V
And even while he was contemplating putting a spoke in the wheel of the gang, it was actually putting a spoke in his.
He went to bed full of this happy resolve.
“To-morrow,” he said, “I’ll propose.”
The big Mr. Neuburg had slipped from his hiding place, with that curious silent swiftness which went so strangely with his bulk, crossed the boat deck noiselessly, and went down to the promenade.
He found the Gorgon sitting there, and he dropped into the seat beside her. What he had to say was not very much, but it was apparently to the point. She listened attentively, nodded, and when he finished she rose.
But before she went to her cabin, she took from him a paper.
“Make this your opening,” Mr. Neuburg said. “I know you are clever; this is a time for being very clever. Be very natural ... be very sympathetic ... do not pretend this letter has any significance for you.”
When Heloise, tired and dispirited, came down to the cabin, she found her companion already half undressed. Not very talkative, she never was, but showing no emotion against or for anybody—Clement, of course, was the anybody. It was no different from any of the going-to-bed scenes that had taken place since they came on board—that is, it wasn’t until Heloise, stretching out her hand for her hairbrush, that inevitable feminine implement, encountered a folded sheet of notepaper. She picked it up absently. It was a business letter, that had been folded lengthways in three, and the printed heading was on the outside. She read the name of the firm which had sent it—Rigby & Root.
“Méduse,” she said in a surprised voice. “Did I leave this lying about?”
“Did you leave what lying about, Loise?” said the companion in a quiet voice, though, for all her apparent indifference, her singularly immobile eyes seemed to gleam below the surface.
“This letter—from my lawyers?”
At that, “Yes, you did,” said the companion—there was the nicest tinge of reproach in her voice; it was beautifully done. “You did—on the promenade deck. Yes, my dear Loise, it was on the very deck. I actually kicked it out of my way before it occurred to me that it really was a letter and not a dirty piece of paper. Then I picked it up, and saw that name on the outside—Rigby & Root. And I was surprised—your lawyers, of course; I knew that—so naturally I brought it straight down here....”
“How could I have taken it up on deck?” said Heloise, puzzled.
“That I don’t know,” said Méduse pleasantly. “Unless you are like me, and use the first thing that comes to hand as a bookmarker. It’s not always wise. I remember once opening a book at a young woman’s religious instruction class, and the piece of paper I had used as a marker slipped out for all to see ... and it was a handbill of the most lurid sort of play—a very fast play even. You see I....” Her manner was gossipy, perfect, but she did not have to carry her garrulous anecdote to a finish.
First, Heloise said, “But a lawyer’s letter.” And then with a sort of gasp she cried, “But it’s not my letter.”
The Gorgon switched round, smiling indulgently. “My dear ... but I saw the name at the top—Rigby & Root.”
“Yes, it’s from Rigby & Root,” said Heloise in a curious voice, for she was at that moment, and abruptly, a prey to strange emotions of doubt and suspicion.
“Well, if it’s from Rigby & Root——” said the Gorgon indolently.
“It’s addressed to Mr. Clement Seadon,” said Heloise in a dry voice.
The Gorgon’s look of smiling amazement was an admirable piece of acting. “But, my dear—whatever are your lawyers writing to Mr. Seadon about?”
And that well-barbed dart was fired with beautiful precision. Without the slightest appearance of malice, the Gorgon had underscored the significant fact that Mr. Clement Seadon was connected with the little lawyer Hartley Hard (a partner in Rigby & Root), who had shown himself so prejudiced against Henry Gunning and Heloise’s journey to Canada. She looked at the girl, her eyebrows raised in faint amusement and surprise. “What could Mr. Hard be writing to Mr. Seadon about?”
Heloise did not read other people’s letters, but the circumstances made it impossible for her not to read that short and very businesslike communication. It was unthrilling. It dealt with the sale of certain stocks, and the buying of certain bonds. It was not signed by the irritating Mr. Hard. She said, “It’s not from Mr. Hard. It’s from Mr. Root himself” (Rigby was dead). “And it’s about nothing in particular—just business. Apparently Rigby & Root are Mr. Seadon’s lawyers also.”
Heloise had an air of dismissing any implication of underhand conduct. But she had not dismissed it. The surprising fact, brought before her mind so suddenly and neatly, made her feel that she had been trusting somebody who could not be trusted. He was in league with the man who had tried to hamper her movements.... She tried to tell herself, of course, that there was no ground for such a thought; people can have the same lawyers without conspiring with those lawyers. But the shock of it, the coincidence of it cut the ground from under her.... This young man who had only just now taken pains to set her against Henry Gunning and his mining schemes was intimate with her lawyers, who had also taken pains to set her against Henry Gunning.... The facts seemed too pronounced to admit of coincidence.... And while she was feeling sore, rankled, the clever companion pushed the barb of suspicion a little deeper.
“How strange that you should both have the same lawyers,” she said with an air of innocent wonder. “How strange that he should know that Mr. Hard who has been so annoying to you.”
It was, of course, the attitude of Méduse Smythe to pretend that she had little or nothing to do with Heloise’s trip to Canada. She pretended all along to play a passive part. All the initiative was supposed to come from Heloise.
Méduse Smythe was clever. She had the master brain of Mr. Neuburg to prompt her, and she had played her cards subtly, so that although it was she alone who had inspired the high-minded girl to undertake this adventure, she was yet able to pose as no more than a lucky and accidental link in the chain of circumstances. Heloise thought of her only as a companion who was but faintly and sentimentally interested in an act of her employer’s life over which she had no control. It was to keep up this air of being altogether outside the business that Méduse had said not that Mr. Hard was annoying to “us,” but that “Mr. Hard had been so annoying to you.”
Her attitude gave her so many advantages. Thus when Heloise said in answer to that little flick on the raw, “I wonder whether he knows Mr. Hard?” she was able to say with an admirable and impersonal air. “Well, it didn’t seem important before, but it may explain why he has monopolized you since you came on board.”
Heloise was suddenly aware how easily, how frequently she had slipped off with Clement Seadon. Had he monopolized her? Why——? She remembered how she had talked to him about Sicamous, about mining. How he had warned her.... Was that the reason? His lawyers were her lawyers ... her lawyers had warned her, too. Was that the reason?
And then as the girl sat quietly, feeling suspicious, miserable, hurt, the clever Miss Méduse Smythe improved the shining hour. She fired another little barb: “Of course, you are both young, and he is very handsome and has charming ways with him—I could understand your getting on so well together ... indulging in even a little ship-board flirtation.”
Heloise gasped. She was acutely conscious of Clement’s good looks, his charming ways—had they been used to an end? And flirting—had she flirted?
“You think I have been flirting?” she said in a low, breathless voice.
“You?” smiled Miss Méduse tolerantly. “Oh, no, I don’t think you flirted, my dear. I know how you feel about your Mr. Gunning.” Heloise winced. She had not been feeling very much about Mr. Gunning lately. She was unpleasantly reminded of her inconstancy—as Miss Méduse Smythe meant her to be reminded. “I knew you were safe enough,” the smiling companion went on, “but I don’t know about that young man.... He seemed, well, yes, I must say, I think he flirted.”
That practically ended the conversation. A conversation with apparently very little in it, but a very telling conversation all the same. When Heloise went to bed she carried it with her. And as she tossed unsleeping, its different phases kept turning over in her mind, turning over and over with something of the steady throbbing of the engines in their ceaselessness.
So that while Clement Seadon, also awake, was tossing in his bunk, the throb of the engines beating out entrancingly the thoughts, “I’ll marry her ... I love her and I’ll marry her ... I’ll make her marry me ... I’ll save her through loving her....” Heloise lay awake asking herself: “Is he in league against me? Is he tricking me? After all I thought of him, isn’t he tricking me? His lawyers are my lawyers. He has wormed out my secret from me ... things my lawyers did not know. Things they wanted to know? Was that accidental, or was it cunning? Is he fighting against—Harry?” She shivered in disgust at herself. “Harry ... have I acted honorably towards Harry? I have flirted with this man ... flirted! I’ve enjoyed his company, I’ve come to like him ...” she could not go on. She dare not go on. She dare not put her feelings for Clement Seadon under close examination.... “I’ve behaved dishonorably. I’ve forgotten Harry for this man who has—has been working against Harry.” Her heart chilled. “Perhaps his—his flirting with me was part of his plan against Harry....”
The whole of these thoughts jumbled and tumbled together in her anguished mind. The duplicity of Clement Seadon became entangled with her own inconstancy towards Henry Gunning, until, in the end, they became one and the same thing, and Seadon was the archvillain responsible for all ... as the adroit Mr. Neuburg and the clever Miss Méduse Smythe had meant him to be.
And so when the morning came Clement rose saying with immense purpose, “I’ll do it to-day. It’s the last day; to-morrow we land. I will tell her I love her to-day. I’ll make her love me.”
As he said that with great cheerfulness, Heloise, rising, jaded, worn out, with a mind incapable of clear and unprejudiced thought, said, “I must find out. I’ll put it to the test. I’ll confront him with this letter. And if I am right....”
She knew a little pain, but that only strengthened her resolve. If she found out she was right, then it would be finished. Clement Seadon would not be allowed to intrude into her life again.