Joan's Enemies/Chapter 11

OAN and Douglas could not refrain from smiling at Miss Gosling's frank chagrin as she stood staring into the untenanted passage.

“I'm afraid we are letting it get on our nerves, Aunt Griselda,” said Joan kindly.

Miss Gosling shut the door softly before she replied: “Some one was there within the last minute, and I could almost swear it was a woman.”

“Bravo!” cried Grant lightly. “But how—”

“If your nose is half as keen as mine, you will be able to smell her perfume yet. I'm not up in scents, but it's none of yours, Joan. It's something like Russia leather.”

“Impossible!” cried the girl. “She's at Atlantic— Oh, wait a moment.” She darted across the room and rang the bell.

“I seem to have dropped into a nest of mysteries,” Grant remarked. “Please tell me candidly which will be helpful—my going or my staying.”

“I think you had better stay,” said the spinster. “Hadn't he, Joan?”

“Yes—yes, of course. He doesn't want his presence known.”

“As to that, I'm afraid there may be difficulties now,” Miss Gosling observed, “—that is,” she added, “unless that door is fairly sound-proof.”

There was silence till the housemaid appeared.

“Has anyone called?” asked her mistress, calmly enough.

The reply, though not unexpected, was yet startling.

“Miss Lismore is in the drawing-room, ma'am. She arrived about twenty minutes ago.”

After a moment Joan asked why she had not been informed.

“Miss Lismore would not have you disturbed, ma'am. I told her you had business in the library, and she said she preferred to wait. But she hoped you could put her up for the night, ma'am. She had a handbag with her.”

“Very well,” said Joan, suppressing her feelings with no small effort. “I will see Miss Lismore immediately.” She had no fault to find with the maid: Elm House knew no guest more familiar than Lottie Lismore.

“Which room shall I prepare, ma'am?”

“I will let you know presently.”

HE instant the door closed Miss Gosling exclaimed: “Go at once, Joan. Don't give her time to think, and you may learn whether or not she has overheard anything. Upon my word, I didn't imagine she had the nerve—”

“Pardon me,” Grant interposed; “but Joan, I beg of you to deal gently with her.”

The girl looked from the one to the other.

“Douglas,” she said, “you ask almost too much of me. Yet one of the last things your uncle said was: 'Continue to be Lottie's friend.'”

“Then you will not do otherwise.”

Miss Gosling fairly writhed. “Mr. Grant, for goodness' sake, don't be too quixotic! Suppose that her action had robbed you of a fortune, what would you say?”

He answered steadily: “Miss Gosling, whatever has happened or may happen, I can take no means that might effect the ruin of Miss Lismore—or her parents.”

The declaration was as a stab to Joan March, but she took it bravely. “If you will stay here, I will go and see her. I cannot promise how I shall act. If she is still unaware of your return, Douglas, she shall remain so.” Without another word she left the room.

ISS GOSLING turned to Grant. Impatience had ousted penitence for the time being. “Really, you are a very trying young man! Are you going to do nothing at all? If there is a treasure waiting for you,—and I'm convinced there is,—aren't you going to make any effort to secure it?”

His eyes looked worried, but his smile at her asperity was good-humored. “I will do everything I can, Miss Gosling,” he said, “for I want the treasure, if it is there, pretty badly.”

“Don't you feel sure it's there?”

“I should not be surprised, now that I come to think of it. I was never particularly curious about my uncle's affairs, but I heard from a friend, a few hours ago, how much he had left, one way and another, and I confess the total sum struck me as small. I just wish I could imagine a reason for my uncle's extraordinary method of informing me of my good fortune.”

“We shall discover that in time! For the present, what are you going to do about those—those people who, undoubtedly, are after the treasure? They must be stopped!'

“Would it not be worth while to let them proceed a little further, just to see—”

“No, no!” she cried, with a rueful look. “You must think me a horribly interfering old woman, Mr. Grant, but I'd do anything, even to the point of offending you, to undo what I have done in this affair.”

“Thank you,” he said, touched by her earnestness. “And what, in your opinion, is the first thing to be done?”

“A serious study of that strip of paper, and then an examination of the laboratory.”

“I can't ask Miss March to open up the old place to-night.”

“She will do so, whether you ask her or not, and probably keep guard till she drops! Of course, Miss Lismore's arrival may complicate matters. If I were Joan, I would simply pack her out of—well, never mind. I don't apologize, but I'm not going to make myself more unpleasant than I can help.”

“If you imagine that my regard for—”

“No, no—not another word, please! “Wont you utilize this precious time in studying your uncle's writing?”

“We might do it together,” he said, glad enough to change the subject, and he placed a couple of chairs at the writing-table.

“It's too good of you,” Miss Gosling said gratefully. “I don't deserve your confidence at all.”:

“You may be troubled with a good deal of it yet,” he returned, unfolding the paper. “Now let us take the thing as seriously as ever you wish.”

This was the manuscript he laid on the table:

PPENING the drawing-room door, Joan first became conscious of a faint fragrance which she recognized as “Cuir de Russe,” a perfume affected by Lottie Lismore—and then of a sound of subdued sobbing. At the latter her resentment cooled slightly. So, after all, Lottie had come to confess! The intuition was correct so far as it went. Lottie had indeed come to Elm House to confess—but twenty minutes had passed since her arrival.

As Joan softly closed the door, wondering how she ought to receive the confession, Lottie's hands fell from her face, disclosing beauty ravaged by a passion which was surely not that of penitence; she sprang to her feet, and her words came in a tempest that fairly took the other aback.

“Oh, oh, how could you be so deceitful! How could you be so underhand? You have pretended to be my friend, and all the time you have been working behind my back! You knew where he was all along, and you have been corresponding with him and telling him abominable things about me! And now he's home again, and you would have hidden it from me! Oh, oh, I never dreamed you could be so—”

“That will do,” Joan interrupted in cold anger. “You are referring, I suppose, to Mr. Grant. May I ask how and when you became aware that he was home?”

“I got tired of waiting for you here, and I went along to the library, thinking you and Miss Gosling wouldn't mind my—”

“The library door is not transparent.”

“I heard his voice,—oh, I don't mind admitting it,—though I couldn't make out what you were all saying. I don't care what you call it. If you can be mean, so can I.”

“You are a little fool,” said Joan scathingly, “and I'm not going to discuss Mr. Grant with you. What brings you here to-night?”

“But I'm going to discuss Douglas with you. You have been trying to steal him from me; yes, I will repeat it! You have—”

“If you do, I'll leave you. You must be crazy. Only a few days ago you refused to believe in his innocence.”

“I don't care! I don't mind whether he is innocent or guilty. He cared for me till you came between—”

Joan went quickly to the door. With her fingers on the handle she turned and once more asked: “What brings you here to-night?”

Lottie's expression had become sullen. “I've quarreled with Father,” she replied, “and I left Mother alone, to come and tell you something fearfully important. But I sha'n't tell it now—or ever!”

“Very well,” said Joan. “It's too late for you to go to Kensington to-night, so I will tell Kate to prepare your room at once and take up some supper for you. Perhaps by the morning you will feel inclined to apologize. Good night.”

HEN she had instructed the housemaid, she went to her own room; she did not feel able to return to the library yet awhile. Certain words of Lottie's rankled horribly. She spent a bad ten minutes, and then her meditations were interrupted by the housemaid.

“Please, ma'am, Miss Lismore has gone. She said she had changed her mind about staying, and she would not let me call you.”

It was an awkward moment, but Joan got over it fairly well. “That was too bad of Miss Lismore,” she remarked, “but as her father is at home, she was not quite happy about staying. I hope you offered her something, Kate.”

“Yes ma'am, but she wouldn't have even a cup of tea.”

“Very well. Is there anything else, Kate?” The maid was lingering.

“Only that the inspector detective person was here again to-night. He wouldn't have you bothered, ma'am, but asked me to tell you that the police had got hold of the suspicious characters, so that there was no need to use the shutters now.”

“Glad to hear it. Miss Gosling will be delighted.”

The maid retired and Joan returned to the library.

RANT rose, saying: “Miss Gosling and I have learned something. It appears that I am not the only person involved in my uncle's—”

“One moment,” the girl interrupted, “I must tell you at once that Lottie has gone. I expected she would stay the night, but while I was upstairs—well, she ran away! She had found out that you were here, Mr. Grant. I can't tell you how ashamed I am.”

“Don't say that! It will pan out all right.” But his smile was a trifle rueful, and he was wondering why she had used the formal mode of address. “I ought not to have come here to-night without warning you. I ought,” he went on with an attempt at levity, “to have asked you to admit me by a back window, after midnight, and have arrived in a slouch hat and whiskers, muffled to the eyes.”

Joan sadly shook her head, sick at heart. She had betrayed him as well as his interests. Oh, she must not allow him to take further risks!

“I wish you would come and inspect the laboratory now,” she said abruptly.

“Right!” cried Miss Gosling.

“I'm ready,” said Grant.

“Then I'll get the keys and some candles,” Joan said. “The electrics were dismantled with the rest.” She left the room.