“Once more, according to the newspapers, her engagement to Sir Charles was expected to be announced.”
He read, also, all about Sir Charles Mallison, V.C. — the long record of his military service, his wealth and the dignified simplicity of his life. He read about his immense popularity in England, his vast but unostentatious charities, his political and social status.
To Quarren it all meant nothing more definite than a stupid sequence of printed words; and he dropped his blond head into both hands and gazed out into the sunshine. And presently he remembered the golden dancer laughing at him from under her dainty mask — years and years ago: and then he thought of the woman whose smooth young hands once seemed to melt so sweetly against his — thought of her gray eyes tinged with violet, and her hair and mouth and throat — and her cheek faintly fragrant against his — a moment’s miracle — and then, the end ——
He made a quick, aimless movement as though impatiently escaping sudden pain; cleared his sun-dazzled eyes and began, half blindly, to turn over his morning’s letters — circulars, bills, business matters — and suddenly came upon a letter from her.
For a while he merely gazed at it, incredulous of its reality.
Then he opened the envelope very deliberately and still, scarcely convinced, unfolded the scented sheaf of note-paper:
“Dear Mr. Quarren,
“At Mrs. Sprowl’s suggestion I wrote to Sir Charles asking him to be kind enough to bring you with him when he came to ‘Skyland.’
“Somehow, I am afraid that my informality may have offended you; and if this is so, I am sorry. We have been such good friends that I supposed I might venture to send you such a message.
“But perhaps I ought to have written it to you instead — I don’t know. Lately it seems as though many things that I have done have been entirely misunderstood.
“It’s gray weather here, and the sea looks as though it were bad-tempered; and I’ve been rather discontented, too, this morning ——
“I don’t really mean that. There is a very jolly party here.... I believe that I’m growing a little tired of parties.
“Molly has asked me to Witch-Hollow for a quiet week in June, and I’m going. She would ask you if I suggested it. Shall I? Because, since we last met, once or twice the thought has occurred to me that perhaps an explanation was overdue. Not that I should make any to you if you and I meet at Witch-Hollow. There isn’t any to make — except by my saying that I hope to see you again. Will you be content with that admission of guilt?
“I meant to speak to you again that day at the Charity affair, only there were so many people bothering — and you seemed to be so delightfully preoccupied with that pretty Cyrille Caldera. I really had no decent opportunity to speak to you again without making her my mortal enemy — and you, too, perhaps.
“May I dare to be a little friendly now and say that I would like to see you? Somehow I feel that even still I may venture to talk to you on a different plane and footing from any which exists between other men and me. You were once so friendly, so kind, so nice to me. You have been nice — always. And if I seem to have acquired any of the hardness, any of the cynical veneer, any of the fashionable scepticism and unbelief which, perhaps, no woman entirely escapes in my environment, it all softens and relaxes and fades and seems to slip away as soon as I begin to talk to you — even on this note-paper. Which is only one way of saying, ‘Please be my friend again!’
“I sometimes hear about you from others. I am impressively informed that you have given up all frivolous social activity and are now most industriously devoting yourself to your real-estate business. And I am wondering whether this rather bewildering volte-face is to be permanent.
“Because I see no reason for anybody going to extremes. Between the hermit’s cell and the Palace of Delights there is a quiet and happy country. Don’t you know that?
“Would you care to write to me and tell me a little about yourself? Do you think it odd or capricious of me to write to you? And are you perhaps irritated because of my manners which must have seemed to you discourteous — perhaps rude?
“I know of course that you called on me; that you telephoned; that you wrote to me; and that I made no response.
“And I am going to make no explanation. Can your friendship, or what may remain of it, stand the strain?
“If it can, please write to me. And forgive me whatever injustice I have seemed to do you. I ask it because, although you may not believe it, my regard for you has never become less since the night that a Harlequin and a golden dancer met in the noisy halls of old King Carnival.... Only, the girl who writes you this was younger and happier then than I think she ever will be again.
“Your friend — if you wish— “Strelsa Leeds.”
He wrote her by return mail:
“My dear Mrs. Leeds,
“When a man has made up his mind to drown without any more fuss, it hurts him to be hauled out and resuscitated and told that he is still alive.
“If you mean, ultimately, to let me drown, do it now. I’ve been too miserable over you. Also, I was insulting to Sir Charles. He’s too decent to have told you; but I was. And I can’t ask his pardon except by mending my manner toward him in future.
“I’m a nobody; I haven’t any money; and I love you. That is how the matter stands this day in May. Let me know the worst and I’ll drown this time for good and all.
“Are you engaged to marry Sir Charles?
“R. S. Quarren.”
By return mail came a note from her:
“Can you not care for me and still be kind to me, Mr. Quarren? If what you say about your regard for me is true — but it is certainly exaggerated, anyway — should not your attitude toward me include a nobler sentiment? I mean friendship. And I know whereof I speak, because I am conscious of a capacity for it — a desire for it — and for you as the object of it. I believe that, if you cared for it, I could give you the very best of me in a friendship of the highest type.
“It is in me to give it — a pure, devoted, lofty, untroubled friendship, absolutely free of lesser and material sentiments. Am I sufficiently frank? I want such a friendship. I need it. I have never before offered it to any man — the kind I mean to give you if you wish.
“I believe it would satisfy you; I am convinced that yours would satisfy me. You don’t know how I have missed such a friendship in you. I have wanted it from the very beginning of our acquaintance. But I had — problems — to solve, first; and I had to let our friendship lie dormant. Now I have solved my perplexities, and all my leisure is for you again, if you will. Do you want it?
“Think over what I have written. Keep my letter for a week and then write me. Does my offer not deserve a week’s consideration?
“Meanwhile please keep away from deep water. I do not wish you to drown.
“Strelsa Leeds.
“P. S. — Lord Dankmere is here. He is insufferable. He told Mrs. Sprowl that you and he were going into the antique-picture business. You wouldn’t think of going into anything whatever with a man of that sort, would you? Or was it merely a British jest?”
He wrote at once:
“I have your letter and will keep it a week before replying. But — are you engaged?”
She answered:
“The papers have had me engaged to Barent Van Dyne, to Langly Sprowl, to Sir Charles. You may take your choice if you are determined to have me engaged to somebody. No doubt you think my being engaged would make our future friendship safer. I’ll attend to it immediately if you wish me to.”
Evidently she was in a gay and contrary humour when she wrote so flippantly to him. And he replied in kind and quite as lightly. Then, at the week’s end he wrote her again that he had considered her letter, and that he accepted the friendship she offered, and gave her his in return.
She did not reply.
He wrote her again a week later, but had no answer. Another week passed, and, slowly into his senses crept the dread of deep
waters closing around him. And after another week he began to wonder, dully, how long it would take a man to drown if he made no struggle.
Meanwhile several dozen crates and packing cases had arrived at the Custom House for the Earl of Dankmere; and, in process of time were delivered at the real-estate office of R. S. Quarren, littering his sleeping quarters and office and overflowing into the extension and backyard.
“All stacked up pell-mell in the back yard and regarded in amazement by the neighbours.”
It was the first of June and ordinarily hot when Lord Dankmere and Quarren, stripped to their shirts and armed with pincers, chisels and hammers, attacked the packing cases in the backyard, observed from the back fences by several astonished cats.
His lordship was not expert at manual labour; neither was Quarren; and some little blood was shed from the azure veins of Dankmere and the ruddier integument of the younger man as picture after picture emerged from its crate, some heavily framed, some merely sagging on their ancient un-keyed stretchers.
There were primitives on panels, triptychs, huge canvases in frames carved out of solid wood; pictures in battered Italian frames — some floridly Florentine, some exquisitely inlaid on dull azure and rose — pictures in Spanish frames, Dutch frames, English frames, French frames of the last century; portraits, landscapes, genre, still life — battle pictures, religious subjects, allegorical canvases, mythological — all stacked up pell-mell in the backyard and regarded in amazement by the neighbours, and by two young men who alternately smoked and staunched their wounds under the summer sky.
“Dankmere,” said Quarren at last, “did your people send over your entire collection?”
“No; but I thought it might be as well to have plenty of rubbish on hand in case a demand should spring up.... What do they look like to you, Quarren — I mean what’s your first impression?”
“They look all right.”
“Really?”
“Certainly. They seem to be genuine enough as far as I can see.”
“But are they otherwise any good?”
“I think so. I’ll go over each canvas very carefully and give you my opinion for what it’s worth. But, for Heaven’s sake, Dankmere, where are we going to put all these canvases?”
“I suppose,” said the Earl gloomily, “I’ll be obliged to store what you haven’t room for. And as I gradually grow poorer and poorer the day will arrive when I can’t pay storage; and they’ll sell ’em under my nose at auction, Quarren. And first I know the papers will blossom out with: ‘A Wonderful Rembrandt discovered in a junk-shop! Ancient picture bought for five dollars and pronounced a gem by experts! Lucky purchaser refuses a hundred thousand dollars cash!’”
Quarren laughed and turned away into the house; and Dankmere followed, gloomily predicting his own approaching financial annihilation.
From his office Quarren telephoned a picture dealer to send men with heavy wire, hooks, ladders and other paraphernalia; then he and Dankmere made their toilets, resumed their coats, and returned to the sunny office to await events.
After a few moments the Earl said abruptly:
“Would you care to go into this venture with me, Quarren?”
“I?” said Quarren, surprised.
“Yes. Will you?”
“Why, I have my own business, Dankmere — —”
“Is it enough to keep you busy?”
“No — not yet — but I — —”
“Then, like a good fellow, help me sell these damned pictures. I haven’t any money to offer you, Quarren, but if you’ll be willing to hang the pictures around your office here and in the back parlour and the extension, and if you’ll talk the merry talk to the lunatics who may come in to look at ’em and tell ’em what the bally pictures are and fix the proper prices — why — why, I’ll make any arrangement with you that you please. Say a half interest, now. Would that be fair?”
“Fair? Of course! It’s far too liberal an offer — but I — —”
“It’s worth that to me, Quarren — if you can see your way to helping me out — —”
“But my help isn’t worth half what these pictures might very easily bring — even at public auction — —”
“Why not? I’d have to pay an auctioneer, an expert to appraise them — an art dealer to hang them in his gallery for a couple of weeks — either that or rent a place by the year. The only way I can recompense you for your wall space, for talking art talk to visitors, for fixing prices, is to offer you half of what we make. Why not? You pay a pretty stiff rent here, don’t you? You also pay a servant. You pay for heat and light, don’t you? So if you’ll turn this floor into a combination gallery of sorts — art and real estate, you see — we’ll go into business, egad! What? The Dankmere galleries! What? By gad I’ll have a sign made to hang out there beside your shingle — only I’m afraid you’ll have to pay for it, Quarren, and recompense yourself after we sell the first picture.”
“But, Dankmere,” he protested, very much amused, “I don’t want to become a picture dealer.”
“What’s the harm? Take a shot at it, old chap! A young man can’t collect too many kinds of experience. Take me for example! — I’ve sold dogs and hunters on commission, gone shares in about every rotten scheme anybody ever suggested to me, financed a show, and acted in it — as you know — and, by gad! — here I am now a dealer in old masters! Be a good fellow and come in with me. What?”
“I don’t really know enough about antique pictures to — —”
“What’s the odds! Neither do I! My dear sir, we must lie like gentlemen for the honour of the Dankmere gallery! What? Along comes a chap walking slowly and painfully for the weight of the money in his pockets— ‘Ho!’ says he— ‘a genuine Van Dyck!’ ‘Certainly,’ you say, very coldly. And, ‘How much?’ says he, shivering for fear he mayn’t get it. ‘Three hundred thousand dollars,’ you say, trying not to yawn in his face — —”
Quarren could no longer control his laughter: Dankmere blinked at him amiably.
“We’ll hang them anyhow, Dankmere,” he said. “As long as there is so little business in the office I don’t mind looking after your pictures for you — —”
“Yours, too,” urged the Earl.
“No; I can’t accept anything — —”
“Then it’s all off!” exclaimed Dankmere, turning a bright red. “I’m blessed if I’ll accept charity! — even if I am hunting heiresses. I’ll marry money if I can, but I’m damned if I hold out a tin cup for coppers!”
“If you feel that way,” began Quarren, very much embarrassed, “I’ll do whatever would make you feel comfortable — —”
“Half interest or it’s all off! A Dankmere means what he says — now and then.”
“One-third interest, then — —”
“A half! — by gad! There’s a good fellow!”
“No; one-third is all I’ll accept.”
“Oh, very well. It may amount to ten dollars — it may amount to ten thousand — and ten times that, perhaps. What?”
“Perhaps,” said Quarren, smiling. “And, if you’re going out, Dankmere, perhaps you had better order a sign painted — anything you like, of course. Because I’m afraid I couldn’t leave these pictures here indefinitely and we might as well make plans to get rid of some of them as soon as possible.”
“Right-o! I’m off to find a painter. Leave it to me, Quarren. And when the picture-hangers come, have them hung in a poor light — I mean the pictures — God knows they need it — the dimmer the light the better. What? Take care of yourself, old chap. There’s money in sight, believe me!”
And the lively little Earl trotted out, swinging his stick and setting his straw hat at an angle slightly rakish.
No business came to the office that sunny afternoon; neither did the picture-hangers. And Quarren, uneasy, and not caring to leave Dankmere’s ancestral collection of pictures in the back yard all night lest the cats and a possible shower knock a little superfluous antiquity into them,
had just started to go out and hire somebody to help him carry the canvases into the basement, when the office door opened in his very face and Molly Wycherly came in, breezily.
“Why, Molly!” he exclaimed, surprised; “this is exceedingly nice of you — —”
“Oh, Ricky, I’m glad to see you! But I don’t want to buy a house or sell one or anything. I’m very unhappy — and I’m glad to see you — —”
She pressed his hand with both her gloved ones; he closed the door and returned to the office; and she seated herself on top of his desk.
“You dear boy,” she said; “you are thin and white and you don’t look very happy either. Are you?”
“Why, of course I’m happy — —”
“I don’t believe it! Anyway, I was passing, and I saw your shingle swinging, and I made the chauffeur stop on the impulse of the moment.... How are you, Ricky dear?”
“First rate. You are even unusually pretty, Molly.”
“I don’t feel so. Strelsa and I came into town for the afternoon — on the most horrid kind of business, Ricky.”
“I’m sorry — —”
“You will be sorrier when you hear that about all of Strelsa’s money was in that miserable Adamant Trust Company which is causing so much scandal. You didn’t know Strelsa’s money was in it, did you?”
“No,” he said gravely.
“Isn’t it dreadful? The child doesn’t know whether she will ever get a penny or not. Some of those disgusting men have run away, one shot himself — you read about it! — and now they are trying to pretend that the two creatures they have arrested are insane and irresponsible. I don’t care whether they are or not; I’d like to kill them. How does their insanity concern Strelsa? For three weeks she hasn’t known what to think, what to expect — and even her lawyers can’t tell her. I hate lawyers. But I think the chances are that her pretty house will be for sale before long.... Wouldn’t it be too tragic if it came into your office — —”
Works of Robert W Chambers Page 595
