"Everybody arrived yet, Preston?" I asked.
"Not yet, Sir Thomas, so I understand. I and Captain Moore"s man and his lordship"s was havin" a cherry brandy in the housekeeper"s room just now, and the bulk of the house-party will be arriving by the later train, between tea and dinner, Sir Thomas."
"And Mr. Morse?"
"Only just before dinner, Sir Thomas; he always travels in a special train."
I saw by Preston"s face that he considered this a sn.o.bbish and ostentatious thing to do, and, in the case of an ordinary multi-millionaire, I should certainly have agreed with him. But I recalled facts that had come to my notice about the famous Brazilian, and I wondered. There was the astounding scene at the Ritz, for instance, and more than that. I had not been following up Juanita for three months, in town, at Henley, and at Cowes, without noticing that Mr. Gideon Morse seemed to have an un.o.btrusive but quite singular entourage.
More than once, for example, I had caught sight of a certain great hulking man in tweeds, a professional Irish-American bruiser, if ever there was one.
Tea was in the hall of the great house. I was introduced to Sir Walter, a delightful man, with a hooked nose, a tiny mustache, the remains of gray hair, and a charming smile. Lady Stileman also made me most welcome. Her hair was gray, but her figure was slight and upright as a girl"s, and many girls in the County must have envied her dainty prettiness, and the charm of her lazy, musical voice.
Circ.u.mstances paired me off with a vivacious young lady whose face I seemed to know, whose surname I could not catch, but whom every one called "Poppy."
"I say," she said, after her third cup of tea and fourth egg sandwich, "you"re the _Evening Special_, aren"t you?"
I admitted it.
"Well," she said, "I do think you might give me a show now and then.
Considering the press I generally get, I"ve never been quite able to understand why the _Special_ leaves me out of it."
I thought she must be an actress--and yet she hadn"t quite that manner.
At any rate I said:
"I"m awfully sorry, but you see I"m only editor, and I"ve nothing really to do with the dramatic criticism. However, please say the word, and I"ll ginger up my man at once."
"Dramatic criticism!" she said, her eyes wide with surprise. "Sir Thomas, can it really be that you don"t know who I am?"
It was a little embarra.s.sing.
"Do you know, I know your face awfully well," I said, "though I"m quite sure we"ve never met before or I should have remembered, and when Lady Stileman introduced us just now all I caught was Poppy."
She sighed--I should put her between nineteen and twenty in age--"Well, for a London editor, you _are_ a fossil, though you don"t look more than about six-and-twenty. Why, Poppy Boynton!"
Then, in a flash, I knew. This was the Hon. Poppy Boynton, Lord Portesham"s daughter, the flying girl, the leading lady aviator, who had looped the loop over Mont Blanc and done all sorts of mad, extraordinary things.
"_Of course_, I know you, Miss Boynton! Only, I never expected to meet you here. What a chance for an editor! Do tell me all your adventures."
"Will you give me a column interview on the front page if I do?"
"Of course I will. I"ll write it myself."
"And a large photograph?"
"Half the back page if you like."
"You"re a dear," she said in a business-like voice. "On second thoughts, I"ll write the interview myself and give it you before we leave here. And, meanwhile, I"ll tell you an extraordinary flight of mine only yesterday."
I was in for it and there was no way out. Still, she was extremely pretty and a celebrity in her way, so I settled myself to listen.
"What did you do yesterday morning?" I asked. "Did you loop the loop over Saint Paul"s or something?"
"Loop the loop!" she replied, with great contempt. "That"s an infantile stunt of the dark ages. No, I went for my usual morning fly before breakfast and saw a marvel, and got cursed by a djinn out of the Arabian Nights."
This sounded fairly promising for a start, but as she went on I jerked like a fish in a basket.
"You know the great wireless towers on Richmond Hill?"
"Of course. The highest erection in the world, isn"t it, more than twice the height of the Eiffel Tower? You can see the things from all parts of London."
"On a clear day," she nodded, "the rest of the time the top is quite hidden by clouds. Now it struck me I"d go and have a look at them close to. Our place, Norman Court, is only about fifteen miles farther up the Thames. I started off in my little gnat-machine and rose to about fifteen hundred feet at once, when I got into a bank of fleecy wet cloud, fortunately not more than a hundred yards or so thick. It was keeping all the sun from London about seven-thirty yesterday morning.
When I came out above, of course I wasn"t sure of my direction, but as I turned the machine a point or so I saw, standing up straight out of the cloud at not more than six miles away, the tops of the towers. I headed straight for them."
She lit a cigarette and I noticed her face changed a little. There was an introspective look in the eyes, a look of memory.
"As I drew near, Sir Thomas, I saw what I think is the most marvelous sight I have _ever_ seen. You people who crawl about on earth never do see what _we_ see. I have flown over Mont Blanc and seen the dawn upon the Matterhorn and Monte Rosa from that height, and I thought that was the most heavenly thing ever seen by mortal eye. But yesterday morning I beat that impression--yes!--right on the outskirts of London and only a few hours ago! Down from below n.o.body can really see much of the towers.
You haven"t seen much, for instance, have you?"
"Only that they"re now all linked together at the top by the most intricate series of girders, on the suspension principle, I suppose.
There are a lot of sheds and things on this artificial s.p.a.ce, or at least it looks like it."
"Sheds and things! Sir Thomas, I thought I saw the New Jerusalem floating on the clouds! The morning sun poured down upon a vast, hanging s.p.a.ce of which you can have no conception, and rising up on every side from snowy-white ramparts were towers and cupolas with gilded roofs which blazed like gold. There were fantastic halls pierced with Oriental windows, walls which glowed like jacinth and amethyst, and parapets of pearl.
"It was a city, a City in the Clouds, a place of enchantment floating high, high up above the smoke and the din of London--serene, majestic, and utterly lovely. I tell you"--here her voice dropped--"the vision caught at my heart, and a great lump came into my throat. I"m pretty hard-bitten, too! As I went past one side of the immense triangle--which must occupy several acres--on which the city is built, I saw an inner courtyard with what seemed like green lawns. I could swear there were trees planted there and that a great fountain was playing like a stream of liquid diamonds.
"I was so startled, and almost frightened, that I ripped away for several miles till, descending a little through the cloud-bank, I found I was right over Tower Bridge.
"But I swore I"d see that majestic city again, and I spiraled up and turned.
"There it was, many miles away now, a mere speck upon the billowing snow of the cloud-bank, and as I raced towards it once more it grew and grew into all its former loveliness. I adjusted my engines and went as slow as I possibly could--perhaps you know that our modern aeroplanes, with the new helicopter central screw, can glide at not much more than fifteen miles an hour, for a short distance that is. Well, that"s what I did, and once more the place burst upon me in all its wonder. It"s the marvel of marvels, Sir Thomas; I haven"t got words even to hint at it. I could see details more clearly now, and I floated by among the ramparts on one side, not a pistol shot away. And then, upon the top of a little flat tower there appeared the most extraordinary figure.
"It was a gigantic yellow-faced man in a long robe and wide sleeves, and he threw his hands above his head and cursed me. Of course the noise of the engine drowned all he said, but his face was simply fiendish. I just caught one flash of it, and I never want to see anything like it again."
I sat spellbound in my chair while she told me this and again the sense that I was being borne along, whither I knew not, by some irresistible current of fate, possessed me to the exclusion of all else.
"Why, you look quite tired and gray, Sir Thomas," said Miss Boynton. "I do hope I haven"t bored you."
"Bored me! I was away up in the air with you, looking upon that enchanted city. But why, what do you make of it, have you told any one?"
"Only father and my sister, who said that it must have been an illusion of the mist, a refraction of the air at high alt.i.tudes that transformed the wireless instrument sheds to fairyland."
She shrugged her shoulders and smiled.
"As if I didn"t know all about that!" she said. "Why, it wasn"t much more than two thousand feet up--a mere hop."
I had to think very rapidly at this juncture. The news took one"s breath away. To begin with, one thing seemed perfectly clear. Gideon Morse had purposely told me as little as he possibly could. Yet, upon reflection, I found that he had told me no lies. He had admitted that he was at the bottom of this colossal enterprise--was it some Earl"s Court of the air, the last word in amus.e.m.e.nt catering? It might well be so, though somehow or other the thought annoyed me. Moreover, the capital outlay must have been so vast that such a scheme could never pay interest upon it. Then I recollected that in a few hours more I should have my promised talk with Morse and he would explain everything as he had promised. There was still a chance of a big scoop for the _Evening Special_.
"Look here, Miss Boynton," I said, "if you keep what you have seen a secret for the next two days, and then let me publish an account of it, my paper would gladly pay two hundred and fifty pounds for the story."