The Street of Seven Stars Part 25

Georgiev rather hoped, by staying by Peter, to be led toward his star.

But Peter left him at the Doctors' Club, still amiable, but absolutely obtuse to the question nearest the little spy's heart.

The club was almost deserted. The holidays had taken many of the members out of town. Other men were taking advantage of the vacation to see the city, or to make acquaintance again with families they had hardly seen during the busy weeks before Christmas. The room at the top of the stairs where the wives of the members were apt to meet for chocolate and to exchange the addresses of dressmakers was empty; in the reading room he found McLean. Although not a member, McLean was a sort of honorary habitue, being allowed the privilege of the club in exchange for a dependable willingness to play at entertainments of all sorts.

It was in Peter's mind to enlist McLean's a.s.sistance in his difficulties. McLean knew a good many people. He was popular, goodlooking, and in a colony where, unlike London and Paris, the great majority were people of moderate means, he was conspicuously well off. But he was also much younger than Peter and intolerant with the insolence of youth. Peter was thinking hard as he took off his overcoat and ordered beer.

The boy was in love with Harmony already; Peter had seen that, as he saw many things. How far his love might carry him, Peter had no idea. It seemed to him, as he sat across the reading-table and studied him over his magazine, that McLean would resent bitterly the girl's position, and that when he learned it a crisis might be precipitated.

One of three things might happen: He might bend all his energies to second Peter's effort to fill Anna's place, to find the right person; he might suggest taking Anna's place himself, and insist that his presence in the apartment would be as justifiable as Peter's; or he might do at once the thing Peter felt he would do eventually, cut the knot of the difficulty by asking Harmony to marry him. Peter, greeting him pleasantly, decided not to tell him anything, to keep him away if possible until the thing was straightened out, and to wait for an hour at the club in the hope that a solution might stroll in for chocolate and gossip.

In any event explanation to McLean would have required justification.

Peter disliked the idea. He could humble himself, if necessary, to a woman; he could admit his asininity in a.s.suming the responsibility of Jimmy, for instance, and any woman worthy of the name, or worthy of living in the house with Harmony, would understand. But McLean was young, intolerant. He was more than that, though Peter, concealing from himself just what Harmony meant to him, would not have admitted a rival for what he had never claimed. But a rival the boy was. Peter, calmly reading a magazine and drinking his Munich beer, was in the grip of the fiercest jealousy. He turned pages automatically, to recall nothing of what he had read.

McLean, sitting across from him, watched him surrept.i.tiously. Big Peter, aggressively masculine, heavy of shoulder, direct of speech and eye, was to him the embodiment of all that a woman should desire in a man. He, too, was jealous, but humbly so. Unlike Peter he knew his situation, was young enough to glory in it. Shameless love is always young; with years comes discretion, perhaps loss of confidence. The Crusaders were youths, pursuing an idea to the ends of the earth and flaunting a lady's guerdon from spear or saddle-bow. The older men among them tucked the handkerchief or bit of a gauntleted glove under jerkin and armor near the heart, and flung to the air the guerdon of some light o' love.

McLean would have shouted Harmony's name from the housetops. Peter did not acknowledge even to himself that he was in love with her.

It occurred to McLean after a time that Peter being in the club, and Harmony being in all probability at home, it might be possible to see her alone for a few minutes. He had not intended to go back to the house in the Siebensternstra.s.se so soon after being peremptorily put out; he had come to the club with the intention of clinching his resolution with a game of cribbage. But fate was playing into his hands. There was no cribbage player round, and Peter himself sat across deeply immersed in a magazine. McLean rose, not stealthily, but without unnecessary noise.

So far so good. Peter turned a page and went on reading. McLean sauntered to a window, hands in pockets. He even whistled a trifle, under his breath, to prove how very casual were his intentions. Still whistling, he moved toward the door. Peter turned another page, which was curiously soon to have read two columns of small type without ill.u.s.trations.

Once out in the hall McLean's movements gained aim and precision. He got his coat, hat and stick, flung the first over his arm and the second on his head, and--

"Going out?" asked Peter calmly.

"Yes, nothing to do here. I've read all the infernal old magazines until I'm sick of them." Indignant, too, from his tone.

"Walking?"

"Yes."

"Mind if I go with you?"

"Not at all."

Peter, taking down his old overcoat from its hook, turned and caught the boy's eye. It was a swift exchange of glances, but illuminating--Peter's whimsical, but with a sort of grim determination; McLean's sheepish, but equally determined.

"Rotten afternoon," said McLean as they started for the stairs. "Half rain, half snow. Streets are ankle-deep."

"I'm not particularly keen about walking, but--I don't care for this tomb alone."

Nothing was further from McLean's mind than a walk with Peter that afternoon. He hesitated halfway down the upper flight.

"You don't care for cribbage, do you?"

"Don't know anything about it. How about pinochle?"

They had both stopped, equally determined, equally hesitating.

"Pinochle it is," acquiesced McLean. "I was only going because there was nothing to do."

Things went very well for Peter that afternoon--up to a certain point.

He beat McLean unmercifully, playing with cold deliberation. McLean wearied, fidgeted, railed at his luck. Peter played on grimly.

The club filled up toward the coffee-hour. Two or three women, wives of members, a young girl to whom McLean had been rather attentive before he met Harmony and who bridled at the abstracted bow he gave her. And, finally, when hope in Peter was dead, one of the women on Anna's list.

Peter, laying down pairs and marking up score, went over Harmony's requirements. Dr. Jennings seemed to fit them all, a woman, not young, not too stout, agreeable and human. She was a large, almost bovinely placid person, not at all reminiscent of Anna. She was neat where Anna had been disorderly, well dressed and breezy against Anna's dowdiness and sharpness. Peter, having totaled the score, rose and looked down at McLean.

"You're a nice lad," he said, smiling. "Sometime I shall teach you the game."

"How about a lesson to-night in Seven-Star Street?"

"To-night? Why, I'm sorry. We have an engagement for to-night."

The "we" was deliberate and cruel. McLean writhed. Also the statement was false, but the boy was spared that knowledge for the moment.

Things went well. Dr. Jennings was badly off for quarters. She would make a change if she could better herself. Peter drew her off to a corner and stated his case. She listened attentively, albeit not without disapproval.

She frankly discredited the altruism of Peter's motives when he told her about Harmony. But as the recital went on she found herself rather touched. The story of Jimmy appealed to her. She scolded and lauded Peter in one breath, and what was more to the point, she promised to visit the house in the Siebensternstra.s.se the next day.

"So Anna Gates has gone home!" she reflected. "When?"

"This morning."

"Then the girl is there alone?"

"Yes. She is very young and inexperienced, and the boy--it's myocarditis. She's afraid to be left with him."

"Is she quite alone?"

"Absolutely, and without funds, except enough for her lessons. Our arrangement was that she should keep the house going; that was her share."

Dr. Jennings was impressed. It was impossible to talk to Peter and not believe him. Women trusted Peter always.

"You've been very foolish, Dr. Byrne," she said as she rose; "but you've been disinterested enough to offset that and to put some of us to shame.

To-morrow at three, if it suits you. You said the Siebensternstra.s.se?"

Peter went home exultant.

CHAPTER XVII

Christmas-Day had had a softening effect on Mrs. Boyer. It had opened badly. It was the first Christmas she had spent away from her children, and there had been little of the holiday spirit in her att.i.tude as she prepared the Christmas breakfast. After that, however, things happened.

In the first place, under her plate she had found a frivolous chain and pendant which she had admired. And when her eyes filled up, as they did whenever she was emotionally moved, the doctor had come round the table and put both his arms about her.

"Too young for you? Not a bit!" he said heartily. "You're better-looking then you ever were, Jennie; and if you weren't you're the only woman for me, anyhow. Don't you think I realize what this exile means to you and that you're doing it for me?"