The Black Bag Part 3

II

"AND SOME THERE BE WHO HAVE ADVENTURES THRUST UPON THEM"

The a.s.sumption seems not unwarrantable, that Mr. Calendar figuratively washed his hands of Mr. Kirkwood. Unquestionably Mr. Kirkwood considered himself well rid of Mr. Calendar. When the latter had gone his way, Kirkwood, mindful of the fact that his boat-train would leave St. Pancras at half-after eleven, set about his packing and dismissed from his thoughts the incident created by the fat _chevalier d'industrie_; and at six o'clock, or thereabouts, let himself out of his room, dressed for the evening, a light rain-coat over one arm, in the other hand a cane,--the drizzle having ceased.

A stolid British lift lifted him down to the ground floor of the establishment in something short of five minutes. Pausing in the office long enough to settle his bill and leave instructions to have his luggage conveyed to the boat-train, he received with entire equanimity the affable benediction of the clerk, in whose eyes he still figured as that radiant creature, an American millionaire; and pa.s.sed on to the lobby, where he surrendered hat, coat and stick to the cloak-room attendant, ere entering the dining-room.

The hour was a trifle early for a London dinner, the handsome room but moderately filled with patrons. Kirkwood absorbed the fact unconsciously and without displeasure; the earlier, the better: he was determined to consume his last civilized meal (as he chose to consider it) at his serene leisure, to live fully his ebbing moments in the world to which he was born, to drink to its cloying dregs one ultimate draught of luxury.

A benignant waiter bowed him into a chair by a corner table in juxtaposition with an open window, through which, swaying imperceptibly the closed hangings, were wafted gentle gusts of the London evening's sweet, damp breath.

Kirkwood settled himself with an inaudible sigh of pleasure. He was dining, for the last time in Heaven knew how long, in a first-cla.s.s restaurant.

With a deferential flourish the waiter brought him the menu-card. He had served in his time many an "American, millionaire"; he had also served this Mr. Kirkwood, and respected him as one exalted above the run of his kind, in that he comprehended the art of dining.

Fifteen minutes later the waiter departed rejoicing, his order complete.

To distract a conscience whispering of extravagance, Kirkwood lighted a cigarette.

The room was gradually filling with later arrivals; it was the most favored restaurant in London, and, despite the radiant costumes of the women, its atmosphere remained sedate and restful.

A cab clattered down the side street on which the window opened.

At a near-by table a woman laughed, quietly happy. Incuriously Kirkwood glanced her way. She was bending forward, smiling, flattering her escort with the adoration of her eyes. They were lovers alone in the wilderness of the crowded restaurant. They seemed very happy.

Kirkwood was conscious of a strange pang of emotion. It took him some time to comprehend that it was envy.

He was alone and lonely. For the first time he realized that no woman had ever looked upon him as the woman at the adjoining table looked upon her lover. He had found time to wors.h.i.+p but one mistress--his art.

And he was renouncing her.

He was painfully conscious of what he had missed, had lost--or had not yet found: the love of woman.

The sensation was curious--new, unique in his experience.

His cigarette burned down to his fingers as he sat pondering. Abstractedly, he ground its fire out in an ash-tray.

The waiter set before him a silver tureen, covered.

He sat up and began to consume his soup, scarce doing it justice. His dream troubled him--his dream of the love of woman.

From a little distance his waiter regarded him, with an air of disappointment. In the course of an hour and a half he awoke, to discover the attendant in the act of pouring very hot and black coffee from a bright silver pot into a demi-ta.s.se of fragile porcelain. Kirkwood slipped a single lump of sugar into the cup, gave over his cigar-case to be filled, then leaned back, deliberately lighting a long and slender panetela as a preliminary to a last lingering appreciation of the scene of which he was a part.

He reviewed it through narrowed eyelids, lazily; yet with some slight surprise, seeming to see it with new vision, with eyes from which scales of ignorance had dropped.

This long and brilliant dining-hall, with its quiet perfection of proportion and appointment, had always gratified his love of the beautiful; to-night it pleased him to an unusual degree. Yet it was the same as ever; its walls tinted a deep rose, with their hangings of dull cloth-of-gold, its lights discriminatingly cl.u.s.tered and discreetly shaded, redoubled in half a hundred mirrors, its subdued s.h.i.+mmer of plate and gla.s.s, its soberly festive a.s.semblage of circ.u.mspect men and women splendidly gowned, its decorously muted murmur of voices penetrated and interwoven by the strains of a hidden string orchestra--caressed his senses as always, yet with a difference. To-night he saw it a room populous with lovers, lovers insensibly paired, man unto woman attentive, woman of man regardful.

He had never understood this before. This much he had missed in life.

It seemed hard to realize that one must forego it all for ever.

Presently he found himself acutely self-conscious. The sensation puzzled him; and without appearing to do so, he traced it from effect to cause; and found the cause in a woman--a girl, rather, seated at a table the third removed from him, near the farther wall of the room.

Too considerate, and too embarra.s.sed, to return her scrutiny openly, look for look, he yet felt sure that, however temporarily, he was become the object of her intent interest.

Idly employed with his cigar, he sipped his coffee. In time aware that she had turned her attention elsewhere, he looked up.

At first he was conscious of an effect of disappointment. She was n.o.body that he knew, even by reputation. She was simply a young girl, barely out of her teens--if as old as that phrase would signify. He wondered what she had found in him to make her think him worth so long a study; and looked again, more keenly curious.

With this second glance, appreciation stirred the artistic side of his nature, that was already grown impatient of his fretted mood. The slender and girlish figure, posed with such absolute lack of intrusion against a screen of rose and gilt, moved him to critical admiration. The tinted glow of shaded candles caught glistening on the spun gold of her fair hair, and enhanced the fine pallor of her young shoulders. He saw promise, and something more than promise, in her face, its oval something dimmed by warm shadows that unavailingly sought to blend youth and beauty alike into the dull, rich background.

In the sheer youth of her (he realized) more than in aught else, lay her chiefest charm. She could be little more than a child, indeed, if he were to judge her by the purity of her shadowed eyes and the absence of emotion in the calm and direct look which presently she turned upon him who sat wondering at the level, penciled darkness of her brows.

At length aware that she had surprised his interest, Kirkwood glanced aside--coolly deliberate, lest she should detect in his att.i.tude anything more than impersonal approval.

A slow color burned his cheeks. In his temples there rose a curious pulsing.

After a while she drew his gaze again, imperiously--herself all unaware of the havoc she was wreaking on his temperament.

He could have fancied her distraught, cloaking an unhappy heart with placid brow and gracious demeanor; but such a conception matched strangely her glowing youth and spirit. What had she to do with Care? What concern had Black Care, whose gaunt shape in sable shrouds had lurked at his shoulder all the evening, despite his rigid preoccupation, with a being as charmingly flushed with budding womanhood as this girl?

"Eighteen?" he hazarded. "Eighteen, or possibly nineteen, dining at the Pless in a ravis.h.i.+ng dinner-gown, and--unhappy? Oh, hardly--not she!"

Yet the impression haunted him, and ere long he was fain to seek confirmation or denial of it in the manner of her escort.

The latter sat with back to Kirkwood, cutting a figure as negative as his snug evening clothes. One could surmise little from a fleshy thick neck, a round, glazed bald spot, a fringe of grizzled hair, and two bright red ears.

Calendar?

Somehow the fellow did suggest Kirkwood's caller of the afternoon. The young man could not have said precisely how, for he was unfamiliar with the aspect of that gentleman's back. None the less the suggestion persisted.

By now, a few of the guests, theater-bound, for the most part, were leaving. Here and there a table stood vacant, that had been filled, cloth tarnished, chairs disarranged: in another moment to be transformed into its pristine brilliance under the deft attentions of the servitors.

Down an aisle, past the table at which the girl was sitting, came two, making toward the lobby; the man, a slight and meager young personality, in the lead. Their party had attracted Kirkwood's notice as they entered; why, he did not remember; but it was in his mind that then they had been three.

Instinctively he looked at the table they had left--one placed at some distance from the girl, and hidden from her by an angle in the wall. It appeared that the third member had chosen to dally a few moments over his tobacco and a liqueur-brandy. Kirkwood could see him plainly, lounging in his chair and fumbling the stem of a gla.s.s: a heavy man, of somber habit, his black and sullen brows lowering and thoughtful above a face boldly handsome.

The woman of the trio was worthy of closer attention. Some paces in the wake of her lack-l.u.s.ter esquire, she was making a leisurely progress, trailing the skirts of a gown magnificent beyond dispute, half concealed though it was by the opera cloak whose soft folds draped her shoulders.

Slowly, carrying her head high, she approached, insolent eyes reviewing the room from beneath their heavy lids; a metallic and mature type of dark beauty, supremely self-confident and self-possessed.

Men turned involuntarily to look after her, not altogether in undiluted admiration.

In the act of pa.s.sing behind the putative Calendar, she paused momentarily, bending as if to gather up her train. Presumably the action disturbed her balance; she swayed a little, and in the effort to recover, rested the tips of her gloved fingers upon the edge of the table. Simultaneously (Kirkwood could have sworn) a single word left her lips, a word evidently pitched for the ear of the hypothetical Calendar alone. Then she swept on, imperturbable, a.s.sured.

To the perplexed observer it was indubitably evident that some communication had pa.s.sed from the woman to the man. Kirkwood saw the fat shoulders of the girl's companion stiffen suddenly as the woman's hand rested at his elbow; as she moved away, a little rippling s.h.i.+ver was plainly visible in the muscles of his back, beneath his coat--mute token of relaxing tension. An instant later one plump and mottled hand was carelessly placed where the woman's had been; and was at once removed with fingers closed.

To the girl, watching her face covertly, Kirkwood turned for clue to the incident. He made no doubt that she had observed the pa.s.sage; proof of that one found in her sudden startling pallor (of indignation?) and in her eyes, briefly alight with some inscrutable emotion, though quickly veiled by lowered lashes. Slowly enough she regained color and composure, while her _vis-a-vis_ sat motionless, head inclined as if in thought.