A Duel Part 39

"Weren't they at the bank? or with his lawyers?"

"They were not. Cannot you recall a hint which he may at sometime have let fall as to their whereabouts?"

She put her hands up to her temples, either to ease her throbbing temples or to aid her memory in its task of looking back.

"I can't think! I can't think!--not now! There are so many things of which I have to think, that they seem to have left me no power to think of anything else. Some day something which he once said may come back; I haven't forgotten much he did say to me; it's all somewhere in my brain, only I can't tell you just where--not at this very moment. At this moment I can only think of her."

"Of whom?"

The voice which made the inquiry was Harry Talfourd's. He stood in the open doorway with his hat in his hand. Perceiving that his appearance seemed to have taken them by surprise he proceeded to explain.

"I did knock--twice; but I presume that you were so much engrossed by what you were saying to each other that my modest raps went unheeded. I heard you say, Meg, in tragic, not to say melodramatic tones, that you can only think of her. Shall I be impertinent if I venture to ask who is the lucky person who so fully occupies your thoughts?"

"The lucky person, as you call her, is Mrs. Gregory Lamb. Harry, they say that in England the duelling days are over. They may be--that is, so far as so-called 'affairs of honour' are concerned--but for duels of another sort the day is never over.

I am going to engage in a duel with Mrs. Gregory Lamb. You and Dr. Twelves here will be my seconds. I shall need all the a.s.sistance that seconds may honourably give to their princ.i.p.al, for it will be a duel to the death."

CHAPTER XXIV

THE INTERIOR

Rather a curious state of things prevailed in Mrs. Lamb's residence in Connaught Square. The largest and best regulated establishments are apt to be disorganised when festival has been kept the night before--that is true enough. But in this case the disorganisation was something altogether out of the common. Mr.

Lamb, who never attended his wife's receptions, and so pleased himself and the lady, had come home with the milk, just sober enough to wonder why the place was in such a state of singular confusion. The servants seemed to be occupying the reception rooms, enjoying themselves in a fas.h.i.+on in which servants are not supposed to do. He had a vague recollection of having a drink with a footman or some such menial while endeavouring to ascertain what was the meaning of the proceedings, and of pledging a housemaid's health in what he was convinced was a gla.s.s of his wife's champagne. But as, later, he was only too glad to be a.s.sisted upstairs by any one and every one, his memory of what took place was scarcely to be relied upon.

His wife had shut herself in her room, constraining her guests to take their departure without affording them an opportunity of saying good-bye to their hostess, and offering her their thanks for a very pleasant evening. Exactly what occurred behind that locked door she alone knew. When her senses returned she was still in her splendour of the previous night. She half lay, half sat, upon her boudoir floor, with her head upon a couch. A broken wine-gla.s.s was at her side. A decanter which had held ether was overturned on a buhl table. The day streamed through the windows.

It was some seconds before she recognised these facts. Then she rose to her feet and looked about her. The first thing she did was to go to the boudoir door and try if it was locked. When she found that it was, and that the key was nicely adjusted in the keyhole, so as to prevent any one peeping in from without, she strode through another door, which stood ajar, into her bedroom, which adjoined. She tried the outer door of that, to find that it also was locked. She glanced at a silver clock which stood upon the mantelpiece. According to it the time was twenty minutes to one, so that more than half of the day had already gone. Then she went to a cheval gla.s.s, which mirrored her from head to foot, and glanced at herself.

What she saw seemed to afford her a grim sort of amus.e.m.e.nt. Her hair was all in disorder, one long tress trailed down her neck.

Her eyes were dull and heavy. Her cheeks were smeared; such "aids to beauty" as she patronised had become misplaced. Her gown was all creased and crumpled; a stain straggled right across the bodice. In a few curt words she recognised the situation so far as the dress was concerned.

"That's done for."

It looked as if it were, it might have been worn twenty times instead of only once. She removed her jewels--her bracelets from her wrists, rings from her fingers, her necklace, ornaments from her hair. When they were all off she took them in her hands and stared at them.

"At any rate, you're worth money. I daresay I could get something on you if I tried, though perhaps not so much as some might think."

She tossed them on to the dressing-table with a mirthless laugh.

Disrobing herself, donning her nightdress, she ensconced herself between the sheets. There she tossed and tumbled about in such a fas.h.i.+on that one was almost disposed to suspect her of indulging in some new form of physical exercise. When she had got the bed into a condition which suggested that it had been occupied throughout the entire night by some peculiarly restless person, ceasing to turn and twist, for some minutes she lay quite still, as if she listened.

"Those servants of mine don't seem to be making much noise; there aren't many sounds of their moving about the house. I should like to know where Stephanie is; she ought to have woke me long before this."

Stretching out her arm she pressed the electric b.u.t.ton which was by her bedside--once, twice, thrice, indeed half-a-dozen times, on each occasion for an unusual length of time, and with a fair interval between each pressure. Nothing, however, transpired to show that she had rung at all, certainly no one answered her summons. As she began to realise that apparently she was not meeting with attention of any sort or kind, her temper did not improve. She kept up a continuous ringing; still no one answered, nor was there aught to show that there was any that heard. She began to be concerned.

"Has every one taken French leave, and am I alone in the house?

What's it mean?"

She kept her finger on the b.u.t.ton for another good five minutes, then she decided that the moment had arrived when it would probably be desirable that she should make some inquiries on her own account. Rising, she put on some clothes, over them a dressing-gown. Then, unlocking the bedroom door, she went out on to the landing. Nothing could be heard. She descended to the floor below, on which were the drawing-rooms. No attempt to tidy them had been made since the guests departed; they were in a state of almost picturesque confusion. Not even the electric lights had been turned off; they were blazing away as merrily as if it were still the middle of the night. The apartments contained certain articles which, as refreshments were provided in the dining-room, could scarcely have been there when the guests retired. Bottles and gla.s.ses were everywhere--all kinds of bottles and all kinds of gla.s.ses, indeed Mrs. Lamb had nearly stumbled over what looked like an empty brandy bottle as she came out of her bedroom door. To Mrs. Lamb the sight of those various empty receptacles was pregnant with meaning.

"The beauties! I suppose they're sleeping it off. They shall smart for this, every one of them."

She turned towards the staircase which led to the servants'

quarters, with the intention, no doubt, of making them smart, when she encountered one of them. An unkempt, untidy figure, clad in a nondescript costume, consisting of checked tweed trousers, carpet slippers, dress-coat and waistcoat, crumpled s.h.i.+rt and collar and no necktie, came strolling leisurely down the stairs as Mrs. Lamb was about to ascend them. It was James Cottrell, the butler, in general, so far as appearances went, the most immaculate of beings. His mistress stared at him in not unnatural surprise.

"Cottrell!--you!--in that state!--at this time of day!--why, you're not even dressed."

So far from showing any signs of being ashamed or disconcerted, Mr. Cottrell's manner was not only self-possessed, it was affability itself. Thrusting his hands into his trouser pockets, he tilted himself on his heels, till his legs touched the stair behind, and he smiled.

"No, Mrs. Lamb, I am not dressed--that is, my costume is not in that perfect state of completeness which I prefer. It is not my habit to make personal remarks, but since we are on the subject, I may observe that you're not dressed either. I shouldn't call that dressing-gown full dress--would you? Your hair don't look--to me--as if it had been done for days, and you really must excuse my mentioning that your complexion seems to have got itself all mixed up anyhow."

"Cottrell, you're drunk; how dare you speak to me like that?"

"No, Mrs. Lamb, I am not drunk; I do a.s.sure you that I am at least as sober as you are. If you want to know what drink can do for a man, I recommend you to go and look at your husband--there is a drunkard, if you like; he's like a perambulating sponge.

Last night it took six of us to get him upstairs; that man ought to be black-listed. As for daring to speak to you, Mrs. Lamb, there may be some folks whom you inspire with awe, but you don't inspire me with any."

"Don't you think I'll let you speak to me like that, although you are a man and I'm a woman. You'll leave my service at once--and without a character."

"As for a character, any character which you might give me, Mrs.

Lamb, would, in all human probability, do me more harm than good. It will be my constant endeavour to conceal the fact that I ever occupied a position in your establishment; it might do me a serious injury were it to become known. As to leaving your service, I shall be only too glad to do so inside sixty seconds; only there's a little formality which I should like to have completed before I go. I should like to have my overdue wages, Mrs. Lamb. They are more than three months overdue, and I should like to see the colour of my money, Mrs. Lamb."

"You shall have your wages; you needn't be afraid."

"Thank you; that is good news. Because, to be quite frank, I was beginning to be afraid--in fact, we all were."

"You impertinent brute! Where are those other creatures?"

"Other creatures? You refer to my colleagues, male and female?

We are all of us creatures, Mrs. Lamb--including you. I believe that two or three of them have already quitted your service, including the young Frenchwoman who was supposed to be your own particular maid. She said that she never bargained to wait on a woman of your cla.s.s, so she's gone. I noticed two young women in the kitchen when I was down there just now. They seemed to be in a more or less tearful condition. Poor wretches! perhaps they never expected to find themselves in such a place as this. As for the rest of my colleagues, I fancy they are still in bed. I do not doubt that if you take them their overdue wages they'll get up, and get out of the house also, as quickly as you like. I imagine they'll be only too glad of the chance."

Mrs. Lamb looked at Mr. Cottrell as if she were meditating measures of a distinctly active kind. Although he might not have been conscious of it, for some seconds he stood in imminent peril of realising that, at least physically, his mistress was more than a match for the average man. But, apparently, after thinking things over she changed her mind and postponed hostilities.

"You shall be paid for this, my man--they all shall--just wait a bit." She moved, as if to return to her bedroom, then paused.

"There's some one at the door."

There did seem to be some one at the front door, some one who saluted with equal vigour both the bell and the knocker. Mr.

Cottrell was philosophical.

"Ah! there's been one or two already this morning. You've perhaps been in such a queer state yourself that you didn't hear them, though they made noise enough; but there have been several visitors. Jones the fishmonger wants his little account, and Franks the butcher wants his, and Murphy the greengrocer, and the baker, and the grocer, and the milkman, and, I think, the laundry, and three or four more besides. They all want their little accounts--good big ones some of them are. I peeped through the dining-room window, but I didn't notice just who was there, and I didn't open to them either. I've had about enough of opening to those kind of people; they won't go round to the side entrance, and it's no use asking them to. But that sounds as if it was the landlord come to put the brokers in for rent. A landlord always thinks himself ent.i.tled to make as much noise as he likes at his own front door."

Some one seemed to consider himself at liberty to make as much clatter as he liked.

"Cottrell, go down at once and see who is at the door."

"Wouldn't you like to go and see yourself, Mrs. Lamb?"

"If you don't obey my orders and go at once I'll throw you out of the house with my own hands, and you shall whistle for your wages."