Miss Maitland Private Secretary Part 19

"Maybe she thought I might have noticed if any one was hanging round lately-hanging round to size up the habits of the family and Bebita's movements."

"Oh," he said, looking at me very pointed, "then you know what's happened to Bebita."

I hadn't any answer ready for _that_. I had to get hold of something quick and as you will do when you're taken off your guard, I got hold of a lie:

"I met Mrs. Janney on the stairs and she told me."

"That's funny," he says, sort of thoughtful. "Before she went she told both Mr. Janney and myself that no one in the house must hear a word of it."

I began to get red, and for a moment, stared at my feet pressed side by side on the wood in front of me. It didn't make it any pleasanter to know that Ferguson was looking at me, intent and narrow, out of the tail of his eye.

"I guess she was so excited she forgot and just blabbed it out."

It was the best I could do, but it was poor stuff. If you knew Mrs.

Janney you'd see why.

"Um," said Ferguson, and took a look ahead at the cloud of dust that hid the other car. Then he comes out with another:

"I wonder if that was the reason she called you Mrs. Babbitts?"

I took a good breath from the bottom of my lungs and said:

"I shouldn't be surprised. Having your grandchild lost is enough to mix up any woman."

He didn't answer and we ran on some way, out of the woods on to a long straight stretch of road. The motor in front was going at a tremendous clip, Mrs. Janney's veil las.h.i.+ng out like a wild hand beckoning us on.

"Look here," says Ferguson, soft and gentle right into my ear, "what _are_ you, anyway?"

"Me?" I bounced round and gave him a baby stare. "I'm a governess. What do you think I am?"

"You may be a good governess but you're a poor liar. I was in the telephone closet and heard what Mrs. Janney said to you on the stairs.

And I don't think you're a governess at all-you're a detective."

I thought a minute but what was the use, he had me. So I raised up my chin and met him, eye for eye:

"All right, I am. What of it?"

"Oh, lots of it. I've had my suspicions for some time. You tapped that 'phone message from New York?"

"I did-it's my job. I have to do it."

"Don't apologize-it wastes time and we haven't any to lose. Now just tell me Miss Rogers, or Mrs. Babbitts, what have you found out about the robbery; where were you getting to before this hideous mess to-day?"

"Well, you've got your nerve with you!" I snorted.

"I have, right here handy. I'm a friend of the Janneys, I'm a-" he stopped. His nerve was handy all right but he hadn't enough to tell me it was because of Esther Maitland he was so keen.

"Go on," I said sarcastic. "I'm interested to hear what _you_ are now you've found out what I am."

"I'm almost a member of the household. I can help. I want to help-and I want to know."

"Maybe you do," I said. "We often want things in this world that we can't get. Don't think you have the monopoly of that complaint."

The motor rose over the crest of a hill, flashed by a farm and slid down an incline. Before us stretched a white line of road, with the forward car racing along it in a blur of dust.

"You mean you won't tell me?"

"You got me."

We suddenly began to slow up, the car swung off sideways from the roadbed, ran toward the bushes on the right, and came to a halt.

Ferguson dropped against the back of the seat, stretched his legs and said:

"This is a nice shady place to stop in."

"Stop!" I cried. "Forget it! What do you want to stop for?"

"I don't-it's you. I'm going to rest here quietly while you tell me."

"Young man," I said, fixing him with a cold eye, "this is no time to be funny."

"I entirely agree with you. Therefore as we're of the same mind it behooves you to get busy and give me the information I want."

The coolness of him would have riled a hen. It did me; I gave a stamp on the footboard and angrily said:

"Start up this machine. I was ordered to go to New York and I've got to get there."

"You will as soon as you tell me. But I won't move until you do. We'll stay here all day, all night if necessary. There's just one thing certain: we'll stay till I hear what I want to know."

I was beaten and it made me mad straight through. I was helpless too and that made me madder. If I'd had the least notion of how you started the dinged machine I was angry enough to have tried to do it, though it wouldn't have been any use with Ferguson there to frustrate me.

"You're losing time," said he. "There'll be trouble if you don't show up."

"Do you think it's a high cla.s.s thing," I snapped out, "to put a girl in a position like this?"

"Don't _you_ think you can trust me?" he answered very quiet.

I looked at him, a long, slow survey, and as I did it my anger simmered down. It's part of my business to read faces and what I saw in his made me say sort of reluctant:

"Well, maybe I can."

He leaned forward and put his hand on mine.

"Miss Rogers, if you'll stand in with me, trust me and let me help, you won't make any mistake. For I'll stand in with you, not now, not just for this thing, but for always. You've my word on it and I don't break my word."

That ended it-not what he said but the look of him while he said it.

Almost without knowing it my hand turned under his and they clasped.

Solemn as a pair of images we shook. Any one pa.s.sing would have thought we were crazy, backed into the brushwood, side by side on the front seat, shaking hands as if we'd just been introduced.