She began to talk of her career, of her independence, her ambitions--rapidly, feeling that there were sunken perils in the course of his conversation.

"Really, it isn't difficult. American men are chivalrous; they always protect a young girl--really, I've been surprised! And then, I don't think it's quite right that I should have advantages other girls haven't. If I'm going on the stage, I should take everything as it comes. Besides, it teaches me what life is, doesn't it? Then, it's such fun being independent, and making yourself respected! By the way, I feel so much stronger now, I shouldn't wonder if I could be on the stage again soon. Blainey wants to talk to me--I may see him this afternoon.

He's such a good kind fellow, just like you, Mr. Peavey! Really, all men seem to try and protect me!"

But the real reason she did not wholly accept his offer she did not tell him.

"Are you sure you want a career?" he said abruptly.

"Do I?... I don't know!" she said, eating hungrily. "But you see the trouble is, I've got to find out! Oh, I don't want anything small! No holding up a horse in the back row of an extravaganza, as Ida says!"

"You won't like the life!..."

"Won't I? Perhaps not!... I know some women have a bad time! But every one looks after me!..."

She shifted the conversation to his interests, and kept it there, with one eye on the clock. It was difficult choosing her questions, for all would not do. For instance, she wished to ask him why he did not stop working and enjoy his money; but that would have opened up a direct and personal reply.

"Why do you work so hard?" she said, instead.

"I've got to do something!" he answered; "and, besides, I'm on the point of something big--if I carry it through. In another year I'll be a rich man--quite a rich man!"

He looked away as he said it, ashamed, knowing at heart why he had offered it up to her thus against his fifty years! But in a moment, chirping ahead rapidly, she had put him at his ease, and keeping the conversation on light topics, avoided further dangers.

He left her with stiff formal bows, placing her in his automobile and giving the chauffeur directions.

The car went smoothly through the crush. It was a good car,--she was a judge!--in perfect order. Whatever Peavey did was always of the best.

The chauffeur had quite an air, too. She disturbed the heavy fur rugs that had been so carefully wrapped about her little feet, sunk her head gratefully against the cushions, and thought, with a long easy breath:

"Well, that's one thing I could do!"

She began to consider it from all points of view:

"I wonder what it'd be like to be Mrs. Orlando B. Peavey?"

An automobile--two or three; seats at the opera--a box in the upper row, perhaps; a big house; big dinners. Or, better still, travel, strange countries, curious places. Then she remembered the mustache. On a colonel or a judge, perhaps. What a pity he wasn't either! To be the young wife of a colonel or a judge was quite distinguished!

He was good, kind, gentle. She might even go in for charity. Perhaps, after ten or fifteen years, she might be left a widow, with lots of money. Fifteen was rather long--ten would be better! There was a girl she knew who had married an old man worth ten millions, who had died before the year was out. What luck! But then, all husbands are not so obliging!

This reverie did not last long. She tied it up, so to speak, in a neat package and put it in a pigeonhole. It was comforting to think of it as a possibility! Why had he offered her his automobile every day--just for her own? Was it pure generosity, or was there something else? She smiled; such motives she read easily. Wasn't it, in fact, to know what her daily life was!--whom she saw, where she went, to know absolutely, before he took the final plunge? She smiled again. She was sure there was something of all this in the gift, and leaning forward, she sought to study the face of Brennon, the chauffeur, wondering if she could make him an ally, could trust him--if he were human.

She had no time for conversation. Hardly had she arrived before Miss Pim's than she perceived Sa.s.soon's automobile turning the corner. She did not wish to meet him thus, though she was not sorry that he had seen her return. So she ran hastily up-stairs to her room, and was in the midst of a quick change of toilet when Josephus brought the card.

"Tell him to wait!"

She took pains that this waiting should not be too short, maliciously studying the clock for a good twenty minutes before, prepared for the street, she went down.

"Now to be a desperate adventuress," she thought to herself; and a.s.suming a languid indifferent manner, she entered the room.

CHAPTER VII

Sa.s.soon was on his feet, moving restlessly, as she entered. He was not accustomed to be kept waiting, and to wait half an hour after he had seen her enter just ahead of him was interminably vexing. And yet, he was profoundly grateful for this teasing delay. It awakened him; it made him hope. There was a resistance, a defiance, in it that was as precious as it was rare. He had wondered much about her as he moved with slow irritation, stopping occasionally to catch a reflection in the foggy mirror of his long, oriental, slightly hanging head, and the grizzled mustache which, with its mounting W, gave to his dulled eyes a sharp staccato quality of a blinking bird of prey.

The drawing-room, or parlor, was like ten thousand other parlors of boarding-houses--brown, musty, with an odor of upholstery and cooking, immense tableaux sunk into the obscurity of the walls, imitation Dresden shepherdesses on the mantel, an alb.u.m of Miss Pim's on the table and a vase containing dried flowers, cheap furniture, a crippled sofa placed in a shadow, and weighing down all, the heavy respectability of a Sunday afternoon. Occasionally the front door opened to a latch-key, and a feminine form flitted by the doorway, always pausing curiously to survey the parlor before sorting the mail that lay displayed on the seat of the hat-rack.

Once a couple with cheery voices came full into the room before perceiving his tenancy. They withdrew abruptly, and he heard the girl saying to her escort:

"Oh, well, come up to the room; there's never a chance at the old parlor!"

This mediocrity, this quiet, these flitting forms of young women, the cub escort who was privileged to enjoy intimacy, strangely excited him.

There was something really romantic in following a fancy into such a lair, and the longer the plaguing clock sounded its tinny march, the more vibrantly alert he felt, in the antic.i.p.ation of her coming.

"I saw you come in!" he said directly. He did not move forward, but stood blinking at her like a night-bird disturbed in the day. "You've kept me waiting quite a while, young lady."

"Really?" she said indifferently. She stopped in the middle of the room.

"Well, Pasha, do you expect me to come to you?"

He roused himself, hastily advancing. In truth, waiting for others to throw themselves at him had become such a habit that he had not noticed the omission.

"Pardon me! I was enjoying--you are a delightful picture!" he said in his silky voice.

She accepted the evasion with an unduped smile.

"You are lucky to catch me at all," she said. "I have an engagement up-town at three."

"Do you always wear the national costume?" he said, indicating her Russian blouse.

"Yes, always."

"But my flowers, Miss Baxter?" he said, standing after she had motioned him to a seat; and the glance from under the prominent, hanging upper lids, that half covered the irises, seemed to sift wearily down at her.

"Your flowers? What flowers? Sit down!"

"My orchids--yesterday--"

"Oh! Your orchids." She stopped suddenly, as though confused. "You won't be angry? I know you won't when I tell you about it! I gave them away."

He took his seat, rubbed the back of one hand with long soft fingers, and slowly raised his mocking glance to hers.

"Ah--you gave them away?"

"Yes! and you'll quite approve," she said, meeting his inquisitorial scrutiny without confusion. "I'll tell you just how it was. I have a protegee, an old woman who sells newspapers under the elevated station--such an old woman! If I were rich I'd send her off to a farm and make her happy for the rest of her life! The first day I came to New York I hadn't any money. I didn't know what to do! I sold newspapers!"

"You?"

"Yes! You didn't hear? Oh, it made quite a fuss at the time! The newspapers had it, 'Mysterious Society Woman Sells Papers.' And I made a lot of money--no change, naturally! Too bad I didn't know you then; you would have paid at least a dollar a paper!"