The Brass Bowl

L >> Louis Joseph Vance >> The Brass Bowl

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He assumed a disarming levity of demeanor, smiling winningly.
"There's only one way," he suggested--not too archly--and extended
his arms.

"Indeed?" She considered him with pardonable dubiety.

Instantly his purpose became as adamant.

"I must carry you. It's the only way."

"Oh, indeed no! I--couldn't impose upon you. I'm--very heavy, you
know--"

"Never mind," firmly insistent. "You can't stay here all night, of
course."

"But are you sure?" (She was yielding!) "I don't like to--"

He shook his head, careful to restrain the twitching corners of
his lips.

"It will take but a moment," he urged gravely. "And I'll be quite
careful."

"Well--" She perceived that, if not right, he was stubborn; and
with a final small gesture of deprecation, weakly surrendered.
"I'm sorry to be such a nuisance," she murmured, rising and
gathering skirts about her.

Maitland stoutly denied the hideous insinuation: "I am only too
glad--"

She balanced herself lightly upon the step. He moved nearer and
assured himself of a firm foothold on the pebbly river-bed. She
sank gracefully into his arms, proving a considerable burden--
weightier, in fact, than he had anticipated. He was somewhat
staggered; it seemed that he embraced countless yards of ruffles
and things ballasted with (at a shrewd guess) lead. He swayed.

Then, recovering his equilibrium, incautiously glanced into her
eyes. And lost it again, completely.

"I was mistaken," he told himself; "daylight will but enhance...."

She held herself considerately still, perhaps wondering why he
made no move. Perhaps otherwise; there is reason to believe that
she may have suspected--being a woman.

At length, "Is there anything I can do," she inquired meekly, "to
make it easier for you?"

"I'm afraid," he replied, attitude apologetic, "that I must ask
you to put your arm around my ne--my shoulders. It would be more
natural."

"Oh."

The monosyllable was heavy with meaning--with any one of a dozen
meanings, in truth. Maitland debated the most obvious. Did she
conceive he had insinuated that it was his habit to ferry armfuls
of attractive femininity over rocky fords by the light of a
midnight moon?

No matter. While he thought it out, she was consenting. Presently
a slender arm was passed round his neck. Having awaited only that,
he began to wade cautiously shorewards. The distance lessened
perceptibly, but he contemplated the decreasing interval without
joy, for all that she was of an appreciable weight. For all
burdens there are compensations.

Unconsciously, inevitably, her head sank toward his shoulder; he
was aware of her breath, fragrant and warm, upon his cheek.... He
stopped abruptly, cold chills running up and down his back; he
gritted his teeth; he shuddered perceptibly.

"What _is_ the matter?" she demanded, deeply concerned, but
at pains not to stir.

Maitland made a strange noise with his tongue behind clenched
teeth. "_Urrrrgh,_" he said distinctly.

She lifted her head, startled; relief followed, intense and
instantaneous.

"I'm sorry," he muttered humbly, face aflame, "but you ... tickled."

"I'm--so--_sorry!_" she gasped, violently agitated. And
laughed a low, almost a silent, little laugh, as with deft fingers
she tucked away the errant lock of hair.

"Ass!" Maitland told himself fiercely, striding forward.

In another moment they were on dry land. The girl slipped from his
arms and faced him, eyes dancing, cheeks crimson, lips a tense,
quivering, scarlet line. He met this with a rueful smile.

"But--thank you--but," she gasped explosively, "it was _so_
funny!"

Wounded dignity melted before her laughter. For a time, there in
the moonlight, under the scornful regard of the disabled
motor-car's twin headlights, these two rocked and shrieked,
while the silent night flung back disdainful echoes of their mad
laughter.

Perhaps the insane incongruity of their performance first became
apparent to the girl; she, at all events, was the first to control
herself. Maitland subsided, rumbling, while she dabbed at her eyes
with a wisp of lace and linen.

"Forgive me," she said faintly, at length; "I didn't mean to--"

"How could you help it? Who'd expect a hulking brute like myself
to be ticklish?"

"You are awfully good," she countered more calmly.

"Don't say that. I'm a clumsy lout. But--" He held her gaze
inquiringly. "But may I ask--"

"Oh, of course--certainly: I am--was--bound for
Greenpoint-on-the-Sound--"

"Ten miles!" he interrupted.

The corners of her red lips drooped: her brows puckered with
dismay. Instinctively she glanced toward the waterbound car.

"What am I to do?" she cried. "Ten miles!... I could never walk
it, never in the world! You see, I went to town to-day to do a
little shopping. As we were coming home the chauffeur was arrested
for careless driving. He had bumped a delivery wagon over--it
wasn't really his fault. I telephoned home for somebody to bail
him out, and my father said he would come in. Then I dined,
returned to the police-station, and waited. Nobody came. I
couldn't stay there all night. I 'phoned to everybody I knew,
until my money gave out; no one was in town. At last, in
desperation, I started home alone."

Maitland nodded his comprehension. "Your father--?" he hinted
delicately.

"Judge Wentworth," she explained hastily. "We've taken the Grover
place at Greenpoint for the season."

"I see,"--thoughtfully. And this was the girl who he had believed
had been in his rooms that evening, in his absence! Oh, clearly,
that was impossible. Her tone rang with truth. She interrupted his
train of thought with a cry of despair. "What will they think!"

"I dare say," he ventured hopefully, "I could hire a team at some
farm-house--"

"But the delay! It's so late already!"

Undeniably late: one o'clock at the earliest. A thought longer
Maitland hung in lack of purpose, then without a word of
explanation turned and again, began to wade out.

"What do you mean to do?" she cried, surprised.

"See what's the trouble," he called back. "I know a bit about
motors. Perhaps--"

"Then--but why--"

She stopped; and Maitland forbore to encourage her to round out
her question. It was no difficult matter to supply the missing
words. Why had he not thought of investigating the motor before
insisting that he must carry her ashore?

The humiliating conviction forced itself upon him that he was not
figuring to great advantage in this adventure. Distinctly a humiliating
sensation to one who ordinarily was by way of having a fine conceit
of himself. It requires a certain amount of egotism to enable one
to play the exquisite to one's personal satisfaction; Maitland had
enjoyed the possession of that certain amount; theretofore his
approval of self had been passably entire. Now--he could not
deny--the boor had shown up through the polish of the beau.

Intolerable thought! "Cad!" exclaimed Maitland bitterly. This all
was due to hasty jumping at conclusions: if he had not chosen to
believe a young and charming girl identical with an--an
adventuress, this thing had not happened and he had still retained
his own good-will. For one little moment he despised himself
heartily--one little moment of clear insight into self was his.
And forthwith he began to meditate apologies, formulating phrases
designed to prove adequate without sounding exaggerated and
insincere.

By this time he had reached the car, and--through sheer blundering
luck--at once stumbled upon the seat of trouble: a clogged valve
in the carbureter. No serious matter: with the assistance of a
repair kit more than commonly complete, he had the valve clear in
a jiffy.

News of this triumph he shouted to the girl, receiving in reply an
"Oh, thank you!" so fervently grateful that he felt more guilty
than ever.

Ruminating unhappily on the cud of contemplated abasement, he
waded round the car, satisfying himself that there was nothing
else out of gear; and apprehensively cranked up. Whereupon the
motor began to hum contentedly: all was well. Flushed with this
success, Maitland climbed aboard and opened the throttle a trifle.
The car moved. And then, with a swish, a gurgle, and a watery
_whoosh!_ it surged forward, up, out of the river, gallantly
up the slope.

At the top the amateur chauffeur shut down the throttle and jumped
out, turning to face the girl. She was by the step almost before
he could offer a hand to help her in, and as she paused to render
him his due meed of thanks, it became evident that she harbored
little if any resentment; eyes shining, face aglow with gratitude,
she dropped him a droll but graceful little courtesy.

"You are too good!" she declared with spirit. "How can I thank
you?"

"You might," he suggested, looking down into her face from his
superior height, "give me a bit of a lift--just a couple of miles
up the road. Though," he supplemented eagerly, "if you'd really
prefer, I should be only too happy to drive the car home for you?"

"Two miles, did you say?"

He fancied something odd in her tone; besides, the question was
superfluous. His eyes informed with puzzlement, he replied: "Why,
yes--that much, more or less. I live--"

"Of course," she put in quickly, "I'll give you the lift--only too
glad. But as for your taking me home at this hour, I can't hear of
that."

"But--"

"Besides, what would people say?" she countered obstinately. "Oh,
no," she decided; and he felt that from this decision there would
be no appeal; "I couldn't think of interfering with your ... arrangements."

Her eyes held his for a single instant, instinct with mischief,
gleaming with bewildering light from out a face schooled to
gravity. Maitland experienced a sensation of having grasped after
and missed a subtlety of allusion; his wits, keen as they were,
recoiled, baffled by her finesse. And the more he divined that she
was playing with him, as an experienced swordsman might play with
an impertinent novice, the denser his confusion grew.

"But I have no arrangements--" he stammered.

"Don't!" she insisted--as much as to say that he was fabricating
and she knew it! "We must hurry, you know, because.... There, I've
dropped my handkerchief! By the tree, there. Do you mind--?"

"Of course not." He set off swiftly toward the point indicated,
but on reaching it cast about vainly for anything in the nature of
a handkerchief. In the midst of which futile quest a change of
tempo in the motor's impatient drumming surprised him.

Startled, he looked up. Too late: the girl was in the seat, the
car in motion--already some yards from the point at which he had
left it. Dismayed, he strode forward, raising his voice in
perturbed expostulation.

"But--I say--!"

Over the rear of the seat a grey gauntlet was waved at him, as
tantalizing as the mocking laugh that came to his ears.

He paused, thunderstruck, appalled by this monstrosity of
ingratitude.

The machine gathered impetus, drawing swiftly away. Yet in the
stillness the farewell of the grey girl came to him very clearly.

"Good-by!" with a laugh. "Thank you and good-by--_Handsome
Dan!_"

III

"HANDSOME DAN"

Standing in the middle of the road, watching the dust cloud that
trailed the fast disappearing motorcar, Mr. Maitland cut a figure
sufficiently forlorn and disconsolate to have distilled pity from
the least sympathetic heart.

His hands were thrust stiffly at full arm's length into his
trousers pockets: a rumpled silk hat was set awry on the back of
his head; his shirt bosom was sadly crumpled; above the knees, to
a casual glance, he presented the appearance of a man carefully
attired in evening dress; below, his legs were sodden and muddied,
his shoes of patent-leather, twin wrecks. Alas for jauntiness and
elegance, alack for ease and aplomb!

"Tricked," observed Maitland casually, and protruded his lower
lip, thus adding to the length of a countenance naturally long.
"Outwitted by a chit of a girl! Dammit!"

But this was crude melodrama. Realizing which, he strove to smile:
a sorry failure.

"'Handsome Dan,'" quoted he; and cocking his head to one side eyed
the road inquiringly. "Where in thunder d'you suppose she got hold
of _that_ name?"

Bestowed upon him in callow college days, it had stuck burr-like
for many a weary year. Of late, however, its use had lapsed among
his acquaintances; he had begun to congratulate himself upon
having lived it down. And now it was resurrected, flung at him in
sincerest mockery by a woman whom, to his knowledge, he had never
before laid eyes upon. Odious appellation, hateful invention of an
ingenious enemy!

"'Handsome Dan!' She must have known me all the time--all the time
I was making an exhibition of myself.... 'Wentworth'? I know no
one of that name. Who the dickens can she be?"

If it had not been contrary to his code of ethics, he would gladly
have raved, gnashed his teeth, footed the dance of rage with his
shadow. Indeed, his restraint was admirable, the circumstances
considered. He did nothing whatever but stand still for a matter
of five minutes, vainly racking his memory for a clue to the
identity of "Miss Wentworth."

At length he gave it up in despair and abstractedly felt for his
watch-fob. Which wasn't there. Neither, investigation developed,
was the watch. At which crowning stroke of misfortune,--the
timepiece must have slipped from his pocket into the water while
he was tinkering with that infamous carbureter,--Maitland turned
eloquently red in the face.

"The price," he meditated aloud, with an effort to resume his
pose, "is a high one to pay for a wave of a grey glove and the
echo of a pretty laugh."

With which final fling at Fortune he set off again for Maitland
Manor, trudging heavily but at a round pace through the dust that
soon settled upon the damp cloth of his trousers legs and
completed their ruination. But Maitland was beyond being disturbed
by such trifles. A wounded vanity engaged his solicitude to the
exclusion of all other interests.

At the end of forty-five minutes he had covered the remaining
distance between Greenfields station and Maitland Manor. For five
minutes more he strode wearily over the side-path by the box hedge
which set aside his ancestral acres from the public highway. At
length, with an exclamation, he paused at the first opening in the
living barrier: a wide entrance from which a blue-stone carriage
drive wound away to the house, invisible in the waning light,
situate in the shelter of the grove of trees that studded the
lawn.

"Gasoline! Brrr!" said Maitland, shuddering and shivering with the
combination of a nauseous odor and the night's coolness--the
latter by now making itself as unpleasantly prominent as the
former.

Though he hated the smell with all his heart, manfully
inconsistent he raised his head, sniffing the air for further
evidence; and got his reward in a sickening gust.

"Tank leaked," he commented with brevity. "Quart of the stuff must
have trickled out right here. Ugh! If it goes on at this rate,
there'll be another breakdown before she gets home." And, "Serve
her right, too!" he growled, vindictive.

But for all his indignation he acknowledged a sneaking wish that
he might be at hand again, in such event, a second time to give
gratuitous service to his grey lady.

Analyzing this frame of mind (not without surprise and some
disdain of him who weakly entertained it) he crossed the drive and
struck in over the lawn, shaping his course direct for the front
entrance of the house.

By dead reckoning the hour was two, or something later; and a
chill was stealing in upon the land, wafted gently southward from
Long Island Sound. All the world beside himself seemed to slumber,
breathless, insensate. Wraith-like, grey shreds of mist drifted
between the serried boles of trees, or, rising, veiled the moon's
wan and pallid face, that now was low upon the horizon. In silent
rivalry long and velvet-black shadows skulked across the ample
breadths of dew-drenched grass. Somewhere a bird stirred on its
unseen perch, chirping sleepily; and in the rapt silence the
inconsiderable interruption broke with startling stress.

In time,--not long,--the house lifted into view: a squat, rambling
block of home-grown architecture with little to recommend it save
its keen associations and its comfort. At the edge of the woods
the lord and master paused indefinitely, with little purpose,
surveying idly the pale, columned facade, and wondering whether or
not his entrance at that ungodly hour would rouse the staff of
house servants. If it did not--he contemplated with mild amusement
the prospect of their surprise when, morning come, they should
find the owner in occupation.

"Bannerman was right," he conceded; "any------" The syllables died
upon his lips; his gaze became fixed; his heart thumped wildly for
an instant, then rested still; and instinctively he held his
breath, tip-toeing to the edge of the veranda the better to
command a view of the library windows.

These opened from ceiling to floor and should by rights have
presented to his vision a blank expanse of dark glass. But, oddly
enough, even while thinking of his lawyer's warning, he had
fancied.... "Ah!" said Maitland softly.

A disk of white light, perhaps a foot or eighteen inches in
diameter, had flitted swiftly across the glass and vanished.

"Ah, ah! The devil, the devil!" murmured the young man
unconsciously.

The light appeared again, dancing athwart the inner wall of the
room, and was lost as abruptly as before. On impulse Maitland
buttoned his top-coat across his chest, turning up the collar to
hide his linen, darted stealthily a yard or two to one side, and
with one noiseless bound reached the floor of the veranda. A
breath later he stood by the front door, where, at first glance,
he discovered the means of entrance used by the midnight marauder;
the doors stood ajar, a black interval showing between them.

So that, then, was the way! Cautiously Maitland put a hand upon
the knob and pushed.

A sharp, penetrating squeak brought him to an abrupt standstill,
heart hammering shamefully again. Gathering himself to spring, if
need be, he crept back toward the library windows, and reconnoitering
cautiously determined the fact that the bolts had just been withdrawn
on the inside of one window frame, which was swinging wide.

"It's a wise crook that provides his own quick exit," considered
Maitland.

The sagacious one was not, apparently, leaving at that moment. On
the contrary, having made all things ready for a hurried flight
upon the first alarm, the intruder turned back, as was clearly
indicated by the motion of the light within. The clink of steel
touching steel became audible; and Maitland nodded. Bannerman was
indeed justified; at that very moment the safe was being attacked.

Maitland returned noiselessly to the door. His mouth had settled
into a hard, unyielding, thin line; and a dangerous light
flickered in his eyes. Temporarily the idler had stepped aside,
giving place to the real man that was Maitland--the man ready to
fight for his own, naked hands against firearms, if it need be.
True, he had but to step into the gun-room to find weapons in
plenty; but these must be then loaded to be of service, and
precious moments wasted in the process--moments in which the
burglar might gain access to and make off with his booty.

Maitland had no notion whatever of permitting anything of the sort
to occur. He counted upon taking his enemy unawares, difficult as
he believed such a feat would be, in the case of a professional
cracksman.

Down the hallway he groped his way to the library door, his
fingers at length encountering its panels; it was closed,
doubtless secured upon the inside; the slightest movement of the
handle was calculated to alarm the housebreaker. Maitland paused,
deliberating another and better plan, having in mind a short
passageway connecting library and smoking-room. In the library
itself a heavy tapestry curtained its opening, while an equally
heavy portiere took the place of a door at the other end. In the
natural order of things a burglar would overlook this.

Inch by inch the young man edged into the smoking-room, the door
to which providentially stood unclosed. Once within, it was but a
moment's work to feel his way to the velvet folds and draw them
aside, fortunately without rattling the brass rings from which the
curtain depended. And then Maitland was in the passage, acutely on
the alert, recognizing from the continued click of metal that his
antagonist-to-be was still at his difficult task. Inch by inch--
there was the tapestry! Very gently the householder pushed it
aside.

An insidious aroma of scorching varnish (the dark lantern)
penetrated the passage while he stood on its threshold, feeling
for the electric-light switch. Unhappily he missed this at the
first cast, and--heard from within a quick, deep hiss of breath.
Something had put the burglar on guard.

Another instant wasted, and it would be too late. The young man
had to chance it. And he did, without further hesitation stepping
boldly into the danger-zone, at the same time making one final,
desperate pass at the spot where the switch should have been--and
missing it. On the instant there came a click of a different
caliber from those that had preceded it. A revolver had been
cocked, somewhere there in the blank darkness.

Maitland knew enough not to move. In another respect the warning
came too late; his fingers had found the switch at last, and
automatically had turned it. The glare was blinding, momentarily;
but the flash and report for which Maitland waited did not come.
When his eyes had adjusted themselves to the suddenly altered
conditions, he saw, directly before him and some six feet distant,
a woman's slight figure, dark cloaked, resolute upon its two feet,
head framed in veiling, features effectually disguised in a motor
mask whose round, staring goggles shone blankly in the warm white
light.

On her part, she seemed to recognize him instantaneously. On
his.... It may as well be admitted that Maitland's wits were gone
wool-gathering, temporarily at least: a state of mind not
unpardonable when it is taken into consideration that he was
called upon to grapple with and simultaneously to assimilate three
momentous facts. For the first time in his life he found himself
nose to nose with a revolver, and that one of able bodied and
respect-compelling proportions. For the first time in his life,
again, he was under necessity of dealing with a housebreaker. But
most stupefying of all he found the fact that this housebreaker,
this armed midnight marauder, was a woman! And so it was not
altogether fearlessness that made him to all intents and purposes
ignore the weapon; it is nothing to his credit for courage if his
eyes struck past the black and deadly mouth of the revolver and
looked only into the blank and expressionless eyes of the wind-mask;
it was not lack of respect for his skin's integrity, but the
sheer, tremendous wonder of it all, that rendered him oblivious to
the eternity that lay the other side of a slender, trembling
finger-tip.

And so he stared, agape, until presently the weapon wavered and
was lowered and the woman's voice, touched with irony, brought him
to his senses.

"Oh," she remarked coolly, "it's only you."

Thunderstruck, he was able no more than to parrot the pronoun:
"_You--you_!"

"Were you expecting to meet any one else, here, to-night?" she
inquired in suavest mockery.

He lifted his shoulders helplessly, and tried to school his tongue
to coherence. "I confess.... Well, certainly I didn't count on
finding you here, Miss Wentworth. And the black cloak, you know--"

"Reversible, of course: grey inside, as you see--Handsome Dan!"
The girl laughed quietly, drawing aside an edge of the garment to
reveal its inner face of silken grey and the fluted ruffles of the
grey skirt underneath.

He nodded appreciation of the device, his mind now busy with
speculations as to what he should do with the girl, now that he
had caught her. At the same time he was vaguely vexed by her
persistent repetition of the obsolescent nickname.

"Handsome Dan," he iterated all but mechanically. "Why do you call
me that, please? Have we met before? I could swear, never before
this night!"

"But you are altogether too modest," she laughed. "Not that it's a
bad trait in the character of a professional.... But really! it
seems a bit incredible that any one so widely advertised as
Handsome Dan Anisty should feel surprise at being recognized. Why,
your portrait and biography have commanded space in every yellow
journal in America recently!"

And, dropping the revolver into a pocket in her cloak, "I was
afraid you might be a servant--or even Maitland," she diverted the
subject, with a nod.

"But--but if you recognized me as Anisty, back there by the ford,
didn't you suspect I'd drop in on you--"

"Why, of course! Didn't _you_ all but tell me that you were
coming here?"

"But--"

"I thought _perhaps_ I might get through before you came, Mr.
Anisty; but I knew all the time that, even if you did manage to
surprise me--er--on the job, you wouldn't call in the police." She
laughed confidently, and--oddly enough--at the same time
nervously. "You are certainly a very bold man, and as surely a
very careless one, to run around the way you do without so much as
troubling to grow a beard or a mustache, after your picture has
been published broadcast."

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