To Kitty at this moment one must be able to the Irish; and nobody or can or will. Consider her twenty-four years, her inheritance, the love of and the love of adventure. Imagine ideas of life and the ability to apply them, and always off on some highway—more often than not by some of a novelist—and you will be able to a of Kitty Conover.
That might be actually on its deathbed, that positively of the world was and and going through the of the German touched her in a way. She sorry, sorry, for the things; but as she not help them she them from her every after she had read the paper, the way most of us do here in these United States. You cannot with the of an unknown person thousand miles away.
That which had taken place the past twenty-four hours was to her a lark, a blindman's for grown-ups. It was not in her to tremble, to shudder, to hesitate, to this and to that. Irish curiosity. Perhaps in the original that line read: “The Irish in where to tread,” and some had a particular against the race.
When the the seventeenth floor, the forth. All Kitty, who tarried.
“We don't to the eighteenth, miss.
“I am Miss Conover,” she replied. “I not tell you until we were alone.”
“I see.” The boy nodded, her with an glance, and sent the up to the loft.
“You understand? If any one about me, you don't remember.”
“Yes, miss. The boss's orders.”
“And if any one you are to report at once.”
“That, too.”
The boy rolled the door and Kitty out upon a Laristan of rose and blue. She what it cost Cutty to keep up an like this. There were fourteen rooms, seven the north and seven the west, with of steam-wreathed and Matterhorns and the the sea. Fine and and from the four ends of the world; but and in no of the museum. Cutty had excellent taste.
She had visited the but twice before, once in her and again when she was eighteen. Cutty had a dinner in of her mother's birthday. She as she the incident. Cutty had a box of at the of her mother's plate and told her to as many into the cake as she best.
“Hello!” said Cutty, from one of the doors. “What the have you been up to? My man has just me that he of you in Wanamaker's.”
Kitty explained, delighted.
“Well, well! If you can a man such as I set to watch you, you'll have no trouble the others.”
“It was Karlov, Cutty.”
“How did you learn?”
“Searched the and a of him. Positively Karlov. How is the patient?”
“Harrison says he's amazingly. A skull. He'll be up for his in no time.”
“How do you do it?” she asked with a gesture.
“Do what?”
“Manage a place like this? In a office district. It's the most in New York. Riverside has nothing like it. It must cost like sixty.”
“The is mine, Kitty. That makes it possible. An uncle who I money and the that go with it, died and left it to me.”
“Why, Cutty, you must be rich!”
“I'm sorry. What can I do? I can't give it away.”
“But you don't have to work!”
“Oh, yes, I do. I'm that kind. I'd die of a if I had to still. It's the game.”
“Did mother know?”
“Yes.”
With the toe of a little Kitty an a pattern in the rug.
“Love is a thing,” was her comment.
“It sure is, old-timer. But what put the into your head?”
“I was how very much must have been in love with father.”
“But she that I loved her, Kitty.”
“What's that got to do with it? If she had wanted money you wouldn't have had the least in the world.”
“Probably not! But what would you have done in your mother's place?”
“Snapped you up like that!” Kitty back.
“You little—little—”
“Liar. Say it!” Kitty laughed. “But am I a little liar? I don't know. It would be an temptation. Somebody to wait on you; of flowers when you wanted them; and and and limousines. I've often what I should do if I myself with love and on one and money and on the other. I've always been in circumstances. I a in all my days when I didn't think I ought to have three or four of it. You can't know, Cutty, what it is to be and want and good times. Of course. I couldn't just money. There would have to be some of a man to go with it. Someone to make me sometimes that I'd away a lover for a pocket-book.”
“Would you me, Kitty?”
“Are you serious?”
“Let's I am.”
“No. I couldn't you, Cutty I should always be having my mother's as a rival.”
“But I in love with you?”
“Then I'd always be your constancy. But what talk!”'
“Kitty, you're a joy! Lordy, my luck in in to see you yesterday!”
“And a little like me calling a great man like you Cutty!”
“Well, if it you, you might to papa once in a while.”
Kitty's the corridor. “I'll that I want to make you mad. Who's here?”
“Nobody but Harrison and the nurse. Both good citizens, and I've taken them into my to a extent. You can talk them.”
“Am I to see the patient?”
“Harrison says not. About Wednesday your Two-Hawks will be up. I've to keep the here until he can take of himself. But he is broke.”
“He said he had money.”
“Well, Karlov's men him clean.”
“Have you any idea who he is?”
“To be honest, that's one of the why I want to keep him here. He's Russian, for all his Oxford English and his Italian gestures; and from his I he's been through seven of hell. Torches and and the call for a woman named Olga—a woman about eighteen.”
“How did you that out?”
“From a photograph I in the of his coat. A girl.”
“Good heavens!”—recollecting her dream. “Where was it printed?”
“Amateur photography. I'll it up on the way to the room.”
It was nothing like the girl of her dream. Still, the girl was charming. Kitty over the photograph. There was on the back.
“Russian? What it say?”
“'To Ivan from Olga with all her love.'”
Cutty was of the presence of an in his tones. Why the should he be bitter—glad that the had left a sweetheart? He the of Kitty's interest, as as that of a going to a fire. On the day the patient himself, Kitty's would cease. An old dog in the manger? Malice.
“Cutty, something has to this woman. That's what makes him out the name. Caught in that horror, and he alone escaped. Is it to be I'm an American? Do they let in these Russians?”
“Not since the Trotzky regime. I Two-Hawks through on some British passport. He'll tell us all about it when he comes round. But how do you after last night's bout?”
“Alive! And I'm going on being alive, and ever! Oh, those drums! They look like in those corners. Tumpitum-tump! Tumpitum-tump!” she cried, her arm in his. “What a view! Just what I'm going to do when my ship comes in—live in a loft. I I up here—I worth-while I and sell.”
“It's yours if you want it when I leave.”
“And I'd have a time to my friends! You old innocent! ... Or are you so innocent?”
“We do live in a world. But I meant it. Don't to to Tony Bernini when you home to-night.”
“I promise.
“Why the gurgle?”
“Because I'm excited. All my life I've wanted to do things. I've been with the audience all the while, and I want to be with the actors.”
“You'll give some man a wild dance.”
“If I do I'll with him. Now lead me to the cookies.”
She was the life of the tea table. Her wit, her effervescence, her the Miss Frances. When she the of the fan, Cutty and Harrison laughed so that the nurse had to put her on her lips. They might wake the patient.
“I am in him,” on Kitty. “I won't it. I want to see how it's going to turn out. He was very after I let him into the kitchen. A perfectly English manner and voice, and Italian when off his guard. I so sorry for him. What we are to each other! Until the we the Canadians. The British didn't know us at all, and the French with the British for the time in history. And the German he us all and nobody. All the Russians I saw were of the type; so that the word Russian up two pictures—the at Monte Carlo and a of men who wear long and when it rains. Think of it! For the time since God set on earth are acquainted. I saw a Russian of this type before.”.
“A in the whirlpool.—Anyhow, we'll keep him here until he's on his feet. By the way, answer any telephone call—I mean, go on a call—unless you are sure of the speaker.”
“I to important.”
“You are important. You have a link this Karlov and the man we wish to protect. I'll I wanted you out of that at first; but when I saw that you were on remaining, I to make use of you.”
“You are going to give me a part in the play?”
“Yes. You are to go about your as always, just as if nothing had happened. Only when you wish to come here will you play any game like that of to-day. Then it will be advisable. Switch your each time. Your part is to be that of lure. Through you we shall learn who Karlov's are. If you don't to play the role all you have to do is to move.”
“The idea! I'm for anything. You men will understand. You go into the world each day—politics, diplomacy, commerce, war—while we at home and or or take of the or make over our and or do work or play the piano or read. Never any adventure. Never any games. Never any clubs. The your house to go to the office is an adventure. A train from here to Philadelphia is an adventure. We are always it. And about all we can out of life is shopping and the after marriage, and going to the marriage with men our fathers don't like. We can't the and the of our more sisters the way you men do. When you see a woman on the do you stop to think that there are ten at home their out? Of you don't. So I'm going through with this, to satisfy instincts; and I shan't promise to along as usual.”
“They may attempt to you, Kitty.”
“That doesn't me.”
“So I observe. But if they should have the luck to you, tell all you know at once. There's only one way up here—the elevator. I can out to the fire escape, but none can in from that direction, as the door is of steel.”
“And, of course, you'll take me into your completely?”
“When the time comes. Half the fun in an is the of the unexpected,” said Cutty.
“Where did you meet Stefani Gregor?”
Captain Harrison laughed. He liked this girl. She was and be upon, as last night's work. Her in being pretty, in looking upon this as a of game, when it was tragedy.
“What makes you think I know Stefani Gregor?” asked Cutty, curious.
“When I that name you upon me as if I had you.”
“Very well. When we learn who Two-Hawks is I'll tell you what I know about Gregor. And in the meantime you will be under guard. You are an asset, Kitty, to you. Captain Harrison is going to for dinner. Won't you join us?”
“I'm going to a studio with some girls. And it's time I was on the way. I'll let your Tony Bernini know. Home at ten.”
Cutty with her to the and when he returned to the tea table he sat without speaking.
“Why not her yourself,” Harrison, “if you don't want her in this?”
“She would me.”
“If she it out.”
“She's the who would. What do you think of her, Miss Frances?”
“I think she is wonderful. Frankly, I should tell her everything—if there is anything more to be told.”
When dinner was over, the nurse gone to the patient and Captain Harrison to his club, Cutty his pipe and the of his study. Ever since Kitty's he had been over in his mind a plan her future—to add a to his will, her five thousand a year, so Molly's girl might always have a for her beauty. The of it was that him the of settling the upon her at once, while she was young. He might her; you tell. Anyhow, he would see to the codicil. An accident might step in.
He got out his chrysoprase. In one of the room there was a large portfolio such as use for their proofs and sketches; and from this he took a dozen twelve-by-fourteen-inch of women, most of them stage of years. The one on top to be Patti. The Patti!... Linda, Violetta, Lucia. Lord, what a she had been! He laughed the photograph on the desk, and his hand into a with green which would have great value if people more about them; for nothing else in the world is so green.
He above the and across the throat. Suddenly a took place. The of the and and slate-blue ones replaced them. The odd part of it was, he not the for the of the actual. Patti, with slate-blue eyes! He the photograph and another. He the game and was just the attack on the problem in his mind when the again. Kitty's eyes! What nonsense! Kitty had to his of her mother. Twenty-four and fifty-two. And yet, hadn't he just read that Maeterlinck, fifty-six, had married Mademoiselle Dahon, many years younger?
In a of he pushed his chair and to pacing, and and of and him. The only light was upon the desk, so he might have been some god cloud-riven Olympus in the twilight. By and by he laughed; and the atmosphere—mental—cleared. Maeterlinck, fifty-six, and Cutty, fifty-two, were two different men. Cutty might mix his occasionally, but he wasn't going to mix his ghosts.
He returned to his game. More and necklaces; and his brain took of the which had in the him to the green stones.
Two-Hawks. That name him. He he had it before, but in the Russian tongue. It might be that the had been Kitty. Still, he had also called himself Hawksley.
The thickened; there were of matches. One by one Cutty the photographs, them on the his chair, his mind this way and that for a solution. He had now come to the point where he to see the or the green stones. The movements of his hands were almost automatic. And in this manner he came to the last photograph. He a necklace and an earring.
It was a face—black that you; full lipped; every of fire and genius. It must be that he saw the when he played this game. It wasn't an pastime, a relaxation. It was a game of solitaire, the and being for cards; and in some manner it permitted him to upon problem his thoughts. It was purely that he saw Patti to-night or her art. Coming upon the last photograph without having a of the of Two-Hawks he the pressure; and his its ability to focus.
“Good Lord!” he ejaculated.
He the photograph excitedly, the green stones. She! The Calabrian, the who had from the world at the of her fame, thirty-odd years gone! Two-Hawks!
Cutty saw himself at twenty, in the at La Scala, with music-mad Milan all about him. Two-Hawks! He now. The the had her she had been by her mother and aunt, fierce-beaked Calabrians, who had that Rosa should herself away on some Adonis.
And this was her son! Yesterday, rich and powerful, with a name that was open he went; to-day, hunted, penniless, and forlorn. Cutty in his chair, by the revelation. In that room yonder!
