Chapter IV
For a full, strained moment not a sound escaped the company; even the strongest natures, Slade, Majendie and Rita Kildair seemed powerless to grasp what had taken place. Then the realization came, in a flash. What the first thief had failed to carry through another had boldly dared: a man or a woman, deliberately or hysterically, had seized the opportunity that had lain there, in the darkness, between the sixty-first second and the hundredth count.
The match in Slade’s hands burned his fingers, and went out. In the sudden blackness a dozen cries were heard:
“Light the candle!”
“Turn on the electric light!”
“Search the floor!”
“Stolen again!”
“Ghastly!”
“A light! A light!”
Another match sputtered, and one candle caught the flame and flung its expanding circles of light around them.
“It must have rolled to the floor,” said Majendie’s voice, among the first.
“Nonsense!” broke in Slade’s powerful bass. “There are no carpets; we would have heard it. There is a second thief here. Every one must be searched. Mrs. Kildair, if you wish I’ll call up my detective agency.”
“No,” said Mrs. Kildair instantly, and her voice had regained its calm. “I will attend to that myself.”
She went quickly to the door into the bedroom, unlocked it, passed through, and locked it again. A moment later the impatient ring of a telephone was heard.
In the ill-lit studio the greatest confusion prevailed. Every one seemed, by a common impulse, to desire to escape to the farthest ends of the room, stumbling and bumping against one another in the obscurity. Some instinct impelled Beecher to Nan Charters’ side. He took her arm with a strong, reassuring grip, expecting to find her still shaken with emotion; but, to his amazement, he found her entirely collected.
“Thank you, I am all right,” she said, releasing herself, with a little smile.
“Are you sure?” he said doubtfully.
At this moment, as he stood staring at her, perplexed, Slade’s voice rang out peremptorily:
“The electric lights—some one turn on the lights!”
He left her, and, going to the wall toward the antechamber, pressed the three buttons embedded there. Instantly the great room was showered with a brutal glare. Near the piano, Mrs. Cheever was sunk in an arm-chair, in a seemingly hysterical state, while Mr. Cheever, glass in hand, was bending over her; Mrs. Bloodgood was seated at the dining-table, her head resting in her hands; Garraboy and Bloodgood were turning in the middle of the floor. Only Maud Lille, stoic and alert, remained at her original place. Slade and Majendie were carefully exploring the floor.
Beecher did not at once return to his companion. Her sudden change perplexed him with thoughts that he did not wish to analyze too deeply. He expected that she would rejoin Mrs. Bloodgood; but the young actress, as though purposely avoiding her, went finally to where Maud Lille was standing, and said, with a command that startled Beecher:
“Mr. Majendie, there is always a chance that the ring may have rolled off the table and been caught in somebody’s dress. Such things have happened again and again. I suggest that every woman make a careful search.”
“Miss Charters is quite right,” said Majendie, who, advancing to the middle of the studio, repeated the suggestion. “The situation is frightful; we must take every precaution to avoid the chances of an accident.”
The four women immediately began to examine the ruffles and draperies of their skirts—without success.
All at once the door at the back of the room opened, and Mrs. Kildair reappeared.
“I shall have the detectives here—a man and a woman—within half an hour,” she said. “There is nothing to do but wait.”
She seated herself in a chair near the door, her hands stretched out over the arms, her head lowered. Every one sat down, with the exception of Maud Lille, who, however, shifted a little so as to have the support of the piano. No one spoke; the situation had passed beyond comment.
On the dining-table the little alcohol-lamp under a chafing-dish burnt itself out unnoticed. At the end of thirty-five minutes, during which every one had been intent on the torturous progress of the clock, a sudden buzz was heard.
Mrs. Kildair rose and, passing out by way of the bedroom, was heard talking behind the closed doors that led into the hall, a sound followed by the indistinguishable jumble of voices.
A nervous five minutes, and she reappeared, with the same incomprehensible calm that had marked her during the period in the dark.
“The women will go into the bedroom,” she said, without variation of her voice. “The men will be searched in the dining-room.”
“One moment,” said Slade, taking a step in advance.
Mrs. Kildair turned with a start, the first agitation noticeable.
“It is absolutely necessary for me to keep an appointment at ten o’clock,” he said, glancing at the clock, which stood at the last quarter. “As I was not here when the ring was first stolen, I ask the privilege of being examined the first.”
At this there was a murmur, and Mrs. Kildair hesitated.
Slade, giving a disdainful shoulder to the protest, strode deliberately to Mrs. Kildair and spoke with her in a low voice. At the end of a moment Mrs. Kildair nodded as though convinced, and, going to the folding doors, unlocked them. Outside a man in a dark business suit, as grimly correct as an undertaker, was waiting with folded arms.
Slade bowed and passed into the hall, shutting the doors behind him, while Mrs. Kildair came back slowly, evidently running over in her mind the order of selection.
“Mrs. Bloodgood,” she said finally, “will you go first?”
Mrs. Bloodgood, surprised at the formal appellation, rose hastily, and started blindly for the vestibule through which Slade had passed.
“In my bedroom, please,” said Mrs. Kildair.
The young woman checked herself, faltering a little, and entered the bedroom, where, for a moment, could be seen the drab figure of another woman, ornamented by a little toque with a red feather.
“Mrs. Kildair,” said Majendie, rising, “it is equally important for me to leave as soon as possible. While I know that I ask a favor, possibly all of you know that my affairs are at a vital stage, and I should appreciate it very much if there were no objection to my being examined the next.”
He turned, with a courteous bow, as he concluded.
“I am perfectly willing,” said Beecher at once.
“I am not,” said Bloodgood, while Cheever made a gesture of dissent.
“Nor I,” said Garraboy. “I have my own appointment, that means a great deal to me. I regret that I cannot accede to Mr. Majendie’s request.”
“These gentlemen are quite within their rights,” said Majendie, accepting the refusal with the same courtesy. He thanked Beecher with a smile, and added: “If you are willing, Mrs. Kildair, shall we draw lots for it?”
“Quite so,” said Mrs. Kildair, and she arranged four slips in her fingers and tendered them.
Majendie drew the longest, and was, therefore, forced to wait until Garraboy, Bloodgood, and Cheever had passed ahead. He glanced at the clock with a sudden, uneasy look, and returned to his chair: but, for the first time, a frown appeared on his face, while his fingers tore into bits the slip of paper, which he did not notice he had retained.
Beecher was unpleasantly aware that Garraboy was watching him, and this scrutiny, which might have been inspired by a personal jealousy, struck him as a deliberate suspicion. He returned the look with a belligerent intensity, conscious in his own mind that he had already formed a prejudice as to the identity of the second thief.
“A woman might have taken the ring on impulse,” he thought uneasily, “but only a man could have had the cold daring to take it the second time.”
He eliminated Majendie by an instinctive rejection; Slade appeared an equally impossible solution.
“It’s Cheever, Bloodgood, or Garraboy,” he thought. “And Cheever hasn’t the nerve—I don’t believe it. It’s Bloodgood or Garraboy—and Garraboy is the most likely.”
Suddenly a hot, panicky feeling came to him. What if the real thief—Garraboy, for instance—had slipped the ring into his own pocket? He unlocked his hands and hurriedly searched his clothes. Then annoyed at seeing this childish action come under the notice of the broker, he shifted in his seat and glanced toward Nan Charters. To his surprise, he found again the same indications of nervousness in the concentration of her eye on the door leading into the bedroom.
At this moment Mrs. Bloodgood emerged, and Mrs. Cheever went in. At once the nervous tension of his companion seemed to relax, and she sank back in her seat, with an indifferent glance around the room.
“Decidedly, there is something queer between the two,” he thought, mystified.
In the studio the same stony silence was maintained. Through the open doors that led to the antechamber Slade reappeared, hesitated a moment as if to reenter the studio, then bowed and went out. Behind him the detective was seen waiting. Garraboy rose and immediately passed into the back.
Mrs. Bloodgood had taken her seat apart, staring ahead as though by a difficult process of mental control, for at times her glance, despite the consciousness of her husband’s espionage, flashed over to where Majendie was impatiently following the movements of the clock.
When Garraboy’s search had ended, he followed the precedent of Slade, bowed without speaking, and departed; while Bloodgood, guarding the same silence, passed into the dining-room. Maud Lille succeeded Mrs. Cheever, who returned in the same state of agitation that she had shown from the beginning. She started to approach her husband, when Mrs. Kildair’s controlled voice was heard:
“Not there, please, Mrs. Cheever. Kindly sit at this side of the room with Mrs. Bloodgood.”
Mrs. Cheever flushed instantly, and sank, or rather collapsed, in the chair which had been indicated.
All at once there came another ring, followed by two or three impatient taps on the outer door. There was a sudden stir in the room, where all nerves were clearly on the edge, and Mrs. Cheever gave a little scream.
“I’ll answer,” said Cheever, rising.
“Wait,” said Mrs. Kildair. She started toward the door, and then, changing her mind, as if unwilling to relax her surveillance of events in the studio, stopped. “Mr. Beecher, please,” she said thoughtfully. “See who it is.” And she moved slightly toward the half-drawn portières, to hear and at the same time to be concealed.
Garraboy was outside, a coat on his arm.
“Excuse me,” he said, without emotion. “I took the wrong coat. Stupid of me. Just found it out.”
“It looks like mine,” said Beecher, examining it.
“Probably is,” said Garraboy, who extracted another coat of similar appearance from the rack, plunged into his pockets and nodded. “Sure enough. Sorry. Good night.”
So thoroughly disagreeable an impression had the broker produced upon Beecher that, in a moment of suspicion, moved by an incredible thought, he ran his hands hastily through the pockets.
“I shouldn’t have been surprised,” he grumbled to himself, and returned to the studio, where the conversation had been overheard.
The search continued, ended, and, as all expected, no trace of the ring was found.
Mrs. Kildair excused herself, evidently maintaining her calm with difficulty. The guests, murmuring inarticulate phrases, took their wraps, and young Beecher found himself shortly in a coupé beside Nan Charters.
For several moments neither spoke, each absorbed in his own speculations. Beecher studied the figure at his side with covert glances, amazed at the transformation from the childlike charm which had first fascinated him. An hour before he had begun to wonder how far that feeling might develop in him; now, as he watched her, he was conscious of a dispassionate, almost resentful analysis. The fragrance of her perfume, a little too overpowering, filled the interior of the coupé. She herself, bending slightly forward, one elbow against the window-pane, pressed her ungloved knuckles against her chin, while her glance, set and controlled, was lost in the cloudy shadows and striped reflections of the street without.
“What is terrible in such a situation,” she said musingly, but without turning, “is that any one may be suspected.”
The words were spoken with almost an absolute change of personality. The very tone brought to him an increased antagonism.
“Quite true,” he said. “You may have taken it the first time, and I the second.”
She turned and tried to distinguish his expression; but, if he had hoped to startle, he was disappointed. She said, quite possessed:
“Why do you put it that way?”
“Because I am convinced that the second time was the deliberate action of a man, and that the first was the impulse of a woman.”
“Why a woman the first time?”
“That is simply my feeling. A woman would not calculate the chances of detection, would have kept the ring on her person, and would have restored it. What do you think?”
“Possibly,” she said, her glance returning to the street.
“But you don’t agree with me,” he said, leaning a little forward.
“I don’t know.”
“Miss Charters, will you allow me to ask you a question?”
“What? Yes.”
“Don’t you know that a woman took it the first time?”
She turned very slowly and looked at him steadily a moment.
“I do not know,” she said at last.
“But you suspect,” he persisted.
“Do you know, Mr. Beecher, that this is a very strange question?” she said. “Exactly what are you implying? Do you, by any chance, suspect me?”
She said the last words gently, with a return of the first manner which had so held him. And again, without being able to resist, he felt the charm on his senses. He knew absolutely nothing about her. At times the most direct suspicions had entered his mind; never-the-less all at once he heard himself answering:
“I know nothing in the world about you, Miss Charters, but my instinct tells me that is absolutely impossible.”
“Only?”
“Only I can not forget your agitation at certain moments.”
“Naturally; that is my temperament.”
“You are perfectly calm now, and you were perfectly calm at certain times tonight.”
She turned suddenly in her seat and faced him, saying sharply:
“What do you mean?”
“May I speak frankly?”
“I ask you to do so,” she said peremptorily.
“I think—in fact, I am convinced—that you suspect who took the ring in the first place.”
The cab was grinding against the curb. She put out her hand hurriedly, as if the impulse were to jump from the carriage. But immediately she checked the movement, and turned, saying very simply and directly:
“Do you wish to be my friend?”
“You know I do,” he said, surprised.
“Then, if you do, and trust me, never ask that question again—or make the slightest reference to it.”
She held out her hand. He took it, but without an answer, opened the door, saw her to her vestibule, and returned silent and moody, turning over again and again in his mind the sudden contradiction in her character.
“I wonder if she repels or attracts me most,” he said, tramping over the quiet pavements, which flung back the riotous thumping of his cane. But, as he went aimlessly along, he felt again creeping over him the suddenness of her charm and a certain unsatisfied restlessness to see her again, which came to him with the faint scent of the perfume that had clung to his coat.
All at once he stopped.
“I’ve got to get to the bottom of all this affair,” he said abruptly. “I believe she’s as straight as they make ’em; I’d wager my soul on it—but I’ve got to know!”
And, boarding a surface car, he returned to Rita Kildair’s.