The Bandbox

“Are you a good sailor?” he enquired gravely.

The girl nodded. “Very.”

“Not afraid of seasickness?”

“No. Why?”

“Because,” said Staff soberly, “I’ve been praying for a hurricane.”

She nodded again without speaking, her eyes alone questioning.

“Mrs. Thataker,” he pursued evenly, “confided to me at dinner that she is a very poor sailor indeed.”

Miss Searle laughed quietly. “You desire a punishment to fit the crime.”

“There are some crimes for which no adequate punishment has ever been contrived,” he returned, beginning to see his way, and at the same time beginning to think himself uncommonly clever.

“Oh!” said Miss Searle with a little laugh. “Now if you’re leading up to a second apology about that question of the bandbox, you needn’t, because I’ve forgiven you already.”

He glanced at her reproachfully. “You just naturally had to beat me to that, didn’t you?” he complained. “All the same, it was inexcusable of me.”

“Oh, no; I quite understood.”

“You see,” he persisted obstinately, “I really did think it was my bandbox. I actually have got one with me, precisely like yours.”

“I quite believed you the first time.”

Something in her tone moved him to question her face sharply; but he found her shadowed eyes inscrutable.

“I half believe you know something,” he ventured, perplexed.

“Perhaps,” she nodded, with an enigmatic smile.

“What do you know?”

“Why,” she said, “it was simple enough. I happened to be in Lucille’s yesterday afternoon when a hat was ordered delivered to you.”

“You were! Then you know who sent it to me?”

“Of course.” Her expression grew curious. “Don’t you?”

“No,” he said excitedly. “Tell me.”

But she hesitated. “I’m not sure I ought …”

“Why not?”

“It’s none of my affair – ”

“But surely you must see … Listen: I’ll tell you about it.” He narrated succinctly the intrusion of the mysterious bandbox into his ken, that morning. “Now, a note was promised; it must have miscarried. Surely, there can be no harm in your telling me. Besides, I’ve a right to know.”

“Possibly … but I’m not sure I’ve a right to tell. Why should I be a spoil-sport?”

“You mean,” he said thoughtfully – “you think it’s some sort of a practical joke?”

“What do you think?”

“Hmm-mm,” said Staff. And then, “I don’t like to be made fun of,” he asserted, a trace sulkily.

“You are certainly a dangerously original man,” said Miss Searle – “almost abnormal.”

“The most unkindest slam of all,” he murmured.

He made himself look deeply hurt. The girl laughed softly. He thought it rather remarkable that they should enjoy so sympathetic a sense of humour on such short acquaintance…

“But you forgive me?”

“Oh, yes,” he said generously; “only, of course, I couldn’t help feeling it a bit – coming from you.”

“From me?” Miss Searle sat up in her deck-chair and turned to him. “Mr. Staff! you’re not flirting with me?”

“Heaven forfend!” he cried, so sincerely that both laughed.

“Because,” said she, sinking back, “I must warn you that Mrs. Ilkington has been talking …”

“Oh,” he groaned from his heart – “damn that woman!”

There was an instant of silence; then he stole a contrite look at her immobile profile and started to get up.

“I – Miss Searle,” he stammered – “I beg your pardon …”

“Don’t go,” she said quietly; “that is, unless you want to. My silence was simply sympathetic.”

He sat back. “Thank you,” he said with gratitude; and for some seconds considered the case of Mrs. Ilkington, not charitably but with murder in his bosom. “Do you mean,” he resumed presently, “she has – ah – connected my name with – ”

“Yes,” nodded the girl.

“‘Something lingering in boiling oil,’” he mused aloud, presently… “What staggers me is how she found out; I was under the impression that only the persons most concerned knew about it.”

“Then it’s true? You are engaged to marry Miss Landis? Or is that an impertinent question?” Without pause the girl answered herself: “Of course it is; only I couldn’t help asking. Please forget I spoke – ”

“Oh, I don’t mind,” he said wearily; “now that Mrs. Ilkington has begun to distribute handbills. Only … I don’t know that there’s a regular, hard-and-fast engagement: just an understanding.”

“Thank you,” said Miss Searle. “I promise not to speak of it again.” She hesitated an instant, then added: “To you or anybody else.”

“You see,” he went on after a little, “I’ve been working on a play for Miss Landis, under agreement with Jules Max, her manager. They want to use it to open Max’s newest Broadway theatre late this autumn. That’s why I came across – to find a place in London to bury myself in and work undisturbed. It means a good deal to me – to all of us – this play… But what I’m getting at is this: Alison – Miss Landis – didn’t leave the States this summer; Mrs. Ilkington (she told me at dinner) left New York before I did. So how in Heaven’s name – ?”

“I had known nothing of Mrs. Ilkington at all,” said Miss Searle cautiously, “until we met in Paris last month.”