Lord John in New York Part 18

EPISODE VI

THE CLUE IN THE AIR

If I had been fighting my own battle, not Maida's, against Doctor Rameses, I might have sometimes admired his cleverness. There seemed to be no way of catching him.

The police theory was that some person, not Rameses, took advantage of the "philanthropist's" conspicuous appearance to commit crimes in a disguise resembling his peculiarities. This, they thought, might be done not only as a means of escaping detection, but with the object of blackmail. My theory was different. I believed that Rameses had a confederate enough like him in looks to deceive an audience a.s.sembled for one of his lectures, or patients undergoing his treatment.

I did not hesitate to a.s.sert this opinion, hoping to provoke the man to open attack.

After the affair of the opium den, he lay low. Nothing happened in which, by any stretching of probabilities, he could have had a hand.

Perhaps, thought I, he had learned that I was a hard nut to crack!

Two-thirds of the time for which Maida had promised herself to the Grey Sisterhood pa.s.sed. Her doubts of me had been swept away, and I hoped to find at the end of the year that I hadn't waited in vain. Now and then I saw, or believed that I saw, light on the mystery of Maida's antecedents. Altogether I was happier than I had been and I was serving my country's interests while I served my own.

I had been ordered to buy desirable new types of aeroplanes, and luckily got hold of some good ones. The "story" of my mission suddenly appeared in the newspapers, and interest in my old exploits as a flying man were revived embarra.s.singly. I was "paragraphed" for a few days when war tidings happened to be dull; and to my surprise received an invitation to demonstrate my "stunt" of looping a double loop at a new aviation park, opened on Long Island. The exhibition resulted in another compliment. I was asked to instruct a cla.s.s of young aviators, and was officially advised by the British Amba.s.sador to accept. I did accept: and was given a "plane" and a hangar of my own; but I kept on my suite in the hotel near Sisterhood House, starting at an early hour most mornings to motor to the aviation ground.

After a few weeks of this, a big aviation meeting took place, and when my part in it was over I found myself holding quite a reception in my hangar. Friends and strangers had kind things to say: and while I explained new features of my 'plane to some pretty women, I saw a prettier woman gazing wistfully at me between hats.

Her face was familiar. I remembered that tremulous, wistful smile of eyes and lips, which (the thought flashed through my head) would be fine stock-in-trade for an actress. Still, for the life of me, I couldn't recall the girl's name or whether we had ever really met, until her chance came to dash into the breach made by disappearing plumes and feathers. She seized the opportunity with a promptness that argued well for her b.u.mp of decision: but she was helped to success by the tallest, thinnest, brightest-eyed young man I had ever seen.

"You've forgotten me, Lord John!" the girl reproached me. "I'm Helen Hartland. Does that name bring back anything?"

"Of course!" I answered, remembering where and how I had met Helen Hartland. She had made her debut on the stage several years ago in a curtain-raiser of mine, my first and last attempt at playwriting "on my own." Her part had been a small one, but she had played it well and looked lovely in it. I had congratulated her. When the run ended, she had asked for introductions to people I knew in the theatrical world, and I had given them. She had written me a few letters, telling of engagements she had got (nothing good unfortunately) and wanting me to see her act. I had never been able to do so; but I had sent her flowers once on a first night.

Not trusting to my recollection, she reminded me of these things, and introduced the tall, thin, bright-eyed young man.

"You must have heard of Charlie Bridges, the California Birdman, as everybody calls him!" she said. And then went on to explain, as if she didn't want their relations misunderstood: "We met on the ship coming over, and Mr. Bridges was _so_ kind! Our steamer chairs were together, and he lent me a copy of _Sketch_ with a picture of him in it! Wasn't it funny, there was a picture of _you_, too, and I mentioned knowing you? Next, it came out that he was bringing a letter of introduction to you from a friend of yours at home. We landed only two days ago. I was so happy, for I've had hard luck for months, and I thought I was falling into a ripping engagement. But it was a fraud--the _queerest_ fraud! I can't understand it a bit. I want to tell you all about it and get your advice. Mr. Bridges brought me to the meeting here. It _was_ nice of him. But now I've paid him back, haven't I, putting him in touch with you?"

Charlie Bridges listened to the monologue with varying emotions, as I could see in his face which was ingeniously expression-ful. Evidently he had fallen in love with Helen Hartland, and was not pleased to stand still listening to protestations of grat.i.tude for small past favours from me. She realised his state of feeling as well as I did, perhaps better, being a woman: and what her motive in exciting him to jealousy was, I couldn't be sure. Maybe she wished to bring him to the point (though he looked eager to impale himself upon it!), maybe she simply didn't care how he felt, and wanted him to understand this once for all: or possibly it amused her to play us off against each other.

In any case, I put myself out to be pleasant to Bridges, who seemed a nice fellow, and was, I knew, a smart aviator. He had been in France at the time of my accident, and had not returned to America since then.

He had news from London and Paris to give me, and even if Helen Hartland had not insisted, we should have struck up a friendship.

I invited them to have food with me at the brand new Aviation Park Hotel (as it called itself), saying that we'd "feed" in the roof-garden restaurant, of which the proprietors were proud. Bridges hesitated, possibly disliking to accept hospitality from the hated rival: but as Helen said "yes," rather than leave her to my tender mercies, the poor chap followed suit.

The hotel had been run up in next to no time, to catch aviation "fans,"

and the roof-garden was a smart idea, as patrons could sit there eating and drinking, and see the flying at the same time. It was small, but nicely arranged, partly gla.s.sed in, partly open, with a "lift" to rush dishes up from the kitchen (this was practically concealed with trellis-work covered with creepers trying to grow in pots), and a low wall or parapet with flowers planted in a shallow strip of earth. The weather was fine, so we chose a table in the open, for our late luncheon. My place--with Helen at my right, and Bridges opposite us both--was close to the parapet, so close that I could peer over a row of pink geraniums, to the newly-sodded lawn and gravelled paths below.

As it happened I did peer while we waited for our oysters, sub-consciously attracted perhaps by the interest an elderly waiter was taking in someone or somebody down there. I was just in time to see a face look up, not to me but to the waiter. Instantly the head ducked, presenting to my eyes only the top of a wide-brimmed soft hat of black felt--an old-fashioned hat.

"By Jove!" I said to myself, and had to beg Helen's pardon for losing a remark of hers: for that quick, snap-shot glance had shown me features like those of the priceless Rameses.

"Now, what can _he_ be doing here--if it is he?" I wondered. It was absurd to fancy that he might bribe a waiter to poison my food, and so rid himself of me once for all. No: poisoning--anyhow at second hand--wasn't in Rameses' line. Besides, his waiter wasn't my waiter, which would complicate the plot for a neat murder. As the man walked away (I still watching) his back was not like that of Rameses, if I had ever seen the real Rameses. The police thought I had not. I thought I had: but the picture in my mind was of a person erect and distinguished: this figure was slouching and common.

I was not, however, to be caught napping. I called to the waiter who now, instead of looking down to the lawn, was picking dead leaves off the pink geraniums. "That was Doctor Rameses of New York, wasn't it?"

I fired at him, staring into his anemic Austrian face. It did not change, unless to drop such little expression as it had worn. Utter blankness must mean complete innocence or extreme subtlety. I could hardly credit the fellow with the latter. "Doctor Ra--mps?" he echoed.

"Who--where, sir?"

"Down below: the man you were looking at," I explained, still fixing him with a basilisk eye.

He shook his head. "I wasn't lookin' at no man, sir," he protested.

"I was lookin' at nothin' at all."

Meanwhile the slouch hat and slouching figure had disappeared into the crowd which still ringed the aviation ground. I abandoned the inquest, and turned my attention to Helen and Bridges.

As we lunched, I learned the history of Helen's trip to America, and the "fraud" she had spoken of as "queer." It seemed that, a few days after the suburban theatre she was acting in had closed, she received a long cable message from New York. A man signing himself "William Morgan, Manager Excelsis Motion Picture Corporation" offered her the "lead" in a forthcoming production. He explained expensively that he had seen her act and thought her ideal for the part. She was to have six months' certain engagement with a salary of a hundred dollars a week, and her dresses and travelling expenses were to be paid by the management. She was to reply by wire, and if she accepted, five hundred dollars would be advanced to her by cable.

The address given, "29, Vandusen Street, New York," did not sound "swell" to an English actress who vaguely thought of Broadway and Fifth Avenue as being the only streets "over there." Still, the promise of an advance gave an air of bona-fides, and Helen had answered "Yes.

Start on receipt of money."

By return, the money came, and the girl took the first ship available, telegraphing again to Mr. Morgan. She expected him to meet her at the docks, but he "never materialised," and "if it hadn't been for Mr.

Bridges she didn't know what she would have done!" Bridges it was who took her in a taxi to 29, Vandusen Street, which address proved to be that of a tobacconist in a small way of business. There she was told that a man named William Morgan had paid for the privilege of receiving "mail," but only a couple of telegrams had come. He had called for them, but had not been seen since. The proprietor of the shop vowed that he knew nothing of Morgan. The man had walked in one day, bought a box of expensive cigars, and made the arrangement mentioned. Bridges inquired "what he was like," but the tobacconist shook his head dully.

Morgan looked like everybody else, neither old nor young, fair nor dark, fat nor lean. If you met him once, you couldn't be sure you would know him again.

"I've three hundred and fifty dollars left," Helen said at last, "all I have in the world, for I was stoney-broke when the cable came. Of course I can't live on that money long. But as I'm here, I shall stop and try to get something to do. I'm puzzled to death, though, why 'Morgan'--whoever he is--picked _me_ out, or why it was worth his while to send a hundred pounds and then never turn up at the ship."

"It does seem odd," I agreed. "He may have been scared off from meeting you--or arrested. However, you'd better be careful what acquaintances you make."

"I _want_ to be careful," the girl said. "But I _must_ find work. And I can't do that without making some acquaintances, can I?--whether they're dangerous or not! Unless--oh, Lord John, if you could _only_ put me in the way of an engagement, no matter how small. I've heard your play was a great success. You must know a lot of managers over here and--

"I don't," I answered her. "My activities lately haven't been in theatres! I'm afraid----" I was going on, but stopped suddenly. She had said "an engagement no matter how small." I would take her at her word!

"You've thought of something for me!" she exclaimed, while Bridges sulked because he numbered no theatrical potentates among his friends.

"I'm almost ashamed to suggest it," I said, "but I could get you a 'job' of a sort here. The proprietor of this hotel and his wife (good creatures and ambitious to cut a dash in the fashionable world) want a pretty girl--a 'real actress'--to sing and recite in the roof-garden these fine summer evenings. I don't suppose you----"

"Oh, yes I _would_! I'd love to be here. It would be _fun_!" Helen broke in. "I adore flying; and I should see _you_ often--and Mr.

Bridges too, perhaps. Anyhow, it would do to go on with till I got something else, if they'd pay me a 'living wage.'"

"I'll be your agent, sing your praises and screw up your price," I imprudently volunteered. Imprudently, because having arranged matters between the hotel people and Miss Hartland, I found her grat.i.tude oppressive. She said it was grat.i.tude; yet she seemed to think that I had got her placed at the Aviation Park Hotel in order to enjoy her society. This was not the case. Helen Hartland was pretty, with charming ways for those who liked them: but I was in the state of mind which sees superlative beauty and charm in one woman only. Because I was separated from Maida Odell by force of circ.u.mstances while she remained with the Grey Sisterhood, it was irritating to see other girls flitting about free to do as they pleased. It bored me when I had to lunch or dine at the hotel to find Helen always on hand with "something to tell," or my "advice to ask."

Whether the girl had taken a fancy to me, or whether she was amusing herself by exciting Bridges' jealousy, I didn't know: I knew only that I was bothered, and that Bridges was miserable.

Helen lived in the hotel from the first, partly through kindness on the part of her employers, partly perhaps because they thought her presence an attraction. They gave her a decent salary--more than she had ever earned in the small parts she'd played at home: she dressed well, and made a "hit" with her sweet soprano voice, her really glorious yellow-brown hair, and that wistful smile of hers. Next door to the best and biggest bedroom in the house was a small room which connected with the larger one, and could be used as a dressing-room. n.o.body ever engaged it for that purpose, however, and Mrs. Edson, the landlady, suggested that Miss Hartland should occupy the little room until it was wanted. The girl described it to me as delightful. There were double doors between it and the large room adjoining, so that one wasn't disturbed by voices on the other side. There was also a door opening close to the service stairway which went up to the roof-garden. This was convenient for Helen, before and after her songs and recitations.

She bought little knick-knacks to make her quarters pretty and, with a patent folding-bed and a screen or two was able to ask her friends in, as if she were the proud possessor of a private sitting-room.

I made excuses instead of calls; but one day I was lured in to see Charlie Bridges (who by then had a hangar on the grounds) do his wonderful "stunt," considered by the Edsons a fine advertis.e.m.e.nt for their hotel. It was not, however, for purposes of advertis.e.m.e.nt that the California Birdman performed the "stunt" in question, but rather for love of Helen Hartland. In the small, smart "one seater" which he was using, he would dive from a height, swoop past Helen's open window and throw in a bunch of roses. It was said that his aim was invariably true, a more difficult feat than might be supposed: anyhow the day that I was there to witness the exhibition it was a brilliant success.

Whether by accident or design the flowers. .h.i.t me on the head, and if Charlie were really jealous he accomplished a neat revenge.

"I could see you as plain as a pikestaff sitting there," he said afterwards. "Oh, I don't mean the 'plain' or the 'pikestaff' in a nasty way, Lord John. I only mean I recognised you as I flew by."

"And Mrs. Edson too, who was with us, I suppose," I hurried to say: for I didn't wish the boy to think that he had anything to fear from me. I saw from his manner, however, when we happened to meet, that he was worried, and to give him the chance which I didn't want for myself, I began to avoid Helen.

This course wasn't easy to steer, I found, while duty kept me often at the aviation grounds. She sent me notes. I had to answer them. She asked me to lend her books. I couldn't refuse. At last she wrote a letter, confessing that she had got into trouble about money. Her salary "wasn't bad, considering"; but she hadn't understood American prices. She'd been stupid enough to run into debt. Would I, as her countryman, help her out of just _one_ sc.r.a.pe, and she wouldn't get into another? Of course, Mr. Bridges would be glad to do it, but she didn't want to take a favour from him. I was "different."

I sent her a hundred dollars, the sum she specified, but in writing her thanks, she "chaffed" me for not making out a cheque. "I believe you think me capable of trying to get a hold on you," she wrote. Naturally I didn't bother to reply to that taunt, but kept out of Helen's way more persistently than before, until one afternoon Mrs. Edson b.u.t.tonholed me. I happened to have seen Helen on her way to New York, so I was venturing to lunch at the hotel.