The Yellow Streak Part 48

There are bigger murderers than Jeekes at liberty in Holland to-day ..."

The detective slapped his thigh.

"I'd have laid a shade of odds," he cried merrily, "that you were watching the gentleman at Amerongen, sir ..."

"Tut, tut, Manderton," said the Chief, raising his hand to silence the other; "you run on too fast, my friend! I wish," he went on, changing the subject, "I could be with you at Harkings to-morrow to witness your reconstruction of the crime, Manderton. You'll go, I suppose, Greve?"

"I certainly shall," answered the barrister, "I have had some experience of criminals, but I must say I never saw one less endowed with criminal characteristics than little Jeekes. A strange character!..."

The Chief laughed sardonically.

"Anyway," he remarked, "he had a d.a.m.n good notion of the end that befitted him ..."

It was a still, starry night. The Flus.h.i.+ng boat stood out of harbour on a calm sea. The high arc lamps threw a blue gleam over the deserted moles and glinted in the oily swell lapping the quays. From the fast-receding quayside the rasping of a winch echoed noisily across the silent water. On the upper deck of the mail-boat Robin Greve and Mary Trevert stood side by side at the rail. They had the deck to themselves.

Above their heads on the bridge the captain stood immobile, a square black figure, the helmsman at his elbow. Otherwise, between the stars and the sea, the man and the girl were alone.

Thus they had stood ever since the mail-boat had cast off from the quay.

Robin had made some ba.n.a.l attempt at conversation, urging (but without much sincerity) that, after her experiences of the day, the girl should go to her cabin and rest. But Mary Trevert had merely shaken her head impatiently, without speaking.

Presently he put his arm through hers. He felt against his wrist the warm softness of her travelling-coat, and it seemed to him that, though the girl made no sign, some slight answering pressure met his touch. So they leaned upon the rail for a s.p.a.ce watching the water fall hissing from the vessel's side as the steamer, jarring and quivering, met the long steady roll from the open sea.

Then Mary Trevert spoke.

"Robin," she said gently, "I owe you an apology ..."

Robin Greve looked at her quickly. But Mary had her eyes fixed seaward in contemplation of a distant light that flared and died with persistent regularity.

"My dear," he answered, "I've only myself to blame. When you told me you were going to marry Hartley Parrish, I should have known that you had your reasons and that those reasons were good. I should have held my tongue ..."

This time the girl stole a glance at him. But now he was gazing away to the horizon where the light came and went.

"All this misunderstanding between us," he went on, "came about because of what I said in the billiard-room that afternoon ..."

The girl shook her head resolutely.

"No," she answered, "it was my fault. I'm a proud devil, Robin, and what you said about Hartley and ... and ... other women, Robin, hurt and ...

and made me angry. No, no, don't apologize again. You and I are old enough friends, my dear, to tell one another the truth. You made me angry because what you said was true. I _was_ selling myself, selling myself with my eyes open, too, and you've got a perfect right never to speak to me again ..."

She did not finish the sentence but broke off. Her voice died away quaveringly. Robin took her hand in his.

"Dear," he said, "don't cry! It's over and done with now ..."

Mary shook herself with an angry gesture.

"What's the good of telling me not to cry?" she protested tearfully; "I've disgraced myself in my own eyes as well as in yours. If you can't forget what I was ready to do, I never shall ..."

Very gently the young man turned the girl towards him.

"I'm not such a prig as all that," he said. "We all make mistakes. You know I understand the position you were in. Parrish is dead. I shall forget the rest ..."

Slowly the girl withdrew her hands from his grasp.

"Yes," she said wearily, "you will find it easy to forget!"

She drew her fur closer about her neck and turned her back on the sea.

"I must go down," she said. And waited for the man to stand aside. He did not move and their eyes met. Suddenly, like a child, she buried her face in her arm flung out across his chest. She began to sob bitterly.

"That afternoon ... in the billiard-room ..." she sobbed, "you will forget ... that ... too ... I suppose ..."

Robin took her face in his hands, a hot, tear-stained face, and detached it from the sheltering arm.

"My dear," he said, "I shall have to try to forget it. But I know I shan't succeed. To the end of my life I shall remember the kiss you gave me. But we are farther apart than ever now!"

There was a great sadness in his voice. It arrested the girl's attention as he dropped his hands and turned back to the rail.

"Why?" she said in a low voice, without looking up.

"Because," replied the young man steadily, "you're rich now, Mary ..."

The girl looked up quickly.

"Will men ever understand women?" she cried, a new note in her voice.

She stepped forward and, putting her two hands on the young man's shoulders, swung him round to face her.

"I'm as poor as ever I was," she said, "for Hartley Parrish's money is not for me ..."

"Mary!" exclaimed the young man joyfully.

"Robin Greve," cried the girl, "do you mean to tell me you'd stand there thinking I'd accept money made like that ..."

But now she was in his arms. With a little fluttering sigh she yielded to his kiss.

"Oh, the man on the bridge!..." she murmured with her woman's instinct for the conventions.

"Come behind the boat, then!" commanded Robin.

And in the shadow of a weather-stained davit he kissed her again.

"So you'll wait for me, after all, Mary?"

"No," retorted the girl firmly. "We'll read the Riot Act to Mother and you must marry me at once!"

The wind blew cold from the North Sea. It rattled in the rigging, flapped the ensign standing out stiffly at the stern, and whirled the black smoke from the steamer's funnels out into a dark aerial wake as far as the eye could reach. With a gentle rhythmic motion the vessel rose and fell, while the stars began to pale and faint grey shadows appeared in the eastern sky. Still the man and the girl stood by the swaying lifeboat and talked the things that lovers say. Step by step they went over their thoughts for one another in each successive phase of the dark tragedy through which they had pa.s.sed.

"And that van der Spyck letter," asked Robin; "how did you get hold of it? I've been wanting to ask you that ever since this afternoon ..."