Rex Stout - 1917 - An Officer and a Lady Page 4

  The clerk smiled affably.

  “The ticket is two years old, pobrecito,” he said, “and wasn’t worth a centava even then.”

  “But the Señor said”—began ’Nuncio pleadingly.

  The clerk only nodded pleasantly toward the door and commenced to talk to the little stenographer.

  Annuncio stumbled to the sidewalk and started slowly away. He thought dazedly of his long journey home on foot and of the sad news he must tell his wife. Someone gave him a peseta and bade him get a drink. He went to a nearby store and purchased a bottle of mezcal, stupidly wondering if the Señor would ever bring back his precious violin, now that the lottery ticket was no good. Surely so kind a man as the Señor would not keep a poor man’s property if he knew.

  Thus sorrowfully musing, Annuncio wandered to the edge of town and took up the long way back to Eulalia. But now the road seemed strangely long to his tired feet. He began to resort to frequent drinks from the bottle. After a time he sat down to rest by the roadside. Some vehicle was coming from the city. Maybe they were coming after him to say that there had been some mistake. Or perhaps it was the mail coche to San Luis. Then he recognized the mayor’s equipage. Ah yes, ’Nuncio remembered this was the evening of the grand baile at Madero’s, and doubtless the Señor Corregidor was overtaking him on his way thither. And would the Señor be so kind as to give him a lift, being very tired with the long walk? Of a certainty the Señor would. ’Nuncio might get up on the seat with the driver.

  Thankfully he did so, and the coche proceeded toward the Madero ranch, the hacienda next beyond his own humble adobe. Little by little ’Nuncio’s body relaxed, lulled by the easy rolling coche, and soon he forgot the troubles of the day, lost in a half-dream of near-forgotten melodies.

  But suddenly, in front of them, through the gathering dusk of the autumn evening, a glorious, scarlet burst of flame leaped quivering into the air. Annuncio started up.

  “Jesus Maria,” he said, dully, “our little plan!”

  The Infernal Feminine

  YOUNG STAFFORD DEVOTED A FULL hour to the note, and even then was unable to satisfy himself. It was the ninth draft that he finally decided to send, and he folded it and sealed the envelope with the air of a philosopher who realizes how far short of the perfect are our most earnest endeavors. The note read as follows:

  Dear Miss Blair:

  I have been in New York two months; just long enough to form a decision that it is for the most part an exceedingly over-praised institution. Then, last night, a friend took me to see “Winning Winona,” and the moment you appeared on the stage that decision was reversed.

  I shall not apologize for the informality of this; if you are inclined to be offended it would be useless. I shall only say that I wish very much to have the pleasure of meeting you, and that, having studied you for two hours, I know you will at least be kind enough to accept my best and most tender regards and wishes.

  Yours sincerely,

  Arnold Stafford.

  Now, despite this evidence to the contrary submitted in black and white, Arnold Stafford was a sensible youth. There comes a time in the life of every man when he feels an overwhelming impulse to send a note to a musical comedy soubrette; and it is no credit to him if he is too cowardly or too cautious to yield to it. And when the soubrette happens to be Betty Blair—well, have you ever seen her?

  As for the merit of the note itself, it must be admitted that it was a rather curious performance. It had a curtness and brevity that was almost legal—which perhaps was an effect intended deliberately. Anyway, it must be remembered that Stafford was wholly without experience in the matter.

  The important thing is, it produced results. It was the third morning after sending his note that Stafford found in his mail a gray, severe envelope. Tearing it open, he read as follows:

  Dear Mr. Stafford—You may meet me—if you will—at the stage door after the performance on Friday evening.

  Sincerely,

  Betty Blair.

  If Stafford had been a member of that gilded brotherhood which impedes the traffic of Broadway without any apparent purpose other than to prove that an animal with two legs is not necessarily a man, this seeming compliance on the part of Miss Blair would have filled him with suspicion. But as he was merely a promising young lawyer, with more or less of an excuse for existence, he was only pleased and a little surprised. As he attempted to convey to his tailor some idea of the importance of the occasion for which certain repairs were necessary, he realized that he was getting considerably more than he had dared to expect.

  On Tuesday evening he went again to see “Winning Winona,” also, on Wednesday and Thursday. He was forced to miss the Wednesday matinée only by a business engagement, which it was impossible to postpone, and yet the dawning of Friday saw, if anything, an increase of his impatience and eagerness. That is what raised Stafford’s whim to the dignity of passion. An infatuation that can withstand four performances of a popular Broadway show is not a thing to be regarded lightly, as an invitation to supper or a wedding engagement. It approaches the divine.

  As is entirely proper in such cases, Stafford harbored no serious intentions. He was not entirely unsophisticated, and he knew very well that one goes to supper with an actress just as he goes to dinner with an appetite, or to church with a Bible. It is true that he was finding it difficult to reconcile this approved viewpoint with his own tumultuous feelings and eager expectation, but he accounted for the difference on the charge of novelty, and gave his undivided attention to the arrangement of his toilet and the choice of a restaurant.

  Friday’s performance of Broadway’s newest hit, though in reality sadly similar to all the others, seemed to Stafford to be invested with a particular charm and freshness. That was due to the fact that he took no notice of it whatever; his mind was entirely occupied with wild admiration of Betty Blair when she was on the stage, and restless impatience when she wasn’t. He felt a sort of pity mingled with superiority, for the rest of the audience, who had to be content with their seats in the fifth row—or the fifteenth, which was worse—and share the glances of the divine Betty with anyone who had two dollars and a distaste for music. Then, reflecting that such a sentiment hardly suited a blase man of the world—which role he had definitely decided to assume—he spent the entire third act in the lobby, smoking cigarettes and looking as tired as possible.

  He carefully avoided all appearance of haste. As the audience emerged from the theater he leaned against a nearby pillar and surveyed them, individually and collectively, with a cold and cheerless eye. Then he sauntered leisurely around to the stage door—and noted with alarm that members of the company were already leaving. He approached the guardian of the door and addressed him in a voice of anxiety.

  “Has Miss Blair come out yet?”

  The man in uniform eyed him a moment impassively, then his face brightened up. “Miss Blair? What is your name, please.”

  Stafford handed him a card, and he disappeared in the narrow hall. A minute passed—two—then out into the white blaze of the arc over the entrance came Miss Betty Blair, with a dainty step and an entrancing swish. As Stafford advanced to meet her, hat in hand, she looked up inquiringly, smiled sweetly and said, in a silvery April-shower voice:

  “Mr. Stafford? I’m so pleased to meet you.”

  Those persons who are inclined to regard Stafford unfavorably, from whatever viewpoint, would do well to remember that the lure of the actress has been felt by more than one man worthy of the name, from Louis the Fourteenth down—or up—to Richard Le Gallienne. Her only business is to be charming, her only care is to entertain, her only desire is to please; for the public, of course. And thrice happy is the man who is able, even for one brief hour, to monopolize those melting glances, those musical tones and those pretty gestures! Studied or ingenuous, it matters not; they are there, and they are irresistible. Besides, do we not hear the man at the next table tell his companion that “that is Betty Blair?”

  Such was the delightful tenor of Stafford’s reflections as he led the way to a table in the tastefully subdued supper room at the Vanderbilt. It was, as he had hoped it would be, crowded. The soft carpets caressed his feet; a Viennese waltz sounded in his ears; the second glances at Betty Blair filled his heart with pride and his chest with wind. He motioned the waiter aside and himself adjusted her chair and arranged her cape. Then, after giving their order, he sat and regarded her expectantly, still scenting vaguely the delicious perfume that had arisen from her crown of golden brown hair.

  “I’m not going to ask why you’re so kind to me,” he said. Betty Blair sat silent, pulling off her gloves.

  “What do reasons amount to at a time like this?” continued Stafford. “It’s enough to know that we are here. Outside is the world, with its sorrows and its pain, its cold logic and its stubborn facts. No one knows better than I how full it is of shams and lies and hypocrisy. It is only when his heart speaks that a man tells the truth.”

  “And you?”

  “Mine is speaking now. It has been—ever since I first saw you. If I could only tell you all that I have felt—all that these few days have meant to me! I have thought of nothing else, I have cared for nothing else, but this.” His tone was full of earnestness, his eyes looked into hers with a sincere and real appeal.

  “But you don’t expect me to believe you?”

  “Try me,” Stafford leaned forward and spoke eagerly. “I know what you would say: that I do not know you. Ah! Do I not? Who could look into your eyes without seeing the kindness of your heart? Nothing could make me happier than that you should ask me for proof. Anything—I would do anything.”

  A smile, charming and earnest, appeared on the face of Betty Blair. She stretched a hand across the table to
ward Stafford. Her eyes looked into his with confidence and satisfaction.

  “I believe you,” she said, “because I want to. But I’m going to demand your proof.”

  “I would do anything, go anywhere for you,” repeated Stafford, as gravely as his intoxication would permit. “A demand from you is a favor. Try me.”

  Betty Blair opened a large silk bag which she had carried on her arm, and from it took a long slip of paper, a leather bound tablet and a fountain pen. She turned a cool, calculating eye on Stafford, unsheathed the fountain pen, and cleared her throat in a businesslike manner.

  “Your address is 25 Broad Street?”

  Stafford, guessing wildly as to the meaning of these deliberate preparations, nodded.

  Betty Blair turned to a page in the leather bound book and wrote on it. Then:

  “You are a Republican, I believe?”

  “Unless you’re a Democrat.”

  “Mr. Stafford, this is no joke. You are a Republican?”

  “I am,” seriously. “Is it a crime?”

  For reply Betty Blair pushed the slip of paper across the table and handed him the fountain pen. “Sign on the twenty-fourth line, please,” she said.

  As Stafford caught up the paper and read the printed paragraph at the top his jaw became firmly set and his hand trembled. Then he looked across at Betty Blair with a cold and cheerless eye.

  “Miss Blair,” he said, “I congratulate you. But you’ve missed your mark. I refuse to keep a promise obtained by fraud and misrepresentation.”

  “Mr. Stafford!”

  “O piffle!” said the exasperated Stafford inelegantly. “You’ve deceived me. You’ve destroyed my illusions. But you’re up against the wrong man. Take it from me, the best thing you can do is to put a marble bust of Sappho on your mantelpiece, read carefully the life of Peg Woffington and hang Susan B. Anthony on a sour apple tree. If you’ve finished supper I’m ready to go.”

  “Mr. Stafford,” Betty Blair’s voice was cold and stern, “this is no time for personalities. Can you deny that ‘Votes for Women’ is the universal password in the intellectual world of today? I’m not surprised that you wouldn’t sign that pledge, even after you’d promised. It’s just like a man. But I warn you—” she choked with indignation—“I warn you—”

  “You have already,” Stafford rose and laid a bill on his plate. Then, as he turned to go, “Never again for me,” he said bitterly. “An hour ago I was thanking God I’d found you. Now I’m thankful I found you out—before it was too late. Oh, I know what a real woman is—or ought to be. I read about one once in a novel. I had no idea they’d gone so far as to demoralize the stage.”

  That was all. An hour later Stafford was uneventfully and comfortably lying lonesome but safe in his bachelor bed. The only really important thing about the story is its application. As Stafford himself expressed it a day or two later, it’s a waste of time to search for live specimens of an extinct species.

  A Professional Recall

  THEY MET AT QUINBY’S UNEXPECTEDLY, for the first time in three months, and after the handshake proceeded to their old table in the corner.

  “Well, how goes it?” asked Bendy.

  “Bendy,” said Dudd Bronson, ignoring the question, “I am the greatest man in the world. I myself am for ham and cabbage, since it tickles my feelings, but if you want anything from peacocks’ hearts to marmalade, it’s on me.”

  Bendy stared at the roll of bills Dudd brought out of his trousers’ pocket. “Dudd,” he said, his voice trembling, “I respect you. Please put it in your breast pocket so I can see the bulge. What was the occurrence?”

  “I hate to tell it,” declared Dudd. “Bendy, I am a modest man. When you admire me most, remember I said that.

  “The pity of it is that there was no one to watch me. I done it in solitude.

  “One day, about two weeks ago, I walks into the sanctum of David Jetmore. Jetmore is the best lawyer in Horton, over in Jersey. He’s one of them fat, bulgy men that looks right through you with a circumambious gaze.

  “ ‘Mr. Jetmore,’ says I, ‘my name is Abe Delman. I been running a store over in Pauline with my brother Leo. We had a fight over a personal matter which ain’t to the purpose, and when Leo began lookin’ for me in an unpeaceful manner I came away for my health. Now I want to get my half of the store which I am broke till I get it, and you should write to Leo’s lawyer, who is Mr. Devlin of Ironton, about a settlement.’

  “ ‘Have you something for a retainer?’ asks Jetmore.

  “ ‘No,’ says I, ‘I’m livin’ at a hotel.’

  “ ‘I’m a busy man,’ says Jetmore, ‘and how do I know I’ll get any money?’

  “ ‘Mr. Jetmore,’ says I, ‘that store’s worth three thousand dollars if it’s worth a cent. And if my half ain’t enough, maybe you can get Leo to give you some of his.’

  “Finally, after I explained promiscuously why I had to keep at an unsafe distance from brother Leo, and other delicate points, Jetmore says he’ll take the job. When he says Devlin, Leo’s lawyer in Ironton, is a personal friend of his, I told him that made it all the better, but I had a mental reserve about the espree dee corpse.

  “That same afternoon about four hours later I walks into Devlin’s office in Ironton.

  “ ‘Mr. Devlin,’ says I, ‘my name is Leo Delman. I been running it a store over in Pauline with my brother Abe. We had a fight over a personal matter which ain’t to the purpose, and Abe left for parts unknown without my blessing. Two days ago comes a letter from Abe’s lawyer, Mr. Jetmore of Horton, about Abe’s share in the store, which he didn’t wait to take with him, and I told him to write to you, because you should make it a settlement for me.’

  “Bendy, these lawyers is all the same. All they think about is what’s in it for them. They’re parasites, Bendy. They’re a menace to society.

  “ ‘Have you something for a retainer?’ asks Devlin.

  “ ‘Mr. Devlin,’ says I, ‘I have not.’

  “ ‘Then,’ says he, ‘how do you expect to settle with brother Abe?’

  “Bendy, I know you won’t repeat this to any of our friends, or I wouldn’t tell it. It fills me with shame, Bendy, when I remember that fifty I handed to Devlin. These lawyers is the worst kind of grafters.

  “I told Devlin I didn’t want any Pauline natives to know about mine and Abe’s intimate pertinacities, and I waits in Ironton for a settlement. As soon as he got my fifty he wrote off a long letter to Jetmore which he let me read to correct the sentiments.

  “It would a’ been cheaper for me to buy that railroad between Ironton and Horton. For eleven days I kept up a to and fro movement worse than a Mount Vernon commuter. It got so the trains wouldn’t start till they saw me comin’. In one day I was Abe three times and Leo twice.

  “Jetmore and Devlin kept burnin’ up the mails with lies and criminalities, me a readin’ everything so as to preserve my interests. I was yellin’ for more on one end and less on the other till the fruit got all ripe and just ready for pickin’. Bendy, it was shameful easy, I used to fall asleep in Devlin’s office from sheer angwee.

  “It was last Thursday when I got to Devlin’s sanctum, just in time to see him puttin’ on his coat to go to lunch with the stenographer.

  “ ‘Hello, Delman,’ says he, ‘I’ll see you in about half an hour. Here’s a letter from Jetmore. Make yourself at home till I get back.’

  “When he’d gone I read the letter over just to make sure there wasn’t no changes since I saw it the night before in Jetmore’s office. It said that Abe had decided to accept Leo’s offer of twelve hundred dollars cash, provided it was paid within three days.

  “I goes to the stenographer’s desk, picks out a nice printed letterhead, and writes on it as follows:

  March 21, 1912

  Mr. David Jetmore,

  Horton, N. J.

  Dear Sir,

  As per advice contained in your favor of the 20th inst., I am enclosing herewith check for twelve hundred dollars in full payment of the claim of Abe Delman against Leo Delman.

  I shall be pleased to have you acknowledge receipt of same.

  Yours very truly,

  “I had already practiced Devlin’s hand till I was sick of it, and I signed that letter so that Devlin himself couldn’t a’ told the difference. Then I pulls out a blank check, makes it to the order of Devlin for twelve hundred dollars and signs it ‘Leo Delman’ and endorses Devlin’s name on the back.