III
TWINS
On the boat-train, en route for Liverpool, Mr. Staff found plenty oftime to consider the affair of the foundling bandbox in every aspectwith which a lively imagination could invest it; but to small profit. Infact, he was able to think of little else, with the damned thingsmirking impishly at him from its perch on the opposite seat. He wasvexed to exasperation by the consciousness that he couldn't guess why orby whom it had been so cavalierly thrust into his keeping. Consequentlyhe cudgelled his wits unmercifully in exhaustive and exhausting attemptsto clothe it with a plausible _raison d'etre_.
He believed firmly that the Maison Lucille had acted in good faith; thename of Staff was too distinctive to admit of much latitude for error.Nor was it difficult to conceive that this or that young woman of hisacquaintance might have sent him the hat to take home for her--thusridding herself of a cumbersome package and neatly saddling him with allthe bother of getting the thing through the customs. But ...! Who wasthere in London just then that knew him well enough so to presume uponhis good nature? None that he could call to mind. Besides, how in thename of all things inexplicable had anybody found out his intention ofsailing on the Autocratic, that particular day?--something of which hehimself had yet to be twenty-four hours aware!
His conclusions may be summed up under two heads: (a) there wasn't anyanswer; (b) it was all an unmitigated nuisance. And so thinking, dividedbetween despair and disgust, Mr. Staff gave the problem up against hisarrival on board the steamship. There remained to him a single gleam ofhope: a note of explanation had been promised; he thought it justpossible that it might have been sent to the steamship rather than tohis lodgings in London.
Therefore, the moment he set foot aboard the ship, he consigned hishand-luggage to a steward, instructing the fellow where to take it, andhurried off to the dining-saloon where, upon a table round whichpassengers buzzed like flies round a sugar-lump, letters and telegramsfor the departing were displayed. But he could find nothing for Mr.Benjamin Staff.
Disappointed and indignant to the point of suppressed profanity, heelbowed out of the thronged saloon just in time to espy a steward (quiteanother steward: not him with whom Staff had left his things)struggling up the main companionway under the handicap of severalarticles of luggage which Staff didn't recognise, and one which heassured himself he did: a bandbox as like the cause of all hisperturbation as one piano-case resembles another.
Now if quite out of humour with the bandbox and all that appertainedthereunto, the temper of the young man was such that he was by no meansprepared to see it confiscated without his knowledge or consent. In twolong strides he overhauled the steward, plucked him back with aperemptory hand, and abashed him with a stern demand:
"I say! where the devil do you think you're going, my man?"
His man showed a face of dashed amazement.
"Beg pardon, sir! Do you mean _me_?"
"Most certainly I mean you. That's my bandbox. What are you doing withit?"
Looking guiltily from his face to the article in question, the stewardflushed and stammered--culpability incarnate, thought Staff.
"Your bandbox, sir?"
"Do you think I'd go charging all over this ship for a silly bandboxthat wasn't mine?"
"But, sir--"
"I tell you, it's mine. It's tagged with my name. Where's the steward Ileft it with?"
"But, sir," pleaded the accused, "this belongs to this lidy 'ere. I'mjust tikin' it to 'er stiteroom, sir."
Staff's gaze followed the man's nod, and for the first time he becameaware that a young woman stood a step or two above them, half turnedround to attend to the passage, her air and expression seeming toindicate a combination of amusement and impatience.
Precipitately the young man removed his hat. Through the confusionclouding his thoughts, he both foreglimpsed humiliation and was dimlyaware of a personality of force and charm: of a well-poised figurecloaked in a light pongee travelling-wrap; of a face that seemed toconsist chiefly in dark eyes glowing lambent in the shadow of awide-brimmed, flopsy hat. He was sensitive to a hint of breeding andreserve in the woman's attitude; as though (he thought) the contretempsdiverted and engaged her more than he did who was responsible for it.
He addressed her in a diffident and uncertain voice: "I beg pardon...."
"The box is mine," she affirmed with a cool and even gravity. "Thesteward is right."
He choked back a counterclaim, which would have been unmannerly, and inhis embarrassment did something that he instantly realised was evenworse, approaching downright insolence in that it demanded confirmationof her word: he bent forward and glanced at the tag on the bandbox.
It was labelled quite legibly with the name of Miss Eleanor Searle.
He coloured, painfully contrite. "I'm sorry," he stammered."I--ah--happen to have with me the precise duplicate of this box. Ididn't at first realise that it might have a--ah--twin."
The young woman inclined her head distantly.
"I understand," she said, turning away. "Come, steward, if you please."
"I'm very sorry--very," Staff said hastily in intense mortification.
Miss Searle did not reply; she had already resumed her upward progress.Her steward followed, openly grinning.
Since it is not considered good form to kick a steward for knowing anass when he meets one, Staff could no more than turn away, disguise theunholy emotions that fermented in his heart, and seek his stateroom.
"It _had_ to be me!" he groaned.
Stateroom 432-433 proved to be very much occupied when he foundit--chiefly, to be sure, by the bandbox, which took up most of the floorspace. Round it were grouped in various attitudes of dejection sundryother pieces of travelling-gear and Mr. Iff. The latter was sitting onthe edge of the lower berth, his hands in his pockets, his brow puckeredwith perplexity, his gaze fixed in fascination to the bandbox. OnStaff's entrance he looked up.
"Hello!" he said crisply.
"Afternoon," returned Staff with all the morose dignity appropriate toseverely wounded self-esteem.
Iff indicated the bandbox with a delicate gesture.
"No wonder," he observed mildly, "you wanted the ship to yourself."
Staff grunted irritably and, picking his way through and over the moundof luggage, deposited himself on the transom opposite the berths.
"A present for the missis, I take it?" pursued Iff.
"You might take it, and welcome, for all of me.... Only it isn't mine._And_ I am not married."
"Pardon!" murmured Mr. Iff. "But if it isn't yours," he suggestedlogically, "what the deuce-and-all is it doing here?"
"I'm supposed to be taking it home for a friend."
"Ah! I see.... A very, _very_ dear friend, of course....?"
"You'd think so, wouldn't you?" Staff regarded the bandbox with openmalevolence. "If I had my way," he said vindictively, "I'd lift it akick over the side and be rid of it."
"How you do take on, to be sure," Iff commented placidly. "If I may bepermitted to voice my inmost thought: you seem uncommon' peeved."
"I am."
"Could I soothe your vexed soul in any way?"
"You might tell me how to get quit of the blasted thing."
"I'll try, if you'll tell me how you got hold of it."
"Look here!" Staff suddenly aroused to a perception of the fact that hewas by way of being artfully pumped. "Does this matter interest you verymuch indeed?"
"No more, apparently, than it annoys you.... And it is quite possiblethat, in the course of time, we _might_ like to shut the door.... But,as far as that is, I don't mind admitting I'm a nosey little beast. Ifyou feel it your duty to snub me, my dear fellow, by all means go to it.I don't mind--and I dessay I deserve it."
This proved irresistible; Staff's humour saved his temper. To thetwinkle in Iff's faded blue eyes he returned a reluctant smile thatended in open laughter.
"It's just this way," he explained somewhat to his own surprise, underthe influence of an unforeseen
gush of liking for this good-humouredwisp of a man--"I feel I'm being shamelessly imposed upon. Just as I wasleaving my rooms this morning this hat-box was sent to me, anonymously.I assume that some cheeky girl I know has sent it to me to tote home forher. It's a certificated nuisance--but that isn't all. There happens tobe a young woman named Searle on board, who has an exact duplicate ofthis infernal contraption. A few moments ago I saw it, assumed it mustbe mine, quite naturally claimed it, and was properly called down in thepolitest, most crushing way imaginable. Hence this headache."
"So!" said Mr. Iff. "So that is why he doesn't love his dear littlebandbox!... A Miss Earle, I think you said?"
"No--Searle. At least, that was the name on her luggage."
"Oh--Searle, eh?"
"You don't happen to know her, by any chance?" Staff demanded, notwithout a trace of animation.
"Who? Me? Nothing like that," Iff disclaimed hastily.
"I just thought you might," said Staff, disappointed.
For some moments the conversation languished. Then Staff rose andpressed the call-button.
"What's up?" asked Iff.
"Going to get rid of this," said Staff with an air of grimdetermination.
"Just what I was going to suggest. But don't do anything hasty--anythingyou'll be sorry for."
"Leave that to me, please."
From his tone the assumption was not unwarrantable that Staff had neveryet done anything that he had subsequently found cause to regret.Pensively punishing an inoffensive wrist, Iff subsided.
A steward showed himself in the doorway.
"You rang, sir?"
"Are you our steward?" asked Staff.
"Yes, sir."
"Your name?"
"Orde, sir."
"Well, Orde, can you stow this thing some place out of our way?"
Orde eyed the bandbox doubtfully. "I dessay I can find a plice for it,"he said at length.
"Do, please."
"Very good, sir. Then-Q." Possessing himself of the bandbox, Orderetired.
"And now," suggested Iff with much vivacity, "s'pose we unpack and getsettled."
And they proceeded to distribute their belongings, sharing the meagreconveniences of their quarters with the impartiality of courteous andexperienced travellers....
It was rather late in the afternoon before Staff found an opportunity toget on deck for the first time. The hour was golden with the glory of awestering sun. The air was bland, the sea quiet. The Autocratic hadsettled into her stride, bearing swiftly down St. George's Channel forQueenstown, where she was scheduled to touch at midnight. Her deckspresented scenes of animation familiar to the eyes of a weatheredvoyager.
There was the customary confusion of petticoats and sporadic displays ofsteamer-rugs along the ranks of deck-chairs. Deck-stewards darted hitherand yon, wearing the harassed expressions appropriate to persons oftheir calling--doubtless to a man praying for that bright day when somepublic benefactor should invent a steamship having at least two leewardsides. A clatter of tongues assailed the ear, the high, sweet accents ofAmerican women predominating. The masculine element of thepassenger-list with singular unanimity--like birds of prey wheeling inever diminishing circles above their quarry--drifted imperceptibly butsteadily aft, toward the smoking-room. The two indispensable adjuncts toa successful voyage had already put in their appearance: _item_, thePest, an overdressed, overgrown, shrill-voiced female-child, blunderinginto everybody's way and shrieking impertinences; _item_, a short,stout, sedulously hilarious gentleman who oozed public-spiritedgeniality at every pore and insisted on buttonholing inoffensivestrangers and demanding that they enter an embryonic deck-quoittournament--in short, discovering every known symptom of being the Lifeand Soul of the Ship.
Staff dodged both by grace of discretion and good fortune, and havingfound his deck-chair, dropped into it with a sigh of content, composinghimself for rest and thought. His world seemed very bright with promise,just then; he felt that, if he had acted on impetuous impulse, he hadnot acted unwisely: only a few more hours--then the pause atQueenstown--then the brief, seven-day stretch across the Atlantic tohome and Alison Landis!
It seemed almost too good to be true. He all but purred with his contentin the prospect.
Of course, he had a little work to do, but he didn't mind that; it wouldhelp immensely to beguile the tedium of the voyage; and all he requiredin order to do it well was the moral courage to shut himself up for afew hours each day and to avoid as far as possible socialentanglements....
At just about this stage in his meditations he was somewhat rudelybrought back to earth--or, more properly, to deck.
A voice shrieked excitedly: "_Why_, Mr. Staff!"
To be precise, it miscalled him "Stahf": a shrill, penetrating,overcultivated, American voice making an attempt only semi-successful tocope with the broad vowels of modern English enunciation.
Staff looked up, recognised its owner, and said beneath his breath: "OLord!"--his soul crawling with recognition. But nothing of this wasdiscernible in the alacrity with which he jumped up and bent over a bonybut bedizened hand.
"Mrs. Ilkington!" he said.
"R'ally," said the lady, "the world _is_ ve-ry small, isn't it?"
She was a lean, angular, inordinately vivacious body whose years, whichwere many more than forty, were making a brave struggle to masquerade asthirty. She was notorious for her execrable taste in gowns and jewelry,but her social position was impregnable, and her avowed mission in lifewas to bring together Society (meaning the caste of money) with the Arts(meaning those humble souls content to sell their dreams for thewherewithal to sustain life).
Her passion for bromidioms always stupefied Staff--left him dazed andwitless. In the present instance he could think of nothing by way ofresponse happier than that hoary banality: "This is indeed a surprise."
"Flatterer!" said Mrs. Ilkington archly. "_I'm_ not surprised," shepursued. "I might have known _you'd_ be aboard this vessel."
"You must be a prophetess of sorts, then," he said, smiling. "I didn'tknow I was going to sail, myself, till late yesterday afternoon."
"Deceiver," commented the lady calmly. "Why can't you men _ever_ becandid?"
Surprise merged into some annoyance. "What do you mean?" he askedbluntly.
"Oh, but two can play at that game," she assured him spiritedly. "If youwon't be open with me, why should I tell all I know?"
"I'm sure I don't know what you're driving at, Mrs. Ilkington."
"Would it improve your understanding"--she threatened him gaily with agem-encrusted forefinger--"if I were to tell you I met a certain personin Paris last week, who talked to me about you?"
"It would not," said he stiffly. "Who--?"
"Oh, well, if you _won't_ be frank!" Mrs. Ilkington's manner impliedthat he was a bold, bad butterfly, but that she had his entomologicalnumber, none the less. "Tell me," she changed the subject abruptly, "howgoes the _great_ play?"
"Three acts are written," he said in weariness of spirit, "the fourth--"
"But I thought you weren't to return to America until it was _quite_finished?"
"Who told you that, please?"
"Never mind, sir! How about the fourth act?"
"I mean to write it _en voyage_," said he, perplexed. From whom couldthis woman possibly have learned so much that was intimate to himself?
"You have it all mapped out, then?" she persisted.
"Oh, yes; it only needs to be put on paper."
"R'ally, then, it's true--isn't it--that the writing is the least partof play construction?"
"Who told you that?" he asked again, this time amused.
"Oh, a _very_ prominent man," she declared; and named him.
Staff laughed. "A too implicit belief in that theory, Mrs. Ilkington,"said he, "is responsible for the large number of perfectly good playsthat somehow never get written--to say nothing of the equally largenumber of perfectly good playwrights who somehow never get anywhere."
"Clever!" screamed the
lady. "But aren't you wasteful of your epigrams?"
He could cheerfully have slain her then and there; for which reason thecivil gravity he preserved was all the more commendable.
"And now," he persisted, "won't you tell me with whom you werediscussing me in Paris?"
She shook her head at him reprovingly. "You don't _know_?"
"No."
"You can't guess?"
"Not to save me."
"R'ally?"
"Honestly and truly," he swore, puzzled by the undertone of light malicehe thought to detect in her manner.
"Then," said she with decision, "_I'm_ not going to get myself intotrouble by babbling. But, if you promise to be _nice_ to me all the wayhome--?" She paused.
"I promise," he said gravely.
"Then--if you happen to be at the head of the companion-ladder when thetender comes off from Queenstown tonight--I promise you a _huge_surprise."
"You won't say more than that?" he pleaded.
She appeared to debate. "Yes," she announced mischievously; "I'll giveyou a leading hint. The person I mean is the purchaser of the Cadogancollar."
His eyes were blank. "And what, please, is the Cadogan collar?"
"You don't mean to tell me you've never _heard_ of it?" She paused withdramatic effect. "Incredible! Surely, everybody knows about the Cadogancollar, the most magnificent necklace of pearls in the world!"
"Everybody, it seems, but myself, Mrs. Ilkington."
"R'ally!" she cried, and tapped his arm playfully. "You are as stupid asmost brilliant men!"
A bugle sang through the evening air. The lady started consciously.
"Heavens!" she cried. "Time to dress for dinner: I must _fly_!... Haveyou made your table reservation yet?"
"Yes," he said hastily.
"Then _do_ see the second-steward at once and get transferred to ourtable; we have just one vacant chair. Oh, but you _must_; you'vepromised to be nice to me, you know. And I do so want you to meet one ofmy protegees--such a _sweet_ girl--a Miss Searle. I'm sure you'll becrazy about her--at least, you would be if there were no Alison Landisin your cosmos. Now, do attend to that right away. Remember you'vepromised."
Staff bowed as she fluttered away. In his heart he was thoroughlyconvinced that this were a sorry scheme of things indeed did it notinclude a special hell for Mrs. Ilkingtons.
What had she meant by her veiled references to this mysterious person inParis, who was to board the steamer at Queenstown? How had she come byso much personal knowledge of himself and his work? And what did sheknow about his love for Alison Landis?
He swore thoughtfully, and went below to dress, stopping on the way tomake arrangements with the second-steward to have his seat changed, inaccordance with his exacted promise.