Elusive Isabel | Page 6

pause. "The
minister from Turkey looks like a barn on fire, doesn't he?"
Señorita Rodriguez laughed, and Mr. Grimm glanced idly toward Miss
Thorne. She was still talking, her face alive with interest; and the fan
was still tapping rhythmically, steadily, now on the arm of her chair.
"Dot-dash-dot! Dot-dash-dot! Dot-dash-dot! Dot-dash-dot!"
"Pretty women who don't want to be stared at should go with their faces
swathed," Mr. Grimm suggested indolently. "Haroun el Raschid there
would agree with me on that point, I have no doubt. What a shock he
would get if he should happen up at Atlantic City for a week-end in
August!"
"Dot-dash-dot! Dot-dash-dot! Dot-dash-dot!"
Mr. Grimm read it with perfect understanding; it was "F--F--F" in the
Morse code, the call of one operator to another. Was it accident? Mr.
Grimm wondered, and wondering he went on talking lazily:
"Curious, isn't it, the smaller the nation the more color it crowds into
the uniforms of its diplomatists? The British ambassador, you will
observe, is clothed sanely and modestly, as befits the representative of a

great nation; but coming on down by way of Spain and Italy, they get
more gorgeous. However, I dare say as stout a heart beats beneath a
sky-blue sash as behind the unembellished black of evening dress."
"F--F--F," the fan was calling insistently.
And then the answer came. It took the unexpectedly prosaic form of a
violent sneeze, a vociferous outburst on a bench directly behind Mr.
Grimm. Señorita Rodriguez jumped, then laughed nervously.
"It startled me," she explained.
"I think there must be a draft from the conservatory," said a man's voice
apologetically. "Do you ladies feel it? No? Well, if you'll excuse me--?"
Mr. Grimm glanced back languidly. The speaker was Charles Winthrop
Rankin, a brilliant young American lawyer who was attached to the
German embassy in an advisory capacity. Among other things he was a
Heidelberg man, having spent some dozen years of his life in Germany,
where he established influential connections. Mr. Grimm knew him
only by sight.
And now the rhythmical tapping of Miss Thorne's fan underwent a
change. There was a flutter of gaiety in her voice the while the ivory
fan tapped steadily.
"Dot-dot-dot! Dash! Dash-dash-dash! Dot-dot-dash! Dash!"
"S--t--5--u--t," Mr. Grimm read in Morse. He laughed pleasantly at
some remark of his companion.
"Dash-dash! Dot-dash! Dash-dot!" said the fan.
"M--a--n," Mr. Grimm spelled it out, the while his listless eyes roved
aimlessly over the throng. "S--t--5--u--t m--a--n!" Was it meant for
"stout man?" Mr. Grimm wondered.
"Dot-dash-dot! Dot! Dash-dot-dot!"

"F--e--d," that was.
"Dot-dot-dash-dot! Dot-dash! Dash-dot-dash-dot! Dot!"
"Q--a--j--e!" Mr. Grimm was puzzled a little now, but there was not a
wrinkle, nor the tiniest indication of perplexity in his face. Instead he
began talking of Raphael's cherubs, the remark being called into life by
the high complexion of a young man who was passing. Miss Thorne
glanced at him once keenly, her splendid eyes fairly aglow, and the fan
rattled on in the code.
"Dash-dot! Dot! Dot-dash! Dot-dash-dot!"
"N--e--a--f." Mr. Grimm was still spelling it out.
Then came a perfect jumble. Mr. Grimm followed it with difficulty, a
difficulty utterly belied by the quizzical lines about his mouth. As he
caught it, it was like this: "J--5--n--s--e--f--v--a--t--5--f," followed by
an arbitrary signal which is not in the Morse code:
"Dash-dot-dash-dash!"
Mr. Grimm carefully stored that jumble away in some recess of his
brain, along with the unknown signal.
"D--5--5--f," he read, and then, on to the end: "B--f--i--n--g 5--v--e--f
w--h--e--n g g--5--e--s."
That was all, apparently. The soft clatter of the fan against the arm of
the chair ran on meaninglessly after that.
"May I bring you an ice?" Mr. Grimm asked at last.
"If you will, please," responded the señorita, "and when you come back
I'll reward you by presenting you to Miss Thorne. You'll find her
charming; and Mr. Cadwallader has monopolized her long enough."
Mr. Grimm bowed and left her. He had barely disappeared when Mr.
Rankin lounged along in front of Miss Thorne. He glanced at her,
paused and greeted her effusively.

"Why, Miss Thorne!" he exclaimed. "I'm delighted to see you here. I
understood you would not be present, and--"
Their hands met in a friendly clasp as she rose and moved away, with a
nod of excuse to Mr. Cadwallader. A thin slip of paper, thrice folded,
passed from Mr. Rankin to her. She tugged at her glove, and thrust the
little paper, still folded, inside the palm.
"Is it yes, or no?" Miss Thorne asked in a low tone.
"Frankly, I can't say," was the reply.
"He read the message," she explained hastily, "and now he has gone to
decipher it."
She gathered up her trailing skirts over one arm, and together they
glided away through the crowd to the strains of a