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CHAPTER XVII
THE SPEAKING-TUBE

Severance accepted the invitation to the Ritz. His principal reason for doing so was because he knew it would enrage Garth.

It was a strange and strained luncheon, for those present (with the exception of "Pobbles") talked very little and thought so much that it seemed to each one as if his or her thoughts shrieked aloud or shot from the head in streaks of blue lightning.

Marise thought, "What comes next? What does He mean to do?" And "He," with a capital "H," was no longer Severance, but this stranger, Garth.

Mrs. Sorel thought, "How are we going to get rid of the man? I'm sure he means mischief. Shall I appeal to Lord Severance, or would that make matters worse?"

Severance thought, "How am I to get some time alone with Marise, and come to an understanding before I sail to-morrow morning? How are we to arrange about our letters and cables?"

And Garth thought, "What will She say when she finds out what I've arranged at the Plaza?"

As for Lord Pobblebrook, he had only vague, pleasant thoughts such as men of his type do have at a wedding luncheon with plenty of champagne. It was a very good luncheon, for they do things well at the Ritz, and the champagne was a last song of glory before America went "dry."

At last, when Severance had to give up hope of a whispered word with Marise, he was obliged to declare his hand. "I'll call at the theatre to-night to say good-bye if you don't mind," he announced aloud, with a casual air. "I suppose you won't hand things over to your understudy, in spite of what's happened to-day?"

"I shall play to-night, of course," said Marise.

"And every night," added Mums.

Silence followed her words.

"Won't you come back to the Plaza with us, Lord Pobblebrook?" asked Mrs. Sorel. "If you have never been there, I'd like you to see what a charming hotel it is. Next time you run over from dear England, you might like to try it for yourself. Major Garth, I'm sorry to say, is obliged to attend to business this afternoon – business concerned with his mission, so unfortunately – unless you'll go with us – my daughter and I will be obliged to taxi back alone."

"Of course I'll come, with pleasure!" heartily consented Pobbles.

"My business doesn't begin quite so early," said Garth. "If you'll drive with Mrs. Sorel, sir, I'll take my wife as far as the Plaza."

If Mums could have stabbed her son-in-law, not fatally but painfully, with a stiletto-flash from her eyes, it would have given her infinite satisfaction to do so. As she could not, she had to confess herself worsted for the moment; for Lord Pobblebrook was the Colonel of Lord Severance as well as of Major Garth; and it was for such as he that the conventional farce of this wedding had taken place. He must not be allowed to suspect that anything was wrong, or Tony's whole elaborate scheme might be wrecked. It was most probable that Lord Pobblebrook and Mr. Ionides belonged to some of the same London clubs and met now and then.

Marise was oddly dazed at finding herself alone in a taxi with Garth, bound for the Plaza Hotel, which she thought of as "home." She had expected that Tony or Mums would succeed in rescuing her, but neither had risen to the occasion: and the girl realised that this lack of initiative on their part was due to the presence of Pobbles. She hardly knew whether to be more vexed or amused at Garth's triumph (she supposed that he considered it such); but her lips twitched with that fatal sense of humour which Mums so disapproved.

"It is rather funny, isn't it?" said her companion.

Marise stiffened. This was a critical moment. Much depended upon the start she made on stepping over the threshold of this strange situation. She must be careful to keep the whip hand.

"What I was laughing at is funny, in a way," she grudged. "It occurred to me that it was smart of you to bring your Colonel to – to – the – er – "

"Show," suggested Garth.

"If you like to call it that."

"I thought the word pretty well described it from your point of view," explained Garth.

Marise looked straight at him.

"What was it from yours? It can't have been much more."

"I don't feel bound to tell you what it was from mine."

"Oh, well, you needn't!" Her chin went up. "I'm not really curious."

"Why should you be? You'll find out in time."

A spark lit the blue eyes under the blue hat.

"I do hope you're not planning to spring any surprises on me, Major Garth," she said, in an acid tone that was a youthful copy of Mums, "because, if you are, it will only lead to unpleasantness. Whereas, if you keep to the spirit of the bargain, we – "

"Allow me to point out," Garth cut in, with an impersonal air of detachment which puzzled her, "that you yourself have 'queered' the 'bargain.'"

"I don't know what you mean," exclaimed Marise.

"That's another instance of your not thinking things out beforehand," he said. "If you'd stopped to reflect a minute before you proposed to marry me this morning you'd have seen what you were up against."

Marise felt the blood rush to her cheeks, as if the man had slapped them with the flat of his big hand.

"What a way of putting it!" she flashed at him. "You may be a hero and all that – no doubt you are, as you're a V.C. But as a man – a gentleman– I'm afraid you've got quite a lot to learn."

"Of course I have," said Garth. "You knew I was only a temporary gentleman. I heard Severance state the fact to you on shipboard when he was telling you some of my other disadvantages. Scratch a temporary gentleman, and under the surface you find – "

"What?" Marise threw into a pause.

"The things you'll find in me, when you know me better."

"Oh!" she breathed. And on second thoughts added, "I don't intend to 'scratch' you, and find things under the surface. I don't suppose I shall ever know you much better."

"Call it worse, then," he suggested.

"Neither better, nor worse!"

"Yet you've just promised to take me for both."

"That meant nothing, as you know very well."

"I do not know anything of the sort."

"Then you are a 'temporary gentleman' indeed! We spoke just now of that bargain – "

"Which, through your own actions, doesn't exist."

"Of course it exists. You talk in riddles!"

"When you put your mind to this one, it will cease to be a riddle. You'll guess it in a moment. You'll see what you've done. Probably Severance would have told you before this if he'd had the chance. The explanation, if there has to be one, will come better from him than from me. But I may as well break one small detail to you before we get to the hotel; I've no intention of leaving him alone with you for a minute, or any part of a minute, before he sails."

"How dare you hope to lay down the law for me?" Marise almost gasped, over a wildly-throbbing heart. "I shall see Lord Severance alone as much as I choose – and as he chooses."

"You can try," said Garth. "So can he."

"You won't have any chance to prevent it! You shan't even come into my mother's suite at the Plaza Hotel if you attempt to put on these ridiculous airs of being my master. I wonder who you think you are, Major Garth?"

"The important thing – to you and your mother and to Severance – is not so much what I think I am, as what other people will think I am. They will think I'm your husband. I understand that this marriage idea was entirely for appearance' sake?"

"Exactly!" cried Marise.

"Then it's up to you and me to look after the appearances. I warned you this morning that you hadn't thought the thing out enough, and that you'd better think hard, then and there. Perhaps you did. If so, you – "

"I didn't. How could I? There was no time."

"That's what you said. Consequently I had to do the thinking for you. And the arranging of your future. I never was a slow chap. My life was always more or less of a hustle since I was a very small kid, and I had to keep my thinking machine on the jump. The war has speeded it up a bit. This morning, when you announced that you'd be ready to be married in an hour or less, I'll tell you just what I had to do. I had to inform the manager of your hotel that I was marrying Miss Sorel, and that we couldn't get away from New York for a few days – "

"You – dared to do that!"

"I got my V.C. for doing something almost as dangerous. I told him he must give us a suite – "

"You – you devil!"

"Thank you. I guess even that sounds more natural from a wife to a husband than 'Major Garth.'"

"You don't dream I'm going to occupy a suite with you, I suppose?"

"I don't dream. I know you are going to occupy that suite, unless you want me openly to leave you on our wedding day. This comes of your not thinking what would happen next. You'd better choose now, because we'll soon be at the Plaza. Is it to be my hotel or not?"

"You said – when my mother explained to Lord Pobblebrook that you had a mission – you said you were going West."

"And that I intended to take you with me. But that won't be for a few days, till you've had time to settle your affairs. I don't want to rush you. What I ask you to decide now is for meanwhile, before we start."

"I shall never start anywhere with you – or live anywhere meanwhile with you."

"Very well then, that's that. Now I know where I am." He seized the speaking-tube, but Marise caught his hand.

"What are you going to do?" she asked.

"Stop the taxi and get out. The snap's off."

The girl was about to exclaim, "But you can't leave me like this!" when it occurred to her that, desperado as he was turning out, it would be well to take him at his word; at all events, to a certain extent.

"Very well," she said. "I shall tell everyone that you've gone West on an important mission. V.C.'s are always expected to have missions."

"And I shall tell everyone that I've done nothing of the sort. I'll go back to the Belmore, 'phone to the Plaza and countermand the suite I took, and allow myself to be interviewed by all the reporters, who'll swarm round me like flies round a honeypot. There'll be plenty of flies left for you. You can give them honey or vinegar, I don't care which. It's your concern, not mine. I don't even care what they make of the combination: my story and yours. It'll be some story, though. That's the one thing sure."

"You're an absolute brute!" cried Marise.

"What did you expect? You heard from Severance that I was a bounder. I'm a fighting man. That's about all, for the moment."

"You mean, you're fighting me?"

"Not in the least. I'm fighting the battle of appearances, which means I'm fighting for you."

"What makes you think there'll be reporters waiting?" Marise changed the subject. "Did you tell anyone?"

"The manager of your hotel and mine. I didn't tell him in confidence. There was no idea of keeping the marriage a secret, was there?"

"No-o."

"Well, then! Am I or am I not to stop the taxi and get out?"

"Wait," Marise temporised. "You must please understand that I'm not going to live with you as your wife."

"I haven't asked you to do so, although you did ask me to become your husband. After last Sunday, I would never have started the subject, or even have tried to meet you again. Please, on your part, understand that."

The girl's breath was caught away for the dozenth time. She spoke more quietly. "I know you haven't asked me, in so many words," she admitted. "But you spoke of a suite."

"Certainly I spoke of a suite. I thought you and your mother were anxious to keep up conventions. Though I'm not Severance's sort of gentleman – perhaps because I'm not – you can trust me not to behave like a brute, even though you're thinking that I speak like one. Or, if you can't trust me as far as that, you ought never to have run the risk you have run."

"But can I trust you – to keep to the bargain?"

"I've told you that owing to your own act, there is no bargain. Haven't you solved that 'puzzle' yet?"

"I have not."

"You will soon. Do I stop here?"

"Bargain or no bargain then, can I trust you?"

"Look me in the face and judge."

She looked him in the face.

In spite of the war tan, not faded yet, he was pale; and his pupils seemed to have flowed like ink over the yellow-grey iris. His eyes were black as they blazed into hers. He might, she thought, commit murder in that mood, but – he could do nothing mean, nothing sly, nothing vile.

"I must trust you, and I do."

Garth let the speaking-tube fall.

CHAPTER XVIII
AU REVOIR – TILL SOMETIME!

When Marise and Garth arrived together in Mrs. Sorel's salon, it was to find a "bunch" of reporters interviewing the bride's mother.

Marise guessed that Mums had had the young men up in order to tell them what she chose about Major Garth's future movements before Garth had time to arrive and speak for himself. But by these tactics she had lost the supporting presence of Lord Severance. Fearing his uncle, and perhaps even detectives set to spy upon him by Constantine Ionides, the last thing he could afford was to have his name appear in print in connection with this surprise wedding. Fearing reporters, he had not even come to the hotel door with Mrs. Sorel, but had gone with his Colonel to pay respects due to lady Pobblebrook; and this was well, for some sharp eye and stylo would have spotted him even in the background of a taxi.

Mums had not only approved, she had advised this prudence. Everything depended upon it, in fact; and she had soothed Tony by assuring him that she and Marise – or she alone – could deal with Garth if Garth were uppish and needed keeping in his place. It was arranged between Mrs. Sorel and Lord Severance that the latter should come to "Dolores's" dressing-room at the theatre to say good-bye, and Mums would see that he got a few minutes at least alone with Marise. Then, in a few weeks he would be back and they would meet again. Mrs. Sorel had provisionally accepted the loan of Bell Towers until he and Œnone should want the house for themselves, whereupon the Sorels could gracefully retire to some charming place they would hope to find in the neighbourhood.

Of course, this acceptance of Bell Towers must depend upon Marise leaving the stage: but Mums said that, if Tony were indeed shortly to be left a widower, the sooner Marise could be disassociated from the theatre, the better it would be for all concerned.

Thus it happened that when "Major and Mrs. Garth" walked into the room a few minutes after Mums' arrival, they found her as busy with a crowd of reporters as a conjurer who keeps a dozen oranges in the air at once.

Mary Sorel was chagrined at sight of her son-in-law.

Not that she thought of him as such, or as the husband of her daughter. She was a woman whom circumstances had forced to become unscrupulous. Ever since Marise had begun, as a flapper, to show signs of unusual beauty and talent, Mums had buckled on a steely armour in which to fight the world for her girl. Naturally conventional, she had adjusted a nice balance between ambition and conscience. When she was obliged to do a thing in itself objectionable, she hastily gilded it for her own benefit as well as that of Marise, seeing it as she wished it to be. Garth in her eyes, therefore, was no more important than one of the leading men with whom Marise played her star parts; and as – like a leading man – he was to be well paid, he would have no right to obtrude upon the star's private life.

She intended that, no matter how he protested, he should immediately be "called away"; and she had hoped to get just what she wanted scribbled into the notebooks of these reporters before Garth could interfere. Without feeling in the least guilty, therefore, she was upset when he had the bad taste to stalk in with Marise.

"Hello, boys!" he breezily greeted the newspaper men, some of whom he had met before.

They were delighted to see him, as well as Marise, and Mrs. Sorel's painstaking work went by the board in a minute. With rage and anguish she heard Garth say that when he "went West" (no longer in the sad vernacular of soldiers) his wife would go with him.

"She'll be leaving the stage, you know, as soon as she can manage to get free," he explained. "And then I'm going to take her out to my adopted state, Arizona."

His mother-in-law's interpolations that "it must be a long time first" were scarcely heard; and all her "exclusive information" was hurriedly blue-pencilled by the newspaper men. In the midst of this (to her) extremely painful scene, Sheridan and Belloc, author and manager, burst in like a couple of bombs. They had heard the news, and dashed to the Plaza in search of the truth.

"Well, I suppose we ought to congratulate you and all that," grumbled Belloc, when his worst fears had been confirmed by the sight of Garth, well known from journalistic snapshots. "We might have suspected something was in the wind, the way you've been an every-nighter for the 'Spring Song,' Major. But safety first! – and we can't be polite till we're out of the woods. You're not going to tear Miss Sorel away from us, of course, in the midst of the run?"

"Miss Sorel has ceased to exist, hasn't she?" asked Garth, with a rather glum smile.

"Not ceased to exist professionally." Belloc explained his meaning to the lay mind. "And I hope she won't cease for many years."

"If I can answer for her, she'll do no more acting after she's handed in her notice to you – two weeks, I suppose, like most contracts," Garth returned. "It's hard on you, in the middle of a run. But didn't I see in some Sunday supplement a photo of a beautiful young lady, labelled 'Miss Sorel's Understudy'? And as you say 'safety first!' – naturally I put my own safety before yours."

"As if anyone would go to the 'Spring Song' to see Marise's understudy!" broke out Mrs. Sorel.

"Well, in my 'Spring Song' there's no understudy to take her part. She has to play it herself," retorted Garth. "But I leave the decision to her."

As he spoke he looked straight at Marise – a warning look, as she read it. The thought of his threat was sharp as the point of a knife, pricking a painful reminder into her breast.

The girl could hear every word he had said to her in the taxi between church and hotel – hear the whole conversation as though it were being repeated by a gramophone. If she ventured to promise Belloc and Sheridan now that she would stay on in spite of her marriage, this big, uncompromising fellow would turn his back on her, giving to the public some garbled story of the desertion, a story which would shame her and ruin Tony's plans. She could have stamped her foot and burst into tears, as the emotional Spanish "Dolores" had to do in one scene of the play: but the reporters were all eyes and ears, and would simply "eat" an exhibition of the star's fury with her brand-new bridegroom. Oh, she was at the beast's mercy in this first round of their fight – and well he must know it, or he'd not dare give her such a lead!

"Of course Marise wouldn't leave two old friends in the lurch at a fortnight's notice," Mrs. Sorel gave her ultimatum. "This is only a joke of Major Garth's."

"No, Mums, I'm afraid it isn't," said the girl, her cheeks hot, her eyes filling with tears. "We – we were talking things over in the taxi just now, and – and – well anyhow there's a fortnight to get Susanne Neville into shape as Dolores before I have to – go. She's so clever and pretty, I shall probably be jealous as a cat of the hit she makes in 'Dolores.'"

Mrs. Sorel was stricken dumb for once. Not that she intended to let things fall to pieces in any such way; but she was sure Marise wouldn't pronounce what sounded like her own doom without reason. Mums would have it out with Marise and the Terrible Garth when everyone else had safely faded away.

The best she could do was to go herself to the vestibule door when the reporters left in a body and breathe a few words to them. "I wouldn't take all this as being definitely decided, if I were you. There may be a quick change. Better say that nothing's settled." And again, when Belloc and Sheridan gloomily departed, "Don't give up. I'll 'phone you later. There's sure to be better news!"

Returning, Mary Sorel the dauntless was surprised and disgusted to find herself vaguely afraid of the man she had despised. She had the same fear of him that one has of an impersonal force like electricity, which cannot be counted on, and of which little is known except that it may strike without considering one's feelings in the least. She tried to shake off the sensation, however, for the man had evidently hypnotised Marise in some secret, deadly way, perhaps by threats of violence. All was lost if she – Mary – did not keep her head.

She entered the salon, therefore, with a bustling air. "Now, Major Garth," she began, "I hope to hear the meaning of this – this ridiculous talk of my daughter throwing over her engagement and going West with you."

"She's thrown over one engagement in favour of another, hasn't she?" Garth inquired with his habitual quiet insolence. "If you asked the Reverend Mr. Jones, I think he'd say she had."

"I wish to ask no one anything about my daughter," Mrs. Sorel crushed the upstart. "I merely assert that it's time this nonsense ceased. It's gone disastrously far already."

"It's up to you and Marise to say how much further it shall go."

"'Marise'! Who gave you permission to call her Marise?"

Garth laughed. Even the girl uttered a faint hysterical giggle. It was rather funny to hear poor Mums ask that! But then Mums prided herself on having no vulgar sense of humour to interfere with justice.

"What would you like me to call her?" the man wanted to know. "'Miss Sorel' would be hardly proper now. And for a husband to call his wife 'Mrs. Garth' would be more suited, wouldn't it, to the lower circles I sprang from, than the high ones where she moves?"

Mary Sorel was reduced to heaving silence. As she bit her lip, Garth turned to Marise. "Would you prefer me to make things clear to your mother, or would you rather I'd go, and leave it to you?"

Marise snatched at the chance he gave. "Go, please," she answered quickly. "I'll – tell Mums what you – said in the taxi. She and I will talk things over, and – and I'll see you again to-morrow or sometime."

"Or sometime," he echoed.

The girl expected him to remind her rudely of the bridal suite he had engaged in the hotel, but he did not. He took up his smart Guards cap, laid the handsome lavender-grey overcoat on his arm, and went to the door. "Au revoir," he said, pronouncing his French remarkably well for a man of the lower stratum. Then, without a word as to the next meeting, in spite of all his threats, he was gone.

What did it mean? Marise asked herself. Had he been bluffing? Or had he seen the monstrous folly of terrorising her? She would have given much to know. Perhaps he guessed that!

Ostentatiously Mums flew to lock the door. She locked it loudly, and running back took Marise into her arms. "My poor child!" she wailed. "What has he done to you? You are like a dove with a snake!"

Strange, that in a turmoil of anger and dread as she was, Marise was continually wanting to laugh! The thought of herself as a fluttering dove and the big, brutal Garth as a sinuous snake was comic! But there was, alas, nothing else comic in the situation, and she explained it as she saw it, while Mums punctuated each sentence with moans.

"It's awful!" sighed Mary at last. "But there's nothing really to be feared, so we must cheer up. Our protection is that this fellow's poor as a church rat (I can't call him a mouse!). When it comes to the point he will have to toe the mark, and keep to his bargain – "

"Ah, that's it!" cried Marise. "He says through my action the bargain is off. He wouldn't explain what he meant: said I'd see for myself sooner or later. But I don't see yet. Do you?"

"I do not, indeed. I believe it's only more wicked bluff on his part. He talks of taking you West with him. What does he expect you to live on? Your own money? He hasn't got his million dollars yet, and he'll lose the lot unless he behaves himself," Mums laid down the law. "For goodness' sake, though, don't complain to Tony of the creature's threats! Tony would fight him – kill him, perhaps. What a sickening scandal! No, you've made an appalling mistake by marrying Garth before you needed to do so, and giving him a hold over you just as Tony is going so far away. But you can take care of yourself – or if you can't I can take care of you. As for this suite the man boasts about, I'll 'phone down now to the manager and question him. If it adjoins this, as it probably does – that would have been arranged if possible, no doubt – why, everything will be simple enough."

Marise did not answer. She was beginning to think that nothing was quite simple where Garth was concerned.