The Deaves Affair

"The mere sight of you provokes me," she said with more frankness, probably, than she intended.

"I'm sorry," said Evan. "You're so different, so unusual, I don't know how to handle you."

The first part of this pleased her, the last outraged her afresh. "Handle me!" she cried. "I like that!"

Evan saw his mistake. "That's not the word," he said quickly. "I mean I study how to please you, and only seem to get in wrong."

"Don't 'study'," she said with a superior air. "Just be yourself."

"But I am myself, and it only provokes you."

The brown eyes flashed. "Oh, you're too conceited for words!"

This was a new thought to Evan. He considered it. "No," he said at last, "I don't think I am. At least not offensively conceited. But it seems to me you are so accustomed to having men bow down before you that the mildest independence in a man strikes you as something outrageous."

This was near enough the truth to be an added cause for offense. She received it in an ultra-dignified silence.

"I'd like to bow down before you too," Evan went on smiling. "But something tells me if I did it would be the end of me. You would despise me."

Her mood changed abruptly. "I feel better now," she said. "One really cannot take you seriously. I'll sing."

Her hands drifted over the keys, and she dropped into "Mighty lak' a Rose." The air was admirably suited to the deeper notes of her voice. The listener's heart was drawn right out of his breast; he forgot at once his fear of being mastered, and his great desire to master her.

When she came to the end he murmured, deeply moved: "I can't say anything."

She could have asked no finer tribute. "You needn't," she murmured.

The pleasure she took in his applause was evidenced in the warmth she imparted to the next song. She made it intolerably plaintive: "Just a Wearyin' for You."

Evan held his breath in delight. "If the words were true!" he thought. But though she sang with abandon, she never looked at him. He was artist enough to know better than to take an artistic performance literally.

Nothing more was said for a long time. She passed from one song to another, singing from memory; dreamily improvising on the piano between. She chose only simple songs in English which pleased Evan well – could she read his heart? – the "Shoogy-Shoo"; "Little Boy Blue"; the "Sands o' Dee."

Evan was incapable of criticising her voice. Some might have objected that it lacked that bell-like clearness so much to be desired; that it had a dusky quality, but Evan was not quarrelling because it was the voice of a woman instead of an angel. One thing she had beyond peradventure, temperament; her heart was in her singing, and so it played on his heartstrings as she willed.

While he listened enraptured, he saw the moon peek over the buildings in the next street. He softly got up and turned off the impertinent gas. Beyond a startled glance over her shoulder she made no objection. He was utterly fascinated by the movements of the bright head, now raised, now lowered, now turned towards the window in the changing moods of the songs.

Moonlight completed the working of the spell that was laid upon him. For the moment he ceased to be a rational being. He was exalted by emotion far out of himself. He experienced the sweetness of losing his own identity. It was as if a great wind had snatched him up into the universal ether, a region of warmth of colour and perfume. But he was conscious of a pull on him like that of the magnet for the iron, a pull that was neither to be questioned nor resisted.

At the last she turned around on the bench again, and her hands dropped in her lap. "That is all. I'm tired," she said like a child.

With a single movement the rapt youth was at her feet, weaving his arms about her waist. Unpremeditated words poured from him; words out of deeps in him of which up to that moment he was unconscious.

"Oh, you woman! You are the first in the world for me! I know you now! I feel your power! It's too much for me. And I'm glad of it! I have waited for you. I looked for you in so many girls' faces only to find emptiness. I began to doubt. Love was just a poetic fancy, I thought. But I have found it. Let me love you."

She was not surprised, nor angry. She gently tried to detach his arms. "Oh, hush! hush!" she murmured. "It is not me! It is just the music!"

"It is you! It is you!" he protested. "I knew it when I first saw you. You or none!"

"But how silly!" she said in a warm, low voice. "You have seen me twice."

"What difference does that make?" he said impatiently. "One cannot be mistaken about a thing like this. I love you with all my heart. It only takes a second to happen, but it can never be undone while I live. You have entered into me and taken possession. If you left me I should be no more than a shell of a man!"

"Ah, but be sensible!" she begged him. He thought he felt her fingertips brush his hair. "Try to be sensible. Think of me."

"I wish to think only of you. What do you want me to do?"

"Get up and sit beside me. Let us talk."

He sat beside her on the bench. He did not offer to touch her again. The moonlight was in her face; the lifted, shadowy oval seemed angelic to him, he was full of awe.

"You're so beautiful!" he groaned, "so beautiful it hurts me!"

"Hush!" she said, "you mustn't talk like that."

"Is it wrong?"

"Yes – no! I don't know. I can't bear it!"

"You can do what you like with me."

"You don't mean that really."

"I do. I have longed to be able to give myself up wholly."

"Then be my brother, my dear brother."

Evan frowned. "You mean – ?"

"Be my brother," she repeated. "I need your help."

"But – but how can I?" said Evan. "I am only a man."

"The other thing only frightens me," she said quickly. "I like you – but I cannot return that. This is not just the feeling of a moment. It will never change. I know myself. But be my friend. Take what I can give you. Do not force me to be on my guard. I wish to let myself go with you."

"That is what I wish," he said quickly. Poor Evan felt hollow inside: hollow and a little dazed. The cloud-piercing tower of his happiness had collapsed. A sure instinct told him that what she proposed was impossible, and what was more, absurd. But he clutched at straws. The idea of giving her up altogether was unthinkable. Moreover he was incapable of resisting her at that moment. It was easy enough to silence that inner voice. He said nothing, but merely raised her hand to his lips.

"Swear it," she murmured.

"You dictate the oath."

"Swear that you will be my friend, and nothing but my friend."

"I swear it."

Suddenly leaning forward she kissed his cheek as a sister might have done – but the spot glowed long afterwards. Then she jumped up.

"You must go now."

"Not quite yet," he pleaded, "Corinna."

"Oh!" she rebuked him.

"But you're my sister now."

"Very well, you may call me Corinna, but you must go. What will the landlady say?"

"But you said you needed my help. How can I rest not knowing – "

"But that's too long a story to begin now. There's no immediate danger threatening me. There will be other nights."

"How can I wait twenty-four hours?"

"How would you like to get up early and go walking in the country before the day's work?"

"I'd like it above all things."

"Then call for me at eight. We'll have breakfast at the French pastry shop. My first lesson's at eleven."

"Great!"

"Now go."

"Say good-night, Evan."

"I will when I am more accustomed to you."

"But try it just for an experiment."

"Well – good-night, Evan."

His name was so sweet on her tongue it required all his self-control to remember his oath. He turned away with a groan.

"Good-night, Corinna."

CHAPTER VIII

EVAN IS RE-ENGAGED

He dreamed of her all night – but not as a sister it is to be feared. In his dream she was running through the springtime woods with the glorious hair flying, and he was running after her, an endless race without his ever drawing nearer, while the sun shone and the little young leaves twinkled as if in laughter.

He was awake at six and sprang out of bed to see what kind of day it was. The sun was already high over the tops of the buildings to the east, the sky was fleckless, and the empty Park was beaming. His anxiety was relieved. He dressed as slowly as possible in order to kill time, taking care to make no sound that might awaken Charley in the next room.

He was not prepared to make explanations just then.

Notwithstanding all his care he was ready a whole hour too soon, an hour that promised to be endless, for he was completely at a loss what to do with himself; couldn't apply his mind to anything; couldn't sit still. Finally he stole down-stairs, sending his love silently through her door as he passed, and started circumnavigating the Park.

He was subconsciously aware of the splendour of the morning, but saw little of what actually met his eyes. He was too busy with the happenings of the night before. A nasty little doubt tormented him. He knew he was slightly insane; it was not that; he gloried in his state and pitied the dull clods who had not fire in their breasts to drive them mad. But here was the rub; would not these same clods have laughed at him had they known of the oath he had taken – would not he have laughed himself yesterday?

It was carried on inside him like an argument; on the one hand the enamoured young man who insisted that the relationship between brother and sister was a holy and beautiful one, on the other hand the matter-of-fact one who said it was all damn nonsense; that a man and woman, free, unattached and not bound by the ties of consanguinity were not intended to be brother and sister. Such arguments have no end. The thought of Charley troubled him most; he had always taken a slightly superior attitude towards Charley's sentimentality. What a chance for Charley to get back at him if he learned of this!

At five minutes to eight, having looked at his watch fifty times or so, he ventured back into the house, and tapped at Corinna's door. "She's bound to be late anyhow," he thought, "no harm to hurry her up a little."

But no, she was hatted, gloved and waiting just inside the door. This little fact won his gratitude surprisingly; a man does not expect it of a woman. In the sunlight they took in each other anew. What Corinna thought did not appear, but Evan was freshly delighted. She was an out-of-doors girl it appeared; the morning became her like a shining garment. He forgot the argument; it was sufficient to be with her, to laugh with her, to be ravished by the dusky, velvety tones of her voice.

Of the hours that followed it is unnecessary to speak in detail. It was one long rhapsody, and rhapsodies are apt to be a little tiresome to those other than the rhapsodists. Everybody has known such hours for themselves – or if they have not they are unfortunate. They breakfasted frugally – there is a delicious intimacy in breakfast no other meal knows, and then decided on Staten Island. Half an hour later they were voyaging down the bay, and in an hour were in the woods.

Corinna was inexorable on the question of eleven o'clock, and to Evan it seemed as if they had no sooner got there than they had to turn back again. Evan got sore, and the pleasure of the return journey was a little dimmed, though there is a kind of sweetness in these little tiffs too. Anybody seeing their eyes on each other, Corinna's as well as Evan's, would have known they were no brother and sister, but they still kept up the fiction.

As they neared home she said: "Do you mind if I go in alone?"

"Are you ashamed to be seen with me?" demanded Evan scowling.

"Silly! Didn't I propose this trip? The reason is very simple. Your ridiculous landlady looks on every man in the house as her property. I don't want to excite her ill-will, that's all."

Evan could not deny the truth of this characterisation of Carmen. "Go on ahead," he said. "I'll hang around in the Park for a while. See you to-night."

She stopped, and gave him an inscrutable look. "Oh, I'm sorry, I shan't be home to-night."

With this the ugly head of Corinna's mystery popped up again. It had been tormenting Evan all morning, but with a lover's pride he would not question her, and she volunteered no information.

"Oh!" said Evan flatly, and waited for her to say more.

But she seemed not to be aware that anything more was required and his brow darkened. "If it was me," he thought, "how eager I would be to explain what was taking me away from her, but she is mum!"

"Come to-morrow night," she said.

He bowed stiffly.

She hesitated a moment as if about to explain, then thought better of it, and hurried away, leaving Evan inwardly fuming.

He plumped down on a bench across the square from 45A, and thrusting his hands deep in his pockets, stretched out his legs and scowled at the pavement. A "platonic friendship" had no charms for him then. "I'm a fool!" he said to himself. "Her brother!" – a bitter note of laughter escaped him, "when I'm out of my mind with wanting her! What a fool I was to stand for it! She's just playing the regular girl's game – no blame to her of course, it's their instinct to keep a man at arm's length as long as they can. It pleases them to have us on the grill. And I fell for it! I'm on my way to make a precious fool of myself. If I can't find out where she's going to-night, I'll be clean off my nut before morning. But I wouldn't ask her! And if she's going out with another man – ! Lord! which is worse, to know or not to know?"

When he let himself in the door of 45A, Miss Sisson, according to her custom, poked her head out into the hall to see who it was. She came out.

"Oh, Mr. Weir," she said importantly, "where have you been?"

"Out," said Evan stiffly.

She was too much excited to perceive the snub. "There's been a man here for you half a dozen times I guess."

"What did he want?"

"I don't know. Says it's most important."

"Who was he?"

"Wouldn't give his name. Acted most mysterious."

"What sort of looking man?"

"A young fellow about your age, but scarcely a friend of yours I should say. A mean-like face."

This meant nothing to Evan. He looked blank.

"The last time he was here he said he'd wait," Miss Sisson went on, "but I said there was no place inside, because I didn't like his looks, so he said he'd wait in the Square and – "

The sound of the door-bell interrupted her.

"Here he is now!"

Evan opened the door and discovered Alfred, the Deaves' second man, on the step. Alfred smiled insinuatingly, but with a difference from their first meeting, more warily. Miss Sisson pressed forward to hear what he had to say.

"Can I see you a moment?" he said to Evan meaningly.

Evan looked at Miss Sisson, who forthwith retired with a chagrined flirt of her skirts.

"They sent me for you," said Alfred.

Evan's eyebrows went up. "What do they want?" he asked coolly.

"Search me!" said Alfred shrugging. "They're in a way about something."

"Anything new?"

"Uh-huh. Hilton says they got another letter from the blackmailers."

Evan being human, could not but feel certain stirrings of curiosity. "Very well, I'll come with you," he said.

They left a furiously unsatisfied Miss Sisson behind them.

Evan and Alfred rode up-town together on the bus. Alfred was no less silky and insinuating than in the beginning, but whereas at first he had been genuinely candid, he now only made believe to be.

"He's been warned off me," thought Evan.

The conversation on Alfred's side consisted of a subtle attempt to elicit from Evan what had happened the day before, and on Evan's side a determination to balk his curiosity without appearing to be aware of what he was after.

The Deaveses, father and son, were in the library. Before he was well inside the room the latter flung out at him:

"Where have you been all morning?"

Evan instantly felt his collar tighten. His jaw stuck out. "I don't know as that is anybody's business but my own," he said.

They both opened up on him then. Evan could not make out what it was all about. But his conscience was easy. He could afford to smile at the racket. Finally George Deaves got the floor.

"Will you or will you not describe your movements this morning?" he demanded.

"I will not," said Evan coolly.

"What did I tell you? What did I tell you?" burst out the old man. "Send for the police!"

Evan's temper had already been put to a strain that morning. It gave way now. "Yes, send for the police!" he cried. "I'm sick of these silly accusations. I owe you nothing, neither of you. My life is as open as a book. I make a few dollars a week by honest work, and that's every cent I possess in the world. Satisfy yourselves of that, and then let me alone!"

"Papa, be quiet!" said George Deaves severely. "I will handle this." To Evan he said soothingly: "There's no need for you to excite yourself. I've no intention of sending for the police – yet."

"Well, if you don't, I will!" said Evan. "I'll tell them the whole story and insist on an investigation!"

George Deaves wilted at the threat of publicity. Evan, in the midst of his anger thought: "Lord, if I were guilty this is exactly the way I would talk! How easy it would be to bluff them!"

George Deaves said: "I hope you won't do anything so foolish as that."

"Well, it's a bit too much to be dragged all the way up-town just to listen to a re-hash of yesterday's row," said Evan.

"The situation is entirely changed," said George Deaves mysteriously.

"Well, I don't know anything about that!"

Deaves shoved a letter across his desk towards Evan. Evan read:

"Mrs. George Deaves:

Dear Madam:

I beg to return herewith the $5,000 in marked bills that your husband left for us yesterday. We are too old birds to be caught with such chaff. The story, a copy of which I sent Mr. Deaves yesterday, goes to the Clarion at eleven A.M. to-day for publication in this evening's edition. If you wish to stop it you must persuade Mr. Deaves to find a similar sum in clean straight money before that hour. These bills must be put in an envelope and addressed to Mr. Carlton Hassell at the Barbizon Club, Fifth avenue near Ninth street. Your messenger must simply hand it in at the door and leave. If there is any departure from these instructions the money will not be touched, and the story goes through.

With best wishes,

Yours most sincerely,

THE IKUNAHKATSI."

"Good Heavens!" cried Evan amazed. "Do you mean to say the money was returned?"

George Deaves nodded.

"And addressed to your wife? What a colossal nerve! What have you done? You haven't sent fresh bills?"

Another nod answered him, a somewhat sheepish nod.

"Maud made him," snarled the old man. "Insisted on taking the money down herself and sent it in by the chauffeur."

"But you've communicated with Mr. Hassell?"

"Do you know him?" demanded George Deaves sharply.

"Why of course, as everybody knows him. The most famous landscape painter in America – or at least the most popular. His pictures bring thousands!"

"What good to communicate with him?" said Deaves sullenly. "I might better have him arrested."

"But don't you see," urged Evan, "Hassell couldn't have had anything to do with this, not with the money he makes and his reputation? Not unless he were crazy, and he's the sanest of men! It's as clear as day. They're just using his name. Easy enough for somebody else to get the letter at the club."

"Is this a trick?" muttered George Deaves scowling.

Evan laughed in exasperation. "Why sure! if you want it that way. It's nothing to me one way or the other." He turned to go.

"Wait a minute," said Deaves. "Why wouldn't it be better to call up the club?"

Evan shook his head. "A man's club is his castle. Club servants are always instructed not to give out information, particularly not over the telephone. Telephone Hassell. You should have telephoned him before sending the money. Or better still go to him. It's his interest to get to the bottom of this."

"Will you go with me?" asked Deaves stabbing his blotter.

Evan smiled. "A minute ago you implied that I was behind the scheme."

"I might have been mistaken. Anyway, if you had nothing to do with it, you ought to be glad to help me clear the matter up."

"I'll go with you," said Evan, "not because I'll feel any necessity for clearing myself, but because it's the most interesting game I've ever been up against!"

"Interesting!" shrilled the old man indignantly, "Interesting! If you were being bled white, you wouldn't find it so interesting! I'll go too."

"You'll stay right here, Papa," commanded George Deaves. "And don't you go out until I come back! You've brought trouble enough on me!"

"Well, you needn't bite off my head!" grumbled the old man.

The Deaves limousine was available, and a few minutes later George Deaves and Evan were being shown into the reception room of a magnificent studio apartment on Art's most fashionable street. George Deaves was visibly impressed by the magnificence. It was rather an unusual hour to pay a call perhaps, but the Deaves name was an open sesame. A millionaire and a potential picture-buyer! the great man himself came hurrying to greet them. He was a handsome man of middle age with a lion-like head, and the affable, assured manner of a citizen of the world.

He showed them into the studio, a superb room, but severe and workmanlike according to the modern usage. Before they were well-seated, an attendant, knowing his duty well, began to pull out canvases.

"I – I didn't come to talk to you about pictures," stammered George Deaves.

At a sign from his master the man left the room. Mr. Hassell waited politely to be enlightened.

Poor George Deaves floundered about. "It's such a delicate matter – I'm sure I don't know what you will think – I scarcely know how to tell you – "

Hassell began to look alarmed. He said: "Mr. Deaves, I beg you will be plain with me."

Deaves turned hopelessly to Evan. "You tell him."

"Better show him the letter," said Evan.

"The letter?" said Deaves in a panic, "what letter? I don't understand you."

"We came to tell him," said Evan. "We've either got to tell him or go."

Deaves wiped his face. "Mr. Hassell, I hope I can rely on your discretion. You will receive what I am about to tell you in absolute confidence?"

"My dear sir," returned the painter a little testily, "you come to me in this state of agitation about I don't know what. Whatever it is, I hope I will comport myself like a man of honour!"

George Deaves handed over the letter in a hand that trembled. Hassell's face was a study as he read it.

"This is blackmail!" he cried. "And in my name!"

"That's why we came to you," said Deaves – a little unnecessarily it might be thought.

"You surely don't suspect – "

"Certainly not," said Evan quickly – there was no knowing what break Deaves might have made. "But you can help us."

"Of course! This letter names eleven o'clock as the hour." Hassell glanced at his watch. "It's nearly twelve now. Why didn't you come to me earlier – or phone?"

"Well, I didn't know – it didn't occur to me," began Deaves, and stopped with an appealing glance at Evan.

Evan said bluntly: "Mr. Deaves was not acquainted with your name and your work until I told him."

The great painter looked a little astonished at such ignorance. "Has the money been sent to the club?" he asked.

Deaves nodded shamefacedly.

Mr. Hassell immediately got busy. "I'll taxi down there at once. I rarely use the Barbizon club nowadays. Haven't been there in a month."

"Shall we go with you?" asked Deaves.

"No. They may have spies posted who would see you even if you remained in the cab. If you'll be good enough to wait here, I'll be back inside half an hour."

Even in his bustle he did not neglect business. As soon as he had gone the servant appeared again, and began to show his pictures. Deaves goggled at them indifferently, but Evan was keenly interested. He studied them with the mixture of scorn and envy that is characteristic of the attitude of poor young artists towards rich old ones.