Front matter (continued 4)

"A set of eight chairs, slightly restored, with your covers on 'em, the dead spit of the Pevensey chairs, would excite attention?"

"More than we might want. I don't see Bundy a biddin' for our set without askin' a lot of questions. He'd spot the repairs."

"Right again. I put these questions, Joe, to have the pleasure of hearin' you answer them as I would myself. In a sort o' friendly fashion I look upon you, my boy, as my pupil."

"Go on!"

Tomlin's large face brightened till it shone like a harvest moon. He had feared that his pupil would withhold those cheering progressive words.

"Do you want to get back some o' your hard-earned savings which you lost over that commode?"

"Yes, I do."

"Follow me close. James goes to work on the quiet with my chairs; he works alone in my room back o' Wardour Street; he puts your covers on; and then we pass judgment on the completed set. If we're satisfied, really satisfied, I don't think we need to worry much about Bundy and Pressland. Lark—thank the Lord!—is losin' his eyesight. When the chairs have passed our examination, they'll go to Christopher's. You can leave all that to me. Nobody will know that you and I have ever seen the chairs."

"Nobody? How about James?"

"Exactly. James must be squared. It's time you raised his salary. I shall make him a handsome present. Remember, you'll lend James to me for this little job. It don't concern you."

"You take James for a fool?"

"Not me. James is a bit of a knave, but he knows which side his bread is buttered. If he was a fool I wouldn't touch him with a bargepole. I'm afraid o' fools. Now, we've got the chairs to Christopher's, and we'll choose a small day for the sale, some day when the big men are elsewhere."

"Then who'll bid for 'em?"

"Me and you, my lad."

He lay back in his chair, winked triumphantly, and laughed. Quinney was still puzzled.

"Bid for our own chairs? Pay a thumpin' commission to find 'em on our hands? Funny business!"

"Joe, you ain't quite as sharp as I thought you was. We two, and anybody else as likes, bid for the chairs. We bid up to nine hundred pounds. Christopher's commission would be ninety o' that. The chairs cost me fifty. What do you value them covers at?"

"Five-and-twenty—thirty."

"Call it thirty. Put James's work at another thirty. That makes a round two hundred quid. What have we got to show for that? A set of eight chairs which have fetched nine hundred pounds at Christopher's, with Christopher's receipt to prove that the money was paid down for 'em. Christopher returns that nine hundred, less their com., to my agent, that is to us. You see to it that the buyin' of the chairs by you is properly paragraphed. You have them on exhibition in this very room, and I bring a customer to whom you show Christopher's receipt. Everything square and simple. My customer offers you eleven hundred. We share and share alike just nine hundred pounds. Four hundred and fifty each. No risks!"

"Um!" said Quinney, for the third time. Tomlin rose with alacrity considering his weight.

"You think it over. Take your time."

"Don't like it!" growled the little man.

"I call it a perfectly legitimate transaction."

"Come off it, Tom!"

"Are you thinkin' o' your inside or your outside? Yer skin or yer conscience? If it's conscience——"

"Well——?"

"I'll make this remark. One way and t'other I've paid you more than a thousand pounds for 'restoration' work done by James Miggott during the past four years or more. Don't forget that! So long!"

Quinney heard him chuckling as he made his way downstairs.

III

He became a party to the projected fraud, but not without perturbations of spirit and rumblings of conscience. Ultimately he salved the latter with the soothing reflection that he was much more honest than Tomlin or Lark or Bundy. It is affirmed, with what truth I know not, that gluttons who happen to be total abstainers are peculiarly virulent against drunkards. Quinney, poor fellow, son of a dishonest father, dishonest himself during his earlier manhood, reflected joyously that he was an admirable husband and father. He said to Susan, who was in blissful ignorance of his dealings with Tom Tomlin:

"Old Tomlin, hoary-headed sinner, went to Blackpool for the last week-end, and he didn't go alone, nor with Mrs. T., neither. He's a moral idiot is Tom. What would you say, Susie, if I went larkin' off to Brighton with Mabel Dredge—hey?"

He pinched her still blooming cheek, staring into her faithful eyes.

Susan replied artlessly:

"Joe, dear, it would break my heart."

"Gosh, I believe it would. Well, mother, your loving heart won't be broken that way."

Susan knew that this was true, and smiled delightfully.

"I'm a good hubby," said Quinney complacently, "and the very best of fathers, by Gum!"

Whenever he "swanked" (we quote Posy) like this, Susan regarded him anxiously.

James Miggott undertook his new job without protest, but there was an expression upon his handsome face which puzzled his employer. He summed up James as "downy." When he raised the young man's salary to four pounds a week, that derisive smile of which mention has been made, played about James's too thin lips. Quinney said sharply:

"You don't seem bustin' with joy and gladness. Four quid a week ain't to be sneezed at."

"Don't I earn it, sir?"

His tone was perfectly respectful, with a faint sub-acid inflection.

When the four chairs were turned into eight, and duly covered with the precious needlework, Tomlin and Quinney inspected them with huge satisfaction. Certainly James had done himself justice. The restorations were subjected to microscopic scrutiny. Tomlin smacked his gross lips.

"You leave the rest to me," he said.

IV

The time has come to explain James's smile. We must attempt what French dramatic critics term the "scène obligatoire."

He had captured Posy.

He achieved this easily, because he happened to be the first good-looking man to make love to a healthy young woman of lively sensibilities and affections. Here again the uncharitable may be justified in hinting at that practice which makes the game of love perfect. If Youth but knew! This youth did know many things which he kept to himself discreetly; saliently amongst them may be reckoned the art of striking hard when the iron is hot. Posy grew very hot, when her sire rebuked her for wandering downstairs into James's room. James perceived this. Let us say this for him in partial excuse of what follows. He had fallen in love with a blooming girl, whose bloom contrasted so agreeably with the too-white cheeks of Miss Mabel Dredge, whose high spirits were strong enough to raise to their level his somewhat gloomy thoughts. Truth being the essence of this chronicle, we are constrained to add that the hope of being admitted to partnership with a prospective father-in-law had been another lever towards this mental exaltation. Nor did James forget that Posy was possessed, under Mrs. Biddlecombe's will, of some three thousand pounds which became hers absolutely when she attained her majority.

The pair talked together very seldom after Quinney's injunction, but they passed each other half a dozen times a day, preserving a silence which is perhaps the most barbed dart in Dan Cupid's quiver! Each began to study facial expression, and the finer shades of common salutation. The mere words, "Good-morning," admit infinite variety of inflection. The pronouncing of a name, even such a name as Quinney, may be made lyrical, almost hymeneal. James showed himself to be a master of these simple arts. His appearance at such moments indicated suffering nobly controlled. Posy began to lie awake at night wondering if James also was a martyr to insomnia. You may be sure that she encountered James in those pleasant suburbs of slumber frequented by lovers, the vias tenebrosas where Dante and Beatrice, Petrarch and Laura, Francesca and Paolo, must have wandered hand in hand. Here, in sequestered peace Posy talked to James without any exasperating restrictions save those which maidenly modesty imposed. Imaginary conversations have won many hearts.

And then one day occurred the coup de foudre.

Quinney and Susan happened to be out. Posy, as usual, was dusting the china in the sanctuary. James entered the room.

"Good-morning, Mr. Miggott!"

"Good-morning, Miss—Posy!"

He had never called her Posy before. But she divined from the tenderness of his tone that her name must have passed his lips a thousand times.

They looked at each other diffidently. Posy stretched out her hand. She felt that this was due to an artist who might reasonably infer that he was not held in the highest esteem by his master's daughter. James hesitated for one moment only. Then he kissed her hand. She quivered. He ran his hungry lips along her slender wrist. She thrilled and sighed. He took her into his arms and kissed her masterfully, feeling her heart throbbing beneath his own.

Presently they discussed the future, although loath indeed to leave the present.

"What will father say?"

"Darling, you must let me deal with your father."

"Can you?"

"I think so. I am sure of it. We must be patient and very, very careful."

"I should like to tell mother."

"No, no! Believe me that would be a blunder. She would tell him. For the moment we must love secretly."

She sighed deliciously.

"It does sound exciting and romantic. Of course you know best."

"I do!" he replied grimly. "I know that I shall have to fight for you. I mean to fight. You'll see. But we must be extra careful. A look——! We can write to each other."

Her smooth forehead puckered.

"Can we? Father always deals out the letters. He would think nothing of opening mine if he suspected."

"I have a plan."

"What! You have made plans? You were sure of me?"

"No, no! Never sure. Torn in two, I was, between hope and fear, but I made plans all the same. Look here, we can use that lac cabinet as a pillar-box."

"Father's precious cabinet?"

"He never opens it; the drawers are empty; the key is in the lock."

Together they approached the cabinet, one of the "gems." Upon the top of it stood the K'ang He mirror-black jar much beloved by Quinney. James opened the cabinet, almost more beautiful within than without. He indicated a drawer.

"Pop your letters into that. Then lock the cabinet and hide the key in the mirror-black bottle."

"What a splendid idea!"

"Isn't it? If he misses the key, you will be asked to find it, and you will find it. Then we can choose another pillar-box. You will post your letters, dearest, in the morning, when you are dusting here. In the middle of the day, while you are lunching, I shall get your letter and post one of my own. That way we run no risks at all."

"You are quite wonderful!"

Susan had used the same words to her Joe twenty years before.

CHAPTER XVII

INTRODUCES CYRUS P. HUNSAKER

I

Some three weeks later the "restored" Chippendale chairs were sold on a by-day at Christopher's famous auction rooms, and, as the public prints set forth, were secured after spirited competition for nine hundred pounds by Mr. Joseph Quinney, of Soho Square. There had been, according to the reporters, a duel à outrance between Quinney and Tomlin for the possession of these magnificent chairs.

Upon the following morning Posy was alone in the sanctuary. Her father had installed recently a speaking-tube, communicating with James Miggott's room, which was just behind the shop. Posy used this whenever the chance presented itself to exchange a few whispered words with her lover. She had just informed him that a billet had been popped into the lac cabinet. Also she had exchanged kisses through the tube, and perhaps on that account her eyes were sparkling more brightly than usual. She was hanging up the tube when Susan entered.

"Thought I heard you talking just before I came in," said Susan.

Posy, the hardened young sinner, never blushed as she answered lightly:

"I was asking Jim through the tube where father was."

Susan stared at her pensively.

"Your dear father would be very much displeased if he heard you speaking of James Miggott as Jim. It's too familiar."

"Why?"

"I'm not going to bandy words with you, Posy, because you do get the best of me, thanks to your fine schooling."

Posy frowned. She was hearing too often of her "advantages." She said protestingly:

"Mumsie, dear, don't rub that in. I'm fed up with such vain repetitions from father. I didn't ask him to send me to an expensive boarding-school. I believe he did it to annoy the Tomlins."

This, we know, was not the reason, but there was some truth in it. Tom Tomlin had considered a governess at forty-five pounds per annum quite good enough to educate his three daughters. Susan laughed. Posy amused her when she talked with entire frankness.

"Dear heart, what things you do say, to be sure! You were sent to Bexhill because there was too much Honeybunning. But it did annoy the Tomlins. I remember when your grandmother bought a small piano for me. We lived in a semi-detached. How the neighbours did tear their hair with envy and jealousy."

Posy, clad in a neat pinafore, was rubbing the lacquer cabinet. Mrs. Quinney watched her fondly, thinking how young and vigorous the girl was.

"Rub the lacquer gently, child. Coax the polish back."

"Right O," said Posy.

"Your poor father thinks the world of that cabinet."

"So do I," said Posy demurely.

Susan opened her eyes wider than usual, detecting real warmth in her daughter's voice.

"Do you? That's your father cropping out in you. I'm beginning to believe that he prefers things to persons; so you'd better be warned in time. The beauty of this world ain't to be found in sticks or stones."

"Cheer up, mumsie! I shan't devote my young life to either a stick or a stone."

She laughed softly as Mabel Dredge came quietly in. Susan looked at her husband's typist not too pleasantly. She was not jealous of the young woman, but it exasperated her to reflect that Mabel spent two hours at least every day with Quinney. She said crisply:

"Mr. Quinney is out, Miss Dredge."

"I know. The chairs from Christopher's have just come."

Posy exclaimed excitedly: "I'm dying to see them." Susan sighed. Nine hundred pounds would have bought another Dream Cottage, with a small garden. Miss Dredge continued in her monotonous voice:

"Mr. Quinney left orders that they were to be brought up here."

"Very good," said Susan. "Tell Mr. Miggott to bring them up."

"Yes, madam."

The typist moved slowly towards the door. Susan glanced at her keenly, contrasting her with Posy. In her usual kind voice she murmured:

"You don't look very well, Miss Dredge."

"I am perfectly well, thank you, madam."

She went out, closing the door. Susan said reflectively:

"Crossed in love, I dare say."

"Poor dear, I hope not."

"Six months ago I did think that she and James Miggott might make a match of it."

"What?"

"Why shouldn't they? Very suitable, I'm sure."

"Oh yes," Posy murmured hastily. Changing the subject briskly, she went on: "If the Christopher chairs are to be placed in this room, I suppose that father means to keep them."

"Till he gets a big price."

Presently James appeared, followed by two men carrying the chairs. They were arranged side by side in a double row. Posy examined them with the keenest interest. Susan glanced at them and sniffed:

"Fancy paying nine hundred pounds for those!"

"They're simply lovely,"'said Posy. She stroked the needlework and glanced at James's impassive face. "It's funny, but there's something familiar about them to me. I must have seen them before."

"Quite impossible," said James. "They came out of an old house in Ireland. They're almost replicas of the famous Pevensey set, which Lark and Bundy bought."

Susan had moved to one of the windows overlooking the dingy square. She never beheld the trees and grass without thinking of her beloved flower-garden in Melchester. The sight of the chairs annoyed her tremendously. More false gods! Would the day ever conic when her Joe, with his keen love of beauty, would turn his eyes and heart to what grew, to what was alive? She heard Posy saying:

"It's the needlework I seem to recognize."

"Bother the needlework!" exclaimed Susan.

"Why, mumsie, what is it?"

"It worries me to see you kneeling and gloating over stupid old furniture, that's all. Here's your father coming. Good-looking young fellow with him, too. Much better worth looking at than them chairs."

James retired. Posy joined her mother at the window. Just below stood her father and a tall stranger. Quinney was pointing out the pediment, and expatiating volubly upon the solid qualities of Georgian houses.

"Father is swanking," said Posy.

The two men entered the shop below.

II

Presently, Quinney came upstairs, betraying some excitement, easily accounted for by Susan. A big buyer was below, the sort of customer who might spend hundreds without turning a hair. Quinney was rubbing his hands together and chuckling. He informed the ladies that a rich American was in the shop, and wanted to see the chairs.

"They're here," said Susan.

Quinney frowned very slightly. It annoyed him when his wife made futile remarks, a habit which she seemed to have acquired recently, or was he becoming more critical?

"Where did you think I thought they was?" he inquired, hovering about them, but not gloating over them, somewhat to Susan's surprise.

"Want us out of the way?" asked Susan.

"Certainly not. Isn't this your drawing-room, old dear?"

"Fiddle!" said Susan tartly.

She could not have explained why she was feeling irritable, but of late, since Posy's return from school, she had lost something of her normal serenity. Possibly she resented being made a fool of before her daughter. The sanctuary was not her room, and never had been or could be anything but Quinney's room, filled to overflowing with his things. Also, she was aware that her husband used her as a stalking horse. No doubt he had just said to this young American: "I'll ask my wife if I can show you her room." What nonsense!

Quinney, however, was not disturbed by her exclamation. He glanced at Posy, and told her to take off a brown holland pinafore. Then he scuttled off, still chuckling. He reappeared, ushering in the stranger, presenting him as Mr. Cyrus P. Hunsaker, of Hunsaker.

Mr. Hunsaker bowed politely. Posy perceived that he was very nice-looking, an out-of-doors man, bronzed by wind and sun, a typical Westerner, probably a rider of bucking bronchos, a man of flocks and herds. He was quite at his ease with the two women, and—unlike young Englishmen of his age (he looked about thirty)—able to appreciate what he saw in words culled from a copious vocabulary. Quinney was delighted with him. He liked most Americans because they were strivers and pushers, and free with their dollars. He saw, too, that Posy had made an immense impression. Hunsaker stared at her with flattering intensity. Posy, equally at ease, asked him if the town of Hunsaker was called after him. This mightily pleased her father, because it established the right atmosphere at once. The "shop" was downstairs. From beginning to end the little comedy about to be played had been rehearsed between Tomlin and Quinney. Tomlin had found Hunsaker and introduced Quinney to him, as the proud owner of the chairs which he, Tomlin, had wanted to secure. Tomlin had said sorrowfully: "They're just what you're after, Mr. Hunsaker, but this Quinney, queer little cuss!—bought 'em, I do believe, for himself. He won't part with his very best things. He's quite potty about it!" This had challenged Hunsaker's interest. Quinney, seemingly, was a man after his own heart. He, too, hated to part with certain possessions. He did not as yet know much about articles of vertu, but he wanted to know. An unslakable thirst for such knowledge consumed many dollars. He answered Posy breezily—one had a whiff of the prairie, of the Wild West.

"Shall I tell you, Miss Quinney, how that great and growing town came to be called by my name?"

"Please."

"Well, most of the towns and villages in New Mexico used to be called after the names of saints and saintesses. When it came to christening this particular village the boys wanted to name it San Clement, but my father was of opinion that we were fed up with saints, so he said: 'Hold hard, why not call this little burg by the name of a sinner!' And, the drinks were on the old man, for then and there they called it Hunsaker."

"Was your father a sinner?" asked Posy demurely.

Hunsaker laughed.

"He was a tough old nut when up against the wrong crowd. Ah! the chairs!"

"Yes," said Quinney carelessly.

"Elegant!" He glanced at the beautiful room with enthusiasm. It made inordinate demands upon his vocabulary. He racked his brains for the right words which came. Very solemnly, he observed:

"You have here, Mr. Quinney, an incomparable reservation."

"Yes," Quinney replied, with equal gravity, "this is my private collection, Mr. Hunsaker; everything I value most in the world, including my wife and daughter. Lordy! How I hate rubbish! Rubbish is beastly!" He pointed to the lacquer cabinet, purposely distracting the young man's attention from the chairs. "Now a cabinet like that makes me think of heaven. I can say my prayers to it!"

Susan said, with a touch of her mother's majesty:

"Joe, how you do go on!"

"Yes, my dear, I go on and up! We'd be stewin' in our own juice in a silly old sleepy town if it hadn't been for me. On and—up! What a motter for a Christmas cracker! Married the right woman, too, a perfect lady!"

"Joe—please!"

Hunsaker was much amused. He had liked the little man at first sight; he was quite as delighted with his family. Quinney continued in high good humour:

"I chose her"—he pointed at Susan, who blushed. "And the result," he pointed at Posy, who did not blush, "justifies my choice—hey?"

"You bet it does," said Hunsaker. "Miss Quinney is by all odds the most precious object in this wonderful room—the gem, if I may say so, of your remarkable collection."

Quinney gazed fondly at his daughter. He had almost forgotten the chairs.

"Just like a bit of Chelsea, Mr. Hunsaker. The real soft paste, and as good as she's pretty; the apple of her father's eye. Plays the pianner and the mandoline! Sings like a canary!"

Posy expostulated.

"Father! Please!" She put her finger to her pretty lips.

Hunsaker, feeling that he had known these pleasant people all his life, said significantly:

"You won't keep her long, sir."

"What?"

"Not if there are any spry young men about."

Quinney betrayed real uneasiness. It flashed upon him suddenly that this abominable loss was inevitable. He consoled himself with the reflection that no spry young men had been about. Then he said with unction:

"I'm going to hang on tight to my little girl. She is the gem of my collection. Cost me more than money, too." He sank his voice confidentially. "Nearly cost me her pore dear mother. By Gum! I remember swearing that I'd give up selling imitation oak as the real stuff, if my old Dutch pulled through."

"And did you?" Hunsaker asked.

"I did. More, I tore up a big card that used to live in our front window—'Genuine Antiques!' Yes; never sold faked stuff after that, unless labelled as such. Lordy! I'm wastin' your valuable time."

"Not at all."

"Posy, show Mr. Hunsaker that case o' miniatures. I've a Samuel Cooper, two Englehearts, a Plimer, and half a dozen Cosways."

Hunsaker shook his head.

"I know nothing about miniatures. There's a daisy of a china cabinet!"

"It is. Delighted to show you stuff, Mr. Hunsaker. You've the collector's eye. Take a squint at those blue and white jars on the mantelpiece."

"I'd sooner look at your chairs."

Quinney said lightly:

"You can look, at anything you like, Mr. Hunsaker, but I understood from Mr. Tomlin that you had all the mahogany you wanted."

"More than I want," replied Hunsaker grimly. "I've been much imposed upon, Mr. Quinney, with mahogany."

Susan flitted quietly from the room. Posy began to rub the lacquer of the Chinese cabinet. She heard her father saying:

"Dear, dear! I've been done, too—crisp as a biscuit! Everybody's done, hey?"

"I'm never done twice by the same man." He bent down to examine the carving of the chairs. "These are immense—the finest I've ever seen."

"By Gum! I wish you could have seen the settee which I sold to the Grand Duke of Roosia."

Hunsaker hardly heard him. He was becoming absorbed in the chairs.

"The papers report you as having paid nine hundred pounds for the set."

Quinney chuckled, nodding his head.

"That's right! I'd had two glasses of old brown sherry after lunch. My tip to all and sundry is: Buy before lunch, unless you're a blooming vegetarian and teetotaler."

Hunsaker prided himself upon the directness of his business methods. He said tentatively:

"Would you take a handsome profit on these chairs?"

"You look at that lac cabinet, and you won't want to buy chairs."

Hunsaker did look at the lac cabinet, and the girl beside it, softly rubbing its polished surface. He crossed to her, smiling.

"On a Charles the Second stand," added Quinney. "The inside is as beautiful as the outside—more so. I'll show it to you. Where's the key?"

He addressed Posy, but she pretended not to hear him.

"Where's the key?" he repeated.

"I saw it yesterday," said Posy quietly. Her heart began to beat uncomfortably, as she thought of her letter in the middle drawer.

"Can you see it now, missie? Is it on the floor?"

Hunsaker interrupted:

"Please don't trouble. Is that screen Chinese?"

"Yes; incised lacquer. They wanted that for the South Kensington Museum. Hits you bang in the eye, don't it?"

Hunsaker examined it as Quinney expatiated upon the enamelling and colour. His enthusiasm, his accurate knowledge, his love of precious objects for their beauty of design and craftsmanship, impressed the young man tremendously. He remembered what Tomlin had said: "You'll find Quinney a character. What he tells you is right is right! That's how he's built up a thumping big business." Hunsaker had not been vastly impressed by Tomlin, but he was quite certain that he had spoken the truth about Quinney. His heart warmed to the little man. When Quinney paused he said gratefully:

"I'm much obliged; it's an education to see such treasures."

"The only education I've had, Mr. Hunsaker."

"I only wish that I could tempt you to part with one of them—this cabinet, for instance."

"It's not for sale. I'd like to oblige you. Is there anything else you particularly fancy?"

Hunsaker's roving eye was captivated by the K'ang He mirror-black bottle, standing alone in its glory upon the top of the cabinet.

"I like that black and gold jar."

"Um! It's not bad, but there ought to be two of 'em."

Posy wiped her pretty forehead. At the mention of the K'ang He jar, in which lay snug the key of the cabinet, she had trembled with apprehension. Hunsaker said quickly:

"I'd like the chairs best of all. You bought them yesterday for nine hundred. Will you take eleven hundred?"

"Yes," said Quinney, "I will."

He pulled out a pocket-book and extracted a slip of paper from it.

"You can have this, Mr. Hunsaker. Don't destroy it! Keep it in your safe."

Hunsaker took it.

"Christopher's receipt for my cheque. It proves that the chairs fetched the price named at public auction."

"Thank you."

"And now, to sweeten our first deal, I'll make you a little present. You fancied that K'ang He bottle. It's yours."

He advanced towards the bottle. Posy said hurriedly:

"Shall I go and clean it, father?"

"Clean it? It's as clean as you are, my pretty."

"You are very generous," said Hunsaker.

Quinney winked and chuckled joyously.

"Biz! There are other things downstairs, Mr. Hunsaker. Are you buying these chairs for yourself?"

As he spoke he held the bottle in both his hands, caressing it softly.

"Why, certainly. Have them cased, please, and consigned to my agents in New York, who will see them through the Custom House. Any marks on that jar, Mr. Quinney?"

Quinney handed to him the bottle.

"I don't think so; they never marked them bottles. It's marked all over."

Hunsaker turned it upside down, and the key of the cabinet fell out.

"The missing key," said Quinney. "Now what fool stuffed it in there?"

He replaced it in the lock of the cabinet.

"Like to see the inside?" he asked.

Posy was in torment. In desperation she blurted out:

"Father, dear, Mr. Hunsaker may have other engagements."

"I have," said Hunsaker. "Important ones, too. Thank you, Miss Quinney." He turned to her father. "May I call to-morrow at eleven, and have another look round?"

"Glad to see you any time."

As he was speaking, Susan drifted back. Hunsaker went up to her, speaking cordially:

"This has been a very pleasant and informal visit, Mrs. Quinney. Do you ever go to the play?"

"Sometimes," said Susan.

"Often," added Posy. Her face was sparkling with smiles. Her cheeks were delicately flushed. Hunsaker said gaily:

"Will you three nice people dine and do a play with me?"

"You must leave me out," said Quinney.

Posy answered for her mother and herself:

"We shall be delighted, Mr. Hunsaker."

The young man shook hands. He seemed to hold Posy's hand a thought longer than was necessary. Quinney chuckled, because he was thinking that if his Posy were to be taken away by some enterprising young man she might well be captured by Cyrus P. Hunsaker, of Hunsaker. Inspired by this thought he enjoined his daughter to accompany the visitor as far as the shop. Characteristically, he blurted out what was in his mind, as soon as he found himself alone with Susan.

"He's taken a shine to our girl, Susie."

"Fiddle!" said Susan, for the second time.

"Stoopid expression! You must break yourself of that. I tell you it's true. Couldn't ask for nothing better. Fine upstanding young chap."

"A foreigner!"

"Nonsense. They could spend half their time over here. You might give the child a hint. Tell her to play up."

"What an idea!"

"I have ideas, Susie. We can't expect to keep her; and the best in this country won't marry a tradesman's daughter. He's as good as any in his country. See?"

"I see a large mare's nest," replied Susan.

Posy returned, brimming with the determination to retrieve her letter. Quinney beckoned to her.

"Come you here, my girl." He took her head between his hands, and gazed at her proudly. "Did that young fellow squeeze your hand just now?"

"Father!"

"None o' your sauce! Did he?"

"Well, yes, he did."

Quinney winked triumphantly at Susan. He kissed Posy, and said superbly:

"You've got a daddy with ambitions, a kind, loving, clever old daddy! Lordy! Sometimes I fair wonder at myself, I do. Because I've climbed so high. But you're a-going higher—bang up! Good looks, I'll admit you got them from mother, and good brains, same as mine. Quick wits, God bless you! You made a hit with young Hunsaker! A bull's-eye! Now scoot, both of you! I've a lot of business."

"I haven't finished dusting, daddy."

"Yes, you have, when I say so. Scoot!"

Unhappily, there was nothing else to do.

CHAPTER XVIII

EXPLOSIONS

I

"I've sold the chairs, James. Take 'em away. Pack 'em up at once! Nail down the cases. See?"

"Yes, sir. I congratulate you, sir."

"Pack up extra carefully that K'ang He bottle."

"The K'ang He bottle?"

Something in his tone arrested Quinney's attention. It brought to mind what, for the moment, he had forgotten—the loss of the key and its tumbling out of the bottle. James, perhaps unconsciously, had glanced at the cabinet, and Quinney's alert eyes had intercepted the somewhat furtive, shifting glance. He said sharply:

"The key of the cabinet was in that bottle. Did you put it there?"

James hesitated and was lost. Had he replied promptly, either in the affirmative or negative, his employer doubtless would have dismissed the incident from his mind. James, unhappily, was constrained to determine swiftly the expediency of saying "Yes."

"I may have done so," he replied. He went on fluently: "The key fits badly, tumbles out of the lock sometimes. I meant to tell you."

Quinney blinked at him, wondering why he answered evasively. How did he know that the key fitted loosely? It was not his business to touch the cabinet. At the same time he was conscious that James, as the restorer of the chairs, had been very prompt with his congratulations. Of course he knew everything; he had to know; and equally of course the secret of the fake bidding was perfectly safe with him, inasmuch as he had received a share of the plunder. Quinney had raised his salary; Tomlin had tipped him handsomely.

"Nice profit for you, sir," continued James blandly.

"Not bad," Quinney admitted.

"Splendid idea, sir, buying in your own stuff."

Quinney rather winced at this, but he covered a slight confusion by his bluff manner and candid speech. He could not flimflam James. It would be fatuous to play the hypocrite with an accomplice. He said confidentially:

"Christopher's receipt just clinched matters. You ought to have been here, my lad. An object lesson for you, by Gum!"

James's voice was very silky as he murmured:

"Nobody like you, sir, to sell stuff."

"Right you are, James, even if I do say it. There ain't my superior in London—that means the world."

It was then that James led trumps for the first time. He continued in the same ingratiating tone:

"Oh yes, sir. And such a father, too."

Quinney swallowed this easily, smacked his lips over it, much to James's satisfaction.

"Always done my duty, my lad. That's a thought to stick to one's ribs—hey? Never can remember the day when I couldn't say that. And the fam'ly, as I read only t'other day, is the unit o' national life. Square, too, I've been, within reasonable limits, although I do make ignorance pay a profit to knowledge. I know a lot, more'n you think for. And you owe a lot to me, James."

"Yes, sir."

"You're very useful to me, my lad, and your future will be my special care."

James smiled.

"Thank you, sir."

Afterwards, Quinney admitted to Susan that at this particular moment James's good looks had hit him, so to speak, in the eye. But he did not consider them in relation to Posy. We know that the little man was amazingly shrewd whenever his own interests were imperilled. And it had occurred to him, not for the first time, that there might be "something" between his handsome foreman and his quite attractive typist. He could trust James. Could he trust Mabel Dredge? Some men babbled indiscreetly to the girls.

"You'll be thinking of gettin' married one of these fine days?"

"I have thought of it, sir."

The young man spoke so pleasantly that Quinney's heart warmed to him. Moreover, he liked and respected Mabel.

"Good! What you want is a helpmate, a worker like yourself, strong, healthy, and comely."

"Strong, healthy, and comely," repeated James.

"One who'll work hard in your house, while you're working hard in mine. There are young fellows in your position, my lad, who make fools o' theirselves by falling in love with young ladies. Useless creatures! It would hurt me to see you doin' that, James."

"I'm sure it would. Much obliged, sir."

"Not at all. Never so happy as when I'm thinking for others."

James removed the chairs.

II

Once more alone, Quinney thought of sending for Mabel Dredge, but he lit a cigar instead, and took stock of his treasures, wondering whether he could screw himself up to part with the lacquer cabinet. Hunsaker would buy it. He would pay gladly a thumping price. Quinney approached it, puffing leisurely at his excellent cigar. As he did so the mysterious hiding of the key recurred to him. He stared at the cabinet, frowning.

Then he opened it.

Always, on such occasions, the hidden beauties of this miracle of craftsmanship appealed to him with ever-increasing strength. The lacquer inside was as softly fresh as upon the day when the last coat was lovingly applied. So soft, and yet so hard, that it could not be scratched with the nail.

He gloated over it.

At this moment he was absolutely at peace with himself and the world. He would not willingly have changed places with the mighty Marquess of Mel. If there was a fly in his precious ointment, it might be considered so tiny as to be negligible. The most illustrious of the Chinese craftsmen, artists to their finger tips, lacked one small knack common to the English artisan. The drawers in these seventeenth-century cabinets did not, alas, slide in and out with the beautiful smoothness characteristic of the best English specimens. Quinney pulled out two or three of them.

In one he perceived a letter. He examined it. It was addressed:

"To my own Blue Bird."

III

The writing was Posy's.

Quinney stared at it, palsied with amazement. Then he read it, and re-read it, till the full meaning of what it meant had percolated through and through his mind. His cigar went out. He sat at his desk with the letter in his hand, dazed for the moment, breathing hard, very red in the face. The fingers which held the sheet of notepaper twitched. He noticed a faint fragrance of lavender, a perfume much affected by Posy, and he remembered vividly a certain afternoon, long ago, when Susan had sat in the garden of the Dream Cottage filling small muslin bags with lavender to place between the baby linen of their tiny daughter.

Slowly, a dull anger and rancour grew in him. What did this shameless baggage mean by deceiving him and Susan? He included Susan. Physically he was overwhelmed, eviscerated, almost faint with impotent rage, but he found himself wondering what Susan would say. Suppose—his heart grew cold—suppose she knew! What! His faithful wife a party to this abominable fraud on him? Impossible!

He rose up wearily, and walked with unsteady steps to the door.

"Susan!" he cried querulously.

Posy appeared, wreathed in smiles. With a terrific effort her father smiled frozenly at her.

"Send your mother to me!" he said stiffly. "I want to see her at once on a small matter of business."

"Right O!" replied Posy.

He returned to his desk. When Susan, came in she perceived at once the change in him.

"Gracious, Joe, is this house afire?"

"No. I am. Shut the door."

She did so, and then approached him.

"Whatever is the matter?"

He held up the billet and said hoarsely, "Listen. I found this in the lacquer cabinet five minutes ago. It's in Posy's writin'. And it's addressed 'To my own Blue Bird.'"

"Oh, dear! Oh, dear!"

The sight of her weakness strengthened him, but he exclaimed testily: "Don't make them stoopid noises. They sound like a mind out of whack. Sit tight! I'm a-going to read this precious letter bang through, a letter written by your daughter."

Susan, wriggling on the edge of a chair, protested feebly:

"My daughter? Ain't she yours, too?"

"I'm beginning to doubt it." He read aloud, "'My own Blue Bird——'"

"Who is her Blue Bird, Joe?"

"We'll come to that soon enough. I may mention that there was a play called 'The Blue Bird'! to which you took Posy twice, and you jawed for three days of nothing else. A damn blue bird, accordin' to you, stands for happiness—hey?"

"Yes."

He went on reading, "'It was splendidly clever of you to think of using that silly old cabinet——' Silly old cabinet! Hear that? And I've refused a thousand guineas for it!"

"Go on, dear!"

"I'm going on if you'll kindly stop wigglin' your leg. I'm going bang to the outside edge of this. Pay partic'lar attention. 'It was splendidly clever of you to think of using that silly old cabinet as a pillar box, and the fact that we are corresponding under the nose of father makes the whole affair deliriously exciting and romantic. I should like to see his funny face——' Is my face funny? Is it?"

"Not now, Joe. Is there any more?"

"Is there any more, Mrs. Ask-Another? D'ye think a girl educated at no expense spared ends a sentence in the middle of it? Keep that leg still, and I'll finish. 'I should like to see his funny face if he could read this.'"

"My!"

"She shall see it, by Gum! 'We've got to be most awfully careful, because if he caught me talking to you except about his dull old business he would simply chatter with rage. But we must have a long talk together, and as soon as possible. Why not to-night? Father and mother are always fast asleep by eleven. At half-past eleven to the minute I shall slip down to the sanctuary. You be ready downstairs. I'll whistle softly through the tube; then you nip up, and we'll have a perfectly lovely talk. Your own POSY.'"

"But, Joe, who is her Blue Bird?"

"He'll be black and blue when I've man-handled him. It's that dog, James Miggott."

Susan grew pale and trembled. She had never seen her Joe so moved to fury, not even when he had been "downed" by the pseudo Major Archibald Fraser. She faltered out:

"Joe, dear, James is much bigger than you."

To this Quinney replied ironically:

"After all these years o' church goin' I thought you believed that Right was stronger than Might. Has it all soaked in? Did you mark that word 'dull' applied to my business? Do you know what the contents o' this room would fetch at Christopher's, if the right men were biddin'?"

"Indeed, indeed, I don't."

"Nobody knows what my collection would fetch. The Quinney Collection! S'pose I leave everything to the nation—hey?"

Susan sat bowed and silent before the storm.

IV

Quinney did not look at her. Her attitude, her troubled face were sufficient alone to acquit her of any possible complicity in this abominable affair. The more he considered it as a tremendous fact in their lives, the more incredible, the more irrational it became to him. His Posy, the Wonder Child, the gem of the Quinney Collection, writing love-letters to an obscure faker of furniture, a "downy" cove, a rather sullen hireling, who earned four quid a week! Had his child been born and educated "regardless" for—this? Had Susan and he suffered pangs unforgettable in order that their child should forsake them for this maggot of a Miggott?

Never!

Slowly, his fighting instinct asserted itself. Catastrophe of any kind overwhelmed him at first, and then his vitality, his recuperative qualities, would come to the rescue. He must fight this issue to the end. His dull anger and rancour passed. His active wits began to work. He felt oddly sensible of a certain exhilaration, the conviction that he would soar, like the Melchester spire, above these ignominies and disasters.

He stood up, inhaling deep breaths, smiling grimly.

"What are you going to do, Joe?"

"Watch on, and see."

He replaced the billet in its envelope, which had been left open. Then he crossed to the cabinet, and put the letter into the drawer where he had found it. He closed the doors of the cabinet, and came back to his desk. About all these actions there was an automatic precision, as if the man had been transformed into a machine.

Susan murmured:

"Joe, you frighten me."

"Wouldn't do that for the world, Susie." His voice was slightly less hard. "I'm going to frighten them. See?"

"How?"

"I'm going to catch 'em together in this room to-night."

"Gracious!"

"And you've got to stand shoulder to shoulder with me, behind that screen. At the right moment, when least expected, we'll pop out."

"And what will you say?"

"Ho! What will I say? Between now and then, my dear, I shall think over what I'm going to say. Words won't fail me. I shall down the pair of them, rub their noses in their insolence and folly."

"Oh, dear!" exclaimed Susan.

CHAPTER XIX

THINGS AND PERSONS

I

That night, as usual, the Quinneys retired to bed at half-past ten. At eleven, the door of Joe's bedroom opened noiselessly, and the little man's head, crowned with a ridiculous smoking-cap appeared. His body followed arrayed in a flowered silk dressing-gown. Posy's room was upstairs.

Susan joined her husband. She was wearing what may be described as a compromise kit. Her pretty hair, still long and abundant, hung down her back in two braids. She had put on a peignoir of wadded silk, a garment not likely to rustle as she walked. Upon her small feet were thick felt slippers. In this costume she looked ten years younger, and she was pleasurably aware of this for reasons that will appear presently.

Quinney closed his bedroom door. They listened for a moment, but no sound came from above. Probably Posy was in bed, counting the minutes till the big clock on the stairs summoned her to meet her lover.

Quinney and Susan tip-toed down to the first floor. In the sanctuary a fire was burning in the dog-grate. Quinney smiled grimly, as he realized that Posy had replenished it with logs which burned brightly enough to illuminate the room with a soft amber glow.

"Sit down, mother."

Susan sat down in an armchair just opposite the fire. As a rule, this chair occupied its own particular corner. Posy, therefore, must have placed it in front of the hearth. Evidently Posy considered that one chair would suffice for two persons.

Meanwhile, Quinney made his dispositions behind the screen. Presently he appeared, rubbing his hands and chuckling quietly. The walls in these fine old houses were so comfortably sound-proof, that he had no hesitation in speaking in his usual voice.

"There! Couched in the ambush, as Shakespeare says. Do you remember, old dear, when me and you took a course o' the Bard to improve our powers o' speech?"

Susan sighed. In the tender light she looked almost the Susan whom he had courted long ago.

"Yes; we were young then, Joe."

"We're young still, dearie. Young and spry! Full o' beans."

He stood on the hearth, facing her, with his back to the glowing logs, looking down upon her delicate features. She raised her eyes to his, speaking in a soft voice, with a faint smile flickering about her mouth. Quinney had fallen in love with her dimples. He thought he could see the ghost of one in the cheek slightly turned from the fire. His attitude, erect and sturdy, her attitude, the firelight, the lateness of the hour—these recalled insistently the sweet past, when Mrs. Biddlecombe used to leave the lovers to talk over the present and the future. Susan remembered, with an odd little pang at her heart, how satisfied she had been with that present, although Joe insisted upon forecasting their future. And his predictions, those ambitions which she had regarded as vaulting high above human probability, had come to pass. He was famous and rich!

"Joe dear!"

"What is it?"

"You became engaged to me, didn't you, against your father's wish, and unbeknown to mother? Yes, you did."

"And what of it?"

"I never told mother that day you kissed me for the first time behind our parlour door."

"Now, Susie, what are you gettin' at? Circumstances alter cases. My father made a white nigger o' me. But, by Gum! I wasn't disobedient."

"You were, and you know it."

"What do you mean?"

"You took up with me against his wish."

"Ho! I honoured him by marrying the best girl in Melchester."

Susan said solemnly:

"You did deceive him, Joe."

"Serve him right, too."

"I say you deceived him."

"Well, for the Lord's sake, don't go on sayin' it, repeatin' yourself like an old poll parrot. Father never did do you justice. He never did know quality. Quantity was what he'd go for. Lordy! how he used to waller in cheap job lots!"

Susan ignored this. With slow pertinacity, working steadily to her point, she continued:

"And I deceived my pore mother. Used to wear my engagement ring at night."

She lifted her hand and looked at it. What a wonderful present it had been reckoned. Three turquoises with small brilliants, paid for out of the savings of a "white nigger"!

Joe stared at the ring. It seemed to shine out of the past. He remembered everything. For instance, he had not haggled about the price demanded—six pounds! He had felt that haggling would be indecent. He said pensively:

"I used to envy that ring, Susie. I used to think of you asleep, and wonder what you looked like." He sighed. "Great times them was, to be sure!"

Susan met his glance.

"Because of those times," she whispered, "go a bit easy, Joe, with these young people."

But his face hardened immediately.

"You leave that to me, my dear. I'll fix 'em to rights. I'll sweep the cobwebs out o' their silly noddles."

"If you'll try not to forget that we was just as silly once."

"Silly? Us? That won't wash, Susie. Like mated like."

Susan remained silent.

II

When Posy entered the room, her parents were sitting snug behind the incised lacquer screen. The girl added a fresh log to the fire, and smiled as she looked at the big empty chair. She was wearing a very becoming pale blue dressing-gown. Her hair, like Susan's, hung down her back in two thick pigtails tied with pale blue ribbon. Her bare feet were thrust into pale blue slippers. She might have been sixteen instead of eighteen, and about her there breathed a virginal air, deliriously fresh and fragrant. She smelled of lavender.

She went to the speaking-tube, and whistled down it. When her signal was answered, she said joyously:

"It's all right, Jim. Father fast asleep and snoring! Come up! Take your shoes off! The fourth stair from the top creaks horribly. Skip that!"

She hung up the tube, and spread her hands before the fire, warming them. Upon the third finger of her right hand sparkled a ring. Upon her charming face a smile sparkled also, as she listened for the step of her lover.

James came in, carrying his slippers in his hand. He was dressed as usual in a well-cut blue serge suit. He closed the door noiselessly, and held out his arms. Posy flew into them, with a sigh of satisfaction, but when he hugged her too masterfully, she protested, blushing, slipping from his embrace with a low laugh.

"You must promise to behave reasonably."

"Reasonably? Don't you like being kissed by me?"

"Of course I—er—like it."

"Awfully?"

"If you sit in that chair, I'll sit on the arm of it. Please! Be good!"

He obeyed. She fussed over him, arranging the cushion behind his back, touching him almost furtively, but laughingly, evading his touches, obviously the elusive nymph, captivated but not yet captured. James turned to look at her, slipping his arm round her waist.

"You are a sweet!" he said fervently.

"Am I much prettier than Mabel Dredge?"

"Rather! What made you mention her?"

"Oh, nothing. But mother was saying only this morning that six months ago, when I was at school, she thought that Mabel Dredge and you might make a match of it."

"What rubbish!"

He spoke irritably, too irritably a finer ear might have decided.

"I expect you flirted with her a teeny-weeny bit?"

"As if any man with eyes in his head would look at Miss Dredge when you were about."

"But I wasn't about then."

It was so evident that she was merely teasing him in the most innocent, girlish way, that he smiled and pressed her closer to him, whispering:

"Don't let's jaw about Miss Dredge. I say, isn't this cosy?"

"Isn't it? Fancy if father could see us now. Jim, dear, I simply adore the excitement of this—our meeting here in the sanctuary. By the way, are you as mad as daddy about things?"

"Things?"

"Things as opposed to persons. Could you fall down and worship figures?"

"I could worship your figure."

"You know what I mean, I'm simply wondering what effect this particular business has had upon your character. Don't frown! We must admit that his business hasn't improved poor father. And as for Mr. Tomlin——"

Jim said slowly:

"What do you mean exactly by business affecting character?"

She paused to consider. Jim kissed her. Perhaps it was significant that she did not return his kiss, being absorbed in her quest for the right word. She continued slowly:

"I hoped you would guess what I meant. Of course, poor father is honest. I have always been so proud of that. It would break my heart if he were like that horrid Mr. Tomlin, but he does care too much for what mother calls sticks and stones. They have come between him and her; and they have come between him and me. I have never really known how much he loved me. And now this is going to be a test, because if he does love me really and truly he will put my happiness before his ambition, won't he?"

He kissed her again, and once more she let him do it, passively, gazing, so to speak, into his mind rather than his heart.

Jim spoke curtly.

"Make up your mind to this, Posy. There will be a big row. It's inevitable."

Posy laughed.

"How like a man! Big rows are never inevitable. And daddy is an awful old fuss-pot, but his bark is much worse than his bite. When he barks at me I laugh inside. Now, Jim, are you necessary to father?"

"Necessary? Perhaps I am more necessary than he thinks, because I know too much to be treated badly. He would hardly dare to sack me."

"Not dare!"

"I mean that I have a sort of 'pull' with him. And I'm a hard worker, and a first-class cabinet-maker. When the time comes for him to take a partner he couldn't find a better man than I am."

Posy laughed.

"Jim, I declare you have caught father's habit of swanking."

"Swank, or no swank, I think I can make terms with your father, and the time has come to do it."

"I'd sooner things went on as they are for the present."

"Why?"

"Well, we haven't seen very much of each other as yet. Why, we hardly know each other."

"I have reasons, dearest, for wishing to tackle your father as soon as possible."

"What reasons?"

She spoke coaxingly, laying her cheek close to his.

"I must keep them to myself for the present. You trust me?"

"Oh, yes, but I'm horribly curious! Are you cross?"

"No, darling, I'm impatient. I want you to be wholly mine."

He laid his lips upon hers, and felt a slight pressure in return. When he pressed her to him, she thrilled. He kissed her ear, as he whispered:

"Do you ever think of what it will be like when you are mine?"

"Ye-es."

"Sit on my lap, you darling!"

He half-pushed her off the arm of the chair. She stood up, hesitating, the colour ebbing and flowing in her cheeks.

"I have never done that."

He held out both hands.

"Isn't it time to begin? Is your dear little heart beating?"

"Yes, it is. Almost loud enough for father to hear. But I feel—I feel——" Her voice died away in an attenuated whisper.

"What do you feel?"

"As if—as if we were playing hide-and-seek in the dark. I'm rather frightened. I suppose it's stupid. I——"

James stood up, facing her. Passion quivered in his voice as he exclaimed:

"I'm going to kiss the fear of me out of you—now!"

"No, you ain't!" said Quinney.

III

The lovers sprang apart as Quinney emerged from behind the screen. He addressed the trembling Posy first.

"Thought it likely you might make a fool of yourself, and I've not been disappointed. Come on, mother!"

Susan appeared, looking very confused and miserable.

"Look at her," continued Quinney. "She's blushin' to the roots of her hair for you."

At this Posy pulled herself together, and remarked defiantly:

"I'm not the least little bit ashamed of myself!"

"Sorry to hear that, my girl; it fair furs my tongue to find you here. Now then, like to take it sittin' or standin'?"

"Take what?"

"The dose I'm goin' to deal out to a deceitful, disobedient, ungrateful daughter. Sharper than a serpent's tooth, you are!"

So far, he had ignored James, who was standing back, not far from the door.

"I'll take it standing," replied Posy, "beside Jim."

Then, to Quinney's rage, she tripped across the room, and flung her arms round the young man's neck. Susan, ever mindful, like a true Biddlecombe, of the proprieties, murmured gaspingly:

"Posy! Please remember what you've not got on!"

"This beats the band," said Quinney. "I call this rank mutiny."

"It's—it's Nature," faltered Susan.

"You hold your tongue, mother! A nice couple, I do declare! Can you cook, Miss Independence?"

Posy removed her arms from James's neck, but she remained standing beside him.

"Cook? Not me. You know I can't cook. Why?"

"Thought not. Anything of a hand with your needle?

"No."

Quinney turned to Susan, who had sunk into a chair. The youth had faded out of her comely face. Every time that Quinney spoke she winced. A couple of tears were trickling down her cheeks.

"Why didn't you teach this young lady to use a broom, mother? Can she wash anything more useful than her own hands?"

Susan shook her head helplessly. The situation was far beyond her. She faltered out:

"Your orders, Joe. The child, you said, was to be brought up like a little princess."

He stared at her, dimly perceiving that his Susan could not be described truthfully as standing shoulder to shoulder with him.

"They tell me," he observed derisively, "that our royal Princesses have to learn such things as cookin' and washin', because revolutions do happen sometimes."

Susan shrugged her shoulders.

For the first time Quinney turned directly to James. The young man confronted his employer with a certain dignity not wasted upon Posy. He seemed to be quite ready to vindicate himself, when the opportunity came.

"Intentions honourable?" demanded the infuriated father.

"They are, sir."

"Arranged the weddin'-day yet?"

"Not yet."

"Waitin', maybe, for father's blessing and a snug settlement?"

James only smiled deprecatingly, but Posy exclaimed:

"And why not? Isn't it your duty to provide for me? It's your fault, not mine, that I can't cook, or wash, or sew."

"What a sauce!" said Quinney, lifting his congested eyes to heaven. "Mother, you go and stand between 'em."

Susan obeyed, muttering to herself and shaking her head. She placed a trembling hand upon Posy's sleeve. Posy saw the tears and kissed her. Quinney continued more fluently, speaking with deliberation, for he had rehearsed carefully this part of the scene.

"Now, Miss Impudence, ain't I been a good father to you? No quibblin'! Ain't I been a tip-top parent to you?"

"I don't quite know."

"What you say?"

"I said I didn't quite know."

"Well, I'm fairly jiggered! Ain't I given' you everything a girl wants?"

Posy remained silent. Can we describe Quinney's astonishment and dismay, when Susan said curtly and clearly:

"Indeed you haven't."

Posy added, hesitatingly:

"I have wanted things you didn't give me."

"Of all the shameless hussies! Now, you answer straight. It'd take a month o' Sundays to tell you what I have given you, but you tell me what I've not given."

Susan answered with a promptitude indicating previous consideration of the question.

"Be fair, Joe! You've not given the child your confidence or your sympathy. You don't know what books she reads; you don't know anything about her except what's on the surface."

"Hark to this!"

"You heard her say just now, when we was behind the screen, that she didn't know whether you loved her. That's something a girl ought to know, isn't it?"

"Go it! Love her? Love my daughter? You know that I love her."

"As she said, this is going to be a test of that."

"See here, Susan! Are you on my side or on hers?"

"I'm trying to stand between you, Joe—trying hard to keep the peace, and—and to be just."

"Just? You dare to hint that I don't love my child?"

Very slowly, Susan answered him. What it cost the faithful soul to speak the truth, as she conceived it to be, no male scribe can set forth. To her his question embodied the hopes and fears of all her married life, what she had suppressed so valiantly, so successfully, that he had never been vouchsafed a glimpse of her tormented sensibilities. To her this was the supreme moment when she must speak plainly, or for ever hold her peace.

"You love old furniture, Joe, old china, tapestries, and lacquer cabinets. You love them too well, dear. They have crept between you and Posy, between you—and me."

The dreariness of her voice smote her husband. Had they been alone, he would have melted; but James was present—James, whom he despised, James, whom he knew to be unworthy. Unable to deal adequately with Susan's pathetic indictment, he turned savagely on the young man.

"And you—don't you love old furniture, old china?" He made a passionate gesture, including within a sweep of his arm all the treasures about him. He continued: "Answer me! Don't you love things worth their weight in gold?"

"They interest me, of course. I don't love them."

"Never entered your overcrowded mind, did it, that when closing-time came for me these things would belong to my only child—hey?"

"It may have entered my mind, sir, but I didn't fall in love with Posy because she was your daughter."

"Ho! Tell me, how do you propose to support this young lady after I've given you the sack?"

"For that matter, Mr. Tomlin wants me. You pay me four pounds a week. I'm worth ten to any big dealer."

"'Ark to Mister Pride-before-the-Fall!"

Rage now possessed him. He had promised himself that he would keep his temper, and deal drastically but calmly with a clever knave and a pretty noodle. But Susan's attitude had blown to the wind such excellent resolutions. Perhaps the dominant idea in his mind was to get Susan alone, to vindicate himself in her eyes. He believed honestly that this abominable affair had distracted her poor wits. Obviously, the first step towards an understanding with Susan was the settlement of this preposterous James Miggott. He nerved himself for a knock-out blow. In James's eyes, set a thought too close together, he fancied that he read derision and defiance. He heard James's quiet voice:

"I am quite able to support a wife."

"Are you? Does that mean, my lad, that you're ready to marry her against my wish, without my consent?"

"I counted on your consent, sir."

"You answer my question. You're in love with Posy for herself—hey? You'd take her as she stands?"

James answered firmly but respectfully:

"Yes."

Poor Quinney! He had expected hesitation, a craven retreat from a false position, glib expostulation—any reply except this stark "Yes." The blow stunned him. He heard Posy's joyful voice:

"Oh, Jim, you are a darling! I was never quite—quite sure till this blessed minute!"

The little man boiled over. He was almost ripe for personal violence. Fortunately, the sense that a man must not fight with his fists in the presence of ladies made him thrust his hands into his pockets. The other convention concerning the use of strong language was honoured in the breach!

"Damn you!" he spluttered. "If you want her, take her—now."

CHAPTER XX

BLACKMAIL

I

The bolt fell from the blue with shattering effect upon Posy and James. Susan, however, with that instinct which makes a woman grab at her petticoats when she is tumbling over a precipice, exclaimed shrilly:

"Joe! He can't take her without her stockings!"

"That's his affair," said Quinney.

His shrewd eye had marked a collapse on the part of James. He felt reasonably assured that the young man was bluffing; he knew that this "downy cove" wanted a wife with more than stockings, no matter how pretty her bare feet might be. Fortified by this conclusion, he, so to speak, fixed bayonets and charged. Unfortunately, he did not take Susan's character into account, which a husband so acute should have done. He was well aware that his wife, with all her shining qualities, was obstinate and emotional. More, he had never regarded her as a mother, although that significant name crossed his lips a hundred times each day. Susan was his wife.

When he charged, head down, seeing "red," intent only upon "downing" the clever knave and the foolish virgin, Susan interposed, metaphorically, her soft body.

"Joe, you ain't serious? You ain't turning our child out of our house at midnight?"

We must admit that Quinney was not serious, but for the moment he was in no condition to think soberly. He replied fiercely:

"I'm turning out a—adder!"

Susan faced him. He had lost his head; she lost hers.

"If you do this——" she gasped.

"Go on!"

"If you do this unnatural, cruel, wicked——"

"That's right. Hit a man when he's down!"

"Down!" she retorted, as fiercely as he; "it's up you are, Joe Quinney, tens o' thousands o' feet above all common sense and common decency. It is things you care for—things—things—things! And our Posy—my Posy, bless her!—is right to prefer persons to the graven images, the false gods, which you've set up and worshipped—yes, worshipped! There's only one person in all the world you care for, and that's yourself—yourself!"

She flung herself into a chair in a paroxysm of grief and distress, covering her face with the hands which had worked so faithfully for a husband changed beyond recognition. Posy flew to her.

"Darling mother!"

Quinney pushed the girl aside.

"All your fault, you baggage! Susan! Susan!"

Susan sobbed inarticulately. Quinney shook her, speaking loudly, but not unkindly, confounded in his turn by an indictment which he hardly understood.

"Stop it, old dear, stop it! I care about you. Susie—I do, indeed! Worked for you, I have, made a perfect lady of yer! Couldn't get along without you, no how! And you know it! Darby and Joan—what? Oh, bung it! Gawd bless me soul! you'll melt away like, if you ain't careful. Sue, s'elp me, you come first."

She lifted her head with disconcerting suddenness.

"Do I? Sure?"

He seized her hand, and pressed it.

"Why, of course. Nice old cup of tea, you are, to doubt that!"

"You'd miss me if I went?"

The sharp interrogation ought to have given him pause.

Perhaps he had always underrated Susan's subtlety. The most foolish mothers can be subtle as the serpent when the happiness of their children is at stake.

"Miss you? Haven't I said time and again that I hoped as I'd be taken first?"

She sat up alert, strangely composed after this tempest of emotion.

"Oh yes, you've said so——"

He was far too excited to perceive that she was leading him into a trap cunningly contrived.

"Meant it, too! Man o' my word, I am!"

Susan stood up.

"Man of your word," she repeated ironically. "Tell me you was joking when you threatened to turn young Posy into the street?"

His mouth opened, his eyes protruded, as if he were a victim of that rare malady known as Graves's disease. Had his Susan plotted and planned to trip him up? Was she a superlative actress? He moistened his parched lips with his tongue, measuring his will against hers, sorry for her, but sorrier still for himself. Then he said more calmly:

"Young Posy needn't leave us unless she wants to. I'll keep on James. I'll sweeten his salary again to please you, but our child ain't for the likes of him. He's no class."

Posy interrupted, with a toss of her head.

"James is good enough class for a child of yours."

Quinney curbed an angry retort. His temper was at last under control. He said quietly:

"It comes to this, Posy. You've got to choose between James Miggott and us. Now, not another word. You scoot off to bed. We'll talk of this again to-morrow."

"I shall choose Jim to-morrow."

Then Susan fired the decisive shot. Nobody will ever know whether she meant it. She had been tried too high. Doubtless the spirit of bluff was hovering in the sanctuary, playing pranks now with this victim, and now with that.

"If you drive Posy out of this house, Joe, I shall go with her. If she never returns to it, I shall never return to it."

Quinney wiped his forehead, as he ejaculated:

"The pore soul's gone potty!"

Susan continued:

"I was ever so happy when we went to live in the Dream Cottage; I have been very unhappy in this big house filled with things which you love more than me."

"Unhappy—here? Lordy! You'll complain of the Better Land when you get there!"

James spoke. So far he had kept his powder dry and his head cool.

"May I suggest——"

"What?"

"A compromise, sir. You have always impressed me with the wisdom of doing nothing rashly."

"Pity you couldn't profit by such advice, Mr. Marry-in-Haste."

"I've been courting Posy for more than three months."

"You've the rest of your life to regret it."

James hesitated, trying to determine the right policy to pursue. Then he said firmly:

"There are one or two matters to talk over, sir, before we part company."

"Meaning, my lad?"

"Matters we had better discuss quietly, and—alone."

"Ho! Hear that, Susan? He's not quite in such a hurry to take the young lady without her stockin's. Very good! You pop off to bed, my girl. Susan, you go with her. I'll see you later."

Posy glanced at James, who nodded.

"Good-night, Jim!"

"Good-night, my darling!"

"Tchah!" muttered Quinney. For the third time in his life the remembrance of the Channel crossing vividly presented itself. He felt deadly sick!

II

As mother and daughter retired, Quinney exclaimed, more to himself than to James:

"When I think of what I've done for them two thankless females!"

"What have you done?" asked James.

"Slaved for 'em for twenty years! Sweated blood, I have! Thanks to me, they've lived in cotton-wool, able to take it easy all the time. Enough o' that! What you got to say to me—alone? Hey?"

"Can't you guess? Didn't you overhear just now what I said to Posy? I told her that I thought I could deal with you, and that the time had come to do it."

"Deal away, my lad. Pull the cards out o' yer sleeve. Lay 'em on the table."

"My cards, sir, are chairs."

"Chairs? You gone potty, too?"

"Chairs. The chairs which Mr. Tomlin bought for fifty pounds; the chairs which I 'restored'; the chairs which were done up with old needlework covers taken from other chairs; the chairs which you put up at Christopher's and bought in after spirited bidding—faked bidding—for nine hundred pounds; the chairs which you sold to Mr. Hunsaker this morning for eleven hundred; the chairs which you ordered me to pack at once. Nice little tale to tell Mr. Hunsaker, when he calls to-morrow! Nice little bit of 'copy' for the newspapers."

We know that this young fellow rehearsed his speeches. He had rehearsed this. It flowed smoothly from his lips.

"Blackmail!" gasped Quinney.

"I prefer to call it a weapon, sir, which you are forcing me, sorely against my will, to use."

"This puts the lid on."

"Yes, it does."

"I understand. It's my daughter against your silence, hey? Hold hard! Does she know of this?"

"No. Don't you remember? She asked for information, which I withheld out of respect for you and her. Posy believes you to be scrupulously honest."

"I'm damned!"

"I fear that you will be, if this story becomes public."

"My Posy against your silence. My Posy against my reputation. My Posy against my wife!"

He was profoundly moved. James perceived this, and proceeded to follow up his advantage. His tactics, admittedly, were intelligently conceived and carried out. His error—a fundamental one—lay in his ignorance of Quinney's character. Like Susan, who had been carried away by her maternal emotions; like Posy, who was still in her salad days, he had taken for granted that Quinney did prefer things to persons.

"May I put my case this way, sir? As your prospective son-in-law, working hard in and for your interest, do I not present serious claims upon your attention?"

Quinney stared at him. This was, indeed, a "plant," skilfully prepared by a rascal and fortune-hunter. He said roughly:

"Cut that prospective son-in-law cackle! As yourself, my lad, you do present very serious claims indeed upon my attention."

"Have it as you please, Mr. Quinney."

"That's exactly how I mean to have it."

"What have you against me, sir?"

Quinney had been pacing the room restlessly. He stopped suddenly, opposite James, within two feet of his pale face.

"You ain't honest; you ain't straight; you ain't fit to marry an honest girl!"

James raised his eyebrows.

"Isn't this a case of the pot calling the kettle black?"

"Yes, it is. We're both pots—dirty pots. How dirty I someway never saw till to-night. But my Posy is porcelain—clean, dainty porcelain. You can't touch her without defilin' her. Now—scoot!"

"Without settling anything?"

"You shall be settled to-morrow. Don't worry."

The young man smiled.

"You are wise, sir, to take a night to sleep over it."

"Done talkin'?"

"For to-night, yes."

"Good! Because with every extra word you're givin' yourself dead away. Easier to marry money than to make it, hey? Kennel up, you puppy!"

The puppy snarled at this, but withdrew.

III

Alone, Quinney opened the cupboard beneath the china cabinet, taking from it a cut-glass decanter half-filled with brown sherry, and two glasses, which he placed upon his desk. Then he summoned Susan. She drifted in rather helplessly, somewhat of a wreck after the storm. Quinney ensconced her in a chair, filled the two glasses with wine, and pushed one across the desk to Susan. She shook her head.

"Drink it, you old spoof-sticks! Lordy, Sue, I didn't know you had it in yer! What a spirit! What a little tigress!"

He tossed off his glass, smacking his lips.

"I meant it, Joe."

"Tch! tch! In two sticks you'll have my pore leg pulled out of shape."

"I meant it, every word of it."

"What? You'd leave the best and kindest hubby in the world?"

"I'd leave a crool, heartless father."

For answer, Quinney seized his empty glass and slammed it down upon the desk, smashing it riotously. Susan said in the same weak, obstinate tone: "Do that to her dear heart, you would." He snatched at the full glass, and hurled that to the floor. Susan merely observed: "Another two shillings gone!"

"Two shillings? Ten! Old Bristol! Lovely stuff!"

"There you go again."

"Ho! You really think I care about money?"

"Yes, I do."

"Well, I don't. You say I care about things. So I do. But things have been a means to an end with me. Never mind that now. If you don't know yer luck in havin' Joe Quinney for a husband, he's too busy a man to learn ye. I want to talk about something else. This James Miggott's a bad lad. He's threatening me."

The word challenged Susan's attention.

"Threatening you, Joe? What about?"

Quinney's high colour deepened. Susan had cornered him. His voice became less masterful.

"Never you mind what about! He ain't goin' to down me that way."

Susan glanced sharply at her husband. He tried to meet her honest eyes, but failed. The impulse surged within him to confess, to ask forgiveness, to promise to run straight for the future. The horns of the dilemma pierced his vitals. How could he expose James without revealing himself stark naked to the wife whose good opinion was dearer to him than all the treasures in his sanctuary? She beheld him squirming, and hastened to draw the wrong conclusion. James, of course—gallant youth—had threatened to take Posy without her stockings. She said tartly:

"James is fighting for our Posy."

"No, he ain't. He's fighting—and hittin' below the belt, too—for things. These things."

"I don't believe it."

"Right! You can believe this, I shall fight to a finish. No quarter—see?"

"Very well. Good-night!"

She rose, whey-faced, but resolute.

"What d'ye mean by 'good-night'?"

"I'm going to sleep with Posy."

"You ain't?"

"Yes, I am!"

She went out slowly, not closing the door. Quinney listened to her familiar steps as she mounted the oak stairs. She ascended higher and higher till she reached Posy's room. Quinney heard the door shut, and then—significant sound—the click of a turning key.

He appeared confounded.

CHAPTER XXI

MABEL DREDGE

I

Quinney telephoned early the next morning to Tom Tomlin, asking him to come to Soho Square before ten. Posy did not descend to breakfast, and during that meal Susan preserved an obstinate silence. Quinney gobbled up his bacon, drank three cups of tea, and hurried to the sanctuary, where a pile of letters left unanswered the day before awaited him. Mabel Dredge, notebook in hand, greeted him perfunctorily. Quinney, lacerated by his own anxieties, noted a dreary tone in the girl's voice. Many excellent persons never recognize trouble in others till they are suffering from trouble of their own. Of such was our hero. He had passed a wretched night, and, as he shaved, was constrained to perceive its ravages upon his face. Upon Mabel's face, also, he seemed to catch a glimpse of faint lines and shadows, as if the spider Insomnia had woven a web across it.

"Anything wrong?" he inquired.

"Nothing," replied Mabel tartly.

He sat down at his desk, glancing at the morning's letters, arranged by Mabel in a neat little pile. The topmost letter contained Hunsaker's cheque for eleven hundred pounds, and a few cordial lines reminding his dear sir that he hoped to call at eleven, and that he might bring a friend with him, an expert of Chippendale furniture. Quinney frowned, resenting the introduction of an expert. But he reflected comfortably that the chairs were already cased. He opened the other letters, and then began to deal faithfully with each correspondent in turn. He dictated these letters after his own fashion. It was Mabel's task to adjust grammatical errors and to eliminate slang. He had grown fond of Mabel because she was competent and tactful.

"I think that will do, my dear."

Mabel rose quietly, shutting her notebook. She used a small room, where she kept her machine and a copying-press and other paraphernalia appertaining to secretarial duties. Unconsciously, she sighed.

"Lookin' peaky, you are," said her employer.

Mabel retorted indifferently:

"Weather affects me. Seems even to have affected you, sir."

"Ho! Observant young miss! But you're wrong. Weather don't affect me; and it oughtn't to affect a healthy young woman like you. Sleep badly?"

"Ye-es."

"Same here."

The need of sympathy gripped him. He was so sorry for himself that he felt sorry for this white-faced typist, whom hitherto he had regarded as a machine.

"Beastly, ain't it?" She nodded, and he continued, speaking rather to himself than to her: "To toss about, tinglin' all over, with one's thoughts in a ferment! Perfectly disgustin'!"

Mabel smiled faintly.

"I've a lot on my mind just now," he went on, "a bigger load than I care to carry—immense responsibilities, see?"

She opened her eyes, wondering what had evoked this amazing confidence, little guessing that the habit of years was behind it. He had always talked to Susan about his affairs, poured them into ears now deaf in the hour of sorest need.

"Sit down," he commanded. "There's no hurry. I'm expecting Mr. Tomlin."

"I beg your pardon; I forgot to mention it. I have a message from Mr. Miggott. His respects, and he wants to see you if you can spare a few minutes."

"Ho! Well, I can't see him yet. He must wait my convenience. Sit you down!"

Mabel obeyed, blushing slightly, because Quinney's eyes were so piercing. She was quite unaware that she had betrayed herself in the pronunciation of a name. At no other time, probably, would Quinney have leapt to the conclusion that James was behind her trouble as certainly as he was behind his own. He hated James. It hurt him to hear his name softly murmured.

"Any of your people ill, my dear?"

"No."

"Not in debt, are you?"

"Certainly not."

"Not sufferin' from neuralgia, or toothache, or anything of that sort?"

"I am in excellent health, sir."

"Then, my girl, you're in love."

Her confusion answered him. She was angry, indignant, scornful; but she could not prevent the red blood rushing into her cheeks. She retorted sharply:

"That's none of your business, sir!"

Quinney chuckled. A ray of light flashed across his dark horizon.

"Don't be too sure o' that, my dear. Perhaps it is my business; anyway, I'm going to make it my business, because I take a fatherly interest in you."

"I can manage my own affairs, Mr. Quinney."

"No, you can't. Look ye here. I'm a wonderful guesser—always was. You like James Miggott. Nothing to be ashamed of in that. I'll be bound he likes you!"

Mabel fidgeted. Quinney's voice was kind. It rang true. The desire to confide in this odd little man, so masterful, so persuasive when he chose, grew as swiftly as Jack the Giant Killer's beanstalk.

"Doesn't he like you?" he asked insistently.

"He used to like me," she answered mournfully.

"Ah! Now, Mabel, there are just as good fish in the sea as ever came out of it."

"And what time have I to catch fish?"

"S'pose you was my daughter, I shouldn't like you to marry James. This is on the strict Q.T., just between me and you, James was a faker of old furniture till he came to me."

"He's no better, I dare say, and no worse, than other men in his trade!"

"Tch! tch! He's lucky to have a nice girl to stick up for him. Now, my dear"—his voice became very soft and confidential—"you say that James used to like you. Why has he cooled off, hey?"

She answered miserably:

"I don't know."

"Cheer up! Maybe I can help you. Lordy! Don't cry! Answer me this—straight. Do you still want him?"

"Ye-es."

It was a doleful, long-drawn-out monosyllable, eloquent of much left unsaid. Quinney nodded sympathetically, although his small eyes were sparkling.

"At one time, I take it, you thought he was yours?"

She was too overcome to utter a word.

"Do you believe that he likes somebody else?" He paused, waiting for an answer. She twisted her fingers, refused to meet his eyes, moved restlessly. He went on, playing upon her emotions:

"Do you know who that somebody is? Come, be square with me, my dear. Is it a young lady who shall remain nameless—a young lady lately returned from school; a young lady whom James Miggott will never marry—never?"

His suppressed excitement communicated itself to her. She was clever enough to understand exactly what he wished to convey. She glanced up and nodded. Quinney drew in his breath sharply; his manner changed.

"And you still want him?"

"Yes."

"Queer creatures you women are, to be sure!"

"We can't pick and choose like men."

"If you want him, you shall have him."

She shook her head dubiously.

"You don't know James, sir."

"Ho! Don't I? Better than you know him, better than he knows himself. I'll help you, my girl, but you must help me."

"How?"

He got up and stood beside her. She watched him with a certain fascination, curiously sensible of his power over her and others. The native confidence that he had in himself percolated slowly through her.

"Tell me truly what has passed between you and this young man."

She was expecting any question except this. The audacity of it overwhelmed her, as he had foreseen that it would. She broke down, sobbing bitterly, hiding her face from the keen eyes looking down into her very soul. Quinney laid his hand upon her head tenderly. For the moment this strangely-assorted pair, linked together by an interest common to each, yet antagonistic to each, stood together upon a plane high above that on which they moved habitually.

"I ain't no saint," said Quinney solemnly. "And I tell you this, Mabel Dredge, I've been through hell during the past twelve hours; and I'm not out of it yet. Stand up, you poor dear! Look me in the face, for then you'll know that you can trust me. Give me your hand—so! It's a nice little hand. Ought there to be a wedding-ring on it?"

"Yes," she whispered.

II

Susan came in shortly after Mabel had gone. Her face was very troubled, but obstinacy sat enthroned upon a head carried at a higher angle than usual. Quinney said facetiously:

"Come to throw yourself at my feet and ask forgiveness?"

"Certainly not."

"Meant all you said last night?"

"Every word of it."

"What is Posy doing?"

"Crying her eyes out, I dare say."

"Sounds sloppy."

"Mr. Tomlin is here. Hateful man! I suppose he'll side with you!"

"That remains to be seen. I doubt it. Ask Tom to step up."

Susan went out with dignity.

Tomlin had been to a banquet the night before, and bore the signs of intemperance in eating and drinking upon his large mottled face. He greeted Quinney sulkily, unable to purge his mind of the conviction that Soho Square ought to come to Bond Street. He asked thickly:

"Ever suffer from indigestion?"

"Never."

"I do," said Tomlin gloomily. He added with finality: "Port, even the best, atop o' bubbly wine is a mistake after fifty. What you want me for, young Joe?"

"Glad I look young, Tom. I don't feel it this morning."

Tomlin stared at him.

"Blest if you ain't made a night of it, too."

"Here's something to cheer us up."

He pushed across the desk Hunsaker's cheque for eleven hundred pounds. Tomlin's heavy features relaxed into a smile. Quinney scribbled some figures on a memorandum pad, and invited his colleague to verify them. The sum represented the exact amount due to Tomlin as his share of the plunder.

"Quite O.K., Joe."

"Like your bit o' ready now?"

"Never refuse cash, my lad."

Quinney wrote out a cheque, and a receipt. Tomlin accepted the cheque, placing it in a bulky pocket-book. He glared askance at the receipt, which set forth that the sum just paid was a commission upon the sale of eight chairs to Cyrus P. Hunsaker, of Hunsaker.

"Why this receipt, Joe? Ain't a cheque a receipt?"

Quinney answered curtly:

"A cheque don't show what money is paid for. My way of doin' business."

"No complaints."

He chuckled fatly, raising his thick eyebrows when Quinney observed lightly:

"What we done the day before yesterday was a leetle bit dangerous, old man. Sailin' too near the reefs—um?"

Tomlin replied pompously:

"Skilled navigators, my lad, do sail near the reefs. I wouldn't assume such risks with another man."

"But you did!"

"What do you mean, Joe?"

"James Miggott is in the know."

"Of course, but he's had his little bit."

"Yes; but he wants more!"

"The swine!" He stared at Quinney, beholding upon the whimsical face of his pupil writing which he could not read. "What's up?" he spluttered.

"I am," said Quinney, rising; "and stripped for the fight of my life."

Tomlin stirred uneasily.

"A fight, Joe? Who with?"

Quinney answered fiercely:

"That dirty dog, James Miggott. He wants more than what we gave him. See? He wants my Posy."

Tomlin exhibited marked relief.

"Your Posy? Don't blame him for wanting her."

"You hold hard! Young Posy wants him."

"Gawd bless my soul! She's not the judge o' quality he is."

"And Susan backs 'em up. That fairly tears it."

Tomlin looked puzzled, unable to account for the younger man's excitement. He considered that Joe, unlike himself, was incapable of managing his womenfolk.

"Between 'em, Tom, they've got a strangle hold on us."

"Us? What have I to do with your fam'ly matters?"

"I sent for you to tell you. Now, first and last, they'll never have my consent, never! But, by thunder! I refuse my consent, not because the dog's my servant, but because he isn't straight. He's no better than you and me."

Tomlin glared at his former pupil, who stood over him, waving a denunciatory hand.

"You speak for yourself, young man."

"I ain't young. We're both of us old enough to know better and do better, but we've had to make our way. Maybe I've been honester than you, maybe I haven't. I ain't whining, least of all to you. We're in a deep hole of our own making. And we must get out of it. I told this James Miggott last night that we was pots, just common pots, sailin' down the stream with other pots. But my little Posy's porcelain, the finest paste, the gem o' my collection. Susan accuses me of caring for things, these things. So I do; so do you; that's why we've struggled to the front. And this son of a gun loves things, and what they stand for. He's after my things, but he's clever enough to have bluffed two innercent females into believin' that he wants my Posy without 'em."

Tomlin blinked and nodded, stupefied by the terrific feeling displayed by Quinney. His headache had come back, that humiliating sense of "unfitness" which clouded his judgment, leaving him dazed and irritable. Nor, as yet, had he grasped the situation, or measured the depth of the hole to which Quinney alluded. The little man went on:

"I've called his bluff, if it is bluff. I've told him that he can take Posy, march her out of this house as she is."

"What did he say to that?"

"I should have downed him, but, by Gum, the old lady butted in. Swore solemn she'd leave my house, if I turned Posy out. She means it, too!"

"A good riddance," snarled Tomlin.

Quinney exploded, shaking his clenched fist in front of the huge, red face.

"What? I'd have you to know, Tom Tomlin, that my Susan and me have stuck together through thick and thin. I think the world of her, but she's without guile, bless her, and as obstinate as Balaam's ass!"

"S'pose you tell me where I come in?"

"Here and now, by the back-door! This dirty dog threatens to down me with the true story of them chairs. And he'll do it, too. Now, let this soak in together with all that port and champagne you swallered last night. If he downs me, he downs you! Got it?"

Assuredly Tomlin had "got it." He began to shake with impotent rage, growling out:

"Threatens to split? I'd like to tell that young man exactly what I think of him."

"You can," said Quinney derisively; "but it will do you more good than him, I reckon. We'll send for him in a jiffy. Ever notice my typist and stenographer, Miss Dredge?"

"Yes, many a time. Nice-lookin' gal."

"This maggot of a Miggott has been eatin' into her young affections, see?"

"Has he? The young man has taste, Joe. Reg'lar lady-killer!"

Quinney lowered his voice:

"It's a weapon, but I don't rely on it. I can't use it, in fairness to Mabel, till we stand in the last ditch."

"Why not? Got to think of ourselves, ain't we?"

Tomlin pulled out an immense silk bandana, and mopped a heated brow.

"It's two-edged, Tom. You ain't yourself this morning, or you'd see, with your knowledge of the fair sex, that Posy might be keener on gettin' this scamp, if she learned that another woman was after him. We'll try to handle Master Miggott first."

He crossed to the speaking-tube, and summoned James to the sanctuary. Then he sat down, very erect and austere, at his desk.

III

Presently James entered, carrying his head at the angle affected by Susan, looking very bland and self-confident.

"Good-morning, Mr. Tomlin! Good-morning, Mr. Quinney!"

Quinney acknowledged this salutation with a derisive grin.

"Mornin', Mr. Chesty! Bin usin' a Sandow's exerciser?"

"No, sir; Indian clubs. Am I to state my case before Mr. Tomlin?"

"Yes. Go ahead and state it. Don't waste my time, or his, or your own."

James addressed himself suavely to Tomlin, selecting his words carefully, speaking slowly, with the utmost respect.

"Last night, Mr. Quinney threatened to turn his daughter into the street, because she's engaged to be married to me."

"My hand was forced, my lad. Go on."

"I can support a wife, and Miss Quinney is ready to marry me by special licence this afternoon."

"Quite sure o' that?"

"Ab—solutely. Unhappily, I'm not yet in a financial position to support two ladies."

"Two ladies?" echoed Quinney, thinking of Mabel Dredge.

"I allude, sir, to Mrs. Quinney. She insists upon leaving you, if her child is turned out. That rather complicates matters."

"It does," said Quinney grimly.

"Under these circumstances, gentlemen, I feel justified in bringing pressure to bear. Mr. Hunsaker, who bought certain chairs yesterday, will call again this morning. He is naturally interested in the history of the chairs; and he might make trouble if he knew all the facts about them as known to you, Mr. Tomlin, to Mr. Quinney, and to me. I may add that my responsibility in the affair is negligible."

"Slick talker," muttered Quinney. He could see that Tomlin was much impressed by James's manner. The big fellow grunted uneasily:

"What do you propose?"

"A compromise, Mr. Tomlin."

Quinney lost something of his dignity, when he jerked out:

"He's compromised my Posy, and many another pore girl, I'll be bound!"

"Pardon me, sir. That sort of talk before a witness is libellous."

The last rag of Quinney's dignity fluttered away.

"I'll down you, my lad; yes, I will!"

"Self-preservation being the first law, sir, I must—sorely against the grain—down you first. Excuse plain speaking."

Quinney jumped up.

"I like plain speaking! I was weaned on it, short-coated on it! By Gum! my father damned me before I was born!"

"Easy all," murmured Tomlin nervously. He addressed James with a civility which the young man acknowledged with a faint smile. "Do I understand that you threaten to down your master because he refuses to sanction an engagement between you and his daughter?"

James shrugged his shoulders.

"It's a case of 'pull, devil—pull, baker!' I mean to pull for all I'm worth."