A Husband by Proxy Part 48

Garrison turned. Dorothy had risen quickly to her feet.

It was Theodore who stood in the doorway. He had come before Garrison's note could be delivered.

"Come in," said Garrison. "You're just the man I wish to see."

CHAPTER x.x.xVI

GARRISON'S VALUED FRIEND

Dorothy, catching up the precious will, had retreated from Theodore's advance. She made no effort to greet him, even with so much as a nod.

"I thought I might possibly find you both, and save a little time,"

said Robinson, striding in boldly, with no sign of removing his hat.

"Seems I hit it off about right."

"Charmingly," said Garrison. "Won't you sit down and take off your hat and stay a while?"

"You sound cheerful," said Theodore, drawing forth a chair and seating himself in comfort. "Perhaps you realize the game is up at last."

"Yes," agreed Garrison. "I think we do--but it's good of you to come and accept our notice, I'm sure."

"I didn't come to accept notice--I came to give it," said young Robinson self-confidently. "I've recently returned from Rockbeach, where I went to investigate your so-called marriage."

He had seen or heard nothing of Fairfax; that was obvious.

"Well?" said Garrison. "Proceed."

"That's about enough, ain't it?" said Theodore. "The marriage having been a fraud, what's the use of beating around the bush? If you care to fix it up on decent terms, I'll make no attempt to break the will when it comes up for probate, but otherwise I'll smash your case to splinters."

"You've put it quite clearly," said Garrison. "You are offering to compromise. Very generous. Let me have the floor for half a minute.

I've had your man Tuttle on your trail, when you thought you had him on mine, for some little time.

"I happen to know that you stole two necklaces in the keeping of Mrs.

Fairfax, on the night I met you first, and placed them on the neck of some bold young woman in the house next door, where, as you may remember, I saw you dressed as Mephistopheles. You----"

"I stole nothing of the kind!" interrupted Theodore. "She's got them----"

"Never mind that," Garrison interposed. "Let's go on. You installed a 'phone in your closet, at the house in Ninety-third Street, and on the night when you overheard an appointment I made with Mrs. Fairfax, you plugged in, overheard it, abducted Dorothy, under the influence of chloroform, stole her wedding-certificate, and delivered me over to the hands of a pair of hired a.s.sa.s.sins to have me murdered in Central Park.

"All this, with the robbery you hired Tuttle to commit at Branchville, ought to keep you reflecting in prison for some little time to come--if you think you'd like to go to court and air your grievances publicly."

Theodore was intensely white. Yet his nerve was not entirely destroyed.

"All this won't save your bacon, when I turn over all my affidavits,"

he said. "The property won't go to you when the will's before the court. The man who married you in Rockbeach was no justice of the peace, and you know it, Mr. Jerold Garrison. You a.s.sumed the name of Fairfax and hired a low-down political heeler, who hadn't been a justice for fully five years, to act the part and marry you to Dorothy.

"I've got the affidavits. If you think that's going to sound well in public--if you think it's pleasant to Dorothy now to know what a blackguard you are, why let's get on the job, both of us flinging the mud!"

Dorothy was pale and tense with new excitement.

"Wait a minute, please," said Garrison. "You say you have legal affidavits that the man who performed that marriage ceremony was a fraud, paid to act the part?--that the marriage was a sham--no marriage at all?"

"You know it wasn't!" Theodore shouted at him triumphantly, pulling legal-looking papers from his pocket. "And you were married to another wretched woman at the time. Let Dorothy try to get some joy out of that, if she can--and you, too!"

"Thank you, I've got mine," said Garrison quietly. "You're the very best friend I've seen for weeks. Fairfax, the man who has done this unspeakable wrong, is a lunatic, somewhere between here and up country, at this moment. He was here in town for a couple of days, and I thought you might have met him."

"You--what do you mean?" demanded Theodore.

"Just what I say," said Garrison. "I'll pay you five hundred dollars for your affidavits, if they're genuine, and you may be interested to know, by the way of news, that a later will by your step-uncle, John Hardy, has come to light, willing everything to Dorothy--without conditions. You wasted time by going out of town."

"A new will!--I refuse to believe it!" said Robinson, weak with apprehension.

Garrison drew open a drawer of his desk and took out a loaded revolver.

He knew his man and meant to take no risk. Crossing to Dorothy, he took the will from her hand.

"This is the doc.u.ment," he said. "Signed and witnessed in the best of legal form. And speaking of leaving town, let me suggest that you might avoid a somewhat unhealthily close confinement by making your residence a good long way from Manhattan."

Robinson aged before their very eyes. The ghastly pallor remained on his face. His shoulders lost something of their squareness. A muscle was twitching about his mouth. His eyes were dulled as he tried once more to meet the look of the man across the desk.

He knew he was beaten--and fear had come upon him, fear of the consequences earned by the things he had done. He had neither the will nor the means to renew the fight. Twice his lips parted, in his effort to speak, before he mastered his impotent rage and regained the power to think. He dropped his doc.u.ments weakly on the desk.

"I'll take your five hundred for the papers," he said. "How much time will you give me to go?"

"Two days," said Garrison. "I'll send you a check to-morrow morning."

Theodore turned to depart. Tuttle had returned. He knocked on the door and entered. Startled thus to find himself face to face with Robinson, he hesitated where he stood.

"So," said Theodore with one more gasp of anger, "you sold me out, did you, Tuttle? I might have expected it of you!"

Tuttle would have answered, and not without heat. Garrison interposed.

"It's all right, Tuttle," he said. "Robinson knows when he's done. I told him you were in a better camp. Any news of Mr. Fairfax for us all?"

"It's out in the papers," said Tuttle in reply, taking two copies of an evening edition from his pocket. "It seems a first wife of Mr. Fairfax has nabbed him, up at White Plains. But he's crazy, so she'll put him away."

For the first time in all the scene Dorothy spoke.

She merely said, "Thank Heaven!"

CHAPTER x.x.xVII

A HONEYMOON