"That's to the good," the Colonel commented. "Well, Arthur, I won't pretend that I would not have been pleased if it had been some one your aunt and I know, whose people we know; but any one you love will receive the welcome due to my son's wife. When is the wedding to be?"
"Next month. I don't want a long engagement, and Violet isn't very happy at home. She's not in the least a cabaret girl, sir. You don't need to be afraid of that."
"How did you come to meet her?" Colonel Walsh asked.
"At one of the Little Owls." Those were Mrs. Finch's famous night-clubs. "She looked such a country girl, such a fish out of water, that I wondered to see her there...I don't say I wasn't a bit taken aback when I found out who she was—I didn't catch her name when we were introduced but by that time I had talked to her and—well, you can't explain these things, can you?" he added with a deprecating laugh.
Colonel Walsh agreed that you couldn't, then went into the question of the increased income his son could expect at his marriage. Colonel Walsh was a very wealthy man indeed. Principally interested in tobacco, his range included many other things as well. At the present moment Arthur was in his father's head office and earned, or rather was paid, a salary of five thousand a year. In addition to this he had his allowance of one thousand. Quite a comfortable total, even in these days. He had been in the Army, and at that time his father had considered a thousand quite sufficient for his needs. Arthur had thought otherwise, and there had finally come a night when the Colonel faced him with a pile of bills before him and Arthur next morning had sent in his papers. It was after that that he had entered his father's office—and Gerald had gone abroad.
"I started some years ago," the Colonel went on, "a sort of marriage fund for each of you two boys. Then when Gerald failed me, and dropped out of the reckoning, the two funds were made into one. It stands at fifty thousand now, and you shall have my cheque for it as my wedding present."
"You're more than generous, Pater," Arthur said gratefully.
Colonel Walsh made a gesture. "I appreciate the way you've kept nothing back about your future wife. If only Gerald had realised that I'll overlook anything but deception, he would probably be here alive to-clay—not killed in an Asia Minor circus."
Arthur nodded. He said nothing. Gerald had been "Gerald." Handsome, debonair, careless of money, and of whether what he said tallied with facts or not. The end had been inevitable, as he had often warned Gerald that it must be.
When he was alone, the Colonel sat on his sad thoughts with Gerald rather than with Arthur.
His sister, Lady Monkhouse, found him still there, staring into the fire, his pipe practically out. She had not yet learnt Arthur's news. Arthur had always been her favourite, but she heard of his engagement with almost comic fury.
"Arthur! Arthur! to be caught by the daughter of that dreadful woman!" She was inconsolable. "Oh, I saw her once; great big, bouncing, noisy bold-eyed creature! If only Ann Lovelace had taken him, when he was head over ears in love with her."
"In those days there was Gerald," Colonel Walsh said in a level voice. "Arthur was the younger son—then."
Lady Monkhouse was shocked. Truths often had that effect on her.
"Ann would have been a wonderful wife for Arthur," she went on, "and he adored her..."
"At that time," finished the Colonel dryly. "Pity he couldn't have taken a fancy to Kitty." Lady Monkhouse raised her nicely plucked eyebrows. Kitty was the Colonel's niece, and lived with them.
"Kitty," Lady Monkhouse said now. "Well, hardly! I think, George, that Arthur is far too clever to be content with little Kitty I Now Ann would be his intellectual equal, and socially, of course—with her connections—she's the Duchess's favourite niece—anything would have been possible...But this Finch girl...! I can't believe it! I simply cannot!"
Arthur came in. "Talking about Violet?" he asked gaily.
His aunt looked sombrely back at him. "Don't expect me to congratulate you," she said bitterly. "It would be a mockery!"
Upon which there was a very fine family quarrel. Arthur, usually very cautious in his words, raved about his aunt's prejudices and Violet Finch's excellences, and his father took his part. So did Kitty when she came in, lured, it must be confessed, by curiosity at the loud tones of the talk. Kitty was a pale-faced slip of a girl with big, brown eyes and an air of youth and freshness and candour that far outweighed mere prettiness in Colonel Walsh's opinion. He would have considered Arthur a very lucky man indeed to have won Kitty. And he had thought that Kitty's heart was turning a little to Arthur. Now he hoped that he had been mistaken. He would not like to think her young life hurt beneath his roof...
Arthur finally stalked away in a fine temper, leaving his aunt looking rather ill-at-ease. She had spoken very hastily...she had said some things anent Violet Finch and the family of Finch that might well have been put differently; and some that were best not put at all.
"I had no idea you knew so much about nightclubs," her brother remarked dryly.
Colonel Walsh had the masculine idea that family plain speaking was his own prerogative, that as long as he did not swear at things no one else should do so. He never could understand why a king of Israel needed to get a prophet to curse the people for him...That always seemed to him one of the few things a man should do for himself, if done at all.
"Oh, I've been to the Little Owls. A couple of years back every one went. That Finch woman made a sinful amount of money out of it. Simply incredible profits Thousands there every night...They gambled for enormous stakes upstairs in her private flat, it was whispered. Now I hear that the place is running down as speedily as it shot up. And to think that Arthur—of all young men! I thought he, at least, was sensible!"
Walsh winced. She was referring obliquely to Gerald, and somehow—just now—it hurt.
"Look here, Kitty," Lady Monkhouse wound up. "You're going to town for a week—to get your brother's flat ready for his return. Do call on these Finches and give us your opinion of the girl. I may be prejudiced, though I'm sure I'm not..."
Kitty raised no objection to this informal scrutiny of the future Mrs. Arthur Walsh, agreeing to do so within the next few days.
CHAPTER II.
Violet Finch Wears Some Fine Pearls at a Dance.
THREE weeks later Mrs. Finch was giving a dance, and apparently at the same time giving the lie to current rumours of her being absolutely on the rocks. True, it was to celebrate her daughter's engagement to Arthur Walsh, that wealthy catch, but, even so, it was very lavish.
There was dancing in two splendid ballrooms, there was bridge in half a dozen card-rooms, and there would be supper such as only the Merveille Hotel could supply in its spacious supper-room. And there was also a Sicilian Marionette show which had caught her guests' fancy.
Kitty Walsh had just been watching the marionettes. At first with keen amusement; but suddenly they had become not funny at all—instead, a sort of ghastly parody on life. They looked so incredibly alive, their actions seemed too intelligent, and yet they were only puppets that were dancing, and making love, and even committing murders with such energy and dash. She shot a glance at Ronald Mills beside her it had been his idea that in lieu of another dance they should watch the Show for a while. He caught her eye and followed her back into the ballroom.
"What do you think of them, Miss Walsh? Good, eh?"
Ronald Mills always spoke in a loud voice as though any one, near or far, must be interested in his opinions, his questions, his lightest utterance.
He was a long, thin man with a long, thin face, long, thin lips, long, thin teeth, and a very cynical smile. Well turned out, he always slouched, whether walking or sitting, and whenever possible had a cigarette dangling