“That’s right—but she lent it to Alicia Rytina, the opera singer. My mother had most of the Metropolitan here last night and Alicia Rytina thought she had tonsillitis—I don’t mean my mother—I mean Rytina. And she left it in a taxi.”
There were now three other boys beside him on the steps.
“Where is Mrs. TenBroek?” said Gwen.
“To tell you the truth she’s on a boat.”
“Oh.”
“But it hasn’t sailed yet—she likes to get on board four hours ahead of time and get used to the motion. In fact we’re going down presently to see her off.”
“I’d like to give her the cape personally,” said Gwen.
“Good enough. It’s the Dacia, Pier 31, North River. Can we drive you down?”
“Thanks, I’ve got a taxi.”
The other three boys—they were aged about sixteen or seventeen—had begun to dance in unison on the steps. It was American dancing but it had an odd jerky English enthusiasm about it.
“These are the three mad Rhumba dancers of Eton,” explained Peddlar TenBroek. “I brought them over for the spring vacation.”
Still dancing they bowed together and Gwen laughed.
“Do you dance the rhumba?” TenBroek inquired.
“I used to,” she said tolerantly.
The three dancers looked somewhat offended. Gwen went down the steps.
“Tell mother we’ll be there soon,” said TenBroek.
As Ethan Kennicott drove off she said:
“They were attractive, but I wonder what made them think they were doing a modern dance.”
He was silent on the way to the pier. Even when they were held up by a long line of strawberry trucks he said nothing and she wondered if he was envying those other boys who had no worries at all.
She found out presently. When he had parked the car and they had started toward the pier entrance, he stopped suddenly.
“This is foolishness,” he said in an odd strained voice.
“What is?”
“Returning this fur. She shouldn’t have left it around.” He talked faster and faster as if he did not quite want to hear his own words. “She has dozens of furs and this is probably insured anyhow. It ought to be finders keepers—it’s really as much ours as the pearl your father found in the restaurant.”
“Oh, no it isn’t,” she exclaimed, “Because father had paid for the oysters.”
“We could probably get thousands for it. I could find out where to take it—”
Shocked, she cut him off.
“I wouldn’t think of such a thing—when we know exactly who owns it.”
“Nobody knows we’ve got it except those boys, and you don’t live in New York and they don’t know your name—”
“Stop it!” Gwen cried. “I never heard anything so terrible in my life. You know you wouldn’t do that. Come along right away—we’ll ride up on this thing.”
Taking his arm she drew him toward the moving belt that was carrying baggage up to the pier. She plopped down on it thinking he would sit beside her but at the last moment he shook himself free; and as she was borne slowly aloft surrounded by bags and golf clubs he stood looking after her—with the cape over his arm.
“Hey, what do you think you’re doing?” a guard called to Gwen. “That’s for baggage.”
But Gwen’s impassioned voice cut across him.
“Come right up here with that cape!”
Ethan shook his head slowly, and called back:
“You come down here—I want to talk to you first.”
An English voice behind him said suddenly:
“What’s all the trouble?”
Confused, Ethan turned around to confront Peddlar TenBroek and his three friends.
“The young lady went up on the moving belt,” he said, flushing.
“So she did. Well, we will too.”
The three English youths were in fact already on it, following in Gwen’s wake to the audible fury of the guard.
“We’d better go up the stairs,” said Peddlar throwing a curious look at Ethan. But when they joined the others above Gwen said nothing—only she averted her eyes from Ethan Kennicott.
The three Englishmen led the way clogging out the pier.
For a moment the wild activity about the gang-plank, hurrying stewards, the rumbling iron wheels of a hundred hand trucks, the swift smell of the harbour—momentarily drove the episode from Gwen’s mind. On the boat they went along many corridors lined by stewardesses with correctly folded arms. A huge bouquet preceded them, a bouquet sheathed in night jasmine, made of rare iris, delphinium, heliotrope and larkspur, with St. Joseph lilies, fresh from New Orleans. They followed in its fragrant path. When it had been crowded through a door the steward guiding them said:
“Here is Mrs. TenBroek’s salon.”
A blond flower of a woman, chic by Gwen’s most exacting standards, stood up to receive them and one of the English boys said:
“You can’t get away from the mad rhumba dancers, Mrs. TenBroek—even by going to the West Indies.”
The words thrilled Gwen; this was the trip of the bright catalogues—of tropical moons and flashing swimming pools and soft music on enchanted beaches.
Mrs. TenBroek saw the cape suddenly and exclaimed:
“Oh, so it’s been found!” She took it and looked it over eagerly. “Tell me, where was it found?”
“It may be a little dusty,” said Gwen, “It was out at 216th Street.”
“But what was it doing out there? I lent it to Madame Rytina, the singer, and surely she doesn’t live out there.”
“It was in this driver’s car,” said Gwen. “We both found it.”
“Well, you must sit down and tell me about it. I’m so relieved because it’s such a nice little cape.”
In a minute Gwen found herself telling what had taken her to 216th Street. When she had done Mrs. TenBroek said:
“And now you’ve missed your matinee—what a shame!” She looked at Gwen tentatively, not quite certain how to proceed. “I mentioned a reward in the afternoon paper—”
“Really this driver found it as much as I did,” Gwen interrupted quickly.
They all looked at Ethan Kennicott and Peddlar TenBroek said suddenly:
“That’s all very well—but I’d like to know what he was doing with the cloak down at the foot of the pier saying he wouldn’t bring it up to you.”
Ethan flushed.
“I didn’t say that.”
“You said something like that. Mother, she found the cape—he didn’t really have anything to do with it.”
“I never claimed I did,” said Ethan.
“Well, what about it?” inquired Mrs. TenBroek, “Who did find it?”
She broke off as the bell rang and the door opened emitting a rancid breeze from another world. The arch type of all the taxi drivers of legend stood there—soiled, sinister and tough as pig-skin.
“Anybody here lose a cape?” he demanded in no uncertain voice.
“What’s all this, steward?” asked Mrs. TenBroek sharply.
“He claims he found a cape, Madame.”
“Not ezatly found it,” Mr. Michaelson corrected him, “But I was driving the car when it was left in it. Then I turn the car over to this mug—” He indicated Ethan—“and he finds it and doesn’t tell me about it. I thought there was something funny when he came to the garage this morning and the old guy at your house tipped me off.”
Mrs. TenBroek looked impatiently from one driver to the other.
“I ought to get a split of that reward,” Michaelson said, “After I dropped them parties last night I went to the Grand Central and slep three hours without movin the car, just as if I was taking care of it.”
“But you didn’t know it was there.”
“Not exatly. This young guy comes along this morning and drives the car away before I can look in it. Here I been with the company nine years and this is the first day he was ever out and he finds it and don’t say nothing. And me with a wife—”
“I’ve had enough of this,” Mrs. TenBroek interrupted. “It’s quite plain that the young lady found the cape, and neither of you have the faintest claim to any reward.”
“What young lady?” demanded Mr. Michaelson. “Oh, her.”
“If you looked in the afternoon papers,” continued Mrs. TenBroek, “—You’d see I didn’t mention any sum so I’ll call it three dollars for each of you to pay for your time.”
She opened her purse and took the elastic from a row of bills.
“Three dollars for a chinchilly coat! Well, if that ain’t—”
“Be careful now,” interrupted Peddlar TenBroek.
“I got this guy to thank for it,” said Michaelson, “The rat never told me.”
He took a sudden step toward Ethan Kennicott and hit him a smashing left on the jaw, knocking him back over a low trunk and up with a smack against the wall. Then snarling “Keep your small change, lady,” he left the room.
“I say, he can’t get away with that!” exclaimed Peddlar TenBroek, and started after him.
“Let him go!” his mother ordered. “I can’t endure such scenes.”
One of the English boys had helped Ethan to his feet; he leaned rockily against the wall, his hand over his eyes.
Fumbling in her purse Mrs. TenBroek found a bill.
“Give this one ten dollars and tell him he can go too.”
Ethan stared at the bill and shook his head.
“Never mind,” he said.
“Put it in his pocket,” she insisted, “And make him go.”
“Somebody ought to help him off,” said Gwen, agonized, “He’s hurt.”
“I’ll help him off,” said the English boy. He asked one of the others to give him a hand.
As Gwen, shaken and confused, started to follow, Mrs. TenBroek stopped her.
“Do wait a minute till I get my breath? I want to talk to you.”
“He shouldn’t have hit him like that,” Gwen said.
“It was terrible—you shouldn’t ever get mixed up with such people.” She turned to her son. “Order me a glass of sherry, Peddlar, and some tea for this young lady.”
“No, thanks, I’ve got to go,” Gwen said. “I have to telephone my chaperone at the hotel.”
“You can phone from the ship. Go with her and find the phone, Peddlar.”
Gwen
