The Mischief Maker | Page 9

with you."
It was impossible for him to remain altogether unmoved. Whatever else
might be the truth, she had risked most of the things that were dear to
her in life by this visit.
"Mrs. Carraby," he declared, "I am entirely at your service. If you think

that any useful purpose can be served by words between you and me, I
would only point out, for your own sake, that your visit is, to say the
least of it, unwise. These are bachelor chambers."
"You know very well," she replied calmly, "that it was my only chance
of speaking with you. If I had sent for you, you would not have come.
If I had spoken to you in the street, you would have passed me
by--quite rightly. This was my only chance. That is why I have come to
you."
"If you think it worth the risk," he remarked gravely, "pray continue."
She shrugged her shoulders very slightly.
"Who can tell what is worth the risk?"
"You have at least excited my curiosity," he admitted, leaning a little
towards her. "I cannot conceive what it is that you want to say to me."
She lifted her eyes to his, and though there was nothing unusual about
them--there were few people, indeed, who could tell you what color
they were--men seldom forgot it when Mrs. Carraby looked at them
steadily.
"I do not know, myself," she said. "I do not know why I have come."
Julien laughed unnaturally.
"Pray be seated," he begged. "Would you like to examine my curios or
my photographs? I must apologize for the condition of my room. You
see, you happen to be the first woman who has ever crossed its
threshold."
"That," she remarked, "rather interests me. Still, it is only what I should
have expected. No, I do not think that I will sit down. I am trying to ask
myself exactly why I have come."
"If you can answer that question," Julien said grimly, "you will appease
a very natural curiosity on my part. It is not like you."

"Quite true," she assented. "It is not like me. I have run a great risk in
coming here and it is not my métier to run risks. And now that I am
here I do not know why I have come. This has been an impulse and this
is an hour outside my life. I am trying to understand it. Come here,
Julien." He came unwillingly to her side. She held out her hand, but he
shook his head.
"Mabel," he said, "you and I do not need to mince words. To-night I am
celebrating the ruin of my career. I am leaving England within a few
hours. I have you to thank for what has happened. Yet you come to me,
you hold out your hand. You must forgive me--I am afraid I am dull."
"No," she replied, "you are not dull. Your feelings towards me are
obvious and very natural. Mine towards you I am not so sure of. It is
not because I did not understand you that I came here to-night. It is
because I did not understand myself. May I go on?"
"Why not?" he answered. "I am at your service."
"From the days of my boarding-school," she continued, "I have known
only one Mabel. In her girlhood she had all that she could get out of life
and turned everything she could to her own ends. A marriage was
arranged for her--you see, I was half a Jewess and my husband was half
a Jew, and things are done like that with us. The marriage opened the
door to a fresh set of ambitions. For the last few years I have trodden a
well-worn path. It was I who advised my husband to refuse a baronetcy.
It was I who won his first election. I see that my photographs are in all
the illustrated papers, that his speeches are properly recorded, that my
visiting list moves within the correct limits. These things have spelt life.
To the fulfillment of my husband's ambitions there was one obstacle.
That obstacle was you. In life one schemes. It was my husband's wish
that I should make myself agreeable to you, even to the extent of a
flirtation."
She raised her eyes.
"Your obedience to your husband is most touching," he said.

"It is true, I suppose," she went on, "that we have flirted. I looked upon
it as the means to an end. The end came. I played my cards quite
ruthlessly, I gathered in the reward. I got your letter, I handed it to my
husband. Your career was finished, my husband's begun."
"This is most interesting," Julien muttered.
"Is it?" she answered. "I suppose it should have been an hour of