The Streets of Ascalon Part 67

And now, as he stood there, looking out into the sunny backyard, for the first time he felt the silence and isolation of the place, and his own loneliness. Doubt crept in whispering the uselessness of working, of saving, of self-denial, of laying by anything for a future that already meant nothing of happiness to him.

For whom, after all, should he save, h.o.a.rd, gather together, economise?

Who was there to labour for? For whom should he endure?

He cared nothing for women; he had really never cared for any woman excepting only this one. He would never marry and have a son. He had no near or distant relatives. For whose sake, then, was he standing here in workman's overalls? What business had he here in the bas.e.m.e.nt of a shabby house in midsummer? Did there remain any vague hope of Strelsa?

Perhaps. Hope is the last of one's friends to die. Or was it for himself that he was working now to provide against those evil days "when the keepers of the house shall tremble"? Perhaps he was unconsciously obeying nature's first law.

And yet, slowly within him grew a certainty that these reasons were not the real ones--not the vital impulse that moved his hand steadily through critical and delicate moments as he bent, breathless, over the faded splendours of ancient canvases. No; somehow or other he had already begun to work for the sake of the work itself--whatever that really meant. That was the basic impulse--the occult motive; and, somehow he knew that, once aroused, the desire to strive could never again in him remain wholly quiescent.

Both Dankmere and Miss Vining had gone to lunch, presumably in different directions; Daisy and her youngsters, having been nourished, were asleep; there was not a sound in the house except the soft rubbing of tissue-paper where Quarren was lightly removing the retouching varnish from a relined canvas. Presently the front door-bell rang.

Quarren rinsed his hands and, still wearing overalls and painter's blouse, mounted the bas.e.m.e.nt stairs and opened the front door. And Mrs.

Sprowl supported by a footman waddled in, panting.

"Tell your master I want to see him," she said--"I don't mean that fool of an Englishman; I mean Mr. Quar--Good Lord! Ricky, is that _you_?

Here, get me a chair--those front steps nearly killed me. Long ago I swore I'd never enter a house which was not bas.e.m.e.nt-built and had an elevator!... Hand me one of those fans. And if there's any water in the house not swarming with typhoid germs, get me a gla.s.s of it."

He brought her a tumbler of spring water; she panted and gulped and fanned and panted, her little green eyes roaming around her.

Presently she dismissed the footman, and turned her heavily flushed face on Quarren. The rolls of fat crowded the lace on her neck, perspiration glistened under her sparklike eyes.

"How are you?" she inquired.

He said, smilingly, that he was well.

"You don't look it. You look gaunt.... Well, I never thought you'd come to this--that you had it in you to do anything useful."

"I believe I've heard you say so now and then," he said with perfect good-humour.

"Why not? Why should I have thought that your talents amounted to more than ornaments?"

"No reason to suppose so," he admitted, amused.

"Not the slightest. Talent usually d.a.m.ns people to an effortless existence. And yours was a pleasant one, too. You had a good time, didn't you?"

"Oh, very."

"There was nothing to do except to come in, kiss the girls all around, and make faces to amuse them, was there?"

"Not much more," he admitted, laughing.

Mrs. Sprowl's little green eyes travelled all over the walls.

"Umph," she snorted, "I suppose these are some of Dankmere's heirlooms.

I never fancied that little bounder----"

"Wait!"

"What!"

"Wait a moment. I like Dankmere, and he isn't a bounder----"

"He _is_ one!"

"Keep that opinion to yourself," he said bluntly.

The old lady's eyes blazed. "I'm d.a.m.ned if I do!" she retorted--"I'll say what----"

"Not here! You mustn't be uncivil here. You know well enough how to behave when necessary; and if you don't do it I'll call your carriage."

For fully five minutes Mrs. Sprowl sat there attempting to digest what he had said. The process was awful to behold, but she accomplished it at last with a violent effort.

"Ricky," she said, "I didn't come here to quarrel with you over an Englishman who--of whom I--have my personal opinion."

He laughed, leaned over and deliberately patted her fat wrist; and she glared at him somewhat as a tigress inspects a favourite but overgrown and presuming cub.

"I don't know why you came," he said, "but it was nice of you anyway and I am glad to see you."

"If that's true," she said, "you're one of mighty few. The joy which people feel in my presence is usually exhibited when I'm safely out of their houses, or they are out of mine."

She laughed at that; and he did too; and she gulped her gla.s.s of water empty and refused more.

"Ricky," she began abruptly, "you've been up to that Witch-Hollow place of Molly's?"

"Yes."

"Well, what the devil is going on there?"

"Aviation," he said blandly.

"What else? Don't evade an answer! I can't get anything out of that little idiot, Molly; I can't worm anything out of Sir Charles; I can't learn anything from Strelsa Leeds; and as for Langly he won't even answer my letters.

"Now I want to know what is going on there? I've been as short with Strelsa as I dare be--she's got to be led with sugar. I've almost ordered her to come to me at Newport--but she doesn't come."

"She's resting," said Quarren coolly.

"Hasn't she had time to rest in that dingy, dead-and-alive place? And what keeps Langly there? He has nothing to look at except a few brood-mares. Do you suppose he has the bad taste to hang around waiting for Chester Ledwith to get out and Mary Ledwith to return? Or is it something else that glues him there--with the _Yulan_ in the North River?"

Quarren shrugged his lack of interest in the subject.

"If I thought," muttered the old lady--"if I imagined for one moment that Langly was daring to try any of his low, cold-blooded tricks on Strelsa Leeds, I'd go up there myself--I'd take the next train and tell that girl plainly what kind of a citizen my charming nephew really is!"

Quarren was silent.

"Why the d.i.c.kens don't you say something?" she demanded. "I want to know whether I ought to go up there or not. Have you ever observed--have you ever suspected that there might be anything between Langly and Strelsa Leeds?--any tacit understanding--any interest on her part in him?... Why don't you answer me?"