A Fool and His Money Part 23

The bed moved. The veins stood out on my neck and temples. My face must have been quite purple, and it is a hue that I detest. When I was a very small laddie my mother put me forward to be admired in purple velveteen. The horror of it still lingers.

By means of great straining I got the heavy bed over against the mirror, upsetting the tin bathtub with a crash that under ordinary circ.u.mstances would have made my heart stand still but now only tripled its pumping activities. One of the legs was hopelessly splintered in the drop from the raised platform.

"There," she said, standing off to survey our joint achievement, "we've stopped it up very nicely." She brushed the tips of her fingers daintily. "This afternoon you may fetch up a hammer and some nails and fasten the mirror permanently. Then you can move the bed back to its proper place. Goodness! What a narrow squeak!"

"Madam," said I, my hand on my heart but not through gallantry, "that bed stays where it is. Not all the king's horses nor all the king's men can put it back again."

"Was it so heavy, Mr. Smart?"

I swallowed very hard. A prophetic crick already had planted itself in my back. "Will you forgive me if I submit that you sleep quite a distance from home?" I remarked with justifiable irony. "Why the deuce don't you stay on the upper floors?"

"Because I am mortally afraid," she said, with a little shudder. "You've no idea how lonely, how spooky it is up there at the dead hour of night. I couldn't sleep. After the third night I had my things moved down here, where I could at least feel that there were strong men within--you might say arm's length of me. I'm--I'm shockingly timid."

She smiled; a wavering, pleading little smile that conquered.

"Of course, I don't mind, Countess," I hastened to say. "Only I thought it would be cosier up there with Rosemary and the two maids for company."

She leaned a little closer to me. "We all sleep down here," she said confidentially. "We bring Rosemary's little mattress down every night and put it in the bathtub. It is a very good fit and makes quite a nice cradle for her. Helene and Blake sleep just across the hall and we leave the doors wide open. So, you see, we're not one bit afraid."

I sat down on the edge of the bed and laughed.

"This is delicious," I cried, not without compunction for I was looking directly into her eager, wistful eyes. A shadow crossed them. "I beg your pardon. I--I can't help laughing."

"Pray do not stop laughing on my account," she said icily. "I am used to being laughed at since I left America. They laugh at all of us over here."

"I dare say they laugh at me, confound them," said I, lugubriously.

"They do," said she flatly. Before I could quite recover from this sentient dig, she was ordering me to put the bathtub where it belonged.

This task completed, I looked up. She was standing near the head of the bed, with a revolver in her hand. I stared. "I keep it under my pillow, Mr. Smart," she said nervously. I said nothing, and she replaced it under the pillow, handling the deadly weapon as gingerly as if it were the frailest gla.s.s. "Of course I couldn't hit anything with it, and I know I should scream when it went off, but still--accidents will happen, you know."

"Urn!" said I, judicially. "And so my study is just beyond this mirror, eh? May I enquire how you happen to know that I have my study there?"

"Oh, I peeked in the other day," she said, serene once more.

"The deuce you did!"

"I was quite sure that you were out," she explained. "I opened Ludwig the Red an inch or two, that's all. You are quite cosy in there, aren't you? I envy you the grand old _chaise longe_."

I wavered, but succeeded in subduing the impulse. "It is the only comfortable piece of furniture I have left in my apartments," said I, with convincing candour.

"You poor man," she said, with her rarest smile. "How fortunate you are that I did not remember the chaise longe. You would have been deprived of it, I am quite sure. Of course I couldn't think of robbing you of it now."

"As a matter of fact, I never lie in it," I said, submitting to a once conquered impulse. "If you'd really like to have it, I'll see that it is taken up to your rooms at once."

"Thank you," she said, shaking her head. "It's kind of you, but I am not so selfish as all that, believe me."

"It is--quite in the way, Countess."

"Some one would be sure to miss it if you sent it up now," she said reflectively.

"We'll wait till they're all gone," said I.

She smiled and the bargain was settled without a word from her. You've heard of men being wrapped about little fingers, haven't you? Well, there you are. We returned to the corridor. She closed the door softly, a mockery in view of the clatter I had made in s.h.i.+fting the bed and its impediments.

"We can't be too careful," she said in a whisper. She might have spoken through a megaphone and still been quite safe. We were tramping up the stairs. "Don't you think your guests will consider you rather inhospitable if you stay away from them all morning?"

I stopped short. "By Jove, now that you remind me of it, I promised to take them all out for a spin in the motor boat before luncheon.

Hazzard has had his boat sent down."

She looked positively unhappy. "Oh, how I should love to get out for a spin on the river! I wonder if I'll ever be free to enjoy the things I like most of--"

"Listen!" I whispered suddenly, grasping her arm. "Did you hear footsteps in the--s.h.!.+"

Some one was walking over the stone floor in the lower hall, brisk strides that rang out quite clearly as they drew nearer.

"It is--it is Mr. Pless," she whispered in a panic. "I recognise his tread. As if I could ever forget it! Oh, how I hate him! He--"

"Don't stop here to tell me about it," I cut in sharply. "Make haste!

Get up to your rooms and lock yourself in. I'll--I'll stop him. How the deuce did he get into this side of the--"

"Through the dungeons. There is a pa.s.sage," she, whispered, and then she was gone, flying noiselessly up the narrow stairway.

a.s.suming a nonchalance I certainly did not feel, I descended the stairs.

We met in the broad hallway below. Mr. Pless approached slowly, evidently having checked his speed on hearing my footsteps on the stairs.

"h.e.l.lo," I said agreeably. "How did you get in?"

He surveyed me coolly. "I know the castle from top to bottom, Mr.

Smart. To be perfectly frank with you, I tried the secret panel in your study but found the opposite door blocked. You have no objection, I trust, to my looking over the castle? It is like home to me."

My plan was to detain him in conversation until she had time to secrete herself on the upper floor. Somehow I antic.i.p.ated the banging of a door, and it came a moment later--not loud but very convicting, just the same. He glanced at me curiously.

"Then how _did_ you get in?" I repeated, cringing perceptibly in response to the slam of the distant door.

"By the same means, I daresay, that you employ," said he.

For a moment I was confounded. Then my wits came to the rescue.

"I see. Through the dungeon. You _do_ know the castle well, Mr. Pless."

"It is a cobwebby, unlovely pa.s.sage," said he, brus.h.i.+ng the dirt and cobwebs from his trousers. My own appearance was conspicuously immaculate, but I brushed in unison, just the same.

"Grewsome," said I.

He was regarding me with a curious smile in his eyes, a pleasantly bantering smile that had but one meaning. Casting an eye upwards, he allowed his smile to spread.

"Perhaps you'd rather I didn't disturb Mrs.-- Mrs.--"