The Short Cut Part 24

Wanda returned then, bringing the tea and a hastily prepared lunch.

Dart winked at her as he went out. He led the shivering horse at a trot to the barn.

"Now," he grunted in a mournful tone that spoke of disappointment and hinted at disgust, "wouldn't you think, to look at her, that dame had more stuff in her head than to do a trick like that?"

For the little black bag was locked and the key was gone, and the lock was a thing to make Mr. Dart sigh and shake his head as he had done over Martin's safe.

"I'll get so used to turning baby tricks," he mused, "I won't be able to do a real man's work. Well, it can't be helped when a man's putting in time in a place like this. Now, Lady Clamsh.e.l.l, we'll take a peep and see if your baggage--"

The bag was open, its contents rifled by slim, white fingers that seemed, each one, endowed with a brain of its own. In an incredibly short time various negligible feminine articles had been examined and replaced very carefully and exactly, a handkerchief without so much as a laundry mark, a silver vanity set with no monogram, and then came the reward to Mr. Dart's curiosity. It was a card case half filled with calling cards.

Mr. Dart did a thing he had rarely done in his life. He swore. He said:

"Well, I'll be d.a.m.ned!"

And being alone, speaking confidentially to himself, he may have meant it. He looked as though he did.

"You are very kind, Miss Leland," the new-comer was saying quietly. "I should like to accept your hospitality further. It has been a pleasure to meet you, I am sure. But you will infer from my being abroad at all at a time like this that my errand is urgent. I must be going immediately."

Mr. Dart came in at this juncture, his expression void of all emotion except a deep, unhidden admiration which embraced the two women, both of whom he felt honoured in including in the list of his friends.

"Miss Hazleton," began Wanda, "I didn't introduce you to Mr. Dart."

"He did," replied the other briefly.

"Sure," supplemented Dart. He handed the black bag to its owner and asked casually, "You're strong for hitting the pike right away?"

"If you are ready."

"Right-o, Miss Hazleton," he answered, p.r.o.nouncing the name as though he enjoyed the sound of it. "I came over on some hurry-up business,"

with a sly look at Wanda that brought a little flush to her cheeks, "and I didn't unhook. Old Bots is pawing the earth and snorting his eagerness to help out. Say the word and we're off."

Involuntarily Wanda showed her surprise at the arrangement. It was the first word she had had of their way lying together.

"The lady's going over to the Bar L-M," Dart remarked as he observed Wanda's look. "She's a friend of Red's."

"Oh," said Wanda.

She strove immediately to act and speak as though there were nothing unusual in the situation. Miss Hazleton put on her coat and furs again without volunteering further information, while Dart hurried away for his own cart and her horse. Wanda accompanied them to the porch, saw them seated and starting and then returned to the house with a little hurt feeling in her heart which she knew was foolish but which she could not drive out. If Claire Hazleton and Wayne Shandon were upon such intimate terms that she made this trip to see him, it was a little strange that Wayne had never so much as mentioned her name to her.

"Wait a minute," cried Dart, jerking his horse up short before they had gone fifty yards from the house. "I forgot my gloves."

He shoved the reins into his companion's hands, jumped down and running back burst in bright faced and eager upon Wanda, startling her with the sudden unexpectedness of his return. With his finger upon his lips, his air surcharged with mystery, he came close to her.

"Have you wised up?" he whispered. "Got next to who the mysterious fairy is?"

"She's Miss Claire Hazleton," said Wanda a little stiffly and a bit puzzled.

"Rats!" grunted Mr. Dart putting much eloquence Into the monosyllable.

"That's a b.u.m monniker out of a French love story. It's the Roosian princess. It's Helga, that's who it is!"

He slipped a little engraved calling card into her hand, winked into her amazed eyes, drew a pair of gloves out of his hip pocket, crumpled them in his hand and hastened back to the cart.

Wanda stared a moment at the card. Then she flung it from her and with blazing eyes watched the flames in the fireplace lick at it.

CHAPTER XVII

"WHERE'S THAT TWENTY-FIVE THOUSAND? WHAT'S THE ANSWER?"

The little clock in Wayne Shandon's room maintained stoutly in the face of the gathering gloom outside, in defiance of the lighted lamp upon the table, that it was still an hour before sunset. The snow was still falling steadily, thickly, swept here and there into shifting mounds, choking the mountain pa.s.ses, robing trees and fence posts and buildings, each feathery flake adhering where it struck softly as though it had been a gummed wafer.

"Garth and I will have to get out to-morrow," Shandon muttered, drawing off his heavy coat and tossing it to the chair across the room, "or we'll have to beat it out on snowshoes--I wonder what's keeping Dart?"

There came a rap at the front door and Shandon, supposing that already his question was answered, called, "Come in."

"You never can tell what that little devil will do next," he grunted.

"Snoop into a man's private business every time he gets the chance and then stand outside knocking at the door in a day like this. _Come in_."

Then, when the knocking came again, louder, insistent and imperative, he realised that there was the bare possibility that the thumb latch had caught and, crossing the room he jerked the door open.

"Is this Mr. Shandon?"

The cool, confident voice though a woman's was not Wanda's, and Shandon realised that he had been a fool to let his heart leap as it had when his eyes made out through the murkiness that it was a woman.

"Yes," he answered, wondering.

"May I come in?" she asked a little impatiently. "I have come a long way to see you."

Wondering more than ever he threw the door wide open, showed her the way into the living room and lighted a lamp. There was no fire in the room but she went quite naturally to the fireplace. He glanced at her sharply, knew that he had never seen her before for he would have remembered her, understood that she was a woman of the cities, and said,

"Are you very cold? Just a minute and I'll have a fire going. I came in only a moment before I heard your knock."

She did not speak until he had gathered an armful of wood from the box at the side of the fireplace and had flung it upon the blaze that a match had started from a bit of paper and some pitch pine. Nor did she seem in haste to speak even then when he stood across the hearth looking at her. But not for a second had her approving eyes left him; no opportunity had they lost to watch the man's face intently.

"Where did you come from in all this storm?" he asked curiously.

"Remotely, from New York. Immediately from El Toyen."

"Lord!" he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed. "You must be dead. I'll get you something hot, some coffee. We haven't any tea, I'm afraid."

She laughed coolly, evidently quite at home with him.

"If a man came in, frozen stiff, would you offer him a cup of tea?"

"What do you mean?" He had started toward the kitchen, and stopped.