One Wonderful Night: A Romance of New York
Schmidt looked up at the ceiling as though his eyes might discern a
trap-door. "Is Mr. Curtis there now?"
"No, sir."
"Where is he?"
"He went out with a Mr. Devar."
"Oh! Do you know where he went to?"
Krantz was tempted to prevaricate, but Schmidt was a power in the
Central Hotel.
"I believe, sir, he is at the Plaza."
"A large hotel, near Central Park, is it not?" demanded the Earl
eagerly.
"My lord, pardon me." The lawyer was no believer in letting all the
world into your secrets, and the clerk's manner showed that he was far
from well posted in certain elements of the affair.
Valletort was for rushing forthwith off in a taxi to the Plaza; but
Schmidt vetoed the notion. He shared the Earl's conviction that
Hermione would be discovered there, but, before meeting her, he wanted
to obtain a great many particulars the lack of which in his client's
earlier story his legal acumen had already scented.
So he drew the impatient nobleman into a quiet corner of the
restaurant, and extracted from his unwilling lips certain details as to
Count Vassilan and the marriage project which had not been forthcoming
before.
Krantz seized the opportunity to call up Steingall on the telephone and
told him something, not all, of what had occurred. He did not say that
the Earl and Schmidt had actually seen de Courtois, and suppressed any
mention of his disclosure with reference to Curtis's whereabouts, not
that he wished to mislead the detective willfully, but he felt that he
had been indiscreet, and there was no need to proclaim the fact.
Moreover, he had never heard Hermione's name mentioned, or he was
gallant enough to have risked any trouble next day if a lady would be
saved distress thereby.
Schmidt's lawyer-like caution was destined to have far-reaching effects
on the night's history. It provided one of the minor rills of a
torrent which was gaining irresistible momentum, and would submerge
many people before its uncontrolled madness was exhausted. Had he
yielded to the Earl, and hurried to the Plaza at once, he would have
met Curtis and Steingall there, and those two men might have diverted
the bursting current of events into a new channel. But, naturally
enough, he wanted to understand precisely where he stood. In a word,
the egg was excellent in its constituents, but lacked the exuberant
freshness of the newly-laid article.
Hence, while the Earl nearly choked with indignation at sight of that
entry in the visitors' book at the Plaza--"Mr. and Lady Hermione
Curtis, Pekin,"--mistress and maid were once more discussing the
astounding things which had taken place since the moment when John
Delancy Curtis rang the bell at Flat 10 in Number 1000 59th Street.
"If only I knew how to act for the best!" wailed Hermione half
tearfully. "I am afraid, Marcelle, I have been too egotistical, too
much concerned about myself, I mean, and far too regardless of others.
I have allowed Mr. Curtis to place himself in a dreadful position----"
"I'm sure, miladi, he doesn't think so," interrupted Marcelle
breathlessly.
"That is the worst feature of it, to my thinking. He is making all the
sacrifice."
"What! To get a wife like you, miladi!"
"I am _not_ his wife."
"Well, you are not married like folk who go away for a honeymoon and
find rice in their clothes every day for a week, but Mr. Curtis says,
miladi, that you are his wife right enough in the eyes of the law, and
I'm sure he admires you immensely already, so there's no telling----"
"Marcelle, do you imagine for one single instant that I would really
marry any man who took me as a favor, who conferred an obligation on
me, who came to my assistance in a moment of despair?"
"No, miladi, not if he thought those things. But I have a sort of
notion that Mr. Curtis would hurt any other man who suggested any of
them, and it is easy to see by the very way he looks at you----"
"Oh, have pity, and don't harp on that string! I can be nothing to
him. You mistake his kindness for something which is so utterly
impossible that it almost drives me to hysteria to hear it even spoken
of."
Marcelle knew better. In some recess of her own acute mind she felt
that Lady Hermione's heightened color and shining eyes were due to just
that wild and irresponsible conceit which they were debating. Indeed,
Hermione could not leave the topic alone. She forbade it, rejected it,
stormed at its folly, yet came back to it like a child held spellbound
by some terrifying yet fascinating object.
The maid was racking her brain for some feminine argument which should
convince an impulsive mistress that Curtis might reasonably regard his
matrimonial entanglement as by no means so incapable of a satisfactory
outcome as his "wife" deemed it, when a knock at the door of the
sitting-room alarmed both.
And, indeed, the ever-present dread which haunted them was justified,
because a page announced "The Earl of Valletort and Mr. Otto Schmidt,"
and before the petrified Marcelle could utter a word of protest, the
two men were in the room.
Marcelle said afterwards that no incident of those tumultuous hours
surprised her more than the way in which Lady Hermione received her
unbidden and unwelcome visitors. The instant before their arrival she
was an irresponsible and doubting and vacillating girl, torn by
emotion, and swayed hither and thither by gusts of perplexity which
ranged from half-formed hope to blank despair, but now she came from
her bedroom without a second's hesitancy, and faced her father and the
lawyer with a proud serenity which obviously disconcerted them, and
quite dumfounded Marcelle.
"Ah! At last!" said the Earl, trying to speak complacently, but
failing rather badly, because his attitude and words were decidedly
melodramatic.
"And too late!" said his daughter, letting her fine eyes dwell on
Schmidt with the contemplative scrutiny she might bestow on an exhibit
in a natural history museum.
"Pardon me, your ladyship, not too late, but just in time, I fancy."
Otto Schmidt met her gaze without flinching, and he was a man who
undoubtedly commanded attention when he spoke. His tone was
deferential but decisive. His black eyes were taking in this charming
and intelligent woman in full measure. Her rare beauty, her unstudied
pose, her slender elegance, the quiet harmonies of her costume--each
and all made their appeal. He even waited for her reply, compelling it
by some subtle transference of the knowledge that he would not endeavor
to browbeat or misunderstand her.
"I have heard your name, but may I ask why you are here?" she said
composedly.
It pleased him to find that he had not erred by underrating her
intelligence.
"A very proper question, Lady Hermione," he said. "I am a lawyer,
fairly well known in New York, and your father has consulted me with
reference to the marriage you have contracted to-night."
"Since, as you say, the marriage has most certainly been contracted,
the statement hardly explains your presence."
He smiled, and Lord Valletort, who had not seen Otto Schmidt smile once
during the past hour, discovered that he had not begun to appraise his
new ally's qualities at their due worth.
"It is a legal habit to state events in their order," he replied
suavely. "But these are matters which we ought to discuss privately."
"No, Marcelle, do not go," said Hermione, hiding her fear under an
assumption of icy indifference, and checking the maid's movement in
response to the lawyer's hint. "Marcelle Leroux is fully in my
confidence," she explained, "and you can say nothing which she may not
listen to."
"I am obliged to your ladyship, but I had to mention her presence,"
said Schmidt. "Well, I am sorry to be the bearer of unpleasant news,
but you were inveigled into a marriage ceremony with John Delancy
Curtis by gross and fraudulent misrepresentation. He told you, I
assume, that Monsieur Jean de Courtois was dead. That is not true.
Monsieur de Courtois is alive, and in his room at the Central Hotel in
27th Street at this moment. He was detained there at the hour you
awaited him--kept there forcibly, by means which must be investigated,
but the really important fact now is that he lives. Need I tell you
what that statement implies? Need I emphasize the lie with which this
man Curtis attained his object? Your father, the Earl, and I myself,
saw Jean de Courtois a few minutes since. Probably, and not without
reason, you doubt my word. If that is so, will you kindly use the
telephone yourself, ring up the Central Hotel, and ask if Monsieur de
Courtois is there? You will hardly imagine that the hotel staff would
enter into a conspiracy with us to deceive you. Again, you might send
for the manager here. He knows me, and will assure you that I am not a
person who would lend himself to subterfuge or falsehood."
"But some man was killed, was he not?"
Hermione's lips had whitened, but her courage was superb, though her
poor heart was like to burst with its frenzied throbbing, for she was
certain this self-possessed man was speaking truly, and, if he were,
her hero with the head of gold had revealed feet of clay.
"Yes, unhappily, a journalist named Hunter."
Schmidt was an artist. He knew when to use few words.
"But Mr. Curtis himself may have been deceived."
"Mr. Curtis was among those who pretended to liberate de Courtois from
his bonds. Your unfortunate friend was brutally tied and gagged in his
room in the hotel, and is now recovering from the effects of the
maltreatment he received."
"Mr. Curtis couldn't have known of this when he was here, little more
than half an hour ago."
"He knew it two hours ago. Not only he, but Mr. Steingall knew it.
Did neither of them tell you?"
In utter despair, broken-hearted now not by reason of her own plight,
but rather because of a shattered faith, Hermione appealed to the Earl.
"Father, is this true?"
"Absolutely true, every syllable. I really think you ought to confirm
Mr. Schmidt's statement by inquiry at the Central Hotel."
"And publish my unhappy story more widely! . . . Will you kindly leave
me now? I must think, and act."
"One word, your ladyship, and I have done," said the lawyer, speaking
with a slow seriousness that could not fail to be convincing. "The
mischief is not irreparable--at present. But you must not remain here.
You are registered in the books of the hotel as the wife of John
Delancy Curtis, and, if I may say it with respect, your own sense of
what is right and proper will forbid the notion that you can abide in
the hotel until to-morrow. I pledge my reputation that it will
immensely facilitate the legal steps necessary to secure the annulment
of the marriage if you dissever yourself from your so-called husband at
the earliest moment after you have discovered his tort."
Hermione was not the type of woman who faints in an emergency, though
gladly now would she have found in unconsciousness a respite from the
bitter pain that was rending her innermost fiber.
"I think--I understand," she said brokenly. "Will you please go?"
"But will you not come with me, Hermione?" said her father. "I give
you my word of honor there will be no recriminations."
"I must be alone--to-night," she cried, flaring into a passionate
vehemence. "Marcelle and I will return to my apartment. You know
where it is. Come there in the morning, at any hour you choose, but go
now, this instant, or I shall refuse to leave the hotel, no matter what
the consequences."
Her voice rose almost to a scream, and Schmidt, a profound student of
human nature, realized that any extra pressure would be fatal. He had
succeeded. This girl would keep her promise, of that he was well