Affinities and Other Stories Part 38

And Poppy put on her wedding ring.

"Now," said Daphne. "You won't pay this money as a matter of principle, and Viv won't, for the same reason. I won't because I haven't got it: Madge probably ditto. But it must be paid. Have you got it in the house?"

Poppy nodded.

"In notes?"

"Yes."

"Where?"

"In my jewel case."

"Very well. Now," said Daphne, "Madge and I are going to fix this thing up. You are not to know anything about it. You can swear to that later on, if the question comes up. Is there any place in your studio where you keep money?"

"In the table drawer."

"Very well. To-night before you go to bed put that money there. Early to-morrow morning send a maid to the drawer. If, by any chance, it is not there, send for the police."

Poppy was sitting up in bed, her eyes narrowed.

"The door of that wing is always locked. Viv has one key; I have the other."

"Never mind about the keys," said Daphne, loftily. "Now lie back and take a nap. Madge and I are going to look at the new picture. And I'm taking Madge home to dinner. I want her to go with me to the Edgware Road meeting to-night."

We did not look at the picture very long. Daphne's lips were shut tight, and I was feeling very queer. I knew what Daphne meant to do--to have the exact amount of Poppy's tax stolen from the table, and reported to the police. And later on in the day to have it sent to the tax office in Poppy's name. Poppy could swear she had not done it and point to the robbery. But by that time it would be credited to her name, and Viv would be free.

"It's a knot," said Daphne, running her fingers through her hair. "It's past un-tying. We have to cut it."

I know it sounds silly now and father has advised me never to tell mother, but it seemed the only thing at the time. Here were Viv and Poppy at an _impa.s.se_, as one may say, and things getting worse every day--Viv on a hunger strike, and Poppy's work waiting, and the vote, which was our natural solution, as far off as ever.

"I'll unlock a window in Viv's study," said Daphne, "and you can come back after midnight and crawl in. I'd do it, but I'm too fat. Once in, you've only to go up the little staircase to the studio, and get the money. The key's always in the side door. You can let yourself out."

"But I don't like it, Daphne."

"A broken window," said Daphne, "would look a lot better. More natural, you know. Here, hold a pillow."

She raised one of Viv's windows a little--we were in his study--and she put her arm outside, with a paper weight in her hand. A smart tap, and a pane fell in on my pillow. We listened but no servants had come running and the house next door was closed and shuttered.

Daphne is very clever. She unlocked the window, drew the shade as it had been before, and put the gla.s.s in a little heap on the floor. The area was outside, about five feet below.

"I could never do it," I protested. "I--I haven't your courage, Daffie.

Be a dear and do it yourself."

"Have to be at Edgware Road," said Daphne. "After all, Poppy's your friend. You made the match, didn't you?"

"But if I'm arrested----"

"You won't be. Jane Willoughby is going with me to-night. I'll lend her some of your clothes and a veil. She can make a speech in your name.

There's an alibi for you!"

Now it sounded all right at the time, but looking back, it seems queer.

For of what use is an alibi if the police have you? But one thing I would not do. I would not climb in the window. Daphne finally put me behind one of Poppy's canvases in the studio on a chair.

"They'll _think_ you broke in, which answers as well," she said. "And you can get the money and let yourself out the side door without any trouble."

"I sha'n't have any dinner," I reminded her. But she said she'd have something ready for me at home after I'd committed my crime, and went down the staircase whistling.

I shall never forget that awful night. I was most uncomfortable. There was a chance that the servants, locking up, would go into Viv's study and find the gla.s.s, although it was behind the curtain. But I'd seen Peters lock up before. He stood in a doorway and looked at each window, and if the curtains did not blow the house was safe. Luckily there was no wind that evening!

But I hated the whole thing. It got darker and darker and things scrambled in the walls. Poppy brought the money and put it in a drawer but of course I did not speak to her. She had to be able to swear she knew nothing. She kissed Viv's picture which she had painted, and trotted out again, sighing. Peters did not discover the broken window in the den below, because he never even went to look. And I felt very dreary, with no one really caring for me, and so far from America, and men--like Basil, for instance--acting so strange and uneasy.

Of course I could have taken the money and gone, as soon as it was dark.

But a policeman took up a position outside the area door, and waited for somebody. He and Peters had a few words about Poppy's maid, and the policeman said he would see her if he had to stay there all night. He stayed for hours.

I got the money and put it in my handbag, and because I did not wish to get it mixed with my own, I put it by itself in one of the pockets. Then I think I dozed for two or three hours, for when waking the street was quiet and the policeman had gone away. I was stiff, tired, and out of humor, and I started down the little staircase past Viv's study to the area door. As I reached the bottom, somebody tried the lock outside. I nearly fainted. I turned and ran up in the dark, and the door below opened. A man came in stealthily and went directly to Vivian's den. And just then a church clock struck two.

I was frightened. It seemed to me that as soon as he ransacked the room below, he'd come up to the studio. Perhaps he knew about the money.

Burglars seem to be able to _smell_ money. And the idea of being caught in the studio, as in a _cul de sac_, made me panicky. I clutched my bag, and slipped down the staircase, past Vivian's door. The burglar was there, going through Viv's desk, with a light turned on and a cap down over his eyes.

I forgot to be cautious then. I bolted for the door, flung it open--it was a patent lock, with a k.n.o.b inside--and stepped out into the night air and the policeman's arms.

"Easy a bit, hold girl!" he said. "Hi'm 'ere and you're 'ere. What's the 'urry?" He held me off and looked at me. Luckily I'd never seen him before. "Quick with your 'ands, ain't you! In you goes and in five minutes out you pops!"

"If you think I'm a burglar," I said haughtily, "I'm nothing of the sort. I'm----" It came over me, all at once, that I'd better not say I was a friend of Poppy's. You see she was being watched very closely. If I was searched, and the exact amount of her income tax in my pocket, it would look very queer, and the whole thing would be out, of course. "The burglar you followed is still in the house," I said. "He's in Mr.--in the study, just beyond that door."

"None of that, young woman," he said, sternly. "You'll just come along with me! 'Ouse-breaking it is; I watched you in and I watched you hout."

He took me by the arm, and I went along. There was nothing else to do. I tried to drop my hand bag as we went, but he heard it and picked it up.

I was rather dazed. The only thing I could think of was that for the sake of the Cause and Poppy I must not tell who I was. But I begged him to send an officer to Poppy's house, because there _was_ a burglar in it, probably after the idea of Vivian's new novel.

At the police station they telephoned Poppy, and here she made her terrible mistake. She said afterwards that if Daphne had only explained she'd have known. But she thought it was all a part of the plot, and she went back to her studio and said she'd lost the money out of a table drawer. She told how it was, in notes and gold, and, of course, they found the exact amount in my bag. She says that when they told her they had it and a young woman too, she almost swooned. She tried to find Basil, but he was not in his rooms and Daphne had been arrested at Edgware Road and was _incommunicado_!

Poppy's position was pitiable. She didn't know what to do. If she declared the plot and freed me, all London would laugh, and the Cause would suffer. If she did not declare the plot, I would get a prison sentence. I have drawn a poor picture of Poppy if you think I stood a chance against The Cause.

That is how things stood the next morning; Daphne, Vivian and I in jail, and Poppy in hysterics. Then a curious thing happened. The evening papers announced that Vivian had paid the tax for Poppy and was free.

Viv repudiated the payment--said he had not done it, and refused his liberty.

"Mr. Harcourt," said one paper, "is quite thin and shows the strain of his confinement. He is apparently cheerful, but very feeble, supporting himself by the back of a chair while he stood. His eyes flashed, however, as he stated that the Income Tax office could not legally accept the payment, as it was not his money. If any of his supporters had, in mistaken zeal, taken a collection for this purpose, he could only regret their action and refuse to profit by it."

At this time I had refused to talk and Poppy was in bed.

But on the next day the _Times_ published a letter, signed "Only a Man"

which stirred the whole thing up again. The writer declared that the tax had been paid with Vivian's own money, that the writer himself had stolen it out of a desk in Mr. Harcourt's house, that it had been sent by messenger to the proper authorities, and a receipt issued, which was appended. And that, in other words, while Mr. Harcourt was to be lauded for his principles, his refusal to accept his liberty was now absurd.

Also, the writer was under the impression that an innocent person was being held for his crime.

This story being investigated by the authorities and Poppy's recovering enough to come down and identify me, furiously indignant at my detention and outraged that I had not told my name and how I came to be leaving her house at that hour, which she said was because we had had a long talk about the next campaign, I was freed at last. It leaked out like this: