Lady Larkspur Part 8

I left the house like a man over whom an enchantment has been spoken and was not pleased when Antoine blocked my path: "Pardon me, sir."

"Bother my pardon; what's troubling you now?" I demanded.

"It's nothing troubling me, sir; not particularly. If you give me time, I think I'll grow used to the poetry talk and playing at being queens.

It's like children in a family I served once; an English family, most respectable. But in a widow, sir----"

"G.o.d knows we ought to be glad when grown-ups have the heart to play at being children and can get away with it as beautifully as those women do! What else is on your mind?"

"It's about Elsie, sir." I groaned at the mention of Flynn's German wife. "I'm sorry, sir; but I thought I should report it. It was a man who came to see her this afternoon. You was out for your walk, and Flynn had taken the ladies for a drive, so Elsie was alone at the garage. This person rode in on the grocer's truck from the village, which is how he got by the gate. As it happened, Pierre--he was a waiter at the Tyringham, a Swiss, who understands German--had gone into the garage for a nap; he's quite old, sir, and has his snooze every afternoon."

"He's ent.i.tled to it," I remarked; "he must be a thousand years old."

"From what he heard Pierre thought the man a spy, sir. He wanted Elsie to steal something from the house, it was a fan he wanted her to take most particular, and it was to be done soon, to-day if she could manage.

It was for the love of the Fatherland that he wanted her to do it. Did you notice, sir, that Mrs. Bashford didn't have the fan to-night? Not that one she carried last night."

I had noticed that she had subst.i.tuted a tiny j.a.panese fan for the one that Montani had inspected so eagerly. When I spoke of the change she had said the other was too precious for every-day use, and she meant to keep it locked up.

"I hate to bother you, sir, knowing you----"

The mention of the fan had brought me to an abrupt halt. I resented having the thing thrust at me in the ecstatic mood in which I had left the house, but the visit of the German-speaking stranger was serious, and Antoine knew that his story had startled me. He told me further that the man had carefully outlined to Elsie just how she could take advantage of her freedom of the house to appropriate the fan when the ladies were out and the servants off the second floor. She was to be paid for her a.s.sistance; two hundred dollars had been promised; even more had been suggested. Elsie and the stranger had left the garage and pa.s.sed out of ear-shot before Elsie fully consented; but Pierre had given Antoine the impression that she would make the attempt.

"It was to be for the Kaiser, for Germany," declared Antoine bitterly.

"And she was to be careful about Flynn. I always thought Flynn was straight--I did indeed, sir!"

"I think Flynn and his wife are both honest, but we'll take no chance.

Warn the guards to be on the alert. We don't want Elsie to get the idea that she's being watched; so tell the men to keep away from the garage.

I'll keep an eye on the Flynns. You go home and go to bed...."

The deep calm of the country night had settled upon the sh.o.r.e, and the Flynns' quarters were perfectly tranquil. It didn't seem possible that an international episode was in process of incubation in that quiet neighborhood. I began to think that the general distrust of the German woman by her a.s.sociates might be responsible for Pierre's story. But, viewed in any light, I had a duty to perform. If Elsie had visited the house and purloined the fan, she would be very likely to get rid of it as quickly as possible, and I determined to keep watch. I drew the blinds, got into my dressing-gown and, reinforcing the lampshade with a newspaper to deaden the light, proceeded to read.

It was on toward one o'clock and I was dozing when a sound roused me. A door on the Flynn side of the hall creaked; there was silence, then I heard furtive steps on the stair. I snapped out my light and peered out of the window just as Elsie's robust figure disappeared into the shadows. I was about to follow when the creaking of the Flynn door was repeated. In a moment another peep through the shade showed me Flynn himself, and he, too, quickly vanished. Here was a situation indeed! If Elsie was keeping tryst with her co-conspirator of the afternoon and her husband was spying upon her, a row of large proportions was likely to result at any moment. I leaned from the window as far as I dared, and saw the woman close to the wall at the farther end of the building. The scene was well set for trouble, and I was wondering what I could do to avert a disturbance and the exposure of the foolish woman when the whole matter was taken out of my hands.

"You fool! You scoundrel!" she bellowed in German. "That you should think me a plaything to commit a robbery for you! That I should steal from my mistress to satisfy you, you piece of swine-flesh!"

I had often heard Elsie vocally disciplining her Irish husband and knew the power of her lungs and the vigor of her invective, but she seemed bent upon apprising the whole commonwealth of Connecticut of the fact that she was vastly displeased with the person she was addressing, who was certainly not Flynn. Amid sounds of a scuffle and the continuous outpouring of billingsgate the light over the garage door flashed on suddenly and disclosed Flynn in the act of precipitating himself into the fray. Elsie had grasped, and was stoutly clinging to a tall man who was trying to free himself of her muscular embrace. Her cries meanwhile included some of the raciest terms in the German dictionary and others--mouthfuls of frightfulness--that I didn't recognize.

When I reached the open Flynn was dancing round the belligerents like an excited boxer, occasionally springing in to land a blow; and all the while Elsie continued to address her captive and the world at large in her native tongue. Flynn was rather more than sixty, and Elsie was not much his junior, while the invader was young and agile. The man had loosened one arm and drawn a revolver with which he was pounding Elsie in the face. I knocked the gun from his hand with my walking-stick and shouted to Elsie to let go of him. Her shouts had roused the guards and, hearing answering cries and the beat of hurrying feet on the walks, he redoubled his efforts to escape. I had hardly got my hands on him when with a twist of his body he wrenched himself free and sped away in the darkness.

I hadn't gone far in pursuit of him before I tripped over the skirts of my dressing-gown and fell into a bed of cannas. This would have been less melancholy if Flynn, hard behind, hadn't stumbled over me and, believing he had captured the enemy, gripped my legs until I could persuade him to let go.

The lights now flared on all the walks and driveways, and Antoine was bellowing orders to the guards to surround the sunken garden. I surmised that the fugitive, surprised by the attack, had lost his bearings and was now far from the boundary wall back of the garage from which presumably he had entered the grounds. With the Sound cutting off his exit beyond the residence, there was a fair chance of catching him if Antoine's veterans were at all vigilant.

I found Antoine, armed with a club and swinging a lantern, majestically posed at the nearer entrance to the garden. With a swallow-tail coat over his night-shirt and his nightcap tipped over one ear, he was an enthralling figure. As he strode toward me his slippers flapped weirdly upon the brick walk. "There's somebody in the garden, sir," he whispered huskily. "The troops has it surrounded." No general in all history, reporting in some critical hour the disposition of his army, could have been more composed.

"You have done well, Antoine. Shall you dig in until morning or go over the top now?"

"As you say, sir. It's better you should take charge."

I walked round the garden and found his men well distributed, but the old fellows were exceedingly nervous. "It's a bit suspicious, sir, that he broke for the garden," remarked Antoine.

"He broke for the garden," I suggested, "because his line of retreat was cut off and he had to go somewhere."

"It's queer, though, sir, when Dutch has been sleeping on the long bench down there by the fountain. You know how we feel about him, sir, he being of that race."

"Dutch told me he was camping in the tool-house," I answered.

"The boys drove him out, sir, and he took to the garden."

"Nasty of the boys, I should say. If that interloper should murder him----"

A yell rose from the midst of the garden, followed by a crash and an instant later by a splash that interrupted another yell. I s.n.a.t.c.hed Antoine's lantern and ran down the steps toward the scene of commotion.

When I reached the circular pool the jet was still playing gayly, but the waters on one side were in furious agitation. Two men were rolling and tumbling about as though bent upon drowning each other. I swung the lantern over them just as Dutch got upon his feet, gripping his antagonist by the collar. He flung him backward over the stone curbing of the pool and fell upon him in the walk with a swish of wet garments.

The guards from the outer edges of the garden had clambered down and they gathered about us as I began questioning Dutch.

Dutch, undoubtedly enjoying his victorious encounter, was tearing open the prostrate captive's collar to give him air and with his knees clamping the man's body was disposed to delay the story of his adventures to increase its dramatic effect.

"It happens this evenin'," he began, spouting water, "that I seen Elsie, who's been sneakin' me meals to the old stables, an' she says to me: 'Dutch,' she says, 'they's all ag'in us here, callin' us Huns, an' we gotta show 'em we's good Americans,' she says. An' she tole me a feller been to see 'er 'at wanted 'er to rob the house fer 'im, he thinkin' 'er likely to do ut fer love o' the Kaiser. She said as 'ow she'd nail 'im when he comes to-night to git a fan she's promised to lift fer 'im. She said that'd prove she wasn't no Dutchwoman and recommended if I got the chance to do the same. I thought nothin' wuz goin' to happen an' wuz sleepin' on me bench here in the garden when the hollerin' at the garage woke me up. I sits quiet, listenin' an' this guy drops into the garden an' wuz crawlin' past me bench an' I pinches 'im. He wuz fer havin' a fight, an' we knocks over one of the big urns an' lit in the tank. He says it's a thousand bones an' ye turn me loose, he says, an' I soused 'im ag'in fer that."

The man was still choking from the sousings and Dutch turned him over and pounded him vigorously on the back, a.s.sisted by Zimmerman, the obliging valet, who had seized the occasion to show his hand on the side of the Allies. "Shall I telephone for the Barton police, sir?" asked Antoine with an extreme exaggeration of his professional manner.

This obviously was the thing to do, but I feigned not to hear the question while I debated the matter. It was plain that many things relating to the capture were veiled in mystery: that if Mrs. Bashford and her companion were involved in an international tangle and had in their possession something that vitally concerned the nations at war, common chivalry demanded that I handle the arrest of Montani's agent in such manner as to shield them. I was thinking hard and in my perplexity even considered sending a messenger for Torrence; but he was already suspicious and would be very likely to summon Raynor immediately and precipitate a crisis I was not prepared to face. To invite the attention of the American State Department to the increasingly complex situation would not be giving my aunt the chance I meant she should have to clear herself.

The captive had got upon his feet and stood dazedly staring at us. He refused to answer my questions, even when I suggested that if he could give a satisfactory account of himself he would be released. He only doggedly shook his head. When I asked if he had been hurt in his bout with Dutch he smiled and extended his arms in denial. He was a very decent-looking fellow, blue-eyed and smooth-shaven, who seemed to accept his plight with a degree of good humor.

I decided that as nothing would be gained by sending him to the Barton calaboose that night, I would a.s.sume the responsibility of detaining him until I had groped my way through the haze of suspicions and circ.u.mstances that enveloped him.

"Get some dry clothes for this man and lock him up in the tool-house. Be sure he has blankets, and you'd better give him some hot coffee."

The captive manifested relief at my decision and broke his silence to thank me, which he did in very good English. His submissiveness only deepened my perplexity, but I couldn't help laughing as he walked away surrounded by the "troops," with Dutch leading the way--Dutch fully conscious that he had vindicated himself and disposed to be rather disdainful of his comrades.

I hurried to the house, where I found Alice and Mrs. Farnsworth ministering to Elsie, who had been taken there by their order. Elsie, sharing with Dutch the honors of the night, lay on a davenport, where she had received first aid. Alice rose from her knees as I entered, gathering up strips of bandages, and turned to me laughingly.

"Elsie's injuries are not serious; only disagreeable bruises in the face. There will be no scars, I'm sure. We'll keep her at the house for a few days until she's quite fit again. Surely any one who has questioned Elsie's loyalty ought to be satisfied now."

"You certainly managed it very cleverly, Elsie. We're all very grateful."

Elsie, her face covered with bandages, acknowledged my thanks by wiggling her foot.

Mrs. Farnsworth said she would put Elsie to bed. Now, I thought, Alice would make some sign if she knew anything that would explain Montani and the prisoner in the tool-house. But the whole affair only moved her to laughter and she seemed less a grown woman than ever in her white robe.

My efforts to impress her with the seriousness of the attempt to secure the fan only added to her delight.

"How droll! How very droll! You couldn't possibly have arranged anything that would please me more! It's delicious! As you say in America, it's perfectly killing!"

I suggested that the holding of a prisoner without process of law might present embarra.s.sments.

"I know," she cried, clapping her hands joyfully. "You mean we are likely to b.u.mp into dear old _habeas corpus_! The sheriff will come and read a solemn paper to you and you will have to hie you to court and produce the body of the prisoner. That will be splendid!"

"It won't be so funny if----"