Jason | Page 5

Possibly you are right. That's
what the grandfather thinks. It's the obvious solution. Unfortunately

there is more or less against it. The boy went away with--so far as can
be learned--almost no money, almost none at all. And he has already
been gone a month. Miss Benham, his sister, is sure that something has
happened to him, and I'm a bit inclined to think so, too. It's all very odd.
I should think he might have been kidnapped but that no demand has
been made for money."
"He was not," suggested Ste. Marie--"not the sort of young man to do
anything desperate--make away with himself?" Hartley laughed.
"Oh, Lord, no!" said he. "Not that sort of young man at all. He was a
very normal type of rich and spoiled and somewhat foolish American
boy."
"Rich?" inquired the other, quickly.
"Oh yes; they're beastly rich. Young Arthur is to come into something
very good at his majority, I believe, from his father's estate, and the old
grandfather is said to be indecently rich--rolling in it! There's another
reason why the young idiot wouldn't be likely to stop away of his own
accord. He wouldn't risk anything like a serious break with the old
gentleman. It would mean a loss of millions to him, I dare say, for the
old beggar is quite capable of cutting him off if he takes the notion. Oh,
it's a bad business all through."
And after they had gone on a bit he said it again, shaking his head:
"It's a bad business! That poor girl, you know. It's hard on her. She was
fond of the young ass for some reason or other. She's very much broken
up over it."
"Yes," said Ste. Marie, "it is hard for her--for all the family, of course.
A bad business, as you say." He spoke absently, for he was looking
ahead at something which seemed to be a motor accident. They had by
this time got well up the Champs-Elysées and were crossing the Rond
Point. A motor-car was drawn up alongside the curb just beyond, and a
little knot of people stood about it and seemed to look at something on
the ground.

"I think some one has been run down," said Ste. Marie. "Shall we have
a look?" They quickened their pace and came to where the group of
people stood in a circle looking upon the ground, and two gendarmes
asked many questions and wrote voluminously in their little books. It
appeared that a delivery boy mounted upon a tricycle cart had turned
into the wrong side of the avenue and had got himself run into and
overturned by a motor-car going at a moderate rate of speed. For once
the sentiment of those mysterious birds of prey which flock
instantaneously from nowhere round an accident, was against the
victim and in favor of the frightened and gesticulating chauffeur.
Ste. Marie turned an amused face from this voluble being to the other
occupants of the patently hired car, who stood apart, adding very little
to the discussion. He saw a tall and bony man with very bright blue
eyes and what is sometimes called a guardsman's mustache--the
drooping, walruslike ornament which dates back a good many years
now. Beyond this gentleman he saw a young woman in a long, gray
silk coat and a motoring veil. He was aware that the tall man was
staring at him rather fixedly and with a half-puzzled frown, as though
he thought that they had met before and was trying to remember when,
but Ste. Marie gave the man but a swift glance. His eyes were upon the
dark face of the young woman beyond, and it seemed to him that she
called aloud to him in an actual voice that rang in his ears. The young
woman's very obvious beauty, he thought, had nothing to do with the
matter. It seemed to him that her eyes called him. Just that. Something
strange and very potent seemed to take sudden and almost tangible hold
upon him--a charm, a spell, a magic--something unprecedented, new to
his experience. He could not take his eyes from hers, and he stood
staring.
As before, on the Pont de la Concorde, Hartley touched him on the arm,
and abruptly the chains that had bound him were loosened.
"We must be going on, you know," the Englishman said, and Ste.
Marie said, rather hurriedly:
"Yes, yes, to be sure! Come along!" But at a little distance he turned
once more to look back. The chauffeur had mounted to his place, the

delivery boy was upon his feet again, little the worse for his tumble,
and the knot of bystanders had begun to disperse, but it seemed to Ste.
Marie that the young woman in the long silk