The House of a Thousand Candles | Page 9

"I'm sorry I couldn't see the object of your interest. Bah! these men!"
I laughed carelessly enough, but I was already summoning from my memory the grave face of the girl in black--her mournful eyes, the glint of gold in her hair. Pickering was certainly finding the pleasant places in this vale of tears, and I felt my heart hot against him. It hurts, this seeing a man you have never liked succeeding where you have failed!
"Why didn't you present me? I'd like to make the acquaintance of a few representative Americans--I may need them to go bail for me."
"Pickering didn't see me, for one thing; and for another he wouldn't go bail for you or me if he did. He isn't built that way."
Larry smiled quizzically.
"You needn't explain further. The sight of the lady has shaken you. She reminds me of Tennyson:
" 'The star-like sorrows of immortal eyes--'
and the rest of it ought to be a solemn warning to you, --many 'drew swords and died,' and calamity followed in her train. Bah! these women! I thought you were past all that!"
[Illustration: She turned carelessly toward me, and our eyes met for an instant.]
"I don't know why a man should be past it at twenty-seven! Besides, Pickering's friends are strangers to me. But what became of that Irish colleen you used to moon over? Her distinguishing feature, as I remember her photograph, was a short upper lip. You used to force her upon me frequently when we were in Africa."
"Humph! When I got back to Dublin I found that she had married a brewer's son--think of it!"
"Put not your faith in a short upper lip! Her face never inspired any confidence in me."
"That will do, thank you. I'll have a bit more of that mayonnaise if the waiter isn't dead. I think you said your grandfather died in June. A letter advising you of the fact reached you at Naples in October. Has it occurred to you that there was quite an interim there? What, may I ask, was the executor doing all that time? You may be sure he was taking advantage of the opportunity to look for the red, red gold. I suppose you didn't give him a sound drubbing for not keeping the cables hot with inquiries for you?"
He eyed me in that disdain for my stupidity which I have never suffered from any other man.
"Well, no; to tell the truth, I was thinking of other things during the interview."
"Your grandfather should have provided a guardian for you, lad. You oughtn't to be trusted with money. Is that bottle empty? Well, if that person with the fat neck was your friend Pickering, I'd have a care of what's coming to me. I'd be quite sure that Mr. Pickering hadn't made away with the old gentleman's boodle, or that it didn't get lost on the way from him to me."
"The time's running now, and I'm in for the year. My grandfather was a fine old gentleman, and I treated him like a dog. I'm going to do what he directs in that will no matter what the size of the reward may be."
"Certainly; that's the eminently proper thing for you to do. But--but keep your wits about you. If a fellow with that neck can't find money where money has been known to exist, it must be buried pretty deep. Your grandfather was a trifle eccentric, I judge, but not a fool by any manner of means. The situation appeals to my imagination, Jack. I like the idea of it-- the lost treasure and the whole business. Lord, what a salad that is! Cheer up, comrade! You're as grim as an owl!"
Whereupon we fell to talking of people and places we had known in other lands.
We spent the next day together, and in the evening, at my hotel, he criticized my effects while I packed, in his usual ironical vein.
"You're not going to take those things with you, I hope!" He indicated the rifles and several revolvers which I brought from the closet and threw upon the bed. "They make me homesick for the jungle."
He drew from its cover the heavy rifle I had used last on a leopard hunt and tested its weight.
"Precious little use you'll have for this! Better let me take it back to The Sod to use on the landlords. I say, Jack, are we never to seek our fortunes together again? We hit it off pretty well, old man, come to think of it--I don't like to lose you."
He bent over the straps of the rifle-case with unnecessary care, but there was a quaver in his voice that was not like Larry Donovan.
"Come with me now!" I exclaimed, wheeling upon him.
"I'd rather be with you than with any other living man, Jack Glenarm, but