Nicholas Hoyt’s laugh was a triumph of will over fury. “I’m willing to concede the Peerless Pretender many fascinating qualities. Hear the clock? Midnight. The servants will be here to dust, or whatever they do in the early morning, before I get this room locked.” He opened the door to the loggia. As she hesitated, he suggested grimly:
“Shall I have to put you out?”
“I’m going.” She looked back from the threshold. “You really should see Philippe and the lovely Sandra together when they think they are unobserved. A fiery southerner leaves a cold-blooded northerner like you at the post, Nick.”
He heard her malicious laughter like the tinkle of ice against glass as she ran along the loggia.
CHAPTER XVII
Jed Langdon paused in his restless pacing of the living room floor at Stone House. He faced Nicholas Hoyt who, back to the mantel, was filling his pipe.
“Of course, you’ve got an explanation coming to you, Nick. Haven’t had time to go into it before, and in all its ramifications the story of my hurry-up trip to England needs time. When Sandra Duval told me that first night at dinner that her father had been the victim of a forger—of a forger at the same time that Rousseau was doing the devoted-friend act, get that—my mind spun like a Dervish doing his stuff. At last! At last I had something to work on! The breaks were with me. I would be able to drive a ten cylinder truck through that diary of Anne Pardoe’s. I must have gone white with excitement for Miss Duval asked me what was wrong. I muttered something about a bad heart—I with the constitution of an ox—getting to France to consult a specialist, and bolted from the room to phone for passage on any ship sailing the next day for London.”
“Go on! Don’t stop there, Jed. B.D. and I suspected that you had gone on estate-fight business. We’ve nobly refrained from asking questions. We’ll crack-up if we don’t know soon the result of your trip.” Nicholas Hoyt’s voice was strained.
Langdon perched on one corner of the table desk and thrust his hands hard into his coat pockets.
“Boy! Result! There ain’t no such animal.”
“What do you mean?” Damon, in a deep-red cushioned chair, matched his broad-tipped fingers and glared from under bristling white brows as he growled the question.
“I mean that I found the bank on which the cheques had been drawn, all right; told my story to the proper official, to be assured suavely that the forger of Duval’s name was at the moment cozily ensconced behind bars. He made a sly reference or two to our slowness in convicting our man on this side of the big pond in contrast to the English method, and bowed me out.”
Nicholas drew a long breath. “Now we can laugh that off! What do you think of the letters the maid found in the secret drawer, Jed?”
“If I hadn’t somewhat lost confidence in my judgment, I would say that we haven’t a prayer if they are presented in court.”
“Then why go through the strain of appearing? Why not send them to Rousseau’s attorney, wind the thing up, and take our medicine?” demanded Damon testily.
“We’ll keep the Kentuckian hopping over the hot coals of suspense as long as we can. We’ve got to get some satisfaction out of the fight. Ever thought how easy it would be to drop those letters into the fire Nick? They’d burn with a lovely light.”
“Cut out wise-cracking, Jed. I wish you had been here when the Emma person brought them. She didn’t ring the bell with me. Her valedictory just as she left the room: ‘That Rousseau fella ain’t no gentleman,’ was out of character with her voice and manner which preceded it. After she had gone, Miss Duval told us that she was sure that she was the woman who had applied to B.D. for the secretarial position just before she did.”
“For Pete’s sake! Why hadn’t she told you before?”
“Sorry for her, imagined her in such desperate need of a job that she would take anything. As she was satisfactory in her work, considered it no business of hers.”
“Had Miss Duval told Rousseau her suspicions?”
“She had not—then.”
“Who hired Emma for Seven Chimneys?”
“Either the housekeeper or Huckins.”
Damon sat forward in his chair. “The woman seemed honest enough when she brought the letters, made no secret of the fact that she hoped for a reward. I wonder—if we should have given it to her at the time, Nick? She may go to Rousseau.”
“If she does, she’ll only tell him what he will know the day the case comes to trial, B.D.”
“I used to be a fairly good sleuth but this mix-up is getting too complicated for me. I’ve had one blinding flash of light though. Have you boys ever thought that Huckins, the butler, might be Raoul Rousseau, the father of Philippe?”
Jed Langdon came up standing. “You engaged Huckins for the Seven Chimneys’ job yourself, didn’t you, B.D.? You’ve got his dossier, haven’t you? He’s butlered for years, hasn’t he?”
“Ask Nick. I was away when the man applied for the job and he interviewed him.”
“His references were O.K.,” Nicholas reassured.
“If you think my suggestion so wild, Jed, perhaps you can give us information as to what became of the man Anne Pardoe married,” Damon challenged.
“We’ve had him looked up. He started his married life as a gray sheep and got blacker and blacker. Used to disappear for years at a time, leaving his wife and boy to manage the plantation and the horses. That part of Philippe’s yarn is well authenticated. The tricky Raoul would reappear when he was on his uppers, repent, reform until he had been fed and decently clothed, then off he would go again.”
“Is he still living?”
“Philippe says that had he been alive he would have appeared when his wife died to claim what he could of her estate.”
“That sounds reasonable. I guess it squelches my blinding light about Huckins. But I still wonder why he stays in this country place and puts up with Mrs. Pat’s rages if he hasn’t an axe to grind. Do they let him into Stone House stables, Nick?”
“No one from outside this place has been there during the last two weeks, B.D.”
“Fortune has already gone to the track paddock, of course?”
“Yes, with Ping Pong and Parsons and the swipes and one boy. I’m going back again before dinner. Hated like the dickens to leave. The thrill of the place got into my blood. Applications for stalls and the entries for stakes have been record-breaking. Wouldn’t have left had not Mrs. Pat asked last night if she might come and see the young Thoroughbreds, I took it that she was loosing the dove of peace, so said: ‘Of course. Come on. Bring any one you like.’ ”
Langdon crossed to the lattice window. “Speaking of angels—here they are. Mrs. Pat, Curt, Estelle on foot, and the Pretender in his roadster. He had the nerve to come!”
In the stir of arrival and greeting, Nicholas avoided speaking directly to Rousseau. Mrs. Pat sank into a chair with an abandon which wrenched a toll of creaks from its internal organs. She stretched out heavily shod feet. Her rough brown tweeds were in character with her manner. Estelle Carter, in a white sports suit, held her cigarette up to Nicholas Hoyt for a light.
“Greetings, dearest boy!”
Nicholas was aware of the cryptic challenge in her eyes. “Will you help me?” they were asking.
He laughed. “Estelle, I would as soon expect to see the Statue of Liberty without her torch as to see you without a cigarette.”
With a shrug she went to the piano. Curtis Newsome prowled from book-shelf to book-shelf, apparently engrossed in reading the titles of the classics, best-sellers of yesteryear, last minute fiction, recent publications of science, countless books on American history, and volumes upon the horse with which they were crowded. Rousseau was gazing at the riot of color in the garden border. Was he remembering the day of Sandra’s accident when he had been forcibly ejected from this very room? Sandra? Where was she? Had he so angered her last night that she had refused to come? Nicholas tried to keep his voice casual as he inquired:
“Whe
re is Miss Duval, Pat?”
“She said that she would come along later—if she came at all. She had work to finish. Perhaps she is resting for the Hunt Ball tonight, though she’s always so full of pep that I never think of her being tired. I guess perhaps the real reason is she’s mad at me. She’s a touchy kid; didn’t like the way I spoke to her. Well, Nick, tea first or the stable?”
“That’s up to you.”
“Then I say tea. I’m dead to the world. And just as if there wasn’t enough going on this week, some imbecile tucks in a Hunt Ball. I don’t know if I’ll go. I’ve been on my feet every minute since I got up at seven this morning when Mac Donovan shouted outside my window:
“ ‘The filly’s come, Mrs. Pat, an’ the mare’s doin’ fine!’ How-do, Nanny O’Day! I’m dying for tea.”
“Sure then an’ this is a good place to come to keep from dying, ma’am.”
The chunky little woman in the gray gown gave orders to a flaxen-haired, rosy-cheeked maid with the air of a general manning walls for a defense. Damon brought Mrs. Pat her tea and Jed Langdon offered two Sheffield trays of sandwiches.
“I don’t know anything about antiques, Nick, but your Great-great-grandmother Hoyt’s silver tea-set starts wheels of envy whizzing every time I see it, and usually I don’t give a tinker’s dam for such things. Can’t beat your mushroom sandwiches, Nanny O’Day! I pay out hundreds of dollars for service each week but I can’t get anything like them. Life is just one fight after another and I’m getting sick of it—the fighting I mean. Stop prowling, Curt, bring the cream. If you won’t ride for me, at least you can see that I don’t die of thirst.”
Estelle Carter ran her fingers lightly over the keys of the piano. “Are you trying to turn Curtis Newsome, the violinist, into a jockey again? If you are—well, professional jocks are quite without the circle of my young life.”
Mrs. Pat’s eyes widened suddenly; dull color darkened her face. She opened her lips as if in acrimonious retort, snapped them shut. Nicholas wondered at her unusual self-control. He had looked for, if not a profane, at least a fierce outburst. He wondered more as she said smoothly:
“I was speaking of riding my show-horses, Estelle. So jockeys are out of the picture with you. Remember that, Curt, if ever you are tempted to get back on your own.”
Newsome’s sensitive face went beet-red; his lips were set in a straight line as he approached the tea-table. With an apologetic laugh, Rousseau turned from his contemplation of the garden border.
“Tea already! Can I help? I was so absorbed in memories that I forgot my manners. The garden brought back the stories my foster-mother used to tell of bringing young Philip Hoyt from Seven Chimneys to call upon his grandfather. I little thought as I listened to her that I was that boy.”
Nicholas felt as if all the blood in his body had charged into his face; the tumult left his brain light. The nerve, the colossal nerve of Rousseau to come into this house and talk of his grandfather, before his claim had been proved! But it would be proved wouldn’t it, when the letters which the maid had found were produced? An arm slipped within his and pressed with a light warning. Had his fury been so evident? Damon’s shaggy head loomed above his shoulder. He had come in time to prevent an explosion. His voice was suave—suave for him—as he sympathized:
“I don’t wonder Stone House gets you, Philippe—you won’t mind if I don’t call you Philip yet, will you? I suppose your mother—beg pardon, foster-mother—also told you the weird history of the picture of the Puritan and …” He stopped to light a cigarette.
Nicholas watched Rousseau’s eyes go wary. Did he suspect a trap? He was on his guard.
“Have a heart!” Mrs. Pat interrupted irascibly. “Don’t set the Stone House ghost to walking! I hate it! It gives me the shivers! That yarn has been handed down so long that of course every one believes it. I’ll bet you do yourself, Nicholas.”
“It has its points; at least it serves to keep curious sightseers away after dark, now that they have found the river entrance to the underground passage. We found the door broken above the bolt the other day.”
“The underground passage!” Mrs. Pat’s startled exclamation brought all eyes to her face. Her laugh was forced. “Sounds as if I never had heard of it before, doesn’t it. I was thinking what a hiding place it might make for gangsters and bootleggers. Better have it walled up, Nick.”
“After the races I will.”
“Or I will,” cut in Philippe Rousseau. “As I said before, Nick, you’ve been too easy. When this house comes to me, I’ll see that no stranger steps foot in it. I’ll not stand for trespassers anywhere on my estate. As for the Stone House ghost, I’ll lay that if I never do anything else in my life.” His voice shook, his eyes burned like black coals.
Nicholas wondered if a person’s heart could break from pain. The thought that the cockily assured man might be master here instead of himself hurt intolerably. His tongue felt thick as he answered:
“Yes? You’ve said before that this house would be yours. Hate to discourage you, Rousseau, but have you ever heard that little adage about the slip between the cup and the lip?”
“Oh, for the love of Mike, stop fighting you two! I get enough of that at home.” Mrs. Pat cut into an atmosphere charged with electric currents of anger. “You ought to have the dogs here, Nicholas; they would keep prowlers away. Take ’em, they’re not crazy about me, and if Bud and Buddy do like a person, their playful charge of welcome would knock him down. Did you hear one of them howl last night? If that happens again, they’ll go back to the stables even if I lose my priceless secretary. It’s unlucky; it’s a sign of—”
“Cut it out, Pat, you’re shivering,” Curtis Newsome interrupted. “You may be a swell horse woman, but you’re as superstitious as they make ’em. You cross your fingers at a race, you knock on wood, don’t you now?” He laid his hand on her shoulder; his tone of affectionate raillery brought a mist to his wife’s eyes.
“Perhaps I do, perhaps I’m a dumbbell that way, but I don’t like a howling dog. You can have Bud and Buddy, Nick, but you may have to take Sandra with them—they are her shadows.”
“That wouldn’t be too hard,” chuckled Damon. “How do you feel about the big races, Mrs. Pat?”
“That Nick and Philippe have it on ice between them. Up Five is the only one of the big circuit horses they have to fear, and he scuffed skin off one of his fore legs Saturday—nothing serious, but it may be enough to withdraw him. Curt has been riding Iron Man in some of his workouts. I wish he could be up at the race. I forgot, the jock has to be a pro. He might lose a friend if he rode again,” Mrs. Pat reminded, with a crudity which flooded her husband’s face with color. His reply was to spread out his sensitive hands.
“I’ll cut out even workouts from now on. Riding stiffens my fingers for the violin.”
“You care more for your old music than for anything else in the world, that’s the real answer. Oh, come on, what’s the use! Let’s go see the horses.”
As they left the house, twilight was drawing a violet veil over hills and fields. At the gate Rousseau stopped.
“As I’ve seen the Stone House youngsters, I’ll go back to the paddock. My trainer is a bunch of nerves before a race and he’ll have the men from Seven Chimneys Mrs. Pat loaned me strung on wires.”
“But you’ll be back for dinner? You’re going to the Hunt Ball, aren’t you, Philippe?”
“Certainly, I’ll be back, Mrs. Pat. With the track only five miles away it doesn’t take long to make the trip.” He flicked a glance at Nicholas Hoyt, before he added: “I’m taking Miss Duval to the ball. Do you think I’d miss it?”
When Nicholas returned to the living room, it seemed hours—though the old clock in the hall assured him that but five minutes had passed—since Mrs. Newsome and her husband had left. Poor Pat. She had been so unlike her usual breezy self. It was quite apparent that her thoughts were anywhere but upon the horses she was viewing. She had appeared as if working out a
problem. Was the financial statement of the Seven Chimneys’ stables going red? It wouldn’t be surprising in this year when any business which had not gone deep crimson was faintly pink.
He stood with his arm on the mantel looking at the gleaming Georgian silver on the tea-table. Would that go with everything else if Rousseau were legally proclaimed Philip Hoyt? In forty-eight hours he himself would appear in court to fight—fight, that was a joke with those two letters the maid had found. The estate would go to Rousseau. Had Estelle been right? Was Sandra hedging until the rightful heir was acclaimed before she pinned her flower on a coat lapel? How could he believe it for a moment? If Sandra married Rousseau, it would be for love, not money. Estelle had jeered at the cold-blooded northerner. He cold-blooded, when every pulse and nerve in him throbbed at the mere sound of Sandra’s voice? When he had to thrust his hands hard into his pockets to keep from seizing her, and kissing her tempting, headily tempting lips? If it were cold-blooded to love with such concentration, heaven help the men she called “fiery.”
He counted the strokes of the old clock. Six! No time to go to the track again if he were to get to Seven Chimneys in time for dinner. Of course Fortune was safe with Parsons and his own men. Perhaps it would be better if he kept away. Fortune vs. Iron Man. The man in possession vs. claimant. Hoyt against Rousseau. Race. Estate. Girl. All worth fighting for, but in the last analysis nothing so important as Sandra.
CHAPTER XVIII
“Why aren’t you coming to Stone House?” Philippe Rousseau had demanded of Sandra as she stood on the terrace at Seven Chimneys with her arms crossed on the top of a white bamboo chair.
She shifted her attention from the high, smoothly clipped hedge at the end of the garden to the windows above her. Curious that the two in the middle should have the shades drawn.
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