The Crimson Blind | Page 2

hand for his telephone and
call Fleet Street to his ear.
It was all unique, delightful, the dream of an artistic soul realised.
Three years before David Steel had worked in an attic at a bare deal
table, and his mother had £3 per week to pay for everything. Usually
there was balm in this recollection.
But not to-night, Heaven help him, not to-night! Little grinning demons
were dancing on the oak cornices, there were mocking lights gleaming
from Cellini tankards that Steel had given far too much money for. It
had not seemed to matter just at the time. If all this artistic beauty had
emptied Steel's purse there was a golden stream coming. What mattered
it that the local tradesmen were getting a little restless? The great
expense of the novelist's life was past. In two years he would be rich.
And the pathos of the thing was not lessened by the fact that it was true.
In two years' time Steel would be well off. He was terribly short of
ready money, but he had just finished a serial story for which he was to
be paid £500 within two months of the delivery of the copy; two novels
of his were respectively in their fourth and fifth editions. But these
novels of his he had more or less given away, and he ground his teeth

as he thought of it. Still, everything spelt prosperity. If he lived, David
Steel was bound to become a rich man.
And yet he was ruined. Within twenty-four hours everything would
pass out of his hands. To all practical purposes it had done so already.
And all for the want of £1,000! Steel had earned twice that amount
during the past twelve months, and the fruits of his labour were as balm
to his soul about him. Within the next twelve months he could pay the
debt three times over. He would cheerfully have taken the bill and
doubled the amount for six months' delay.
And all this because he had become surety for an absconding brother.
Steel had put his pride in his pocket and interviewed his creditor, a little,
polite, mild-eyed financier, who meant to have his money to the
uttermost farthing. At first he had been suave and sympathetic, until he
had discovered that Steel had debts elsewhere, and then--
Well, he had signed judgment, and to-morrow he could levy execution.
Within a few hours the bottom would fall out of the universe so far as
Steel was concerned. Within a few hours every butcher and baker and
candle-stick-maker would come abusively for his bill. Steel, who could
have faced a regiment, recoiled fearfully from that. Within a week his
oak and silver would have to be sold and the passion flower would
wither on the walls.
Steel had not told anybody yet; the strong man had grappled with his
trouble alone. Had he been a man of business he might have found
some way out of the difficulty. Even his mother didn't know. She was
asleep upstairs, perhaps dreaming of her son's greatness. What would
the dear old mater say when she knew? Well, she had been a good
mother to him, and it had been a labour of love to furnish the house for
her as for himself. Perhaps there would be a few tears in those gentle
eyes, but no more. Thank God, no reproaches there.
David lighted a cigarette and paced restlessly round the dining-room.
Never had he appreciated its quiet beauty more than he did now. There
were flowers, blood-red flowers, on the table under the graceful electric
stand that Steel had designed himself. He snapped off the light as if the

sight pained him, and strode into his study. For a time he stood moodily
gazing at his flowers and ferns. How every leaf there was pregnant with
association. There was the Moorish clock droning the midnight hour.
When Steel had brought that clock--
"Ting, ting, ting. Pring, pring, ping, pring. Ting, ting, ting, ting."
But Steel heard nothing. Everything seemed as silent as the grave. It
was only by a kind of inner consciousness that he knew the hour to be
midnight. Midnight meant the coming of the last day. After sunrise
some greasy lounger pregnant of cheap tobacco would come in and
assume that he represented the sheriff, bills would be hung like banners
on the outward walls, and then.--
"Pring, pring, pring. Ting, ting, ting, ting, ting, ting, ting, ting. Pring,
pring, pring."
Bells, somewhere. Like the bells in the valley where the old vicarage
used to stand. Steel vaguely wondered who now lived in the house
where he was born. He was staring in the most absent way at his
telephone, utterly unconscious of the shrill impatience of the little