The Cardinal Moth. Fred M. White
is your steam-pipe?" he asked.
Frobisher indicated the steam-cock languidly. Ever and again the nozzle worked automatically, half filling the orchid-house with the grateful steam which was as life to the gorgeous flowers. Lopez turned the cock full on; there was a hiss, a white cloud that fairly enveloped his recent work.
"Now you shall see what you shall see," he said in his calm, cool voice. "Oh, my friend, you will be with your arms about my neck presently!"
Already the masses of flowers were glistening with moisture. It filled up the strands of the loose Manilla rope, and drew it up tight as a fiddle-string. Through the dim cloud Frobisher could see the dry stalks literally bursting into life.
"Aaron's rod," murmured Frobisher. "Do you know that for Aaron's rod, properly verified, and in good working order, I would give quite a lot of money?"
"You would cut it up for firewood to possess what I shall show you presently," said Lopez. "See here."
He turned off the steam-cock and the thin, vapoury cloud rapidly dispelled. And then behold a miracle! The twisted, withered stalk was a shining, joyous green, from it burst a long glistening cluster of great white flowers, pink fringed, and with just a touch of the deep green sea in them. They ran along the stem like the foam on a summer beach. And from them, suspended on stems so slender as to be practically invisible to the eye, was a perfect fluttering cloud of smaller blossoms of the deepest cardinal red. Even in that still atmosphere they floated and trembled for all the world like a palpitating cloud of butterflies hovering over a cluster of lilies. Anything more chaste, more weird, and at the same time more bewilderingly beautiful, it would be impossible to imagine.
Frobisher jumped to his feet with a hoarse cry of delight. Little beads of perspiration stood on his sleek head. The man was quivering from head to foot with intense excitement. With hesitating forefinger he touched the taut Manilla rope and it hummed like a harp-string, each strand drawn rigid with the moisture. And all the moths there leapt with a new, hovering life.
"The Cardinal Moth," Frobisher said hoarsely. "Hafid, it is the Cardinal Moth!"
Hafid came, from the darkness of the study with a cry something like Frobisher's, but it was a cry of terror. His brown face had turned to a ghastly, decayed green, those lovely flowers might have been a nest of cobras from the terror of his eye.
"Chop it up, destroy it, burn it!" he yelled. "Put it in the fire and scatter the ashes to the four winds. Trample on it, master; crush the flower to pieces. He is mad, he has forgotten that dreadful night in Stamboul!"
"Would you mind taking that tankard of iced water and pouring it over Hafid's head?" said Frobisher. "You silly, superstitious fool! The Stamboul affair was a mere coincidence. And so there was another Cardinal Moth besides my unfortunate plant all the time! Oh, the beauty, the gem, the auk amongst orchids! Where, where did you get it from?"
"It came from quite a small collection near London."
"The greedy ruffian! Fancy the man having a Cardinal Moth and keeping it to himself like that! The one I lost was a mere weed compared to this. Name your price, Paul, and if it is too high, Hafid and I will murder you between us and swear that you were a burglar shot in self-defence."
Lopez laughed noiselessly—a strange, unpleasant laugh.
"You would do it without the slightest hesitation," he said. "But the orchid is quite safe with you, seeing that the owner is dead, and that his secret was all his own. And the price is a small one."
"Ah, you are modest, friend Paul! Name it."
"You are merely to tell a lie and to stick to it. I am in trouble, in danger. And I hold that hanging is the worst use you can put a man to. If anything happens, I came here last night at ten o'clock. I stayed till nearly midnight. Hafid must remember the circumstances also."
"Hafid," Frobisher said slowly, "will forget or remember anything that I ask him to."
Hafid nodded with his eyes still fixed in fascinated horror on the palpitating, quivering, crimson floating over its bed of snow. He heard and understood, but only by instinct.
"I was at home all the evening, and her ladyship is away," said Frobisher. "I was expecting a mere commonplace rascal—not an artist like yourself, Paul—and the others had gone to bed. And you were here for the time you said. Is not that so, Hafid?"
"Oh, by the soul of my father, yes!" Hafid said in a frozen voice. "Take it and burn it, and scatter it. What my lord says is the truth. Take it and burn it, and scatter it."
"He'll be all right in the morning," Frobisher said. "Lopez, take the big steps and festoon that lovely new daughter of mine across the roof. You can fasten it to those hooks. To-morrow I will have an extra steam valve for her ladyship. Let me see—if she gets her bath of steam every night regularly she will require no more. Aphrodite, beautiful, your bath shall be remembered."
He kissed his fingers gaily to the trembling flowers now hooked across the roof. Already the loose Manilla rope was drying and hanging in baggy folds that made a more artistic foil for the quivering red moths. It was only when the steaming process was going on that the thin, strong ropes drew it up humming and taut as harp-strings.
"Ah, that is like a new planet in a blue sky!" Frobisher cried. "Lopez, I am obliged to you. Come again when I am less excited and I will suitably reward you. To-night I am tête montêe—I am not responsible for my actions. And the lie shall be told for you, a veritable chef-d'oeuvre amongst lies. Sit down, and the best shall not be good enough for you."
"I must go," Lopez said in the same even tones. "I have private business elsewhere. I drink nothing and I smoke nothing till business is finished. Good-night, prince of rascals, and fair dreams to you."
Lopez passed leisurely into the black throat of the library, Hafid following. Frobisher nodded and chuckled, not in the least displeased. He had not been so excited for years. The sight of those blossoms filled him with unspeakable pleasure. For their sakes he would have committed murder without the slightest hesitation. He had eyes for nothing else, ears deaf to everything. He heeded not the purr of the hall bell again, he was lost to his surroundings until Hafid shook him soundly.
"Count Lefroy to see you, and Mr. Manfred," he said. "I told them you were engaged, but they said that perhaps——"
Frobisher dropped into his chair with the air of a man satiated with a plethora of good things.
"Now what have I done to deserve all this beatitude!" he cried. "An unique find and a brother collector to triumph over, to watch, to prick with the needle of jealousy. But stop, I must worship alone to-night. Say that I shall particularly desire to see them at luncheon to-morrow."
CHAPTER II.
ANGELA.
Frobisher sat the following morning in the orchid-house chuckling to himself and waiting the advent of his two guests to luncheon. Heaven alone could follow the twists and turns of that cunning brain. Frobisher was working out one of his most brilliant schemes now. He took infinite pains to obtain by underground passages the things he might have obtained openly and easily. But there was the delight of puzzling other people.
He looked up presently, conscious of a presence beyond his own. In the dark Frobisher could always tell if anybody came into the room. He crooked his wicked head sideways with the air of a connoisseur, and in sooth there was good cause for his admiration. Here was something equal at least to his most beautiful and cherished orchids, a tall, graceful girl with shining brown hair, and eyes of the deepest, purest blue. Her complexion was like old ivory, and as pure, the nose a little short, perhaps, but the sweet mouth was full of strength and character.
"I came for the flowers that you promised me, Sir Clement," she said.
"Call me uncle and you shall have the conservatory," Frobisher grinned. "I am your uncle by marriage, you know, and your guardian by law. Angela, you are looking lovely. With the exception of a peasant woman I once met in Marenna, you are the most beautiful creature I ever saw."
Angela