Anna the Adventuress Part 18

He handed her a cheque for thirty-one pounds, ten s.h.i.+llings, and read the agreement through to her. Anna took up the pen, and signed, after a moment's hesitation,

A. PELLISSIER.

"I will send you a copy," Mr. Earles said, rubbing his hands together, "by post. Now, will you do me the honour of lunching with me, Miss Pellissier?"

Anna hesitated.

"Perhaps," he queried, "you wish to avoid being seen about with any one--er--connected with the profession, under present circ.u.mstances.

If so, do not hesitate to tell me. Be frank, I beg you, Miss Pellissier. I am already too much flattered that you should have given me your confidence."

"You are very good, Mr. Earles," Anna said. "I think, perhaps if you will excuse me, that we will defer the luncheon."

"Just as you wish," Mr. Earles declared good-humouredly, "but I shall not let you go without drinking a gla.s.s of wine to our success."

He plunged into one of his drawers, and brought up a small gold-foiled bottle. The cork came out with a loud pop, and Anna could not help wondering how it must sound to the patient little crowd outside. She drank her gla.s.s of wine, however, and clanked gla.s.ses good-naturedly with Mr. Earles.

"You must leave me your address if you please," he said, as she rose to go.

She wrote it down. He looked at it with uplifted eyebrows, but made no remark.

"I shall probably want you to come down to the 'Unusual' to-morrow morning," he said. "Bring any new songs you may have."

Anna nodded, and Mr. Earles attended her obsequiously to the door. She descended the stairs, and found herself at last in the street--alone.

It was a brief solitude, however. A young man, who had been spending the last hour walking up and down on the opposite side of the way, came quickly over to her. She looked up, and recognized Mr. Brendon.

_Chapter XIII_

"HE WILL NOT FORGET!"

The external changes in Brendon following on his alteration of fortune were sufficiently noticeable. From head to foot he was attired in the fas.h.i.+onable garb of the young man of the moment. Not only that, but he carried himself erect--the slight slouch which had bent his shoulders had altogether disappeared. He came to her at once, and turning, walked by her side.

"Now I should like to know," she said, looking at him with a quiet smile, "what you are doing here? It is not a particularly inspiring neighbourhood for walking about by yourself."

"I plead guilty, Miss Pellissier," he answered at once. "I saw you go into that place, and I have been waiting for you ever since."

"I am not sure whether I feel inclined to scold or thank you," she declared. "I think as I feel in a good humour it must be the latter."

He faced her doggedly.

"Miss Pellissier," he said, "I am going to take a liberty."

"You alarm me," she murmured, smiling.

"Don't think that I have been playing the spy upon you," he continued.

"Neither Sydney nor I would think of such a thing. But we can't help noticing. You have been going out every morning, and coming home late--tired out--too tired to come down to dinner. Forgive me, but you have been looking, have you not, for some employment?"

"Quite true!" she answered. "I have found out at last what a useless person I am--from a utilitarian point of view. It has been very humiliating."

"And that, I suppose," he said, waving his stick towards Mr. Earles'

office, "was your last resource."

"It certainly was," she admitted. "I changed my last s.h.i.+lling yesterday."

He was silent for a moment or two. His lips were tight drawn. His eyes flashed as he turned towards her.

"Do you think that it is kind of you, Miss Pellissier," he said, almost roughly, "to ignore your friends so? In your heart you know quite well that you could pay Sydney or me no greater compliment than to give us just a little of your confidence. We know London, and you are a stranger here. Surely our advice would have been worth having, at any rate. You might have spared yourself many useless journeys and disappointments, and us a good deal of anxiety. Instead, you are willing to go to a place like that where you ought not to be allowed to think of showing yourself."

"Why not?" she asked quietly.

"The very question shows your ignorance," he declared. "You know nothing about the stage. You haven't an idea what the sort of employment you could get there would be like, the sort of people you would be mixed up with. It is positively hateful to think of it."

She laid her fingers for a moment upon his arm.

"Mr. Brendon," she said, "if I could ask for advice, or borrow money from any one, I would from you--there! But I cannot. I never could. I suppose I ought to have been a man. You see, I have had to look after myself so long that I have developed a terrible b.u.mp of independence."

"Such independence," he answered quickly, "is a vice. You see to what it has brought you. You are going to accept a post as chorus girl, or super, or something of that sort."

"You do not flatter me," she laughed.

"I am too much in earnest," he answered, "to be able to take this matter lightly."

"I am rebuked," she declared. "I suppose my levity is incorrigible.

But seriously, things are not so bad as you think."

He groaned.

"They never seem so at first!" he said.

"You do not quite understand," she said gently. "I will tell you the truth. It is true that I have accepted an engagement from Mr. Earles, but it is a good one. I am not going to be a chorus girl, or even a super. I have never told you so, or Sydney, but I can sing--rather well. When my father died, and we were left alone in Jersey, I was quite a long time deciding whether I would go in for singing professionally or try painting. I made a wrong choice, it seems--but my voice remains."

"You are really going on the stage, then?" he said slowly.

"In a sense--yes."

Brendon went very pale.

"Miss Pellissier," he said, "don't!"

"Why not?" she asked, smiling. "I must live, you know."

"I haven't told any one the amount," he went on. "It sounds too ridiculous. But I have two hundred thousand pounds. Will you marry me?"

Anna looked at him in blank amazement. Then she burst into a peal of laughter.

"My dear boy," she exclaimed. "How ridiculous! Fancy you with all that money! For heaven's sake, though, do not go about playing the Don Quixote like this. It doesn't matter with me, but there are at least a dozen young women in Mr. Earles' waiting-room who would march you straight off to a registrar's office."