V
For a moment, all that George Finch felt as he glared out at this latest visitation was a weak resentment at the oafishness of Fate in using the same method for his tormenting that it had used so short a while before. Fate, he considered, was behaving childishly, and ought to change its act. This ankle business might have been funny enough once: but, overdone, it became tedious.
Then to indignation there succeeded relief. The remarks of Hamilton Beamish in his conversation with the policeman had made it clear that the possessor of the ankles had been his old friend May Stubbs of East Gilead, Idaho: and, seeing ankles once again, George naturally assumed that they were attached, as before, to Miss Stubbs, and that the reason for her return was that she had come back to fetch something—some powder-puff, for example, or a lipstick—which in the excitement of the recent altercation she had forgotten to take along with her.
This, of course, altered the whole position of affairs. What it amounted to was that, instead of a new enemy he had found an ally. A broad-minded girl like May would understand at once the motives which had led him to hide under the bed and would sympathise with them. He could employ her, it occurred to him, as a scout, to see if the staircase was not clear. In short, this latest interruption of his reverie, so far from being a disaster, was the very best thing that could have happened.
Sneezing heartily, for he had got a piece of fluff up his nose, George rolled out from under the bed: and, scrambling to his feet with a jolly laugh, found himself gazing into the bulging eyes of a complete stranger.
That, at least, was how the girl impressed him in the first instant of their meeting. But gradually, as he stared at her, there crept into his mind the belief that somewhere and at some time he had seen her before. But where? And when?
The girl continued to gape at him. She was small and pretty, with vivid black eyes and a mouth which, if it had not been hanging open at the moment like that of a fish, would have been remarkably attractive. Silence reigned in the sleeping-porch: and Mrs. Waddington, straining her ears outside, was beginning to think that George could not be in this lair and that a further vigil was before her, when suddenly voices began to speak. What they were saying, she was unable to hear, for the door was stoutly built: but beyond a doubt one of them was George’s. Mrs. Waddington crept away, well content. Her suspicions had been confirmed, and now it remained only to decide what it was best to do about it. She moved into the shadow of the water-tank, and there remained for a space in deep thought.
Inside the sleeping-porch, the girl, her eyes fixed on George, had begun to shrink back. At about the third shrink she bumped into the wall, and the shock seemed to restore her power of speech.
“What are you doing in my bedroom?” she cried.
The question had the effect of substituting for the embarrassment which had been gripping George a sudden bubbling fury. This, he felt, was too much. Circumstances had conspired that night to turn this sleeping-porch into a sort of meeting-place of the nations, but he was darned if he was going to have his visitors looking on the room as their own.
“What do you mean, your bedroom?” he demanded hotly. “Who are you?”
“I’m Mrs. Mullett.”
“Who?”
“Mrs. Frederick Mullett.”
Mrs. Waddington had formed her plan of action. What she needed, she perceived, was a witness to come with her to this den of evil and add his testimony in support of hers. If only Lord Hunstanton had been present, as he should have been, she would have needed to look no further. But Lord Hunstanton was somewhere out in the great city, filling his ignoble tummy with food. Whom, then, could she enroll as a deputy? The question answered itself. Ferris was the man. He was ready to hand and could be fetched without delay.
Mrs. Waddington made for the stairs.
“Mrs. Mullett?” said George. “What do you mean? Mullett’s not married.”
“Yes, he is. We were married this morning.”
“Where is he?”
“I left him down below, finishing a cigar. He said we’d be all alone up here, nesting like two little birds in a tree top.”
George laughed a brassy, sardonic laugh.
“If Mullett thought anyone could ever be alone for five minutes up here, he’s an optimist. And what right has Mullett to go nesting like a little bird in my apartment?”
“Is this your apartment?”
“Yes, it is.”
“Oh! Oh!”
“Stop it! Don’t make that noise. There are policemen about.”
“Policemen!”
“Yes.”
Tears suddenly filled the eyes that looked into his. Two small hands clasped themselves in a passionate gesture of appeal.
“Don’t turn me over to the bulls, mister! I only did it for ma’s sake. If you was out of work and starvin’ and you had to sit and watch your poor old ma bendin’ over the washtub. …”
“I haven’t got a poor old ma,” said George curtly. “And what on earth do you think you’re talking about?”
He stopped suddenly, speech wiped from his lips by a stunning discovery. The girl had unclasped her hands, and now she flung them out before her: and the gesture was all that George’s memory needed to spur it to the highest efficiency. For unconsciously Fanny Mullett had assumed the exact attitude which had lent such dramatic force to her entrance into the dining-room of Mrs. Waddington’s house at Hempstead earlier in the day. The moment he saw those outstretched arms, George remembered where he had met this girl before: and, forgetting everything else, forgetting that he was trapped on a roof with a justly exasperated policeman guarding the only convenient exit, he uttered a short, sharp bark of exultation.
“You!” he cried. “Give me that necklace.”
“What necklace?”
“The one you stole at Hempstead this afternoon.”
The girl drew herself up haughtily.
“Do you dare to say I stole a necklace?”
“Yes, I do.”
“Oh? And do you know what I’ll do if you bring a charge like that against me! I’ll. …”
She broke off. A discreet tap had sounded on the door.
“Honey!”
Fanny looked at George. George looked at Fanny.
“My husband!” whispered Fanny.
George was in no mood to be intimidated by a mere Mullett. He strode to the door.
“Honey!”
George flung the door open.
“Honey!”
“Well, Mullett?”
The valet fell back a pace, his eyes widening. He passed the tip of his tongue over his lips.
“A wasp in the beehive!” cried Mullett.
“Don’t be an idiot,” said George.
Mullett was gazing at him in the manner of one stricken to the core.
“Isn’t your own bridal-trip enough for you, Mr. Finch,” he said reproachfully, “that you’ve got to come butting in on mine?”
“Don’t be a fool. My wedding was temporarily postponed.”
“I see. And misery loves company, so you start in breaking up my home.”
“Nothing of the kind.”
“If I had known that you were on the premises, Mr. Finch,” said Mullett with dignity, “I would not have taken the liberty of making use of your domicile. Come, Fanny, we will go to a hotel.”
“Will you?” said George unpleasantly. “Let me tell you there’s a little matter to be settled before you start going to any hotel. Perhaps you are not aware that your wife is in possession of a valuable necklace belonging to the lady who, if it hadn’t been for her, would now be Mrs. George Finch?”
Mullett clapped a hand to his forehead.
“A necklace!”
“It’s a lie,” cried his bride.
Mullett shook his head sadly. He was putting two and two together.
“When did this occur, Mr. Finch?”
“This afternoon, down at Hempstead.”
“Don’t you listen to him, Freddy. He’s dippy.”
“What precisely happened, Mr. Finch?”
“This woman suddenly burst into the room where everybody was and pretended that I had made love to her and deserted her. Then she fell on the table where the wedding-presents were and pretended to faint. And then she dashed out, and some time afterwards it was discovered that the necklace was gone. And don’t,” he added, turning to the accused, “say that you only did it for your poor old ma’s sake, because I’ve had a lot to put up with today, and that will be just too much.”
Mr. Mullett clicked his tongue with a sort of sorrowful pride. Girls will be girls, Frederick Mullett seemed to say, but how few girls could be as clever as his little wife.
“Give Mr. Finch his necklace, pettie,” he said mildly.
“I haven’t got any necklace.”
“Give it to him, dearie, just like Freddie says, or there’ll only be unpleasantness.”
“Unpleasantness,” said George, breathing hard, “is right!”
“It was a beautiful bit of work, honey, and there isn’t another girl in New York that could have thought it out, let alone gone and got away with it. Even Mr. Finch will admit it was a beautiful bit of work.”
“If you want Mr. Finch’s opinion …” began George heatedly.
“But we’ve done with all that sort of thing now, haven’t we, pettie? Give him his necklace, honey.”
Mrs. Mullett’s black eyes snapped. She twisted her pretty fingers irresolutely.
“Take your old necklace,” she said.
George caught it as it fell.
“Thanks,” he said, and put it in his pocket.
“And now, Mr. Finch,” said Mullett suavely, “I think we will say good night. My little girl here has had a tiring day and ought to be turning in.”
George hurried across the roof to his apartment. Whatever the risk of leaving the safety of the sleeping-porch, it must be ignored. It was imperative that he telephone to Molly and inform her of what had happened.
He was pulling the French window open when he heard his name called: and perceived Mullett hurrying towards him from the door that led to the stairs.
“Just one moment, Mr. Finch.”
“What is it? I have a most important telephone-call to make.”
“I thought you would be glad to have this, sir.”
With something of the air of a conjurer who, to amuse the children, produces two rabbits and the grand old flag from inside a borrowed top-hat, Mullett unclasped his fingers.
“Your necklace, sir.”
George’s hand flew to his pocket and came away empty.
“Good heavens! How … ?”
“My little girl,” explained Mullett with a proud and tender look in his eyes. “She snitched it off you, sir, as we were going out. I was able, however, to persuade her to give it up again. I reminded her that we had put all that sort of thing behind us now. I asked her how she could expect to be happy on our duck-farm if she had a thing like that on her mind, and she saw it almost at once. She’s a very reasonable girl, sir, when tactfully approached by the voice of love.”
George drew a deep breath. He replaced the necklace in his inside breast-pocket, buttoned his coat and drew away a step or two.
“Are you going to let that woman loose on a duck-farm, Mullett?”
“Yes, sir. We are taking a little place in the neighbourhood of Speonk.”
“She’ll have the tail-feathers off every bird on the premises before the end of the first week.”
Mullett bowed his appreciation of the compliment.
“And they wouldn’t know they’d lost them, sir,” he agreed. “There’s never been anyone in the profession fit to be reckoned in the same class with my little girl. But all that sort of thing is over now, sir. She is definitely retiring from business—except for an occasional visit to the department stores during bargain-sales. A girl must have her bit of finery. Good night, sir.”
“Good night,” said George.
He took out the necklace, examined it carefully, replaced it in his pocket, buttoned his coat once more, and went into the apartment to telephone to Molly.