Part 21 (1/2)

Again she laughed. ”Oh, say!” she said. ”What are you anyway? Reporters on the trail of a story? I'm telling you the truth. Why not? As for Ita,--Oh, ho! She put it all over a b.o.o.b, she did. She's ambitious, she is. She was out to find a mut who'd keep her, that was her game. She told us so from the first. We used to watch her trying one after another of the soft ones. But they were wise, they were. But at last some little feller fell for her foreign accent and little sobs. She had a fine tale all ready. Oh, she's clever. She ought to be on the stage playing parts.

Most of us go round to her place in the daytime and have a good time with some of her men friends. I've not been yet. But from what my sister says, I wouldn't be a bit surprised if she gets her man to marry her.

From what she says, he's a sentimental Alick, and, O Gos.h.!.+ won't she lead him some dance!”

At last Graham broke forth, his face white, his eyes blazing and his whole body shaking as though he had ague. ”You're lying!” he shouted.

”Every word you've said's a lie!”

The girl, entirely unoffended at this involuntary outburst, bent forward and looked at Graham with a new gleam of intelligence, amus.e.m.e.nt and curiosity. ”My word, I believe you're Mr. Strabosck. I believe you're the b.o.o.b. Oh, say! come into the light. I guess I must have a look at you.”

Graham got up, stood swaying for a moment as though he had received a blow between the eyes, and staggered across the room and out into the pa.s.sage.

”Now he knows,” said Kenyon. ”Come on, Peter. We shall have our work cut to hold him in. There was blood in his eyes.” Utterly ignoring the girl, Kenyon made for the door, forced his way through new arrivals and found Graham utterly sober, but with his mouth set dangerously, standing in front of the j.a.panese. ”My hat and coat, quick!” he was saying, ”or I'll break the place up.”

”Steady, steady,” said Kenyon. ”We don't want a scene here.”

”Scene be d.a.m.ned. I tell you something's got to break.”

The j.a.panese ducked into the coat-room.

”Where's Peter?” Graham looked back expecting to see his brother's head and shoulders above the crowd. There was no sign of him.

By accident the lime-light which had been suddenly turned on for a new performance fell on Peter as he was marching towards the door of the studio. Instantly he found himself surrounded by half a dozen good-natured men who had all taken a little too much to drink. They, like the other people present, were in Egyptian clothes and obviously glad to see in Peter a healthy normal specimen of humanity.

”Oh, h.e.l.lo, brother, where are you off to?” asked one.

”Out!” said Peter shortly.

”I'll be darned if you are. Come and have a drink!”

”No, thanks, I've other things to do.”

”Oh, rot! Be a sport and stay and help us to stir things up. Come on, now!”

Peter tried to push his way through. ”Please get out of the way,” he said.

But a jovial red-headed fellow got into it. ”You're staying, if I have to make you.”

Something snapped in Peter's brain. Before he could control himself he bent down and picked up the man by the scruff of his neck and the cloth that was wound round his middle and heaved him over the heads of the crowd into a divan, and then hitting out right and left cleared a path to the door, leaving chaos and bleeding noses behind him. Without waiting to get his hat and coat he made a dash for the elevator, caught it just as it was about to descend and went down to the main floor dishevelled and panting.

Out in the street he saw Kenyon trying to put Graham into a taxicab.

Kenyon saw him and called out. ”Come on, or Papowsky will make it hot for us.”

On his way home from a late evening at one of his clubs, Ranken Townsend caught the name Papowsky, whose evil reputation had come to his ears. He threw a quick glance at the men who were leaving her place and saw that one of them was Peter. He drew up and stood in front of the man in whom he thought he had recognized cleanness and excellence and told himself that he was utterly mistaken.

”So this was your precious business engagement,” he said, with icy contempt. ”Well, I don't give my daughter to a man who shares her with women like Papowsky, so you may consider yourself free. Good night.”

And the smile that turned up the corners of Kenyon's mouth had in it the epitome of triumph. All along the line he had won. All along the line.