The Voice in the Fog - Harold MacGrath (new reading txt) 📗

Mr. Thornden laid aside his tea-cup.

"I am a newspaper man, Mr. Thornden," said the young man, his eye roving about the room, visualizing everything, from the slices of lemon to the brilliant eyes of the valet.

"Ah! a pressman. What will you be wanting to see me about, sir?"-neither hostile nor friendly.

"Do you intend to remain long in America-incog?"

"Incog!" Mr. Thorndon leaned forward in his chair and drew down his eyebrow tightly against the rim of his monocle.

"Yes, sir. I take it that you are Lord Henry Monckton, ninth Baron of Dimbledon."

Master and man exchanged a rapid glance.

"Tibbets," said the master coldly, "you registered."

"Yes, sir."

"What did you register?"

"Oh," interposed the reporter, "it was the name Dimbledon caught my eye, sir. You see, there was a paragraph in one of our London exchanges that you had sailed for America. I'm what we call a hotel reporter; hunt up prominent and interesting people for interviews. I'm sure yours is a very interesting story, sir." The reporter was a pleasant, affable young man, and that was why he was so particularly efficient in his chosen line of work.

"I was not prepared to disclose my identity so soon," said Lord Monckton ruefully. "But since you have stumbled upon the truth, it is far better that I give you the facts as they are. Interviewing is a novel experience. What do you wish to know, sir?"

And thus it was that, next morning, New York-and the continent as well-learned that Lord Henry Monckton, ninth Baron of Dimbledon, had arrived in America on a pleasure trip. The story read more like the scenario of a romantic novel than a page from life. For years the eighth Baron of Dimbledon had lived in seclusion, practically forgotten. In India he had a bachelor brother, a son and a grandson. One day he was notified of the death (by bubonic plague) of these three male members of his family, the baron himself collapsed and died shortly after. The title and estate went to another branch of the family. A hundred years before, a daughter of the house had run away with the head-gardener and been disowned. The great-great-grand-son of this woman became the ninth baron. The present baron's life was recounted in full; and an adventurous life it had been, if the reporter was to be relied upon. The interview appeared in a London journal, with the single comment-"How those American reporters misrepresent things!"

It made capital reading, however; and in servants' halls the newspaper became very popular. It gave rise to a satirical leader on the editorial page: "What's the matter with us republicans? Liberty, fraternity and equality; we flaunt that flag as much as we ever did. Yet, what a howdy-do when a title comes along! What a craning of necks, what a kotowing! How many earldoms and dukedoms are not based upon some detestable action, some despicable service rendered some orgiastic sovereign! The most honorable thing about the so-called nobility is generally the box-hedge which surrounds the manse. Kotow; pour our millions into the bottomless purses of spendthrifts; give them our most beautiful women. There is no remedy for human nature."

It was this editorial which interested Killigrew far more than the story which had given birth to it.

"That's the way to shout."

"Does it do any good?" asked Kitty. "If we had a lord for breakfast-I mean, at breakfast-would you feel at ease? Wouldn't you be watching and wondering what it was that made him your social superior?"

"Social superior? Bah!"

"That's no argument. As this editor wisely says, there's no remedy for human nature. When I was a silly schoolgirl I often wondered if there wasn't a duke in the family, or even a knight. How do you account for that feeling?"

"You were probably reading Bertha M. Clay," retorted her father, only too glad of such an opening.

"What is your opinion of titles, Mr. Webb?" she asked calmly.

"Mr. Webb is an Englishman, Kitty," reminded her mother.

"All the more reason for wishing his point of view," was the reply.

"A title, if managed well, is a fine business asset." Thomas stared gravely at his egg-cup.

"A humorist!" cried Killigrew, as if he had discovered a dodo.

"Really, no. I am typically English, sir." But Thomas was smiling this time; and when he smiled Kitty found him very attractive. She was leaning on her elbows, her folded hands propping her chin; and in his soul Thomas knew that she was looking at him with those boring critical blue eyes of hers. Why was she always looking at him like that? "It is notorious that we English are dull and stupid," he said.

"Now you are making fun of us," said Kitty seriously.

"I beg your pardon!"

She dropped her hands from under her chin and laughed. "Do you really wish to know the real secret of our antagonism, Mr. Webb?"

"I should be very glad."

"Well, then, we each of us wear a chip on our shoulder, simply because we've never taken the trouble to know each other well. Most English we Americans meet are stupid and caddish and uninteresting; and most of the Americans you see are boastful, loud-talking and money-mad. Our mutual impressions are wholly wrong to begin with."

"I have no chip on my shoulder," Thomas refuted eagerly.

"Neither have I."

"But I have," laughed her father. "I eat Englishmen for breakfast; fe-fo-fum style."

How democratic indeed these kindly, unpretentious people were! thought Thomas. A multimillionaire as amiable as a clerk; a daughter who would have graced any court in Europe with her charm and elfin beauty. Up to a month ago he had held all Americans in tolerant contempt.

It was as Kitty said: the real Englishman and the real American seldom met.

He did not realize as yet that his position in this house was unique. In England all great merchants and statesmen and nobles had one or more private secretaries about. He believed it to be a matter of course that Americans followed the same custom. He would have been wonderfully astonished to learn that in all this mighty throbbing city of millions-people and money-there might be less than a baker's dozen who occupied simultaneously the positions of private secretary and friend of the family. Mr. Killigrew had his private secretary, but this gentleman rarely saw the inside of the Killigrew home; it wasn't at all necessary that he should. Killigrew was a sensible man; his business hours began when he left home and ended when he entered it.

"Do you know any earls or dukes?" asked Killigrew, folding his napkin.

"Really, no. I have moved in a very different orbit. I know many of them by sight, however." He did not think it vital to add that he had often sold them collars and suspenders.

The butler and the second man pulled back the ladies' chairs. Killigrew hurried away to his offices; Kitty and her mother went up-stairs; and Thomas returned to his desk in the library. He was being watched by Kitty; nothing overt, nothing tangible, yet he sensed it: from the first day he had entered this house. It oppressed him, like a presage of disaster. Back of his chair was a fireplace, above this, a mirror. Once-it was but yesterday-while with his back to his desk, day-dreaming, he had seen her in the mirror. She stood in the doorway, a hand resting lightly against the portiere. There was no smile on her face. The moment he stirred, she vanished.

Watched. Why?


CHAPTER XI

The home-bureau of charities was a success from the start; but beyond the fact that it served to establish Thomas Webb as private secretary in the Killigrew family, I was not deeply interested. I know that Thomas ran about a good deal, delving into tenements and pedigrees, judging candidates, passing or condemning, and that he earned his salary, munificent as it appeared to him. Forbes told me that he wouldn't have done the work for a thousand a week; and Forbes, like Panurge, had ten ways of making money and twelve ways of spending it.

The amazing characteristic about Thomas was his unaffected modesty, his naturalness, his eagerness to learn, his willingness to accept suggestions, no matter from what source. Haberdashers' clerks-at least, those I have known-are superior persons; they know it all, you can not tell them a single thing. I can call to witness dozens of neckties and shirts I shall never dare wear in public. But perhaps seven years among a clientele of earls and dukes, who were set in their ideas, had something to do with Thomas' attitude.

Killigrew was very well satisfied with the venture. He had had some doubts at the beginning: a man whose past ended at Pier 60 did not look like a wise speculation, especially in a household. But quite unconsciously Thomas himself had taken these doubts out of Killigrew's mind and-mislaid them. The subscriptions to all the suffragette weeklies and monthlies were dropped; and there were no more banners reading "Votes for Women" tacked over the doorways. Besides this, the merchant had a man to talk to, after dinner, he with his cigar and Thomas with his pipe, this privilege being insisted upon by the women folk, who had tact to leave the two men to themselves.

Thomas amused the millionaire. Here was a young man of a species with whom he had not come into contact in many years: a boy who did not know the first thing about poker, or bridge, or pinochle, who played outrageous billiards and who did not know who the latest reigning theatrical beauty was, and moreover, did not care a rap; who could understand a joke within reasonable time if he couldn't tell one; who was neither a nincompoop nor a mollycoddle. Thomas interested Killigrew more and more as the days went past.

Happily, the voice of conscience is heard by no ears but one's own.

After luncheons Thomas had a good deal of time on his hands; and, to occupy this time he returned to his old love, composition. He began to rewrite his romance; and one day Kitty discovered him pegging away at it. He rose from his chair instantly.

"Will you be wanting me, Miss Killigrew?"

"Only to say that father will be detained down-town to-night and that you will be expected to take mother and me to the theater. It is one of your English musical comedies; and very good, they say."

Thomas had been dreading such a situation. As yet there had been no entertaining at the Killigrew home; nearly all their friends were out of town for the summer; thus far he had escaped.

"I am sorry, Miss Killigrew, but I have no suitable clothes." Which was plain unvarnished truth. "And I do not possess an opera-hat." And never did.

Kitty laughed pleasantly. "We are very democratic in this house, as by this time you will have observed. In the summer we do not dress; we take our amusements comfortably. Ordinarily we would be at our summer home on Long Island; but