The Coast of Chance
Page 1
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THE COAST OF CHANCE
_By_
ESTHER AND LUCIA CHAMBERLAIN
WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY
CLARENCE F. UNDERWOOD
FLORA GILSEY.]
NEW YORK
GROSSET & DUNLAP
PUBLISHERS
COPYRIGHT 1908
THE BOBBS-MERRILL COMPANY
APRIL
* * * * *
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I THE VANISHING MYSTERY 1
II A NAME GOES ROUND A TABLE 24
III ENCOUNTERS ON PARADE 63
IV FLOWERS BY THE WAY 82
V ON GUARD 93
VI BLACK MAGIC 105
VII A SPELL IS CAST 129
VIII A SPARK OF HORROR 142
IX ILLUMINATION 162
X A LADY UNVEILED 175
XI THE MYSTERY TAKES HUMAN FORM 197
XII DISENCHANTMENT 213
XIII THRUST AND PARRY 216
XIV COMEDY CONVEYS A WARNING 231
XV A LADY IN DISTRESS 248
XVI THE HEART OF THE DILEMMA 285
XVII THE DEMIGOD 293
XVIII GOBLIN TACTICS 330
XIX THE FACE IN THE GARDEN 345
XX FLIGHT 361
XXI THE HOUSE OF QUIET 381
XXII CLARA'S MARKET 410
XXIII TOUCHE 422
XXIV THE COMIC MASK 435
XXV THE LAST ENCHANTMENT 451
THE COAST OF CHANCE
I
THE VANISHING MYSTERY
Flora Gilsey stood on the threshold of her dining-room. She had turnedher back on it. She swayed forward. Her bare arms were lifted. Her handslightly caught the molding on either side of the door. She was lookingintently into the mirror at the other end of the hall. All the lights inthe dining-room were lit, and she saw herself rather keenly set againsttheir brilliance. The straight-held head, the lifted arms, the short,slender waist, the long, long sweep of her skirts made her seem tallerthan she actually was; and the strong, bright growth of her hair and thevivacity of her face made her seem more deeply colored.
She had poised there for the mere survey of a new gown, but after amoment of dwelling on her own reflection she found herself consideringit only as an object in the foreground of a picture. That picture, seenthrough the open door, reflected in the glass, was all of a bright, hardglitter, all a high, harsh tone of newness. In its paneled oak, in itsglare of cut-glass and silver, in the shining vacant faces of its floorsand walls, there was not a color that filled the eye, not a shadow whereimagination could find play. As a background for herself it struck heras incongruous. Like a child looking at the landscape upside down, shefelt herself in a foreign country. Yet it was hers. She turned about tobring it into familiar association. There was nothing wrong with it. Butits great capacity suggested large parties rather than close intimacies.In the high lift of its ceilings, the ample openings of its doors, theswept, garnished, polished beauty of its cold surfaces, it proclaimeditself conceived, created and decorated for large, fine functions. Shethought whimsically that any one who knew her, coming into her house,would realize that some one other than herself had the ordering of it.
She glanced over the table. It was set for three. It lacked nothing butthe serving of dinner. She looked at the clock. It wanted a few minutesto the hour. Shima, the Japanese butler, came in softly with the eveningpapers. She took them from him. Nothing bored her so much as a paper,but to-night she knew it contained something she really wanted to see.She opened one of the damp sheets at the page of sales.
There it was at the head of the column in thick black type:
AT AUCTION, FEBRUARY 18 PERSONAL ESTATE OF ELIZABETH HUNTER CHATWORTH CONSISTING OF----
She read the details with interest down to the end, where the name ofthe "famous Chatworth ring" finished the announcement with a flourish.Why "famous"? It was very provoking to advertise with that vagueadjective and not explain it.
She turned indifferently to the first page. She read a sentence, re-readit, read it again. Then, as if she could not read fast enough, her eyesgalloped down the column. Color came into her cheeks. The grasp of herhands on the edges of the paper tightened. It was the most extraordinarything! She was bewildered with the feeling that what was blazing at herfrom the columns of the paper was at once the wildest thing that couldpossibly have happened, and yet the one most to have been expected.
For, from the first the business had been sinister, from as far back asthe tragedy--the end of poor young Chatworth and his wife--the Bessie,who, before her English marriage, they had all known so well. Her death,that had befallen in far Italian Alps, had made a sensation in theirlittle city, and the large announcements of auction that had followedhard upon it had bred among the women who had known her a morbidexcitement, a feverish desire to buy, as if there might be some specialluck in them, the jewels of a woman who had so tragically died. They hadbeen ready to make a social affair of the private view held in the"Maple Room" before the auction. And now the whole spectacular businesswas capped by a sensation so dramatic as to strain credulity to itslimit. She could not believe it; yet here it was glaring at her from thefirst page. Still--it might be an exaggeration, a mistake. She must goback to the beginning and read it over slowly.
The striking of the hour hurried her. Shima's announcement of dinneronly sent her eyes faster down the page. But when, with a faint, smoothrustle, Mrs. Britton came in, she let the paper fall. She always facedher chaperon with a little nervousness, and with the same sense ofstrangeness with which she so frequently regarded her house.
"It's fifteen minutes after eight," Mrs. Britton observed. "We wouldbetter not wait any longer."
She took the place opposite Flora's at the round table. Flora sat down,still holding the paper, flushed and bolt upright with her news.
"It's the most extraordinary thing!" she burst forth.
Mrs. Britton paused mildly with a radish in her fingers. She took in thepresence of the paper, and the suppressed excitement of her companion'sface--seemed to absorb them through the large pupils of her light eyes,through all her smooth, pretty person, before she reached for anexplanation.
"What is the most extraordinary thing?" The query came bland and smooth,as if, whatever it was, it could not surprise her.
"Why, the Chatworth ring! At the private view this afternoon it simplyvanished! And--and it was all our own crowd who were there!"
"Vanished!" Clara Britton leaned forward, peering hard in the face ofthis extraordinary statement. "Stolen, do you mean?" She made itdefinite.
Flora flung out her hands.
"Well, it disappeared in the Maple Room, in the middle of theafternoon, when everybody was there--and they haven't the faintestclue."
"But how?" For a moment the preposterous fact left Clara too quick to becalm.
Again Flora's eloquent hands. "That is it! It was in a case like all theother jewels. Harry saw it"--she glanced at the paper--"as late as fouro'clock. When he came back with Judge Buller, half an hour after, it wasgone."
Flora leaned forward on her elbows, chin in hands. No two could havediffered more than these two women in their bl
ondness and theirprettiness and their wonder. For Clara was sharp and pale, with silverylights in eyes and hair, and confronted the facts with an alert andcalculating observation; but Flora was tawny, toned from brown to ivorythrough all the gamut of gold--hair color of a panther's hide, eyes darkhazel, glinting through dust-colored lashes, chin round like a fruit.The pressure of her fingers accented the slight uptilt of her brows toelfishness, and her look was introspective. She might, instead ofwondering on the outside, have been the very center of the mysteryitself, toying with unthinkable possibilities of revelation. She lookedfar over the head of Clara Britton's annoyance that there should be noclue.
"Why, don't you see," she pointed out, "that is just the fun of it? Itmight be anybody. It might be you, or me, or Ella Buller. Though I wouldmuch prefer to think it was some one we didn't know so well--some onestrange and fascinating, who will presently go slipping out the GoldenGate in a little junk boat, so that no one need be embarrassed."
Clara looked back with extraordinary intentness.
"Oh, it's not possible the thing is stolen. There's some mistake! And ifit were"--her eyes seemed to open a little wider to take in thispossibility--"they will have detectives all around the water front byto-night. Any one would find it difficult to get away," she pointed out."You see, the ring is an important piece of property."
"Of course; I know," Flora murmured. A faint twitch of humor pulled hermouth, but the passionate romantic color was dying out of her face. Howwas it that one's romances could be so cruelly pulled down to earth? Sheought to have learned by this time, she thought, never to fly her littleflag of romance except to an empty horizon--never, at least, to fly itin Clara's face. It was always as promptly surrounded by Clara's commonsense as San Francisco would be surrounded by the police. But still shecouldn't quite come down to Clara. "At least," she sighed, "he has savedme an awful expense, whoever took it, for I should have had to have it."
Mrs. Britton surveyed this statement consideringly. "Was it the mostvaluable thing in the collection?"
Flora hesitated in the face of the alert question. "I--don't know. Butit was the most remarkable. It was a Chatworth heirloom, the papers say,and was given to Bessie at the time of her marriage." The thought of thedeath that had so quickly followed that marriage gave Flora a littleshiver, but no shade of the tragedy touched Clara. There was nothing butspeculation in Clara's eyes--that, and a little disappointment. "Thenthey will put off the auction--if it is really so," she mused.
"Oh, yes," Flora mourned, "they can put it off as long as they please.The only thing I wanted is gone--and I hadn't even seen it."
"Well, I wouldn't be too sure. There may be some mistake about it. Thepapers love a sensation."
"But there must be something in it, Clara. Why, they closed the doorsand searched them--_that_ crowd! It's ridiculous!"
Clara Britton glanced at the empty place. "Then that must be what haskept him."
"Who? Oh, Harry!" It took Flora a moment to remember she had beenexpecting Harry. She hoped Clara had not noticed it. Clara always hadtoo much the assumption that she was taking him only as thebest-looking, best-natured, safest bargain presented. "He will behere," she reassured, "but I wish he would hurry. His dinner will bespoiled; and, poor dear, he likes his dinner so much!"
The faint silver sound of the electric bell, a precipitate double peal,seemed to uphold this statement. The women faced each other in amoment's suspense, a moment of expectation, such as the advance columnmay feel at sight of a scout hotfoot from the field of battle. Therewere muffled movements in the hall, then light, even steps crossing thedrawing-room. Those light steps always suggested a slight frame, and, asalways, Flora was re-surprised at his bulk as now it appeared betweenthe parted curtains, the dull black and sharp white of his eveningclothes topped by his square, fresh-colored face.
YES, HE WAS MAGNIFICENT, SHE THOUGHT.]
"Well, Flora," he said, "I know I'm late," and took the hand she held tohim from where she sat. Her face danced with pleasure. Yes, he wasmagnificent, she thought, as he crossed with his light stride to Mrs.Britton's chair. He could even stand the harsh lines and lights ofevening clothes. He dominated their ugly convention with his height,his face so ruddy and fresh under the pale brown of his hair, his alert,assured, deft movement. His high good nature had the effect ofsweetening for him even Clara Britton's flavorless manner. The "We werespeaking of you," with which she saw him to his seat, had all the warmthof a smile, but a smile far in the background of Flora's immediatepossession. Indeed, Flora had seldom had so much to say to Harry as atthis moment of her excitement over what he had actually seen. For theevidence that he had seen something was vivid in his face. She had neverfound him so splendidly alive. She had never seen him, it came to her,quite like this before.
She shook the paper at him. "Tell us everything, instantly!"
He gaily acknowledged her right to make him thus stand and deliver. Heshot his hands into the air with the lightening vivacity that was in hima sort of wit. "Not guilty," he grinned at her.
"Harry, you know you were in it. The papers have you the most importantpersonage."
"Oh, not all that," he denied her allegation. "They had the whole lot ofus cooped up together for investigation for as much as two hours. Ithought I shouldn't have time to dress! I'm as hungry as a hawk!" Herolled it out with the full gusto with which he was by this time engagedon his first course.
"Poor dear," said Flora with cooing mock-sympathy, "and did they starveit? But would it mind telling us, now that it has its food, what istrue, and what was the gallant part it played this afternoon?"
"Well," he followed her whimsical lead, "the chief detective and I werethe star performers. I found the ring wasn't there, and he found hecouldn't find it."
"Don't you know any more than the paper?" Flora mourned.
"Considerably less--if I know the papers." He grinned with a fine flashof even teeth. "What do you want me to say?"
"Why, stupid, the adventures of Harry Cressy, Esquire. How did youfeel?"
"Thirsty."
"Oh, Harry!" She glanced about, as if for a missile to threaten himwith.
"Upon my word! But look here--wait a minute!" he arrived deliberately atwhat was required of him. "Never mind how I felt; but if you want toknow the way it happened--here's your Maple Room." He began a diagramwith forks on the cloth before him, and Clara, who had watched theirsparring from her point of vantage in the background, now leanedforward, as if at last they were getting to the point.
"This is the case, furthest from the door." He planted a salt-cellar inhis silver inclosure. "I come in very early, at half-past two, beforethe crowd; fail to meet you there." He made mischievous bows to rightand left. "I go out again. But first I see this ring."
"What was it like?" Flora demanded.
"Like?" Harry turned a speculative eye to the dull glow of thecandelabrum, as if between its points of flame he conjured up thevision of the vanished jewel. "Like a bit of an old gold heathen godcurled round himself, with his head, which was mostly two yellowsapphires, between his knees, and a big, blue stone on top. Soft, yellowgold, so fine you could almost dent it. And carved! Even through a glassevery line of it is right." He paused and ran the tip of his fingeralong the silver outline of his diagram, as if the mere memory of theprecious eyes of the little god had power to arrest all otherconsideration. "Well, there he was," he pulled himself up, "and I can'tremember when a thing of that sort has stayed by me so. I couldn't seemto get away from it. I dropped into the club and talked to Buller aboutit. He got keen, and I went back with him to have another look at it.Well, at the door Buller stops to speak to a chap going out--a crazyEnglishman he had picked up at the club. I go on. By this time there's acrowd inside, but I manage to get up to the case. And first I miss thespot altogether. And then I see the card with his name; and then,underneath I see the hole in the velvet where the god has been."
Flora gave out a little sigh of suspense, and even Clara showed a gleamof exci
tement. He looked from one to the other. "Then there werefireworks. Buller came up. The detective came up. Everybody came up.Nobody'd believe it. Lots of 'em thought they had seen it only a fewminutes before. But there was the hole in the velvet--and nothing moreto be found."
"But does no one know anything? Has no one an idea?" Clara almost pantedin her impatience.
"Not the ghost of a glimmer of a clue. There were upward of two hundredof us, and they let us out like a chain-gang, one by one. My number wasone hundred and ninety-three, and so far I can vouch there were nodiscoveries. It has vanished--sunk out of sight."
Flora sighed. "Oh, poor Bessie Chatworth!" It came out with a quickinconsequence that made Clara--even in her impatience--ever so faintlysmile. "It seems so cruel to have your things taken like that whenyou're dead, and can't help it," Flora rather lamely explained. "Ishould hate it."
Harry stared at her. "Oh, come. I guess you wouldn't care." His eyesrested for a moment on the fine flare of jewels presented by Flora'sclasped hands. "Besides,"--his voice dropped to a graver level--"thedeuce of it is--" he paused, they, both rather breathless, looking athim. He had the air of a man about to give information, and then the airof a man who has thought better of it. His voice consciously shook offits gravity. "Well, there'll be such a row kicked up, the probability isthe thing'll be returned and no questions asked. Purdie's keen--verykeen. He's responsible, the executor of the estate, you see."
But Clara Britton leveled her eyes at him, as if the thing he hadproduced was not at all the thing he had led up to. "Still, unless therewas enormous pressure somewhere--and in this case I don't see where--Ican't see what Mr. Purdie's keenness will do toward getting it back."
Harry played a little sulkily with the proposition, but he would notpick up the thread he had dropped. "I don't know that any one sees. Thequestion now is--who took it?"
"Why, one of us," said Flora flippantly. "Of course, it is all on theWestern Addition."
"Don't you believe it!" he answered her. "It's a confounded fineprofessional job. It takes more than sleight of hand--it takes genius, athing like that!"
Flora gave him a quick glance, but he had not spoken flippantly. He wasserious in his admiration. She didn't quite fancy his tone. "Why,Harry," she protested, "you talk as if you admired him!"
At this he laughed. "Well, how do you know I don't? But I can tell youone thing"--he dropped back into the same tone again--"there's no localcrook work in this affair. It should be some one big--some one--" Hefrowned straight before him. He shook his head and smiled. "There was achap in England, Farrell Wand."
The name floated in a little silence.
"He kept them guessing," Harry went on recalling it; "did some greatvanishing acts."
"You mean he could take things before their eyes without people knowingit?" Flora's eyes were wide beyond their wont.
"Something of that sort. I remember at one of the Embassy balls at St.James' he talked five minutes to Lady Tilton. Her emeralds were on whenhe began. She never saw 'em again."
Flora began to laugh. "He must have been attractive."
"Well," Harry conceded practically, "he knew his business."
"But you can't rely on those stories," Clara objected.
"You must this time," he shook his tawny head at her; "I give you myword; for I was there."
It seemed to Flora fairly preposterous that Harry could sit therelooking so matter-of-fact with such experiences behind him. Even Claralooked a little taken aback, but the effect was only to set her moresharply on.
"Then such a man could easily have taken the ring in the Maple Room thisafternoon? You think it might have been the man himself?"
His broad smile of appreciation enveloped her. "Oh, you have a scentlike a bloodhound. You haven't let go of that once since you started. Hecould have done it--oh, easy--but he went out eight, ten years ago."
"Died?" Flora's rising inflection was a lament.
"Went over the horizon--over the range. Believe he died in thecolonies."
"Oh," Flora sighed, "then I shall have to fancy he has come back again,just for the sake of the Chatworth ring. That wouldn't be too strange.It's all so strange I keep forgetting it is real. At least," she went onexplaining herself to Harry's smile, "it seems as if this must be goingon a long way off, as if it couldn't be so close to us, as if the ring Iwanted so much couldn't really be the one that has disappeared." Allthe while she felt Harry's smile enveloping her with an odd,half-protecting watchfulness, but at the close of her sentence hefrowned a little.
"Well, perhaps we can find another ring to take the place of it."
She felt that she had been stupid where she should have been mostdelicate. "But you don't understand," she protested, leaning far towardhim as if to coerce him with her generous warmth. "The Chatworth ringwas nothing but a fancy I had. I never thought of it for a moment as anengagement ring!"
By the light stir of silk she was aware that Clara had risen. She lookedup quickly to encounter that odd look. Clara's face was so smooth, sopolished, so unruffled, as to appear almost blank, but none the lessFlora saw it all in Clara's eye--a look that was not new to her. It wasthe same with which Clara had met the announcement of her engagement;the same look with which she had confronted every allusion to theapproaching marriage; the same with which she now surveyed the mentionof the engagement ring--a look neither approving nor dissenting, whosecalm, considerate speculation seemed to repudiate all interest positiveor negative in the approaching event except the one large question,"What is to become of me?" Many times Clara had held it up before her,not as a question, certainly not as an accusation; as a flat assertionof fact; but to-night Flora felt it so directly and imperatively aimedat her that it seemed this time to demand an audible response. AndClara's way of getting up, and standing there, with her gloves on,poised and expectant, as if she were only waiting an opportunity to takefarewell, took on, in the light of her look, the fantastic appearance ofa final departure. "I'm afraid," she mildly reminded them, "that Shimaannounced the carriage ten minutes ago."
"Oh, dear, I'm so sorry!" Flora's eyes wavered apologetically in thedirection of the waiting Japanese. Clara's flicker of amusement made herhate herself the moment it was out. She could always depend on herselfwhen she knew she was on exhibition. She could be sure of the rightthing if it were only large enough, but she was still caught at oddmoments by the trifles, the web of a certain social habit into which shehad slipped, full grown on the smooth surface of her father's millions.Clara's fleeting smile lit up these trifles to her now as enormous. Ittook advantage of her small deficit to point out to her more plainlythan ever to what large blunders she might be liable when she had cutloose from Clara's guiding, reminding, prompting genius, and chose toconfront the world without it.
To be sure, she was not to confront it alone; but, looking at Harry, itcame to her with a moment's qualm that she did not know him as well asshe had thought.