The Majestic came gliding into New York harbour on an autumn morning. She sniffed at the tug-boats and turtle-gaited ferries, winked at a gaudy young yacht and ordered a cattle-boat out of her way with a snarling whistle of steam. Then she drew up at her private dock with all the fuss of a stout lady sitting down, and announced complacently that she had just come from Cherbourg and Southampton with a cargo of the very best people in the world.
The very best people in the world stood on the deck and waved idiotically to their poor relations who were waiting on the dock for gloves from Paris. Before long a great toboggan had connected the Majestic with the North American continent and the ship began to disgorge these very best people in the world – who turned out to be cinema stars, missionaries, retired jewellers, British authors, musical comedy twins, the Duchess Mazzini (née Goldberg) and, needless to add, Lord and Lady Thingumbob, of Thingumbob Manor.
The deck gradually emptied, but when the last Poiret Madonna had reached shore the photographers still remained at their posts. And the officer in charge of debarkation still stood at the foot of the gangway, glancing first at his watch and then at the deck as if some important part of the cargo was still on board. At last from the watchers on the pier there arose a long-drawn ‘Ah-h-h!’ as a final entourage began to stream down from deck B.
First came two French maids, one carrying a pair of minute dogs and the other bearing an enormous green parrot in an enormous red cage. After these marched a squad of porters, blind and invisible under innumerable bunches and bouquets of fresh flowers. Another maid followed, leading a sad-eyed orphan child of a French flavour, and close upon its heels walked the second officer, pulling along three neurasthenic wolfhounds, much to their reluctance and his own.
A pause. Then the captain, Sir Howard Deems Macdougall, appeared at the rail, with something that might have been a pile of gorgeous silver fox fur standing by his side.
Rags Martin-Jones, after two years in the capitals of Europe, was returning to her native land! Rags Martin-Jones was not a dog! She was half a girl and half a flower, and as she shook hands with Captain Sir Howard Deems Macdougall she smiled as if someone had told her the newest, freshest joke in the world. All the people who had not already left the pier felt that smile trembling on the morning air and turned around to see. She came slowly down the gangway. Her hat, an expensive, inscrutable experiment, was crushed under her arm so that her scant, French-bobbed hair tossed and flopped a little in the harbour wind. Her face was like seven o’clock on a summer morning, save where she had slipped a preposterous monocle into an eye of clear, childish blue. At every few steps her long lashes would tilt out the monocle and she would laugh, a bored, happy laugh, and replace the supercilious spectacle in the other eye.
Tap! Her one hundred and five pounds reached the pier, and it seemed to sway, and bend from the shock of her beauty. A few porters fainted. A large, sentimental shark which had followed the ship across made a despairing leap to see her once more, and then dived, broken-hearted, back into the deep sea. Rags Martin-Jones had come home.
There was no member of her family there to meet her, for the simple reason that she was the only member of her family left alive. In 1913 her parents had gone down on the Titanic together rather than be separated in this world, and so the Martin-Jones fortune of seventy-five millions had been inherited by a very little girl on her tenth birthday. It was what the pessimists always refer to as a ‘shame.’ Rags Martin-Jones (everybody had forgotten her real name long ago) was now photographed from all sides. The monocle persistently fell out, and she kept laughing and yawning and replacing it, so no very clear picture of her was taken, except by the motion-picture camera. All the photographs, however, included a flustered, handsome young man, with an almost ferocious love-light burning in his eyes, who had met her on the dock. His name was John Chestnut, he was already talked of as a risen star in the financial world, and he had been hopelessly in love with Rags ever since the time when she, like the tides, had come under the influence of the summer moon.
When Rags became really aware of his presence they were walking down the pier, and she looked at him blankly, as though she had never seen him before in this world.
‘Rags!’ he began. ‘Rags –’
‘John Chestnut?’ she inquired, inspecting him with interest.
‘Of course!’ he exclaimed angrily. ‘Are you trying to pretend you don’t know me? That you didn’t write to tell me to meet you here?’ She laughed. A chauffeur appeared at her elbow, and she twisted out of her coat, revealing a dress made in great, splashy checks of sea-blue and grey. She shook herself like a wet bird.
‘I’ve got a lot of stuff to declare at the customs,’ she remarked absently.
‘So have I,’ said Chestnut anxiously, ‘and the first thing I want to declare is that I’ve loved you, Rags, every minute since you’ve been away.’ She stopped with a groan.
‘Please! There were some young men on the boat. The subject’s gotten to be a bore.’
‘My Heaven!’ cried Chestnut. ‘Do you mean to say that you class my love with what a lot of insolent kids said to you on a boat!’ His voice had risen, and several people in the vicinity turned to hear.
‘Sh!’ she warned him. ‘I’m not giving a circus. If you want me to even see you while I’m here you’ll have to be less violent.’
But John Chestnut seemed unable to control his voice.
‘Do you mean to say’ – it trembled to a carrying pitch – ‘that you’ve forgotten what you said on this very pier just twenty-two months ago last Thursday?’ Half the passengers from the ship were now watching the scene on the dock, and another little eddy drifted out of the customs house to see.
‘John’ – her displeasure was increasing – ‘if you raise your voice again I’ll arrange it so you’ll have plenty of chance to cool off. I’m going to the Ritz. Come and see me there this afternoon.’
‘But Rags!’ he protested hoarsely. ‘Listen to me. Twenty-two months ago –’ Then the watchers on the dock were treated to a curious sight. A beautiful lady in a checkered dress of sea-blue and grey took a brisk step forward so that her hands came into contact with the excited young man by her side. The young man, retreating instinctively, reached back with his foot, but finding nothing relapsed gently off the thirty-foot dock and plopped into the Hudson River. A shout of alarm went up and there was a rush to the edge just as his head appeared above water. He was swimming easily and, perceiving this, the young lady who had apparently been the cause of the accident leaned over the pier and made a megaphone of her hands.
‘I’ll be in at half-past four!’ she cried. And with a cheerful wave of her hand, which the engulfed gentleman was unable to return, she adjusted her monocle, threw one haughty glance at the gathered crowd and walked leisurely from the scene.
The five dogs, the three maids, the parrot and the French orphan were installed in the largest suite at the Ritz, and Rags tumbled lazily into a steaming bath, where she dozed for the greater part of an hour. At the end of that time she received business calls from a masseuse, a manicurist, a beauty doctor and finally from a Parisian hairdresser who restored the French bob to its original perfection. When John Chestnut arrived at four he found half a dozen lawyers and bankers, the administrators of the Martin-Jones trust fund, waiting in the hall. They had been there since half-past one, and were now in a state of considerable agitation. After one of the maids had subjected him to a severe scrutiny, possibly to be sure that he was thoroughly dry, John was conducted immediately into the presence of M’selle. M’selle was in her bedroom, reclining on the chaise-longue among two dozen silk pillows that had accompanied her across the water. John came into the room somewhat stiffly and greeted her with a formal bow.
‘You look better,’ she said, raising herself from her pillows and staring at him appraisingly. ‘It gave you a colour.’ He thanked her coldly for the compliment.
‘You ought to go in every morning.’ And then she added irrelevantly, ‘I’m going back to Paris tomorrow.’ John Chestnut gasped.
‘I told you in my letter that I didn’t intend to stay more than a week, anyhow,’ she added.
‘But Rags –’
‘Why should I? There isn’t an interesting man in New York.’
‘But listen, Rags – won’t you give me a chance? Won’t you stay for, say, ten days and get to know me a little?’
‘Know you!’ Her tone implied that he was already a far too open box.
‘Well, what do you want me to be?’ he demanded resentfully. ‘A cross between an actor and an amusement park?’
‘I want a man who’s capable of a gallant gesture.’
‘Do you want me to express myself entirely in pantomime?’
Rags uttered a disgusted sigh.
‘I mean you haven’t any imagination,’ she explained patiently. ‘No Americans have any imagination. Paris is the only city where a civilized person can exist. Paris is the capital of the world.’
‘Don’t you care for me at all any more?’
‘I wouldn’t have crossed the Atlantic to see you if I didn’t. But as soon as I looked over the Americans on the boat I knew I couldn’t marry you. I’d just hate you, John, and the only fun I’d have out of it would be the fun of breaking your heart.’ She began to twist herself down among the cushions until she almost disappeared from view.
‘I’ve lost my monocle,’ she exclaimed. After an unsuccessful search in the silken depths she discovered the elusive glass hanging down the back of her neck.
‘I’d love to be in love,’ she went on, replacing the monocle in her childish eye. ‘Last spring in Rome I almost eloped with an Indian Rajah, but I took an intense dislike to one of his other wives.’
‘Don’t talk that rubbish!’ cried John, sinking his face into his hands.
‘Well, I didn’t marry him,’ she protested. ‘But in one way he had a lot to offer. He was the third richest subject of the British Empire. That’s another thing – are you rich?’
‘There you are. What have you to offer me?’
‘Love.’
‘Love!’ She disappeared again among the cushions. ‘Listen, John. Life to me is a series of glistening bazaars, with a merchant in front of each one, rubbing his hands together and saying, “Patronize this place here. Best Bazaar in the world.” So I go with my purse full of beauty and money and youth, all prepared to buy. “What have you got for sale?” I ask him, and he rubs his hands together and says, “Well, mademoiselle, today we have some perfectly be-oo-tiful love.” Sometimes he hasn’t even got that in stock, but he sends out for it when he finds I have so much money to spend. Oh, he always gives that to me before I go, and for nothing. That’s the one revenge I have.’ John Chestnut rose despairingly to his feet and took a step toward the window.
‘Don’t throw yourself out,’ Rags exclaimed quickly.
‘I won’t.’ He tossed away his cigarette.
‘It isn’t just you,’ she said in a softer voice. ‘Dull and uninspired as you are, I care for you more than I can say. But life’s so stupid here. Nothing ever happens.’
‘Well,’ he said doggedly, ‘just for a change you’re to come out with me tonight.’
‘Where to?’ demanded Rags with scorn.
‘I’ll take you to the most amusing place in the city.’
‘What’ll happen? You’ve got to tell me what’ll happen?’
John Chestnut suddenly drew a long breath and looked cautiously around as if he were afraid of being overheard.
‘Well, to tell you the truth,’ he said in a low, worried tone, ‘if everything was known something pretty awful would be liable to happen to me.’
She sat upright, and the pillows tumbled about her like leaves.
‘Do you mean to imply that there’s anything shady in your life?’ she cried, with laughter in her voice. ‘Do you expect me to believe that? No, John, you’ll have your fun by plugging ahead on the beaten path – just plugging ahead.’
Her mouth, a small, insolent rose, dropped the words on him like thorns. John took his hat and coat from the chair and picked up his cane.
‘For the last time, will you come along with me tonight and see what we can see?’
‘See what? See whom? Is there anything in this country worth seeing?’
‘Well,’ he said, in a matter-of-fact tone, ‘for one thing you’ll see the Prince of Wales.’
‘What?’ She left the chaise-longue at a bound. ‘Is he in New York?’
‘He will be tonight. Would you care to see him?’
‘Would I? I’d give a year of my life to see him for an hour.’ Her voice trembled with excitement.
‘He’s been in Canada. He’s down here in cognito. And I happen to know where he’s going to be tonight.’
Rags gave a sharp, ecstatic cry: ‘Felice! Louise! Nanine!’
The three maids came running. The room seemed to fill suddenly with vibrations of wild, startled light.
‘Felice, the car!’ cried Rags. ‘Louise, my gold dress and the slippers with the real gold heels! The big pearls too, all the pearls, and the egg diamond and the stockings with the sapphire clocks! Nanine, send for the hairdresser on the run! My bath again, ice cold and half full of almond cream! Felice, Tiffany’s like lightning, before they close! Find me a bracelet, a brooch, a pendant, anything, it doesn’t matter, with the arms of the House of Windsor!’ She was fumbling at the buttons of her dress, and as John turned it was already sliding from her shoulders.
‘Orchids, for the love of heaven! Four dozen, so I can choose four.’
And then maids flew here and there about the room like frightened birds.
‘Perfume, Louise! Bring out all my perfume and my white sable and my diamond garters and the sweet oil for my hands! Here, take these things! This too and this – ouch! – and this!’ With becoming modesty John Chestnut closed the outside door. The six trustees, in various postures of fatigue, of ennui, of resignation, of despair, were still cluttering up the outer hall.
‘Gentlemen,’ announced John Chestnut, ‘I fear that Miss Martin-Jones is much too weary from her trip to talk to you this afternoon.’
‘This place, for no particular reason, is called the Hole in the Sky.’ Rags looked around her. They were on a roof garden wide open to the night. Overhead the true stars winked cold and the moon was a sliver of ice in the dark west. But where they stood it was as warm as June, and the couples dining or dancing on the central floor were unconcerned with the forbidding sky.
‘What makes it so warm?’ she whispered as they moved toward a table.
‘It’s some new trick that keeps the warm air from rising. I don’t know the principle of the thing, but I know it’s open like this even in the middle of winter. Do you see that man at the corner table? That’s the heavyweight champion of the world. He knocked out the challenger at five o’clock this afternoon.’
‘Where’s the Prince of Wales?’ she demanded tensely.
John looked around.
He hasn’t arrived yet. He won’t be here for about half an hour.’
She sighed profoundly. ‘It’s the first time I’ve been excited in four years.’ Four years – one less than he had loved her. He wondered if when she was sixteen, a wild, lovely child, sitting up all night in restaurants with officers who were to leave for France next day, losing the glamour of life too soon in the old, sad, poignant days of war, she had ever been so lovely as under these amber lights and this dark sky. From her excited eyes to her tiny slipper heels which were striped with layers of real silver and gold, she was like one of those amazing ships that are carved complete in a bottle. She was finished with that delicacy, with that care – as though the long lifetime of some worker in fragility had been used to make her so. John Chestnut wanted to take her up in his hands, turn her this way and that, examine the tip of a slipper or the tip of an ear or squint closely at the fairy stuff from which her lashes were made.
Rags became suddenly aware of the sound of violins and drums, but the music seemed to come from far away, seemed to float over the crisp night and on to the floor with the added remoteness of a dream.
‘The orchestra’s on another roof,’ exclaimed John. ‘It’s a new idea. Look, the entertainment’s beginning.’
He broke off. Just as the light went down for the number, Rags had given a long sigh and leaned forward tensely in her chair. Her eyes were rigid like the eyes of a pointer dog, and John saw that they were fixed on a party that had come through some side entrance and were arranging themselves around a table in the half darkness. The table was shielded with palms, and Rags at first made out only three dim forms. Then she distinguished a fourth who seemed to be placed well behind the other three, a pale oval of a face topped with a glimmer of dark yellow hair.
‘Hallo!’ ejaculated John. ‘There he is now!’
Her breath seemed to die murmurously in her throat. She was dimly aware that the comedian was now standing in a glow of white light on the dancing-floor, that he had been talking for some moments and that there was a constant ripple of laughter in the air. Her eyes remained motionless, enchanted. She saw one of the party bend and whisper to another, and after the low glitter of a match the bright button of a cigarette-end gleamed in the background. How long it was before she moved she did not know. Then the moment was over. The lights returned, the comedian left the floor, and the far-away music began. John leaned toward her. She started. There were now only two men sitting at the table across the floor.
‘He’s gone!’ she exclaimed in quick distress.
‘Don’t worry; he’ll be back. He’s got to be awful careful, you see, so he’s probably waiting outside with one of his aides until it gets dark again. He’s not supposed to be in New York. He’s even in Canada under another name.’ The lights dimmed again, and almost immediately a dark-haired man appeared out of the darkness and was standing by their table.
‘May I introduce myself?’ he said rapidly to John in a supercilious British voice. ‘Lord Charles Este, of Baron Marchbanks’ party.’ He glanced at John closely as if to be sure that he appreciated the significance of the name. John nodded.
‘The Baron Marchbanks had the pleasure of meeting Mr Martin-Jones on a previous visit here several years ago, and would be honoured if Miss Martin-Jones would join his party for the next number.’
‘Very well,’ she said, glancing back again interrogatively at John. Again he nodded. Then she rose and, with her heart beating wildly, threaded the tables, making the half circuit of the room, then melted, a slim figure in shimmering gold, into the table set in half darkness.
The number drew to a close, and John Chestnut sat alone at his table, stirring auxiliary bubbles in his glass of champagne. Just as the lights went on there was a soft rasp of gold cloth, and Rags, flushed and breathing quickly, sank into her chair. Her eyes were shining with tears. John looked at her moodily.
‘Well, what did he say?’
‘He was very quiet.’
‘Didn’t he say a word?’ Her hand trembled as she took up her glass of champagne.
‘He just – looked at me while it was dark. And we said a few things, conventional things. He was like his picture, only he looks very bored and tired.’
‘Is he leaving New York tonight?’
‘In half an hour. He and his aides have a car outside, and they expect to be over the border before dawn.’
Just as she turned back an utterly strange young man who had been standing for a moment in the main entrance came toward them with an air of hurry. He was a deathly pale person in a dishevelled business suit, and he laid a trembling hand on John Chestnut’s shoulder.
‘Monte!’ exclaimed John, starting up so suddenly that he upset his champagne. ‘What is it? What’s the matter?’
‘They’ve picked up the trail!’ said the young man in a shaken whisper. He looked around. ‘I’ve got to speak to you alone.’ John got to his feet, and Rags noticed that his face, too, had become white as the napkin in his hand. He excused himself, and they retreated to an unoccupied table a few feet away. Rags watched them curiously for a moment, then she resumed her scrutiny of the table across the floor. Then John returned to the table, and Rags was startled to find that a tremendous change had come over him. He lurched into his chair like a drunken man.
‘John! What’s the matter?’ Instead of answering he reached for the champagne bottle, but his fingers were trembling.
‘Rags,’ he said unsteadily, ‘I’m done for!’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I’m all through, I tell you.’ He managed a sickly smile. ‘There’s been a warrant out for me for over an hour.’
‘What have you done?’ she demanded in a frightened voice. ‘What’s the warrant for?’ The lights went out for the next number, and he collapsed suddenly over the table.
‘What is it?’ she insisted, with rising apprehension. She leaned forward. His answer was barely audible.
‘Murder?’ She could feel her body grow cold as ice. He nodded. She took hold of both arms and tried to shake him upright as one shakes a coat into place. His eyes were rolling in his head.
‘Is it true? Have they got proof?’ Again he nodded drunkenly.
‘Then you’ve got to get out of the country now! Do you hear me, John? You’ve got to get out now, before they come looking for you here!’ He loosed a wild glance of terror toward the entrance.
‘Oh, Heaven!’ cried Rags. ‘Why don’t you do something?’ She looked distractedly around the roof. Her eyes strayed here and there in desperation, became suddenly rigid. She drew in her breath sharply, hesitated, and then whispered fiercely into John’s ear.
‘If I arrange it, will you go to Canada tonight?’
‘How?’
‘I’ll manage if you’ll pull yourself together a little. This is Rags talking to you, don’t you understand, John? I want you to sit here and not move until I come back!’ A minute later she had crossed the room under cover of the darkness.
‘Baron Marchbanks!’ she whispered softly, standing just behind his chair. He half rose, motioned her to sit down.
‘Have you room in your car for two more passengers tonight?’ One of the aides looked around abruptly.
‘His Lordship’s car is full,’ he said shortly.
‘It’s terribly urgent.’ Her voice was trembling.
‘Well,’ said the Prince hesitatingly, ‘I don’t know.’ Lord Charles Este looked at him and shook his head.
‘I don’t think it’d do, sir. This is a risky matter anyhow, with contrary orders from home. You know we agreed there’d be no complications.’ The Prince frowned.
‘This isn’t a complication,’ he objected. Este turned frankly to Rags.
‘Why is it urgent?’ Rags hesitated.
‘Why –’ She flushed suddenly. ‘It’s a runaway marriage.’ The Prince laughed.
‘Right-o!’ he exclaimed. ‘That settles it. Este here is just being official. Bring over the lucky man right away. We’re leaving shortly, what?’ Este looked at his watch.
‘Right now!’ Rags rushed away. She wanted to move the whole party from the place while the lights were still down.
‘Hurry!’ she cried in John’s ear. ‘We’re going over the border with the Prince of Wales. You’ll be safe by morning.’
He looked up at her with dazed eyes. She hurriedly paid the account and, seizing his arm, piloted him as inconspicuously as possible to the other table, where she introduced him with a word. The Prince acknowledged his presence by shaking hands, the aides nodded, only faintly concealing their displeasure.
‘We’d better start,’ said Este, looking impatiently at his watch. They were on their feet when suddenly an exclamation broke out from all of them at once. Two policemen and a red-haired man in plain clothes had come in at the main door.
‘Out we go!’ breathed Este, impelling the party toward the side entrance. ‘There’s going to be some kind of riot here.’ He gasped. Two more bluecoats barred the exit there. They paused uncertainly. The plain-clothes man was beginning a careful inspection of the people at the table. Este looked sharply at Rags and then at John, who shrank back behind the palms.
‘There’s going to be trouble,’ whispered Rags. ‘Can’t we get out by this entrance?’ The Prince, with rising impatience, sat down again in his chair.
‘Let me know when you chaps are ready to go.’ He smiled at Rags. ‘Now, just suppose we all get into trouble just for that jolly face of yours!’ Then suddenly the lights went up. The plain-clothes man whirled around quickly and sprang to the middle of the cabaret floor.
‘Nobody try to leave this room!’ he shouted. ‘Sit down, that party behind the palms! Is John Chestnut in this room?’ Rags gave a short, involuntary cry.
‘Here!’ cried the detective to the policeman behind him. ‘Take a look at that bunch over there. Hands up, you men!’
‘My God!’ whispered Este. ‘We’ve got to get out of here!’ He turned to the Prince. ‘This won’t do, Ted. You can’t be seen here. I’ll try and stall them off while you get to the car.’ He took a step toward the side entrance.
‘Hands up, there!’ cried the plain-clothes man. ‘And when I say hands up I mean it! Which one of you’s Chestnut?’
‘You’re mad!’ shouted Este. ‘We’re British subjects. We’re not involved in this affair in any way!’ A woman screamed somewhere, and there was a general movement toward the lifts, a movement which stopped short before the muzzles of two automatic pistols. A girl next to Rags collapsed in a dead faint to the floor, and at the same moment the music on the other roof began to play.
‘Stop that music!’ bellowed the plain-clothes man. ‘And get some handcuffs on that whole bunch – quick!’ Two policemen advanced toward the party, and simultaneously Este and the other aides drew their revolvers and, shielding the Prince as best they could, began to edge toward the side. A shot rang out and then another, followed by a crash of silver and china as half a dozen diners overturned their tables and dropped quickly behind.
The panic became general. There were three shots in quick succession and then a fusillade. Rags saw Este firing coolly at the eight amber lights which lit the roof, and a thick fume of grey smoke began to fill the air. As a strange undertone to the shouting and screaming came the incessant clamour of the distant jazz band. Then in a moment it was all over. A shrill whistle rang out over the roof, and through the smoke Rags saw John Chestnut advancing toward the plain-clothes man, his hands held out in a gesture of surrender. There was a last nervous cry, a shrill clatter as someone inadvertently stepped into a pile of dishes, and then a heavy silence fell on the roof; even the band seemed to have died away.
‘It’s all over!’ John Chestnut’s voice rang out wildly on the night air. ‘The party’s over. Everybody who wants to can go home!’ Still there was silence. Rags knew it was the silence of awe. The strain of guilt had driven John Chestnut insane.
‘It was a great performance,’ he was shouting. ‘I want to thank you one and all. If you can find any tables still standing, champagne will be served as long as you care to stay.’ It seemed to Rags that the roof and the high stars suddenly began to swim round and round. She saw John take the detective’s hand and shake it heartily, and she watched the detective grin and pocket his gun. The music had recommenced, and the girl who had fainted was suddenly dancing with Lord Charles Este in the corner. John was running here and there patting people on the back, and laughing and shaking hands. Then he was coming toward her, fresh and innocent as a child.
‘Wasn’t it wonderful?’ he cried. Rags felt a faintness stealing over her. She groped backward with her hand toward a chair.
‘What was it?’ she cried dazedly. ‘Am I dreaming?’
‘Of course not! You’re wide awake. I made it up, Rags, don’t you see? I made up the whole thing for you. I had it invented! The only thing real about it was my name!’ She collapsed suddenly against his coat, clung to his lapels and would have wilted to the floor if he had not caught her quickly in his arms.
‘Some champagne – hurry!’ he called, and then he shouted at the Prince, who stood near-by: ‘Order my car, quick! Miss Rags Martin-Jones has fainted from excitement.’
Miss Rags Martin-Jones sat waiting – waiting for perhaps the first time in her life.
Mr Chestnut wants to know if you’ll come right in to his private office.’ It was a respectful voice at her elbow.
Obediently her slim feet moved along the carpet into a long, cool, exquisite room. John Chestnut sat at his desk, waiting, and Rags walked to him and put her arms around his shoulder.
‘Are you sure you’re real?’ she asked anxiously. ‘Are you absolutely sure?’
‘You only wrote to me a week before you came?’ he protested modestly, ‘or I could have arranged a revolution.’
‘Was the whole thing just mine?’ she demanded. ‘Was it a perfectly useless, gorgeous thing, just for me?’
‘Useless?’ He considered. ‘Well, it started out to be. At the last minute I invited a big restaurant man to be there, and while you were at the other table I sold him the whole idea of the cabaret.’ He looked at his watch.
‘I’ve got one more thing to do, and then we’ve got just time to be married before lunch.’ He picked up his telephone to give some brief swift orders, rang off, turned to the wild-eyed girl with a laugh.
‘John,’ she asked him intently, ‘who was the Prince of Wales?’ He waited until they were in an outer room, and then pointed to a young secretary who had come politely to his feet. His face was pale, oval, framed in yellow hair. Rags blushed like fire.
‘He’s from Wessex,’ explained John. ‘The resemblance is, to say the least, amazing.’
Rags took the monocle from around her neck and threw the ribbon over his head.
‘Thank you,’ she said simply, ‘for the second greatest thrill of my life.’
Then John Chestnut began rubbing his hands together in a commercial gesture.
‘Patronize this place, lady,’ he besought her. ‘Best bazaar in the city!’
‘What have you got for sale?’
‘Well, m’selle, today we have some perfectly be-oo-tiful love.’
‘Wrap it up, Mr Merchant,’ cried Rags Martin-Jones. ‘It looks like a bargain to me.’