You talk to him for an hour at a time. There should be nothing in your life which I do not know of, Elizabeth," he continued, his voice suddenly hoa.r.s.e as he leaned towards her. "Can"t you see that there is danger in friendships for you and for me, there is danger in intimacies of any sort? I share the danger; I have a right to share the knowledge.
This young man has no money of his own, I take it. Of what use is he to us?"
"You are too hasty, my dear father," she replied. "Let me a.s.sure you that there is nothing at all mysterious about Mr. Tavernake. The simple truth is that the young man rather attracts me."
The professor gazed at her incredulously.
"Attracts you! He!"
"You have never perfectly understood me, my dear parent," she murmured.
"You have never appreciated that trait in my character, that strange preference, if you like, for the absolutely original. Now in all my life I never met such a young man as this. He wears the clothes and he has the features and speech of just such a person as you have described, but there is a difference."
"A difference, indeed!" the professor interrupted roughly. "What difference, I should like to know?"
She shrugged her shoulders lightly.
"He is stolid without being stupid," she explained. "He is entirely self-centered. I smile at him, and he waits patiently until I have finished to get on with our business. I have said quite nice things to him and he has stared at me without change of expression, absolutely without pleasure or emotion of any sort."
"You are too vain, Elizabeth," her father declared. "You have been spoilt. There are a few people in the world whom even you might fail to charm. No doubt this young man is one of them."
She sighed gently.
"It really does seem," she admitted, "as though you were right, but we shall see. By-the-bye, hadn"t you better go? The five minutes are nearly up."
He came over to her side, his hat and gloves in his hand, prepared for departure.
"Will you tell me, upon your honor, Elizabeth," he begged, "that there is no other reason for your interest? That you are not engaged in any fresh schemes of which I know nothing? Things are bad enough as they are. I cannot sleep, I cannot rest, for thinking of our position. If I thought that you had any fresh plans on hand--"
She flicked the ash from her cigarette and checked him with a little gesture.
"He knows where Beatrice is," she remarked thoughtfully, "and I can"t get him to tell me. There is nothing beyond--absolutely nothing."...
When Tavernake was announced, Elizabeth was still smoking, sitting in an easy-chair and looking into the fire. Something in her att.i.tude, the droop of her head as it rested upon her fingers, reminded him suddenly of Beatrice. He showed no other emotion than a sudden pause in his walk across the room. Even that, however, in a person whose machinelike att.i.tude towards her provoked her resentment, was noticeable.
"Good morning, my friend!" she said pleasantly. "You have brought me the fresh list?"
"Unfortunately, no, madam," Tavernake answered. "I have called simply to announce that I am not able to be of any further a.s.sistance to you in the matter."
She looked at him for a moment without remark.
"Are you serious, Mr. Tavernake?" she asked.
"Yes," he replied. "The fact is I am not in a position to help you. I have left the employ of Messrs. Dowling, Spence & Company."
"Of your own accord?" she inquired quietly.
"No, I was dismissed," he confessed. "I should have been compelled to leave in a very short time, but Mr. Dowling forestalled me."
"Won"t you sit down and tell me about it?" she invited.
He looked her in the eyes, square and unflinching. He was still able to do that!
"It could not possibly interest you," he said.
"And--my sister? You have seen her?"
"I have seen your sister," Tavernake answered, without hesitation.
"You have a message for me?"
"None," he declared.
"She refuses--to be reconciled, then?"
"I am afraid she has no friendly feelings towards you."
"She gave you no reason?"
"No direct reason," he admitted, "but her att.i.tude is--quite uncompromising."
She rose and swept across the floor towards him. With firm but gentle fingers she took his worn bowler hat and mended gloves from his hand.
Her gesture guided him towards a sofa.
"Beatrice has prejudiced you against me," she murmured. "It is not fair.
Please come and sit down--for five minutes," she pleaded. "I want you to tell me why you have quarrelled with that funny little man, Mr.
Dowling."
"But, madam,--" he protested.
"If you refuse, I shall think that my sister has been telling you stories about me," she declared, watching him closely.
Tavernake drew a little away from her but seated himself on the sofa which she had indicated. He took up as much room as possible, and to his relief she did not persist in her first intention, which was obviously to seat herself beside him.
"Your sister has told me nothing about you whatsoever," he said deliberately. "At the same time, she asked me not to give you her address."
"We will talk about that presently," she interrupted. "In the first place, tell me why you have left your place."
"Mr. Dowling discovered," he told her, in a matter-of-fact tone, "that I had been doing some business on my own account. He was quite right to disapprove. I have not been back to the office since he found it out."
"What sort of business?" she asked.
"The business of the firm is to buy property in undeveloped districts and sell it for building estate," he explained. "I have been very successful hitherto in finding sites for their operations. A short time ago, I discovered one so good that I invested all my own savings in buying certain lots, and have an option upon the whole. Mr. Dowling found it out and dismissed me."
"But it seems most unfair," she declared.
"Not at all," he answered. "In Mr. Dowling"s place I should have done the same thing. Every one with his way in life to make must look out for himself. Strictly speaking, what I did was wrong. I wish, however, that I had done it before. One must think of one"s self first."
"And now?" she inquired. "What are you going to do now?"
"I am going to find a capitalist or float a company to buy the rest of the site," he announced. "After that, we must see about building. There is no hurry about that, though. The first thing is to secure the site."