IV
A LIKELY STORY
From the squalour, the heat, dirt and turmoil of Eighth Avenue, P.Sybarite turned west on Thirty-eighth Street to seek hisboarding-house.
This establishment--between which and the Cave of the Smell hisexistence alternated with the monotony of a pendulum--was situatedmidway on the block on the north side of the street. It boasted afront yard fenced off from the sidewalk with a rusty railing: a plotof arid earth scantily tufted with grass, suggesting that stage ofbaldness which finally precedes complete nudity. Behind this, themoat-like area was spanned to the front door by a ragged stoop ofbrownstone. The four-story facade was of brick whose pristine coat offair white paint had aged to a dry and flaking crust, lending thehouse an appearance distinctly eczematous.
The sun of April, declining, threw down the street a slant of kindlylight to mitigate its homeliness. In this ethereal evanescence thehouse Romance took the air upon the stoop.
George Bross was eighty-five per-centum of the house Romance. Theremainder was Miss Violet Prim. Mr. Bross sat a step or two below MissPrim, his knees adjacent to his chin, his face, upturned to hischarmer, wreathed in a fond and fatuous smile. From her higher plane,she smiled in like wise down upon him. She seemed in the eyes of herlover unusually fair--and was: Saturday was her day for seemingunusually fair; by the following Thursday there would begin to be abarely perceptible shadow round the roots of her golden hair....
She was a spirited and abundant creature, hopelessly healthy beneaththe coat of paint, powder and peroxide with which she armoured herselfagainst the battle of Life. Normally good-looking in ordinarydaylight, she was a radiant beauty across footlights. Her eyes werebright even at such times as belladonna lacked in them; her nosepretty and pert; her mouth, open for laughter (as it usually was),disclosed twin rows of sound, white, home-made teeth. Her active youngperson was modelled on generous lines and, as a rule, clothed in amanner which, if inexpensive, detracted nothing from her conspicuoussightliness. She was fond of adorning her pretty, sturdy shoulders, aswell as her fetching and shapely, if plump, ankles, withsemi-transparent things--and she was quite as fond of having themadmired.
P. Sybarite, approaching the gate, delicately averted his eyes....
At that moment, George was announcing in an undertone: "Here's thelollop now."
"You are certainly one observin' young gent," remarked Miss Prim inaccents of envious admiration.
Ignoring the challenge, Bross pondered hastily. "Think I better springit on him now?" he enquired in doubt.
"My Gawd, no!" protested the lady in alarm. "I'd spoil the plant,sure. I'd _love_ to watch you feed it to him, but Heaven knows I'dnever be able to hold in without bustin'."
"You think he'll swallow it, all right?"
"That simp?" cried Miss Prim in open derision. "Why, he'll eat it_alive_!"
P. Sybarite walked into the front yard, and the chorus lady began tocrow with delight, welcoming him with wild wavings of a pretty,powdered forearm.
"Well, _look_ who's here! 'Tis old George W. Postscript--as I live!Hitherwards, little one: I wouldst speech myself to thee."
Smiling, P. Sybarite approached the pair. He liked Miss Prim for herunaffected high spirits, and because he was never in the least ill atease with her.
"Well?" he asked pleasantly, blinking up at the lady from the foot ofthe steps. "What is thy will, O Breaker of Hearts?"
"That'll be about all for yours," announced Violet reprovingly. "Youhadn't oughta carry on like that--at your age, too! Not that _I_mind--I rather like it; but what'd your family say if they knew youwas stuck on an actress?"
"'Love blows as the wind blows,'" P. Sybarite quoted gently. "Howshall I hide the fact of my infatuation? If my family cast me off, sobe it!"
"I told you, behave! Next thing you know, George will be bitin' thefence.... What's all this about you givin' a box party at theKnickerbocker to-night?"
"It's a fact," affirmed P. Sybarite. "Only I had counted on thepleasure of inviting you myself," he added with a patient glance atGeorge.
"Never mind about that," interposed the lady. "I'm just as tickled todeath, and I love you a lot more'n I do George, anyway. So _that's_all right. Only I was afraid for a while he was connin' me."
"You feel better now?"
Violet placed a theatrical hand above her heart. "Such a relief!" shedeclared intensely--"you'll never know!" Then she jumped up andwheeled about to the door with petticoats professionally a-swirl."Well, if I'm goin' to do a stagger in society to-night, it's me to godoll myself up to the nines. So long!"
"Hold on!" George cried in alarm. "You ain't goin' to go dec--decol--lowneck and all that? Cut it, kid: me and P.S. ain't got no dress soots,yunno."
"Don't fret," returned Violet from the doorway. "I know how to prettymyself for my comp'ny, all right. Besides, you'll be at the back ofthe box and nobody'll know you exist. Me and Molly Leasing'll get allthe yearnin' stares."
She disappeared by way of the vestibule. George shook a head heavywith forebodings.
"Class to that kid, all right," he observed. "Some stepper, take itfrom me. Anyway, I'm glad it's a box: then I can hide under a chair. Iain't got nothin' to go in but these hand-me-downs."
"You'll be all right," said P. Sybarite hastily.
"Well, I won't feel lonely if you don't dress up like a horse. Whatare you going to wear, anyway?"
"A shave, a clean collar, and what I stand in. They're all I have."
"Then you got nothin' on me. What's your rush?"--as P. Sybarite wouldhave passed on. "Wait a shake. I wanna talk to you. Sit down and havea cig."
There was a hint of serious intention in the manner of the shippingclerk to induce P. Sybarite, after the hesitation of an instant, toaccede to his request. Squatting down upon the steps, he accepted acigarette, lighted it, inhaled deeply.
"Well?"
"I dunno how to break it to you," Bross faltered dubiously. "Youbetter brace yourself to lean up against the biggest disappointmentever."
P. Sybarite regarded him with sharp distrust. "You interest mestrangely, George.... But perhaps you're no more addled than usual.Consider me gently prepared against the worst--and get it off yourchest."
"Well," said George regretfully, "I just wanna put you next to thefacts before you ask her. Miss Lessing ain't goin' to go with usto-night."
P. Sybarite looked startled and grieved.
"No?" he exclaimed.
George wagged his head mournfully. "It's a shame. I know you countedon it, but I guess you'll have to get summonelse."
"I'm afraid I don't understand. How do you know Miss Lessing won't go?Did she tell you so?"
"Not what you might call exactly, but she won't all right," Georgereturned with confidence. "There ain't one chance in a hundred I'm inwrong."
"In wrong? How?"
"About her bein' who she is."
P. Sybarite subjected the open, naif countenance of the shipping clerkto a prolonged and doubting scrutiny.
"No, I ain't crazy in the head, neither," George asseverated with someheat. "I suspicioned somethin' was queer about that girl right along,but now I _know_ it."
"Explain yourself."
"Ah, it ain't nothin' against her! You don't have to scorch yourcollar. _She's_ all right. Only--she 's in bad. I don't s'pose youseen the evenin' paper?"
"No."
"Well, I picked up the _Joinal_ down to Clancey's--this is it." Withan effective flourish, George drew the sheet from his coat pocket andunfolded its still damp and pungent pages. "And soon's I seen that,"he added, indicating a smudged halftone, "I begun to wise up to thatlittle girl. It's sure some shame about her, all right, all right."
Taking the paper, P. Sybarite examined with perplexity a portraitlabelled "Marian Blessington." Whatever its original aspect, thecoarse mesh of the reproducing process had blurred it to a vaguepresentment of the head and shoulders of almost any young woman withfair hair and regular features: only a certain, almost indefinableindividuality in
the pose of the head remotely suggested MollyLessing.
In a further endeavour to fathom his meaning, the little bookkeeperconned carefully the legend attached to the putative likeness:
MARIAN BLESSINGTON
only daughter of the late Nathaniel Blessington, millionaire founder of the great Blessington chain of department stores. Although much sought after on account of the immense property into control of which she is to come on her twenty-fifth birthday, Miss Blessington contrived to escape matrimonial entanglement until last January, when Brian Shaynon, her guardian and executor of the Blessington estate, gave out the announcement of her engagement to his son, Bayard Shaynon. This engagement was whispered to be distasteful to the young woman, who is noted for her independent and spirited nature; and it is now persistently being rumoured that she had demonstrated her disapproval by disappearing mysteriously from the knowledge of her guardian. It is said that nothing has been known of her whereabouts since about the 1st of March, when she left her home in the Shaynon mansion on Fifth Avenue, ostensibly for a shopping tour. This was flatly contradicted this morning by Brian Shaynon, who in an interview with a reporter for the EVENING JOURNAL declared that his ward sailed for Europe February 28th on the _Mauretania_, and has since been in constant communication with her betrothed and his family. He also denied having employed detectives to locate his ward. The sailing list of the _Mauretania_ fails to give the name of Miss Blessington on the date named by Mr. Shaynon.
Refolding the paper, P. Sybarite returned it without comment.
"Well?" George demanded anxiously.
"Well?"
"Ain't you hep yet?" George betrayed some little exasperation inaddition to his disappointment.
"Hep?" P. Sybarite iterated wonderingly.
"Hep's the word," George affirmed: "John W. Hep, of the well-knownfamily of that name--very closely related to the Jeremiah Wises. Yunnowho I mean, don't you?"
"Sorry," said P. Sybarite sadly: "I'm not even distinctly connectedwith either family."
"You mean you don't make me?"
"God forestalled me there," protested P. Sybarite piously."Inscrutable!"
Impatiently brushing aside this incoherent observation, George slappedthe folded paper resoundingly in the palm of his hand.
"Then this here don't mean nothin' to you?"
"To me--nothing, as you say."
"You ain't dropped to the resemblance between Molly Lessing and MarianBlessington?"
"Between Miss Lessing and _that_ portrait?" asked P. Sybaritescornfully.
"Why, they're dead ringers for each other. Any one what can't seethat's blind."
"But I'm _not_ blind."
"Well, then you gotta admit they look alike as twins--"
"But I've known twins who didn't look alike," said P.S.
"Ah, nix on the stallin'!" George insisted, on the verge of losing histemper. "Molly Lessing's the spit-'n'-image of Marian Blessington--andyou know it. What's more--look at their names? _Molly_ for _Mary_--youmake that? _Mary_ and _Marian's_ near enough alike, ain't they? Andwhat's _Lessing_ but _Blessington_ docked goin' and comin'?"
"Wait a second. If I understand you, George, you're trying to implythat Miss Lessing is identical with Marian Blessington."
"You said somethin' then, all right."
"Simply because of the similarity of two syllables in their surnamesand a fancied resemblance of Miss Lessing to this so-called portrait?"
"Now you're gettin' warm, P.S."
P.S. laughed quietly: "George, I've been doing you a grave injustice.I apologise."
George opened his eyes and emitted a resentful "_Huh?_"
"For years I've believed you were merely stupid," P.S. explainedpatiently. "Now you develop a famous, if fatuous, gift of imagination.I'm sorry. I apologise twice."
"Imag'nation hell!" Mr. Bross exploded. "Where's your own? It'splain's daylight what I say is so. When did Miss Lessing come here?Five weeks ago, to a day--March foist, or close onto it--just when the_Joinal_ says she did her disappearin' stunt. How you goin' to getaround that?"
"You forget that the _Journal_ simply reports a rumour. It doesn'tclaim it's true. In fact, the story is contradicted by the very personthat ought to know--Miss Blessington's guardian."
"Well, if she sailed for Europe on the _Mauretania_, like hesays--how's it come her name wasn't on the passenger list?"
"It's quite possible that a young woman as much sought after andannoyed by fortune hunters, may have elected to sail incognita. It canbe done, you know. In fact, it _has_ been done."
George digested this in profound gloom.
"Then you don't believe what I'm tellin' you?"
"Not one-tenth of one iota of a belief."
George betrayed in a rude, choleric grunt, his disgust to see hissplendid fabrication, so painfully concocted for the delusion anddiscomfiture of P. Sybarite, threatening to collapse of sheerintrinsic flimsiness. He had counted so confidently on the credulityof the little bookkeeper! And Violet had supported his confidence withso much assurance! Disgusting wasn't the word for George's emotions.
In desperation he grasped at one final, fugitive hope.
"All right," he said sullenly: "_all_ right! You don't gotta believeme if you don't wanta. Only wait--that's all I ask--_wait_! You'll seeI'm right when she turns down your invite to-night."
P. Sybarite smiled sunnily. "So that is why you thought she wouldn'tgo with us, is it?"
"You got me."
"You thought she, if Marian Blessington, must necessarily be such asnob that she wouldn't associate with poor devils like us, did you?"
"Wait. You'll see."
"Well, it's none of your business, George; but I don't mind tellingyou, you're wrong. Quite wrong. In the head, too, George. I've alreadyasked Miss Lessing, and she has accepted."
George's eyes, protruding, glistened with poignant surprise.
"You ast her already?"
"That's why I left you down the street. I dropped into Blessington'sfor the sole purpose of asking her."
"And she fell for it?"
"She accepted my invitation--yes."
After a long pause George ground his cigarette beneath his heel, androse.
"In wrong, as usual," he admitted with winning simplicity. "I neverdid guess _any_thin' right the first time. Only--you just grab thisfrom me: maybe she's willin' to run the risk of bein' seen with us,but that ain't sayin' she's anybody but Marian Blessington."
"You really think it likely that Miss Blessington, hiding from herguardian and anxious to escape detection, would take a job at theglove counter of her own store, where everybody must know her bysight--where her guardian, Shaynon himself, couldn't fail to see herat least twice a day, as he enters and leaves the building?"
Staggered, Bross recovered quickly.
"That's just her cuteness. She doped it out the safest place for herwould be the last place he'd look for her!"
"And you really think that she, accustomed to every luxury that moneycan buy, would voluntarily come down to living here, at six dollars aweek, and clerking in a department store--simply because, according tothe papers, she's opposed to a marriage that she can't be forced tocontract in a free country like this?"
"Wel-l...." George floundered helplessly for a moment; and fell backagain upon an imagination for the time being stimulated to an abnormaldegree of inventiveness:
"P'raps old Shaynon's double-crossed her somehow we don't know nothin'about. He ain't above it, if all they tell of him's true. Maybe he'sgot her coin away from her, and she had to go to work for a livin'.Stranger things have happened in this burg, P.S."
It was the turn of P.S. to hesitate in doubt; or at all events, soGeorge Bross inferred from a sudden change in the expression of thelittle man's eyes. Momentarily they seemed to cloud, as if inintrospection. But he rallied quickly enough.
"All things are possible, George," he admitted with his quizzicalgrin. "But this time you're mistaken. I'm not arguing wit
h you,George; I'm _telling_ you: you're hopelessly mistaken."
"You think so--huh?" growled George. "Well, I got eight iron bucksthat says Marian Blessington to any five of your money."
He made a bold show of his pay envelope.
"It'd be a shame to rob you, George," said P. Sybarite. "Besides,you're bad-tempered when broke."
"Never you mind about that. Here's my eight, if you've got five thatmakes a noise like Molly Lessing."
P. Sybarite laughed softly and produced the little wad of bills thatrepresented his weekly wage. At this, George involuntarily drew back.
"And how would you settle the bet?"
"Leave it to her," insisted George in an expiring gasp of bravado.
"You'd ask her yourself?"
"Ye-es--"
"And let it stand on her answer?"
"Wel-l--"
"Here she comes now," added P. Sybarite, glancing up the street."Quick, now; you've only a minute to decide. Is it a bet?"
With a gesture of brave decision, George returned his money to hispocket.
"You're an easy mark," he observed in accents of deep pity. "I knewyou'd think I meant it."
"But didn't you, George?"
"Nah--nothin' like that! I was just kiddin' you along, to see how muchyou'd swallow."
"It's all right then," agreed P. Sybarite. "Only--George!"
"Huh?"
"Don't you breathe a word of this to Miss Lessing?"
"Why not?"
"Because I tell you not to--because," said P. Sybarite firmly, "Iforbid you."
"You--you forbid me? Holy Mike! And what--"
"Sssh!" P. Sybarite warned him sibilantly. "Miss Lessing might hearyou.... What will happen if you disobey me," he added as the shop girlturned in at the gateway, lowering his own voice and fixing theshipping clerk with a steely stare, "will be another accident, muchresembling that of this afternoon--if you haven't forgotten. Now mindwhat I tell you, and be good."
Mr. Bross swelled with resentment; exhibited a distorted and empurpledvisage; but kept silence.
The Day of Days: An Extravaganza Page 4
