The Spenders Part 21

In the mirror under the candle-light he saw the man's dark face come beside the other, heard a little cry from the girl as she half-turned; then he saw the man take her in his arms, saw her head fall on to his shoulder, and her face turn to his kiss.

He tried to stop breathing, fearful of discovery, grasping with one hand the heavy fold of the curtain back of him to steady himself.

There was the s.p.a.ce of two long, trembling breaths; then he heard her say, in a low, tense voice, as she drew away:

"Oh, you are my bad angel--why?--why?"

She fled toward the door to the hall.

"Don't come this way," she called back, in quick, low tones of caution.

The man turned toward the door where Percival stood, and in the darkness stumbled over a ha.s.sock. Instantly Percival was on the other side of the portiere, and, before the other had groped his way to the dark corner where the door was, had recrossed the empty parlour and was safely in the hall.

He made his way to the dining-room, where supper was under way.

"Mr. Bines has seen a ghost," said the sharp-eyed Mrs. Drelmer.

"Poor chap's only starved to death," said Mrs. Gwilt-Athelstan. "Eat something, Mr. Bines; this supper is go-as-you-please. n.o.body's to wait for anybody."

Strung loosely about the big table a dozen people were eating hot scones and bannocks with clotted cream and marmalade, and drinking mulled cider.

"And there's cold fowl and baked beans and doughnuts and all, for those who can't eat with a Scotch accent," said the host, cheerfully.

Percival dropped into one of the chairs.

"I'm Scotch enough to want a Scotch high-ball."

"And you're getting it so high it's top-heavy," cautioned Mrs. Drelmer.

Above the chatter of the table could be heard the voices of men and the musical laughter of women from the other rooms.

"I simply can't get 'em together," said the hostess.

"It's nice to have 'em all over the place," said her husband, "fair women and brave men, you know."

"The men _have_ to be brave," she answered, shortly, with a glance at little Mrs. Akemit, who had permitted Percival to seat her at his side, and was now pleading with him to agree that simple ways of life are requisite to the needed measure of spirituality.

Then came strains of music from the rich-toned organ.

"Oh, that dear Ned Ristine is playing," cried one; and several of the group sauntered toward the music-room.

The music flooded the hall and the room, so that the talk died low.

"He's improvising," exclaimed Mrs. Akemit. "How splendid! He seems to be breathing a paean of triumph, some high, exalted spiritual triumph, as if his soul had risen above us--how precious!"

When the deep swell had subsided to silvery ripples and the last cadence had fainted, she looked at Percival with moistened parted lips and eyes half-shielded, as if her full gaze would betray too much of her quivering soul.

Then Percival heard the turquoised brunette say: "What a pity his wife is such an unsympathetic creature!"

"But Mr. Ristine is unmarried, is he not?" he asked, quickly.

There was a little laugh from Mrs. Drelmer.

"Not yet--not that I've heard of."

"I beg pardon!"

"There have been rumours lots of times that he was going to be _unmarried_, but they always seem to adjust their little difficulties.

He and his wife are now staying over at the Bloynes."

"Oh! I see," answered Percival; "you're a jester, Mrs. Drelmer."

"Ristine," observed the theosophic Wilberforce, in the manner of a hired oracle, "is, in his present incarnation, imperfectly monogamous."

Some people came from the music-room.

"Miss Milbrey has stayed by the organist," said one; "and she's promised to make him play one more. Isn't he divine?"

The music came again.

"Oh!" from Mrs. Akemit, again in an ecstasy, '"' he's playing that heavenly stuff from the second act of 'Tristan and Isolde'--the one triumphant, perfect love-poem of all music."

"That Scotch whiskey is good in some of the lesser emergencies,"

remarked Percival, turning to her; "but it has its limitations. Let's you and me trifle with a nice cold quart of champagne!"

CHAPTER XX.

Doctor Von Herzlich Expounds the Hightower Hotel and Certain Allied Phenomena

The Hightower Hotel is by many observers held to be an instructive microcosm of New York, more especially of upper Broadway, with correct proportions of the native and the visiting provincial. With correct proportions, again, of the money-making native and the money-spending native, male and female. A splendid place is this New York; splendid but terrible. London for the stranger has a steady-going, hearty hospitality. Paris on short notice will be cosily and coaxingly intimate. New York is never either. It overwhelms with its lavish display of wealth, it stuns with its tireless, battering energy. But it stays always aloof, indifferent if it be loved or hated; if it crush or sustain.

The ground floor of the Hightower Hotel reproduces this magnificent, brutal indifference. One might live years in its mile or so of stately corridors and its acre or so of resplendent cafes, parlours, reception-rooms, and restaurants, elbowed by thousands, suffocated by that dense air of human crowdedness, that miasma of brain emanations, and still remain in splendid isolation, as had he worn the magic ring of Gyges. Here is every species of visitor: the money-burdened who "stop" here and cultivate an air of being blase to the wealth of polished splendours; and the less opulent who "stop" cheaply elsewhere and venture in to tread the corridors timidly, to stare with honest, drooping-jawed wonder at its marvels of architecture and decoration, and to gaze with becoming reverence at those persons whom they shrewdly conceive to be social celebrities.

This mixture of many and strange elements is never at rest. Its units wait expectantly, chat, drink, eat, or stroll with varying airs through reception-room, corridor, and office. It is an endless function, attended by all of Broadway, with entertainment diversely contrived for every taste by a catholic-minded host with a sincere desire to please the paying public.

"Isn't it a huge bear-garden, though?" asks Launton Oldaker of the estimable Doctor von Herzlich, after the two had observed the scene in silence for a time.

The wise German dropped an olive into his Rhine wine, and gazed reflectively about the room. Men and women sat at tables drinking.

Beyond the tables at the farther side of the room, other men were playing billiards. It was four o'clock and the tide was high.

"It is yet more," answered the doctor. "In my prolonged studies of natural phenomena this is the most valuable of all which I have been privileged to observe."

He called them "brifiletched" and "awbsairf" with great nicety. Perhaps his discernment was less at fault.

"Having," continued the doctor, "granted myself some respite from toil in the laboratory at Marburg, I chose to pleasure voyage, to study yet more the social conditions in this loveworthy land. I suspected that much tiredness of travel would be involved. Yet here I find all conditions whatsoever--here in that which you denominate 'bear-garden'.