's hoping some day mother'll change her mind—and you'll be my father in reality!"
"Thank you, Jack!" the Judge said huskily, gripping Jack's hand.
Over in her corner, beneath her veil, Mrs. De Peyster flushed hotly.
They talked on about the distant Mrs. De Peyster, and she listened with keenest ears. They were all so sympathetic about her—sick—alone—in far-off Europe. So sympathetic—so very, very sympathetic!
As for Mr. Pyecroft, standing on guard beside her, he looked appropriately grave. But inside his gravity he was smiling. These people had no guess that in a way he was connected with the great Mrs. De Peyster of whom they talked—that "Miss Gardner" who was the companion to the ailing social leader in France was something more than just Miss Gardner. And he felt no reason for revealing his little secret.... Clara, the dear little Puritan, would be scandalized by this his wildest escapade—by his having used, after all and despite her prohibition, Mrs. De Peyster's closed house as a retreat; but when she came back from Europe, and he made hersee in its proper light this gorgeous and profitable lark, she would relent and forgive him. Why, of course, she would forgive him.
He was very optimistic, was Mr. Pyecroft; and the founder of his family must have been a certain pagan gentleman by the name of Pan.