Vision House Part 4

It was after two o'clock when he arrived at the Hotel Belmore, where he had stayed five years ago on the eve of sailing for England with his invention. He was hungry, and aimed straight for the restaurant; but it appeared that the manager had a.s.signed to the only American V.C. a suite with a private salon as well as bedroom and bath. A special luncheon for the Major would be served there, with the compliments of the directors.

Garth could only accept with dazed thanks; and feeling like a newly-awakened "Christopher Sly," he entered a room decorated with flowers and flags. As he devoured delicious food, the New York evening papers were handed to him by a smiling waiter who had read the headings.

Yes, there he was, served up hot to the public with sauce piquante! Lord knew how the fellows had got his photograph! Must be from some snapshot caught by a _Daily Mirror_ man in London, and sent over to New York for use to-day. What a great lout he looked!... And--gee! if there wasn't old Severance in another photo down under his. Wouldn't his earls.h.i.+p be wild?

Garth chuckled, and then suddenly choked. A gulp of the champagne, in which he'd been pressed to drink to his own health, had gone the wrong way. _Her_ picture had caught his eye, in an adjoining column of the _Evening World_, next to the portrait of Severance. "Our Own Marise Comes Home," was the legend in big black type above. Oh! She was American, not Englis.h.!.+ Must be an heiress if that chap intended to marry her. Severance was supposed to be poor, for a peer; had been a pauper till the death of an uncle and three cousins in the war gave him the t.i.tle.... What? an actress! Then, it wasn't true about her and Severance--couldn't be true! That glorious girl was free! And, to judge from the way New York was treating him, John Garth, V.C., was Somebody, too. He was put above Miss Sorel's pal Severance in the papers--every one of the papers!

Eagerly Garth read about "The Spring Song" and "Dolores," the great emotional part Marise Sorel had created, and was now to revive in New York. It did not directly interest him that the whole of the old cast would support the star, but it did matter that this fact reduced the need for rehearsals to a minimum. The play would open at Belloc's Theatre next week, and it was announced that for many days the house had been entirely sold out. There wasn't a seat to be had for love or money.

"But I bet I get one for both!" Garth said to himself. "A seat for every performance." Also he thought of something else he would do. The thing might not help him to make Miss Sorel's acquaintance, but it would satisfy his soul. And it would be worth all his back pay as a British officer if he could carry out the plan.

CHAPTER V

ANONYMOUS

"Oh, Mums, I'm so happy!" purred Marise, as she sank into a chair, physically spent, spiritually elated.

It was in her dressing-room at the theatre--the marvellous dressing-room which Belloc had engaged Herte to re-decorate as a tribute and a surprise to the star. The stage curtain had rung down on the last act, after eighteen recalls and a little laughing, hysterical speech from Dolores. Sheridan and Belloc had both kissed her; and everyone had cried, and her mother had torn her from clinging arms, to shut the dressing-room door upon a dozen faces.

Sudden peace followed clamour. There was not a sound. The air was sweet with the breath of a thousand flowers. Celine moved softly about, with stolid face. Mrs. Sorel beamed.

"Well, yes, dear; I do think you may be happy now," she vouchsafed.

Marise caught the "second meaning"--the little more than met the ear--hiding in her mother's words. Mums hadn't been easy about Severance. She'd thought he had "something on his mind." She had even been afraid that, although he was following the girl he loved from London to New York, he didn't mean marriage. She had feared, and almost expected, that he might break to Marise the news of his engagement to another woman--a very different woman from the pretty actress. But that time of Mum's depression had been on s.h.i.+pboard. Severance had "broken"

no news. He had been more devoted than ever before. He had curtailed his official business in Was.h.i.+ngton, and rushed back to New York for the first night of "The Song," so now Mrs. Sorel began to hope that for once her "instinct" had been a deceiving Voice.

"Yes, happy about everything," she added, so that Marise might understand without the maid sharing her enlightenment.

"I am, just that!" agreed Marise, stealing time to breathe before Celine should take off Dolores' "bedroom-scene" dress.

She looked round the room. It had been decorated by the Russian-French artist, Herte (who had never seen her), to suit Sargent's portrait which Belloc had lent him to study. In the girl's opinion it did not suit her at all, unless she were in reality a tigress camouflaged to represent a sheaf of lilies. But evidently that was what Herte thought she was, and his conception of her temperament made the girl feel subtle and mysterious. She adored feeling like that, and she adored Herte's tawny orange splashes on violent blues, and his sombre blacks and dazzling whites and lemon yellows, which somehow did not fade her sunlight fairness. People knew about this room, for descriptions and photographs of it had appeared in all the papers since she and Mums landed; consequently everyone had sent flowers to match Herte's famous colourings.

There were silver azaleas, black tulips, queer scarlet roses, j.a.panese tiger lilies, weird magenta orchids, and purple pinks. Severance had sent blue lilies--the blue that Marise loved, and called "the colour of her soul." The lilies had been the best of the huge collection, until the Exciting Thing came--the thing accompanied by no letter, no card.

Towards this object the eyes of Marise travelled. She had been "intrigued" by it the whole evening, whenever she had time to think, and puzzle over its charm and mystery.

"It" was a table; a small, round tea-table of rich red mahogany with a well in its centre for flowers, and small holes in a line circling its edge for the same purpose. These receptacles were filled and hidden with the largest, purplest, and most fragrant violets Marise had ever seen, and their amethyst tones, ma.s.sed against the dark, rose-brown wood, produced an exquisite effect. Marise believed herself an up-to-date young woman, and her Persian dressing-room in London had rivalled Lily Brayton's Chinese room during the run of "Chu Chin Chow." But she had never heard of such a design as this in tables. It must be the newest of the new, and invented by a great artist, she thought. In fear of seeming ignorant, she had asked no questions of anyone, hoping to glean information by luck: and vanity, as usual with her, had its own reward.

"By George, who sent you Herte's latest?" Belloc had exclaimed, when he bounced into her room before the first act to see if his star were "going strong."

Marise had to admit that she didn't know. But she put on an air of awareness as to Herte. This was the sort of thing her mother taught her: to seem innocent, but never ignorant--especially of anything "smart."

Mrs. Sorel had suggested that Herte himself might have contributed the lovely specimen of his work, to complete the decoration of the room.

Belloc, however, had vetoed this idea. If there were no accompanying poem, or at least a card, Herte wasn't guilty. He was not a young man who bothered to blush unseen. So that hypothesis was "off"; and Marise could think of no one among her acquaintances likely to spend so much cash without getting credit.

Belloc was giving a supper for her after the theatre, and Herte was there; a dark, haggardly beautiful young man who looked as if he had detached himself from one of his own wall decorations. Belloc had placed him next the star, not knowing whether Marise were really engaged to Lord Severance or not; and the first question the girl asked was about the table.

"Ah, you have my beloved violet-table!" he said, looking at her in the way he had with beautiful young women: stripping her with his eyes and dressing her all over again in a gown of his own creation. "I am glad--glad."

"You didn't know?"

He shook his head until a black lock fell over his pale forehead. "I did not. It was finished by the glorified cabinet-maker I employ: it appeared in the window of my place. You must see my place, now your rehearsals are over! You will want beauty to rest your mind--and you will want Me to design your dresses! An hour later the table was snapped up--gone from me forever."

"Ah, but who snapped it?"

Herte looked blank. "Your admiring friend, who knew it belonged, by right of beauty, to you."

"Thanks! But I want you to tell me his--or her--name."

"Are you not acquainted with so much of him?"

"I'm not. And I'm dying to be, because the gentleman is anonymous--a great unknown!"

"I am sure he is great, as a judge of art and ladies. But that is all I am sure of, beautiful Dolores."

"Monsieur Herte, you are hiding his secret!"

"I could hide no secret from you. I will tell you all I know. A boy messenger bought the table. A millionaire's boy messenger, perhaps! My manager informed me what had happened. We guessed at once there was a mystery."

"Couldn't you find out?" Marise persisted.

Herte shrugged his sloping shoulders. "Beyond a boy messenger no man can go. He keeps the gate with a flaming sword. But you will find out some day. Meanwhile, be content. You have the latest creation of my brain--of my heart. At present it is the one thing of its kind in existence."

Mrs. Sorel asked Severance if he had sent the table, which, she explained, Marise had found in her dressing-room on arriving there. It had been brought to the theatre by two boy messengers, full of flowers (not the boys, but the table), and no word had been left whence it came.

Severance, bitterly jealous of the secret gift (which had, so to speak, taken all the blue paint off his Persian lilies), would gladly have claimed credit had he dared. But the real giver might announce himself at any moment, and be able to prove his _bona fides_: so Severance made a virtue of necessity. Belloc's supper-party was a "frost" for him, though he sat by the second prettiest girl. He hated Herte and the others, especially a millionaire member of New York's "Four Hundred,"

who was financially interested in Belloc's schemes--and in his leading ladies.

Severance would have given anything--short of his t.i.tle and estates, and such money as came with them--to s.n.a.t.c.h the girl from all the men, who would go on admiring and making love to her when he was far away. He did not know how he could bear to turn his back and leave her to these Americans, who had so much money and so much "cheek." He felt as if he were throwing her to the lions--this exquisite morsel which he coveted for himself, but was unlikely to get on the terms he could offer.

Almost, he wished that he had told her the truth in London, and said good-bye to her then. Almost, but not quite; for he simply had not been able to let her go like that. He had to be with her: he had to see the sort of men she would gather round her on the other side of the world.

Well, he had come; and he had seen; and he had made things harder for himself instead of easier. He did not know what he should do next. An arrangement, a compromise, must be thought of. When he spoke, he must have something to propose--some alternative or other. But what under heaven, or in h.e.l.l, it could be, he had no clear inspiration yet.

Marise ordered the violet-table to be taken from the theatre to the Plaza Hotel, where she and her mother had a suite. She thought it would give her more pleasure there, where much of her time was pa.s.sed, and the wonderful violets had not lost their freshness: they were so firm and vital that they looked as if they would never fade. But on the second night of "The Song," when Marise arrived in her dressing-room, another anonymous gift awaited her.

It was smaller than the table, but not less original; a black bowl, half full of water bright and pale green as aquamarines, on the surface of which floated three pink pond-lilies. The bowl stood on the star's dressing-table, and, switching on the electric lights, a gleam as of drowned emeralds sparkled under the lilies. Marise cried out in delight, and ran to look for a card. This time he would reveal himself! (She knew it was "he," and that it was the same man who had sent the table.) But no. There was neither card nor note. Messenger boys had brought the bowl. They had driven up in a taxi. If only Marise had dreamed of receiving a second gift from the same source, she would have watched--or even employed a detective. She was so excited and curious that she feared for her acting that night.

With the bowl and the lilies had come a large jar of crystals for tinting the water: green, glittering lumps, like precious stones from Aladdin's Cave, and that was precisely the label on the jar of jewels: "Aladdin's Cave." Marise was childishly thrilled. When Belloc peeped in, she showed her treasures, and learned that "Aladdin's Cave" was the name chosen by a queer artist, new, but famous already for his exhibition-shop in a cellar of that Bohemian haunt known as Greenwich Village.

Next morning the girl went there in a taxi: and when she had bought exotic enamels, and transparent vases filled with synthetic sapphires, she told "Aladdin" about the bowl. Like Herte, he shook his head. He was but another man who "could not go beyond a District messenger boy."

The stage door-keeper was now warned to find out what he could, if another anonymous gift appeared. Also, Celine was sent early to the theatre. Marise could not, however, quite bring herself to engage a detective. She was tempted to do so, and urged by her mother, who had visions of a mysterious millionaire ready to take the place of Severance if the Englishman failed after all. But the girl felt that to set sleuth-hounds on its track would kill romance. It would, she told Mums, be like deliberately rubbing the bloom off hothouse grapes before you ate them. And as it turned out, she was glad she had listened to sentiment; for on the third night her only offerings were chocolates and flowers ticketed conspicuously with their givers' names.

This was like a too abrupt ending to a fairy tale. But, after all, it was only the end of a chapter. On the fourth night a long blue-and-silver box lay across two chairs in the dressing-room. It looked like a box from a smart dressmaker, though no dressmaker's name was visible. "Has Mademoiselle ordered anything?" Celine inquired, as she untied the ribbon-fastenings.

No, Mademoiselle had ordered nothing that day--at least nothing for the theatre. She gave a little gasp as the Frenchwoman removed the box cover and a layer of silver-stencilled blue tissue paper. Underneath filmed a pale blue cloud which Marise s.n.a.t.c.hed up and p.r.o.nounced to be a "boudoir gown." It was made from a material which fas.h.i.+on names mousseline de soie one year and something else another. It was the blue of bluebells, banded with swansdown and embroidered with silver thistles. Altogether, it might have been created expressly for Miss Sorel by an admiring genius.

"From Herte!" exclaimed Mums.

But Marise knew better, and would pit her own "instinct" against her mother's any day. "No, from Him," she p.r.o.nounced. "If this goes on much longer without my finding out who He is, I shall simply perish."