The Brass Bowl | Page 3

gave me th' sthart, Misther

Maitland, sor!" O'Hagan paused in the gloom below, his upturned face
quaintly illuminated by the flame of a wax taper in his gaslighter.
"I'm dining in town to-night, O'Hagan, and dropped around to dress. Is
anybody else at home?"
"Nivver a wan, sor. Shure, th' house do be quiet's anny tomb--"
"Then who was that lady, O'Hagan?"
"Leddy, sor?"--in unbounded amazement.
"Yes," impatiently. "A young woman left the house just as I was
coming in. Who was she?"
"Shure an' I think ye must be dr'amin', sor. Divvle a female-- rayspicts
to ye!--has been in this house for manny an' manny th' wake, sor."
"But, I tell you--"
"Belike 'twas somewan jist sthepped into the vesthibule, mebbe to tie
her shoe, sor, and ye thought--"
"Oh, very well." Maitland relinquished the inquisition as unprofitable,
willing to concede O'Hagan's theory a reasonable one, the more readily
since he himself could by no means have sworn that the woman had
actually come out through the door. Such had merely been his
impression, honest enough, but founded on circumstantial evidence.
"When you're through, O'Hagan," he told the Irishman, "you may come
and shave me and lay out my things, if you will."
"Very good, sor. In wan minute."
But O'Hagan's conception of the passage of time was a thought vague:
his one minute had lengthened into ten before he appeared to wait upon
his employer.
Now and again, in the absence of the regular "man," O'Hagan would
attend one or another of the tenants in the capacity of substitute valet:
as in the present instance, when Maitland, having left his host's roof
without troubling even to notify his body-servant that he would not
return that night, called upon the janitor to understudy the more trained
employee; which O'Hagan could be counted upon to do very
acceptably.
Now, with patience unruffled, since he was nothing keen for the
evening's enjoyment, Maitland made profit of the interval to wander
through his rooms, lighting the gas here and there and noting that all
was as it should be, as it had been left--save that every article of
furniture and bric-à-brac seemed to be sadly in want of a thorough

dusting. In the end he brought up in the room that served him as study
and lounge,--the drawing-room of the flat, as planned in the forgotten
architect's scheme,--a large and well-lighted apartment overlooking the
street. Here, pausing beneath the chandelier, he looked about him for a
moment, determining that, as elsewhere, all things were in order--but
grey with dust.
Finding the atmosphere heavy, stale, and oppressive, Maitland moved
over to the windows and threw them open. A gush of warm air, humid
and redolent of the streets, invaded the room, together with the roar of
traffic from its near-by arteries. Maitland rested elbows on the sill and
leaned out, staring absently into the night; for by now it was quite dark.
Without concern, he realized that he would be late at dinner. No matter;
he would as willingly miss it altogether. For the time being he was
absorbed in vain speculations about an unknown woman whose sole
claim upon his consideration lay in a certain but immaterial glamour of
mystery. Had she, or had she not, been in the house? And, if the true
answer were in the affirmative: to what end, upon what errand?
His eyes focused insensibly upon a void of darkness beneath him,--
night made visible by street lamps; and he found himself suddenly and
acutely sensible of the wonder and mystery of the City: the City whose
secret life ran fluent upon the hot, hard pavements below, whose voice
throbbed, sibilant, vague, strident, inarticulate, upon the night air; the
City of which he was a part equally with the girl in grey, whom he had
never before seen, and in all likelihood was never to see again, though
the two of them were to work out their destinies within the bounds of
Manhattan Island. And yet....
"It would be strange," said Maitland thoughtfully, "if...." He shook his
head, smiling. "_Two shall be born,_'" quoted Mad Maitland
sentimentally,--
"'_Two shall be born the whole wide world apart--_'"
A piano organ, having maliciously sneaked up beneath his window,
drove him indoors with a crash of metallic melody.
As he dropped the curtains his eye was arrested by a gleam of white
upon his desk,--a letter placed there, doubtless, by O'Hagan in
Maitland's absence. At the same time, a splashing and gurgling of water
from the direction of the bath-room informed him that the janitor-valet
was even then preparing his bath. But that could wait.

Maitland took up the envelope and tore the flap, remarking the name
and address of his lawyer in its upper left-hand corner. Unfolding the
inclosure, he read a date