Part 6 (1/2)

”Nothing more?” He laughed.

”That is all, if you please, for the present.”

”I am to content myself with the promise of the future?”

”The future,” she told him seriously, ”is to-morrow; and to-morrow ...” She moved restlessly in her chair, eyes and lips pathetic in their distress.

”Please, we will go now, if you are ready.”

”I am quite ready, Miss Calendar.”

He rose. A waiter brought the girl's cloak and put it in Kirkwood's hands.

He held it until, smoothing the wrists of her long white gloves, she stood up, then placed the garment upon her white young shoulders, troubled by the indefinable sense of intimacy imparted by the privilege. She permitted him this personal service! He felt that she trusted him, that out of her grat.i.tude had grown a simple and almost childish faith in his generosity and considerateness.

As she turned to go her eyes thanked him with an unfathomable glance. He was again conscious of that esoteric disturbance in his temples. Puzzled, hazily a.n.a.lyzing the sensation, he followed her to the lobby.

A page brought him his top-coat, hat and stick; tipping the child from sheer force of habit, he desired a gigantic porter, impressively ornate in hotel livery, to call a hansom. Together they pa.s.sed out into the night, he and the girl.

Beneath a permanent awning of steel and gla.s.s she waited patiently, slender, erect, heedless of the attention she attracted from wayfarers.

The night was young, the air mild. Upon the sidewalk, muddied by a million feet, two streams of wayfarers flowed incessantly, bound west from Green Park or east toward Piccadilly Circus; a well-dressed throng for the most part, with here and there a man in evening dress. Between the carriages at the curb and the hotel doors moved others, escorting fluttering b.u.t.terfly women in elaborate toilets, heads bare, skirts daintily gathered above their perishable slippers. Here and there meaner shapes slipped silently through the crowd, sinister shadows of the city's proletariat, blotting ominously the brilliance of the scene.

A cab drew in at the block. The porter clapped an arc of wickerwork over its wheel to protect the girl's skirts. She ascended to the seat.

Kirkwood, dropping sixpence in the porter's palm, prepared to follow; but a hand fell upon his arm, peremptory, inexorable. He faced about, frowning, to confront a slight, hatchet-faced man, somewhat under medium height, dressed in a sack suit and wearing a derby well forward over eyes that were hard and bright.

”Mr. Calendar?” said the man tensely. ”I presume I needn't name my business. I'm from the Yard--”

”My name is not Calendar.”

The detective smiled wearily. ”Don't be a fool, Calendar,” he began. But the porter's hand fell upon his shoulder and the giant bent low to bring his mouth close to the other's ear. Kirkwood heard indistinctly his own name followed by Calendar's, and the words: ”Never fear. I'll point him out.”

”But the woman?” argued the detective, unconvinced, staring into the cab.

”Am I not at liberty to have a lady dine with me in a public restaurant?”

interposed Kirkwood, without raising his voice.

The hard eyes looked him up and down without favor. Then: ”Beg pardon, sir.

I see my mistake,” said the detective brusquely.

”I am glad you do,” returned Kirkwood grimly. ”I fancy it will bear investigation.”

He mounted the step. ”Imperial Theater,” he told the driver, giving the first address that occurred to him; it could be changed. For the moment the main issue was to get the girl out of the range of the detective's interest.

He slipped into his place as the hansom wheeled into the turgid tide of west-bound traffic.

So Calendar had escaped, after all! Moreover, he had told the truth to Kirkwood.

By his side the girl moved uneasily. ”Who was that man?” she inquired.