The Paliser case Part 32

Past the servant, Ca.s.sy forced her way through the vestibule, into the sitting-room, where the usual gloom abided, but where, unusually, were a smell of camphor, two overcoats, two trunks and a bag.

Ca.s.sy, putting down the bundle, exclaimed at them. "He is not leaving town?"

"Yes, mem, to-morrow morning, for Mineola." He spoke grudgingly, looking as he spoke like a little old mule at bay.

Ca.s.sy, noticing that, said: "See here, I don't mean to bully you, but it is most important that I should see Mr. Lennox--important for him, do you hear?"

"I hear you, mem, but I don't know where he is."

"Then find out. There must be a telephone."

Harris scratched his head but otherwise he did nothing.

"Come!" Ca.s.sy told him. "Hurry!"

Harris s.h.i.+fted. "I don't know as how he'd like it. He's been that upset these last few days. I----" He hesitated. Visibly an idea had visited him with which he was grappling. "You're not from Miss Austen, now, are you?"

Ca.s.sy caught at it. To confirm it would be fanciful. To deny it would be extravagant. Choosing an in-between for the benefit of this servant whom she knew to be English, she produced it.

"I am the Viscountess of Casa-Evora."

Harris wiped his mouth. A viscountess who had come only the other day with a bundle, and who now forced her way in with another bundle, did not coincide with such knowledge as he had of the n.o.bility. But she was certainly overbearing enough to be anybody.

He turned. "Very good, your ladys.h.i.+p, I'll telephone."

Don't ladys.h.i.+p me, Ca.s.sy was about to reply, but judging that impolitic, she sat down.

On the train in she had debated whether she would go first to Harlem or to Lennox and in either case what afterward she should do. She had a few dollars which her father would need. The thought of these a.s.sets reminded her that in changing her clothes she had omitted to change back into her own stockings. Well, when she changed again she would return the pair which she had on and, as she determined on that, she saw Paliser's face as she had seen it when she threw the vase. That relapse into the primitive shamed her. She had behaved like a fish-wife. But though she regretted the violence, she regretted even more deeply the vase. The destruction of art is so despicably Hun! For moxa, she evoked the Grantly masquerade.

The entire lack of art in that seemed to her incongruous with the surface Paliser whom she had known. But had she even known the surface which itself was a mask? Yet behind the mask was an intelligence which at least was not ordinary, yet which, none the less, had descended to that! She could not understand it. She could not understand, what some one later explained to her, that a high order of intellect does not of itself prevent a man from soiling it and, with it, himself and his hands. The explanation came later, when other matters were occupying her and when Paliser, headlined in the papers, was dead.

Meanwhile the train had landed her in the Grand Central and she decided to go to Lennox first.

Now as she sat in his sitting-room where, for all she knew, she might have to sit for hours, it comforted her to think that she had so decided. If she had put it off until the morrow, Lennox would, by then, have gone to the aviation-field, where he might be killed before she could patch things up. At thought of that, she wondered whether he might not stay out undiscoverably all night and send for his things to be fetched to the station.

But in that case, Ca.s.sy promptly reflected, I'll go to her, pull her out of bed, drag her there--and no thanks either. I didn't do it for you, I did it for him. He's too good for you.

On the mantel, a clock struck, while thinly, through a lateral entrance, Harris emerged.

"The hall-porter at Mr. Lennox' club says he's just gone out with Mr.

Jones. Yes, ma'am."

"Mr. Jones! What Mr. Jones? The novelist?"

"I'm thinking so, ma'am. A very haffable gentleman."

"Try to get him. Ask if Mr. Lennox, is there. Or, no, I'll do the talking."

Then presently she was doing it, collaborating rather in the dialogue that ensued.

"Mr. Jones?"

"Yes, darling."

Ca.s.sy, swallowing it, resumed: "Mr. Jones, forgive a stranger for intruding, I----"

"Beautiful voice, forgive me. Triple brute that I am, I thought it was my aunt."

"Then let me introduce myself. This is Miss Cara."

"Casta diva! You do me infinite honour!"

"Mr. Jones, I must see Mr. Lennox. It is a matter of life and death."

"Lennox is engaged with death now."

"What!"

"He is preparing for the great adventure. At this moment he is making his will. Miss Cara?"

"Yes?"

"Lennox takes even serious matters gravely."

"But he is with you?"

"In my workshop and at your service as I am."

"You will let me come there?"

"Enthusiastically and yet with all humility for I have no red carpet to run down the stair."

"Then hold on to him, please."

Ouf! sighed Ca.s.sy, as she hung it up. Another man who might be Mrs.

Yallum's husband! She took the telephone-book, found and memorised the address and turned to Harris. "Thank you very much. Will you mind giving me that package?"

"Beg pardon, ma'am," the little man said, as he opened the door for her.

"There's nothing more amiss, is there?"

Ca.s.sy covered him with her lovely eyes. "When Mr. Lennox comes back here, he may tell you to unpack."

"Then may G.o.d bless your ladys.h.i.+p."

Ca.s.sy went on.

At Jones' shop, a floor in a reconstructed private house, a man who had the air of performing a feat, showed her into a room that was summarily, but not spartanly, furnished. On one side was a bookcase supported by caryatides. Above, hung a stretch of silk on which was a flight of dragons. Above the silk was an ivory mask. Fronting the bookcase was the biggest table that Ca.s.sy had ever seen.