The Green Rust | Page 5

one particular quality of attraction did she excel. Rather was her
charm the charm of the perfect agglomeration of all those
characteristics which men find alluring and challenging.
She raised her hand with a free unaffected gesture, and greeted the
doctor with a flashing smile.
"Well, Miss Cresswell, I haven't seen you for quite a long time."
"Two days," she said solemnly, "but I suppose doctors who know all
the secrets of nature have some very special drug to sustain them in
trials like that."
"Don't be unkind to the profession," he laughed, "and don't be sarcastic,
to one so young. By the way, I have never asked you did you get your
flat changed?"
She shook her head and frowned.
"Miss Millit says she cannot move me."
"Abominable," he said, and was annoyed. "Did you tell her about
Beale?"
She nodded vigorously.
"I said to her, says I," she had a trick of mimicry and dropped easily

into the southern English accent, "'Miss Millit, are you aware that the
gentleman who lives opposite to me has been, to my knowledge,
consistently drunk for two months--ever since he came to live at
Kroomans? Does he annoy you?' says she. 'Drunken people always
annoy me,' says I. 'Mr. Beale arrives home every evening in a condition
which I can only describe as deplorable.'"
"What did she say?"
The girl made a little grimace and became serious.
"She said if he did not speak to me or interfere with me or frighten me
it was none of my business, or something to that effect." She laughed
helplessly. "Really, the flat is so wonderful and so cheap that one
cannot afford to get out--you don't know how grateful I am to you,
doctor, for having got diggings here at all--Miss Millit isn't keen on
single young ladies."
She sniffed and laughed.
"Why do you laugh?" he asked.
"I was thinking how queerly you and I met."
The circumstances of their meeting had indeed been curious. She was
employed as a cashier at one of the great West End stores. He had made
some sort of purchase and made payment in a five-pound note which
had proved to be counterfeit. It was a sad moment for the girl when the
forgery was discovered, for she had to make up the loss from her own
pocket and that was no small matter.
Then the miracle had happened. The doctor had arrived full of
apologies, had presented his card and explained. The note was one
which he had been keeping as a curiosity. It has been passed on him
and was such an excellent specimen that he intended having it framed
but it had got mixed up with his other money.
"You started by being the villain of the piece and ended by being my

good fairy," she said. "I should never have known there was a vacancy
here but for you. I should not have been admitted by the proper Miss
Millit but for the terror of your name."
She dropped her little hand lightly on his shoulder. It was a gesture of
good-comradeship.
She half-turned to go when an angry exclamation held her.
"What is it? Oh, I see--No. 4!"
She drew a little closer to the doctor's side and watched with narrowing
lids the approaching figure.
"Why does he do it--oh, why does he do it?" she demanded impatiently.
"How can a man be so weak, so wretchedly weak? There's nothing
justifies that!"
"That" was apparently trying to walk the opposite kerb as though it
were a tight-rope. Save for a certain disorder of attire, a protruding
necktie and a muddy hat, he was respectable enough. He was young
and, under other conditions, passably good looking. But with his fair
hair streaming over his forehead and his hat at the back of his head he
lacked fascination. His attempt, aided by a walking-stick used as a
balancing-pole, to keep his equilibrium on six inches of kerbing, might
have been funny to a less sensitive soul than Oliva's.
He slipped, recovered himself with a little whoop, slipped again, and
finally gave up the attempt, crossing the road to his home.
He recognized the doctor with a flourish of his hat.
"Glorious weather, my Escu-escu-lapius," he said, with a little slur in
his voice but a merry smile in his eye; "simply wonderful weather for
bacteria trypanosomes (got it) an' all the jolly little microbes."
He smiled at the doctor blandly, ignoring the other's significant glance
at the girl, who had drawn back so that she might not find herself

included in the conversation.
"I'm goin' to leave you, doctor," he went on, "goin' top floor, away from
the evil smells of science an' fatal lure of beauty. Top floor jolly stiff
climb when a fellow's all lit