Chapter 10

For a moment or two they eyed one another in silence, Whitaker wondering just how much of a fool she was thinking him and dubiously considering various expedients to ingratiate himself. She was really quite too charming to be neglected, after so auspicious an inauguration of their acquaintance. Momentarily he was becoming more convinced that she was exceptional. Certain he was he had never met any woman quite like her--not even the fair but false Miss Carstairs of whom he had once fancied himself so hopelessly enamoured. Here he divined an uncommon intelligence conjoined with matchless loveliness. Testimony to the former quality he acquired from eyes serenely violet and thoughtful. As for the latter, he reflected that few professional beauties could have stood, as this woman did, the acid test of that mercilessly brilliant morning.

"I don't seem to think of anything useful to say," he ventured. "Can you help me out? Unless you'd be interested to know that my name's Whitaker--Hugh Whitaker--?"

She acknowledged the information merely by a brief nod. "It seems to me," she said seriously, "that the pressing question is, what are you going to do about that ankle? Shall you be able to walk?"

"Hard to say," he grumbled, a trifle dashed. He experimented gingerly, moving his foot this way and that and shutting his teeth on groans that the test would surely have evoked had he been alone. "'Fraid not. Still, one can try."

"It isn't sprained?"

"Oh, no--just badly wrenched. And, as I said, this is the second time within a week."

With infinite pains and the aid of both hands and his sound foot, he lifted himself and contrived to stand erect for an instant, then bore a little weight on the hurt ankle--and blenched, paling visibly beneath his ineradicable tan.

"I don't suppose," he said with effort--"they grow--crutches--on this neck of land?"

And he was about to collapse again upon the sands when, without warning, he found the woman had moved to his side and caught his hand, almost brusquely passing his arm across her shoulders, so that she received no little of his weight.

"Oh, I say--!" he protested feebly.

"Don't say anything," she replied shortly. "I'm very strong--quite able to help you to the boat. Please don't consider me at all; just see if we can't manage this way."

"But I've no right to impose--"

"Don't be silly! Please do as I say. Won't you try to walk?"

He endeavoured to withdraw his arm, an effort rendered futile by her cool, firm grasp on his fingers.

"Please!" she said--not altogether patiently.

He eyed her askance. There was in this incredible situation a certain piquancy, definitely provocative, transcending the claims his injury made upon his interest. Last night for the first time he had seen this woman and from a distance had thought her desirable; now, within twelve hours, he found himself with an arm round her neck!

He thought it a tremendously interesting neck, slender, not thin, and straight and strong, a milk-white column from the frilled collar of her bathing-cloak to the shimmering tendrils that clustered behind her ears. Nor was the ear she presented to his inspection an everyday ear, lacking its individual allure. He considered that it owned its distinctive personality, not unworthy of any man's studious attention.

He saw her face, of course, en profile: her head bowed, downcast lashes long upon her cheeks, her mouth set in a mould of gravity, her brows seriously contracted--signifying preoccupation with the problem of the moment.

And then suddenly she turned her head and intercepted his whole-hearted stare. For a thought wonder glimmered in the violet eyes; then they flashed disconcertingly; finally they became utterly cold and disdainful.

"Well?" she demanded in a frigid voice.

He looked away in complete confusion, and felt his face burning to the temples.

"I beg your pardon," he mumbled unhappily.

He essayed to walk. Twenty feet and more of treacherous, dry, yielding sand separated them from the flight of steps that ascended the bluff. It proved no easy journey; and its difficulty was complicated by his determination to spare the woman as much as he could. Gritting his teeth, he grinned and bore without a murmur until, the first stage of the journey accomplished, he was able to grasp a handrail at the bottom of the stairs and breathe devout thanks through the medium of a gasp.

"Shall we rest a bit?" the woman asked, compassionate, ignoring now the impertinence she had chosen to resent a few moments ago.

"Think I can manage--thanks," he said, panting a little. "It'll be easier now--going up. I shan't need help."

He withdrew his arm, perhaps not without regret, but assuredly with a comforting sense of decent consideration for her, as well as with some slight and intrinsically masculine satisfaction in the knowledge that he was overcoming her will and her resistance.

"No--honestly!" he insisted. "These handrails make it easy."

"But please be sure," she begged. "Don't take any chances. _I_ don't mind...."

"Let me demonstrate, then."

The stairway was comfortably narrow; he had only to grasp a rail with either hand, and half lift himself, half hop up step by step. In this manner he accomplished the ascent in excellent, if hopelessly ungraceful, style. At the top he limped to a wooden seat beside one of the bath-houses and sat down with so much grim decision in his manner that it was evident to the woman the moment she rejoined him. But he mustered a smile to meet her look of concern, and shook his head.

"Thus far and no farther."

"Oh, but you must not be stubborn!"

"I mean to be--horrid stubborn. In fact, I don't mind warning you that there's a famous strain of mule in the Whitaker make-up."

She was, however, not to be diverted; and her fugitive frown bespoke impatience, if he were any judge.

"But seriously, you must--"

"Believe me," he interrupted, "if I am to retain any vestige of self-respect, I must no longer make a crutch of you."

"But, really, I don't see why--!"

"Need I remind you I am a man?" he argued lightly. "Even as you are a very charming woman...."

The frown deepened while she conned this utterance over.

"How do you mean me to interpret that?" she demanded, straightforward.

"The intention was not uncomplimentary, perhaps," he said gravely; "though the clumsiness is incontestable. As for the rest of it--I'm not trying to flirt with you, if that's what _you_ mean--yet. What I wished to convey was simply my intention no longer to bear my masculine weight upon a woman--either you or any other woman."

A smile contended momentarily with the frown, and triumphed brilliantly.

"I beg your pardon, I'm sure. But do you mind telling me what you do mean to do?"

"No."

"Well, then--?" The smile was deepening very pleasantly.

"I mean to ask you," he said deliberately, taking heart of this favourable manifestation: "to whom am I indebted--?"

To his consternation the smile vanished, as though a cloud had sailed before the sun. Doubt and something strongly resembling incredulity informed her glance.

"Do you mean to say you don't _know_?" she demanded after a moment.

"Believe me, I've no least idea--"

"But surely Mr. Ember must have told you?"

"Ember seemed to be labouring under the misapprehension that the Fiske place was without a tenant."

"Oh!"

"And I'm sure he was sincere. Otherwise it's certain wild horses couldn't have dragged him back to New York."

"Oh!" Her tone was thoughtful. "So he has gone back to town?"

"Business called him. At least such was the plausible excuse he advanced for depriving himself of my exclusive society."

"I see," she nodded--"I see...."

"But aren't you going to tell me? Or ought I to prove my human intelligence by assuming on logical grounds that you're Miss Fiske?"

"If you please," she murmured absently, her intent gaze seeking the distances of the sea.

"Then that's settled," he pursued in accents of satisfaction. "You are Miss Fiske--Christian name at present unknown to deponent. I am one Whitaker, as already deposed--baptized Hugh. And we are neighbours. Do you know, I think this a very decent sort of a world after all?"

"And still"--she returned to the charge--"you haven't told me what you mean to do, since you refuse my help."

"I mean," he asserted cheerfully, "to sit here, aping Patience on a monument, until some kind-hearted person fetches me a stick or other suitable piece of wood to serve as emergency staff. Then I shall make shift to hobble to your motor-boat and thank you very kindly for ferrying me home."

"Very well," she said with a business-like air. "Now we understand one another, I'll see what I can find."

Reviewing their surroundings with a swift and comprehensive glance, she shook her head in dainty annoyance, stood for an instant plunged in speculation, then, light-footed, darted from sight round the side of the bath-house.

He waited, a tender nurse to his ankle, smiling vaguely at the benign sky.

Presently she reappeared, dragging an eight-foot pole, which, from certain indications, seemed to have been formerly dedicated to the office of clothes-line prop.

"Will this do?"

Whitaker took it from her and weighed it with anxious judgment.

"A trifle tall, even for me," he allowed. "Still...."

He rose on one foot and tested the staff with his weight. "'Twill do," he decided. "And thank you very much."

But even with its aid, his progress toward the boat necessarily consumed a tedious time. It was impossible to favour the injured foot to any great extent. Between occasional halts for rest, Whitaker hobbled with grim determination, suffering exquisitely but privately. The girl considerately schooled her pace to his, subjecting him to covert scrutiny when, as they moved on, his injury interested him exclusively.

He made little or no attempt to converse while in motion; a spirit of bravado alone, indeed, would have enabled him to pay attention to anything aside from the problem of the next step; and bravado was a stranger to his cosmos then, if ever. So she had plenty of opportunity to make up her mind about him.

If her eyes were a reliable index, she found him at least interesting. At times their expression was enigmatic beyond any rending. Again they seemed openly perplexed. At all times they were warily regardful.

Once she sighed quietly with a passing look of sadness of which he was wholly unaware....

"Odd--about that fellow," he observed during a halt. "I was sure I knew him, both times--last night as well as to-day."

"Last night?" she queried with patent interest.

"Oh, yes: I meant to tell you. He was prowling round the bungalow--Ember's, I mean--when I first saw him. I chased him off, lost him in the woods, and later picked him up again just at the edge of your grounds. That's why I thought it funny that he should be over here this morning, shadowing you--as they say in detective stories."

"No wonder!" she commented sympathetically.

"And the oddest thing of all was that I should be so sure he was Drummond--until I saw--"

"Drummond!"

"Friend of mine.... You don't by any chance know Drummond, do you?"

"I've heard the name."

"You must have. The papers were full of his case for a while. Man supposed to have committed suicide--jumped off Washington Bridge a week before he was to marry Sara Law, the actress?"

"Why ... yes. Yes, I remember. But.... 'Supposed to have committed suicide'--did you say?"

He nodded. "He may have got away with it, at that. Only, I've good reason to believe he didn't.... I may as well tell you: it's no secret, although only a few people know it: Ember saw Drummond, or thinks he did, alive, in the flesh, a good half-hour after the time of his reported suicide."

"Really!" the girl commented in a stifled voice.

"Oh, for all that, there's no proof Ember wasn't misled by an accidental resemblance--no real proof--merely circumstantial evidence. Though for my part, I'm quite convinced Drummond still lives."

"How very curious!" There was nothing more than civil but perfunctory interest in the comment. "Are you ready to go on?"

And another time, when they were near the boat:

"When do you expect Mr. Ember?" asked the girl.

"To-night, probably. At least, he wired yesterday to say he'd be down to-night. But from what little I've seen of him, you can never be sure of Ember. He seems to lead the sedentary and uneventful life of a flea on a hot griddle."

"I shall be glad to see him," said the girl in what Whitaker thought a curious tone. "Please tell him, will you? Don't forget."

"If that's the way you feel about him, I shall be tempted to wire him not to come."

"Just what do you mean by that?" asked the woman sharply, a glint of indignation in her level, challenging stare.

"Merely that your tone sounded a bit vindictive. I thought possibly you might want to have it out with him, for the sin of permitting me to infest this neck o' the woods."

"Absurd!" she laughed, placated.

When finally they came to the end of the dock, he paused, considering the three-foot drop to the deck of the motor-boat with a dubious look that but half expressed his consternation. It would be practically impossible to lower himself without employing the painful member to an extent he didn't like to anticipate. He met the girl's inquiring glance with one wholly rueful.

"If it weren't low tide...." he explained, crest-fallen.

She laughed lightly. "But, since it is low tide, you'll have to let me help you again."

Cautiously lowering himself to a sitting position on the dock, feet overhanging the boat, he nodded. "'Fraid so. Sorry to be a nuisance."

"You're not a nuisance. You're merely masculine," the girl retorted, jumping lightly but surely to the cockpit.

She turned and offered him a hand, eyes dancing with gay malice.

Whitaker delayed, considering her gravely.

"Meaning--?" he inquired pleasantly.

"Like all men you must turn to a woman in the end--however brave your strut."

"Oh, it's that way, is it? Thank you, but I fancy I can manage."

And with the aid of the clothes-prop he did manage to make the descent without her hand and without disaster.

"Pure _blague_!" the girl taunted.

"That's French for I-think-I'm-smart-don't-I--isn't it?" he inquired with an innocent stare. "If so, the answer is: I do."

Her lips and eyes were eloquent of laughter repressed.

"But now?" she argued, sure of triumph. "You've got to admit you couldn't do without me now!"

"Oh, I can manage a motor, if that's what you mean," he retorted serenely; "though I confess there are a few new kinks to this one that might puzzle me a bit at the start. That chain-and-cogwheel affair to turn the flywheel with, for instance--that's a new one. The last time I ran a marine motor in this country we had to break our backs and run chances of breaking our arms as well, turning up by hand."

The girl had gone forward, over the cabin roof, to cast off. She returned along the outboard, pushing the boat clear, then, jumping back into the cockpit, started the engine with a single, almost effortless turn of the crank which Whitaker had mentioned, and took the wheel as the boat swung droning away from the dock. Not until she had once or twice advanced the spark and made other minor adjustments, did she return attention to her passenger.

Then, in a casual voice, she inquired: "You've been out of the country for some time, I think you said?"

"Almost six years on the other side of the world--got back only last spring."

"What," she asked, eyes averted, spying out the channel--"what does one do on the other side of the world?"

"This one knocked about, mostly, for his health's sake. That is, I went away expecting to die before long, was disappointed, got well and strong and--took to drifting.... I beg your pardon," he broke off hastily; "a civil answer to a civil question needn't necessarily be the history of one's life."

The girl put the wheel down slowly, swinging the boat upon a course direct to the landing-stage at Half-a-loaf Lodge.

"But surely you didn't waste six years simply 'drifting'?"

"Well, I did drift into a sort of business, after a bit--gold mining in a haphazard, happy-go-lucky fashion--did pretty well at it and came home to astonish the natives."

"Was it a success?"

"Rather," he replied dryly.

"I meant your plan to astonish the natives."

"So did I."

"You find things--New York--disappointing?" she analyzed his tone.

"I find it overpowering--and lonely. Nobody sent a brass band to greet me at the dock; and all the people I used to know are either married and devoted to brats, or divorced and devoted to bridge; and my game has gone off so badly in six years that I don't belong any more."

She smiled, shaping her scarlet lips deliciously. The soft, warm wind whipped stray strands of hair, like cords of gold, about her face. Her eyelids were half lowered against the intolerable splendour of the day. The waters of the bay, wind-blurred and dark, seemed a shield of sapphire fashioned by nature solely to set off in clear relief her ardent loveliness.

Whitaker, noting how swiftly the mainland shores were disclosing the finer details of their beauty, could have wished the bay ten times as wide.

XII

THE MOUSE-TRAP

Late in the afternoon of the same day, Ember, appearing suddenly in front of the bungalow, discovered Whitaker sitting up in state; a comfortable wicker chair supported his body and a canvas-seated camp stool one of his feet; which last was discreetly veiled in a dripping bath-towel. Otherwise he was fastidiously arrayed in white flannels and, by his seraphic smile and guileless expression, seemed abnormally at peace with his circumstances.

Halting, Ember surveyed the spectacle with mocking disfavour, as though he felt himself slightly at a disadvantage. He was, indeed, in a state that furnished an admirable contrast to that of the elegant if disabled idler. His face was scarcely whiter with the impalpable souvenirs of the road than was his slate-coloured mohair duster. The former, indeed, suffered by comparison, its personal coat of dust being deep-rutted with muddy paths of perspiration; beneath all lay the dull flush of flesh scorched by continuous exposure to sunlight and the swift rush of superheated air. None the less, his eyes, gleaming bright as through a mask, were not unamiable.

"Hel-_lo_!" he observed, beginning to draw off his gauntlets as he ascended the veranda steps and dropped into another wicker chair.

"How _do_ you do?" returned Whitaker agreeably.

"I'm all right; but what the deuce's the matter with you?"

"Game leg, thanks. Twisted my ankle again, this morning. Sum Fat has been doctoring it with intense enthusiasm, horse liniment and chopped ice."

"That's the only proper treatment for sprains. Bad, is it?"

"Not very--not half as bad as I thought it would be at first. Coming on top of the other wrench made it extra painful for a while--that's all. By to-morrow morning I'll be skipping like the silly old hills in the Scriptures."

"Hope so; but you don't want to overdo the imitation, you know. Give nature a chance to make the cure complete. Otherwise--well, you must've had a pretty rotten stupid time of it, with that storm."

"Oh, not at all. I really enjoyed it," Whitaker protested.

"Like this place, eh?"

"Heavenly!" asserted the invalid with enthusiasm. "I can't thank you enough."

"Oh, if you forgive me for leaving you alone so much, we'll call it square." Ember lifted his voice: "Sum Fat, ahoy!"

The Chinaman appeared in the doorway, as suddenly and silently as if magically materialized by the sound of his name. He bore with circumspection a large tray decorated with glasses, siphons, decanters and a bowl of cracked ice.

"I make very remarkable damn fine quick guess what you want first," he observed suavely, placing the tray on a small table convenient to Ember's hand. "That all now?"

"You're a sulphur-coloured wizard with pigeon-toed eyes," replied Ember severely. "Go away from here instantly and prepare me all the dinner in the establishment, lest an evil fate overtake you."

"It is written," returned Sum Fat, "that I die after eight-seven years of honourable life from heart-failure on receiving long-deferred raise in wages."

He shuffled off, chuckling.

"Scotch or Irish?" demanded Ember, clinking glasses.

"Irish, please. How's your friend's case?"

"Coming along. You don't seem surprised to see me."

"I had your telegram, and besides I heard your car, just now."

"Oh!" There was a significance in the ejaculation which Whitaker chose to ignore as he blandly accepted his frosted glass. "You weren't--ah--lonely?" Ember persisted.

"Not in the least."

"I fancied I saw the flutter of a petticoat through the trees, as I came up to the house."

"You did."

"Found a--ah--friend down here?"

"Acquaintance of yours, I believe: Miss Fiske."

"Miss Fiske!" There was unfeigned amazement in the echo.

"Anything wonderful about that?" inquired Whitaker, sharply. "I fancied from what she said that you two were rather good friends."

"Just surprised--that's all," said Ember, recovering. "You see, I didn't think the Fiske place was open this year."

He stared suspiciously at Whitaker, but the latter was transparently ingenuous.

"She expressed an unaccountable desire to see you--told me to tell you."

"Oh? Such being the case, one would think she might've waited."

"She had just started home when you drove in," Whitaker explained with elaborate ease. "She'd merely run over for a moment to inquire after my ankle, and couldn't wait."

"Thoughtful of her."

"Wasn't it?" To this Whitaker added with less complacency: "You'll have to call after dinner, I suppose."

"Sorry," said Ember, hastily, "but shan't be able to. Fact is, I only ran in to see if you were comfortable--must get back to town immediately after dinner--friend's case at a critical stage."

"Everybody loves me and worries about my interesting condition--even you, wretched host that you are."

"I apologize."

"Don't; you needn't. I wouldn't for the world interfere with your desperate business. I'm really quite happy here--alone."

"Alone--I think you said?" Ember inquired after a brief pause.

"Alone," Whitaker reiterated firmly.

"I'm glad you like the place."

"It's most attractive, really.... I say, who are the Fiskes, anyway?"

"Well ... the Fiskes are the people who own the next cottage."

"I know, but--"

"Oh, I never troubled to inquire; have a hazy notion Fiske does something in Wall Street." Ember passed smoothly over this flaw in his professional omniscience. "How did you happen to meet her?"

"Oh, mere accident. Over on the beach this morning. I slipped and hurt my ankle. She--ah--happened along and brought me home in her motor-boat."

On mature reflection, Whitaker had decided that it would be as well to edit his already sketchy explanation of all reference to the putative spy who wasn't Drummond; in other words, to let Ember's sleeping detective instincts lie. And with this private understanding with himself, he felt a little aggrieved because of the quarter toward which Ember presently saw fit to swing their talk.

"You haven't seen Drummond--or any signs of him, have you?"

"Eh--what?" Whitaker sat up, startled. "No, I ... er ... how should I?"

"I merely wondered. You see, I.... Well, to tell the truth, I took the liberty of camping on his trail, while in town, with the idea of serving him with notice to behave. But he'd anticipated me, apparently; he'd cleared out of his accustomed haunts--got away clean. I couldn't find any trace of him."

"You're a swell sleuth," Whitaker commented critically.

"You be damn'.... That's the true reason why I ran down to-day, when I really couldn't spare the time; I was a bit worried--afraid he'd maybe doped out my little scheme for keeping you out of harm's way."

"Oh, I say!" Whitaker expostulated, touched by this evidence of disinterested thoughtfulness. "You don't mean--"