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Within the Law: From the Play of Bayard Veiller, a novel by Marvin Dana |
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Chapter 10. Marked Money |
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_ CHAPTER X. MARKED MONEY Mary had scarcely received from Aggie an account of Cassidy's threatening invasion, when the maid announced that Mr. Irwin had called. "Show him in, in just two minutes," Mary directed. "Who's the gink?" Aggie demanded, with that slangy diction which was her habit. "You ought to know," Mary returned, smiling a little. "He's the lawyer retained by General Hastings in the matter of a certain breach-of-promise suit." "Oh, you mean yours truly," Aggie exclaimed, not in the least abashed by her forgetfulness in an affair that concerned herself so closely. "Hope he's brought the money. What about it?" "Leave the room now," Mary ordered, crisply. "When I call to you, come in, but be sure and leave everything to me. Merely follow my lead. And, Agnes--be very ingenue." "Oh, I'm wise--I'm wise," Aggie nodded, as she hurried out toward her bedroom. "I'll be a squab--surest thing you know!" Next moment, Mary gave a formal greeting to the lawyer who represented the man she planned to mulct effectively, and invited him to a chair near her, while she herself retained her place at the desk, within a drawer of which she had just locked the formidable-appearing document received from Harris. Irwin lost no time in coming to the point. "I called in reference to this suit, which Miss Agnes Lynch threatens to bring against my client, General Hastings." Mary regarded the attorney with a level glance, serenely expressionless as far as could be achieved by eyes so clear and shining, and her voice was cold as she replied with significant brusqueness. "It's not a threat, Mr. Irwin. The suit will be brought." The lawyer frowned, and there was a strident note in his voice when he answered, meeting her glance with an uncompromising stare of hostility. "You realize, of course," he said finally, "that this is merely plain blackmail." There was not the change of a feature in the face of the woman who listened to the accusation. Her eyes steadfastly retained their clear gaze into his; her voice was still coldly formal, as before. "If it's blackmail, Mr. Irwin, why don't you consult the police?" she inquired, with manifest disdain. Mary turned to the maid, who now entered in response to the bell she had sounded a minute before. "Fanny, will you ask Miss Lynch to come in, please?" Then she faced the lawyer again, with an aloofness of manner that was contemptuous. "Really, Mr. Irwin," she drawled, "why don't you take this matter to the police?" The reply was uttered with conspicuous exasperation. "You know perfectly well," the lawyer said bitterly, "that General Hastings cannot afford such publicity. His position would be jeopardized." "Oh, as for that," Mary suggested evenly, and now there was a trace of flippancy in her fashion of speaking, "I'm sure the police would keep your complaint a secret. Really, you know, Mr. Irwin, I think you had better take your troubles to the police, rather than to me. You will get much more sympathy from them." The lawyer sprang up, with an air of sudden determination. "Very well, I will then," he declared, sternly. "I will!" Mary, from her vantage point at the desk across from him, smiled a smile that would have been very engaging to any man under more favorable circumstances, and she pushed in his direction the telephone that stood there. "3100, Spring," she remarked, encouragingly, "will bring an officer almost immediately." She leaned back in her chair, and surveyed the baffled man amusedly. The lawyer was furious over the failure of his effort to intimidate this extraordinarily self-possessed young woman, who made a mock of his every thrust. But he was by no means at the end of his resources. "Nevertheless," he rejoined, "you know perfectly well that General Hastings never promised to marry this girl. You know----" He broke off as Aggie entered the drawing-room, Now, the girl was demure in seeming almost beyond belief, a childish creature, very fair and dainty, guileless surely, with those untroubled eyes of blue, those softly curving lips of warmest red and the more delicate bloom in the rounded cheeks. There were the charms of innocence and simplicity in the manner of her as she stopped just within the doorway, whence she regarded Mary with a timid, pleading gaze, her slender little form poised lightly as if for flight "Did you want me, dear?" she asked. There was something half-plaintive in the modulated cadences of the query. "Agnes," Mary answered affectionately, "this is Mr. Irwin, who has come to see you in behalf of General Hastings." "Oh!" the girl murmured, her voice quivering a little, as the lawyer, after a short nod, dropped again into his seat; "oh, I'm so frightened!" She hurried, fluttering, to a low stool behind the desk, beside Mary's chair, and there she sank down, drooping slightly, and catching hold of one of Mary's hands as if in mute pleading for protection against the fear that beset her chaste soul. "Nonsense!" Mary exclaimed, soothingly. "There's really nothing at all to be frightened about, my dear child." Her voice was that with which one seeks to cajole a terrified infant. "You mustn't be afraid, Agnes. Mr. Irwin says that General Hastings did not promise to marry you. Of course, you understand, my dear, that under no circumstances must you say anything that isn't strictly true, and that, if he did not promise to marry you, you have no case--none at all. Now, Agnes, tell me: did General Hastings promise to marry you?" "Oh, yes--oh, yes, indeed!" Aggie cried, falteringly. "And I wish he would. He's such a delightful old gentleman!" As she spoke, the girl let go Mary's hand and clasped her own together ecstatically. The legal representative of the delightful old gentleman scowled disgustedly at this outburst. His voice was portentous, as he put a question. "Was that promise made in writing?" "No," Aggie answered, gushingly. "But all his letters were in writing, you know. Such wonderful letters!" She raised her blue eyes toward the ceiling in a naive rapture. "So tender, and so--er--interesting!" Somehow, the inflection on the last word did not altogether suggest the ingenuous. "Yes, yes, I dare say," Irwin agreed, hastily, with some evidences of chagrin. He had no intention of dwelling on that feature of the letters, concerning which he had no doubt whatsoever, since he knew the amorous General very well indeed. They would be interesting, beyond shadow of questioning, horribly interesting. Such was the confessed opinion of the swain himself who had written them in his folly--horribly interesting to all the reading public of the country, since the General was a conspicuous figure. Mary intervened with a suavity that infuriated the lawyer almost beyond endurance. "But you're quite sure, Agnes," she questioned gently, "that General Hastings did promise to marry you?" The candor of her manner was perfect. And the answer of Aggie was given with a like convincing emphasis. "Oh, yes!" she declared, tensely. "Why, I would swear to it." The limpid eyes, so appealing in their soft lusters, went first to Mary, then gazed trustingly into those of the routed attorney. "You see, Mr. Irwin, she would swear to that," emphasized Mary. "We're beaten," he confessed, dejectedly, turning his glance toward Mary, whom, plainly, he regarded as his real adversary in the combat on his client's behalf. "I'm going to be quite frank with you, Miss Turner, quite frank," he stated with more geniality, though with a very crestfallen air. Somehow, indeed, there was just a shade too much of the crestfallen in the fashion of his utterance, and the woman whom he addressed watched warily as he continued. "We can't afford any scandal, so we're going to settle at your own terms." He paused expectantly, but Mary offered no comment; only maintained her alert scrutiny of the man. The lawyer, therefore, leaned forward with a semblance of frank eagerness. Instantly, Aggie had become agog with greedily blissful anticipations, and she uttered a slight ejaculation of joy; but Irwin paid no heed to her. He was occupied in taking from his pocket a thick bill-case, and from this presently a sheaf of banknotes, which he laid on the desk before Mary, with a little laugh of discomfiture over having been beaten in the contest. As he did so, Aggie thrust forth an avaricious hand, but it was caught and held by Mary before it reached above the top of the desk, and the avaricious gesture passed unobserved by the attorney. "We can't fight where ladies are concerned," he went on, assuming, as best he might contrive, a chivalrous tone. "So, if you will just hand over General Hastings' letters, why, here's your money." Much to the speaker's surprise, there followed an interval of silence, and his puzzlement showed in the knitting of his brows. "You have the letters, haven't you?" he demanded, abruptly. Aggie coyly took a thick bundle from its resting place on her rounded bosom. "They never leave me," she murmured, with dulcet passion. There was in her voice a suggestion of desolation--a desolation that was the blighting effect of letting the cherished missives go from her. "Well, they can leave you now, all right," the lawyer remarked unsympathetically, but with returning cheerfulness, since he saw the end of his quest in visible form before him. He reached quickly forward for the packet, which Aggie extended willingly enough. But it was Mary who, with a swift movement, caught and held it. "Not quite yet, Mr. Irwin, I'm afraid," she said, calmly. The lawyer barely suppressed a violent ejaculation of annoyance. "But there's the money waiting for you," he protested, indignantly. The rejoinder from Mary was spoken with great deliberation, yet with a note of determination that caused a quick and acute anxiety to the General's representative. "I think," Mary explained tranquilly, "that you had better see our lawyer, Mr. Harris, in reference to this. We women know nothing of such details of business settlement." "Oh, there's no need for all that formality," Irwin urged, with a great appearance of bland friendliness. "Just the same," Mary persisted, unimpressed, "I'm quite sure you would better see Mr. Harris first." There was a cadence of insistence in her voice that assured the lawyer as to the futility of further pretense on his part. "Oh, I see," he said disagreeably, with a frown to indicate his complete sagacity in the premises. "I thought you would, Mr. Irwin," Mary returned, and now she smiled in a kindly manner, which, nevertheless, gave no pleasure to the chagrined man before her. As he rose, she went on crisply: "If you'll take the money to Mr. Harris, Miss Lynch will meet you in his office at four o'clock this afternoon, and, when her suit for damages for breach of promise has been legally settled out of court, you will get the letters.... Good-afternoon, Mr. Irwin." The lawyer made a hurried bow which took in both of the women, and walked quickly toward the door. But he was arrested before he reached it by the voice of Mary, speaking again, still in that imperturbable evenness which so rasped his nerves, for all its mellow resonance. But this time there was a sting, of the sharpest, in the words themselves. "Oh, you forgot your marked money, Mr. Irwin," Mary said. The lawyer wheeled, and stood staring at the speaker with a certain sheepishness of expression that bore witness to the completeness of his discomfiture. Without a word, after a long moment in which he perceived intently the delicate, yet subtly energetic, loveliness of this slender woman, he walked back to the desk, picked up the money, and restored it to the bill-case. This done, at last he spoke, with a new respect in his voice, a quizzical smile on his rather thin lips. "Young woman," he said emphatically, "you ought to have been a lawyer." And with that laudatory confession of her skill, he finally took his departure, while Mary smiled in a triumph she was at no pains to conceal, and Aggie sat gaping astonishment over the surprising turn of events. It was the latter volatile person who ended the silence that followed on the lawyer's going. "You've darn near broke my heart," she cried, bouncing up violently, "letting all that money go out of the house.... Say, how did you know it was marked?" "I didn't," Mary replied, blandly; "but it was a pretty good guess, wasn't it? Couldn't you see that all he wanted was to get the letters, and have us take the marked money? Then, my simple young friend, we would have been arrested very neatly indeed--for blackmail." Aggie's innocent eyes rounded in an amazed consternation, which was not at all assumed. "Gee!" she cried. "That would have been fierce! And now?" she questioned, apprehensively. Mary's answer repudiated any possibility of fear. "And now," she explained contentedly, "he really will go to our lawyer. There, he will pay over that same marked money. Then, he will get the letters he wants so much. And, just because it's a strictly business transaction between two lawyers, with everything done according to legal ethics----" "What's legal ethics?" Aggie demanded, impetuously. "They sound some tasty!" With the comment, she dropped weakly into a chair. Mary laughed in care-free enjoyment, as well she might after winning the victory in such a battle of wits. "Oh," she said, happily, "you just get it legally, and you get twice as much!" "And it's actually the same old game!" Aggie mused. She was doing her best to get a clear understanding of the matter, though to her it was all a mystery most esoteric. Mary reviewed the case succinctly for the other's enlightenment. "Yes, it's the same game precisely," she affirmed. "A shameless old roue makes love to you, and he writes you a stack of silly letters." The pouting lips of the listener took on a pathetic droop, and her voice quivered as she spoke with an effective semblance of virginal terror. "He might have ruined my life!" Mary continued without giving much attention to these histrionics. "If you had asked him for all this money for the return of his letters, it would have been blackmail, and we'd have gone to jail in all human probability. But we did no such thing--no, indeed! What we did wasn't anything like that in the eyes of the law. What we did was merely to have your lawyer take steps toward a suit for damages for breach of promise of marriage for the sum of ten thousand dollars. Then, his lawyer appears in behalf of General Hastings, and there follow a number of conferences between the legal representatives of the opposing parties. By means of these conferences, the two legal gentlemen run up very respectable bills of expenses. In the end, we get our ten thousand dollars, and the flighty old General gets back his letters.... My dear," Mary concluded vaingloriously, "we're inside the law, and so we're perfectly safe. And there you are!" _ |
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