"Not _too_ late," said the other, mistaking him; "your wife is still ready to meet you half-way, Jack."
"Oh--that? I meant the Algonquin matter--" He checked himself, seeing for the first time in his life contempt distorting Grandcourt"s heavy face.
"Man! Man!" he said thickly, "is there nothing in that letter for you except money offered?"
"What do you mean?"
"I say, is there nothing in that message to you that touches the manhood in you?"
"You don"t know what is in it," said Dysart listlessly. Even Grandcourt"s contempt no longer produced any sensation; he looked at the letter, tore it into long strips, crumpled them and stood up with a physical effort:
"I"m going to burn this. Have you anything else to say?"
"Yes. Good G.o.d, Jack, _don"t_ you care for your wife? _Can"t_ you?"
"No."
"Why?"
"I don"t know." His tone became querulous. "How can a man tell why he becomes indifferent to a woman? I don"t know. I never did know. I can"t explain it. But he does."
Grandcourt stared at him. And suddenly the latent fear that had been torturing him for the last two weeks died out utterly: this man would never need watching to prevent any attempt at self-destruction; this man before him was not of that caste. His self-centred absorption was of a totally different nature.
He said, very red in the face, but with a voice well modulated and even:
"I think I"ve made a good deal of an a.s.s of myself. I think I may safely be cast for that role in future. Most people, including yourself, think I"m fitted for it; and most people, and yourself, are right. And I"ll admit it now by taking the liberty of asking you whom you were with in Baltimore."
"None of your d.a.m.ned business!" said Dysart, wheeling short on him.
"Perhaps not. I did not believe it at the time, but I do now.... And her brother is after you with a gun."
"What do you mean?"
"That you"d better get out of town unless you want an uglier scandal on your hands."
Dysart stood breathing fast and with such effort that his chest moved visibly as the lungs strained under the tension:
"Do you mean to say that drunken whelp suspects anything so--so wildly absurd----"
"Which drunken whelp? There are several in town?"
Dysart glared at him, careless of what he might now believe.
"I take it you mean that little cur, Quest."
"Yes, I happen to mean Quest."
Dysart gave an ugly laugh and turned short on his heel:
"The whole d.a.m.n lot of you make me sick," he said. "So does this club."
A servant held his rain-coat and handed him his hat; he shook his bent shoulders, stifled a cough, and went out into the rain.
In his own home his little old father, carefully be-wigged, painted, cleaned and dressed, came trotting into the lamp-lit living-room fresh from the ministrations of his valet.
"There you are, Jack!--te-he! Oh, yes, there you are, you young dog!--all a-drip with rain for the love o" the ladies, eh, Jack?
Te-he--one"s been here to see you--a little white doll in chinchillas, and scared to death at my civilities--as though she knew the Dysarts--te-he! Oh, yes, the Dysarts, Jack. But it was monstrous imprudent, my son--and a good thing that your wife remains at Lenox so late this season--te-he! A lucky thing, you young dog! And what the devil do you mean by it--eh? What d"ye mean, I say!"
Leering, peering, his painted lips pursed up, the little old man seated himself, gazing with dim, restless eyes at the shadowy blur which represented to him his handsome son--a Dysart all through, elegant, debonair, resistless, and, married or single, fatal to feminine peace of mind. Generations ago Dysarts had been shot very conventionally at ten paces owing to this same debonair resistlessness; Dysarts had slipped into and out of all sorts of unsavoury messes on account of this fatal family failing; some had been neatly winged, some thrust through; some, in a more sordid age, permitted counsel of ability to explain to a jury how guiltless a careless gentleman could be under the most unfortunate and extenuating appearances.
The son stood in his wet clothes, haggard, lined, ghastly in contrast to the startling red of his lips, looking at his smirking father: then he leaned over and touched a bell.
"Who was it who called on Mrs. Dysart?" he asked, as a servant appeared.
"Miss Quest, sir," said the man, accepting the cue with stolid philosophy.
"Did Miss Quest leave any message?"
"Yes, sir: Miss Quest desired _Mrs._ Dysart to telephone her on _Mrs._ Dysart"s return from--the country, sir--it being a matter of very great importance."
"Thank you."
"Thank _you_, sir."
The servant withdrew; the son stood gazing into the hallway. Behind him his father mumbled and muttered and chuckled to himself in his easy-chair by the fire!
"Te-he! They are all alike, the Dysarts--oh, yes, all alike! And now it"s that young dog--Jack!--te-he!--yes, it"s Jack, now! But he"s a good son, my boy Jack; he"s a good son to me and he"s all Dysart, all Dysart; bon chien cha.s.se de race!--te-he! Oui, ma fois!--bon chien cha.s.se de race."
CHAPTER XIX
QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
By the first of January it became plain that there was not very much left of Colonel Mallett"s fortune, less of his business reputation, and even less of his wife"s health. But she was now able to travel, and toward the middle of the month she sailed with Nada and one maid for Naples, leaving her son to gather up and straighten out what little of value still remained in the wreckage of the house of Mallett. What he cared most about was to straighten out his father"s personal reputation; and this was possible only as far as it concerned Colonel Mallett"s individual honesty. But the rehabilitation was accomplished at the expense of his father"s reputation for business intelligence; and New York never really excuses such things.
Not much remained after the amounts due every creditor had been checked up and provided for; and it took practically all Duane had, almost all Nada had, and also the sacrifice of the town house and country villa to properly protect those who had suffered. Part of his mother"s estate remained intact, enough to permit her and her daughter to live by practising those inconsequential economies, the necessity for which fills Europe with about the only sort of Americans cultivated foreigners can tolerate, and for which predatory Europeans have no use whatever.
As for Duane, matters were now in such shape that he found it possible to rent a studio with adjoining bath and bedroom--an installation which, at one time, was more than he expected to be able to afford.
The loss of that luxury, which custom had made a necessity, filled his daily life full of trifling annoyances and surprises which were often unpleasant and sometimes humorous; but the new and arid order of things kept him so busy that he had little time for the apathy, bitterness, or self-commiseration which, in linked sequence, usually follow sudden disaster.
Sooner or later it was inevitable that he must feel more keenly the death of a father who, until in the shadow of impending disaster, had never offered him a very close intimacy. Their relations had been merely warm and pleasant--an easy camaraderie between friends--neither questioned the other"s rights to reticence and privacy. Their mutual silence concerning business pursuits was instinctive; neither father nor son understood the other"s affairs, nor were they interested except in the success of a good comrade.
It was inevitable that, in years to come, the realisation of his loss would become keener and deeper; but now, in the reaction from shock, and in the anxiety and stress and dire necessity for activity, only the surface sorrow was understood--the pity of it, the distressing circ.u.mstances surrounding the death of a good father, a good friend, and a personally upright man.