Читать книгу The Light Beyond - E. Phillips Oppenheim - Страница 8

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Mrs. Widdowes possessed most of the qualities desirable in the wife of a popular Ambassador, combined with a singular and entirely individual charm. She was inclined to be fussy about details, however, and Mark was not sorry when his half-an-hour’s conversation with her before dinner was at an end.

“What about to-night’s party?” he enquired.

“Quite informal,” she answered. “There are only three interesting people. One is Baron Machiowinscki, the Polish banker. He came to see us several times in New York.”

“I have heard of him,” Mark acknowledged. “They say that he lost everything during the War, and has made another fortune since.”

Mrs. Widdowes indulged in a significant grimace.

“I know very little about any of these people,” she confessed, “and though I suppose it’s silly nowadays, I’m not very fond of entertaining foreigners all the time. The really interesting people who are coming to-night, however, are Felix Dukane and his daughter.”

“Felix Dukane and his daughter—dining here to-night!” Mark repeated breathlessly.

“They are coming quite informally,” Mrs. Widdowes confided. “We haven’t even exchanged calls or anything. George has been asked from home to try to get some information from Mr. Dukane and thought the simplest way was to invite him to dine.”

“Shall I be seated anywhere near the daughter?” Mark enquired.

Mrs. Widdowes glanced at the list which lay upon the table.

“Opposite. We are so small a party that we have only one married woman, so Miss Dukane has to sit on George’s left. You don’t know her by any chance, do you?”

“I met her at luncheon-time.”

“I have never even seen her,” Mrs. Widdowes admitted. “Is she attractive?”

“I should say so!” Mark replied, with restrained, but obvious enthusiasm.

Mrs. Widdowes glanced once more at the list.

“Sorry I can’t put you on her other side, Mark,” she observed. “It doesn’t work out, though. It is one of the penalties of being something like an inmate of the household, as you will discover, that you have sometimes to make yourself agreeable to the dull people. However, you’ll have a chance to talk to her afterwards. We must go down now....”

In the drawing-room, Mark, as he talked on unimportant matters with Brownlow, was conscious of a sense of excited anticipation which almost bewildered him. His mind was filled once more with vivid impressions of the girl who had taken so unexpectedly a wonderful place in his life and thoughts. He pictured her as he had seen her for the first time, entering the restaurant, and recalled the curious thrill which had struck a new note amongst his emotions, which had kept him almost spell-bound during their brief interview. Then he remembered the mute tenseness of her expression as she had turned round from the low driving seat of her automobile in the Mall, and half invited, half ordered him to take his place by her side; and afterwards the breathless seconds in that strange sitting-room, with the fog growing denser outside and the sense of tragedy within. To-night, in a few months—any moment—he would see her under entirely different conditions. He found his mind dwelling with singular persistence upon trifles—what coloured dress she would wear, how she would arrange her hair. Yet when she at last came into the room, followed by her father, he noticed none of these things. He knew later that she was wearing black, that her pearls were marvellous, that her hair lent itself naturally to the mode of the day. In those first few seconds of her coming, however, he could only realise with poignant disappointment that the very gracious smile with which she greeted the other people presented to her faded almost entirely from her lips as their eyes met.

“Mr. Van Stratton, you know, I believe,” her hostess concluded.

“We met at luncheon to-day, didn’t we?” was the indifferent assent.

Mark murmured something conventional, and immediately afterwards dinner was announced. He took in Myra, the somewhat youthful daughter of the house, who had been his protégée since childhood, and did his best to listen to her rather voluble chatter. All the time he was puzzled, even distressed. The fascinating little smile which in conversation so seldom left Estelle’s lips, was absent if by chance she looked across the table. Her eyes met his once, and remained unmagnetic and aloof. Once he ventured to address her, but her reply was monosyllabic. A few places from him Felix Dukane sat by his hostess’s side, taciturn, almost morose, as he talked in a somewhat stilted fashion of subjects which he obviously found uninteresting. One of the other guests, conveniently placed for intercourse with him, was a great English banker with an historic name, but all his attempts to discuss even indirectly the great problems of finance were absolutely unsuccessful. Dukane was living up to his reputation; a hard, impenetrable person, without the desire or the capacity for social amenities. He was everything that might have been expected, perhaps, but the more Mark considered his daughter’s manner, the more puzzled he became. At least, she might have vouchsafed him one little kindly glance of understanding, even if she preferred to ignore everything else. On the contrary, when the women left the room she avoided his eyes with a persistence which sent him back to his place disheartened and depressed.

The after-dinner interval was fortunately short. Felix Dukane drank no wine and refused to smoke. In a few minutes his host rose to his feet.

“Mr. Dukane and I are going into the study,” he announced. “You will perhaps join us, Baron, and you, Mark, if you like, can come along, too. You want to be off, I know, Brownlow. Mark can do anything necessary.”

“If you wouldn’t mind excusing me, sir,” Brownlow assented. “Mrs. Widdowes was anxious that I should take Myra on to the dance at Apley House.”

Crossing the hall, Mark did his best to detach Dukane for a moment from the others, but absolutely failed. There seemed to be some understanding between father and daughter to utterly ignore the happening of the afternoon. Mark relapsed into gloomy and silent resentment. At his Chief’s request he passed round the cigarettes and cigars which were set out upon the sideboard and, helping himself to a liqueur brandy, took a seat at a writing-table in the background, in case he should be required.

Mr. Widdowes, with a facility which amounted almost to genius, threw off the mantle of the ambassador and became a private American citizen, as he stretched himself out in his easy-chair and puffed contentedly at his cigar.

“It’s very good of you to have come along this evening, Mr. Dukane,” he said. “I couldn’t help thinking that a few minutes’ friendly chat between us at the present juncture of affairs might save a whole lot of misunderstanding in the future.”

There was no response in Dukane’s manner to the geniality of his host. He had refused an easy-chair, and was seated without any measure of relaxation at the table in the middle of the room. He had declined both cigars and liqueurs, and his coffee remained as yet untasted.

“I could scarcely refuse a conference with the representative of a Country which numbers amongst its citizens so many of my friends and competitors,” he commented dryly.

Mr. Widdowes frowned.

“But my dear Mr. Dukane,” he pointed out, “I want to make it quite clear to you—I hoped that my little invitation had already done so—that, for the purposes of our conversation, I am entirely an unofficial person. I have no Government instructions of any sort. I simply wanted a friendly chat as regards certain of your activities in Drome.”

“You wish to speak to me, I take it, then, unofficially,” Felix Dukane observed. “Why?”

“Don’t you see,” the Ambassador explained, “that a frank and friendly conversation may clear away certain misunderstandings which if they were allowed to develop might necessitate official action?”

Dukane almost smiled; at any rate, his lips parted, although any impression of humour was entirely lacking.

“What official action,” he enquired, “could you ever take with regard to me? I am a private individual. I doubt whether anyone knows for certain of what Country I am a citizen. The Government—especially the Government of a great Country like the United States of America—can scarcely make use of the weapons of international diplomacy against an individual.”

“The situation is unique, I grant you,” Mr. Widdowes assented, good-humouredly, “but you must remember that you are a very exceptional individual, Mr. Dukane. You appear to have set yourself to acquire the whole of the assets of a Country where considerable American interests exist. One hears of millions of acres of fertile country, of mines, and a whole province of oil producing land, passing into your possession. A dozen times within the last few months, American citizens have been denied an option on various territories in this Country. The strongest representations to the court of Andropulo, by our representative there have failed to evoke anything but evasive replies. What does it all mean, Mr. Dukane? Are you aiming at taking your place amongst the royalties or dictators of Europe, by right of purchase? If so, you’ll have to set up a court, you know, and invite foreign representatives. Other people have an interest in Drome. You can’t treat a whole kingdom like a country estate.”

“Isn’t my money,” Felix Dukane enquired, “as good as the money of these American citizens you speak of? Why shouldn’t the Government of Drome—if they prefer it—do business with me instead of with your Country people? I don’t buy on behalf of your competitors, I don’t buy to increase the wealth of any other European Country. I buy for my own hand, and I buy where and what I choose. If the mines of Drome are in the market, and please me, I buy. If her wheat lands seem to me a good investment, I buy. Is your Country going to war with me because I get ahead of her citizens?”

The Ambassador, still unruffled, knocked the ash from his cigar. Dukane rose to his feet.

“Mr. Widdowes,” he went on, “I came here at your invitation, and I listened to what you had to say. I need no information from Machiowinscki. I may not possess an army or a navy or an air force, but I have my own secret service. I could tell you of that meeting of bankers in New York who sent a representative to Washington, which resulted in this—unofficial—invitation of yours. I could tell Machiowinscki a few things about the visit of certain American exploiters to his capital, and their influence upon his presence here. I will content myself by saying that I do not work in the dark because I work alone in life. It is my glory and my pride to do so. Such success as I achieve, I achieve alone. If ever I fall—and I feel indeed, a Daniel,” he concluded, with that ghost of a smile, “when I think of the Goliath you, Mr. Widdowes, unofficially represent—I fall alone.... May I be permitted to pay my respects to Mrs. Widdowes? I am an early man, and I am convinced that any further discussion on this subject would be futile.”

Mr. Widdowes rose at once to his feet, and accompanied his guest courteously towards the door.

“I am sorry I can’t make any impression upon you, Mr. Dukane,” he regretted. “I am not talking about Washington, but our people on the other side as a whole would have much appreciated a plain statement from you as regards your intentions. You have the right, of course, to keep your own counsel.”

“As you do yours when it suits you,” was the somewhat gruff rejoinder....

The drawing-room was unexpectedly empty when the three men reached it. Mrs. Widdowes looked up from her writing-desk.

“Your daughter has gone on to the ball at Apley House with Myra and Mr. Brownlow, Mr. Dukane,” she announced. “I was to tell you that she would only stay an hour, and Mr. Brownlow will see her to your hotel.”

Felix Dukane received the news without any sign of interest. Mark frowned gloomily. His hostess smiled at him.

“Why don’t you go on there for an hour, Mark?” she suggested. “You’re an official member of the household now, and we’re all invited if by any chance you didn’t have a card of your own.”

“Why, I’d like to,” Mark assented eagerly, “if you’re sure it would be all right.”

There was a brief interchange of farewells. Afterwards Mark followed Dukane out into the hall, waited whilst he took his overcoat and hat from a servant and stood upon the steps with him.

“I have something to tell you, sir,” he confided, under his breath. “Will you drop me at Apley House? It’s only a short distance.”

“You didn’t fail, I hope?” Dukane asked anxiously.

“It wasn’t that,” Mark replied, his voice a little unsteady with the import of the news so long repressed. “The fellow wasn’t dead.”

If the announcement was any relief to Felix Dukane he certainly showed no signs of it. He stood for a moment perfectly still, drawing on his gloves and frowning gloomily. Then he motioned his companion to enter the car which had just drawn up.

“When did you find that out?” he demanded.

“Just as I was leaving him,” Mark explained. “I got him out to Richmond Park all right, propped him up against a tree in a lonely place, and was just starting in my car to drive away when he called after me.”

“You had to go back, of course?” Dukane enquired bitterly.

“Why sure!” Mark answered. “I couldn’t leave him there to die.”

“Rubbish!” Dukane scoffed. “I told you what sort of a creature he was. What did you do with him then?”

“Well, I thought of a hospital,” Mark confided, “but then I realised that there might be too many questions asked, so I took him back to my house. He has a doctor and a nurse, and is being well looked after there. They seem to think that he will be all right in a week or so. I’d have told you all this before, but I couldn’t get a word either with you or your daughter. I telephoned from Curzon Street, but your people would give me no information as to your whereabouts.”

Felix Dukane scowled out into the darkness. He had the air of a man confronted with an ugly problem.

“My hand weakens with the years,” he muttered. “If I had the chance again I would strike harder.”

Mark felt a sudden impulse of revulsion against his companion. He had expected relief, and found nothing but a ferocious disappointment.

“Is there anything more you wish me to do in the matter?” he asked, as the car stopped before the great porticoed front of Apley House.

“Keep him where he is if you can, until I have made up my mind,” Dukane enjoined. “If you could prevent his communicating with anyone so much the better.”

“I’ll do my best,” Mark assented, a little dubiously, “but it’s difficult in one’s own house, and the man is still very ill.”

“Difficult!” Felix Dukane repeated angrily. “You don’t know what this means, what that man stands for. He is a venomous creature, a professional spy and blackmailer, but if he chooses, if he says the right word to the right person, he can set all Europe ablaze. Where is your house?”

“20b, Curzon Street,” Mark replied.

Dukane nodded and turned away. Mark felt himself dismissed, and stepped out of the limousine, the door of which a footman was holding open. A moment or two later he was ascending the broad stairs of Apley House.