“I don’t understand.”
“Let me explain: I have come here,” R. Jones went on, getting more gentlemanly every moment, “on a very distasteful errand, to oblige a friend. Will you bear in mind that whatever I say is said entirely on his behalf?”
By this time Joan had abandoned the idea that this stout person was a life-insurance tout, and was inclining to the view that he was collecting funds for a charity.
“I came here at the request of the Honorable Frederick Threepwood.”
“I don’t quite understand.”
“You never met him, Miss Valentine; but when you were in the chorus at the Piccadilly Theatre, I believe, he wrote you some very foolish letters. Possibly you have forgotten them?”
“I certainly have.”
“You have probably destroyed them—eh?”
“Certainly! I never keep letters. Why do you ask?”
“Well, you see, Miss Valentine, the Honorable Frederick Threepwood is about to be married; and he thought that possibly, on the whole, it would be better that the letters–and poetry–which he wrote you were nonexistent.”
Not all R. Jones’ gentlemanliness–and during this speech he diffused it like a powerful scent in waves about him–could hide the unpleasant meaning of the words.
“He was afraid I might try to blackmail him?” said Joan, with formidable calm.
R. Jones raised and waved a fat hand deprecatingly.
“My dear Miss Valentine!”
Joan rose and R. Jones followed her example. The interview was plainly at an end.
“Please tell Mr. Threepwood to make his mind quite easy. He is in no danger.”
“Exactly–exactly; precisely! I assured Threepwood that my visit here would be a mere formality. I was quite sure you had no intention whatever of worrying him. I may tell him definitely, then, that you have destroyed the letters?”
“Yes. Good-evening.”
“Good-evening, Miss Valentine.”
The closing of the door behind him left him in total darkness, but he hardly liked to return and ask Joan to reopen it in order to light him on his way. He was glad to be out of her presence. He was used to being looked at in an unfriendly way by his fellows, but there had been something in Joan’s eyes that had curiously discomfited him.
R. Jones groped his way down, relieved that all was over and had ended well. He believed what she had told him, and he could conscientiously assure Freddie that the prospect of his sharing the fate of poor old Percy was nonexistent. It is true that he proposed to add in his report that the destruction of the letters had been purchased with difficulty, at a cost of just five hundred pounds; but that was a mere business formality.
He had almost reached the last step when there was a ring at the front door. With what he was afterward wont to call an inspiration, he retreated with unusual nimbleness until he had almost reached Joan’s door again. Then he leaned over the banister and listened.
The disheveled maid opened the door. A girl’s voice spoke:
“Is Miss Valentine in?”
“She’s in; but she’s engaged.”
“I wish you would go up and tell her that I want to see her. Say it’s Miss Peters–Miss Aline Peters.”
The banister shook beneath R. Jones’ sudden clutch. For a moment he felt almost faint. Then he began to think swiftly. A great light had dawned on him, and the thought outstanding in his mind was that never again would he trust a man or woman on the evidence of his senses. He could have sworn that this Valentine girl was on the level. He had been perfectly satisfied with her statement that she had destroyed the letters. And all the while she had been playing as deep a game as he had come across in the whole course of his professional career! He almost admired her. How she had taken him in!
It was obvious now what her game was. Previous to his visit she had arranged a meeting with Freddie’s fiancee, with the view of opening negotiations for the sale of the letters. She had held him, Jones, at arm’s length because she was going to sell the letters to whoever would pay the best price. But for the accident of his happening to be here when Miss Peters arrived, Freddie and his fiancee would have been bidding against each other and raising each other’s price. He had worked the same game himself a dozen times, and he resented the entry of female competition into what he regarded as essentially a male field of enterprise.