Success, A Novel

Deep in work at her desk, Camilla Van Arsdale noted, with the outer tentacles of her mind, slow footsteps outside and a stir of air that told of the door being opened.  Without lifting her head she called: 

“You’ll find towels and a bathrobe in the passageway.”

There was no reply.  Miss Van Arsdale twisted in her chair, gave one look, rose and strode to the threshold where Io Welland stood rigid and still.

“What is it?” she demanded sharply.

The girl’s hands gripped a folded newspaper.  She lifted it as if for Miss Van Arsdale’s acceptance, then let it fall to the floor.  Her throat worked, struggling for utterance, as it might be against the pressure of invisible fingers.

“The beast!  Oh, the beast!” she whispered.

The older woman threw an arm over her shoulders and led her to the big chair before the fireplace.  Io let herself be thrust into it, stiff and unyielding as a manikin.  Any other woman but Camilla Van Arsdale would have asked questions.  She went more directly to the point.  Picking up the newspaper she opened it.  Halfway across an inside page ran the explanation of Io’s collapse.

BRITON’S BEAUTIFUL FIANCEE LOST

read the caption, in the glaring vulgarity of extra-heavy type, and below;

Ducal Heir Offers Private Reward to Dinner Party of Friends

After an estimating look at the girl, who sat quite still with hot, blurred eyes, Miss Van Arsdale carefully read the article through.

“Here is advertising enough to satisfy the greediest appetite for print,” she remarked grimly.

“He’s on one of his brutal drunks.”  The words seemed to grit in the girl’s throat.  “I wish he were dead!  Oh, I wish he were dead!”

Miss Van Arsdale laid hold on her shoulders and shook her hard.  “Listen to me, Irene Welland.  You’re on the way to hysterics or some such foolishness.  I won’t have it!  Do you understand?  Are you listening to me?”

“I’m listening.  But it won’t make any difference what you say.”

“Look at me.  Don’t stare into nothingness that way.  Have you read this?”

“Enough of it.  It ends everything.”

“I should hope so, indeed.  My dear!” The woman’s voice changed and softened.  “You haven’t found that you cared for him, after all, more than you thought?  It isn’t that?”

“No; it isn’t that.  It’s the beastliness of the whole thing.  It’s the disgrace.”

Miss Van Arsdale turned to the paper again.

“Your name isn’t given.”

“It might as well be.  As soon as it gets back to New York, every one will know.”

“If I read correctly between the lines of this scurrilous thing, Mr. Holmesley gave what was to have been his bachelor dinner, took too much to drink, and suggested that every man there go on a separate search for the lost bride offering two thousand dollars reward for the one who found her.  Apparently it was to have been quite private, but it leaked out.  There’s a hint that he had been drinking heavily for some days.”

“My fault,” declared Io feverishly.  “He told me once that if ever I played anything but fair with him, he’d go to the devil the quickest way he could.”

“Then he’s a coward,” pronounced Miss Van Arsdale vigorously.

“What am I?  I didn’t play fair with him.  I practically jilted him without even letting him know why.”

Miss Van Arsdale frowned.  “Didn’t you send him word?”

“Yes.  I telegraphed him.  I told him I’d write and explain.  I haven’t written.  How could I explain?  What was there to say?  But I ought to have said something.  Oh, Miss Van Arsdale, why didn’t I write!”

“But you did intend to go on and face him and have it out.  You told me that.”

A faint tinge of color relieved the white rigidity of Io’s face.  “Yes,” she agreed.  “I did mean it.  Now it’s too late and I’m disgraced.”

“Don’t be melodramatic.  And don’t waste yourself in self-pity.  To-morrow you’ll see things clearer, after you’ve slept.”

“Sleep?  I couldn’t.”  She pressed both hands to her temples, lifting tragic and lustrous eyes to her companion.  “I think my head is going to burst from trying not to think.”

After some hesitancy Miss Van Arsdale went to a wall-cabinet, took out a phial, shook into her hand two little pellets, and returned the phial, carefully locking the cabinet upon it.

“Take a hot bath,” she directed.  “Then I’m going to give you just a little to eat.  And then these.”  She held out the drug.

Io acquiesced dully.

Early in the morning, before the first forelight of dawn had started the birds to prophetic chirpings, the recluse heard light movements in the outer room.  Throwing on a robe she went in to investigate.  On the bearskin before the flickering fire sat Io, an apparition of soft curves.

“D—­d—­don’t make a light,” she whimpered.  “I’ve been crying.”

“That’s good.  The best thing you could do.”

“I want to go home,” wailed Io.

“That’s good, too.  Though perhaps you’d better wait a little.  Why, in particular do you want to go home?”

“I w-w-w-want to m-m-marry Delavan Eyre.”

A quiver of humor trembled about the corners of Camilla Van Arsdale’s mouth.  “Echoes of remorse,” she commented.

“No.  It isn’t remorse.  I want to feel safe, secure.  I’m afraid of things.  I want to go to-morrow.  Tell Mr. Banneker he must arrange it for me.”

“We’ll see.  Now you go back to bed and sleep.”

“I’d rather sleep here,” said Io.  “The fire is so friendly.”  She curled herself into a little soft ball.

Her hostess threw a coverlet over her and returned to her own room.

When light broke, there was no question of Io’s going that day, even had accommodations been available.  A clogging lassitude had descended upon her, the reaction of cumulative nervous stress, anesthetizing her will, her desires, her very limbs.  She was purposeless, ambitionless, except to lie and rest and seek for some resolution of peace out of the tangled web wherein her own willfulness had involved her.

“The best possible thing,” said Camilla Van Arsdale.  “I’ll write your people that you are staying on for a visit.”

“Yes; they won’t mind.  They’re used to my vagaries.  It’s awfully good of you.”

At noon came Banneker to see Miss Welland.  Instead he found a curiously reticent Miss Van Arsdale.  Miss Welland was not feeling well and could not be seen.

“Not her head again, is it?” asked Banneker, alarmed.

“More nerves, though the head injury probably contributed.”

“Oughtn’t I to get a doctor?”

“No.  All that she needs is rest.”

“She left the station yesterday without a word.”

“Yes,” replied the non-committal Miss Van Arsdale.

“I came over to tell her that there isn’t a thing to be had going west.  Not even an upper.  There was an east-bound in this morning.  But the schedule isn’t even a skeleton yet.”

“Probably she won’t be going for several days yet,” said Miss Van Arsdale, and was by no means reassured by the unconscious brightness which illumined Banneker’s face.  “When she goes it will be east.  She’s changed her plans.”

“Give me as much notice as you can and I’ll do my best for her.”

The other nodded.  “Did you get any newspapers by the train?” she inquired.

“Yes; there was a mail in.  I had a letter, too,” he added after a little hesitation, due to the fact that he had intended telling Miss Welland about that letter first.  Thus do confidences, once begun, inspire even the self-contained to further confidences.

“You know there was a reporter up from Angelica City writing up the wreck.”

“Yes.”

“Gardner, his name is.  A nice sort of fellow.  I showed him some nonsense that I wrote about the wreck.”

“You?  What kind of nonsense?”

“Oh, just how it struck me, and the queer things people said and did.  He took it with him.  Said it might give him some ideas.”

“One might suppose it would.  Did it?”

“Why, he didn’t use it.  Not that way.  He sent it to the New York Sphere for what he calls a ‘Sunday special,’ and what do you think!  They accepted it.  He had a wire.”

“As Gardner’s?”

“Oh, no.  As the impressions of an eye-witness.  What’s more, they’ll pay for it and he’s to send me the check.”

“Then, in spite of a casual way of handling other people’s ideas, Mr. Gardner apparently means to be honest.”

“It’s more than square of him.  I gave him the stuff to use as he wanted to.  He could just as well have collected for it.  Probably he touched it up, anyway.”

“The Goths and Vandals usually did ‘touch up’ whatever they acquired, I believe.  Hasn’t he sent you a copy?”

“He’s going to send it.  Or bring it.”

“Bring it?  What should attract him to Manzanita again?”

“Something mysterious.  He says that there’s a big sensational story following on the wreck that he’s got a clue to; a tip, he calls it.”

“That’s strange.  Where did this tip come from?  Did he say?”

Miss Van Arsdale frowned.

“New York, I think.  He spoke of its being a special job for The Sphere.”

“Are you going to help him?”

“If I can.  He’s been white to me.”

“But this isn’t white, if it’s what I suspect.  It’s yellow.  One of their yellow sensations.  The Sphere goes in for that sort of thing.”

Miss Van Arsdale became silent and thoughtful.

“Of course, if it’s something to do with the railroad I’d have to be careful.  I can’t give away the company’s affairs.”

“I don’t think it is.”  Miss Van Arsdale’s troubled eyes strayed toward the inner room.

Following them, Banneker’s lighted up with a flash of astonished comprehension.

“You don’t think—­” he began.

His friend nodded assent.

“Why should the newspapers be after her?”

“She is associated with a set that is always in the lime-light,” explained Miss Van Arsdale, lowering her voice to a cautious pitch.  “It makes its own lime-light.  Anything that they do is material for the papers.”

“Yes; but what has she done?”

“Disappeared.”

“Not at all.  She sent back messages.  So there can’t be any mystery about it.”

“But there might be what the howling headlines call ‘romance.’  In fact, there is, if they happen to have found out about it.  And this looks very much as if they had.  Ban, are you going to tell your reporter friend about Miss Welland?”

Banneker smiled gently, indulgently.  “Do you think it likely?”

“No; I don’t.  But I want you to understand the importance of not betraying her in any way.  Reporters are shrewd.  And it might be quite serious for her to know that she was being followed and hounded now.  She has had a shock.”

“The bump on the head, you mean?”

“Worse than that.  I think I’d better tell you since we are all in this thing together.”

Briefly she outlined the abortive adventure that had brought Io west, and its ugly outcome.

“Publicity is the one thing we must protect her from,” declared Miss Van Arsdale.

“Yes; that’s clear enough.”

“What shall you tell this Gardner man?”

“Nothing that he wants to know.”

“You’ll try to fool him?”

“I’m an awfully poor liar, Miss Camilla,” replied the agent with his disarming smile.  “I don’t like the game and I’m no good at it.  But I can everlastingly hold my tongue.”

“Then he’ll suspect something and go nosing about the village making inquiries.”

“Let him.  Who can tell him anything?  Who’s even seen her except you and me?”

“True enough.  Nobody is going to see her for some days yet if I can help it.  Not even you, Ban.”

“Is she as bad as that?” he asked anxiously.

“She won’t be any the better for seeing people,” replied Miss Van Arsdale firmly, and with that the caller was forced to be content as he went back to his own place.

The morning train of the nineteenth, which should have been the noon train of the eighteenth, deposited upon the platform Gardner of the Angelica City Herald, and a suitcase.  The thin and bespectacled reporter shook hands with Banneker.

“Well, Mr. Man,” he observed.  “You’ve made a hit with that story of yours even before it’s got into print.”

“Did you bring me a copy of the paper?”

Gardner grinned.  “You seem to think Sunday specials are set up and printed overnight.  Wait a couple of weeks.”

“But they’re going to publish it?”

“Surest thing you know.  They’ve wired me to know who you are and what and why.”

“Why what?”

“Oh, I dunno.  Why a fellow who can do that sort of thing hasn’t done it before or doesn’t do it some more, I suppose.  If you should ever want a job in the newspaper game, that story would be pretty much enough to get it for you.”

“I wouldn’t mind getting a little local correspondence to do,” announced Banneker modestly.

“So you intimated before.  Well, I can give you some practice right now.  I’m on a blind trail that goes up in the air somewhere around here.  Do you remember, we compared lists on the wreck?”

“Yes.”

“Have you got any addition to your list since?”

“No,” replied Banneker.  “Have you?” he added.

“Not by name.  But the tip is that there was a prominent New York society girl, one of the Four Hundred lot, on the train, and that she’s vanished.”

“All the bodies were accounted for,” said the agent.

“They don’t think she’s dead.  They think she’s run away.”

“Run away?” repeated Banneker with an impassive face.

“Whether the man was with her on the train or whether she was to join him on the coast isn’t known.  That’s the worst of these society tips,” pursued the reporter discontentedly.  “They’re always vague, and usually wrong.  This one isn’t even certain about who the girl is.  But they think it’s Stella Wrightington,” he concluded in the manner of one who has imparted portentous tidings.

“Who’s she?” said Banneker.

“Good Lord!  Don’t you ever read the news?” cried the disgusted journalist.  “Why, she’s had her picture published more times than a movie queen.  She’s the youngest daughter of Cyrus Wrightington, the multi-millionaire philanthropist.  Now did you see anything of that kind on the train?”

“What does she look like?” asked the cautious Banneker.

“She looks like a million dollars!” declared the other with enthusiasm.  “She’s a killer!  She’s tall and blonde and a great athlete:  baby-blue eyes and general rosebud effect.”

“Nothing of that sort on the train, so far as I saw,” said the agent.

“Did you see any couple that looked lovey-dovey?”

“No.”

“Then, there’s another tip that connects her up with Carter Holmesley.  Know about him?”

“I’ve seen his name.”

“He’s been on a hell of a high-class drunk, all up and down the coast, for the last week or so.  Spilled some funny talk at a dinner, that got into print.  But he put up such a heavy bluff of libel, afterward, that the papers shied off.  Just the same, I believe they had it right, and that there was to have been a wedding-party on.  Find the girl:  that’s the stunt now.”

“I don’t think you’re likely to find her around here.”

“Maybe not.  But there’s something.  Holmesley has beaten it for the Far East.  Sailed yesterday.  But the story is still in this country, if the lady can be rounded up….  Well, I’m going to the village to make inquiries.  Want to put me up again for the night if there’s no train back?”

“Sure thing!  There isn’t likely to be, either.”

Banneker felt greatly relieved at the easy turn given to the inquiry by the distorted tip.  True, Gardner might, on his return, enter upon some more embarrassing line of inquiry; in which case the agent decided to take refuge in silence.  But the reporter, when he came back late in the evening disheartened and disgusted with the fallibility of long-distance tips, declared himself sick of the whole business.

“Let’s talk about something else,” he said, having lighted his pipe.  “What else have you written besides the wreck stuff?”

“Nothing,” said Banneker.

“Come off!  That thing was never a first attempt.”

“Well, nothing except random things for my own amusement.”

“Pass ’em over.”

Banneker shook his head.  “No; I’ve never shown them to anybody.”

“Oh, all right.  If you’re shy about it,” responded the reporter good-humoredly.  “But you must have thought of writing as a profession.”

“Vaguely, some day.”

“You don’t talk much like a country station-agent.  And you don’t act like one.  And, judging from this room”—­he looked about at the well-filled book-shelves—­“you don’t look like one.  Quite a library.  Harvey Wheelwright!  Lord!  I might have known.  Great stuff, isn’t it?”

“Do you think so?”

“Do I think so!  I think it’s the damndest spew that ever got into print.  But it sells; millions.  It’s the piety touch does it.  The worst of it is that Wheelwright is a thoroughly decent chap and not onto himself a bit.  Thinks he’s a grand little booster for righteousness, sweetness and light, and all that.  I had to interview him once.  Oh, if I could just have written about him and his stuff as it really is!”

“Why didn’t you?”

“Why, he’s a popular literary hero out our way, and the biggest advertised author in the game.  I’d look fine to the business office, knocking their fat graft, wouldn’t I!”

“I don’t believe I understand.”

“No; you wouldn’t.  Never mind.  You will if you ever get into the game.  Hello!  This is something different again.  ‘The Undying Voices.’  Do you go in for poetry?”

“I like to read it once in a while.”

“Good man!” Gardner took down the book, which opened in his hand.  He glanced into it, then turned an inquiring and faintly quizzical look upon Banneker.  “So Rossetti is one of the voices that sings to you.  He sang to me when I was younger and more romantic.  Heavens! he can sing, can’t he!  And you’ve picked one of his finest for your floral decoration.”  He intoned slowly and effectively: 

“Ah, who shall dare to search in what sad maze Thenceforth their incommunicable ways Follow the desultory feet of Death?”

Banneker took the book from him.  Upon the sonnet a crushed bloom of the sage had left its spiced and fragrant stain.  How came it there?  Through but one possible agency of which Banneker could think.  Io Welland!

After the reporter had left him, Banneker bore the volume to his room and read the sonnet again and again, devout and absorbed, a seeker for the oracle.