“But her costume, Monty! The girl hasn’t got a fancy dress. And Minnie—”
“Forget Minnie, will you? Mirabelle Leicester is going to the Arts Ball tonight.” He tapped the tray before him to emphasize every word. “You have a ticket to spare, and you simply can’t go alone because I have a very important business engagement and your friend has failed you. Her dress will be here in a few minutes: it is a bright green domino with a bright-red hood.”
“How perfectly hideous!” She forgot for the moment her disappointment in this outrage. “Bright green! Nobody has a complexion to stand that!”
Yet he ignored her.
“You will explain to Miss Leicester that the dress came from a friend who, through illness or any cause you like to invent, is unable to go to the dance—she’ll jump at the chance. It is one of the events of the year and tickets are selling at a premium.”
She asked him what that meant, and he explained patiently.
“Maybe she’ll want to spend a quiet evening—have one of those headaches,” he went on. “If that is so, you can tell her that I’ve got a party coming to the house tonight, and they will be a little noisy. Did she want to know anything about me?”
“No, she didn’t,” snapped Joan promptly. “She didn’t want to know about anything. I couldn’t get her to talk. She’s like a dumb oyster.”
Mirabelle was sitting by the window, looking down into the square, when there was a gentle tap at the door and Joan came in.
“I’ve got wonderful news for you,” she said.
“For me?” said Mirabelle in surprise.
Joan ran across the room, giving what she deemed to be a surprisingly lifelike representation of a young thing full of innocent joy.
“I’ve got an extra ticket for the Arts Ball tonight. They’re selling at a—they’re very expensive. Aren’t you a lucky girl!”
“I?” said Mirabelle in surprise. “Why am I the lucky girl?”
Joan rose from the bed and drew back from her reproachfully.
“You surely will come with me? If you don’t, I shan’t be able to go at all. Lady Mary and I were going together, and now she’s sick!”
Mirabelle opened her eyes wider.
“But I can’t go, surely. It is a fancy dress ball, isn’t it? I read something about it in the papers. And I’m awfully tired tonight.”
Joan pouted prettily.
“My dear, if you lay down for an hour you’d be fit. Besides, you couldn’t sleep here early tonight: Monty’s having one of his men parties, and they’re a noisy lot of people—though thoroughly respectable,” she added hastily.
Poor Joan had a mission outside her usual range.
“I’d love to go,”—Mirabelle was anxious not to be a killjoy—“if I could get a dress.”
“I’ve got one,” said the girl promptly, and ran out of the room.
She returned very quickly, and threw the domino on the bed.
“It’s not pretty to look at, but it’s got this advantage, that you can wear almost anything underneath.”
“What time does the ball start?” Mirabelle, examining her mind, found that she was not averse to going; she was very human, and a fancy dress ball would be a new experience.
“Ten o’clock,” said Joan. “We can have dinner before Monty’s friends arrive. You’d like to see Monty, wouldn’t you? He’s downstairs—such a gentleman, my dear!”
The girl could have laughed.
A little later she was introduced to the redoubtable Monty, and found his suave and easy manner a relief after the jerky efforts of the girl to be entertaining. Monty had seen most parts of the world and could talk entertainingly about them all. Mirabelle rather liked him, though she thought he was something of a fop, yet was not sorry when she learned that, so far from having friends to dinner, he did not expect them to arrive until after she and Joan had left.
The meal put her more at her ease. He was a polished man of the world, courteous to the point of pomposity; he neither said nor suggested one thing that could offend her; they were halfway through dinner when the cry of a newsboy was heard in the street. Through the dining-room window she saw the footman go down the steps and buy a newspaper. He glanced at the stop-press space and came back slowly up the stairs reading. A little later he came into the room, and must have signalled to her host, for Monty went out immediately and she heard their voices in the passage. Joan was uneasy.
“I wonder what’s the matter?” she asked, a little irritably. “It’s very bad manners to leave ladies in the middle of dinner—”
At that moment Monty came back. Was it imagination on her part, or had he gone suddenly pale? Joan saw it, and her brows met, but she was too wise to make a comment upon his appearance.
Mr. Newton seated himself in his place with a word of apology and poured out a glass of champagne. Only for a second did his hand tremble, and then, with a smile, he was his old self.
“What is wrong, Monty?”
“Wrong? Nothing,” he said curtly, and took up the topic of conversation where he had laid it down before leaving the room.
“It isn’t that old snake, is it?” asked Joan with a shiver. “Lord! that unnerves me! I never go to bed at night without looking under, or turning the clothes right down to the foot! They ought to have found it months ago if the police—”
At this point she caught Monty Newton’s eye, cold, menacing, malevolent, and the rest of her speech died on her lips.
Mirabelle went upstairs to dress, and Joan would have followed but the man beckoned her.
“You’re a little too talkative, Joan,” he said, more mildly than she had expected. “The snake is not a subject we wish to discuss at dinner. And listen!” He walked into the passage and looked round, then came back and closed the door. “Keep that girl near you.”
“Who is going to dance with me?” she asked petulantly. “I look like
