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Plain as day!" exclaimed Mr. Mayfair. "The face was unrecognizable," continued Mr. Pyecroft, "but since the gown had sewn into it Mrs. De Peyster's name, of course " "Of course! The most natural mistake in the world!" cried Mr. Mayfair excitedly. "Go on! Go on!" Mrs. De Peyster had slowly turned a dazed countenance upward and was gazing at the sober, plausible face of her young man of the sea.
Presently Mrs. De Peyster's eyes opened. "It would be some relief" weak hope was in her voice "if only I could manage to get down into my own suite." "But, ma'am, with that Mr. Pyecroft " "He's a risk we've got to run," Mrs. De Peyster cried desperately. "We've somehow got to manage to get me there without his knowing it." Suddenly she sat up.
Jack was too excited by his happiness to have noticed Mrs. De Peyster's voice had it been a dozen-fold more unlike Matilda's than it was. "Yes!" he cried. "And wouldn't it surprise mother if she knew! Mother, sailing so unsuspiciously along on the Plutonia!" He gave a chortle of delight. "But oh, I say, Matilda," he cried suddenly, "you mustn't write her!" Mrs. De Peyster did not answer.
The three continued their interchange of helpless gaze. "Pardon me if I seem to intrude," spoke up the even voice of Mr. Pyecroft. Swiftly, but without appearing to hurry, he stepped to Mrs. De Peyster's writing-desk, and began running through the pages of the telephone book. With terrified apprehension, Mrs. De Peyster watched him: what what was that terrible man going to do?
"I was passing," said he, "and chanced to overhear you say a moment since that you simply had to have money." Mrs. De Peyster's face filled with suspicion. "You have been listening all the while?" "Possibly," said Mr. Pyecroft, with the same bland smile. "Eavesdropper!" His smile did not alter. "I did not hear very much, really. Miss Thompson, may I beg the favor of a few minutes with you alone?"
"And what's worse," Matilda faltered, as though the blame was hers, "the hotels won't trust you unless you have baggage. And we have no baggage, ma'am." "Matilda!" There was now real tragedy in Mrs. De Peyster's voice. "What are we going to do?" They walked along the Park, whispering over their unforeseen and unforeseeable predicament.
De Peyster's fire would no more have forgotten itself and shown a boisterous enthusiasm than would one of her admirably trained servants. Beside a small steel safe, whose outer shell of exquisite cabinet-work transformed that fortress against burglarious desire into an article of furniture that harmonized with the comfortable elegance of a lady's boudoir, sat Mrs.
Clark was so crafty that he might circle above the town and come down by the river, but in a week or so the alarm passed. Henry spent the period of alarm in his prison, but when de Peyster's fears relaxed he was allowed the liberty of the court again. Neither Holderness nor Desmond was visible and he walked back and forth for a long time.
"But, ma'am, the money?" said Matilda who had handled Mrs. De Peyster's petty cash account for twenty years, and whose business it had been to think of petty practicalities. "We've only got twenty-three cents left, and we can't possibly get any more soon, and no one will take us in without money or baggage. Don't you see? We can't stay here, and we can't go any place else."
"He asked me for the key to" "your" almost escaped Matilda "to Mrs. De Peyster's suite. He'd been particularly ordered to touch up Mrs. De Peyster's private desk, he said." "And you gave him the key?" inquired Mr. Pyecroft, asking the very question that was struggling at Mrs. De Peyster's lips. "I told him I didn't have a key," said Matilda. "Oh!" breathed Mrs. De Peyster.
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