The Flying Mercury Part 8

"I was only joking," he hastily explained. "I'll come. It's only that you're so confoundedly reckless sometimes, Lestrange, and--But I'll come."

Lestrange gave his fine, glinting smile as he rose to salute Emily.

"All right. If you don't get down to the factory in time, I'll call for you," he promised.

V

There was a change in the Ffrench affairs, a lightening of the atmosphere, a vague quickening and stir of healthful cheer in the days that followed. The somber master of the house met it in Bailey's undisguised elation and pride when they discussed the successful business now taxing the factory's resources, met it yet again in Emily's pretty gaiety and content. But most strikingly was he confronted with an alteration in d.i.c.k.

It was only a week after his first morning ride with Lestrange, that d.i.c.k electrified the company at dinner, by turning down the gla.s.s at his plate.

"I've cut out claret, and that sort of thing," he announced. "It's bad for the nerves."

His three companions looked up in complete astonishment. It was Sat.u.r.day night and by ancient custom Bailey was dining at the house.

"What has happened to you? Have you been attending a revival meeting?"

the young man's uncle inquired with sarcasm.

"It's bad for the nerves," repeated d.i.c.k. "There isn't any reason why I shouldn't like to do anything other fellows do. Les--that is, none of the men who drive cars ever touch that stuff, and look at their nerve."

Mr. Ffrench contemplated him with the irritation usually produced by the display of ostentatious virtue, but found no comment. Emily gazed at the table, her red mouth curving in spite of all effort at seriousness.

"You're right, Mr. d.i.c.k," said Bailey dryly. "Stick to it."

And d.i.c.k stuck, without as much as a single lapse. Ffrenchwood saw comparatively little of him, as time went on, the village and factory much. He lost some weight, and acquired a coat of reddish tan.

Emily watched and admired in silence. She had not seen Lestrange again, but it seemed to her that his influence overlay all the life of both house and factory. Sometimes this showed so plainly that she believed Mr. Ffrench must see, must feel the silent force at work. But either he did not see or chose to ignore. And d.i.c.k was incautious.

"I'm going to buy one of our roadsters myself," he stated one day.

"Can I have it at cost?"

Mr. Ffrench felt for his pince-nez.

"You? Why do you not use the limousine?"

"Because I don't want to go around in a box driven by a chauffeur. I want a cla.s.sy car to run myself. I've been driving some of the stripped cars, lately, and I like it."

"I will give you a car, if you want one," answered his uncle, quite kindly. "Go select any you prefer."

"Thank you," d.i.c.k sat up, beaming. "But I'll have to wait my turn, we've orders ahead now. Lestrange says I've no right to come in and make some other fellow wait."

Mr. Ffrench slowly stiffened.

"We do not require lessons in ethics from this Lestrange," was the cold rebuke. "I shall telephone Bailey to send up your car at once."

Rupert brought the sixty-horse-power roadster to the door, three hours later. And Emily appreciated that Lestrange was discreet as well as compelling, when she found the black-eyed young mechanician was detailed to accompany d.i.c.k's maiden trips; which duty was fulfilled, incidentally, with the fine tact of a Richelieu.

In May there was a still greater accession of work at the factory. In addition, the first of June was to open with a twenty-four hour race at the Beach track, and Lestrange was entered for it. Excitement was in the air; d.i.c.k came in the house only to eat and sleep.

The day before the race, Mr. Ffrench walked into the room where his niece was reading.

"I want to see Bailey," he said briefly. "Do you wish to drive me down to the factory, or shall I have Anderson bring around the limousine?"

"Please let us drive," she exclaimed, rising with alacrity. "I have not been to the factory for months."

"Very good. You are looking well, Emily, of late."

Surprised, a soft color swept the face she turned to him.

"I am well. Dear, I think we are all better this spring."

"Perhaps," said Ethan Ffrench. His bitter gray eyes pa.s.sed deliberately over the large room with all its traces of a family life extending back to pre-Colonial times, but he said no more.

It was an exquisite morning, too virginal for June, too richly warm for May. When the two exchanged the sunny road for the factory office, a north room none too light, it was a moment before their dazzled eyes perceived no one was present. This was Bailey's private office, and its owner had pa.s.sed into the room beyond.

"I will wait," conceded Mr. Ffrench, dismissing the boy who had ushered them in. "Sit down, Emily; Bailey will return directly, no doubt."

But Emily had already sat down, for she knew the voice speaking beyond the half-open door, and that the long-prevented meeting was now imminent.

"It will not do," Lestrange was stating definitely. "It should be reinforced."

"It's always been strong enough," Bailey's slower tones objected.

"For years. It's not a thing likely to break."

"Not likely to break? Look at last year's record, Mr. Bailey, and tell me that. A broken steering-knuckle killed Brook in Indiana, another sent Little to the hospital in Ma.s.sachusetts, the same thing wrecked the leader at the last Beach race and dashed him through the fence. Do you know what it means to the driver of a machine hurling itself along the narrow verge of destruction, when the steering-wheel suddenly turns useless in his grasp? Can you feel the sick helplessness, the confronting of death, the compressed second before the crash? Is it worth while to risk it for a bit of costless steel?"

The clear realism of the picture forced a pause, filled by the dull roar and throb through the machinery-crowded building.

"They were not our cars that broke, any of them," Bailey insisted.

"Not our cars, no. But the steering-knuckle of my own machine broke under my hands last March, on the road, and if I had been on a curve instead of a straight stretch there would have been a wreck. As it was, I brought her to a stop in the ditch. There is no other thing that may not leave a fighting chance after it breaks, but this leaves absolutely none. I know, you both know, that the steering-wheel is the only weapon in the driver's grasp. If it fails him, he goes out and his mechanician with him."

Emily paled, shrinking. She remembered the road under the maples and Lestrange's laughing face as he leaned breathless across his useless wheel. That was what it had meant, then, the lightly treated episode!

"You'd better fix it like he wants it," advised d.i.c.k's disturbed tones. "Remember, he's got to drive the car Friday and Sat.u.r.day, Bailey, not us."

"It's not alone for my racer I'm speaking, but for every car that leaves the shop," Lestrange caught him up. "I'm not flinching; I've driven the car before and I will again. It may hold for ever, that part, but I've tested it and it's a weak point--take the warning for what it's worth."

There was a movement as if he rose with the last word. Emily laid her hand on the arm of the chair, turning her excited dark eyes on her uncle. Surely if ever Mr. Ffrench was to meet his manager, this was the moment; when Lestrange's ringing argument was still in their ears, his splendid force of earnestness still vibrant in the atmosphere. And suddenly she wanted them to meet, pa.s.sionately wanted Ethan Ffrench's liking for this man.

"Uncle," she began. "Uncle--"

But it was not Lestrange's light step that halted on the threshold.

"Why, I didn't know--" exclaimed Bailey. "Excuse me, Mr. Ffrench, they didn't tell me you were down."