Who Goes There!. Chambers Robert William
was another silence. Then the door crack slowly widened.
"Please extend your hand," she said.
There was just enough of space for him to slip his hand between door and frame and he did so. There came a light, soft touch on his ring-finger. The ring slipped off.
When she spoke again her voice was altered: "I shall dress immediately," she said. "I shall not keep you waiting long. You will find the door open. Please come in when I have gone upstairs."
"Thank you."
He could hear her light, flying feet on the stairs; he waited a little longer, then opened the door.
The hallway was dark, and he left the door open, then entered the room to the left which seemed to be a library, music-room and living-room combined. Books, piano, easy chairs and sofas loomed in the dim light of drawn curtains. An easel on which stood a water-colour drawing occupied the end of the room, and beside it was a table on which were porcelain dishes, tubes of colour and scattered badger brushes.
It was evident that Miss Girard's talents were multiple, for he noticed also a violin and music stand near the piano, and on the violin score as well as on the score spread across the piano the same hand had written "Karen Girard."
He stood by the table, mechanically picking up, one after another, the books lying there. Some of the books were printed in French, some in German, in Italian, in Danish, in Swedish, in English. Miss Girard's name was written in all of them. Miss Girard appeared to be accomplished.
In the dim light Guild began to saunter around the room encountering various evidences of Miss Girard's taste and mode of living – one or two Braun photographs of Velasquez, Boucher, and Gainsborough on the walls – certainly a catholicism of taste entirely admirable; – one or two graceful bits of ancient Chinese art – blue and gold marvels of Pekin enamel; a mille-fleur tapestry panel, a bundle of golf clubs, a tennis bat, and a pair of spurs.
He thought for himself that when a girl goes in for all of these accomplishments it is because the gods have been otherwise unkind, and that she has to.
At the same time he remembered the voice he had heard through the scarcely opened door – the lovely voice of a young English girl – than which in all the world there is nothing half so lovely.
And it suddenly occurred to him that there had not been in it the faintest kind or trace of a German accent – that only its childish and sleepy sweetness had struck him first, and then its purity and its youthful and cultivated charm.
Yes, truly, the gods had been kind to this young German girl of nineteen, but it would be a little too much to ask of these same gods that they endow her with figure and features commensurate with her other charms and talents.
Then he suddenly remembered her profession, and that she was studying still for the dramatic profession. And he knew that this profession naturally required exterior charm of any woman who desired to embrace it.
While these ideas and speculations were occupying his mind he heard her on the stairs, and he turned and came forward as she entered the room.
She was a slender, straight girl of medium height; and her face was one of those fresh young faces which looked fragrant. And instantly the thought occurred to him that she was the vivid, living incarnation of her own voice, with her lilac-blue eyes and soft white neck, and the full scarlet lips of one of those goddesses who was not very austere.
She wore a loosely-belted jacket of tan-coloured covert-cloth, and narrow skirts of the same, and a wide golden-brown hat, and tan spats. The gods had been very, very kind to Miss Girard, for she even adorned her clothes, and that phenomenon is not usual in Great Britain or among German Fräuleins however accomplished and however well born.
She said: "I beg your pardon for detaining you so long on the outside door-step. Since the war began my maid and I have been annoyed by strangers telephoning and even coming here to ask silly and impertinent questions. I suppose," she added, disdainfully, "it is because there is so much suspicion of foreigners in England."
"I quite understand," he said. "Being German, your neighbors gossip."
She shrugged her indifference.
"Shall we talk here?" she asked gravely, resting one very white hand on the back of a chair. "You come from General Baron Kurt von Reiter. The ring is a credential beyond dispute."
"We can talk anywhere you wish," he said, "but there is little time, and somebody must pack a traveller's satchel for you. Have you a maid?"
"She went to London yesterday evening. She was to have returned on the eleven o'clock train last night. I can't understand it."
"Are you alone in the house?"
"Yes. My cook sleeps out. She does not come until half-past nine. My maid serves my breakfast."
"You haven't had any, then?"
"No."
"Can you fix something for yourself?"
"Yes, of course. Shall I do so now?"
"Yes. I'll go to the kitchen with you while you are doing it. There are several things to say and the time is short."
She led the way; he opened the kitchen shutters and let in the sunshine, then stood a moment watching her as she moved about the place with graceful celerity, preparing cocoa over an alcohol lamp, buttering a roll or two and fetching cup, plate, spoon and marmalade.
"Have you breakfasted?" she asked, looking at him over her shoulder.
"Yes – it is very good of you – "
"There will be plenty of cocoa and rolls – if you care for them. The rolls are yesterday's and not fresh."
She poured the cocoa in two cups and looked at him again in grave invitation.
"You are sure there is plenty?" he asked, smilingly.
"Plenty."
"Then – I do seem to be rather hungry."
He drew a chair for her; she seated herself and ate with a youthful appetite. He drank his cocoa, ate his rolls, and tried not to look at her too often.
"This is why I am here," he said. "I saw General Baron von Reiter four days ago under somewhat extraordinary circumstances.
"He told me that since the war broke out he had not been able to communicate directly with you or to get you out of England, and he asked me to find you and bring you to his estate at Trois Fontaines in Luxembourg."
"To Quellenheim?" she asked, surprised and disturbed. "Is he there?"
"No, he is with a field army, and he does not know where orders from staff headquarters may send him."
"Still," she said, hesitating, "I should think that he might wish me to go to Silesia – "
"Silesia is threatened by the Russian army."
"Silesia!" she repeated, incredulously. "Cossacks in Silesia?" She sat, her cup of cocoa half raised to her lips, her surprised and disconcerted eyes on his. Then she set the cup aside.
"He wishes me to go to Quellenheim? With you?"
"Yes."
"Why?"
"Travelling on the continent is precarious."
Her eyes rested on his; she said with a candour which he began to understand was characteristic of her: "He seems to have confidence in you. I never heard him speak of you. You are American?"
"Yes."
"That is odd. He never cared for Americans."
Guild said: "He could not send a German into England."
"That is true. Nor an Englishman either. No Englishman would be likely to do anything to oblige a German."
She rose: "I don't understand why Anna, my maid, is still absent," she added uneasily. "My maid often goes to London, but never before has she remained over night. I don't know why she remained. She knew I was alone in the house."
She lifted her serious blue eyes to Guild, then gazed