Part 16

"Well, this is outrageous!" I exclaimed, rising in good earnest this time. "We shall see whether your father can imprison two adult women in a free country to suit his whim! I shall make my toilet at once and then we shall see what we shall see!"

"Better hurry up then!" replied Peaches. "Because they--he and Mark--are going to the city on the twelve-o'clock train. Don't you remember why we came home early last night?"

Last night seemed a thousand years ago. But she was quite right; I did recall the fact, and accordingly made all possible haste, Peaches assisting me.

"Now look here, you flighty young thing!" she warned. "Don't do anything rash! Remember, you are the only person I have to depend on for help. Don't go get yourself kept away from me now!"

"I must and shall interview your father," I protested. "But perhaps if you would be kind enough to give me an idea of what you intend doing I shall be in a better position to be of assistance."

"I'm going to leave this house before another twenty-four hours are over," she declared firmly. "If you can persuade pa to let me go like a human, and come along with me, so much the better. If not, I'll have to go some other way that may not be as agreeable to him in the long run."

"Why not let me tell him about that terrible performance of Mr. Markheim's?" I suggested. "That will be sufficient, or I mistake your father greatly."

"Sure it would be sufficient," said Peaches. "But then I'd have to give myself away pretty badly, wouldn't I? And there might be a roughhouse. Pa is a dead shot and I'd rather get him out of shooting distance before I break the information to him. At present he just about thinks I'm crazy in the head."

"Well, I'll do what I can to persuade him that this is the twentieth century and not the middle ages!" I responded. "This indignity certainly cannot be allowed to continue. But suppose you--we do get away from here to-day, what then? How do you propose to find a thief that the police will have a hard time discovering?"

"I don't propose," said Peaches. "I intend. That's a whole lot stronger. How, I haven't the remotest idea. But it's plain enough I can't do anything while they've got me cooped up like a marketable yearling, can I? Let's get out of this, that's the first thing to accomplish."

"Very well," I agreed, gathering up my reticule and taking up the house-telephone receiver.

I asked to speak with Mr. Pegg. The request was at once attended to by the footman who responded, and in a tone which brooked no delay I commanded the Citrus King to come upstairs and release me. My tone must have foreshadowed the mood I was in, for he responded as if by magic. In less than five minutes I was face to face with him in the hall.

"Come on over and sit down in the conservatory, Miss Free," he entreated as soon as he saw my face. "We want to keep the servants out of this much as we can, you know!"

"All right, Mr. Pegg," I agreed, for this was my own thought. "All right. But if you allow the situation to continue you will have a hard time in doing that!"

Accordingly we repaired down the corridor to a little glass room full of plants, where we could talk in seclusion. Mr. Pegg, as usual, chewed upon an unlighted cigar and looked at me thoughtfully over the top of it, his shrewd eyes half closed.

"You've got awfully pretty hair, Miss Free," said he unexpectedly. "I'm glad you've took back to them curls again."

"Now see here, Mr. Pegg," I said severely, not to be diverted by any frivolous remarks. "Now see here, Mr. Pegg, what is the meaning of this outrageous performance?"

"When I was a cattleman," said Mr. Pegg, looking at the ornate ceiling, "we used to lock 'em in a corral until they cooled off a little."

"What--who?" I demanded.

"The ones we was breaking," he informed me. Then his manner changed and he brought his big fist down on his knee with a thump. "Now, my dear lady," he said firmly, "I know what I'm doing. Why, I had to keep her on the ranch, watched like a hawk--and simply because she kept thinking she was in love with some undesirable or other. I've seen her do this before. So I'm just going to detain her where she'll be safe until she comes to her senses."

"Mr. Pegg, you are taking the wrong track with Peaches this time!" I warned him. "You can't play the Roman father with your child and marry her out of hand--you cannot! You engaged me as a social mentor and I would be doing less than my duty if I didn't inform you that this sort of thing is no longer being done in the best families!"

"Say!" remarked Mr. Pegg, removing the cigar and staring at me. "Are you trying to be humorous, or what?"

"I assure you I am far from any such idea!" I replied with hauteur. "I merely affirm that you cannot, even legally, keep an adult female child imprisoned against her will and then marry her off to--to a swindler!"

"A swindler!" exclaimed Mr. Pegg. "Oh, come now, Miss Free--smuggling in that picture wasn't Mark's fault. You can't say he did it--because you don't know it. Why, you and he have always been good friends; you're not going back on him now? Peaches is just a kid. By the end of the week she will have changed her mind again. Good heavens, look at the fix it would put us in if she insisted on breaking her engagement now! The invitations out, the presents coming in--trousseau bought! We'd be the laughingstock of the country. Not that I'd give a--cuss--if it wasn't that I know Alicia. She'd up and go back to him when it was all thoroughly broken off. You see that what she needs is the high hand. I've had to use it before."

"Mr. Pegg," said I, "you are mistaken. What is worse, you are a cave man! I am convinced Peaches really is in love with Sandro di Monteventi and that you will break her heart if you persist in your heroic attitude. I beg you will desist."

"Nothing doing!" said Mr. Pegg, rising and lighting the cigar--a sign that the interview was closed. "I'm not in a desisting mood. I may as well add that I am wise to the fact that she's been mooning round after that fellow ever since she came into this house. Kimball's Commercial Arithmetic, indeed!"

"I don't know to what you refer, I assure you!" I said stiffly. "And I insist upon at least having a key to our rooms."

"Will you give me your word of honor not to use that key to let her out with?" asked my employer doubtfully.

"Certainly, if you wish," I replied promptly. "You may have my word for that!"

"Well, here you are, then," he answered, taking a key from a great cluster on his ring. "You'll keep the letter of your word, I know, no matter how uneasy the spirit gets. And now I must mosey along. Mark and I have to run up to town on business, and he wants to see the family-doctor about his eye--he ran into his bedpost in the dark last night, and maybe it's just as well to keep Peaches from seeing him wearing that beauty spot."

With which intelligent and discerning remark Mr. Pegg left me to my own devices, and of course I promptly returned to my apartment and the waiting Peaches, who greeted my entrance the more eagerly when she observed I let myself in with a key.

"You wonder!" cried she, embracing me with a look of rapture. "So he gave in to you--you enchantress!"

"He did not!" I said dryly. "He put me on my honor not to let you have this key, and my honor is sacred, and I'm going to keep it that way!"

"Free--you beast!" cried Peaches. "Give it to me. Don't be absurd!"

"Keeping one's freely given word is never absurd," I observed. "Besides, if I were to break it and let you walk out, do you think for one minute that the servants would let you get away without protest? Or without notifying your father by telephone? It is you who are absurd!"

"That's so!" said Peaches, suddenly weary. "Oh, Free--you think it out! Help me, I am so tired."

"Lack of sleep," I pronounced. "And I'll wager you have eaten nothing. The first thing to do is to have a nice hot luncheon sent upstairs--I presume your father's instructions permit the service of food. And then you must get a few hours of complete rest while I take a stroll in the fresh air and perfect some course of action."

"Then you will help me?" said Peaches eagerly.

It was really pathetic to see her so comparatively tired and helpless. She was never more than comparatively so, I may state. However, my compassion for her was not lessened by this fact.

"Of course I am going to help you," I declared. "That any mere man should attempt a performance of this kind outside of Bolshevik Russia is too outrageous to be endured. But first take some hot soup and a nap. I will have a plan when you wake up, I feel sure."

Meekly as a little girl she submitted to my ministrations, hot broth and all. And when at length she lay sleeping amidst the golden glory of her loosened hair, her face like a pale sage lily in its midst, I stole downstairs, first faithfully locking the door behind me and pocketing the key.

The garden between walls was filled with the roseate glow of sunset as I stepped forth into it, and the night promised fair. The earth was damp and fragrant from the April storm of the night before, and the new buds seemed to have doubled their endeavor to make the world green overnight. On the edges of the paths the frail hothouse-born tulips lay beaten into the earth. But in the meadow toward the river the wild crocuses marched bravely. Robins were warbling their mellow sunset note, and the world seemed sweetly peaceful and greatly at variance with my mood.

With my mind continually revolving the problem at hand I walked about the bordered barren beds with a step that was listless enough in good sooth, pausing now and again to glance up at the walls of the fine dwelling, which was now to all intents and purposes a prison. And after a few turns I began to realize that my attention was turning more and more frequently to the window that had been Sandro's and to the problem of his escape.

That he had come out by the window upon the first occasion of my discovering him in the library, and simply let himself in at the casement door, was plain enough, leaving his door locked from the inside to avoid invasion by the other servants; indeed it had developed that it had been his habit to keep his door locked during the entire period of his employment in the house. But how had he got there? That was the question. So far as one could see there was absolutely no means of reaching the ground from that third story, unless one excepted a frail and narrow wooden lattice intended for the encouragement of vines, which extended upward to the level of the higher windows.

Obeying an impulse I went over and made examination of this lattice, and the riddle was a riddle no longer.

"I wonder, I wonder!" I said aloud.

"I often have, myself!" agreed a cheerful voice behind me.

With a guilty start I turned about, and there, of all people on earth, was Richard, the chauffeur, big nose and all, smiling at me in his familiar, friendly manner.

"Richard!" I cried warmly. "What brought you here?"

"I--say, Aunt Mary, I had to come, that was all," he said with troubled eyes. "It's Peaches. You know how I feel about her--how I have felt all along. I had to see her. It was as if she needed me. Just a fool hunch. But I came. I couldn't help it--you understand?"

"Understand?" I cried. "Bless the boy, I do!" Then a way out of our situation began to make itself clear in my brain and I seized him by the arm, dragging him to a bench out of general sight from the house and making him sit beside me, greatly to his bewilderment.

"Richard," I said solemnly, "have you been at the house yet?"

"Why, no!" said he. "I came right into the garden when I saw you from the drive."

"Does anybody know you are coming?"

"Not a soul!" declared Dicky. "Why all this mystery?"

"Listen!" I said rapidly. "Something awful has happened. Peaches is a prisoner. Your intuition was right. She--we need your help, and need it badly."

"Is she hurt?" he asked. "A prisoner? What in the name----"

"I want you to get a big powerful automobile and have it at the entrance of the park at twelve o'clock to-night. As soon as you arrive, park your car, and come to the foot of that trellis over there. When you get there give the whistle you used to call Peaches with. If you get an answer, wait for us. If after half an hour you don't hear anything, call me on the telephone first thing in the morning. Is that clear?"

"Yes--but Great Scott! What's wrong?"

"Never you mind, except that something is very wrong here. Markheim is an unspeakable beast, and Mr. Pegg is trying to force Peaches into going through with the marriage in spite of what she has found out. He has locked her in her room, which opens into mine."

"Well, why not unlock her, then?" he asked with stupid masculine simplicity. "Haven't you got a key?"

"I have," I said. "But I have given him my word not to unlock it to let her out!"

"But you'll break your word!" he said with a satisfied grin.

"Not at all!" I disclaimed the suggestion. "Not at all. However, I made no promise in regard to the window. And with your assistance----"

"I get you!" cried Dicky, springing to his feet. "Twelve sharp to-night it is. And I'd better be off now before the old boys get back from town and spot me--eh, what?"

"Yes," I agreed.

Then I hesitated. Should I tell him of the duke? Was it possible that he had not seen the afternoon papers? Evidently so, since he had not commented upon the robbery. Assuredly they had escaped his notice. And why tell the poor lovesick boy about Alicia's part in it? I had a feeling that he would be even more effective in assisting us if he did not know until we were well on our way that night. So I merely repeated my instructions and hurried from him to impart the glad tidings to my charge and then to secure my knitting, in order that I might be flaunting that badge of womanly innocence in the drawing-room when those wretched cave men, Markheim and Mr. Pegg, came down dressed for dinner.

XVI

My dear father used to say that the test of good breeding lay in the ability to maintain the social amenities toward some one who had wronged you. Kipling, I think it is, cites the instance of an Englishman who continued to dress for dinner alone in the jungle, as a perfect example of breeding. But then, Kipling had only the Englishman's word for it, because if he were alone when he dressed, which seems probable--indeed is so stated--how could any one have seen him? Whereas I have watched my dear father turn the other cheek to the barber who used to visit our establishment weekly, when one cheek had been badly scraped, and not utter anything stronger than an inquiry about the man's health!

And the art of behaving naturally, yet not too naturally, if you understand me, through the routine of living under trying domestic conditions, certainly appears to come more easily to persons whose traditional training has been in the line of self-restraint rather than that of self-expression; in other words, to those of aristocratic forbears. Perhaps that is why the purest aristocracy so seldom attains anything except good manners. But I digress. My intent was merely to make a passing philosophic comment upon the dinner party of three--Mr. Markheim, Mr. Pegg and myself--which was held that evening at the villa.

For though no one could deny Mr. Pegg's sterling worth there were times when his, as it were, silver needed repolishing. And this was such a time. As for Sebastian Markheim, for all his wealth, the veneer of culture, which had never been much more than tailor-deep, now showed the common clay beneath all too plainly; and the bandage which his New York physician had arranged over one eye did nothing to make his behavior more becoming. Whereas on the other hand I was my own cheery, chatty self, only more so, if possible, entertaining both gentlemen with a pleasant account of a railroad accident of which I had read that day, and an explanation of the main differences between knitting and crochet work.

However, they were not very responsive, proving conclusively my dear father's theory. In point of fact they were both so uncommunicative that it was necessary for me to exercise considerable tact and ingenuity before I could get out of them the fact that Sandro di Monteventi was still at large, though he had been traced as far as New York City.

Indeed I cannot imagine why these two gentlemen should have been suspicious of my trustworthiness, yet their reticence could have no other implication. However, when I made quite sure that no further information was to be had out of them I continued to be quite as delightful as before, even insisting upon serving their after-dinner coffee with my own hands as soon as the footman had carried it into the library for us.

I confess that my solicitation about the serving of this was not wholly disinterested, inasmuch as I administered a small dose of veronal in each cup--a mere five grains to insure their sleeping--and sleeping early. And in truth my dear father never approved the taking of coffee in the evening, and I knew that neither of these men had had sufficient sleep during the past forty-eight hours. Also, I did not wish my project to fail through any oversight on my part. Moreover, neither being a good judge of coffee, they made no comment on the flavor.

Thus it was that when, shortly after nine o'clock, first one and then the other excused himself and went off to bed, I did not seek to detain either, but remained myself in the library for half an hour, ostensibly engaged in the perusal of a volume of Carlyle's French Revolution but in reality with one eye fixed upon the clock, and my attention absorbed with waiting for the moment when I might retire to my chamber without apparent undue haste.

At length the clock struck ten, having been considerably longer than its usual time in getting round to it, or so I fancied, and I rose in a leisurely fashion, putting away my book and ringing for the footman. When he appeared I bade him a cheerful good night and told him to put out the lights. Then I made my way upstairs to Peaches, my heart beating with excitement but my head quite cool and collected as I admitted myself to our, as it were, joint prison.

I found the dear girl already dressed in a dark suit and small hat, her face still pale, though her sleep had greatly refreshed her and her eyes were once more the great fiery cat eyes of amber that I loved to watch.

"Free," she began at once, "is there any news of him? Have they caught him?"

"Not yet," I replied, "but he's in New York somewhere--at least that's what they think. Don't forget to take your toothbrush."

"And you are sure that Dicky understands what to do?"

"Of course!" I replied, going to my top bureau drawer and regarding the contents critically. "Now let me see what I shall take."

"I guess father will never forgive us," remarked Peaches dolefully. "But it seems a person never can do what they think right without getting in wrong with some one."

"I shall take my father's chronometer," I mused half aloud, "smelling salts and a pack of cards, for solitaire. Also my small folding check book. These, together with my toothbrush and clean handkerchief, will just about fill my reticule."

I was putting these articles into their receptacle as I talked, but my attention was fixed upon Alicia's face. She looked as if she were seeing a vision; never have I beheld such an expression of anxious beatitude, if one may say so, on any human countenance either before or since. It was hardly wholesome.

"Did you put on low-heeled shoes?" I asked practically. Peaches came to with a start.

"Yes," she replied. "Free, do they let you get married in jail?"

"They send you there for getting married too often," I replied. "Now keep your mind on the excitement of the moment and hook up my shirt waist for me, there's a good girl."

"A shirt waist that hooks up the back is a blouse, Free," she replied, smiling wanly. "How am I ever going to make your sense of luxury as strong as your pocket-book?"

"This blouse by any other name was just as dear," I replied.

And so with light chaffing we made the interval of our preparation and waiting durable to each other; and at length I sat down by the opened, darkened window for the third night in succession, to listen for Richard, the chauffeur, to signal. One by one the other lights in the house were extinguished and gradually complete silence reigned over the massive pile of what had but a brief three days ago been Peaches' future home, and which we were about to forswear forever in the cause of love and spiritual freedom, not to mention actual physical freedom. At five minutes of the hour Peaches broke the silence with an impatient whisper.

"All this stage stuff is the greatest bunk!" she exclaimed under her breath. "I wish to goodness you'd open the door and let us walk downstairs like rational human beings!"

"And break a Talbot's word?" I retorted. "Never! What I promise your dear father I keep my word about."

"Freedom Talbot, I sometimes think you are stuck on pa," commented Peaches reflectively.

And then, before I was obliged to reply to this most inconsiderate comment and indefensible charge, a low whistle sounded from the garden, the old familiar whistle with which I had heard Peaches signal to Richard, the chauffeur, a thousand times. At once she was upon her feet, her body tense, her foolish remark mercifully forgotten as she responded. Three liquid notes, soft yet clear. Then silence.

"Now for it!" I whispered. "You follow me--I know the way!" And carrying my shoes in my hand I stepped forth across that window sill, which must, so I believe, bear about it the odor of romance forevermore.

I am pained to relate that the first thing Peaches did upon reaching the ground was to embrace Dick Talbot and kiss him upon both cheeks. But such is the distressing truth, inappropriate as the action was in view of the fact that she was escaping from one fiancé in order to go in search of another, and that Dick was neither of them. But he did not seem to object in the least, though the moment she freed him he very properly turned his attention to helping me on with my shoes.

"All set, Aunt Mary!" he whispered then. "This way, please, and watch your step in case the enemy sets up a barrage!"

In silence we followed him through the garden and out across the meadow, keeping in the shadow of the trees and hedges whenever possible, and trampling the brave little white crocuses underfoot. At length we reached the fence which separated the grounds from the highroad, and as it was fortunately not very high he helped us over without difficulty, the main gates at the lodge being, as he informed us, locked for the night.

Drawn close to the fence was a powerful car with the engine running softly. Richard assisted me into the rear seat and Peaches sprang up beside him in front; there was a grinding sound from the creature's innards and we slid smoothly out into the open road.

The river road from Ossining to New York is one of surpassing beauty, even at night, when the smooth winding ribbon of it is practically without traffic. But I was not much concerned with its loveliness, as the night was too dark, for one thing, to permit more than a speculation as to what lay behind the hedges and rows of trees with which it is lined, and the Hudson lay hidden in the black depth of its own valley save when a moving light or two from a nocturnal vessel betrayed its whereabouts. Overhanging clouds now threatened rain, and a mist crept up from the broad stream, obscuring the lamps and blurring the occasional lighted window by our way. At any moment I expected that, as The Duchess would say, the heaven would open to emit a torrential storm; and I wished heartily that I had worn my other hat.