Charles Garvice - Adrien Leroy

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ADRIEN LEROY

CHARLES GARVICE

LONDON

GEORGE NEWNES, LIMITED SOUTHAMPTON STREET, STRAND, W.C.

CHAPTER I

It was a cold night in early spring, and the West End streets were
nearly deserted. The great shutters of the shops were being drawn down
with a dull rumble, and every moment the pavements grew more dreary
looking as the glories of the plate-glass windows were hidden.

Tired workers with haggard faces were making their way homeward; to them
the day was at an end. But to the occupants of the whirring taxis and
smart motors, as they sped westward, the round of their day was but
half-way through; for them, the great ones of the earth, the
all-important hour of dinner was at hand.

At the entrance of one of the most luxurious clubs in Pall Mall two men,
in immaculate evening dress, stood carelessly surveying the hurrying
throngs of people.

"Seven," said one, as the hour struck from the nearest church. "I
thought Standon said seven."

"Yes, and like a woman, meant half-past," returned the other, hiding a
yawn.

"Stan's too young to value his dinner properly, but Leroy ought to have
been punctual. Oh, here _is_ Stan!" as a slight, well-dressed man sprang
hastily from a smart motor and came towards them.

"Hello!" said the new-comer, shaking hands, "you two fellows first? I
hope I'm not late, Shelton."

"Of course you're late," growled Shelton, with characteristic pessimism.
"You always are, and Leroy is worse. Come along, we may as well wait
inside as in this beastly draught."

In the great dining-hall the snowy-covered tables were being taken
rapidly by members about to dine; silent-footed waiters were hurrying to
and fro, carrying out their various duties, while intermittently the
sound of opening champagne bottles mingled with the buzz of conversation
and the ripple of laughter.

The three men, Mortimer Shelton, Lord Standon and Frank Parselle, seated
themselves at a table in a comfortable recess and took stock of the
room, responding to numerous nods and smiles of recognition, while
grumbling at the unpunctuality of their friend.

"Ten past seven!" groaned Shelton, looking at his watch. "I might have
known that Leroy would be late. Shall we wait?"

"Oh, yes!" said Parselle; "Adrien might not like it, you know. It is a
bore, though! The soup will be as thick as mud!"

"By Jove! I'd forgotten," interrupted Standon suddenly. "I met Leroy
yesterday, and he asked me to tell you he might be late, as he was off
to Barminster Castle last night. We were not to wait. He gave me a note,
and--if I haven't left it in my other coat--" He fumbled in his pocket.
"No; here it is." He produced the note with an air of triumph, and
Shelton, with a muttered exclamation of disgust, ordered dinner to be
served before he opened it. As he did so and ran his eye over the
contents, he frowned.

"Just listen to this," he said irritably.

"'MY DEAR MORTIMER,

A letter from Jasper takes me down to the Castle. I will return in time
to join your little party and, with your leave, bring Jasper along too;
but don't wait on any account.

"'Yours,

"'ADRIEN LEROY.'"

"Jasper--always Jasper!" commented Standon. "I'd like to know by what
means Jasper Vermont has obtained such influence over Leroy."

"Ah, that's the mystery!" said Parselle, frowning.

"It's as plain as a pikestaff," growled Mortimer Shelton. "Leroy saved
Vermont's life years ago--at Oxford, I think. That's enough for Adrien.
If a cat or dog, or even a one-eyed monkey, placed itself under his
protection, Adrien Leroy would stick to it through thick and thin. You
know his little way; and this Vermont is no fool. He intends to make
full use of his friend."

"And yet Leroy is not easily taken in," remarked Parselle thoughtfully.

"Every man has his weak point," retorted Shelton with a shrug, "and
Jasper is Leroy's one vulnerable spot. He will believe nothing against
him."

"He's a lucky chap, Vermont," said Standon pensively. "No one really
knows what he is or where he springs from; yet he always seems to have
plenty of money, and apparently the whole of Leroy's passes through his
hands."

"Something near a million," put in Parselle enviously, "and with the run
of a castle like a palace. No, Vermont's no fool!"

Mortimer Shelton nodded.

"The Castle's all right," he said curtly. "You can trust the Leroys to
have the best of everything. They treat money like dirt, and bow before
nothing but Royalty and women. Yet, with it all, there's no stauncher
friend than a Leroy."

"As Vermont knows only too well," muttered Standon dryly. "By the way, I
saw Ada Lester in the Park this morning. Jove! Such furs!"

"In that quarter Adrien certainly treats his money like dust," said
Parselle, with a short laugh. "I can't think what he sees in her; to me
she seems an insatiate animal--and about as difficult to satisfy. It's a
jolly good job for Leroy that, thanks to his father's generosity, his
income runs into five figures--nothing else would stand the strain."

"Do you know, some one told me at the Casket the other night that Leroy
had made the theatre over to Ada entirely, and settled a thousand a year
on her into the bargain," said Standon, leaning forward.

"I daresay," Mortimer commented dryly. "He's fool enough for anything.
The place runs him into eight thousand a year as it is--not including
Ada Lester, the lady manager--so he might just as well hand it over to
her altogether. I wish to goodness the wretched building would burn
down! 'Pon my word, I shall set it alight myself one fine night----"

"Hush! Here he is," said Lord Standon; adding quickly, "with Vermont, of
course."

The others looked round towards the new-comers. One was a dark-haired
man of about forty years of age. His face was pale, with an almost
unhealthy pallor, from which his small dark eyes glittered restlessly;
his thin lips, tightly closed, were set in an almost straight line.
Clean-shaven, sleek of hair, he wore an expression of cautious slyness
that implied a mental attitude ever on guard against some sudden
exposure of his real feelings. Such was Jasper Vermont.

His companion was of a different calibre. Still apparently in the early
thirties, tall, and with clear-cut aristocratic features, he was
decidedly good to look upon. His face, fair as that of a woman, was
perhaps slightly marred by the expression of weakness which lurked round
the finely-moulded lips; but for all that it was stamped with the latent
nobility which characterised his race.

The Hon. Adrien Leroy, only son of Baron Barminster, was one of the most
noted figures in fashionable society. His father, who since the death of
Lady Barminster had lived almost as a recluse, spent the days in the old
Castle, and had practically abdicated in favour of his son. So that the
colossal income accruing from the coal mines of Wales, the rentals of
the Leroy estates in the Southern Counties, and the ground rents of a
considerable acreage in one of the most fashionable parts of London, all
passed through the hands of Adrien, who, in his turn, spent it like
water, leaving Jasper Vermont--his one-time college friend and now his
confidential steward--to watch over his affairs.

Leroy, with a genial smile of greeting for all, but a grave, almost
weary expression in his blue eyes, parried the numerous questions and
invitations that beset him on all sides, and, taking Vermont's arm, drew
him towards the table where his three friends awaited him.

"I'm sorry we're late," he said in a pleasant voice, which was clear and
unaffected, in strong contrast to the chatter which buzzed round him at
their entry. "Blame Jasper, who, if he is as hungry as I am, is punished
already."

His good-humoured laugh as he seated himself drew echoes from his
friends; Leroy's popularity was never more apparent than in a gathering
of this sort, composed exclusively of his own sex.

"So, have just come up from Barminster," said Shelton presently, "How is
the Castle looking?"

Adrien, busily satisfying a vigorous appetite, merely nodded and smiled
in reply; but Jasper Vermont answered for him.

"Beautiful!" he said, with a smile which showed his white, even teeth.
"Beautiful! It's a charming view; but we saw little of it this visit.
Ah, Shelton, you are really an epicure! We don't get clear turtle like
this at the Pallodeon--eh, Adrien?"

"No," replied the young man, looking up. "We ought to have Shelton on
the committee. No wonder they love you here, Shelton! And so the colt
has lost the steeplechase? I saw the news as I came along."

"And you have lost, how much--two thousand?" queried Parselle.

"Five," said Vermont, not quickly, but just before Adrien could speak.

"Is it five?" asked Leroy indifferently. "I thought I'd backed 'Venus'
for more."

"I backed her myself for a couple of hundred," put in Lord Standon
ruefully. "She's a beautiful creature, though, and I'd like to buy her."

"You can have her, my dear Stan, for a mere song," said Leroy cordially.

"I'm afraid that's impossible," interposed Jasper with suavity. "She's
sold."

Adrien looked up in surprise.

"Sold! To whom?" he asked.

"To the knacker," was the calm reply. "Don't you remember, Adrien, that
she threw Fording and broke her leg over the last hurdle?"

Leroy's race resumed its usual air of bored indifference.

"Ah, yes, so you told me. My dear Stan, I'm awfully sorry! I had
completely forgotten." He looked round the table. "Any of you seen the
papers?" he inquired. "Last night was the first of the new comedy at the
Casket--how did it go?"

Frank Parselle laughed. "I was there," he admitted. "Ada played finely,
but they hissed once or twice."

"Lost on my horse and on my new play. That is bad luck!" exclaimed
Adrien, looking, however, very little disturbed by the news. "It must be
withdrawn."

"Certainly," agreed Vermont amiably. "Certainly."

"By Jove! what did you tell me the mounting cost?" asked Parselle,
addressing Vermont, but glancing significantly at the others.

"Three thousand pounds," answered Vermont glibly, while Adrien ate his
fish with the most consummate indifference.

"Three thousand for four nights, that's about it. The public ought to be
grateful to you," said Shelton with a tinge of sarcasm in his voice, as
he nodded across at Leroy.

Adrien laughed.

"Or I to them," he said cheerfully. "It's no light thing to sit through
a bad play. But how is that, Jasper? You said it would run."

"I?" protested Vermont, with a pleasant smile. "No, Adrien, not so
certainly as that. I said I thought the play well written, and that in
my opinion it ought to run well--a very different thing. Eh, Shelton?"

"Ah!" replied Shelton, who had been watching him keenly. "So you were
out in your reckoning for once. It is to be hoped you didn't make the
same mistake with the colt. I think you were also favourably inclined to
that, weren't you?"

"Yes," admitted Vermont, leaning back with an admirable air of content.
"I laid my usual little bet, and lost--of course."

"You should have hedged," said Shelton, who knew as a positive fact that
Vermont had done so.

"I have no judgement," Vermont responded deprecatingly. "I am a man of
no ideas, and I admit it. Now Adrien is all acuteness; without him I
should soon go astray. I am supposed to look after his interests; but,
by Jove! it is he who supplies the brains and I the hands. I am the
machine--a mere machine, and he turns the handle!" He laughed gently at
his own joke, and held up his glass for replenishment.

"A pretty division of labour," commented Shelton, with a faint sneer.
"Now _we_ give _you_ the credit for all the tact and business capacity."

"Ah, what a mistake!" replied Vermont, spreading out his fat hands with
a gesture of amusement. "Well, since you give me credit, I will assume
the virtue, though I have it not."

He changed the subject adroitly to one of general interest; and as the
wine came and disappeared with greater rapidity, the talk ran on with
more wit and laughter, Vermont always handling the ball of conversation
deftly, and giving it an additional fillip when it seemed to slacken.
Adrien Leroy spoke little; though when he did make a remark, the rest
listened with an evident desire to hear his opinion.

At length Vermont rose, with a lazy look round.

"Well, I must be off," he said smoothly. "Good-night, Adrien. I shall be
with you to-morrow at twelve."

Having bade the rest of the company a hasty adieu, he turned once more
to his host.

"Good-night, Shelton," he said smilingly. "Thanks for the excellent
dinner. Rome would not have perished had you lived with the last of
Caesars."

"And Adrien Leroy would not go to the dogs so quickly, if you did not
show him the way," murmured Shelton inaudibly, as Vermont departed, with
the bland smile still hovering round his thin lips.

CHAPTER II

Outside the club door, Vermont's motor was drawn up at the side waiting
for him. He looked at his watch, and was surprised at the lateness of
the hour. Stepping hastily into the vehicle, he held up two fingers to
the chauffeur, who apparently needed no other instructions; for the car
glided off, and Vermont, as he passed the club, looked up at the windows
with an ugly smile.

As Lord Standon had said, few knew his origin or his business; but, in
reality, his antecedents were of a very ordinary nature. He was the son
of a solicitor who had lived with but one object in his sordid life,
namely, the desire to make his son a man of position with the power to
mix as an equal among that portion of society which only came to Malcolm
Vermont when it wanted its scandals glossed over, or to obtain money.
Ill-natured people were apt to hint that he had amassed his wealth by
means of usury and the taking up of shady cases. At any rate, he made
sufficient to bring up his son in luxury and send him to Oxford, where
Jasper had first come in contact with Adrien Leroy. At the death of his
father, Vermont found himself possessed of an income of a thousand a
year, which enabled him to become a member of Adrien's set,
notwithstanding that the amount was a much smaller one than he had been
led to expect, and, in his opinion, savoured almost of aristocratic
poverty.

The car had rolled silently into a side street off St. James's, where
the chauffeur pulled up sharply at the door of one of the old-fashioned,
though now newly-painted houses. Vermont sprang out and rang the bell
twice.

"Has Miss Lester returned yet?" he asked of the smart maid who opened
the door.

"Yes, sir," she answered, and promptly led the way up a newly-carpeted
staircase, redolent of Parma violet scent and glistening with white
enamelled woodwork and plaster casts. The walls were adorned with
pictures in the worst possible taste and the most glaring colours. As
Vermont reached the first floor, a strong, savoury odour filled the air.

He smiled sarcastically, and sniffed as if the perfume were familiar to
him.

"Miss Lester at supper?" he asked the white-capped maid, as she threw
open the door on the first floor, and stood aside to let the visitor
precede her.

"Yes, sir; supper's been served," was the demure answer.

Vermont passed into the room, which was furnished with the same lack of
taste as the staircase. Two women were seated at the table, apparently
just finishing their supper.

At first glance they might have been mistaken for mother and daughter,
as the elder woman was clad in a sombre black velvet dress, and had a
pale, thin face, crowned with heavy masses of grey hair. On closer
inspection, however, one perceived that Julia Lester was far from
old--indeed, not more than about forty-five, and with a peculiarly
gentle, almost child-like expression, which at first took one almost by
surprise.

On the other hand, her sister, though only about ten years younger,
would easily have passed as twenty-five, especially when behind the
footlights, which was her usual environment.

"Oh, it's you, Jasper, is it?" she remarked carelessly, pausing in the
act of lighting a cigarette. "Didn't hear you come in. You're so quiet
on your pins."

Like the house she inhabited, Miss Lester combined in her person
prodigality of colours with a fine disregard of taste. Beautiful she
undoubtedly was, with the black-browed, dark-eyed beauty of a Cleopatra,
for there was some Italian blood in her veins. It was given out
occasionally by the Press that she had been a theatre-dresser, an
organ-grinder, and fifty other things; but nevertheless, illiterate,
common and ill-bred, she had yet achieved fame--or rather, perhaps,
notoriety---by her dancing and sheer animal good looks.

As a matter of fact she owed her success primarily to Jasper Vermont,
who, as a young man and during a quarrel with his father, had lodged in
the same house with the handsome sisters, Julia, and Ada Lester, the
latter then being only about fifteen years of age. He had fallen
violently in love with Julia, then in the height of her beauty, and had
cruelly deceived her. To appease the indignation of the younger sister
he had got her an introduction to the manager of the Rockingham Theatre,
who was about to put on a new Egyptian ballet, and from that time
onwards it had been plain sailing for Ada. Later on came a meeting with
Leroy, planned by Jasper's connivance; and Adrien, attracted by the
woman's ripe beauty, had been blind, so far, to the deficiencies of her
mind and character.

To-night she looked a veritable daughter of the South. Her dress was of
scarlet, touched with black, and she was wearing diamonds--gifts from
her many admirers--of such intrinsic value as to render many a countess
jealous.

"Yes, it is I," said Vermont. "Onions and cigarettes! I thought Leroy
objected to both."

Ada laughed.

"It's the smell he don't like," she said lightly. "He's so particular.
But he's not coming to-night; leastways, he said he wasn't."

"Ah!" said Vermont smiling, as he seated himself at the table and took
up a small bottle which proved to be empty, "Is there anything left to
drink?"

"Have some fizz," said Ada hospitably. "Ring the bell, Ju, and give me
another chop. Well, Jasper, what's the news?"

"Just the question I was about to ask," he replied, as the maid-servant
brought in a bottle of champagne and glasses on a silver tray. "How did
the comedy go?"

"Rotten!" pronounced Ada shortly. "I told Adrien it wouldn't go, though
I did my best--didn't I, Ju? The frocks were really first-class--blue
satin and silver, with loads of pearls, and my turquoise armlets. All
right, eh?"

"Yes," agreed Vermont, adding, with a sneer, "Perhaps the stupid public
got tired of looking at the blue satin."

"Then they could have looked at me instead," retorted Ada tartly. "But
I've no patience with Adrien. Why can't he get 'em something lively? A
musical comedy now--I could make that go, if you like! Plenty of songs
and no talky-talky business. Besides, I _can_ dance."

"But can't act," murmured Jasper, with his sarcastic smile.

"Can't I!" cried Ada furiously. "That's all you know about it. Why
didn't you come last night?"

"Business," he answered carelessly, sipping his wine; adding, as he saw
her about to question him, "With which I won't trouble you, my fair
Ada."

"Oh won't you!" was that lady's retort. "You're mighty polite, I must
say. I suppose you were down at that old Castle again, and Adrien too!
What were you doing there?"

"Minding our own business," he replied smilingly, as he lit a cigarette.

"Close as a fox, you are," she declared, with a short, disagreeable
laugh. "Where's Adrien? Down there still?"

"No; at the Thessalian. I left him there with Mortimer Shelton."

"I hate that man," said Miss Lester viciously.

"So do I," agreed Vermont, "but I don't say so. Anyhow, Adrien's safe
there for another hour, and I came on to give you a word of warning."

He turned to her companion, who had been quietly finishing her supper as
if unconscious of anyone's presence.

"Julia, you look tired; you'd better get off to bed."

She rose and hesitated for a moment, looking from him to Ada; then
quietly left the room. Vermont gazed after her, much as he would have
watched a useless piece of furniture in course of removal; then he leant
back in his chair, and, before resuming, regarded fixedly Ada's flushed,
handsome face.

"Well?" she queried, impatiently striking the table with her fork.

Jasper leant forward and spoke with calm, unpleasant deliberation.

"Ada," said he, "there was once a person who killed the goose that laid
him golden eggs; there was another who beat his horse till it pitched
him into the ditch; but neither of these attained such a height of folly
as Miss Lester bids fair to reach, if she persists in worrying her prize
donkey into kicking her to the ground and leaving her in the mud."

"Oh, don't be an idiot, Jasper!" she exclaimed irritably. "Speak out
plain, can't you?"

"I certainly can, and will, my dear lady. To put it plainly, then, you
are going the quickest way to make Adrien tired of you. After all, if
you happen to possess a goose with the propensity to lay golden eggs,
surely it is wise to humour him. And if the said goose happens to
dislike the smell of onions, why fill the house with that particular
perfume, sufficient to suffocate an elephant? Again, is it not the
height of folly to stick plaster statues on the staircase which he
ascends daily, when you know this particular goose detests imitation
art? In short, my dear Ada, if you persist in thrusting vulgarity down
his throat, you will find yourself very soon out of the graces of our
friend, Adrien Leroy."

Ada, who had been beating a loud tattoo with the fork which she still
held in her hand, sprang to her feet and struck the table with a force
which set the glasses jingling.

"Jasper!" she almost shouted. "You'll drive me mad! Why don't you speak
out and say what you mean? What's the matter with Adrien? What does he
want? Aren't there a hundred men who'd be glad enough to furnish a house
for me as I like? And can't I even eat what I choose without Adrien
Leroy's delicate nose being turned up in disapproval?"

"You can go to the deuce, if you like, my dear," declared Jasper with a
calm smile. "I merely warn you that you are on the way to finding
yourself in the street, if I may be allowed to speak out. Have another
cigarette, and spray some patchouli about the room. There are more geese
than one, as you say; and, after all, it is hard if you can't indulge in
onions in your own room at one o'clock in the morning."

Goaded almost to desperation by the sneering sarcasm of Vermont's words,
the woman threw down her fork, thereby smashing a champagne glass, and
thrust her angry, flushed countenance close to his.

"What's your game?" she hissed. "Are you playing with me and Adrien? Are
you setting him against me? I know your artful tricks; but don't you
play 'em on me, Jasper! What are you doing up at the Castle so often?
Making yourself pleasant to old Lord Barminster's niece there, I'll be
bound. P'raps she ain't fond of scent or a pork chop or two, and she can
have real statues if she likes. You don't remind him of that, do you?
Oh, no, of course not! But you mind your skin, Jasper, for you can't
play fast and loose with me. Shuffle him on to that Constance girl, and
I'll make you pay for it. I know something you wouldn't like my lord to
hear about; so, if you don't want me to open my mouth and split on your
little games, don't you play me any of your tricks, that's all, or I'll
go straight to Adrien and tell him all!"

She stopped, out of breath, and Jasper Vermont, springing to his feet,
glared down at her in impotent fury. But she only laughed at his angry
face.

"Oh, no, you wouldn't like Adrien to know how you fooled poor Julia,
though it is over twenty years ago. I haven't forgotten, if you have,
how you took her over to Paris while I was away on my first tour, and
went through some form of marriage with her. You wouldn't like him to
know how you told her what you'd done, when there was no longer need to
keep it dark from your father, and of the attack of brain fever it
brought on, poor dear! You were a nice brute to her, you were, Jasper
Vermont; and it's a lucky thing for you and her too that when she
recovered her memory had gone, and she forgot you as well as the child."

Jasper stirred uneasily.

"I didn't think she would have cared so much," he said. "Besides, she's
all right now; she only forgets those few years."

"Lucky thing for you," repeated Ada dryly.

"What have you done with the child?" he asked suddenly.

His companion's face lighted up with malicious triumph.

"I've put her where you can't find her, anyhow," she said. "You shan't
break her heart, as you did her mother's."

"Oh, nonsense, Ada!" said Vermont contemptuously. "Don't begin to
rant--you're not on the stage now. I kept all my promises to you, at any
rate. I got you on at the Rockingham and I introduced you to Leroy; and
if you had only played your cards properly you would have hooked him by
this time. As it is, he'll marry his cousin, if you're not careful."

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