Charles Norris Williamson - British Murder Mysteries – 10 Novels in One Volume

"Good gracious!" gasped Annesley. " Are you a millionaire?"

Her lover laughed. "Well, I don't want to boast to you, though I may to your cousins, but if I'm not one of your conventional, stodgy millionaires, I have a sort of Fortunatus purse which is never empty. I can always pull out whatever I want. We'll let your people understand without any bragging.

"I think Lady Annesley-Seton, née Miss Haverstall, whose father's purse has flattened out like a pancake, will jump for joy when she hears what you want her to do. But come along, let's have breakfast!"

Overwhelmed, Annesley walked beside him in silence to the almost deserted restaurant where the latest breakfasters had finished and the earliest lunchers had not begun.

So the mysterious Mr. Smith was rich. The news frightened rather than pleased her. It seemed to throw a burden upon her shoulders which she might not be able to carry with grace. The girl had little self-confidence; but the man appeared to be troubled with no doubts of her or of the future. Over their coffee and toast and hot-house fruit, he began to propose exciting plans, and had got as far as an automobile when the voice of the Countess surprised them.

She had come close to their table without being heard.

"Good morning!" she exclaimed. "I was going out, but from far off I saw you two, with your profiles cut like silhouettes against all this glass and sunshine. I couldn't resist asking how Miss Grayle slept, and if there's anything I can do for her in the shops?"

As she spoke her eyes dwelt on Annesley's plain toque and old-fashioned shabby coat, as if to emphasize the word "shops." The girl flushed, and Smith frowned at the Countess.

"No, thank you," he replied for Annesley. "There's nothing we need trouble you about till the wedding to-morrow afternoon. You can put on your gladdest rags then, and be one of our witnesses. I believe that's the legal term, isn't it?"

"I do not know," said the Countess with a suppressed quiver in her voice, and a flash in the eyes fixed studiously on the river. "I know nothing of marriages in England. Who will be your other witness, if it's not indiscreet to ask?"

"I haven't decided yet," returned Smith, laconically.

"Ah, of course, you have plenty of friends to choose from; and so the wedding will be to-morrow?"

"Yes. One fixes up these things in next to no time with a special license. Luckily I'm a British subject. I never thought much about it before, but it simplifies matters; and I'll have been living in this parish a fortnight to-morrow. That's providential, for it seems that legally it must be a fortnight. I've been up since it was light, learning the ropes and beginning to work them. Even the hour's fixed—two-thirty."

(This was news for Annesley also, as there had been no time to begin talking over the "hundred plans" Smith had mentioned in his letter.)

"You are prompt—and businesslike!" returned the Countess, and again the girl blushed. She did not like to think of her knight of romance being "businesslike" in his haste to make her his wife. But perhaps the Countess didn't mean to suggest anything uncomplimentary. "At what church will the 'ceremony take place' as the newspapers say?" she went on. "It is to be a fashionable one?"

"No," replied, Smith, shortly. "Weddings in fashionable churches are silly unless there's to be a crowd; and my wife and I are going to collect our circle after we're married. I'll let you know in time where we are going. As you'll be with the bride you can't lose yourself on the way, so you needn't worry."

"I don't!" laughed the Countess. "I'm at your service, and I shall try to be worthy of the occasion. But now I shall take myself off, or your coffee will be cold. You have a busy day and it's late—even later than our breakfasts on the Monarchic three weeks ago. Already it seems three months. Au revoir , Don. Au revoir , Miss Grayle."

She finished with a nod for Annesley, and turned away. Smith let her go in silence; and the girl watched the tall figure—as perfect in shape and as perfectly dressed as a French model—walk out of the restaurant into the foyer.

She seemed to have taken with her the golden glamour which had made up for lack of sunshine in the room before her arrival; or if she had not taken it, at least it was dimmed. Annesley gazed after the figure until it disappeared, because she felt vaguely that it would be best not to look at her companion just then. She knew that he was angry, and that he wanted to compose himself.

The Countess was as handsome by morning light, in her black velvet and chinchilla, as at night in flame colour and gold. But—the girl hoped she was not ill-natured—she looked meretricious . If she were "made up," the process defied Annesley Grayle's eyes; yet surely never was skin so flawlessly white; and such golden-red hair with dark eyes and eyebrows must be unique.

"Great Scott, I thought she meant to spend the morning with us!" Smith broke out, viciously. "I realize, now I've seen you together, that she's not—the ideal chaperon. But any port in a storm!"

"I thought you liked her," Annesley said.

"So I do—within limits. At least I appreciate qualities that she has. But there are times—when a little of her goes a long way."

"I'm afraid she realized that you weren't making her welcome," Annesley smiled. "You weren't very nice to her, were you?"

"I was as nice as she deserved," the man excused himself.

"But she was good to me last night!"

"She owes it to me to be good. It's a debt I expect her to pay, that's all, and I'm not sure she's paying it generously. You needn't be too grateful, dear."

"Perhaps, as she's known you some time, she feels you're sacrificing yourself," Annesley defended the Countess. "I don't blame her!"

"She's sharp enough to see that I'm in great luck," said Smith. "But I suppose there's always a dash of the cat in a woman of her race. I hope there's no need to tell you that she has no right to be jealous. If she had, I wouldn't have put you within reach of her claws. There are assorted sizes and kinds of jealousy, though. Some women want all the lime-light and grudge sparing any for a younger and prettier girl."

Annesley laughed. " Prettier! Why, she's a beauty, and I——"

"Wait till I introduce you to Mrs. Nelson Smith, who's going to be one of the best-dressed, best-looking young women in London, and you'll be sorry for the poor old Countess," returned Smith, warmly. "You can afford then to heap coals of fire on her head, which can't make it redder than it is. Meanwhile, it occurs to me, from the way the wind blows, you'd better go carefully with the lady! Don't let her pump you about yourself, or what happened at Mrs. Ellsworth's. It's not her business. Don't confide any more than you need, and if she pretends to confide in you understand that it will be for a purpose. The Countess is no ingénue !

"But enough about her," he went on, abruptly. "She sha'n't spoil our first breakfast together, even by reminding me of gloomy meals I used sometimes to eat with her when we happened to find ourselves in each other's society on board the Monarchic . I was feeling down on my luck then, and she wasn't the one to cheer me up. But things are different now. Have you noticed, by the way, that she has a nickname for me?"

"Yes," Annesley admitted. "She calls you 'Don.'"

"It's a name she made up because she used to say, when we first met, I was like a Spaniard; and I can jabber Spanish among other lingos. It's more her native tongue, you know, than English. I only refer to it because I want you to have a special name of your own for me, and I don't want it to be that one. It can't be Nelson, because—well, I can never be at home as Nelson with the girl I love best—the one who knows how I came to call myself that. Will you make up a name for me, and begin to get used to it to-day? I'd like it if you could."