CHAPTER THREE
SLOWLY Caruth regained his balance. The valet’s deferential plea came like a tonic to his overstrung nerves. Nothing was more natural than that Wilkins should have had a letter addressed in his care; he wondered that the possibility of this had not occurred to him at once. And with the advent of the valet, the whole situation had become ridiculous; he felt as if he had been playing a part in some melodrama and had suddenly stepped back into the realm of common sense. With a laugh on his lips, he turned to Miss Fitzhugh.
His lips straightened and his smile froze. Never had he seen such disappointment on the face of a woman. Her eyes glared roundly and her breath whistled through her parted lips. Blindly she caught at the table, like one about to collapse. Her trembling fingers touched a wine-glass, and mechanically she lifted it to her lips.
As she drank, the color came back to her cheeks and her eyes brightened. Caruth, watching, noticed that she was listening to some one. An instant later he realized that it was Wilkins, and, with an effort, he wrenched his eyes away from hers and turned them on the valet.
The man’s attitude was deferential in the extreme. His eyes were discreetly dropped, and he seemed unaware of the confusion his appearance had caused. “I had a brother that was a sea-faring man, sir,” he was saying. “Sailed out of Lunnon in the steamshipOrkneyfor St. Petersburg, hard on two years ago, sir. She was never heard from again. Lost at sea somewheres, sir. The letter may be from him, sir. I told him to write me in your care, sir.”
Miss Fitzhugh did not speak, and Caruth hesitated, but only for a moment. Slowly he opened the letter and glanced at the top and bottom of the scrawl; mechanically he refolded it and slipped it back into its envelope. “You’ve hit it, Wilkins,” he declared. “The letter does begin ‘Dear Jim’ and does end ‘Your brother, Bill.’ Your claim seems to be clear.” He handed the letter to the man.
As the latter took it, the woman came out of her trance. “Wilkins!” she called sharply.
“Yes, madam.” The valet turned toward her, subservient as ever.
Without taking her eyes from him, Miss Fitzhugh sank into her chair. “So, Wilkins,” she said slowly, “you have been listening?”
“Yes, madam.” There was no defiance nor disrespect in the valet’s tones, nor was there any apology. He simply admitted the undeniable fact, as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
“It is a vice of servants the world over. When one subordinates himself to the will of another, he seemsto lose many of the manly virtues. If you have been listening, Wilkins, you know that I put a high value on that letter. It seems that it is yours. Well, I will buy it from you—unread. What is your price?”
Slowly the man shook his head. “I would rather not sell it, madam,” he answered.
“Nonsense! Of course you will sell it.” The woman spoke imperiously, but the valet did not change his submissive yet dogged bearing. “I have not much money with me, but I will give you five hundred dollars cash for it.”
Again Wilkins shook his head. “I can’t consider it, madam,” he repeated.
Miss Fitzhugh opened the bag that swung from her belt and threw a roll of bills on the table. “Count that for me, please, Mr. Caruth,” she ordered. “I am not quick at American money.”
Caruth obeyed in silence. Though Wilkins was clearly within his rights, he found himself regarding the man with rising anger, and would have intervened if it had seemed possible for him to do so. But the situation for the time being, at least, was dearly beyond his control. “Eleven hundred and fifty-one dollars,” he announced.
“It is all I have. Take it and give me the letter.” Miss Fitzhugh was again addressing the valet.
For the third time Wilkins shook his head. “No!” he repeated doggedly.
Undisturbed, the woman turned to Caruth. “Lend me a thousand dollars,” she requested.
Caruth started. Then, with a smile, he took out his pocket-book and added its contents to the pile. “There’s only about seven hundred here, Wilkins,” he remarked, half humorously, “but I’ll give you my check for the balance—if you’ll accept it.”
The letter rustled in Wilkins’s fingers as he twisted and turned it. Obviously he was tempted. Yet, after a quick questioning glance at the woman’s face, he again shook his head. “No, madam,” he replied coolly. “Bill took a good deal of trouble to get this to me, and I fancy it’s valuable. Any way, I think I’ll chance it, madam.”
“Valuable!” The woman stared at the valet in seeming surprise. “Nonsense!” she scoffed. “What could your Bill tell you that could be worth eighteen hundred dollars. If you suppose that the information I hope it contains will be worth anything to you in a money way, you are mistaken. It would cost you your life to try to use it. Be wise: take the money and give me the letter. The value of the letter to us lies chiefly in preventing other people from getting it.”
“Very well, madam. I’ll destroy it, then, madam.” He stepped to the fire and made a motion to throw it upon the flames.
Like a cat, the woman sprang forward and caught his arm, her silken skirts hissing as she moved. “No, no!” she cried.
A triumphant smile curled the valet’s lips. “Very well, madam,” he acceded meekly. “As you wish, madam.”
LIKE A CAT, THE WOMAN SPRANG FORWARD AND CAUGHT HIS ARMLIKE A CAT, THE WOMAN SPRANG FORWARD AND CAUGHT HIS ARM
LIKE A CAT, THE WOMAN SPRANG FORWARD AND CAUGHT HIS ARM
LIKE A CAT, THE WOMAN SPRANG FORWARD AND CAUGHT HIS ARM
The woman fell back a step, and stood staring at the valet. For the first time, she seemed to try to take his measure as a man, and to bend her faculties to reading the lines of his features. “Humph!” she murmured, at last, in a singular tone. “I am beginning to see. How long have you been with Mr. Caruth, Wilkins?”
“Two years, madam.”
“You brought recommendations, of course! Mr. Caruth, I should advise you to look up the writers of those recommendations at once. You may learn something that will surprise you. Now, Wilkins, listen to me.” A subtle change came into Miss Fitzhugh’s voice; she might almost have been addressing an equal. “You have played your part well and have served your master well. But you had better not push matters too far. It is dangerous.”
A glint of fear crept into the valet’s eyes, and his look wandered up and down the girl’s person, as if expecting to see a weapon; almost he seemed to fear an attack of some kind. “Dangerous in what way, madam?” he asked, still respectfully.
“Dangerous by violence. Do you think those who sent me here—four thousand miles—to get that letter, will let you escape with it? Once you have read it, there will be no more safety for you on the face of the earth. Death will dog your footsteps and sit by your side. Sleeping and waking, he will be upon you. You cannot beg for mercy, for there will be no one from whom to beg. When I go out of that door,I disappear, and even if you could find me, it would not save you, for I am only an agent, powerless to change the will of my superiors. I give you my word that in asking for that letter I am trying to save your life, as well as to gain my own ends. I give you my word that I know of no way in which you can evade your fate, once you have read it. For the last time, I beg you, take the money and give me the letter.”
There was silence in the room as the valet turned the letter over and over, staring at it, hesitating. His fingers trembled and his eyes grew wider.
With a shock, Caruth realized that murder had been threatened in his very presence—and that he was not horrified, as he knew he ought to have been. Rather, he sympathized with the woman, who towered above the man in angry beauty.
At last the valet broke the silence. “My God!” he whispered. “My God!” Slowly and unsteadily, he made his way to the table and laid the letter upon it. Slowly, he picked up the bills one by one. Then he raised his heavy eyes and for an instant looked into the face of the woman. The next moment he was at the door, hurrying away with the swift, silent footsteps of the well-trained servant. The portières fell together behind him.
With a long sigh of relief, the girl picked up the letter. The strain of the past moments showed itself in her face.
“I will return your money as soon as I can see my friends,” she declared weariedly. “Meanwhile,perhaps you will retain this.” She stripped a ring from her fingers. “It is worth more than the money,” she added.
Caruth drew back, deeply hurt. “Thank you,” he returned angrily, “but I am not a pawnbroker—even if I am accessory to a threat to commit murder. Return the money when you like.”
He spoke bitterly, for he was furious that he should have allowed his man to be forced into the surrender of his rights. Man-like, he felt the necessity of blaming his own derelictions on some one else.
Miss Fitzhugh seemed to understand, for she stepped forward and laid her hand on his arm. “Believe me, Mr. Caruth,” she declared earnestly, “believe me, you have done right. Whatever value this letter possessed belongs to us of right. The man who wrote it betrayed a secret that was not his; and, whether his or no, your valet could not have profited by it. You have done a good deed, and you have been as kind and true and staunch to me as my own brother could have been. My mother was right when she told me a woman could always appeal safely to an American gentleman. Now, good-night and good-by.”
Alarm drove away Caruth’s misgivings. “You—you will let me see you again,” he begged.
Slowly the woman shook her head. “I fear not,” she answered. “I shall sail for home on the next steamer—this very day if I can find one leaving. This is good-by.”
“But—but—where are you going? It is not easy for a woman to find accommodations at this time of the night. See, it is after twelve o’clock. Won’t you stay here? I can easily go to a hotel.”
Again the woman shook her head. “I have friends waiting for me,” she averred. “Good-night.”
The blackness of despair settled on Caruth. “But—but—I can’t let you go like this. I must see you again. Tell me where your home is. Let me hope to see you there some day. I’ve known you only an hour or two, but I can’t—I can’t let you go out of my life this way, without a word or a sign. I must see—good God! What’s the matter?”
On the woman’s face a look of frozen horror had dawned. Her eyes dropped from his to the letter she had unconsciously withdrawn from its envelope; and following them, Caruth saw in her hand a sheet of paper, stiff and white, very different from the soft, sea-stained sheet he had handled a few moments before. It scarcely needed her terrified words to give the explanation.
“He has substituted another letter!” she cried. “He was acting all the time! And I did not guess! I did not guess! He has gone with the hope of Russia in his hands!”