CHAPTER III
A SOCIETY SENSATION
“HAVE you heard the latest sensation, Lady Rotherfield?”
“Oh, no, Mr. Greetland. Do tell me. It’s not the scandal about Lord Barnoldby and Infanta Turnour? Of course every one knows all about that.”
“Hardly all, dear lady,” Greetland simpered. He was one of the cohort of smart diners-out; the social bagmen who all travel in the same commodity, for which there is universal demand—scandal. “The Barnoldby-Turnour affair is never-ending. Nobody ever will hear the last of that.”
“The Infanta is old enough to know better,” observed Mrs. Hargrave on the other side of him, scandalized but interested.
“She is big enough at any rate,” Greetland smirked.
“To be ashamed of herself,” supplemented Lady Rotherfield illogically.
“Perhaps she has out-grown the sense of shame,” suggested Greetland, whose stature matched his ambition. “But that wasn’t what I was referring to. Something much more thrilling.”
“Mr. Greetland!”
The society purveyor glanced round to see whether he had an audience worthy of the news. People on each side seemed to be pricking up their ears. There was evidently something of interest going forward; the spasmodic tea-table talk languished; Dormer Greetland was always interesting; even men who itched to kick him admitted that. “A curiously marked caterpillar” had once been Gastineau’s correction when some one spoke of Greetland as a worm. He was too sleek and foppish to be a human exemplar of the more coarse and naked invertebrate.
A pretty piece of scandal was evidently forthcoming, and he got an audience to his liking—almost every one of importance in the room, with one notable exception, the hostess, Countess Alexia von Rohnburg, who was listening to a prosy Russian diplomat.
“What is it? You have some news for us, Greetland?” cried the high-pitched voice of Baron de Daun, as he came across the floor and stood over the group. In his way the Baron was as great a scandal-monger and blagueur as the other man, but he tore reputations to shreds with greater violence than his English confrère, who was, after all, more of an artist. On the other hand, the Baron had greater justification in peeping through the chinks in society’s shutters, for was he not a diplomatist?
“A very extraordinary thing has come to light,” Greetland said, with an air befitting the communication. “It is really quite dramatic, and Heaven only knows what will be the end of it.”
“What? What?” Baron de Daun’s temper was impatient of preliminaries, a circumstance which, however, was not so great a drawback as it would seem in his profession, where due weight is given to considerations other than individual fitness.
“You remember,” Greetland proceeded, still deliberately—on his own ground it took more than the representative of a second-rate power to flurry him—“you remember the affair of poor Beauty Martindale?”
“Oh, yes; the poor fellow who died so tragically at the ball at—where was it? Yes?”
To Lady Rotherfield details were unimportant; but to Greetland they had their value. “Vaux House,” he supplied.
“Yes? yes?”
“Let’s see. He was supposed to have died of heart disease, but it was doubted——”
“There was no doubt about it,” de Daun asserted quickly. The subject was too interesting for more diplomatic contradiction.
“Of course,” corroborated Sir Perrott Aspall, who had been in Australia at the time and was consequently well qualified to give an authoritative dictum. “He was murdered, done to death by one of his partners, eh? That’s the idea.”
“I recollect,” put in Mrs. Hargrave breathlessly. “Half the smart women in town were suspected.”
“Many of whom were not at the dance,” de Daun laughed.
“It’s years ago,” Lady Rotherfield said, as an excuse for general vagueness.
“Well, what of it? What has come to light?” the Baron demanded. “Get on, my dear fellow, if you have anything to tell us.”
Greetland, master of the situation, was content to wait till the chatter stopped. “The facts were these. Reggie Martindale, the handsomest man in town, was found dead at the Lancashires’ dance. You are quite right, dear lady, it was at first supposed and given out that it was heart disease. Then, almost by accident, and after the certificate had been given, a tiny wound, scarcely bigger than a pin-prick, was found in his left side near the heart. That was hushed up; luckily the Lancashires’ medico, who found it out, happened to be Martindale’s as well, and so had the matter in his own hands; and naturally the Duchess did not want a scandal. It was said that Dr. Blaydon handed the Duke three-eights of an inch of broken steel which he had found imbedded in poor Beauty’s heart, and received in return a cheque which established a record price for the metal. But old Blaydon knew himself to be a dying man at the time; an exposé could hardly hurt him, and he had a large family to provide for. As a matter of fact he died a few months afterwards, to the dear Duchess’s great content. It’s extraordinary how fussy some good people can be over the idea of a scandal.”
“You see,” observed Mrs. Hargrave, “the Duchess does not require advertisement for herself or her dances.”
“If it had been that terrible Oglander woman, now, she would have paid the doctor to call in the Coroner, and sent out invitations for the inquest, with reserved seats and champagne for the Press.” Lady Rotherfield never missed an opportunity, even when she was in a hurry, of girding at her especial abomination among the many parvenues who beset her path.
“Well? well?” Baron de Daun’s sharp voice split the air like the crack of a whip. “And now, after all, the affair has come out, eh?”
“Something more than that,” Greetland returned, with all the superiority of the man who knows. “A good many people knew that much already. You see, after Blaydon’s death, when she felt they were safe, the dear Duchess allowed herself to be a little indiscreet, of course only in her own set.” His tone included himself by implication in the select band who shared the ducal secret. De Daun saw it was no use trying to hurry him, and worked off his impatience by pulling viciously at his moustache.
“What I am going to tell you,” Greetland proceeded, “happened only a day or two ago. They were doing something to the little room where Beauty was found dead, just off the ball-room, putting up new cornices or something—not before they were wanted, they say the curtains at Vaux House were hung in Queen Anne’s time; probably the poles date from the Conquest—well, in pulling the old window trappings about, the men found a long jewelled hair-pin, a tiny sword, the hilt set in diamonds and with the point broken off.”
“By Jove!” exclaimed Sir Perrott.
“They found this in the cornice?” de Daun asked intently. It was important for him to get the story correctly.
“Somewhere stuck away in the curtains or behind the shutter; anyhow, hidden by the window.”
“And who found it? A workman, eh?”
“One of the Duke’s men.”
“And what is to be the upshot?” Mrs. Hargrave’s turn of mind was practical and anticipatory.
“Well, the whole thing will come out,” Greetland asserted.
“No? Be made public?” Lady Rotherfield was dead against the publicity of to-day. A scandal to which the mob had access lost all its piquancy and was not worth discussing. The world was becoming less interesting every hour.
“To-morrow,” Greetland confidently affirmed, “the man in the street will know as much of the affair as we do.”
Lady Rotherfield gave a shrug of despair. The world where the man in the street is as well posted as the Duchess in the Square was scarcely worth living in.
“Then the Duke can’t hush it up this time, eh?” de Daun demanded, showing his malicious teeth.
“No,” Greetland purred on. “He is in an awful way about it, and the Duchess is having a bad time.”
“Poor woman!” cried Mrs. Hargrave with cynical sympathy.
“Well, it is all her fault, so Lady Helen says,” the Society Newsman went on, as suavely as though he were referring to no greater tragedy than a failure on the Matrimonial Exchange. “The dear Duchess would dismiss one of her carriage footmen because he was three-quarters of an inch shorter than his fellow. Lady Helen’s maid tells her that the man wore cork wedges in his boots till he could hardly keep his balance, and was quite willing to meet her views and obliging, but the other day he had to go out unexpectedly, and in his hurry forgot the corks; the Duchess’s eagle eye caught the disparity, her artistic sense was outraged, and the poor Duke had to give the man notice. She said that so long as Nature continued occasionally to turn out human beings six feet two inches in height she would not put up with a trumped-up, inferior article, only six feet one, of which a quarter only was genuine flesh and blood and the rest cork, and who looked as though liable to fall on his nose. Men of her standard height were to be had, and she meant to have them, all through alike; the cork-tipped variety she would leave to Bishop’s wives, dowager Countesses, and other latitudinarians.”
“So like the dear Duchess,” Lady Rotherfield laughed. “Poor Duke, what could he say?”
“There was only one thing he could say to the man. Well, the fellow resented his dismissal, which was rather absurd of him.”
“He ought to have been thankful to get rid of the corks,” was Sir Perrott’s opinion.
“Instead of which he appears to have declared that the proper thing for the Duchess to have done was to have sacked his tall colleague and replaced him by a man to match himself, minus the corks. This was flat treason in the face of the fact that the standard height of the Lancashires’ carriage footmen was settled for all time in the second year of the reign of William and Mary. When the lèse-majesté was repeated to the Duchess she became livid. The sacredness of the Lancashire traditions to be scoffed at by a cork-mounted flunkey! Should the ducal glory be belittled by a creature whose only claim for notice rested upon a pair of false heels? The consequence was that the wretched man was told to go on the spot, and that happened just after the discovery of the compromising hair-pin.”
“Oh, I see,” said Sir Perrott.
“The man thought he would get what he could out of the ducal ménage, and went straight off with his secret to Hepplethwaite. Hepplethwaite gave him twenty pounds for it, and resold it within the hour to the Duke for a hundred and an invitation for his wife to the next reception at Vaux House.”
“I must remember not to go,” Lady Rotherfield murmured. “That odious pushing woman tries to work her way everywhere.”
“It would have been a grand coup for the Hepplethwaite group of papers,” Greetland said; “and would have set up their circulation phenomenally, but Hepplethwaite wants something more than money now. The Brailsfords of the Daily Comet somehow succeeded in dining at Montford House last week. Montford wants advertisement for that ass of a son of his, Darsingham, who is by way of taking up the New Hibernian question in the House to keep him out of mischief; and so the Hepplethwaites were bound to go one better.”
“They say,” observed Mrs. Hargrave, “that Hepplethwaite and Brailsford were office boys together in a tea warehouse.”
“And,” put in Sir Perrott, “they are now running it neck and neck for a Peerage.”
“Shocking!” Lady Rotherfield groaned.
“Then the Vaux House affair is not to be public property at all?” de Daun asked. So long as he could add it to his dossier the stock of public knowledge might just as well be the poorer by that pungent scandal.
“Won’t it come out, though?” Greetland returned. “I haven’t finished my story. The footman on finding that the news did not appear in the Hepplethwaite rags took it to Brailsford, got fifteen pounds for it this time; and it is going to burst upon a jaded reading public to-morrow morning. They were to have had it to-day, only special-sized type had to be cast, and they were not ready.”
“What is this thrilling announcement which is being prepared for us, Mr. Greetland?”
The tatler looked up with almost a start. The question had been put by Countess Alexia von Rohnburg, their young hostess, who had joined the group, unnoticed by Greetland or his listeners, intent as they were upon the new sensation. The Russian proser had come to a pause in that flow of shallow talk with which diplomatists are wont to disguise their thoughts and to cover the watchful observation of their fellows, and the Countess, who had caught above the suave murmur a word or two in de Daun’s high-pitched voice that had arrested her, had risen and crossed the room. There was nothing in her handsome, animated face, the index of a susceptive mind, that showed more than an almost languid curiosity, as of one who lived in an atmosphere filled with tales concerning the great names of the day, and whose appetite was slightly blunted by the familiar fare. Nevertheless Greetland, the most studiously composed man of his world, looked up with an expression of greater embarrassment than he often permitted himself. And it was de Daun, not he, who answered the question.
“Mr. Greetland was telling us of the discovery of a hair ornament, a small jewelled dagger with the point broken off, in the room at Vaux House where Captain Martindale met his death two years ago.”
“Ah! How thrilling!” If the speaker were really thrilled the mobile face must surely have indicated it more vividly. A wave of interest passed across it; the dark curves of the eyebrows rose and fell, that was all. Dormer Greetland, watching the face intently for a man in whose social balance-sheet manners stood as a notable asset, saw no more.
“Is it quite true, Mr. Greetland?” The tone implied an amount of incredulity which compelled a spirited justification.
“Absolutely, Countess. I was just saying that the discovery will be in the papers to-morrow.”
His questioner smiled. “Does that make it true?”
“It will at least bring the story to its proof. The Duchess won’t let it pass if it is a canard: she doesn’t need advertisement. But I happen to know it is quite true.”
“I am sure Mr. Greetland would rather be dull than unauthentic, as the lesser of the two crimes.” The sarcasm was none the less stinging from being shot through the sweetest of smiles.
“The Duke has been trying to hush it up,” Lady Rotherfield put in.
Countess Alexia laughed. “All the details complete. And of course the owner of the sword has been found.”
“I think not,” said Greetland.
“Probably the Duke knows, as he was so anxious to hush up the affair,” the Countess continued, in her fascinating banter. “Poor Duke, he had better be careful, or he will be arrested as what you call an accessory after the fact, which would be a sensation, if you like. Always supposing, that is, that poor Reggie Martindale did not die of heart disease.”
“That has been clearly proved, Countess,” Greetland said, glad of one firm foothold in stemming the increasing flow of increduilty.
Alexia gave a shrug. “I never heard it, and I’m afraid I hear most things.”
“The Duke hushed that up,” explained Sir Perrott.
“How clever of him! With that talent for hushing tiresome tongues what a perfect nursemaid he might have been if he hadn’t been born a Duke and a man. How lucky he has failed this time, or we should not be having the sensation of the jewelled dagger, the false lover and the fair assassin. What hard lines! What a warning to inconstant young men and fussy Dukes. And we are to see it all in print to-morrow?”
“Get the Daily Comet for choice, Countess,” de Daun grinned.
“I will, indeed. I am so sorry for the poor Duke.”
“And the lady, the owner of the tell-tale weapon?” Greetland suggested.
“Ah, yes. But it is so long ago. Our sympathy by this time is probably superfluous. Our tragedies to-day are almost as short-lived as our comedies.”
“And almost as amusing.”
“Much more, to the spectators. Having left the art of pure comedy behind us with the days of patches and powder and red heels, we have taken a lesson from our stage managers and learnt to turn a tiresome tragedy into a roaring farce. It is easy enough. Play with a light touch, and exaggerate the sentiment, that’s the way to get your laughs and your audience; the world must be amused at any cost. Oh, Prosper”; she broke off, and called to her brother, Count Prosper von Rohnburg, who had just come in with a scientific-looking man, “have you heard anything of the wonderful tale Mr. Greetland has been telling us, how they have found at Vaux House the weapon with which that poor Captain Martindale is supposed to have been killed? Isn’t it thrilling?”
“No,” he answered, speaking with a foreign accent far more pronounced than his sister’s. “I am behind the world to-day. There was no time to go to the Clubs, we have been absurdly busy at the Embassy. Here, Alix, let me present to you Doctor Hallamar who has come to spend a little time in England.”
Doctor Hallamar bent his leonine head with its mass of obstreperous hair low till his lips touched the Countess’s hand. Manifestly he was a man of power, the keen, resolute face was of the kind that makes one glad to think its indicative strength has taken up arms against our common enemy, disease.
“You are taking a holiday in England, Doctor,” Alexia enquired.
“Hardly.” The deep tones sounded in unison with the rest of the man’s heroic fibre. “My visit is professional primarily, but I hope to see something of England during my enforced stay; if not of its scenery, at least of its scientific side.”
“Doctor Hallamar means the hospitals,” the Count laughed. “He would rather see an interesting operation than the finest view in the world. You know the Doctor is the only man in Europe who can cure a certain form of disease.”
Hallamar smiled deprecatingly. “Let us say, treat it, Count. I fear I cannot often undertake to cure it.”
“Oh, you are modest, Doctor,” Alexia laughed. “And you have come over to attend a special case?”
Hallamar bowed assent. “A lady who has lost the use of her limbs through an accident. As a diplomatist’s sister, Countess, you will not expect me to say more.” He beamed inscrutably through his spectacles. “My mission may be a failure, and then the less we shall have said about it the better.”
“I can’t imagine you a failure, Doctor,” Alexia said, and truly, as her eyes rested with admiration on the strong, resourceful face.
Hallamar’s smile had a touch of regret now.
“I would, Countess, that your gracious words did not carry with them to me the sting of unintended satire.”
“What is all this about the discovery at Vaux House?” Count Prosper asked.
“Oh, we are to have the whole account to-morrow in the papers,” his sister replied. “We can scarcely trouble Mr. Greetland to go over the story again.”
The Mayfair newsman seemed not disinclined to repeat the recitation to a, perhaps, more appreciative listener; but the Count, accustomed to take his sister’s slightest hint, abandoned any further show of curiosity. But he said presently, “We were at that ball at Vaux House, weren’t we, Alix? Yes; I recollect poor Martindale. Good-looking fellow he was.”
“You remember the sensation his death caused,” Sir Perrott said. “Half the smart women in town, married and single, were supposed to be hit by it.”
Doctor Hallamar’s smile had faded. He was not interested and he showed it.
Baron de Daun and Dormer Greetland rose to go at the same time. Greetland’s adieux were the more lengthy; he had so many social loose ends to tie up. It seemed when he reached the hall that de Daun must have been waiting for him. They went out together.
“Serious thing this about Vaux House,” the Baron remarked, in quite a concerned voice. “I say, Greetland, between ourselves, was the Countess,” he gave a jerk of the head in the direction of the house they had just left, “one of the women talked of with Martindale?”
“I fancy she was,” the other answered, looking straight in front of him.
Tatler as he was, he knew de Daun, and did not care to be pumped to serve the thirst of that blatant young diplomat.
“It seemed rather curious, to say the least of it,” his companion persisted, “her affecting to doubt the truth of the story. I wonder if the sword hair-pin was hers.”
He looked round at Greetland with the quick turn of a bird of prey.
“Oh, that’s going too far,” Greetland cried, throwing up his hand half way in protest, then full length to hail a passing hansom.