"Only a couple of days."
The stranger folded himself up another foot or so until his knees were higher than his head, and lit a cigarette.
"The curse of New York," he said, mournfully, "is the way everything changes in it. You can"t take your eyes off it for a minute. The population"s always shifting. It"s like a railway station. You go away for a bit and come back and try to find your old pals, and they"re all gone: Ike"s in Arizona, Mike"s in a sanatorium, Spike"s in jail, and n.o.body seems to know where the rest of them have got to. I came up from the country two days ago, expecting to find the old gang along Broadway the same as ever, and I"m dashed if I"ve been able to put my hands on one of them! Not a single, solitary one of them! And it"s only six months since I was here last."
Lord Dawlish made sympathetic noises.
"Of course," proceeded the other, "the time of year may have something to do with it. Living down in the country you lose count of time, and I forgot that it was July, when people go out of the city. I guess that must be what happened. I used to know all sorts of fellows, actors and fellows like that, and they"re all away somewhere. I tell you," he said, with pathos, "I never knew I could be so infernally lonesome as I have been these last two days. If I had known what a rotten time I was going to have I would never have left Brookport."
"Brookport!"
"It"s a place down on Long Island."
Bill was not by nature a plotter, but the mere fact of travelling under an a.s.sumed name had developed a streak of wariness in him. He checked himself just as he was about to ask his companion if he happened to know a Miss Elizabeth Boyd, who also lived at Brookport. It occurred to him that the question would invite a counter-question as to his own knowledge of Miss Boyd, and he knew that he would not be able to invent a satisfactory answer to that offhand.
"This evening," said the thin young man, resuming his dirge, "I was sweating my brain to try to think of somebody I could hunt up in this ghastly, deserted city. It isn"t so easy, you know, to think of fellows" names and addresses. I can get the names all right, but unless the fellow"s in the telephone-book, I"m done. Well, I was trying to think of some of my pals who might still be around the place, and I remembered Gates. Remembered his address, too, by a miracle. You"re a pal of his, of course?"
"Yes, I knew him in London."
"Oh, I see. And when you came over here he lent you his flat? By the way, I didn"t get your name?"
"My name"s Chalmers."
"Well, as I say, I remembered Gates and came down here to look him up. We used to have a lot of good times together a year ago. And now he"s gone too!"
"Did you want to see him about anything important?"
"Well, it"s important to me. I wanted him to come out to supper. You see, it"s this way: I"m giving supper to-night to a girl who"s in that show at the Forty-ninth Street Theatre, a Miss Leonard, and she insists on bringing a pal. She says the pal is a good sport, which sounds all right-" Bill admitted that it sounded all right. "But it makes the party three. And of all the infernal things a party of three is the ghastliest."
Having delivered himself of this undeniable truth the stranger slid a little farther into his chair and paused. "Look here, what are you doing to-night?" he said.
"I was thinking of going to bed."
"Going to bed!" The stranger"s voice was shocked, as if he had heard blasphemy. "Going to bed at half-past ten in New York! My dear chap, what you want is a bit of supper. Why don"t you come along?"
Amiability was, perhaps, the leading quality of Lord Dawlish"s character. He did not want to have to dress and go out to supper, but there was something almost pleading in the eyes that looked at him between the sharply-pointed knees.
"It"s awfully good of you-" He hesitated.
"Not a bit; I wish you would. You would be a life-saver."
Bill felt that he was in for it. He got up.
"You will?" said the other. "Good boy! You go and get into some clothes and come along. I"m sorry, what did you say your name was?"
"Chalmers."
"Mine"s Boyd-Nutcombe Boyd."
"Boyd!" cried Bill.
Nutty took his astonishment, which was too great to be concealed, as a compliment. He chuckled.
"I thought you would know the name if you were a pal of Gates"s. I expect he"s always talking about me. You see, I was pretty well known in this old place before I had to leave it."
Bill walked down the long pa.s.sage to his bedroom with no trace of the sleepiness which had been weighing on him five minutes before. He was galvanized by a superst.i.tious thrill. It was fate, Elizabeth Boyd"s brother turning up like this and making friendly overtures right on top of that letter from her. This astonishing thing could not have been better arranged if he had planned it himself. From what little he had seen of Nutty he gathered that the latter was not hard to make friends with. It would be a simple task to cultivate his acquaintance. And having done so, he could renew negotiations with Elizabeth. The desire to rid himself of half the legacy had become a fixed idea with Bill. He had the impression that he could not really feel clean again until he had made matters square with his conscience in this respect. He felt that he was probably a fool to take that view of the thing, but that was the way he was built and there was no getting away from it.
This irruption of Nutty Boyd into his life was an omen. It meant that all was not yet over. He was conscious of a mild surprise that he had ever intended to go to bed. He felt now as if he never wanted to go to bed again. He felt exhilarated.
In these days one cannot say that a supper-party is actually given in any one place. Supping in New York has become a peripatetic pastime. The supper-party arranged by Nutty Boyd was scheduled to start at Reigelheimer"s on Forty-second Street, and it was there that the revellers a.s.sembled.
Nutty and Bill had been there a few minutes when Miss Daisy Leonard arrived with her friend. And from that moment Bill was never himself again.
The Good Sport was, so to speak, an outsize in Good Sports. She loomed up behind the small and demure Miss Leonard like a liner towed by a tug. She was big, blonde, skittish, and exuberant; she wore a dress like the sunset of a fine summer evening, and she effervesced with s.p.a.cious good will to all men. She was one of those girls who splash into public places like stones into quiet pools. Her form was large, her eyes were large, her teeth were large, and her voice was large. She overwhelmed Bill. She hit his astounded consciousness like a sh.e.l.l. She gave him a buzzing in the ears. She was not so much a Good Sport as some kind of an explosion.
He was still reeling from the spiritual impact with this female tidal wave when he became aware, as one who, coming out of a swoon, hears voices faintly, that he was being addressed by Miss Leonard. To turn from Miss Leonard"s friend to Miss Leonard herself was like hearing the falling of gentle rain after a thunderstorm. For a moment he revelled in the sense of being soothed; then, as he realized what she was saying, he started violently. Miss Leonard was looking at him curiously.
"I beg your pardon?" said Bill.
"I"m sure I"ve met you before, Mr Chalmers."
"Er-really?"
"But I can"t think where."
"I"m sure," said the Good Sport, languishingly, like a sentimental siege-gun, "that if I had ever met Mr Chalmers before I shouldn"t have forgotten him."
"You"re English, aren"t you?" asked Miss Leonard.
"Yes."
The Good Sport said she was crazy about Englishmen.
"I thought so from your voice."
The Good Sport said that she was crazy about the English accent.
"It must have been in London that I met you. I was in the revue at the Alhambra last year."
"By George, I wish I had seen you!" interjected the infatuated Nutty.
The Good Sport said that she was crazy about London.
"I seem to remember," went on Miss Leonard, "meeting you out at supper. Do you know a man named Delaney in the Coldstream Guards?"
Bill would have liked to deny all knowledge of Delaney, though the latter was one of his best friends, but his natural honesty prevented him.
"I"m sure I met you at a supper he gave at Oddy"s one Friday night. We all went on to Covent Garden. Don"t you remember?"