The Cardinal Moth

"You cannot say that you are not happy," Lopez said after a long pause.

"Well, no. Happiness is but a negative quality, after all. I am probably a great deal happier than if I had married a scoundrel like yourself, for instance. That is Aaron's voice in the hall. I suppose you have come to see him on business, or you would not be here at all."

Lopez gravely accepted his dismissal. All this wonderful beauty and intellect would have been his had he at one time chosen to take it. Slowly and thoughtfully Mrs. Benstein went up to dress for dinner. She chose her gown and her jewels and her flowers with the utmost care; she might have been going to a state concert or dance, from the nicety of her selection.

"Madame is going out to-night?" the maid suggested.

"Madame is going to do nothing of the kind," Isa said, with one of her seductive smiles. "I am going to stay at home and dine tête-à-tête with my husband. Always look as nice to your husband, Minon, as to other people. You will find the trouble an excellent investment."

Benstein was late. He had been detained so long that Isa was in the dining-room before he arrived breathlessly and full of apologies. With his fat, fair face, and heavy, pendulous lips, he made an almost repulsive contrast to his wife. His dress-suit was shabby and ill-fitting, suggesting that it had been bought second-hand like his large pumps. The red silk socks bore a pleasing resemblance to the cyclist's trousers when confined to the leg with those inevitable clips; they bulged over at the ankles. Benstein wore no diamonds; he had not even a large stud in his crumpled shirt. It was a great deprivation, and the financier mourned over the fact in secret. But Isa was inexorable on that point. The man was hideously common enough, without jewels. Besides, Isa's interference in the matter was by way of being a compliment. It showed at least that she took some sort of interest in the man she had married.

"Kept by business," Benstein wheezed. He raised his dyed eyebrows. He flattered himself that the dye took from his seventy years, whereas the deception merely added to them. "Nice you look! Lovely!"

His little eyes appraised her. Despite his many limitations, Benstein had a keen love of the beautiful —qua beautiful. Isa stood before him a vision of loveliness in a dress of green touched here and there with gold. The shaded lights rendered her eyes all the more brilliant.

"Give me a kiss," Benstein said hoarsely. "When you look like that I can refuse you nothing. I am getting into my dotage, men say. Well, perhaps. Good thing some of them can't see me now."

The elaborate dinner proceeded in that perfect Tudor dining-room. Not a single article of furniture was there that lacked historic interest. The old oak and silver were priceless, and every bit of it had been collected under Isa Benstein's own eye. No dealer had ever succeeded in imposing on her.

The silk slips were drawn at length from the polished dark oak with the wonderful red tints in it, so that the nodding flowers were reflected from a lake of thin blood. Here and there the decanters gleamed, a Tudor model of a Spanish galleon mounted on wheels was pushed along the table, its various compartments filled with all kinds of cigarettes.

"No, a Virginian for me," Isa said, as the servants withdrew. The drawing-room was a dream of beauty, but she preferred the dining-room. For restfulness and form and artistic completeness there was no room like the Tudor hall, she declared. "Give me good, honest tobacco."

"How did you get on to-day?" Benstein asked.

"I didn't. I sat and watched the procession. Sir Clement Frobisher came and made himself agreeable to me, and so did his wife – under compulsion. But she asked me to her dance, and I am going."

"Hope that they won't ask me, too," Benstein said uneasily.

"You need not go, in any case; in fact, I'd rather you didn't. I've been scheming out my dress, Aaron; do you happen to be strong in rubies just now?"

Benstein nodded his huge head and smiled. More or less, he had the jewels of the great world in his possession. It was his whim to keep them at home. He trusted nobody, not even a bank. Besides, nearly every day brought something neat and ingenious in the way of a jewel fraud.

"I can rig you out in anything," he said. "Yes, I could pretty well cover you in rubies. They're all on diamonds just for the moment, so that they bring their emeralds and rubies to redeem the white stones. Wonder what some of those big swells would say if they knew you had got their jewels to wear, Isa?"

Isa smiled at some amusing recollection, but she held her peace. Humour was not Benstein's strong point. He puffed away to the library, followed by his wife, and once there locked the door. Here was a large iron sheet that, being opened, disclosed something in the nature of a strong-room. There were scores of tiny pigeon-holes, each filled with cases and bags all carefully noted and numbered, for method was Benstein's strong point.

"More papers," Isa exclaimed. "A fresh lot since yesterday. Is it some new business, Aaron?"

"Count Lefroy," Benstein wheezed. "Valuable concessions from the Shan of Koordstan. Shouldn't wonder if those papers don't become worth half a million. Queer-looking things. Like to see them?"

Isa expressed a proper curiosity on the point. The papers were in Hindustani and English, with some cramped-looking signature and the impression of a seal at the bottom.

"Those signatures are both forgeries," Mrs. Benstein said, after careful examination. "And that seal, I feel quite sure, is a clumsy imitation of something better."

"Doesn't matter if they are," Benstein said without emotion. "If they are real, I only get a finger in the pie; if they are forged I bag the whole of the pastry. Let me once get Lefroy under my thumb like that, and I'll make a pocket borough of Koordstan. Leave your Aaron alone for business, my dear. Now let us see what we can do in the way of rubies, though I am a great fool to – "

"It's too late in the day to think of that," Isa said sharply. "Turn them out."

The shabby cases began to yield their glittering contents. The electrics glowed upon the piled-up mass of rubies, bracelets, brooches, tiaras, armlets – the loot of the East, it seemed to be. Isa's slim fingers played with the shining strings lovingly.

"This is even better than I expected," she murmured. "I shall be able to trim my dress with them, I can have them all over my skirt, I can cover my bodice. I am going simply as 'rubies.' Give me that tiara."

She placed the glittering crown on her head, she draped her neck and arms with the beautiful stones. Benstein gasped, and his little eyes watered. Was there ever so lovely a woman before? he wondered. When Isa looked at him like that he could refuse her nothing. It was criminally weak, but —

"The thing is almost complete," Isa said. "Now haven't you got something out of the common, some black swan amongst rubies that I could attach to the centre of my forehead, something to blaze like the sun? Aaron, you've got it; you are concealing something from me."

The financier laughed weakly, still dazzled by that show of beauty. In a dazed way he unlocked a little compartment and took a huge stone from a leather bag. His hands trembled as he handed it to his wife.

"You can try it," he said hoarsely; "you can see how it goes. But you can't have that to wear, no, no. If anything happened to it, they would make an international business of it, my life wouldn't be worth a day's purchase. You are not to ask me for that, no, no."

He meandered on in a senile kind of way. With a low cry Isa fastened on the gem. She pressed it to her white forehead, where it blazed and sparkled. The effect was electric, wonderful. She stood before a mirror fascinated and entranced by her own beauty.

"I shall have it," she said. "I couldn't go without this, Aaron. You are going to have it set into the finest of gold wires for me. Come, I won't even ask you where you got it from. And from what you say, nobody in England is likely to recognise it. Aaron, do, do."

Her smile was subtle and pleading. Nobody could have withstood it. Benstein gabbled something, his cheeks shook.

"Oh, Lord," he groaned. "If anything does happen! Well, well, my darling! Unlock the door and stay here till I come back. What artful creatures you women are! My dear, my dear. Positively I must go into the dining-room and treat myself to a liqueur-brandy!"

CHAPTER XIII

THE QUEEN OF THE RUBIES

The faint sobbing of violins sounded from somewhere, giving the artistic suggestion of being far off, the dominant note of the leader hung high on the air. Now and then a door opened somewhere, letting in the splitting crack of Piccadilly, the raucous voices of news-boys more or less mendaciously. Sir Clement Frobisher stood before the glass in his smoking-room setting his white tie. Over his shoulder he could see the dark, smileless face of Lopez looking in.

"What do you want here to-night?" he asked. "What are you thinking about me?"

"I'd give a good round sum – if I had it – to know what you are thinking about," Lopez retorted.

"Money isn't worth it. I was wondering if I really looked like a waiter, after all."

"Well, you don't. There is something too infernally sardonic and devilish about your head for that. May I take a cigarette? I dare say you wonder how I got here to-night? I – well, I just walked in. That kind of audacity always pays. Also you wonder why I came."

"Indeed I don't. You want me to lend you one hundred pounds. What do you do with your money, friend Lopez? Not that it is any business of mine."

"That being so, you have answered your own question," Lopez said dryly. "Every man has his weakness, even the strongest chain has its breaking-point. Let me have one hundred pounds. And pay yourself ten times over, as you always do for your accommodation. Did I earn my last five hundred pounds?"

"Indeed you did," Frobisher said frankly. "A wonderful woman, Mrs. Benstein."

"About the most wonderful I ever met. None of your dark schemers about her, none of your flashing eyes and figures drawn up to their full height. But there is the rare mind in its beautiful setting. You are going to make use of that woman? We shall see."

Both men smiled meaningly. The plaintive wail of the violins rose and fell, from the great hall beyond came the murmur of voices. Lady Frobisher's great function had commenced. Frobisher glanced significantly at the clock. He was in no fancy-dress himself, presumedly he was disguised as an honest man, as Lopez suggested. He laughed heartily at the gibe, and pushed Lopez outside the door with a cheque in his pocket.

Quite a crowd of cloaked and dominoed women had gathered there. Lady Frobisher had reverted to the old idea of a masked ball and the uncovering after the last dance before supper. The masks appeared to be walking about as they generally did, for Shepherd strolled up to Chloe and Adonis to Aphrodite in a manner that might have suggested collusion to the sophisticated mind. One tall woman, closely draped, touched Frobisher on the arm as he threaded between the silken mysteries.

"I have no flowers," she said. "My man stupidly dropped mine and somebody trod on them. Take me to your conservatory, Sir Clement, and give me my choice."

Frobisher offered his arm; he did not need to ask who the speaker was. Those low, thrilling tones, with the touch of power in them, could only have belonged to Isa Benstein. There was nobody in the conservatory which was devoted to orchids, and nobody was likely to be, for that part of the house was forbidden ground. Mrs. Benstein looked out from under her cloud – only her eyes and nose could be seen.

"May I not be privileged to see your dress?" Frobisher pleaded.

"Certainly not," Isa Benstein laughed. "Why should you be specially favoured? Get me two long sprays of orchid. I shall be content with nothing less than the Cardinal Moth."

It was something in the nature of extracting a tooth, but Frobisher mounted the steps and tore down the two sprays asked for. Isa Benstein whipped them under the folds of her cloak. There was a subtle fragrance about her that a younger man than Frobisher would have found heady.

"I must fly to the dressing-room," she said. "And then to pay my respects to my hostess. Do you think that she is likely to recognise me?"

Frobisher thought not. He lingered over his cigarette, making not the slightest attempt to play the host, though the dance was in full swing now, and the house echoed to the thud of feet in motion. At the same time, Frobisher was looking forward to plenty of amusement presently, before supper, when everybody unmasked. He grew a little tired of his own company presently and strolled into the ballroom. There the electrics were festooned and garlanded with ropes of roses, the plaintive band could not be seen behind a jungle of feathery ferns, a bewildering kaleidoscope of colour looped and twisted and threaded in a perfect harmony.

A few of the younger and consequently more blasé men lined the walls. A cavalier of sorts with a long, thin scar on the side of his lean head was watching the proceedings. Frobisher touched him on the arm.

"Not dancing, Lefroy?" he said. "Are you past all those fleeting joys?"

"It's an old wound in my thigh," Lefroy explained. He was just a little chagrined to discover that his host had so easily detected him. Frobisher's superior cleverness always angered him. "It is my amusement to spot the various women, and I have located most of them. But there is one! Ciel!"

"One that even meets with your critical approval! Good. She must be a pearl among women. Point her out to me and let us see if our tastes agree."

Lefroy's eyes glittered behind their mask as they swept over the reeling crowd. A moment or two later and he just touched Frobisher on the arm.

"Here she comes," he whispered. "On the arm of General Marriott. No mistaking his limp, and his white hair like a file of soldiers on parade. What a costume and what a cost! That scarlet band across her brow over the mask is wonderfully effective. That woman is an artist, Frobisher. And she has the most perfect figure in Europe. Who is she?"

Frobisher made no reply; he was studying Isa Benstein's costume – lustrous black from head to foot, with white seams fairly covered with rubies. There were rubies all over her corsage, bands of them up her arm, a serpent necklace round the milky way of her throat. The whole thing was daring, bizarre, and yet artistic to a point. The scarlet band across the brows struck a strong and vivid note. The rubies were not so bright as the woman's eyes. As she came nearer the tangle of blossom across her bosom showed up clearly. Lefroy gasped.

"A mystery in a mystery," he said. "She is wearing the Cardinal Moth. Who is she?"

Frobisher laughed, and protested that each must solve the problem for himself. He liked to puzzle and bewilder Lefroy, and he was doing both effectively at the present moment. The Count would have liked to take the little man by the shoulders and shake him heartily.

"I believe you know who she is," he growled. "Come, Frobisher, gratify my curiosity."

"I will refresh it if you like," Frobisher said with one of his sudden grins. "I am not positively sure, but I fancy I can give a pretty shrewd guess as to the identity of Madame Incognita. But would it be fair to give her secret away before supper-time? Patience, my fire-eater."

The lady of the rubies passed along leaning on the arm of her companion. She gave one glance in Frobisher's direction, and Lefroy looked eagerly for some sign of recognition. But the dark eyes were absolutely blank so far as the master of the house was concerned.

Lefroy turned and followed the couple in front. As Frobisher lounged back to the smoking-room for another cigarette, he almost ran into his wife.

As hostess she was wearing no mask. Her beautiful face was just a little set and tired.

"Seems to be all right," Frobisher croaked. "They appear to be enjoying themselves. And yet half of them would like better to come to my funeral. Some pretty dresses here, but one head and shoulders over the others.

"You mean the ruby guise," Lady Frobisher exclaimed, with some animation. "Is it not superb! So daring, and yet in the best of taste. Everybody is asking who she is and nobody seems to know. I declare I feel quite proud of my mystery."

"An angel unawares," Frobisher laughed silently. "You never can tell. And you mean to say that you can't guess who it is that is exciting all this attention?"

Lady Frobisher looked swiftly down into the face of her husband. The corrugated grin, the impish mischief told her a story. It seemed very hard that the woman she most desired to keep in the background was actually creating the sensation of the evening.

"Mrs. Benstein," she whispered. "Clement, do you really think so?"

"My dear, I am absolutely certain of it. And why not? Isn't Mrs. Benstein as well-bred as a score of American women here to-night? Doesn't she carry a long pedigree in that lovely face of hers? Some folks here to-night suffer from a pedigree so old that even their grandfathers are lost in the mists of antiquity. What short-sighted creatures you women are! Can't you see that a creature so rich and daring and clever as Mrs. Benstein will be riding on the crest of the wave within a year? And you will gain kudos from the mere fact that your house saw her début into 'society' – Heaven save the mark!"

Lady Frobisher had no more to say. There was a great deal of cynical truth in Frobisher's words. Mrs. Benstein was going to be a brilliant success as far as the men were concerned, therefore her presence at the assemblies of the smart set would become almost necessary. Lefroy came back at the same time, having learnt little or nothing in the refreshment room. Lady Frobisher might have gratified his curiosity if he had asked her, only she gave him no opportunity. She detested the man thoroughly; with her fine instinct she had detected the tiger under his handsome, swaggering exterior.

"No luck?" Frobisher laughed. "Well, it is nearly twelve o'clock, and then you will know. Come with me and smoke a cigarette till the clock strikes. It will soothe your nerves. A small soda and a drop of 1820 brandy, eh? Don't give my general run of guests that liqueur."

Lefroy nodded carelessly. He would have it appear that he had dismissed the matter from his mind. But he had finished his cigarette and brandy as the clock chimed the midnight hour, and then, with a fine assumption of indifference, he returned to the ballroom. The band was playing something weird from Greig, the guests stopped just where they stood, and each cast their masks upon the floor.

The swashbuckler was in luck, so it seemed to him, for the lady of the rubies stood smiling by the side of her military escort just opposite. The scarlet band had gone with the mask, revealing a fillet of rubies round the smooth white brow, a fillet with one huge ruby in the middle, so large and blazing that Lefroy stood aghast. He staggered back, and something like a stammering oath escaped him. The vulgarism was lost for the moment, and people congregated round the stranger. That many people there did not know who Mrs. Benstein was only gave piquancy to the situation.

"My God!" Lefroy muttered, "who is she? Where did she get it from? It's the real thing. I would swear to it amongst a million imitations. And I dare swear that, despite his air of mystery, Frobisher – But he must not see it, I must prevent that, anyway."

Lefroy hastened back to the smoking-room. His limbs were trembling under him now, a little moisture broke out on his forehead and trickled down his face. He had made a discovery that wrenched even his iron nerves. And at any cost Frobisher must not know.

He was smoking and sipping brandy as Lefroy entered. If he saw anything strange or strained about the face of Count Lefroy, he did not betray the fact. He looked up gaily.

"Come to fetch me?" he asked. "Want me to see the lady of the rubies? Well, was the face worthy of the setting? Did you recognise her?"

"Never saw her in my life before," Lefroy said hoarsely. He stammered on, saying anything to gain time, anything to keep Frobisher where he was. "I've lost interest in the whole thing. Let's stay here and smoke, and talk about old times. What do you say?"

Frobisher said nothing. He studied Lefroy's white face intently. Outside was a babel of laughter and chatter and the swish of drapery. A clear, calm voice announced a late visitor.

"His Highness the Shan of Koordstan," the footman said.

Frobisher glanced at Lefroy's face. In itself it was a tragedy.

CHAPTER XIV

"UNEASY LIES THE HEAD – "

As a matter of fact, His Highness the Shan of Koordstan had not intended to go to Lady Frobisher's dance at all, though he had been graciously pleased to accept the invitation. His present intention was to go to bed early and be a little more careful for the future. There was a shakiness about the ruler of Koordstan that told its own tale, a shakiness that would not have conduced to his popularity with his subjects in the Far East.

An interview with a recently-arrived minister of his had changed his plans entirely. In place of bed he had a cold bath and a cup of strong coffee, and sat down, as far as his aching head would allow him, to review the situation. The final outcome was a fit of utter despair and an express letter to Harold Denvers, who fortunately was at home and ready to respond to the invitation.

The Eastern potentate was smoking moodily as he arrived. Harold significantly declined the offer of refreshment of a spirituous description.

"Meaning that I have had enough already," the Shan said moodily. "But I'm sober as a judge now, had enough to make me. The shocking luck I've had lately!"

He tossed a cigarette across to Denvers, and lighted a fresh one of his own.

"So I sent you to give me a leg up if you can. You are the only honest man of the lot. Denvers, I'm in a fine mess over the Blue Stone. If I don't produce it at once I'm done for. It would be madness for me to show my face at home again."

"Somebody has discovered that your Highness has parted with it?"

"That's it. Lefroy is the rogue in the play. The game is Koordstan; for years he has been trying to get rid of me and put my cousin in my place. Even my own ministers are against me. And now I feel positive that Lefroy has given me away. They don't ask me to show the stone, or accuse me of parting with it – they are too deep for that. A minister comes with a lot of literature which he calls important documents of State which require to be sealed immediately. That rascal has been in my cousin's pay for years. And the worst of it is, the whole thing looks so natural and straightforward that I can't refuse, especially as everything has my sanction."

"The document must be sealed with the Blue Stone?" Harold asked.

"Inevitably. It has been the custom for generations. Any deviation from this rule would do for me at once. Hamid Khan was here this afternoon, and I put him off this time by saying I was ill, which was no more than the truth. What shall I say when he comes back presently? If my confounded head did not ache so, I might find some way out of the difficulty, but as it is – "

The Shan smote his fist passionately on the table. Nothing was any good, nothing could save the situation but the immediate production of the twenty thousand pounds needed to recover the jewel from Benstein. At the present moment the Shan had no resources whatever; he had always mortgaged his income, and most of his personal property had been dissipated in his brilliant pursuit of pleasure.

"But that's more or less beyond the point," he groaned. "The stone must be redeemed at once. I could not possibly put Hamid Khan off after to-night, even if I can manage that."

"That will give us time to think," said Harold. "Let your man know that you don't keep so sacred a jewel at your hotel. You have heard of Chancery Lane Safe Deposit?"

The Shan's eyes twinkled. His subtle mind rose to the suggested deception. For the present, at any rate, he saw his way to a pleasing subterfuge. He was pondering over the matter when there came a timid knock at the door, and a slim brown figure came humbly in.