XIITHE EAVESDROPPERS
Itwas a clear, warm night, but with no moon. From the Casino the lights shone out over the dark water, illuminating here and seeming to deepen the already dark shadows there.
A flight of steps ran down to the dock from the dance pavilion, but, instead of taking this natural way, Kennedy plunged into the deeper shadow of a path that wound around the slight bluff and came out on the beach level, below the dock. From the path we could still hear the sounds of gaiety in the Casino.
We were about to emerge on the beach, not far from the spiling on which the dock platform rested, when I felt Kennedy’s hand on my elbow. I drew back into the hidden pathway with him and looked in the direction he indicated.
There, in a little summer-house above us, at the shore end of the dock, I could just distinguish the figures of two women, sitting in the shadow and looking out intently over the strip of beach andthe waves of the rising tide that were lapping up on it. It was apparent that they were waiting for some one.
I turned and strained my eyes to catch a glimpse down the beach, but in the blackness could make out nothing. A look of inquiry toward Kennedy elicited nothing but a further caution to be silent. Apparently he was determined to play the eavesdropper on the two above us.
They had been talking in a low tone when we approached and we must have missed the first remark. The answer was clear enough, however.
“I tell you, Winifred, I saw them together,” we heard one voice in the summer-house say.
Instantly I recognized it as that of Irene Maddox. It needed no clairvoyancy to tell precisely of whom she was talking. I wondered whether she was trying to vent her grudge against Paquita at the expense of Shelby and Winifred. At least I could fancy how Shelby would bless his sister-in-law as a trouble-maker, if he knew.
“I can’t believe that you are right,” returned the other voice, and it was plainly that of Winifred.
There was a quiver of emotion in it, as though Winifred were striving hard to convince herself that something she had heard was not true.
“I can’t help it,” replied Mrs. Maddox. “That is what I used to think—once—that it couldn’tbe so. But you do not know that woman—nor men, either.”
She made the last remark with unconcealed bitterness. I could not help feeling sorry for her in the misfortune in which her own life with Maddox had ended. Yet it did not seem right that she should poison all romance. Still, I reflected, what, after all, did I really know, and why should I rise to the defense of Shelby? Better, far, that Winifred should learn now than to learn when it was too late.
“I have been watching her,” pursued Irene. “I found that I could not trust any man where that woman was concerned. I wish I had never trusted any.”
“I cannot believe that Shelby would deliberately deceive me,” persisted Winifred.
Irene Maddox laughed, hollowly. “Yet you know what we discovered this afternoon,” she pressed. “Why, I cannot even be sure that that detective, Kennedy, may not be working against me. And as for that lawyer of my husband’s, Hastings, I don’t know whether I detest him more than I fear him. Let me warn you to be careful of him, too. Remember, I have been observing for a long time. I don’t trust him, or any other lawyer. You never can tell how far they may be concerned in anything.”
There was a peculiar piquancy to the innuendo. Evidently Irene Maddox suspected Hastings of much. And again I was forced to ask myself, what did I really so far know?
I fancied I could detect that the poor woman had reached a point where she was suspicious of everybody and everything, not an unnatural situation, I knew, with a woman in her marital predicament.
“What has Mr. Hastings done?” inquired Winifred.
“Done?” repeated Mrs. Maddox. “What has he left undone? Why, he shielded Marshall in everything, whenever I mentioned to him this Paquita woman—said it was not his business what his client’s private life was unless he was directed to interest himself in it by his client himself. He was merely an attorney, retained for certain specific purposes. Beyond that he was supposed to know nothing. Oh, my dear, you have much to learn about the wonderful freemasonry that exists among men in matters such as this.”
I caught Kennedy’s quizzical smile. We were having a most telling example of freemasonry among women, into which Irene was initiating a neophyte. I felt sure that Winifred would be much happier if she had been left alone, andevents might have a chance to explain themselves without being misinterpreted—a situation from which most of the troubles both in fact and in fiction arise. In her watching of her errant husband, Irene had expected every one immediately to fall in line and aid her—forgetting the very human failing that most people possess of objecting to play the rôle of informer.
“What fools men are!” soliloquized Irene Maddox a moment later, as though coming to the point of her previous random remarks. “Just take that little dancer. What do they see in her? Not brains, surely. As for me, I don’t think she has even beauty. And yet, look at them! She has only to appear up there in the Casino at this very moment to be the most popular person on the floor, while other girls go begging for partners.”
I could feel Winifred bridling at the challenge in the remark. She had tasted popularity herself. Was she to admit defeat at the hands of the little adventuress? Criticize as one might, there was still a fascination about the mystery of Paquita.
One could feel the coolness that had suddenly risen in the summer-house—as if a mist from the water had thrown it about. Nor did the implication of the silence escape Irene Maddox.
“You will pardon me, my dear,” she said,rising. “I know how thankless such a job is. Perhaps I had better not be seen with you. Yes, I am sure of it. I think I had better return to the hotel.”
For a moment Winifred hesitated, as if in doubt whether to go, too, or to stay.
Finally it seemed as if she decided to stay. I do not know which course would have been better for Winifred—to accompany the elder woman and imbibe more of the enforced cynicism, or to remain, brooding over the suspicions which had been injected into her mind. At any rate, Winifred decided to stay, and made no move either to detain or accompany the other.
Irene Maddox arose and left Winifred alone. If she had been watching Paquita there was no further need. Winifred would watch now quite as closely.
As her footsteps died away, instead of remaining near the dock Kennedy turned and, keeping back in the shadows where we could not be seen by the silent watcher in the summer-house, we went down along the shore.
In the shelter of a long line of bath-houses that belonged to the hotel we paused. There was no one in bathing at this hour, and we sat down and waited.
“What did you make of that conversation?” Iwhispered, cautiously, lowering my voice so that we might not be eavesdropped upon in turn.
“Not strange that Mrs. Maddox hates the little dancer,” replied Craig, sententiously. “It’s quite evident Riley was right and that Shelby must be with her. I wonder whether they will return this way or on the land? It’s worth taking a chance. Let’s stay awhile, anyway.”
He lapsed into silence, as though trying to motivate the actors in the little drama which was unfolding.
It was not long before, down the beach, we saw a man and a woman coming toward us rapidly. Kennedy and I drew back farther, and as we did so I saw that the figure above us in the summer-house had moved away from the edge so as to be less conspicuous.
The crackle of some dry sea-grass back of the bath-house startled us, but we did not move. It was one of the Secret Service men. There was no reason why we should conceal from him that we were on a similar quest. Yet Kennedy evidently considered it better that nothing should happen to put any one on guard. We scarcely breathed. He passed, however, without seeing us, and we flattered ourselves that we were well hidden.
A few minutes later the couple approached.It was unmistakably Shelby Maddox and Paquita.
“It’s no use,” we heard Shelby say, as they passed directly beside the bath-houses. “Even down here on the beach they are watching. Still, I have had a chance to say some of the things I wanted to say. From now on—we are strangers—you understand?”
It was not said as brutally as it sounds on paper. Rather it gave the impression, from Shelby’s tone, that they had never been much more.
For a moment Paquita said nothing. Then suddenly she burst forth with a little bitter laugh.
“It takes two to be strangers. We shall see!”
Without another word she turned, as though in a fit of pique and anger, and ran up the flight of steps from the bath-houses to the Casino, passing within five feet of us, without seeing us.
“We shall see,” she muttered under her breath; “we shall see!”
In surprise Shelby took a step or two after her, then paused.
“The deuce take her,” he swore under his breath, then strode on in the direction of the steps to the dock and the summer-house.
He had scarcely gained the level when the figure in the summer-house emerged from the gloom.
“Well, Shelby—a tryst with the other charmer, was it?”
“Winifred!”
Miss Walcott laughed sarcastically. “Is that all that your fine speeches mean, Shelby?” she said, reproachfully. “At the Lodge you scarcely bow to her; then you meet her secretly on the beach.”
“Winifred—let me explain,” he hastened. “You do not understand. She is nothing to me—never has been. I am not like Marshall was. When she came down here the other night she may have thought she could play with me as she had with him. I met her—as I have scores of others. They have always been all the same to me—until that night when I met you. Since then—have I even looked at her—at any one else?”
“Another pretty speech,” cut in Winifred, icily. “But would you have met her now, if you had known that you would be watched?”
“I should have met her in the lobby of the hotel, if that had been the only way,” he returned, boldly. “But it was not. I do not understand the woman. Sometimes I fear that she has fallen in love with me—as much as her kind can fall in love. I sent for her, yes, myself. I wanted to tell her bluntly that there could neverbe anything between us, that we could not—now—continue even the acquaintance.”
“But you knew her before—in the city, Shelby,” persisted Winifred. “Besides, was it necessary to take her arm, to talk so earnestly with her? I saw you when you started.”
“I had to be courteous to her,” defended Shelby, then stopped, as though realizing too late that it was not defense he should attempt, but rather confession of something that did not exist and a prayer of forgiveness for nothing.
“I did not believe what I heard,” said Winifred, coldly. “I was foolish enough to listen to you, not to others. It is what I see.”
“To others?” he asked, quickly. “Who—what have they told you about me? Tell me.”
“No—it was in confidence. I cannot tell you who or what. No, not another word of that. You have opened my eyes yourself. You have only yourself to thank. Take your little Mexican dancer—let us see what she does to you!”
Winifred Walcott had moved away toward the steps up to the Casino.
“Please!” implored Shelby. “Why, I sent for her only to tell her that she must keep away. Winifred!”
Winifred had turned and was running up the steps. Instead of waiting, as he had done withPaquita, Shelby took the steps two at a time. A moment later he was by her side.
We could not hear what he said as he reached her, but she took no pains to modulate her own voice.
“No—no!” she exclaimed, angrily, choking back a sob. “No—leave me. Don’t speak to me. Take your little dancer, I say!”
A moment later she had come into the circle of light from the Casino. Pursuit meant only a scene.
At the float at the other end of the pier bobbed one of the tenders of theSybarite. Shelby turned deliberately and called, and a moment later his man ran up the dock.
“I’m not going to go out to the yacht to-night,” he ordered. “I shall sleep at the Lodge. Tell Mito, and come ashore with my things.”
Then he turned, avoiding the Casino, and walked slowly up to the Harbor House, as we followed at a distance.
I wondered if he might be planning something.