The Destroying Angel Part 47

"But it's a lie."

"Well--?"

"I've just remembered: Max was at the Fiske place, urging her to return, the night before you caught Drummond at the bungalow. I saw them, walking up and down in front of the cottage, arguing earnestly: I could tell by her bearing she was refusing whatever he proposed. But I didn't know her then, and naturally I never connected Max with the fellow I saw, disguised in a motoring coat and cap. Neither of 'em had any place in my thoughts that night."

Ember uttered a thoughtful "Oh?" adding: "Did you find out at all definitely when Max is expected back?"

"Two or three weeks now, they say. He's got his winter productions to get under way. As a matter of fact, it looks to me as if he must be neglecting 'em strangely; it's my impression that the late summer is a producing manager's busiest time."

"Max runs himself by his own original code, I'm afraid. The chances are he's trying to raise money out on the Coast. No money, no productions--in other words."

"I shouldn't wonder."

"But there may be something in what you say--suspect, that is. If I agree to keep an eye on him, will you promise to give me a free hand?"

"Meaning--?"

"Keep out of Max's way: don't risk a wrangle with him."

"Why the devil should I be afraid of Max?"

"I know of no reason--as yet. But I prefer to work unhampered by the indiscretions of my princ.i.p.als."

"Oh--go ahead--to blazes--as far as you like."

"Thanks," Ember dryly wound up the conference; "but these pa.s.sing flirtations with your present-day temper leave me with no hankering for greater warmth...."

Days ran stolidly on into weeks, and these into a month. Nothing happened. Max did not return; the whispered rumour played wild-fire in theatrical circles that the eccentric manager had encountered financial difficulties insuperable. The billboards flanking the entrance to the Theatre Max continued to display posters announcing the reopening early in September with a musical comedy by Tynan Dodd; but the comedy was not even in rehearsal by September fifteenth.

Ember went darkly about his various businesses, taciturn--even a trace more than ever reserved in his communication with Whitaker--preoccupied, but constant in his endeavour to enhearten the desponding husband. He refused to hazard any surmises whatever until the return of Max or the reappearance of Mary Whitaker.

She made no sign. Now and then Whitaker would lose patience and write to her: desperate letters, fond and endearing, pa.s.sionate and insistent, wistful and pleading, strung upon a single theme. Despatched under the address of her town house, they vanished from his ken as mysteriously and completely as she herself had vanished. He received not a line of acknowledgment.

Day by day he made up his mind finally and definitely to give it up, to make an end of waiting, to accept the harsh cruelty of her treatment of him as an absolute definition of her wishes--to sever his renewed life in New York and return once and for all to the Antipodes. And day by day he paltered, doubted, put off going to the steams.h.i.+p office to engage pa.s.sage. The memory of that last day on the lonely island would not down. Surely she dared not deny the self she had then revealed to him!

Surely she must be desperately ill and unable to write, rather than ignoring him so heartlessly and intentionally. Surely the morrow would bring word of her!

Sometimes, fretted to a frenzy, he sought out Ember and made wild and unreasonable demands upon him. These failing of any effect other than the resigned retort, "I am a detective, not a miracle-monger," he would fly into desperate, gnawing, black rages that made Ember fear for his sanity and self-control and caused him to be haunted by that gentleman for hours--once or twice for days--until he resumed his normal poise of a sober and civilized man. He was, however, not often aware of this sedulous espionage.

September waned and October dawned in grateful coolness: an exquisite month of crisp nights and enlivening days, of mellowing sunlight and early gloamings tenderly coloured. Country houses were closed and theatres reopened. Fifth Avenue after four in the afternoon became thronged with an ever thickening army--horse, foot and motor-car.

Several main-travelled thoroughfares were promptly torn to pieces and set up on end by munic.i.p.al authorities with a keen eye for the discomfort of the public. A fresh electric sign blazed on Broadway every evening, and from Thirty-fourth Street to Columbus Circle the first nights crackled, detonated, sputtered and fizzled like a string of cheap Chinese firecrackers. One after another the most exorbitant restaurants advanced their prices and decreased their portions to the prompt and extraordinary multiplication of their clientele: restaurant French for a species of citizen whose birth-rate is said to be steadfast to the ratio of sixty to the hour. Wall Street wailed loudly of its poverty and hurled bitter anathemas at the President, the business interest of the country continued to suffer excruciating agonies, and the proprietors of leading hotels continued to add odd thousands of acres to their game preserves.

Then suddenly the town blossomed overnight with huge eight-sheet posters on every available h.o.a.rding, blazoning the news:

JULES MAX begs to announce the return of SARA LAW in a new Comedy ent.i.tled FAITH by JULES MAX Theatre MAX--Friday October 15th

But Whitaker had the information before he saw the broad-sides in the streets. The morning paper propped up on his breakfast table contained the illuminating note under the caption, "News of Plays and Players":

"Jules Max has sprung another and perhaps his greatest surprise on the theatre-going public of this city. In the face of the rumor that he was in dire financial straits and would make no productions whatever this year, the astute manager has been out of town for two months secretly rehearsing the new comedy ent.i.tled 'Faith' of which he is the author and in which Sara Law will return finally to the stage.

"Additional interest attaches to this announcement in view of the fact that Miss Law has authorized the publication of her intention never again to retire from the stage. Miss Law is said to have expressed herself as follows: 'It is my dearest wish to die in harness. I have come to realize that a great artiste has no duty greater than her duty to her art. I dedicate my life and artistry to the American Public.'

"The opening performance of 'Faith' will take place at the Theatre Max to-morrow evening, Friday, October 15. The sale of seats opens at the box-office this morning. Despite the short notice, a b.u.mper house is confidently expected to welcome back this justly popular and most charming American actress in the first play of which Mr.

Max has confessed being the author."

Whitaker glanced up incredulously at the date-line of the sheet. Short notice, indeed: the date was Thursday, October fourteenth. Max had planned his game and had played his cards cunningly, in withholding this announcement until the last moment. So much was very clear to him whose eyes had wit to read between those lines of trite press-agent phraseology.

After a pause Whitaker rose and began to walk the length of the room, hands in his pockets, head bowed in thought. He was telling himself that he was not greatly surprised, after all; he was wondering at his coolness; and he was conning over, with a grim, sardonic kink in his twisted smile, the needless precautions taken by the dapper little manager in his fear of Whitaker's righteous wrath. For Whitaker had no intention of interfering in any way. He conceived it a possibility that his conge might have been more kindly given him, but ... he had received it, and he was not slow to recognize it as absolute and without appeal.

The thing was finished. The play was over, so far as concerned his part therein. He had no doubt played it poorly; but at least his exit would not lack a certain quality of dignity. Whitaker promised himself that.

He thought it really astonis.h.i.+ng, his coolness. He a.n.a.lyzed his psychological processes with a growing wonder and with as much, if less definite, resentment. He would not have thought it credible of himself.

Search as he would, he could discover no rankling indignation, no smouldering rage threatening to flame at the least breath of provocation, not even what he might have most confidently looked forward to--the sickening writhings of self-love mortally wounded and impotent to avenge itself: nothing but some self-contempt, that he had allowed himself to be so carried away by infatuation for an ign.o.ble woman, and a cynic humour that made it possible for him to derive a certain satisfaction from contemplating the completeness of this final revelation of herself.

However, he had more important things to claim his attention than the spectacle of a degraded soul making public show of its dishonour.

He halted by the window to look out. Over the withered tree-tops of Bryant Square, set against the rich turquoise of that late autumnal sky, a gigantic sign-board heralded the news of perfidy to an unperceptive world that bustled on, heedless of Jules Max, ignorant (largely) of the existence of Hugh Whitaker, unconcerned with Sara Law save as she employed herself for its amus.e.m.e.nt.

After all, the truth was secret and like to stay so, jealously husbanded in four bosoms at most. Max would guard it as he would a system for winning at roulette; Mary Whitaker might well be trusted never to declare herself; Ember was as secret as the grave....

Returning to the breakfast table, he took up the paper, turned to the s.h.i.+pping news and ran his eye down the list of scheduled sailings: nothing for Friday; his pick of half a dozen boats listed to sail Sat.u.r.day.

The telephone enabled him to make a hasty reservation on the biggest and fastest of them all.

He had just concluded that business and was waiting with his hand on the receiver to call up Ember and announce his departure, when the door-bell interrupted. Expecting the waiter to remove the breakfast things, he went to the door, threw it open, and turned back instantly to the telephone. As his fingers closed round the receiver a second time, he looked round and saw his wife....

His hand fell to his side. Otherwise he did not move. But his glance was that of one incuriously comprehending the existence of a stranger.

The woman met it fairly and fearlessly, with her head high and her lips touched with a trace of her shadowy, illegible smile. She was dressed for walking, very prettily and perfectly. There were roses in her cheeks: a healthful glow distinguishable even in the tempered light of the hallway. Her self-possession was faultless.

After a moment she inclined her head slightly. "The hall-boys said you were busy on the telephone. I insisted on coming directly up. I wish very much to see you for a few moments. Do you mind?"

"By no means," he said, a little stiffly but quite calmly. "If you will be good enough to come in--"

He stood against the wall to let her pa.s.s. For a breath she was too close to him: he felt his pulses quicken faintly to the delicate and indefinite perfume of her person. But it was over in an instant: she had pa.s.sed into the living-room. He followed, grave, collected, aloof.

"I had to come this morning," she explained, turning. "This afternoon we have a rehearsal...."

He bowed an acknowledgment. "Won't you sit down?"

"Thank you." Seated, she subjected him to a quick, open appraisal, disarming in its nave honesty.

"Hugh ... aren't you a bit thinner?"

"I believe so." He had a match for that impertinence: "But you, I see, have come off without a blemish."

"I am very well," she admitted, unperturbed. Her glance embraced the room. "You're very comfortable here."

"I have been."

"I hope that doesn't mean I'm in the way."