A Court of Inquiry Part 21

"Going to-morrow, you know. It doesn't matter where I hang up to-night.

Matters a good deal where Mrs. Lieutenant-Governor hangs up."

"But where----?"

"Anywhere. May sit up till morning, anyhow. Feel like it. Your show sort of goes to my head."

"My show? Yours! But why on earth don't you come down and----?"

"By and by, son. Say, send me some clean linen and I'll see that this room's in shape for the lady--girls all busy yet. Room swept yesterday.

My truck's packed. I'll have things ready in ten minutes."

Tom went downstairs feeling more than ever that his guest was an enigma.

But he was too busy to stop just then to think about it.

The hours went by. The guests talked and laughed, ate and promenaded.

They crowded the porch to watch the fireworks on the mountain; they swept over the smooth s.p.a.ce and the roadway in front of the Inn, looking up at it and remarking upon the quaint charm of it, the desirability of its location, its attractiveness as a resort. Tom heard one pretty girl planning a luncheon here next week; he heard a group of men talking about entertaining a visiting delegation of bankers up here at Boswell's out of the heat.

Everywhere people were asking, "Why haven't we known about this?" and to one and another Arthur Haskins, in Tom's hearing, was saying such things as, "Just opened up. Jolly place, isn't it? Going to be the most popular anywhere around. Deserves it, too."

"But is the table as good every day as it is to-night?" one skeptic inquired.

"Better." Haskins might have been an owner of the place, he was so prompt with his flattering statements. "First time I came up was with a crowd of fellows. We took them unawares, and they served a supper that made us smile all over. Their cook can't be beaten--and the service is first-cla.s.s."

It was over at last. But it was at a late hour that the first cars began to roll away down the hill, and later still when the last got under way.

They carried a gay company, and the final rockets, spurting from West Peak, flashed before the faces of people in the high good humour of those who have been successfully and uniquely entertained.

The Lieutenant-Governor and his wife had gone to the pink and white welcome of the bridal suite when Perkins at last came strolling downstairs. Only Haskins's party remained in the flag-hung lobby, the women sheathing themselves in veils, as their motor chugged at the porch steps.

Haskins turned as Perkins crossed the lobby. He stared an instant, then advanced with outstretched hand, smiling.

"Why, Mr. Parker," he said, "I didn't know you were here. Doctor Austin was asking me to-day if I knew where you were. He seems to have got you on his mind. He'll be delighted to see you. I'll call him--he's just outside. He's with our party."

With an expression half dismayed, half amused, Perkins looked after the Mercury Club's secretary as he darted to the outer door, where a big figure in a motoring coat was pacing up and down.

Tom, leaning over the office desk, looked at Perkins. But Haskins had called the man "Parker." What----?

The big figure in the motoring coat came hurriedly in at the doorway and grasped the hand of Tom's guest. "Parker," he cried, "what are you doing here? Are you responsible for this panjandrum to-night? Didn't I send you off for an absolute rest?"

"Been obeying directions strictly, Doctor. I've lain around up here till the gra.s.s sprouted under my feet. You haven't seen me here to-night, have you?"

"No, but the thing looks like one of your managing."

"No interest in this place whatever. Never heard of it till I stumbled on it." But Perkins's eyes were dancing.

"You're looking a lot better, anyhow. Come out here and meet Mrs.

Austin. I want to show her the toughest patient I ever had to pull loose from his work."

The two went out upon the porch. Tom gazed at young Haskins, as the latter looked at him with a smile.

"Did he engineer this part of the thing, too, Boswell?" questioned the young man, interestedly.

"Sure, he did. But who is he?"

"Didn't you know who he was? That's so--you've called him Perkins all along, but this is the first time I've seen him here, and I didn't put two and two together. His letters and 'phones about this supper came from in town somewhere. Why, he's Chris Parker, the biggest hotel man in the country. n.o.body like him--he'd make the deadest hotel in the loneliest hamlet pay in a month. Head of all the hotel organizations you can count. Most original chap in the world. Doctor Austin was telling me to-night about ordering him off for a rest because he'd put such a lot of nerve tension into his schemes he was on the edge of a bad breakdown.

Well, well, you're mighty lucky if you've got him backing you. No other man on earth could have got the Mercury Club up here to-night--a place they'd never heard of."

So Tom was thinking. He was still thinking it when the motor car shot away down the hill with its load, the physician calling back at his ex-patient: "Don't get going too soon again, Parker! So far, so good, but don't----"

The last words were lost in a final boom from West Peak.

Tom went slowly out upon the porch, feeling embarra.s.sed and uncertain.

How could he ever express his grat.i.tude to this mighty man of valour?

"Perkins" was sitting, as usual, astride the porch rail, the red light of his cigar glowing against the dark background of the mountains where the bonfires were dying to mere sparks. He looked around as Tom appeared, and grinned in a friendly way under the Chinese lanterns.

"Tough luck, to get caught at the last minute, eh?" he said.

"Mr. Per--Parker----" began Tom, and stopped.

The "biggest hotel man in the country" looked at the greenest young innkeeper, and there was satisfaction in his bright black eyes.

"Not any thanks, son. Should have croaked in one week more if I couldn't have worked off a few pounds of high pressure. This sort of thing to me's like a game to a gambler--as I told you. Had to keep incog., or I'd have had a dozen parties from town after me on one deal or another.

Thought I could put this little stunt through without giving myself away--but came downstairs five minutes too soon. Went off pretty well--eh? You'll have patronage after this, all right. No--no thanks, I said. I'm under obligations to you for trusting me to run the thing.

It's saved my life!"

Well, if it were all a game, Tom thought, as he watched Mr. Christopher Parker run lightly up the stairs, a few minutes later, it was certainly a wondrous friendly one.

_And Boswell's Inn was now known to be only sixteen short motor miles from town._

II

HONOUR AND THE GIRL

He lay back among the crimson pillows in his big chair, close beside the fire, with his eyes on the burning logs. A tablet and pen lay in his lap, and he had written a few paragraphs, but he was listening now to certain sounds which came from below stairs: voices, laughter, scurryings up and down the hall and staircase; then the slam of a heavy door, the tuneful ring of sleighbells in a rapid _decrescendo_ down the street, and absolute silence within the house. Three times in the last fifteen minutes before the door closed somebody had looked in upon the occupant of the big chair to say something like this:

"Oh, Jerry--sorry we couldn't spend Nan's last evening with you. Too bad this wretched Van Antwerp dance had to come to-night--Christmas Eve, too. Busy, aren't you, as usual? At work on those sketches of country life in winter? You clever boy--who but you could make so much out of so little? Anything we can do for you before we are off? Nan hates to go, since it's the very last evening of her visit. She thought we all ought to give up and stay with you, but we told her you disliked to be 'babied.' Well--good-night, old fellow. Don't write too late. You know the doctor thinks plenty of sleep is part of your cure."

That was the sort of thing they had been saying to him for a year now--a year. And he seemed no nearer health than when he had been sent home from his gloriously busy, abounding life in New York, where he was succeeding brilliantly, far beyond anybody's expectations--except those of the few knowing ones who had recognized the genius in him in his school and college days. But he had never given up. Invalided in body, his mind worked unceasingly; and a certain part of the literary work he had been doing he did still. He said it kept him from going off his head.

When the stillness of the usually noisy house had become oppressive he took up his tablet and pen again. He wrote a sentence or two--slowly; then another--more slowly; and drew an impatient line through them all.

He tossed the tablet over to a table near at hand and sat staring into the fire. Certain lines about his mouth grew deep.

A knock on his door roused him, and he realized that it had sounded before. "Come in," he called, and the door opened and closed behind him.

An unmistakable sound, as of the soft rustle of delicate skirts, swept across the floor and paused behind his chair. He drew himself up among his pillows, and strained his neck to look over his shoulder. A young face, full of life and colour, laughed down into his.