One Wonderful Night: A Romance of New York
way she little imagined. "Will you come in here, and be seated? . . .
Now, please tell me just why you have called, Mr. Curtis."
She had preceded him into a prettily furnished dining-room, and the
notion leaped up in his troubled mind that she was not so deeply moved
by the malfortune of Monsieur Jean de Courtois as might be expected
from the man's prospective bride.
Still, he tried bravely to accommodate himself to conditions which left
his brain in a whirl.
"I had better begin by saying that your marriage cannot take
place--to-night----" he added, flinching from the necessity of bringing
that look of dismay into those charming eyes. "That is why I asked
your maid if there was no other person whom I could take into my
confidence. You see, it is a terribly hard thing to be compelled to
discuss such a matter with one so closely bound up with--with Monsieur
de Courtois."
"But there is no one else. Marcelle and I live here quite alone."
More than ever did Curtis feel uncomfortable, but he had deliberately
elected for this miserable job, and he meant to go through with it.
"So I gathered from Mademoiselle Marcelle herself," he said. "Well,
then, Miss Grandison, I have no option but to inform you, with all the
sympathy any man must feel for a woman in your position, that Monsieur
de Courtois has met with an accident."
"Oh, how terrible! Is he badly hurt?"
"Yes."
"Yet it may be possible for the ceremony to be performed. Monsieur de
Courtois has proved himself such a true friend, he has always been so
anxious to help me, that I am sure he would be glad if I brought the
minister to the hospital, or to his apartments in the hotel if he has
been taken there, and the marriage would be solemnized without causing
him the slightest inconvenience or worry, no matter how ill he may be,
so long as he is conscious."
Curtis thought he had never before heard the English language twisted
into such enigmas as these few simple words presented. It was an
outrage to credit this well-mannered and delightful girl with the
cold-blooded callousness which seemed to reveal itself in every
syllable. That she was blithely unaware of this element in her excited
utterances was shown by her eager face and animated attitude. She had
risen from the chair in which she had seated herself when they entered
the room, and obviously expected him to lose no time in conducting her
to the bedside of Jean de Courtois.
"Pray sit down again, Miss Grandison," said Curtis, and his voice
assumed a sterner, more commanding note, though he, too, stood up, and
approached nearer, lest she might collapse in a faint and fall before
he could save her. "I fear I have blundered woefully in assuming a
role for which I am ill-fitted, but I must make you realize somehow
that your marriage is irrevocably--postponed."
"Why?"
A slight color tinged her cheeks; she was actually becoming annoyed
with him!
"I will tell you when you are seated."
"What nonsense! One can hear as well standing."
Nevertheless, she obeyed. People generally did obey when Curtis spoke
in that insistent manner.
Now he was quite near her, and his tone grew gentle again.
"The accident from which Monsieur de Courtois suffered was fatal," he
said.
She looked at him, wide-eyed, alarmed, but assuredly not with the
soul-sickened terror of a woman who loves when she hears that her lover
is dead.
"Do you mean that he has been killed?" she whispered.
"Yes."
"Oh, poor fellow. I have lost my only friend, and now, indeed, I am
the most wretched girl in all the world."
Flinging her clasped arms on the table, she hid her face in them, and
sobbed as though her heart would break. Curtis placed a hand on her
shoulder, and strove to calm her with such commonplace phrases as his
dazed brain could dictate, but she wept bitterly, just as a child might
weep if disappointed about the non-fulfillment of some object on which
its heart was set.
"It sounds horrid--I know--" she murmured brokenly, "that I
should--seem to be thinking--only of myself. But--Monsieur de
Courtois--was the one man--who could save me. Now--I don't know--what
will become of me. How cruel is fate! If only--we could have been
married yesterday--perhaps this dreadful thing would not have happened."
Curtis, who had never been so mystified in his life, followed up those
last disjointed words as a man lost in a forest might cling to a path
in the certainty that it would lead somewhere. He rejected all else,
since the wild vagaries of events during the past few minutes were
beyond his comprehension. He waited, therefore, until the vehemence of
her grief had somewhat subsided, and then, with another friendly
pressure on her shoulder, he spoke with as much firmness as he thought
the situation demanded.
"Now, Miss Grandison, you must endeavor to regain self-control," he
said. "Monsieur de Courtois has been killed, and your--your friendship
for him--no less than the interests of justice--demand that those
responsible for his death should be discovered and punished."
At that, she raised her head, and lifted her swimming eyes to his, and
Curtis saw that they were blue, not violet, and that their hue changed
as the light irradiated their profound depths.
"He met with no accident, then, but was murdered?" she cried.
"Yes."
"And for my sake?"
"I gather from what you have said that that is possible."
"But what have I said?"
"Well, you seemed to hint that your marriage might have prevented this
crime."
"Why?"
No more exasperating monosyllable can fall from a woman's lips than
that one word "why," and Curtis felt its full force then and there.
"That is what I am asking you," he said, a trifle brusquely.
"But how can I tell you?" she cried.
"I am only striving vainly to pierce the fog which seems to envelop us.
Let me begin again. I, a mere stranger in New York, just three hours
landed from the _Lusitania_, witnessed a murderous attack on a young
man who was alighting from a cab in front of my hotel, the Central, in
West 27th Street. I saw him stabbed so seriously that he died within a
couple of minutes, and his assailants made off in an automobile, the
very vehicle, in fact, in which he arrived. I managed to note its
number, and I gathered, from instructions the victim himself had given,
that the chauffeur's Christian name was Anatole. The two men who
actually committed the murder--though the chauffeur was in league with
them--seemed to me to be Czechs or Hungarians----"
"Ah, I thought so," broke in the girl.
"And now may I ask why you did think so?"
"I may tell you later, perhaps. Please forgive me. I am quite
unnerved, and oh, so unhappy. Why have you come here?"
"That is due to one of those fantastic chances which occur
occasionally. In the effort to save Monsieur de Courtois, or rather to
seize his slayers, because I was too far away to interfere when the
blow was struck, I dropped the overcoat I was carrying. A crowd
gathered, and someone gave me a coat which I took as my own. It was
not until I had quitted the police and doctor, who arrived almost
immediately, and I had gone into Broadway to avoid the clamor in the
hotel, that I discovered I was wearing the dead man's overcoat, and in
one of the pockets I found a marriage license. Here it is. By that
means I learnt your address, and I came here quickly, hoping to save
you some of the agony which the appearance of a policeman or detective
would have caused. Unfortunately, I have proved but a sorry substitute
for an official messenger."
"Oh, no, no, Mr. Curtis. You have been most kind, most considerate.
If anyone is to blame, it is I."
"Will you pardon me, then, if I remind you that time is pressing? Even
a half-hour gained to-night by the authorities may be invaluable. If
you are able to supply any clew, the least hint of motive, the most
shadowy of guesses at a personality behind this beastly crime, you will
be rendering a great service."
"Please, please, give me time to think. I am not heartless--indeed I
am not. . . . If I could do anything to save Monsieur de Courtois'
life I would make the sacrifice--you will believe that, won't
you? . . . But he is dead, you say, and I might blurt out something in
my distress which would cause endless mischief. Perhaps I have thought
too much of my own troubles. Now I must begin to endure for the sake
of others. That is the woman's lot in life, I fear. . . . Have you a
wife or a sister, Mr. Curtis, or is there some woman whom you love?
For her sake, have pity on me, and do not drag me into the horrible
arena of courts and newspapers."
Her pleading, her attitude, her pathetic gestures, gave extraordinary
force to an appeal which, by contrast with her extreme agitation, was
almost grotesquely inconsequent. Curtis was at his wits' end to find
the line of reasoning calculated to convince this beautiful creature
that she might, indeed, begin enduring "for the sake of others" by
expressing her determination to give the police all possible assistance.
"There is no urgency for a few minutes," was the best reply he could
frame on the spur of the moment. "Shall I leave you alone for a little
while? Perhaps you would like to consult your maid? Indeed, her
services might meet all the requirements of the case. The police would
be the first to recognize that a woman who had lost her affianced
husband under such terrible----"
"Ah, but that is the wretched difficulty I am in. Poor Monsieur de
Courtois was nothing to me."
"Nothing to you!"
Probably Curtis's brain did not reel, but it assuredly felt like
reeling, and it is quite certain that his eyes blazed down on the
half-hysterical girl with an intensity that magnetized her into a
broken excuse.
"It is--quite--true," she stammered, with the diffidence of a child
explaining some lapse which, it was hoped, might not be regarded as a
real fault. "I never dreamed of marriage--in the sense--that people
mean--when they intend to live happily together. . . . Monsieur de
Courtois was to be my husband--only in name. I--I paid him for
that. . . . I--I gave him a thousand dollars--and--and---- Don't look
at me in that way or I shall scream! . . . I have done nothing
wrong. . . . I was trying to protect myself. . . . Oh, if you are a
man you will want to help me, rather than push me into the living tomb
which threatens to engulf me before to-morrow morning!"
Even in their agitation, they both heard the jar of a bell. The girl
sprang upright. There was something splendid in her courage, in the
way she threw back her proud head and clenched her tiny hands.
"Ah me!" she sighed. "Perhaps it is already too late!"
CHAPTER III
EIGHT-THIRTY
They stood in silence, listening to the footsteps of Marcelle on the
parquet floor of the passage. The outer door was opened, and a murmur
of voices reached them indistinctly.
"I have had the honor of knowing you not much longer than ten minutes,
Miss Grandison," said Curtis, and the strong, vibrant note in his voice
might well have won any woman's confidence, "but if you feel that you
can trust me, and my help is of value, please command me, that is, if
your enemies are men."
She rewarded him with one swift look of gratitude.
"If it is my father, both you and I are powerless," she whispered.
"And the other would not dare come without him."
A discreet tap on the door heralded Marcelle. That sprightly young
person, despite her Parisian name, was unquestionably American in every
inch of her self-possessed neatness; she smiled at Curtis while giving
him a message.
"The driver of your taxi has sent up the hall-porter to ask if you wish
him to wait any longer," she said.