The Evil Shepherd Part 34

"There is some one in the lounge there to whom I wish to speak," she said. "Perhaps you won't mind if we finish later. The floor seems sticky tonight, or my feet are heavy."

Her partner made the best of it, as Lady Cynthia's partners, nowadays, generally had to. She even dispensed with his escort, and walked across the lounge of Claridge's alone. Sir Timothy rose to his feet. He had been sitting in a corner, half sheltered by a pillar, and had fancied himself unseen.

"What a relief!" she exclaimed. "Another turn and I should have fainted through sheer boredom."

"Yet you are quite wonderful dancing," he said. "I have been watching you for some time."

"It is one of my expiring efforts," she declared, sinking into the chair by his side. "You know whose party it is, of course? Old Lady Torrington's. Quite a boy and girl affair. Twenty-four of us had dinner in the worst corner of the room. I can hear the old lady ordering the dinner now. Charles with a long menu. She shakes her head and taps him on the wrist with her fan. 'Monsieur Charles, I am a poor woman. Give me what there is--a small, plain dinner--and charge me at your minimum.'

The dinner was very small and very plain, the champagne was horribly sweet. My partner talked of a new drill, his last innings for the Household Brigade, and a wonderful round of golf he played last Sunday week. I was turned on to dance with a man who asked me to marry him, a year ago, and I could feel him vibrating with grat.i.tude, as he looked at me, that I had refused. I suppose I am very haggard."

"Does that matter, nowadays?" Sir Timothy asked.

She shrugged her shoulders.

"I am afraid it does. The bone and the hank of hair stuff is played out.

The dairy-maid style is coming in. Plump little f.a.n.n.y Torrington had a great success to-night, in one of those simple white dresses, you know, which look like a sack with a hole cut in the top. What are you doing here by yourself?"

"I have an engagement in a few minutes," he explained. "My car is waiting now. I looked in at the club to dine, found my favourite table taken and nearly every man I ever disliked sidling up to tell me that he hears I am giving a wonderful party on Thursday. I decided not to dine there, after all, and Charles found me a corner here. I am going in five minutes."

"Where to?" she asked. "Can't I come with you?"

"I fear not," he answered. "I am going down in the East End."

"Adventuring?"

"More or less," he admitted.

Lady Cynthia became beautiful. She was always beautiful when she was not tired.

"Take me with you, please," she begged.

He shook his head.

"Not to be done!"

"Don't shake your head like that," she enjoined, with a little grimace.

"People will think I am trying to borrow money from you and that you are refusing me! Just take me with you some of the way. I shall scream if I go back into that dancing-room again."

Sir Timothy glanced at the clock.

"If there is any amus.e.m.e.nt to you in a rather dull drive eastwards--"

She was on her feet with the soft, graceful speed which had made her so much admired before her present listlessness had set in.

"I'll get my cloak," she said.

They drove along the Embankment, citywards. The heat of the city seemed to rise from the pavements. The wall of the Embankment was lined with people, leaning over to catch the languid breeze that crept up with the tide. They crossed the river and threaded their way through a nightmare of squalid streets, where half-dressed men and women hung from the top windows and were even to be seen upon the roof, struggling for air. The car at last pulled up at the corner of a long street.

"I am going down here," Sir Timothy announced. "I shall be gone perhaps an hour. The neighbourhood is not a fit one for you to be left alone in.

I shall have time to send you home. The car will be back here for me by the time I require it."

"Where are you going?" she asked curiously. "Why can't I come with you?"

"I am going where I cannot take you," was the firm reply. "I told you that before I started."

"I shall sit here and wait for you," she decided. "I rather like the neighbourhood. There is a gentleman in s.h.i.+rt-sleeves, leaning over the rail of the roof there, who has his eye on me. I believe I shall be a success here--which is more than I can say of a little further westwards."

Sir Timothy smiled slightly. He had exchanged his hat for a tweed cap, and had put on a long dustcoat.

"There is no gauge by which you may know the measure of your success,"

he said. "If there were--"

"If there were?" she asked, leaning a little forward and looking at him with a touch of the old brilliancy in her eyes.

"If there were," he said, with a little show of mock gallantry, "a very jealously-guarded secret might escape me. I think you will be quite all right here," he continued. "It is an open thoroughfare, and I see two policemen at the corner. Ha.s.sell, my chauffeur, too, is a reliable fellow. We will be back within the hour."

"We?" she repeated.

He indicated a man who had silently made his appearance during the conversation and was standing waiting on the sidewalk.

"Just a companion. I do not advise you to wait. If you insist--au revoir!"

Lady Cynthia leaned back in a corner of the car.

Through half-closed eyes she watched the two men on their way down the crowded thoroughfare--Sir Timothy tall, thin as a lath, yet with a certain elegance of bearing; the man at his side shorter, his hands thrust into the pockets of his coat, his manner one of subservience. She wondered languidly as to their errand in this unsavoury neighbourhood.

Then she closed her eyes altogether and wondered about many things.

Sir Timothy and his companion walked along the crowded, squalid street without speech. Presently they turned to the right and stopped in front of a public-house of some pretensions.

"This is the place?" Sir Timothy asked.

"Yes, sir!"

Both men entered. Sir Timothy made his way to the counter, his companion to a table near, where he took a seat and ordered a drink. Sir Timothy did the same. He was wedged in between a heterogeneous crowd of shabby, depressed but apparently not ill-natured men and women. A man in a flannel s.h.i.+rt and pair of shabby plaid trousers, which owed their precarious position to a pair of worn-out braces, turned a beery eye upon the newcomer.

"I'll 'ave one with you, guvnor," he said.

"You shall indeed," Sir Timothy a.s.sented.

"Strike me lucky but I've touched first time!" the man exclaimed. "I'll 'ave a double tot of whisky," he added, addressing the barman. "Will it run to it, guvnor?"

"Certainly," was the cordial reply, "and the same to your friends, if you will answer a question."

"Troop up, lads," the man shouted. "We've a toff 'ere. He ain't a 'tec--I know the cut of them. Out with the question."

"Serve every one who desires it with drinks," Sir Timothy directed the barman. "My question is easily answered. Is this the place which a man whom I understand they call Billy the Tanner frequents?"

The question appeared to produce an almost uncomfortable sensation. The enthusiasm for the free drinks, however, was only slightly damped, and a small forest of grimy hands was extended across the counter.