The tomb of Ts'in
Then curiosity got the better of him.
“I suppose you’re aching to tell me,” he said ungraciously. “How was
it?”
“It happened in the West End,” said the valet. “A man was writing a
note with a fountain-pen in the vestibule of one of the cafés. He
happened to shake it, and some drops fell on the gentleman’s shirt.
The gentleman who did it was very sorry and wiped it off with his own
silk handkerchief, but my master lost a bundle of notes from the
inside pocket of his coat whilst the wiping process was going on.”
As he proceeded, De Costa’s face was a study. He realised now how the
paper came to be lost.
So Tillizinni had the paper, and had, too, evidence as to his
complicity in the Embassy robbery! But had he? Nobody would be able to
identify the documents which were stolen. It had been stated so at the
inquest.
No, there would be no evidence to convict the respectable Raymond de
Costa in that, or he would have been arrested by now. Besides, he was
a known antiquarian and a collector of Chinese objects, art, and
literature. There would be every excuse for his being in possession of
such a thing. He had the transcription, and the document had no value
now save to the antiquarian.
He must act at once.
CHAPTER XIII.
CAPTAIN TALHAM PROPOSES.
Talham had proposed to Yvonne Yale. It had followed many meetings,
many calls at the house in Upper Curzon Street, many lengthy orations
on the future of applied mechanics delivered to Mrs. Yale, who took
what might be termed a shareholder’s interest in such matters, and the
end of it was that Talham, after a sleepless night, called upon the
Yales at five o’clock in the morning.
This statement is made in all seriousness, because it is true. At this
outrageous hour Captain Talham, a tall, handsome figure of a man,
tanned and debonair, knocked at the door of the Yale ménage.
He had knocked half a dozen times before the shuffling of slippered
feet told him that his efforts had succeeded. A sleepy servant
admitted him, albeit reluctantly. She asked him to stand in the hall
while she went to arouse her mistress.
“Remember,” said Talham, solemnly, “that it is only Miss Yvonne that I
wish to see.”
The servant came down again in her wrapper and led him to the
drawing-room.
Talham, with deplorable familiarity, pulled the blinds up.
In five minutes the girl came in. She wore a long kimono of dark blue,
edged with Russian embroidery, and she had hidden the glory of her
hair under a boudoir cap.
She looked singularly beautiful--he had never seen her more so.
She was worried, too. Naturally, she could only interpret this
unexpected call into a recurrence of the perils which she had already
experienced.
“I have called to see you, Miss Yale,” said Talham, gravely, “on a
most important matter.” She nodded and waited.
“Last night, or, rather, in the early hours of this morning, I had an
interview with a Mr. de Costa,” said Talham.
He went on to give particulars of that interview. She seemed more than
ordinarily interested. It was rather as though she were eager for all
he could tell her. The light of sympathy was in her eyes. She sat on
one of those hard, straight-backed chairs which are to be found in
London drawing-rooms, and are designed to discourage lengthy visits,
her hands clasping her crossed knees, as step by step, concealing
nothing, exaggerating nothing, omitting nothing--except, perhaps, his
own foresight and resourcefulness--Talham took her through the act of
his “just piracy,” as he described it. He went on to tell the full
story of the Emperor’s tomb. When he had finished, there was a pause.
Then she said gently:
“I understand, Captain Talham, and I appreciate your confidence. I am
glad you have told me, because Mr. de Costa himself sent me a version
last night which was not as complimentary to yourself as you have made
it.” She frowned a little as at some unpleasant memory. De Costa had
threatened her--she did not tell him this. Now, in a panic, she
realised that the information for which the old man had asked and
which she had not at the moment possessed, was now hers!
“Why, oh why, have you come?” she asked.
“You are entitled to know that,” said Talham. “I must hurry forward
all my arrangements and go back to China. I cannot go back until I
know one thing. I cannot wait a day,” he said, vehemently, “with one
doubt in my mind. Miss Yale----”
He leant forward, his hands tightly clasped, his face tense and drawn,
a new Talham, and a Talham she had never seen before--the strong,
clean soul of the man shone in his face.
“I want a partner,” he said. “I want--you!”
He jerked the last word.
She rose slowly, and looked down at him still in the same attitude in
which he had made his plea--and a look of pity and something else came
over her face.
“I am sorry, Captain Talham,” she said in a low voice. “I cannot
agree, though I recognise how great an honour you have done me.”
He got up and drew a long breath.
“You cannot agree,” he repeated.
She did not trust herself to speak, but shook her head slowly.
Then a pause--one of those seemingly interminable pauses so trying to
the nerves. Neither of the two spoke. Talham’s eyes were on the floor;
hers, filled with pity, were on his face. It seemed that five minutes
passed like this, though, as a matter of fact, the period was less.
Then Talham said, “Oh!”
That was all he said. It was not an “Oh” of pain, or an “Oh” of
surprise, or “Oh” of indifference; it was just “Oh!”
When Talham left the house that memorable morning to return to the
hotel after his fantastic and fruitless quest, Yvonne Yale sat for
quite a long time in the little drawing-room.
It was not an apartment which shone in the merciless grey light of
early morning. At such an hour you saw the mark of the cleaner’s
vacuum-brush--the discolourations where an amateur varnisher had
endeavoured to renovate the chipped chairs--the thinness of the carpet
here and there, and, most appalling of all, the blatant artificiality
of the “Gloire de Dijon” roses which Mrs. Yale had brought back from
Ostend with her the previous year.
Yvonne had taken a seat by the window and was sitting on it sideways,
one arm thrown across the back and the other twisting and untwisting a
piece of loose embroidery upon her kimono.
She was thankful, at that moment, that her mother was a heavy sleeper
and had not been aroused by the summons.
Yvonne Yale hoped that she was a dutiful daughter. There were times
when she came perilously near being glad that she was not. This was a
moment when the presence of her mother would have sent her to her
room.
It was good to be here alone, in the silence and in the sweet light of
the early day, to think this problem over--for Talham had become a
problem.
A fortnight ago, she would have dismissed his proposal with a
laugh--and found relief in the sight of his disappearing back.
But now, this tall, brown man, with his obvious sincerity, his
interminable speeches, his earnestness, which verged upon pomposity,
had taken a place with her.
He filled a niche no other man had occupied, could occupy, to do
Talham justice, for Nature does not create duplicates of his quality.
Exactly where was that niche? This speculation puzzled her. If she
could have answered that question after long deliberation and
self-analysis, the problem was a problem no longer.
Where did he stand? At that moment of time she had no feeling of love,
as young people understand love, no quickening of the pulse at his
approach, no blotting out of her soul’s sun at his departure--no
gnawing ache or unsatisfied voidance of soul at his continued absence.
Indeed, she had none of the conventional symptoms, and might be
excused the belief that, so far as love was concerned, there was no
bond between Talham and her.
And yet----
She walked to the French windows and, opening them, stepped out on to
the little stone balcony. She looked up and down the street; there was
nobody in sight; it would be little short of a social crime for any of
the inhabitants of Upper Curzon Street to be seen abroad at that hour,
save in evening dress.
Insensibly, she found herself looking long, and a little wistfully, in
the direction which she knew Talham must have taken.
He was something more to her than a friend, though he was not even a
friend in the accepted sense. The confidences, which mark the growth
of friendship, had been all one-sided. It had been Talham who had
talked--be sure of that. She had listened excellently.
Talham’s passion was an inspiration, a thing born of a momentary
glance--love at first sight, though the term is hateful.
To fulfil the requirements of the ideal, those two souls should have
leapt together to light, as two chemical elements dormant apart, will,
on impact, forsake their independent properties and mingle riotously
in the creation of a newer element.
But Talham had done all the leaping. The girl had been but the passive
agent, a screen to reflect his brilliancy--Talham was a dazzling
searchlight that played on Yvonne Yale. She, herself, produced no
increase in the power of illumination.
It was absurd to say that she was cold. All women are cold--just as
all men are liars. In a dark room a diamond is undistinguishable from
half a brick. People who, when groping in the gloom of ignorance, in a
vain search for the furnace, which they felt must burn within the
heart of the girl, not infrequently came up against the refrigerating
plant, and retired in disorder, composing wicked little epigrams.
She stood for a long time on the balcony--then returned to the room.
The servant, who had admitted her, still waited resentfully. Her name
was Martha Ann, and she had in her colourless composition no romance.
Her hour for rising was seven, and she had risen at five. That was
all.
“Do you want me, miss?” she asked, with offensive patience.
Yvonne shook her head, and the girl went off.
“I don’t suppose I shall get to sleep now,” she said bitterly. “A nice
time in the morning for a gentleman to call.”
She said many other things, but was careful to wait until her voice
was only represented to the girl below by a succession of
incomprehensible sounds, the tenor of which might be grasped from the
fact that each sentence ended on a high note.
When Martha came down at the conventional hour she found her young
mistress fully dressed, moreover, dressed for the street.
“I am going to Covent Garden to buy some flowers, Martha,” said
Yvonne.
Martha tightened her lips and said nothing until she heard the door
close behind the girl.
“What a house!” said Martha, and raised her eyes to the ceiling.
It was a glorious morning. The air was sweet and clean; the flood of
golden sunlight which bathed the green spaces of the city squares and
made ornate avenues of the long orderly streets, was a veritable
elixir of life.
There was a spring even in the hard, asphalt pavement that morning,
and the girl found herself singing quietly to herself as she walked
along.
Covent Garden Market was no great distance from the hotel which housed
Talham. An hour later she was standing in the Strand, her arms filled
with dewy blooms, looking with a thoughtful eye upon the great block
of buildings which constituted the caravanserai.
Breakfast was seldom a pleasant meal in Upper Curzon Street. The
urbanity, the graciousness, and the Foreign Office manner of Mrs. Yale
were never on view at so early an hour. The great hostess of eleven
p.m. became the vinegary housekeeper of nine a.m.
It was as though Nature had reversed her processes, and had evolved
from the overnight butterfly a most business-like grub.
There was a pile of letters by the side of Mrs. Yale’s plate when she