Peter Part 13

The dear lady straightened her back, her face crinkling with merriment.

"Present!" she replied, drawing down the corners Of her mouth.

"When did you leave home? How long will you stay? Can you come to dinner--you and Methusaleh--on Wednesday night?"

"I refuse to answer by advice of counsel. As to coming to dinner, I am not going anywhere for a week--then I am coming to you and Kitty, whether it is Wednesday or any other night. Now, Peter, take him away.

He's so puffed up with his Gold Medal he's positively unbearable."

All this time Jack had been standing beside Ruth. He had heard the stir at the door and had seen Holker join Miss Felicia, and while the talk between the two lasted he had interspersed his talk to Ruth with accounts of the supper, and Garry's getting the ring, to which was added the boy's enthusiastic tribute to the architect himself. "The greatest man I have met yet," he said in his quick, impulsive way. "We don't have any of them down our way. I never saw one--n.o.body ever did. Here he comes with Mr. Grayson. I hope you will like him."

Ruth made a movement as if to start to her feet. To sit still and look her best and attend to her cups and hot water and tiny wafers was all right for men like Jack, but not with distinguished men like Mr. Morris.

Morris had his hand on her chair before she could move it back.

"No, my dear young lady--you'll please keep your seat. I've been watching you from across the room sand you make too pretty a picture as you are. Tea?--Not a drop."

"Oh, but it is so delicious--and I will give you the very biggest piece of lemon that is left."

"No--not a drop; and as to lemon--that's rank poison to me. You should have seen me hobbling around with gout only last week, and all because somebody at a reception, or tea, or some such plaguey affair, made me drink a gla.s.s of lemonade. Give it to this aged old gentleman--it will keep him awake. Here, Peter!"

Up to this moment no word had been addressed to Jack, who stood outside the half circle waiting for some sign of recognition from the great man; and a little disappointed when none came. He did not know that one of the great man's failings was his forgetting the names even of those of his intimate friends--such breaks as "Glad to see you--I remember you very well, and very pleasantly, and now please tell me your name," being a common occurrence with the great architect--a failing that everybody pardoned.

Peter noticed the boy's embarra.s.sment and touched Morris' arm.

"You remember Mr. Breen, don't you, Holker? He was at your supper that night--and sat next to me."

Morris whirled quickly and held out his hand, all his graciousness in his manner.

"Yes, certainly. You took the ring to Minott, of course. Very glad to meet you again--and what did you say his name was, Peter?" This in the same tone of voice--quite as if Jack were miles away.

"Breen--John Breen," answered Peter, putting his arm on Jack's shoulder, to accentuate more clearly his friendship for the boy.

"All the better, Mr. John Breen--doubly glad to see you, now that I know your name. I'll try not to forget it next time. Breen! Breen! Peter, where have I heard that name before? Breen--where the devil have I--Oh, yes--I've got it now. Quite a common name, isn't it?"

Jack a.s.sured him with a laugh that it was; there were more than a hundred in the city directory. He wasn't offended at Morris forgetting his name, and wanted him to see it.

"Glad to know it; wouldn't like to think you were mixed up in the swindle. You ought to thank your stars, my dear fellow, that you got into architecture instead of into Wall--"

"But I am in--"

"Yes, I know--you're with Hunt--" (another instance of a defective memory) "and you couldn't be with a better man--the best in the profession, really. I'm talking of some scoundrels of your name--Breen & Co., the firm is--who, I hear, have cheated one of my clients--young Gilbert--fine fellow--just married--persuaded him to buy some gold stock--Mukton Lode, I think they called it--and robbed him of all he has. He must stop on his house I hear. And now, my dear Miss--" here he turned to the young girl--"I really forget--"

"Ruth," she answered with a smile. She had taken Morris's measure and had already begun to like him as much as Jack did.

"Yes--Miss Ruth--Now, please, my dear girl, keep on being young and very beautiful and very wholesome, for you are every one of these things, and I know you'll forgive me for saying so when I tell you that I have two strapping young fellows for sons who are almost old enough to make love to you. Come, Peter, show me that copy of Tacitus you wrote me about.

Is it in good condition?" They were out of Jack's hearing now, Morris adding, "Fine type of Southern beauty, Peter. Big design, with broad lines everywhere. Good, too--good as gold. Something about her forehead that reminds me of the Italian school. Looks as if Bellini might have loved her. h.e.l.lo, Major! What are you doing here all by yourself?"

Jack stood transfixed!

Horror, anger, humiliation over the exposure (it was unheard, if he had but known it, by anyone in the room except Peter and himself) rushed over him in hot concurrent waves. It was his uncle, then, who had robbed young Gilbert! The Mukton Lode! He had handled dozens of the certificates, just as he had handled dozens of others, hardly glancing at the names. He remembered overhearing some talk one day in which his uncle had taken part. Only a few days before he had sent a bundle of Mukton certificates to the transfer office of the company.

Then a chill struck him full in the chest and he shivered to his finger-tips. Had Ruth heard?--and if she had heard, would she understand? In his talk he had given her his true self--his standards of honor--his beliefs in what was true and worth having. When she knew all--and she must know--would she look upon him as a fraud? That his uncle had been accused of a shrewd scoop in the Street did not make his clerk a thief, but would she see the difference?

All these thoughts surged through his mind as he stood looking into her eyes, her hand in his while he made his adieux. He had determined, before Morris fired the bomb which shattered his hopes, to ask if he might see her again, and where, and if there could be found no place fitting and proper, she being motherless and Miss Felicia but a chaperon, to write her a note inviting her to walk up through the Park with him, and so on into the open where she really belonged. All this was given up now. The best thing for him was to take his leave as quietly as possible, without committing her to anything--anything which he felt sure she would repudiate as soon as she learned--if she did not know already--how undesirable an acquaintance John Breen, of Breen & Co., was, etc.

As to his uncle's share in the miserable transaction, there was but one thing to do--to find out, and from his own lips, if possible, if the story were true, and if so to tell him exactly what he thought of Breen & Co. and the business in which they were engaged. Peter's advice was good, and he wished he could follow it, but here was a matter in which his honor was concerned. When this side of the matter was presented to Mr. Grayson he would commend him for his course of action. To think that his own uncle should be accused of a transaction of this kind--his own uncle and a Breen! Could anything be more horrible!

So sudden was his departure from the room--just "I must go now; I'm so grateful to you all for asking me, and I've had such a good--Good-by--"

that Miss Felicia looked after him in astonishment, turning to Peter with:

"Why, what's the matter with the boy? I wanted him to dine with us. Did you say anything to him, Peter, to hurt his feelings?"

Peter shook his head. Morris, he knew, was the unconscious culprit, but this was not for his sister's or Ruth's ears--not, at least, until he could get at the exact facts for himself.

"He is as sensitive as a plant," continued Peter; "he closes all up at times. But he is genuine, and he is sincere--that's better than poise, sometimes."

"Well, then, maybe Ruth has offended him," suggested Miss Felicia.

"No--she couldn't. Ruth, what have you done to young Mr. Breen?"

The girl threw back her head and laughed.

"Nothing."

"Well, he went off as if he had been shot from a gun. That is not like him at all, I should say, from what I have seen of him. Perhaps I should have looked after him a little more. I tried once, but I could not get him away from you. His manner is really charming when he talks, and he is so natural and so well bred; not at all like his friend, of whom he seems to think so much. How did you like him, dear Ruth?"

"Oh, I don't know." She knew, but she didn't intend to tell anybody.

"He's very shy and--"

"--And very young."

"Yes, perhaps."

"And very much of a gentleman," broke in Peter in a decided tone. None should misunderstand the boy if he could help it.

Again Ruth laughed. Neither of them had touched the b.u.t.ton which had rung up her sympathy and admiration.

"Of course he is a gentleman. He couldn't be anything else. He is from Maryland, you know."

CHAPTER X

Reference has been made in these pages to a dinner to be given in the house of Breen to various important people, and to which Mr. Peter Grayson, the honored friend of the distinguished President of the Clearing House, was to be invited. The Scribe is unable to say whether the distinguished Mr. Grayson received an invitation or not. Breen may have thought better of it, or Jack may have discouraged it after closer acquaintance with the man who had delighted his soul as no other man except his father had ever done--but certain it is that he was not present, and equally certain is it that the distinguished Mr. Portman was, and so were many of the directors of the Mukton Lode, not to mention various others--capitalists whose presence would lend dignity to the occasion and whose names and influence would be of inestimable value to the future of the corporation.

As fate would have it the day for a.s.suaging the appet.i.tes of these financial magnates was the same that Miss Felicia had selected for her tea to Ruth, and the time at which they were to draw up their chairs but two hours subsequent to that in which Jack, crushed sad humiliated by his uncle's knavery, had crept downstairs and into the street.

In this frame of mind the poor boy had stopped at the Magnolia in the hope of finding Garry, who must, he thought, have left Corinne at home, and then retraced his steps to the club. He must explode somewhere and with someone, and the young architect was the very man he wanted. Garry had ridiculed his old-fashioned ideas and had advised him to let himself go. Was the wiping out of Gilbert's fortune part of the System? he asked himself.