Under Cover Part 35

"I'm sure they weren't after me," he returned. "They wouldn't wait in the garden, and even if they are detectives, they wouldn't get the necklace, it's safe--now."

Ethel Cartwright shook her head. "I'm afraid I've got nerves like every other woman," she confessed, "and the evening has been quite eventful enough as it is. I think I prefer to stay here."

She glanced up to see Monty descending the stairs. All this talk of robbery and actual partic.i.p.ation in a scene of violence had induced in Monty the desire for the company of his kind.

"I thought I'd rather be down here," he stated naively.

"All right, old man," Denby said smiling. "Glad to have you. Did you put the pouch where I said?"

"Yes," Monty answered, handing him a key, "and I locked it up," he explained.

"Good!" his friend exclaimed, putting the key in his pocket.

Miss Cartwright yawned daintily. "Excitement seems to make me sleepy,"

she said. "I think I shall go."

"You're not going to leave us yet?" Denby said reproachfully.

"I was up very early," she told him.

"I guess everything is safe now," Monty a.s.sured her.

"Let's hope so," Denby said. "Still, the night isn't half over yet.

Pleasant dreams, Miss Cartwright."

She paused on the half landing and looked down at the two men.

"I'm afraid they won't be quite--that."

Monty crept to the foot of the stairway and made certain she was pa.s.sed out of hearing. "Steve," he said earnestly, "she's gone now to get into your room."

"No, she hasn't," Denby protested, knowing he was lying.

Monty looked at his friend in wonderment. Usually Denby was quick of observation, but now he seemed uncommonly dull.

"Why, she never made a move to leave until she knew I'd put the pouch in the drawer. Then she said she was tired and wanted to go to bed. You must have noticed how she took in everything you said. She's even taken to watching me, too. What makes you so blind, Steve?"

"I'm not blind," Denby said, a trifle irritably. "It happens you are magnifying things, till everything you see is wrong."

"Nonsense," Monty returned bluntly. "If she gets that necklace it's all up with us, and you needn't pretend otherwise."

"Make your mind easy," Denby exclaimed, "she won't get it."

"May I ask what's going to stop her?" Monty inquired, goaded into sarcasm. "Do you think she needs to know the combination of an ordinary lock like that top drawer?"

"The necklace isn't there," Denby said.

Monty looked at him piteously. "For Heaven's sake don't tell me I've got it somewhere on me!"

Denby drew it out of a false pocket under the right lapel of his coat and held the precious string up to the other's view. "That's why," he observed.

"Then everything's all right," Monty cried with unrestrained joy.

"Everything's all wrong," Denby corrected.

"But, Steve," Monty said reproachfully, "the necklace--"

"Oh, d.a.m.n the necklace!" Denby interrupted viciously.

Monty shook his head mournfully. His friend's aberrations were astounding.

"Steve," he said slowly, "you're a fool!"

"I guess I am," the other admitted. "But," he added, snapping his teeth together, "I'm not such a fool as to get caught, Monty, so pull yourself together, something's bound to happen before long."

"That's what I'm afraid of," sighed Monty.

CHAPTER TWELVE

On the way to her room Ethel Cartwright met Michael Harrington, a box of cigars in his hand, coming toward the head of the stairway.

"Whither away?" he demanded.

"To bed," she returned. "The excitement's been too much for me."

"This box," he said, lovingly caressing it, "contains what I think are the best that can be smoked." He opened and showed what seemed to her cigars of a very large size. "I'm going to give the boys one apiece as a reward for bravery." He laughed with glee. "And as Lambart is going to be one of the search party, I'm going to give him one, too. He'll either leave at my temerity in offering him the same kind of weed his employer smokes, or else he'll have it framed."

"A search party?" she said. "What do you mean?"

"We're going to beat the bushes for tramps," he said. "I am directing operations from the balcony outside my room. The general in command," he explained, "never gets on the firing-line in modern warfare."

"Is Mr. Denby going?" she asked.

"No, no," he said. "I can't expect my guests to expose themselves to the risk of being shot. Don't you be alarmed," he said solicitously, "I shall be at hand in case of trouble."

When she reached her room she sat motionless for a few moments on the edge of the bed. Then suddenly, she rose and walked along a corridor and knocked at the door of the room she knew was Alice Harrington's.

"Alice," she said nervously, and there was no doubt in the elder woman's mind that the girl was thoroughly upset, "I'm nervous of sleeping in the room you've given me. Can't I sleep somewhere near people? Let me have that room I had the last time I was here."

"Why, my dear girl, of course, if you want it," Alice said sympathetically. "But it isn't as pretty, and I especially had this bigger room for you. Don't be a silly little girl; you'll be asleep in five minutes. Better still, I'll come and read till you're drowsy."

"Please humor me," the other pleaded. "I'd rather be where, if I scream, someone can hear, and the men are sleeping down there, and one after all does depend on them in emergencies."

"All right," Alice said good-humoredly, "I'll ring for the servants to take your things in."