XXXIII
LOGIC VS. INTUITION
And now, Henry Leroux, Denise Ryland and Helen Cumberly were speedingalong the Richmond Road beneath a sky which smiled upon Leroux'sconvalescence; for this was a perfect autumn morning which ordinarilyhad gladdened him, but which saddened him to-day.
The sun shone and the sky was blue; a pleasant breeze played upon hischeeks; whilst Mira, his wife, was...
He knew that he had come perilously near to the borderland beyond whichare gibbering, moving things: that he had stood upon the frontier ofinsanity; and realizing the futility of such reflections, he struggledto banish them from his mind, for his mind was not yet healed--and hemust be whole, be sane, if he would take part in the work, which, now,strangers were doing, whilst he--whilst he was a useless hulk.
Denise Ryland had been very voluble at the commencement of the drive,but, as it progressed, had grown gradually silent, and now sat withher brows working up and down and with a little network of wrinklesalternately appearing and disappearing above the bridge of her nose. Aself-reliant woman, it was irksome to her to know herself outside thecircle of activity revolving around the mysterious Mr. King. She had hadone interview with Inspector Dunbar, merely in order that she might givepersonal testimony to the fact that Mira Leroux had not visited herthat year in Paris. Of the shrewd Scotsman she had formed the poorestopinion; and indeed she never had been known to express admiration for,or even the slightest confidence in, any man breathing. The amiable M.Gaston possessed virtues which appealed to her, but whilst she admittedthat his conversation was entertaining and his general behavior good,she always spoke with the utmost contempt of his sartorial splendor.
Now, with the days and the weeks slipping by, and with the spectaclebefore her of poor Leroux, a mere shadow of his former self, with thecase, so far as she could perceive, at a standstill, and with the police(she firmly believed) doing "absolutely... nothing... whatever"--DeniseRyland recognized that what was lacking in the investigation was thatintuition and wit which only a clever woman could bring to bear upon it,and of which she, in particular, possessed an unlimited reserve.
The car sped on toward the purer atmosphere of the riverside, and eventhe clouds of dust, which periodically enveloped them, with the passingof each motor-'bus, and which at the commencement of the drive hadinspired her to several notable and syncopated outbursts, now left herunmoved.
She thought that at last she perceived the secret working of thatProvidence which ever dances attendance at the elbow of accomplishedwomankind. Following the lead set by "H. C." in the Planet ("H. C." wasHelen Cumberly's nom de plume) and by Crocket in the Daily Monitor, theLondon Press had taken Olaf van Noord to its bosom; and his exhibitionin the Little Gallery was an established financial success, whilst "OurLady of the Poppies" (which had, of course, been rejected by the RoyalAcademy) promised to be the picture of the year.
Mentally, Denise Ryland was again surveying that remarkable composition;mentally she was surveying Olaf van Noord's model, also. Into the schemeslowly forming in her brain, the yellow-wrapped cigarette containing"a small percentage of opium" fitted likewise. Finally, but not last inimportance, the Greek gentleman, Mr. Gianapolis, formed a unit of thewhole.
Denise Ryland had always despised those detective creations whichabound in French literature; perceiving in their marvelous deductions atortured logic incompatible with the classic models. She prided herselfupon her logic, possibly because it was a quality which she lacked, andprobably because she confused it with intuition, of which, to do herjustice, she possessed an unusual share. Now, this intuition wasat work, at work well and truly; and the result which this mentalcontortionist ascribed to pure reason was nearer to the truth than areal logician could well have hoped to attain by confining himself tolegitimate data. In short, she had determined to her own satisfactionthat Mr. Gianapolis was the clue to the mystery; that Mr. Gianapolis wasnot (as she had once supposed) enacting the part of an amiable liarwhen he declared that there were, in London, such apartments as thatrepresented by Olaf van Noord; that Mr. Gianapolis was acquainted withthe present whereabouts of Mrs. Leroux; that Mr. Gianapolis knewwho murdered Iris Vernon; and that Scotland Yard was a benevolentinstitution for the support of those of enfeebled intellect.
These results achieved, she broke her long silence at the moment thatthe car was turning into Richmond High Street.
"My dear!" she exclaimed, clutching Helen's arm, "I see it all!"
"Oh!" cried the girl, "how you startled me! I thought you were ill orthat you had seen something frightful."...
"I HAVE... seen something... frightful," declared Denise Ryland. Sheglared across at the haggard Leroux. "Harry... Leroux," she continued,"it is very fortunate... that I came to London... very fortunate."
"I am sincerely glad that you did," answered the novelist, with one ofhis kindly, weary smiles.
"My dear," said Denise Ryland, turning again to Helen Cumberly, "you sayyou met that... cross-eyed... being... Gianapolis, again?"
"Good Heavens!" cried Helen; "I thought I should never get rid of him; amost loathsome man!"
"My dear... child"--Denise squeezed her tightly by the arm, and peeredinto her face, intently--"cul-tivate... DELIBERATELY cul-tivate thatman's acquaintance!"
Helen stared at her friend as though she suspected the latter's sanity.
"I am afraid I do not understand at all," she said, breathlessly.
"I am positive that I do not," declared Leroux, who was as muchsurprised as Helen. "In the first place I am not acquainted with thiscross-eyed being."
"You are... out of this!" cried Denise Ryland with a sweepingmovement of the left hand; "entirely... out of it! This is no MAN'S...business."...
"But my dear Denise!" exclaimed Helen....
"I beseech you; I entreat you;... I ORDER... you to cultivate...that... execrable... being."
"Perhaps," said Helen, with eyes widely opened, "you will condescend togive me some slight reason why I should do anything so extraordinary andundesirable?"
"Undesirable!" cried Denise. "On the contrary;... it is MOST ...desirable! It is essential. The wretched... cross-eyed ... creature haspresumed to fall in love... with you."...
"Oh!" cried Helen, flushing, and glancing rapidly at Leroux, who now wasthoroughly interested, "please do not talk nonsense!"
"It is no... nonsense. It is the finger... of Providence. Do you knowwhere you can find... him?"
"Not exactly; but I have a shrewd suspicion," again she glanced in anembarrassed way at Leroux, "that he will know where to find ME."
"Who is this presumptuous person?" inquired the novelist, leaningforward, his dark blue eyes aglow with interest.
"Never mind," replied Denise Ryland, "you will know... soon enough.In the meantime... as I am simply... starving, suppose we see about...lunch?"
Moved by some unaccountable impulse, Helen extended her hand to Leroux,who took it quietly in his own and held it, looking down at the slimfingers as though he derived strength and healing from their touch.
"Poor boy," she said softly.