Mrs. Raffles by John Kendrick Bangs (best romance books of all time TXT) 📖

when along came Mrs. Shadd's cards announcing that she would be pleased to have Mrs. Van Raffles at Onyx House on Friday evening, August 27th, to meet Herr Jockobinski, the eminent virtuoso.

"It's very annoying," said Henriette, as she opened and read the invitation. "I had quite set my heart on having Jockobinski here. Not that I care particularly about the music end of it, but because there is nothing that gives a woman so assured a social position as being the hostess of an animal of his particular kind. You remember, Bunny, how completely Mrs. Shadd wrested the leadership from Mrs. Gaster two seasons ago with her orang outang dinner, don't you?"

I confessed to having read something about such an incident in high society.

"Well," said Henriette, "_this_ would have thrown that little episode wholly in the shade. Of course Mrs. Shadd is doing this to retain her grip, but it irritates me more than I can say to have her get it just the same. Heaven knows I was willing to pay for it if I had to abscond with a national bank to get the money."

"It isn't too late, is it?" I queried.

"Not too late?" echoed Henriette. "Not too late with Mrs. Shadd's cards out and the whole thing published in the papers?"

"It's never too late for a woman of your resources to do anything she has a mind to do," said I. "It seems to me that a person who could swipe a Carnegie library the way you did should have little difficulty in lifting a musicale. Of course I don't know how you could do it, but with _your_ mind--well, I should be surprised and disappointed if you couldn't devise some plan to accomplish your desires."

Henriette was silent for a moment, and then her face lit up with one of her most charming smiles.

"Bunny, do you know that at times, in spite of your supreme stupidity, you are a source of positive inspiration to me?" she said, looking at me, fondly, I ventured to think.

"I am glad if it is so," said I. "Sometimes, dear Henriette, you will find the most beautiful flowers growing out of the blackest mud. Perhaps hid in the dull residuum of my poor but honest gray matter lies the seed of real genius that will sprout the loveliest blossoms of achievement."

"Well, anyhow, dear, you have started me thinking, and maybe we'll have Jockobinski at Bolivar Lodge yet," she murmured. "I want to have him first, of course, or not at all. To be second in doing a thing of that kind is worse than never doing it at all."

Days went by and not another word was spoken on the subject of Jockobinski and the musicale, and I began to feel that at last Henriette had reached the end of her ingenuity--though for my own part I could not blame her if she failed to find some plausible way out of her disappointment. Wednesday night came, and, consumed by curiosity to learn just how the matter stood, I attempted to sound Henriette on the subject.

"I should like Friday evening off, Mrs. Van Raffles," said I. "If you are going to Mrs. Shadd's musicale you will have no use for me."

"Shut up, Bunny," she returned, abruptly. "I shall need you Friday night more than ever before. Just take this note over to Mrs. Shadd this evening and leave it--mind you, don't wait for an answer but just leave it, that's all."

She arose from the table and handed me a daintily scented missive addressed to Mrs. Shadd, and I faithfully executed her errand. Bunderby, the Shadd's butler, endeavored to persuade me to wait for an answer, but assuring him that I wasn't aware that an answer was expected I returned to Bolivar Lodge. An hour later Bunderby appeared at the back door and handed me a note addressed to my mistress, which I immediately delivered.

"Is Bunderby waiting?" asked Henriette as she read the note.

"Yes," I answered.

"Tell him to hand this to Mrs. Shadd the very first thing upon her return to-morrow evening," she said, hastily scribbling off a note and putting it in an envelope, which by chance she left unsealed, so that on my way back below-stairs I was able to read it. What it said was that she would be only too happy to oblige Mrs. Shadd, and was very sorry indeed to hear that her son had been injured in an automobile accident while running into Boston from Bar Harbor. It closed with the line, "you must know, my dear Pauline, that there isn't anything I wouldn't do for you, come weal or come woe."

This I handed to Bunderby and he made off. On my return Henriette was dressed for travel.

"I must take the first train for New York," she said, excitedly. "You will have the music-room prepared at once, Bunny. Mrs. Shadd's musicale will be given here. I am going myself to make all the necessary arrangements at the New York end. All you have to do is to get things ready and rely on your ignorance for everything else. See?"

I could only reflect that if a successful issue were dependent upon my ignorance I had a plentiful supply of it to fall back on. Henriette made off at once for Providence by motor-car, and got the midnight train out of Boston for the city where, from what I learned afterwards, she must have put in a strenuous day on Thursday. At any rate, a great sensation was sprung on Newport on Friday morning. Every member of the smart set in the ten-o'clock mail received a little engraved card stating that owing to sudden illness in the Shadd family the Shadd musicale for that evening would be held at Bolivar Lodge instead of in the Onyx House ballroom. Friday afternoon Jockobinski's private and particular piano arrived at the Lodge and was set up promptly in the music-room, and later when the caterers arrived with the supper for the four hundred odd guests bidden to the feast all was in readiness for them. Everything was running smoothly, and, although Henriette had not yet arrived, I felt easy and secure of mind until nearing five-thirty o'clock when Mrs. Shadd herself drove up to the front-door. Her color was unusually high, and had she been any but a lady of the _grande monde_ I should have said that she was flustered.

She demanded rather than asked to see my mistress, with a hauteur born of the arctic snow.

"Mrs. Van Raffles went to New York Wednesday evening," said I, "and has not yet returned. I am expecting her every minute, madame. She must be here for the musicale. Won't you wait?"

"Indeed I will," said she, abruptly. "The musicale, indeed! Humph!" And she plumped herself down in one of the drawing-room chairs so hard that it was as much as I could do to keep from showing some very unbutlerian concern for the safety of the furniture.

I must say I did not envy Henriette the meeting that was in prospect, for it was quite evident that Mrs. Shadd was mad all through. In spite of my stupidity I rather thought I could divine the cause too. She was not kept long in waiting, for ten minutes later the automobile, with Henriette in it, came thundering up the drive. I tried as I let her in to give her a hint of what awaited her, but Mrs. Shadd forestalled me, only however to be forestalled herself.

"Oh, my dear Pauline!" Henriette cried, as she espied her waiting visitor. "It is _so_ good of you to come over. I'm pretty well fagged out with all the arrangements for the night and I _do_ hope your son is better."

"My son is not ill, Mrs. Van Raffles," said Mrs. Shadd, coldly. "I have come to ask you what--"

"Not ill?" cried Henriette, interrupting her. "Not ill, Pauline? Why,"--breathlessly--"that's the most extraordinary thing I ever heard of. Why am _I_ giving the musicale to-night then, instead of you?"

"That is precisely what I have come to find out," said Mrs. Shadd.

"Why--well, of all queer things," said Henriette, flopping down in a chair. "Surely, you got my note saying that I would let Jockobinski play here to-night instead of--"

"I did receive a very peculiar note from you saying that you would gladly do as I wished," said Mrs. Shadd, beginning herself to look less angry and more puzzled.

"In reply to your note of Wednesday evening," said Henriette. "Certainly you wrote to me Wednesday evening? It was delivered by your own man, Blunderby I think his name is? About half-past seven o'clock it was--Wednesday."

"Yes, Bunderby did carry a note to you from me on Wednesday," said Mrs. Shadd. "But--"

"And in it you said that you were called to Boston by an accident to your son Willie in his automobile: that you might not be able to get back in time for to-night's affair and wouldn't I take it over," protested Mrs. Van Raffles, vehemently.

"I?" said Mrs. Shadd, showing more surprise than was compatible with her high social position.

"And attend to all the details--your very words, my dear Pauline," said Henriette, with an admirably timed break in her voice. "And I did, and _I told you I would_. I immediately put on my travelling gown, motored to Providence, had an all-night ride to New York on a very uncomfortable sleeper, went at once to Herr Jockobinski's agent and arranged the change, notified Sherry to send the supper to my house instead of yours, drove to Tiffany's and had the cards rushed through and mailed to everybody on your list--you know you kindly gave me your list when I first came to Newport--and attended to the whole thing, and now I come back to find it all a--er--a mistake! Why, Pauline, it's positively awful! What _can_ we do?"

Henriette was a perfect picture of despair. "I don't suppose we can do anything now," said Mrs. Shadd, ruefully. "It's too late. The cards have gone to everybody. You have all the supper--not a sandwich has come to my house--and I presume all of Mr. Jockobinski's instruments as well have come here."

Henriette turned to me.

"All, madame," said I, briefly.

"Well," said Mrs. Shadd, tapping the floor nervously with her toe. "I don't understand it. _I never_ wrote that note."

"Oh, but Mrs. Shadd--I have it here," said Henriette, opening her purse and extracting the paper. "You can read it for yourself. What else could I do after that?"

Innocence on a monument could have appeared no freer of guile than Henriette at that moment. She handed the note to Mrs. Shadd, who perused it with growing amazement.

"Isn't that your handwriting--and your crest and your paper?" asked Henriette, appealingly.

"It certainly looks like it," said Mrs. Shadd. "If I didn't know I _hadn't_ written it I would have sworn I had. Where could it have come from?"

"I supposed it came from Onyx House," said Henriette simply, glancing at the envelope.

"Well--it's a very mysterious affair," said Mrs. Shadd, rising, "and I--oh, well, my dear woman, I--I can't blame you--indeed, after all you have done I ought to be--and really am--very much obliged to you. Only--"

"Whom did you have at dinner Wednesday night, dear?" asked Henriette.

"Only the Duke and Duchess of Snarleyow and--mercy! I wonder if he could have done it!"

"Who?" asked Henriette.

"_Tommy Dare!_" ejaculated Mrs. Shadd, her eyes beginning to twinkle. "Do you suppose this is one of Tommy Dare's