The Marathon Mystery/Part 3/Chapter 3
CHAPTER III
A Crossing of Swords
WHEN Drysdale opened his window next morning, he found the sun shining from a sky unclouded and the air warm with the promise of spring. It called him in a way not to be resisted and he stepped out on the little balcony which ran beneath the window; then he caught the odour of a cigarette, and turned to see Tremaine smiling at him.
“Good-morning!” cried Tremaine. “A beautiful morning, isn’t it? Won’t you join me?”
It was impossible to refuse him; but Drysdale had no thought of refusal—he rather welcomed the opportunity to cross swords with his rival, to test his skill, to find out in how far that air of triumph was justified by the strength behind it. So he took the little cylinder of paper as he returned the greeting, and sat down on the sill of his window.
“But how grey the sea is,” continued Tremaine. “It is not so in the tropics—it is blue—oh, such a blue!”
“You seem to be an early riser,” observed Drysdale, who had thought to find himself the first astir.
“It is a habit one learns at St. Pierre. The dawn is, there, the only pleasant portion of the day—one rises to burn incense to it.”
“You have lived long at St. Pierre?”
“Nearly four years.”
“And before that?”
Drysdale felt the baldness of the question, and knew that he was not proceeding as deftly as he should, that he was fencing clumsily; but opposed to this was a burning desire to know more about this man, to probe into his past. Not by the quiver of a lash did Tremaine indicate that he found the question either strange or unwelcome.
“Ah, I have been a wanderer,” he answered readily, and with apparent frankness. “I have lived in many countries and I have met many people—at Paris, at St. Petersburg, at London, even at Stamboul. And you, Mr. Drysdale?”
There was something subtly ironic in the tone—a shade of veiled contempt—that brought a flush to the other’s face.
“Yes, you have guessed it,” he said; “I’ve lived only in New York.”
The merest flicker of amusement flashed across Tremaine’s lips and they finished their cigarettes in silence. Tremaine’s suavity seemed to have come suddenly to an end. He no longer attempted to disregard the barrier that had arisen between them, or explain away that swift glance of the night before. They went down together to breakfast, presently; but only Delroy joined them there, and it was not an especially pleasant meal, despite the bright sun at the windows and Tremaine’s imperturbable good humour. As they arose from table, that gentleman announced his intention of going for a walk about the grounds, and Drysdale carried Delroy off to the library.
“Now, Dickie,” he began resolutely, as soon as they were seated, “I’m going to quarrel with you. You’re not careful enough of your family. Who is this Tremaine, anyway?”
Delroy regarded the questioner with a long stare of astonishment.
“Why, he’s a mighty pleasant fellow who’s putting through”
“I know all that,” interrupted the other, a little rudely. “But who is he? Where did he come from?”
“He came from St. Pierre”
“Dickie,” said Drysdale impressively, “you’re too easy. You think all men are honest. Have you seen his credentials? Who stands for him?”
Delroy jumped up impatiently.
“See here, Jack,” he demanded, “what is it you’re driving at?”
“I’m trying to point out to you that you’ve taken Tremaine to your bosom a little too hastily,” answered Drysdale bluntly.
Delroy flushed with annoyance.
“Mr. Tremaine,” he said with emphasis, “is one of the most cultured and charming men I ever met. He came to me on a matter of business; I found that we had many tastes in common, and I have enjoyed his society immensely.”
“That’s all right, Dickie. I’ve no objection to your enjoying his society as much as you like. But you oughtn’t to bring him here.”
“Why?” demanded Delroy.
“Because,” answered Drysdale hotly, “he’s making love to Grace. Didn’t you see him last night at the piano, when”
Delroy, who had been listening open-mouthed, burst into a sudden roar of laughter. Drysdale stopped, looked at him, then turned and left the room.
Tremaine seemed to enjoy his walk; at least, he did not return to the house until nearly the hour for luncheon. At that meal, the women joined them, and a drive was planned for the afternoon, which ended at the vesper service at the little chapel at Babylon. For some reason, the drive had not been a success; a certain constraint seemed to have fallen upon the party, a feeling of unrest, of uneasiness, which sent them severally to their rooms as soon as they reached the house.
Drysdale did not proceed to dress immediately. Instead, he sat moodily down and stared out into the darkness. He could see the flare of light which streamed from his neighbour’s windows—what was there about him that repelled while it attracted? What had he meant by that glance of disdain? Drysdale flushed hotly at thought of it. It had been so quick, so elusive, that at the instant he had not caught its full mining, its almost insolent triumph. Triumph? And was there cause for that? Did that explain Grace’s indifference during the drive? Was that why she sat beside him silent, distraught? Was she thinking of Tremaine? Or was she waiting for him before the fire…
He sprang to his feet, switched on the lights, and began hastily to dress.
What instinct was it that told him to set his foot lightly on the stair, or was it only that he hoped to look down upon her for a moment, unseen? The sound of voices reached him, and leaning over, he saw two figures standing before the fire which the evening chill had rendered necessary-Miss Croydon and Tremaine. He started abruptly to descend, when he caught a sentence that made him pause.
“I’m not in the least like that,” Tremaine was saying, and though the voice was carefully repressed, it had in it a ring of savage earnestness. “In your heart you know it, or you wouldn’t stand there listening. I have come to you at once, boldly, because I’m sure that I shall win. He is not worthy of you—in your heart you know that, also. He cannot hold you; he is too weak; I shall wrench you away! You’re not the woman to be tied to a gilded mediocrity. You have fire—ah! I have studied you—you need a larger outlook upon life. You’ve been kept in a cage—you’ve never had a chance to be yourself. Here, you will never have the chance—with me, it would be different. You do not know how different! At Paris, at Vienna, at Rome”
She had been leaning away from him, staring into the fire, as though charmed into silence by this impetuous eloquence. Now, she stood erect and looked at him.
“What you are proposing to me is infamous,” she said, through clenched teeth.
“It is not in the least infamous,” he retorted coolly. “I am offering you the future I know you sigh for. It is a future that I sigh for, too; that I have sighed for from the first moment I saw you, and which I am going to make come true. Together, we will conquer the world. As my wife”
“Your wife?” There was scorn, anger, fear in the words, and in the glance she cast at him.
“Certainly—my wife,” he repeated, with emphasis. “If I should prove to you”
She stopped him by an imperative gesture.
“You go too far,” she said. “There is a limit to what even I will endure. Do not push me too far; do not rely too much upon my forbearance. A man capable of any crime”
He held her by the motion of a finger.
“Is a man who appeals to you,” he concluded. “To be capable of any crime, and yet to commit none, is a virtue”
“To commit none!” she echoed scornfully.
He looked at her without the flicker of a lash.
“To commit none, yes—your own conscience acquits me,” he repeated steadily. “But I would pause at none to gain possession of you. Look at me—do you doubt it?”
She looked at him with a little shiver.
“No,” she said.
“Is there any other man you know who can say as much?”
She wrested her eyes away from his and turned again to the fire.
“You strangely mistake me,” she said in a cold voice. “You are reading your own nature into me. I would ask no man to commit a crime for my sake—I should abhor the man who did.”
He did not answer, but stood looking at her with a gaze which seemed to envelop her, to pierce her through and through. Drysdale felt the perspiration start across his forehead; he wished to cry out, but could not…
A door at the farther end of the hall opened and Delroy came in. The bonds loosened and Drysdale fled back to his room. He needed to compose himself.
Mrs. Delroy did not come down to dinner, pleading a headache, and after the meal was over, Delroy carried Tremaine off to the library for a last talk over the details of the railroad enterprise. They intended going into New York in the morning for an interview with certain capitalists that would be crucial, and they needed to arrange their plan of attack.
Drysdale, left to himself, threw away his cigar and went straightway to seek Grace Croydon. He found her sitting before the fire in the hall, gazing into it, her head in her hands. She did not hear his approach, and for a moment, as he gazed down at her, he doubted whether he had really witnessed that strange interview of an hour before. Had he not rather dreamed it? Was it not merely a wild imagining? He passed his hand before his eyes and dropped into the chair beside her.
She started at the sound, turned, saw him, and smiled. But it was not the smile that had greeted him the night before; it was not from the heart; it did not reveal, it dissembled. He saw the change and trembled as he guessed its meaning. Then he put hesitation behind him.
“Grace,” he said gently, “as I was coming down to dinner tonight, I happened to see you and Tremaine standing here together, and, without intending to, I overheard a sentence which stopped me up there at the turn of the stair.”
She looked at him, her eyes dark with apprehension.
“You mean that you listened?” she asked.
“After that first sentence, it seemed to me that I had a right to listen.”
Her lips were curling in scorn, her eyes were burning through him.
“Oh, a right!”
“Yes, a right,” he repeated boldly. “No man should be permitted to talk to you as he talked. Why, he insulted you, he threatened you-Heaven knows what outrage he was ready to commit. Why did you permit it?”
She turned away from him and her arms dropped wearily by her sides.
“Your proper course is to inform Delroy,” he continued doggedly, braving the certainty of offending her. “Or, better still, I will, and then kick that scoundrel out. I’ve already had one quarrel with Dickie about him.”
“Have you?” she asked listlessly.
“Yes, I distrust him. Why did you permit him to talk to you the way he did?”
“I can’t tell you,” she answered hoarsely.
“But I have a right to know.”
“Yes, I suppose you have. Why not break it off? Then you won’t need to worry about me any more.”
He started from his chair at the words, but controlled himself and sat down again.
“Do you mean that you want to break it off?” he demanded, in a quivering voice. “Do you mean that you can possibly care for that”
She turned upon him with blazing eyes.
“Do you insult me, too?”
For an instant he sat motionless as stone; then he fell at her knees and caught her hands and covered them with kisses.
“Forgive me!” he cried. “Forgive me! It was unworthy. But, oh, Grace, give me a word—just a word—tell me”
“Listen,” she said, bending over him, instantly moved, instantly tender; “you told me last night that you trusted me.”
“I do with my whole soul.”
“And Kate the Queen needs you, as she said she would. Only I must have time to think; to straighten out the tangle. Tomorrow I will tell you—to-morrow night-till then”
He seized her and drew her down to him and kissed her on the lips.
“I’ve never doubted you,” he said. “And I’ll fight the battle of my life before I give you up.”
At the farther end of the hall, a door closed very, very softly.