Persons Unknown
CHAPTER VII
HERRICK HAS A BUSIEST DAY
There was a time coming when Herrick was to salute as prophetic what henow noted with a grim amusement; that from the moment the shadow sprangupon the blind the current of his life was changed. Peopled, busy,adventurous, it had passed, as one might say, into active circulation.He was suddenly in the center of the stage.
This was brought home to him rather sharply when Deutch had been notfive minutes gone. On the exit of that gentleman Herrick's first thoughthad been for Miss Hope's photograph. Although an actress seems less awoman than a type, yet, since, to any stray gossip, she was recognizableas a real person, she mustn't, at this critical time, be left hanging onhis wall to excite comment. He had scarcely laid the photograph on hisdesk to compare it with a cut in one of the newspapers when informationthat he was "wanted on the 'phone" made him drop the paper atop of hisdethroned Heroine and hurry into the hall. And the place to which thetelephone invited him was the Ingham publishing house.
The message was from old Gideon Corey, the prop and counselor of theHouse of Ingham, father and son. It told Herrick that Ingham senior hadjust arrived in New York and had not yet gone to an hotel; he had turnedinstinctively to his office, where he besought Herrick, whose name hehad recognized, to come to him and tell him what there was to tell. Itwas only the piteous human longing to be brought nearer, by some detail,by some vision later than our own, to those to whom we shall never benear again. Herrick flinched from the task, but there could be noquestion of his obedience; and he came out from that interview humbly,softened by the gentleness of such a grief. It seemed to him that he hadnever seen so tender a dignity of reserve; that beautiful old gentlemanwho had wished to question him had also wished to spare him; wished,too,--and taken the loyalest precautions--to spare some one else.
"I don't know if you are aware, Mr. Herrick," Ingham's father had saidto him, "that my son was engaged to be married?"
"I had just heard--"
"Then you will understand how especially painful it is that there shouldbe any mention of a--another lady--Miss Hope is a sweet girl," said theold gentleman, "a sweet, good girl--" He paused, as if he were feelingfor words delicate enough for what he had to say; and then a littlebreath that was like a cry broke from him. "My son was a wild boy, Mr.Herrick, but he loved her--he loved her! Will it be necessary to add toher grief by telling her that, at the very last, he was entertaining--?I wanted her for my daughter! May she not keep even the memory of myson?"
Herrick could have groaned aloud. "Only tell me," he said, "what can Ido?"
"Mr. Ingham means to ask"--Corey interposed--"whether, at the--theinquest, it will be necessary to lay so much emphasis on that shadow youobserved?"
Thus, for the second time that day, from what different mouths and underwhat different circumstances, came the same request! And there passedover Herrick that little shiver of the skin which takes place, thecountry people tell you, when some one steps over your grave.
"Could you not assume that you might have been mistaken? That it mighthave been a man's shadow--?"
"I was not mistaken--Why, look here!" he continued, eagerly. "Can't yousee that it would be the worst kind of a mistake for me to change now?They'd think I'd heard who the woman was, and was trying to shield her!And, besides," he added to Corey, "it's your only clue." It occurred tohim, as he spoke, that Ingham's family might be concerned for hisreputation rather than for vengeance; this continued to seem probableeven while they assured him that it was not the police, but Miss Hopealone, from whom they wished to keep the circumstance; they werethinking of what would have been the dead man's dearest wish. What sheread in the papers they could perhaps deny; but what she heard at theinquest--
When, however, they reluctantly agreed with him that it was too late forany effectual reticence it was with unabated kindliness that Corey wentwith him into the hall. "We remain infinitely obliged to you, Mr.Herrick, and--later on--we mustn't lose track of you again--Well,good-morning! Good-morning!"
It was nearly afternoon and Herrick stepped out from the dark,old-fashioned elevator into its sunny heat, which occasional spatteringshowers had vainly tried to dissipate, with a very highly charged senseof moving among vivid personalities. Concerning two of these therepersisted a certain lack of reassurance, and as that of Inghambrightened or darkened the shadow herself now shone as a tigressdevouring, now an avenging angel. Sometimes her figure stood outclearly, by itself; sometimes it wavered and changed, and passed,whether Herrick willed it or not, into the figure of Christina Hope.Then, whether for Deutch's or Ingham's sake, or for Evadne's, there wassomething oppressive in the sunshine.
But the young fellow was not enough of a hypocrite to pretend, even tohimself, that all this excitement, all this acquaintance with swiftevents, with salient people under the influence of strong emotion, allthis quick, warm, and strong feeling which had been aroused in himself,were anything but very welcome. Nor were his adventures over yet. Hiswalk brought him, with a thoughtful forehead but all in a breathing glowof interest, to City Hall Park; a spot where he had loitered that summera score of times, wearying vaguely for a friendly face. To-day, hisbrisk step had scarcely carried him within its boundaries before heheard his name called and, turning, was accosted by a _Record_acquaintance of six years ago whose recognition displayed the utmosteagerness.
The spirit of New York City, which had hitherto considered him merelyone of her returned failures, had now made up her mind to show what shecould do for such a darling as the near-eye-witness of a murder. Hefound himself hailed into the office of the _Record_, whence they hadbeen madly telephoning him this long while, and immediatelycommissioned, at the price of a high, temporary specialist, to reportthe Ingham inquest, and to write a Sunday special of the murder!
He thought of Ingham's father, and "It isn't a tasty job!" he said tohis old chief. But it swept upon him what material it was; it felt, inhis empty hand, like the key of success; and then, there is always inour ears at such a time the whisper that it will certainly be done bysomebody. "And never, surely," Herrick wrote his sister that night, "sochastely, so justly, with either such dash or such discretion, as by ourelegant selves!"
This, at least, was the view which the Ingham office took of it. Coreyreported the family as glad to leave it in Herrick's hands; while atremor at once of regret, pleasure and superstition pricked overHerrick's nerves as Corey followed up this statement with an invitationthrough the _Record_ phone to meet him at the Pilgrims' Club and talksome things over during lunch!
"To shake the iron hand of Fate" was becoming so much the rule thatHerrick was nearly capable of feeling gripped by it even in the somewhatremote circumstances that the Pilgrims' had been founded as a club ofactors and, overrun as it was by men of all professions and particularlyliterary men, it had remained essentially a club of actors--while he,Bryce Herrick, hastening toward it through a smart shower, had at firstconceived of his novel as a play and then, in Switzerland, been baffledby the inaccessibility of that world! His novel, of whom the heroine hadbeen so unwittingly Christina Hope!--However, the low, wide portals ofthe Pilgrims' received him under their great, wrought iron lanternswithout excitement and he passed, self-consciously and with a certainshyness, into the cooling twilight of a hallway still perfectly calm andover the lustrous, glinting sweeps of easy and quite indifferent stairsup to an "apartment brown and booklined" that looked out on a greenpark.
At one of the windows Corey stood talking to a dark, heavy, vigorous manwhose face was familiar to Herrick and whom Corey introduced as RobertWheeler. It was a name of note but Herrick bewilderedly exclaimed "MissHope's manager?" Two or three men turned to Wheeler and grinned and he,himself, said with a gruff chuckle, yes, he supposed it had come tothat, already! Herrick's embarrassed tactlessness sought refuge inlooking out of doors.
The famous square had kept its ancient privacy secure from all thecity's noise and hurry. It was still, secluded; self-sufficient with anold-world grace; and the
green park shone fresh after the shower, itsflower beds and the window boxes of its grave, dark houses gave out adelicate, glimmering sparkle along with their moist and newly piercingsweetness. Nothing could have been more tranquil except the cool spaces,the dusky, sunny, airy, oak-hued shadows of the wide-windowedclub--neither could anything have been less like Mrs. Grubey's or evenProfessor Herrick's idea of what an actors' club would be. The wholeplace seemed to rebuke its visitor, more graciously than had HermannDeutch, for the feverish suggestion which Christina's calling had hintedround her name. The blithe young gentlemen in light clothes, fussingover with cigarette smoke and real and unreal English accents, the oldermen, less saddled and bridled and fit for the fray but still withsomething at once lazy and boyish in the quick sensibility of theirfaces, appeared to have no very lurid intensities up their sleeve andamid so much serene and humorous assurance Ingham senior's "sweet, goodgirl," Hermann Deutch's "Miss Christina" seemed better founded in kindand credible probabilities. She bloomed, indeed, hedged with allproprieties in the sound of Wheeler's voice saying, "But must Miss Hopeappear at the inquest?"
"Yes," said Corey, tartly, "since her name will add to its notoriety!Have you forgotten our coroner?" Wheeler lifted his thick brows inannoyance and with the same sourness of inflection Corey added, "Is itpossible any corner of the universe can for a moment forget Cuyler TenEuyck!"
Herrick started and looked at the two men with quick eagerness. "Youdon't mean--"
"Precisely! The mighty in high places--Peter Winthrop Brewster CuylerTen Euyck! No less!"
Wheeler broke into a curse and then into his deep laugh, and said MissHope's manager would do well to clear out before any Sherlock Holmeswith wings got to throwing his mouth around here. "I can stand hisalways bringing down a curtain with 'Seventy times a millionaire--theworld is at my feet!' A man has to believe in something! But it's histaking himself for a tin District-Attorney-on-wheels that'll get hispoor jaw broken one of these days!"
Herrick's curiosity was roused to certain reminiscences and he went onputting them together even while he followed Corey downstairs and outonto an open gallery whose tables overlooked a little garden. As soonas the waiter left them he asked Corey, "But--I've been so longaway--this coroner can't be the same Ten Euyck--"
"Can you think there are two?"
Well, the world is certainly full of entertainment! A man born to one ofthe proudest names and greatest fortunes of his time serving ascoroner--coroner! That was what certain references of McGarrigle'smeant, certain newspaper flippancies. "Mr. Ten Euyck!" Herrick's extremeyouth had witnessed the historic thrill that shook society when the fullsignificance of the great creature's visiting-cards first burst upon astartled and ingenuous nation! But even then Mr. Ten Euyck must haveaspired beyond social thrills and seen himself as a man of parts andpublic conscience. It was not so much later that Herrick remembered himas a literary dabbler, an amateur statesman, endeavoring by means ofelegant Ciceronics to waken his class to its duty as leader of thepeople! He had then seemed merely a solemn ass who, having learnedduring a long residence abroad an aristocratic notion of government,took his caste and its duties much too seriously.--"But why coroner?"
Despair, apparently, over that caste's lack of seriousness! There hadbeen talk of abolishing the coronership, Corey said, and Ten Euyck hadrun for it. If irresponsible idlers dared to slight even the presidencyin their choice of careers let them see what could be done with theleast considerable of offices! If younger sons dared lessen class-powerby neglecting government, let them see to what Mr. Ten Euyck couldcondescend in the public service! It was an old-fashioned, an old-worldambition; the man, essentially stiff-necked, essentially egotistical,was in no sense a reformer. "He pushes his office, upon my word, to thediversion of the whole town; holding court, if you please, as if he werelaunching a thunderbolt, making speeches and denunciations, and takinghimself for a kind of District Attorney.--I may as well say, Mr.Herrick, that it's a black bitterness to me that that pretentious puppyshould have authority in--in dealing with Mr. James. There was neveranything cordial between them; in fact, quite the contrary. We refused abook of his once!"
"But, great heavens,--"
"It was a book of plays, Mr. Herrick; blank verse and Romansoldiery--with orations! I don't deny Mr. James's letter was a triflesaucy; he was often not conciliating; no, not conciliating! Well, now,it's Ten Euyck's turn. If he can soil Mr. James's memory in Miss Hope'seyes, why, that will be just to his taste, believe me. Now I come tothink of it, I believe Miss Hope herself is rather in his black books!It seems to me she once took part in one of the plays, and it failed. Itell you all this, Mr. Herrick, because James Ingham had the highestadmiration for you, and had great pleasure in the hope of bringing outyour novel."
Herrick gaped at him in an astonishment which had not so much as becomearticulate before--such is our mortal frailty--his slight, but hithertopersistent, repulsion from the dead man was shaken to its foundation andmoldered in dust away.
"Yes, when we are ourselves again, you must bring in that manuscript.Yes, yes, he wished it! They were almost the last words I had from him.He was very pleased to get your letter, very pleased. He was talkingabout it to Stanley, his young brother, and to me; we were all thereyesterday--think of it, Mr. Herrick, yesterday!--working out his ideasfor our new Weekly. He was always an enthusiast, a keen enthusiast, andthe Weekly was his latest enthusiasm. Its politics would have been verydifferent from Mr. Ten Euyck's--"
A friendly visage at another table favored them with a sidelongcontortion and a warning wink. Just behind them a shrewd voice ceasedabruptly and a metallic tone responded, "Yes, but you--you're a man witha mania!"
The first voice replied, "Well, you're down on criminals and I'm down oncrime."
Then Ten Euyck's was again lifted. "You're out after a criminal whom youthink corrupting and to wipe him out you'll pass by fifty of theplainest personal guilt! In my view nobody but the corruptible iscorrupted. Any person who commits a crime belongs in the criminalclass."
"Crime may end in the criminal class," the other voice took up thechallenge, "but it begins at home. You can't always pounce upon thedecayed core. But if you observe a very little speck on a healthysurface, one of two things--either you can cut it away and save theapple, or your tunneling will lead you farther and farther in, it willopen wider and wider and the speck will vanish, automatically, becausethe whole rotten fruit will fall open in your hand."
"Delightful, when it does! But in this short life I prefer the pounce!"
By this time everybody was harkening and Herrick ventured to turn hischair and look round. He beheld a sallow man, nearer forty than thirtyand as tall as himself or taller, but of a straighter and stifferheight; with a long head, a long handsome nose and chin, long hands andlong ears. This elongated countenance was not without contradictions.Under the sparse, squarely cut mustache Herrick was surprised to findthe lips a little pouting, and the glossily black eyes were prominentand full. Fastidiously as he was dressed there persisted somethingfunereal in the effect; forward of each ear a shadow of clipped whiskerleant him the dignity of a daguerreotype. He spoke neatly, distinctly.His excellent, strong voice was dry, cold and inflexible. On the wholeHerrick's easy and contemptuous amusement received a slight set-back.
"I prefer the pounce!" To be pounced upon by that bony intensity mightnot be amusing at all!
Then he discovered what had changed his point of view: it had shifted atrifle toward the criminal's! All very well for Ten Euyck'sguest--Herrick had somehow gathered that the other man was a guest--togive up the argument, indifferently refusing to play up to his host! Allvery well for the free-hearted lunchers to sit, diverted, gettingoratorical pointers from the monologue into which Ten Euyck had plunged!It was neither the lunchers nor the guest, but Herrick who must,to-morrow morning, appear as a witness before Ten Euyck! He would haveto tell the man something which the Inghams had asked him not to tellbecause it might prove prejudicial to James Ingham--his admirer--w
hichHermann Deutch had asked him not to tell because it might proveprejudicial to Christina Hope--she whose face had been his heart'scompanion through hard and lonely times! The idea of the inquest hadbecome exceedingly disagreeable to Herrick.
And the more he listened to Ten Euyck, the more disagreeable it became;the more he felt that a derisive audience had underestimated its man.Ten Euyck might take himself too seriously; he might show too small asense of the ridiculous in loudly delivering, at luncheon, a sort ofOration-on-the-Respect-of-Law-in-Great-Cities. But this depended onwhether you considered him as a man or a trap. The real quality in atrap is not a sense of the ridiculous nor a delicate repugnance totaking itself seriously. Its real quality is the ability to catchthings. And, as a trap, Herrick began to feel that Ten Euyck was madefor success.
The new-born criminal actually felt an impulse to warn his unknownaccomplice how trivial gossip had been, how blind the public gaze.Platitudes about law, yes. But, when the orator came to dealing with thelawless, the whole man awoke. Those who broke the rules of the world'sgame and yet struggled not to lose it were to him mere despicableimpertinents whose existence at large was an outrage to self-respectingplayers and for what he despised he found excellent cold thrusts andeven a kind of homely and savage humor. Then, indeed, "it was not bloodwhich ran in his veins, but iced wine." Why, he was right to think ofhimself as a prosecutor--he was born a prosecutor! In unconsciouslyassuming the robes of justice he had simply found himself. To himjustice meant punishment, punishment an ideal vocation for the righteousand life a thing continually coming up before him to be weighed, foundwanting and rebuked. To admonish, to blame, and then--with a spring--tocrush--it is a passion which grows by what it feeds on, so that even TenEuyck's jests had become corrections and the whole creature admirably ofone piece, untorn by conflicting beliefs and inaccessible to reason,provocation, pity or consequences; because illegal actions--ideas, too,daily spreading--must be suppressed at all costs by proper persons andthe patriarchal arrangement of the world rebuilt over the body of arebel.--Of course, as his cowed analyst admitted, with P. W. B. C. TenEuyck on top! Thank heaven the monster had one weak spot! As he jibed ata newspaper cartoon of the coroner's office he displayed fully thesymptom of his disease; a raging fever of egotism. He was one to die ofa laugh and Herrick doubted if he could have survived a losing game.
But when was he likely to lose? Not when, as now, he lifted the bugle ofa universal summons, calling expertly on a primitive instinct. Youraristocrat may be a fool and a bore in your own workshop, but he is thehereditary leader of the chase; his mounted figure convinces you he willrun down the fugitive and in the minds of men the weight of his millionsadd themselves, automatically, to his hand. This huntsman had branchedoff to the importance of motive in murder trials and his audience wasnot smiling, now. It had warmed itself at his cold fire and theexcitement of the hunt was in the air. Ten Euyck always uttered the word"crime" with a gusto that spat it forth, indeed, but richly scrunched;and it was a day on which that word could not but start an electricalcontagion. Nothing definite was said, in Corey's presence; still lesswas a name named--nor was any needed. But a sense of gathering issues,of closing in on some breathless revelation thickened in the heating,thrilling, restive atmosphere till a boy's voice said languidly, "Leadme to the air, Reginald! This is too rich for my blood!" and they alldropped the wet blanket of a shamefaced relief upon the coroner'sinconsiderate eloquence. The quiet guest got suddenly to his feet andbore his host away.
In a tone of tremulous scorn Corey said to Herrick, "He's grown amustache, you see, because Kane wears one!"
"Kane?"
"You've no nose for celebrities! Ten Euyck brought him here to-day topose before him as a literary man and before us as a political lion. Butour coroner's founded himself on Gerrish so long I don't know what'llbecome of him now we've got a District-Attorney who has no particularappetite for the scalps of women!"
Kane! So the District-Attorney was the quiet guest! To Herrick's rousedapprehension Kane might just as well have been brought there to bepresented with any chance mention which might indicate some circumstanceconnected with last night. And he understood too well the allusion toGerrish, a District-Attorney of the past whose successful prosecutionshad made a speciality of women; who had never delegated, who had alwaysprosecuted with especial and eloquent ardor, any case in which thedefendant was a woman, whether notorious or desperate. Herrick couldscarcely restrain a whistle; this did indeed promise a lively inquest!Heaven help the lady of the shadow if this imitation prosecutor shouldnose her out! It was, perhaps, an immoral exclamation. Yet all theafternoon, as Herrick worked on his story for the _Record_, he could notrout his distaste for his own evidence.
Even after his late and imposing lunch he brought himself to a cheap andearly dinner, rather than go back to the Grubey flat. He affected, whenhe found himself downtown, a little Italian table d'hote in theneighborhood of Washington Square; much frequented by foreign laborersand so humble that a plaintive and stocky dog, a couple of peremptorycats, and two or three staggering infants with seraphic eyes and achronic lack of handkerchiefs or garters generally lolled about thebeaten earth of the back yard, where the tables were spread under atent-like sail-cloth. It was all quaint and foreign and easy; and, sofar as might be, it was cool; on occasions, the swarthy _dame decomptoir_ was replaced by a spare, square, gray-haired woman, small andneat and Yankee, whom it greatly diverted Herrick to see at home in suchsurroundings; a little gray parrot, looking exactly like her, climbedand see-sawed about her desk; a vine waved along the fence; the late sunflickered on the clean coarseness of the table-cloths and jeweled them,through the bottles of thin wine, with ruby glories; there was aworthless, poverty-stricken charm about the place, and Herrick satthere, early and alone, smiling to himself with, after all, a certainsense of satisfying busyness and of having come home to life again.
He had little enough wish to return to his close room where hisperplexities would be waiting for him and he lingered after dinner,practicing his one-syllable Italian on Maria Rosa, the little eldestdaughter of the house, who trotted back and forth bearing tall glassesof branching bread-sticks and plates of garnished sausage to where hermother was setting a long table for some fete, and, when the guestsbegan to come, he still waited in his corner, idly watching.
They were all men and all poor, but all lively; there was an almostfeminine sweetness in the gallantry of the Latin effervescence withwhich they passed a loving-cup in some general ceremony. And no womancould have been more beautiful than the tall Sicilian whose gravestateliness, a little stern from the furrowing of brows still touchedwith Saracen blood, faced Herrick from the table's farther end. Herrickeven inquired, as he paid his check, who this imposing creature was andthe Yankee woman replied with unconcern that he was Mr. Gumama, who rana pool-game at the barber's.
It charmed Herrick to combine this name and occupation with the ferventkisses which Mr. Gumama, rising majestically and swooping to the nearerend of the table, implanted, one on each cheek, upon the hero of thefete. All the guests, as each finished the ceremonial draught, followedhis example. None of the rest, however, had Saracen brows, nor long,grim earrings whose fringe swing beneath three stories of gilt squares.The Yankee woman turned contemptuously from "such monkey-shines," butHerrick lingered till the last kiss and as he even then walked homethrough the hot cloudy night it was after nine o'clock before he reachedthere. He had not been in since morning and he was greatly to blame. Forhe had had a caller and the caller was Cuyler Ten Euyck!
The Grubeys were greatly excited by this circumstance and it excitedHerrick, too. The coroner had himself examined Ingham's apartment andthen the conscientious creature had climbed the stairs to Herrick's. Hehad even waited in the hope that his witness might return. All this wasproudly poured forth while Herrick was also asked to examine a rivalpublic interest--a most peculiar prize which the corner saloon-keeper'sson had been awarded at a private school; he had loaned it to JohnnieGrubey for t
wenty-four hours if Johnnie would let him see the revolverwith which Herrick would have shot the murderer last night if themurderer had been there! It was a sort of return in kind; for theschool prize was also a revolver.
It was a very little one and Johnnie insisted that it was solid gold. Onthe handle was a monogram of three capital A's in small bright stones,white, green and red--near them a straggling C had been wantonlyscratched. Johnnie averred that the A's stood for Algebra, Astronomy andArt-Drawing and even had the combination of studies for one prize beenless remarkable Herrick would have suspected that the boy was lying.What he suspected he hardly knew; still less when he discovered thatthis unwontedly sympathetic prize was, after all, a fake. The littlegolden pistol was not a pistol, but a curiously pointless trinket--thecylinder was nothing but a sculptured suggestion; the toy was made allin one piece!--"D'yeh ever see the like?" Mrs. Grubey asked him. And henever had. It was quainter than Mr. Gumama's kisses.
But Herrick's head was full of other things. As he opened his door hegrinned to think of that aristocratic scion waiting in his humblebedroom. Well, it had been a great day! Even if he had lost heart forthat taxi-ride up the river with Evadne! And then from long habit, heglanced at Evadne's empty place.
The picture had left an unfaded spot on the wall-paper. "I suppose Imight add 'And on my heart!'" said Herrick. He lifted the concealingnewspaper. Then he went out and made inquiries. No one but Ten Euyck andMrs. Grubey had been in the room nor had Mrs. Grubey noticed that thepicture had been moved. Now Herrick was certain he had left the likenessunder the newspaper, lying face up. It was still under the newspaper,but face down. He said to himself, with a shrug of annoyance, that thecoroner had made good use of his time.