Somewhere in France Part 7

With an effort Jimmie choked a cry of delight. He had reason to feel relief. In dragging the will from its hiding-place he had put behind him the most difficult part of his adventure; the final ceremony of replacing it in the safe was a matter only of minutes. With self-satisfaction Jimmie smiled; in self-pity he sighed miserably. For, when those same minutes had pa.s.sed, again he would be an exile. As soon as he had set his house in order, he must leave it, and once more upon the earth become a wanderer and an outcast.

The k.n.o.b of the door from the bedroom he grasped softly and, as he turned it, firmly. Stealthily, with infinite patience and stepping close to the wall, he descended the stairs, tiptoed across the hall, and entered the living-room. On the lower floor he knew he was alone. No longer, like Oliver Twist breaking into the scullery of Mr. Giles, need he move in dreadful fear. But as a cautious general, even when he advances, maps out his line of retreat, before approaching the safe Jimmie prepared his escape. The only entrances to the dining-room were through the living-room, in which he stood, and from the butler's pantry. It was through the latter he determined to make his exit. He crossed the dining-room, and in the pantry cautiously raised the window, and on the floor below placed a chair. If while at work upon the safe he were interrupted, to reach the lawn he had but to thrust back the door to the pantry, leap to the chair, and through the open window fall upon the gra.s.s. If his possible pursuers gave him time, he would retrieve his shoes; if not, he would abandon them. They had not been made to his order, but bought in the Sixth Avenue store where he was unknown, and they had been delivered to a man named Henry Hull. If found, instead of compromising him, they rather would help to prove the intruder was a stranger.

Having arranged his get-away, Jimmie returned to the living-room. In defiance of caution and that he might carry with him a farewell picture of the place where for years he had been so supremely happy, he swept it with his torch.

The light fell upon Jeanne's writing-desk and there halted. Jimmie gave a low gasp of pleasure and surprise. In the shaft of light, undisturbed in their silver frames and in their place of honor, he saw three photographs of himself. The tears came to his eyes. Then Jeanne had not cast him utterly into outer darkness. She still remembered him kindly, still held for him a feeling of good will. Jimmie sighed gratefully. The sacrifice he had made for the happiness of Jeanne and Maddox now seemed easier to bear. And that happiness must not be jeopardized.

More than ever before the fact that he, a dead man, must not be seen, impressed him deeply. At the slightest sound, at even the suggestion of an alarm, he must fly. The will might take care of itself. In case he were interrupted, where he dropped it there must it lie. The fact of supreme importance was that unrecognized he should escape.

The walls of the dining-room were covered with panels of oak, and built into the jog of the fireplace and concealed by a movable panel was the safe. In front of it Jimmie sank to his knees and pushed back the panel. Propped upon a chair behind him, the electric torch threw its shaft of light full upon the combination lock. On the floor, ready to his hand, lay the will.

The combination was not difficult. It required two turns left, three right, and in conjunction two numerals. While so intent upon his work that he scarcely breathed, Jimmie spun the k.n.o.b. Then he tugged gently, and the steel door swung toward him.

At the same moment, from behind him, a metallic click gave an instant's warning, and then the room was flooded with light.

From his knees, in one bound, Jimmie flung himself toward his avenue of escape.

It was blocked by the bulky form of Preston, the butler.

Jimmie turned and doubled back to the door of the living-room. He found himself confronted by his wife.

The sleeve of her night-dress had fallen to her shoulder and showed her white arm extended toward him. In her hand, pointing, was an automatic pistol.

Already dead, Jimmie feared nothing but discovery.

The door to the living-room was wide enough for two. With his head down he sprang toward it. There was a report that seemed to shake the walls, and something like the blow of a nightstick knocked his leg from under him and threw him on his back. The next instant Preston had landed with both knees on his lower ribs and was squeezing his windpipe.

Jimmie felt he was drowning. Around him millions of stars danced. And then from another world, in a howl of terror, the voice of Preston screamed. The hands of the butler released their hold upon his throat.

As suddenly as he had thrown himself upon him he now recoiled.

"It's _'im!_" he shouted; "it's _'im!_"

"Him?" demanded Jeanne.

"_It's Mr. Blagwin!_"

Unlike Preston, Jeanne did not scream; nor did she faint. So greatly did she desire to believe that "'im" was her husband, that he still was in the same world with herself, that she did not ask how he had escaped from the other world, or why, having escaped, he spent his time robbing his own house.

Instead, much like Preston, she threw herself at him and in her young, firm arms lifted him and held him close.

"Jimmie!" she cried, "_speak_ to me; _speak_ to me!"

The blow on the back of the head, the throttling by Preston, the "stopping power" of the bullet, even though it pa.s.sed only through his leg, had left Jimmie somewhat confused. He knew only that it was a dream. But wonderful as it was to dream that once more he was with Jeanne, that she clung to him, needed and welcomed him, he could not linger to enjoy the dream. He was dead. If not, he must escape. Honor compelled it. He made a movement to rise, and fell back.

The voice of Preston, because he had choked his master, full of remorse, and, because his mistress had shot him, full of reproach, rose in dismay:

"You've 'it 'im in the leg, ma'am!"

Jimmie heard Jeanne protest hysterically:

"That's nothing, he's _alive_!" she cried. "I'd hit him again if it would only make him _speak_!" She pressed the bearded face against her own. "Speak to me," she whispered; "tell me you forgive me. Tell me you love me!"

Jimmie opened his eyes and smiled at her.

"You never had to shoot me," he stammered, "to make me tell you _that_."

THE CARD-SHARP

I had looked forward to spending Christmas with some people in Suffolk, and every one in London a.s.sured me that at their house there would be the kind of a Christmas house party you hear about but see only in the ill.u.s.trated Christmas numbers. They promised mistletoe, snapdragon, and Sir Roger de Coverley. On Christmas morning we would walk to church, after luncheon we would shoot, after dinner we would eat plum pudding floating in blazing brandy, dance with the servants, and listen to the waits singing "G.o.d rest you, merry gentlemen, let nothing you dismay."

To a lone American bachelor stranded in London it sounded fine. And in my grat.i.tude I had already s.h.i.+pped to my hostess, for her children, of whose age, number, and s.e.x I was ignorant, half of Gamage's dolls, skees, and cricket bats, and those crackers that, when you pull them, sometimes explode. But it was not to be. Most inconsiderately my wealthiest patient gained sufficient courage to consent to an operation, and in all New York would permit no one to lay violent hands upon him save myself. By cable I advised postponement. Having lived in lawful harmony with his appendix for fifty years, I thought, for one week longer he might safely maintain the _status quo_. But his cable in reply was an ultimatum. So, on Christmas eve, instead of Hallam Hall and a Yule log, I was in a gale plunging and pitching off the coast of Ireland, and the only log on board was the one the captain kept to himself.

I sat in the smoking-room, depressed and cross, and it must have been on the principle that misery loves company that I forgathered with Talbot, or rather that Talbot forgathered with me. Certainly, under happier conditions and in haunts of men more crowded, the open-faced manner in which he forced himself upon me would have put me on my guard. But, either out of deference to the holiday spirit, as manifested in the fict.i.tious gayety of our few fellow pa.s.sengers, or because the young man in a knowing, impertinent way was most amusing, I listened to him from dinner time until midnight, when the chief officer, hung with snow and icicles, was blown in from the deck and wished all a merry Christmas.

Even after they unmasked Talbot I had neither the heart nor the inclination to turn him down. Indeed, had not some of the pa.s.sengers testified that I belonged to a different profession, the smoking-room crowd would have quarantined me as his accomplice. On the first night I met him I was not certain whether he was English or giving an imitation.

All the outward and visible signs were English, but he told me that, though he had been educated at Oxford and since then had spent most of his years in India, playing polo, he was an American. He seemed to have spent much time, and according to himself much money, at the French watering-places and on the Riviera. I felt sure that it was in France I had already seen him, but where I could not recall. He was hard to place. Of people at home and in London well worth knowing he talked glibly, but in speaking of them he made several slips. It was his taking the trouble to cover up the slips that first made me wonder if his talking about himself was not mere vanity, but had some special object.

I felt he was presenting letters of introduction in order that later he might ask a favor. Whether he was leading up to an immediate loan, or in New York would ask for a card to a club, or an introduction to a banker, I could not tell. But in forcing himself upon me, except in self-interest, I could think of no other motive. The next evening I discovered the motive.

He was in the smoking-room playing solitaire, and at once I recalled that it was at Aix-les-Bains I had first seen him, and that he held a bank at baccarat. When he asked me to sit down I said: "I saw you last summer at Aix-les-Bains."

His eyes fell to the pack in his hands and apparently searched it for some particular card.

"What was I doing?" he asked.

"Dealing baccarat at the Casino des Fleurs."

With obvious relief he laughed.

"Oh, yes," he a.s.sented; "jolly place, Aix. But I lost a pot of money there. I'm a rotten hand at cards. Can't win, and can't leave 'em alone." As though for this weakness, so frankly confessed, he begged me to excuse him, he smiled appealingly. "Poker, bridge, chemin de fer, I like 'em all," he rattled on, "but they don't like me. So I stick to solitaire. It's dull, but cheap." He shuffled the cards clumsily. As though making conversation, he asked: "You care for cards yourself?"

I told him truthfully I did not know the difference between a club and a spade and had no curiosity to learn. At this, when he found he had been wasting time on me, I expected him to show some sign of annoyance, even of irritation, but his disappointment struck far deeper. As though I had hurt him physically, he shut his eyes, and when again he opened them I saw in them distress. For the moment I believe of my presence he was utterly unconscious. His hands lay idle upon the table; like a man facing a crisis, he stared before him. Quite improperly, I felt sorry for him. In me he thought he had found a victim; and that the loss of the few dollars he might have won should so deeply disturb him showed his need was great. Almost at once he abandoned me and I went on deck.

When I returned an hour later to the smoking-room he was deep in a game of poker.

As I pa.s.sed he hailed me gayly.

"Don't scold, now," he laughed; "you know I can't keep away from it."

From his manner those at the table might have supposed we were friends of long and happy companions.h.i.+p. I stopped behind his chair, but he thought I had pa.s.sed, and in reply to one of the players answered: "Known him for years; he's set me right many a time. When I broke my right femur 'chasin,' he got me back in the saddle in six weeks. All my people swear by him."

One of the players smiled up at me, and Talbot turned. But his eyes met mine with perfect serenity. He even held up his cards for me to see.

"What would you draw?" he asked.

His audacity so astonished me that in silence I could only stare at him and walk on.

When on deck he met me he was not even apologetic. Instead, as though we were partners in crime, he chuckled delightedly.