CHAPTER VIII CONCERNING MR. FERRIS STANHOPE, THE POPULAR NOVELIST; ALSO PETER, THE QUIET ONLOOKER

Peter had not yet returned to the yacht when Varney went to bed that night. Like the Finnegan of song, he was gone again when Varney rose next morning. Indeed, it was only too clear that his Celtic interests had been suddenly engrossed by matters much nearer his heart than the prospect, as he saw the thing, of spanking a naughty child.

"He was off by half-past eight, sir," the steward, McTosh, told Varney at breakfast. "He said to tell you to give yourself no uneasiness, sir; that he was only going to Mr. Hare's—I think was the name—for a short call, and would return by ten o'clock."

"What else did he say?"

"Well, sir, he was saying how the poltix of the village is not all they might be, but he seemed very cheerful, sir, and took three times to the chops."

At dinner-time last night such extraordinary behavior from his fellow-conspirator would have both disturbed and angered Varney. At breakfast-time this morning it hardly interested him. He had employed his walk from the cottage of refuge to the Carstairs front gate to unbelievable advantage. In fact, his mission in Hunston seemed to be all over but the shouting, and until the moment of final action arrived, there appeared no reason why Peter should not employ his time in any way he saw fit.

The heavy storm had scoured the air, and the world was bright as a new pin. In the shaded solitude of the after-deck, Mr. Carstairs's agent sat in an easy-chair with a cigarette, and thought over the remarkable happenings of his first night in Hunston. In retrospect young Editor Smith seemed to be but the ordered instrument of fate, dispatched in a rowboat to draw him against his will from the yacht to the town, where all his business was neatly arranged for his doing. Certainly it appeared as if the hand of intelligent destiny must have been in it somewhere. No mere blind luck could have driven him half a mile into the country to the one spot in all Hunston—impossibly unlikely as it was—where he could become acquainted with Uncle Elbert's daughter without the formality of an introduction.

Uncle Elbert! How desperately the old man must desire his daughter to have planned a mad scheme like this with a subterfuge at the expense of his best friend cunningly hidden away in the heart of it. Yet, after the first staggering flash, Varney had found it impossible to be angry with Mr. Carstairs. He only felt sorry for him, sorrier than he had ever felt for anybody in his life. The old man's madness and his deceit were but the measure of his desire for his daughter. And the more he desired her, so it seemed to Varney, the more he was entitled to have her.

Interrupting his meditations, the steward approached on silent feet, bearing a flat brown-paper package in his hand. It appeared that the under-steward had just returned from a marketing tour in Hunston, had met Mr. Maginnis on the street, and been ordered to take back the parcel to Mr. Varney.

"All right, McTosh," said Varney.

He broke the string with some curiosity and pulled off the wrappers.
Within was nothing but a copy of a current literary monthly.

A present of a magazine from Peter! This was a delicate apology for his remissness, indeed. "He will be sending me chocolates next," thought Varney, not a little puzzled.

He turned the pages curiously. Soon, observing a bit of brown wrapping-paper sticking out between the leaves, he opened the magazine at that point and found himself looking at a picture; and he sat still and stared at it for a long time.

It was the full-page portrait of a young man of some thirty years: a rather thin young man with a high forehead, a straight nose, and a smallish chin. The face was good-looking, but somehow not quite attractive. About the eyes was an expression faintly unpleasant, which the neat glasses did not hide. On the somewhat slack lip was a slight twist, not agreeable, which the well-kept mustache could not conceal. Still it was an interesting face, clever, assured, half-insolent. To Varney, it was exceptionally interesting; for removing the mustache and eye-glasses, it might have passed anywhere for his own.

Below the portrait was printed this legend:

FERRIS STANHOPE.

The popular author of "Rosamund," etc., who will reopen the old Stanhope cottage near Hunston, New York, and spend the autumn there upon a new novel.

Mr. Stanhope's health has not been good of late, and his physicians have recommended an extended stay in this quiet Hudson River country.

* * * * *

Here was that "Mr. Ferris," whom the young lady of the grocery had coyly saluted; the "Beany," whom the pale young editor had bluntly bidden to leave town; and the literary celebrity whom Miss Mary Carstairs so evidently and so warmly admired. Varney stared at the portrait with a kind of fascination. Now he saw many points of difference between the face of "the popular author" and his own. The resemblance was only general, after all. Still it was undoubtedly strong enough to warrant all kinds of mistakes.

What a very extraordinary sort of thing to have happen!

Suddenly his eye fell upon a penciled line in the white margin above the picture which had at first escaped him:

"On no account leave the yacht till I come back. Vitally important."

Varney pitched the magazine across the deck with an irritated laugh. Peter—utterly ignorant of how matters stood—attempting to fire off long-distance orders and direct his movements. The splendid gall!

As it chanced, he had no occasion to leave the yacht, either before or after Peter got back. His work was done. He made himself comfortable with morning papers and a novel—not one of Mr. Stanhope's—and began to seek beguilement.

But his reading went forward rather fitfully. There were long intervals when his book, "eleventh printing" though it was, slipped forgotten to his knees, and he sat staring thoughtfully over the sunny water….

Peter failed to keep his promise about returning to the yacht at ten o'clock. In fact, it was four o'clock that afternoon when he arrived, and at that, the manner in which he sprang up the stair indicated him as a man who had but few moments to spare to yachts and that sort of thing.

Varney, at his ease upon the transom, watched his friend's approach with a quizzical eye.

"Greetings, old comrade! How did you leave them all in Hunston?"

Peter, who, truth to tell, had been looking forward to bitter personal denunciation, looked somewhat relieved, and laughed. However, his manner suggested little of hang-dog consciousness of guilt; it was far too absorbed and business-like for that. He dropped down into a chair by Varney and swabbed the back of his neck with a damp-looking handkerchief.

"Larry, who'd have dreamed last night that we were parting for all this time?"

"Well, not I for one."

"Awfully sorry about it all, and I know you'll think I'm acting like a funny kind of helper. I hadn't the faintest idea of bottling you up on the yacht all day like this, but—well, you might say, Larry, that a man couldn't help it to save his life. I certainly meant to be back by the time you had finished breakfast and explain the whole situation to you—there are a deuced lot of complications, you know—but one thing led right on to another and—good Lord! I couldn't find a minute with a fine-tooth comb."

"It's all right, statesman. You don't hear me making any complaints. All I ask is a little rÉsumÉ of what you've been doing since you so cleverly lost me. In Reform to the ears, I suppose?"

Peter again looked rather surprised at his chief's easy indifference.

"You want that part of it first? Well," he said rapidly, "I've been trying to do four days' work for Reform in one, and a pinch it's been to make both ends meet, I can tell you. At it practically without a break since I left you last night. J. Pinkney took me right in and bared his soul. Said he was down and out and beaten to a fluid. A clever little devil fast enough, but no more idea of how to play the game than a baby baboon. When he caught on to what I wanted to do for him, he would have fallen on my neck except that he isn't that kind. That was this morning. I worked out my idea in the still watches: couldn't sleep for thinking of it. It just means this: if my plans carry through Hare gets the biggest hearing to-night that this old town can give. And I think they'll carry all right. You wouldn't be interested in the details. Now this other thing—"

"Oh, but I would, though! Give me at least a peep behind the scenes before you dash on. What about these plans of yours?"

Peter laid down the newspaper with which he had been busily fanning himself. A sudden light came into his eyes.

"I'll tell you just how it all happened," he said in an eager voice. "Only I'll have to hurry, as I'm due back in town right away—that is, of course, unless you should need me for anything. Well, I left Hare last night after only a couple of hours' talk, listening to the same old story of boss-rule, and giving him, if I do say it, some cracking good practical pointers. By the way, we were interrupted at that. Hadn't got started before Hare remembered that he'd promised to bring some girl home from somewhere, and dragged me off a mile down the road, only to find out afterwards that she'd gone home with somebody else. Made me tired. I left him about ten o'clock and started down Main Street for the river, meaning to come straight back here. But as I was footing it along, thinking over my talk with Hare and attending to my own business, who should brace me but that pale-faced rascal we saw playing dead in the rowboat. This time the poseur was lying flat on some packing-cases in front of a store, and who do you suppose he turned out to be?"

"The brains of the machine," said Varney.

He told briefly of his own meeting with Coligny Smith at the same spot two hours earlier, and of the editor's stagey warnings.

"Exactly the way he did me!" cried Peter. "Saved the announcement of who he was for the grand finale in Act V. I got mad as a wet hen, told him what I thought of him in simple language, and then when the grafter twitted me to go and do something about it, I broke loose and swore that I'd make Hare Mayor of Hunston if I had to buy the little two-by-twice town to do it. Told him to pack his trunk, for all the crooks would soon be traveling toward the timber. So then I turned right around, hiked back to Hare's, told him what I'd done, gave him my hand on it, and pulled out the old family check-book. This morning I went to him and laid before him the greatest scheme that ever was. You know Hare can't get a hall to speak in for love or money—nobody dares rent him one; he can't buy an inch of space in the Gazette; he can't put spreads on the billboards without having 'em pasted out in the night. To-night the whole thing's been done for him—Ryan's big town-meeting. Well, we're going to try to swipe that meeting—do you see? I'm getting in some husky fellows from New York to see fair play, and so on. Oh, it's a bully chance—you can see! I've spent a nice bunch of father's money working the scheme up, and, by George! I believe we are going to get by with it. If we do—well, we give this town the biggest shock it's had in years, and that's the way reform begins, Larry. Shock!"

Something of his contagious enthusiasm spread to and fired Varney. Fate had thrown in their way a plucky and honest man engaged in an apparently hopeless fight against overwhelming powers of darkness. He deserved help. And what possible risk was there now when the Cypriani's work was practically done?

"I can't say," continued Peter dutifully, "that this is exactly playing the quiet onlooker, as my orders read. As I said last night, I consider that this excursion into politics will help our little business, not interfere with it. It will divert attention. It will seem to explain why we are here. But if you don't agree with me, if you want me to drop it—"

"No," said Varney, slowly. "I don't."

"Good for you, old sport!" cried Peter, evidently relieved. "Needless to say, I'm right on the job whenever you need me. And nothing's going to happen. Trust me. Now as to this other matter. You got that magazine I sent this morning?"

"Yes. Thanks for the picture of my twin brother. But why couldn't I leave the yacht till you got back?"

Peter stared. "Why, just that, of course. Deuced unfortunate coincidence, isn't it? Everybody in town is going to think that you are this fellow Stanhope."

"Well?"

"Well? Oh, I forgot—you haven't heard. Well, from the stories that are floating round town to-day, Stanhope is a cad of the original brand. He was born here—lived here until he was twenty-one or two. Women were his trouble. The climax came about twelve years ago. The girl was named Orrick—Mamie Orrick, I believe. Nobody knows exactly what became of her, but they practically ran Stanhope out of the town then. Well—there it is."

He paused long enough to light one of his Herculean cigars, employing his hat as a wind-shield, and rapidly continued: "It's very curious and strange, and all that, but there it is. A month or so ago the Gazette announced that Stanhope was coming back to Hunston. Last night you were seen on the square, and now the news has spread like wildfire that the author has arrived. Hare heard a lot of gossip on the street to-day. He's lived here only a few years and doesn't know anything personally; but he says the old feeling against Stanhope seems to have revived as though it had all happened yesterday. Orrick, the girl's father, a half-witted old dotard, was heard to say that he would shoot on sight. There are three or four others besides Orrick who've got personal grudges too. If any of these meet you, there is almost sure to be trouble. How is that for a little complication?"

"And this was the reason you sent me word to lock myself up on the Cypriani? You're a bird, Peter. Not that it made any difference, but I ventured to suppose that my leaving before you got back would interfere with some plans you had been making for me, and—"

"It would interfere with some plans I have been making for you, in a general way, to have you assassinated."

"Stuff. Ten to one all these stories that somebody has been so careful to have get back to you are right out of the whole cloth—"

"What's the use of setting up your cranky opinions against the hard facts? The plain truth is that everybody who ever heard of Stanhope is going to give you the cold shoulder for a dog; we can depend absolutely on that."

But Varney had his own reasons for depending on nothing of the sort.

"You've been imposed upon, Peter. In fact, one of the population mistook me for the author last night, and instead of giving me the cold shoulder, as you say, she seemed to think that being Stanhope was the best credentials that a man could have."

"She? Who're you talking about?"

"I'm talking about Uncle Elbert's daughter, Miss Mary Carstairs. I had the pleasure of meeting her last night."

"The devil you did!" cried Peter, laughing with astonishment. "You certainly walk off with the prize for prompt results. How in the world did you manage it?"

Varney told him succinctly how he had managed it.

"Fine! Fine! Honestly, I was getting afraid that you never could do it at all, with the rotten reputation they've pinned on you here. Good enough! Still it's absurd to cite the opinion of a little child in a matter like this."

"It depends upon what you call a little child, doesn't it? Miss
Carstairs is nineteen years old."

Peter straightened in his chair with a jerk, and stared at him as though one or the other had suddenly gone mad.

"Nineteen! Why, I thought she was twelve."

"So did I."

"Why, how in Sam Hill did you ever make such an asinine mistake?"

Varney gave an impatient laugh.

"What difference does that make now? My impression was that the separation took place about eight years ago. It may have been twelve. My other impression was that the girl was about four at the time. She may have been eight instead. If it's of any interest to you, I should say that the mistake was natural enough. Besides, Uncle Elbert rather helped it along."

"Uncle Elbert rather lied to you—that's what he did," said Peter with the utmost quietness.

There was a considerable silence. Peter pulled frowningly at his cigar; it had gone out but he was too absorbed to notice it, and mechanically pulled on. Presently he raised his head and looked at Varney.

"Well? This ends it, I suppose? You'll go back to New York this afternoon?"

"No," said Varney, "I'm going to stay and carry it through just as I expected."

Peter tapped the chair-arm with his heavy fingers. "Why?"

"Because—well, I promised to, and on the strength of my promise, Uncle Elbert has gone to trouble and expense for one thing, and has pinned high hopes on me, for another. I had my chance to ask questions and make terms and stipulations—and I didn't do it. That was my fault. I am not even sure that he meant to deceive me. I have no right to break a contract because I find that my part in it is going to be harder than I thought."

"This business about her age changes everything. Carstairs has no legal rights over a nineteen-year-old daughter."

"Legal rights! My dear Peter, you never supposed I thought I was doing anything legal, did you? No, no; the moral part of it has been my prop and stay all along, and that still holds. I promised without conditions, and I'll go ahead on the same terms."

"Give me a match," said Peter thoughtfully. "Maybe you are right, Larry," he added presently. "I only wanted to point out another way of looking at it. I stand absolutely by your decision. You think that this girl is wrong-headed and obstinate, and that her father has a moral right to have her, over age or not. This—discovery makes it a pretty serious business, but of course you've thought of all that. But—will it be possible now?"

"I have invited her," said Varney, with a light laugh, "to lunch on the Cypriani on Thursday with two or three other Hunston friends."

"Well?"

"She accepted with every mark of pleasure. Great men like Stanhope, it seems, require no introduction: it beats me. The point now is to find the other Hunston friends."

"Hare and his sister, Mrs. Marne—the very thing!—chaperon and all! I'll invite them to-night. Then the whole thing's done!" Peter sat silent a moment, looking at Varney. "I've been awfully rushed to-day," he resumed, "because if I was going to help Hare at all, I didn't dare lose this one big opportunity. But remember, anything that has to be done from now on—I'm your man."

"There'll be nothing more now until Thursday. The thing's practically done."

Peter was still looking at him steadily. "It's going to be dirt easy, provided we don't weaken. You can't do things to your friends, but you can emphatically do them to your enemies. We have got to remember always that this girl, who has been so heartless to her old fool of a father, is our enemy."

"Yes, that is what we have got to remember."

"Good Lord!" cried Peter, looking at his watch. "Twenty minutes past four, and I must be at the hall at four-thirty sharp. I'll have to sneak right away. You're going to sit tight on the yacht, of course?"

"Never! I like to have a little of the fun myself. I must certainly take in this meeting to-night, and watch you put your heel on their necks and all that."

"Don't! With what you've got to do, you can't afford to expose yourself. What's the use of running risks, even little ones, when there is nothing to gain?"

"Satan reproving sin! Fudge! Free yourself once for all, my dear sir, that I'm starring in The Prisoner on the Yacht for the next three days, or anything of that sort."

"Well, if you will go," said Peter, reluctantly, "here's a reserved seat ticket—a peacherine, right up at the front."

"Great! Count on me to lead the applause."

Peter rose. His engrossed brow advertised the fact that his thought had already flown back to his own private maelstrom of new concerns.

"If Hare gets his chance to-night," he meditated out loud, "you can rely on him to make the most of it. He'll make good; he's a man, sound in wind and limb, head and heart. I do wish, though, he wasn't so—somehow innocent—so easy—so confoundedly affable and handshaking with everybody that comes along. There's a sneaky-looking stranger at the hotel—rubber-heeled fellow named Higginson, with one of these black felt hats pulled down over his eyes like a stage villain—that Hare never laid eyes on till to-day. For all he knows the man may be an agent of Ryan's, a hired spy imported to—By Jove! That's just what he is, I'll bet!" he cried suddenly; and after a frowning pause, hurried warmly on: "Don't you remember last night, just after we hit the town, I said there was a man following us—sneaked up the alley when he saw me looking at him?"

"I believe I do, Peter. But the fact is that I met so many exciting people last night—"

"It's the same man—it was Higginson!" said Peter positively. "I'm sure of it! I didn't get a look at his face last night, but it's the same hat, same figure—everything. I'll bet anything he's on Ryan's payroll; and there's little Hare hobnobbing with him as friendly as though they'd been classmates at college! That kind of free-for-all geniality doesn't go, you know! A reformer in a rotten town like this," said Peter vehemently "would do well to cultivate a profound distrust of strangers."

Varney burst out laughing.

"You yourself have known Hare from the cradle, I believe?"

"I'm different," said Peter without a smile. "Well! I must move. Now let's see—that lunch. What time shall I ask Hare and Mrs. Marne for?"

"Two o'clock, Thursday. I didn't have the nerve," Varney explained, "to ask Miss Carstairs for to-day—rather lucky I didn't—and she was engaged for Thursday."

"Right. I'll arrange it all. Well, for the Lord's sake take care of yourself to-night, Larry, and trust me to keep out of trouble. So long."

Varney looked after Peter's disappearing back, and envied him all the fun he was having. His own lot was certainly far less entertaining. However, it was his own; and here he resembled his friend in one respect at least. His thoughts, like Peter's, had a way just now of reverting at short notice to the matters in which he himself was most closely concerned.

He lay back idly among the cushions, and let his mind once more run over the unexpected problems of his situation.

The new graveness of what he was pledged to do had, of course, been strongly present in his mind from the first moment of revelation. Kidnapping a nineteen-year-old girl was certainly, as Peter had pointed out, a pretty serious business. He perceived that it would not look well in the papers in the least. Also if she cared to raise a row afterwards, there might be an aftermath which would not be wholly a laughing matter.

Nevertheless, this side of the question seemed remote and of minor interest to him just now. The problem appeared to be a personal one, not a question of statutes and judges. In his talk with Miss Carstairs before he knew her by name, he had failed to notice anything that suggested the spoiled and wilful child he had come to find. He could remember nothing she had said or done that helped him at all to think of her as his enemy. The fact was that it was all quite the other way. And this helped him to understand now, as he had not understood before, why Uncle Elbert had begged a solemn oath from him with such a piteous look on his handsome, haggard old face.