The Danger Mark

She turned and scrutinised him insultingly:

"I don't know," she said, "how many kinds of treachery you are capable of."

"What do you mean?"

"What I say. Frankly, I don't know what you are capable of doing with my money. If I can judge by what you've done with my married life, I scarcely feel inclined to confide in you financially."

"There is no use in going over that again," he said patiently. "We differ little from ordinary people, I fancy. I think our house is as united as the usual New York domicile. The main thing is to keep it so. And in a time of some slight apprehension and financial uneasiness—perhaps even of possible future stress—you and I, for our own sakes, should stand firmly together to weather any possible gale."

"I think I am able to weather whatever I am responsible for," she said. "If you do the same, we can get on as well as we ever have."

"I don't believe you understand," he persisted, forcing a patient smile. "All business in the world is conducted upon borrowed capital. I merely–"

"Do you need more capital?" she inquired, so bluntly that he winced.

"Yes, for a few months. I may require a little additional collateral–"

"Why don't you borrow it, then?"

"There is no necessity if you will temporarily transfer–"

"Can you borrow it? Or is the ice in your trust company too rotten to stand the strain?"

He flushed darkly and the temper began to escape in his voice:

"Has anybody hinted that I couldn't? Have you been discussing my personal business affairs with any of the pups whom you drag about at your heels? No matter what your personal attitude toward me may be, only a fool would undermine the very house that–"

"I don't believe you understand, Jack," she said quietly; "I care absolutely nothing about your house."

"Well, you care about your own social status, I suppose!" he retorted sharply.

"Not very much."

"That's an imbecile thing to say!"

"Is it?" She turned to the mirror and touched her powdered hair lightly with both hands, and continued speaking with her back turned toward him:

"I married you for love. Remember that. There was even something of it alive in the roots, I think, until within a few days—in spite of what you are, what you have done to me. Now the thing is dead. I can tell you when it died, if you like."

And as he said nothing:

"It died when I came in late one evening, and, passing my corridor and a certain locked door, I heard a young girl sobbing. Then it died."

She turned on him, contemptuously indifferent, and surveyed him at her leisure:

"Your conduct to me has been such as to deliberately incite me to evil. Your attitude has been a constant occult force, driving me toward it. By the life you have led, and compelled me to lead, you have virtually set a premium upon my infidelity. What you may have done, I don't know; what you have done, even recently, I am not sure of. But I know this: you took my life and made a parody of it. I never lived; I have been tempted to. If the opportunity comes, I will."

Dysart rose, his face red and distorted:

"I thought young Mallett had taught you to live pretty rapidly!" he said.

"No," she replied, "you only thought other people thought so. That is why you resented it. Your jealousy is of that sort—you don't care what I am, but you do care what the world thinks I am. And that is all there ever was to you—all there ever will be: desperate devotion to your wretched little social status, which includes sufficient money and a chaste wife to make it secure."

She laughed; fastened a gardenia in her hair:

"I don't know about your money, and I don't care. As for your wife, she will remain chaste as long as it suits her, and not one fraction of a second longer."

"Are you crazy?" he demanded.

"Why, it does seem crazy to you, I suppose—that a woman should have no regard for the sacredness of your social status. I have no regard for it. As for your honour"—she laughed unpleasantly—"I've never had it to guard, Jack. And I'll be responsible for my own, and the tarnishing of it. I think that is all I have to say."

She walked leisurely toward the door, passing him with a civil nod of dismissal, and left him standing there in his flower-embroidered court-dress, the electric light shining full on the thin gray hair at his temples.

In the corridor she met Naïda, charming in her blossom-embroidered panniers; and she took both her hands and kissed her, saying:

"Perhaps you won't care to have me caress you some day, so I'll take this opportunity, dear. Where is your brother?"

"Duane is dressing," she said. "What did you mean by my not wishing to kiss you some day?"

"Nothing, silly." And she passed on, turned to the right, and met Sylvia Quest, looking very frail and delicate in her bath-robe and powdered hair. The girl passed her with the same timid, almost embarrassed little inclination with which she now invariably greeted her, and Rosalie turned and caught her, turning her around with a laugh. "What is the matter, dear?"

"M-matter?" stammered Sylvia, trembling under the reaction.

"Yes. You are not very friendly, and I've always liked you. Have I offended you, Sylvia?"

She was looking smilingly straight into the blue eyes.

"No—oh, no!" said the girl hastily. "How can you think that, Mrs. Dysart?"

"Then I don't think it," replied Rosalie, laughing. "You are a trifle pale, dear. Touch up your lips a bit. It's very Louis XVI. See mine?… Will you kiss me, Sylvia?"

Again a strange look flickered in the girl's eyes; Rosalie kissed her gently; she had turned very white.

"What is your costume?" asked Mrs. Dysart.

"Flame colour and gold."

"Hell's own combination, dear," laughed Rosalie. "You will make an exquisite little demon shepherdess."

And she went on, smiling back at the girl in friendly fashion, then turned and lightly descended the stairway, snapping on her loup-mask before the jolly crowd below could identify her.

Masked figures here and there detained her, addressing her in disguised voices, but she eluded them, slipped through the throngs on terrace and lawn, ran down the western slope and entered the rose-garden. A man in mask and violet-gray court costume rose from a marble seat under the pergola and advanced toward her, the palm of his left hand carelessly balanced on his gilded hilt.

"So you did get my note, Duane?" she said, laying her pretty hand on his arm.

"I certainly did. What can I do for you, Rosalie?"

"I don't know. Shall we sit here a moment?"