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Show THE-'-GIFT-WIFE... O RUPERT HUGHES WNU SERVICE By RUPERT HUGHES CHAPTER XII Continued 13 Jebb's whisper reached her. She started, turned, saw him, checked a cry with a swift hand to her mouth. Then she rose as she alone could rise, like a lark came to him fleetly, fleet-ly, lithely, oblivious of her unwonted costume. Their hands met in a fierce clutch and she dropped at his side. "I I didn't know you at first in those clothes." He could have cursed himself for such sublime inanity, but her greeting greet-ing was small improvement on his: "Bidden" you know me? I knewed you the feerst meenute I heard you weesper." They stared at each other and she flushed a little deeper as she asked: "But you didden' call me hanim effendi or madame like that you used to what it was the word you call me joost now?" "Mirumal" She closed her eyes and breathed deep as if the sound were perfume. Of all Fate's practical jokes this seemed to Jebb the meanest, that he should meet Minima like this in a crowded hotel parlorl and that another an-other woman should be coming for him at any moment. CHAPTER XIII Rarely has a Woman's Five Minutes Min-utes been -longer than Jennie Lud-lam's, Lud-lam's, rarely has it seemed shorter. Minima was saying with a childish child-ish giggle: "You didden' know me at feerst. See if you know me now?" And she She was so beautiful, now, alone; so doubly lovable here in the surroundings sur-roundings of civilization. She would honor him and his name anywhere. But he and his name would not honor her. What protection could he give her when he could not protect himself? He had fought the battle through in Uskub and had chosen the honorabler course, had silenced his love and fled with it That she had come up with him and that she was here at his mercy did not change his duty. He was wondering how to broach the subject to Jennie Ludlam and her brother and the ring, when he heard his name paged along the corridor. He called the boy and was informed in-formed that Miss Ludlam was waiting wait-ing for him in a lower alcove. Jebb answered: "Ich komm' sofortl" The boy went his way, and Jebb turned to find a troubled curiosity on Minima's face. "Miss Ludlam is er you remember remem-ber that ring I had?" "Yes." "It belonged to her." "But you did say you buyed It in Cologne." "Did I?" "You sayed it had no associations." associa-tions." "It hasn't." "And I find you here; you wait for her: the beautiful Mees Lood-lam?" Lood-lam?" She rose and crushed the Jealousy, the disillusionment, the shattered "There's your brother now," Jebb exclaimed. "No! Impossible! So it is!" and she left him and made an almost un-old-maidenly haste, catching her brother just as he was asking for her at the desk. His eye fell on Jebb. He stopped short, snorted like a bull, and charged. "So here you are, eh? I never expected ex-pected to see you again." "Again?" cried Jennie, "you've seen him?" "Have I seen him! Didn't he give me the slip in Munich?" "You've met Mr. Pierpont before! Isn't that funny?" "Pierpont? That's Dr. Jebb." "Dr. Jebb! why" she turned to Jebb. "That's the name," said Jebb. "And I got your ring away from him, Jennie. See, here it is." And he fished it out. "He wouldn't tell me how he came by it, though." "Wasn't that delicate of him?" And she beamed on Jebb till she frightened him. "Delicate!" gasped Charlie. "Delicate! "Del-icate! Then you really did give it to him? Then it is true that you" "Sit down, you old dear, and I'll tell you." She toppled the mountain on to the wailing divan. "It's an old story to you, Mr. Pierpont," Pier-pont," she said, "but you won't mind hearing it again. Well, to begin at the beginning, you see, Charlie, you wrote me that you were going into the mountains for a month or so of hunting. Just after you disappeared, Charlie, I had a call for five thou- nnrl rinllnra mnro ma to i n nn mw the sum in English bank notes. Then he said: " 'You must have something to get along on till you hear from your brother or till your bank reopens,' and he actually wanted to give me a thousand dollars more. But I compromised com-promised on five hundred. The next morning I had the money at the brokers' bright and early and I made a solemn resolve that I'd never nev-er speculate on margins again." "Did you keep the vow?" grinned Charlie. She pouted meekly: "Well, I might have kept it if the stock hadn't gone skyrocketing up again. It never rains but it pours, you know, and in two days that awful aw-ful bank was reorganized and reopened, re-opened, and my letter of credit was all right But when I came to look for Mr. Pierpont he had paid his bill and disappeared, taking his little niece along with him." "But the ring the ring," said brother Charles, voicing a curiosity that was aching in Jebb's breast "how did you come to give him the ring I gave you?" "Such a silly question, Charlie. Can't you see I felt so ashamed of taking his money with no security, that I forced it on him. He didn't want to take it but I made him. When he learned it was worth only about half what he lent me he consented." con-sented." Charlie rounded on Jebb: "Well, why in thunder didn't you tell me all this on the train when I accused you of stealing the ring?" "That was his delicacy. Can't you stock in the oh, that awful investment invest-ment you let me in for." "Rock Island, you mean." "That's it You told me to hold for a rise." "Well, I see by the paper that it's up twenty-nine points." "Yes, but at that time somebody attacked it and the bottom fell out for a few days. I had word one afternoon from my brokers in Munich Mu-nich that if I didn't cover the drop by morning I'd be wiped out." "Is that so! Somebody was hammering ham-mering her, I suppose." "Well, whoever hammered it it hit the toboggan and I stood to lose , all I had put up. That very evening eve-ning the cablegrams announced that my bank in New York had been looted by its president, and had closed its doors. I found where the cashier of my Munich bank lived and telephoned his house. He said that my letter of credit was good for nothing unless the bank opened again. I was simply in despair. "At that moment who should come along but Mr. Pierpont here. I didn't know him and he didn't know me, but he heard me crying, and said, 'Pardon me, madame, is there anything any-thing I can do for you?' It sounded so good to hear an American voice and he spoke so gently and I was so weak that I just up and told him the story. "Well, what do you suppose this angel of a Mr. Pierpont did? I can hear him now 'There, there, my poor child' " she laughed moistly; "he called me his poor child when I'm old enough to be his mother!" But Charlie was impatient: "Go on. What did he say?" "He said, 'There, there, my poor child; if you'll stop crying, I'll give you the money.' I said, 'You'll lend me twenty thousand marks me! a total stranger!' 'Certainly,' he said, 'you are an American,' and I said, 'But I have no security,' and he said, 'You're an American' as if that proved anything! "He wouldn't listen to any argument argu-ment or scruples, he just asked me to excuse him while he went to his room and got at his money-belt; and when he came back he handed me I see, Charlie? He didn't want to involve in-volve me." Charles could understand that he owed Jebb a handsome apology, and he put it in his own terms. "I guess the drinks are on me, old man. I've made a Jackass of myself, and I admit it What'll it be?" But Jebb declined to liquidate the account. And then sister Jennie said she must run up to her room and write him a check for twenty-two thousand marks. "Would you mind making the check payable to David Jebb?" "David Jebb?" "That's the name you gave me on the train," her brother put in. "That's my real name," said Jebb. Now Charlie was off again: "But why did you call yourself Pierpont to my sister?" ' "Hush, Charlie, don't make another an-other exhibition of yourself. He was traveling incog. Very rich people often do that." t Brother Charles and Jebb were such mutually discomforting companions com-panions that when they were left together to-gether Ludlam grew restive: "Come on into the cafe and have something." "No. thanks." "Well, will you excuse me if I do? I've Just got in from Munich and I'm horribly thirsty." "Don't let me keep you." Left alone, Jebb was overcome by this new turn of the wheel. The money meant so much to him jusi now; it meant power, salvation from infinite humiliations; it meant funds for the pursuit of Cynthia. Then the luxury of being a minor Croesus faded before a keen anxiety anxi-ety fnr Miruma. He must find her She must be told the news, the news that solved everything. He would go to the desk and send her his card, imploring her to grant him a hearing. He paused what was her name? Miruma was her first name what was her last? Had she registered as hanim effendi? or madame hanim? or Mme Fehmi Pasha or what? (TO BE CONTINUED) "But I compromised on five hundred." trust back in her breast Jebb rose to her side whispering: "Hanim effendim! madame! Miruma! I beg you! I can explain if you" "Please! if you would not have me shame myself here please speak nothing let me go" She hurried away as fast as she dared, slipping through the crowd with a lithe panther-like grace that impressed him even then. He stood fast and saw her vanish. And then he heard a voice back of him a sweet and womanly voice: "Is this Dr. Jebb?" He was brought sharply to book, by a gasp of surprise. "Why, it's Mr. Pierpont. The card said it was Dr. Jebb." His worst fears seemed realized by the swift change from the formal greeting for Dr. Jebb to the gush of cordiality for Mr. Pierpont. And his uneasiness was increased by the hid the lower part of her face, peering peer-ing over the white, white hand that mimicked a yashmak. "Oh, I knew you as soon as I saw those eyes." "Jebb Effendi remembers these eyes, then?" "They are the most wonderful eyes in the world." "Mazallah! A compliment!" "You're no longer in Turkey. Don't be afraid." Then he flew to safer topics: "But how did you ever get here? and when?" "Didden' you received my letters?" let-ters?" "No." "I sended you twice letters!" He explained the Trieste contre-tempts contre-tempts briefly, but neglected to mention men-tion the Ludlams. She looked sad: "Then I deed not helped youl I hoped so much to help you. You have finded the guzeljik the pretty leetla girl vitout me!" "I have not found her." "You deed not try the Budapest place, then?" "What Budapest place?" "I sended you in my letter a postcard. post-card. You did not been to Budapest?" Buda-pest?" "I came through there, but I didn't stop except to eat" "Only to eat! Yazik, aman, aman! What a pity! The child was perhaps very near you. Leesten. The day after you have goed, Jaffar is breeng to me a picture postcard. He say he find it tack up on the wall In the room of one of the other servants. The man say he find it long time before in the room where Jaffar maked your clothes dry after you first earned to my home you remember?" re-member?" "Do I remember!" "Jaffar say peerhaps the picture is fall out of your pocket out, and shall he burn it. I take it and send it to you in a letter." "It is in Trieste now, then. You say it was a picture postcard?" yes he is a carte postale in many colors a picture of a bttle ada how you say island. And it say I cannot pronounce the majar language but I can spell if you have a pencil" He gave her a card and his fountain pen and she wrote "Margit-Sziget Budapest." "Who is Margit Seegit? I wonder?" won-der?" "I think he Is the name of the island. is-land. The picture is of a beautiful park. And on eet is writed in a writing writ-ing like the little writing you sended send-ed to me, 'Dear Mother: Do not worry. I am having a nice time here in theese beautiful place weet Mees-ter Mees-ter Pierpont Do you know a man name Pierpont?" Jebb nodded impatiently. "Was that all?" "No, then comes, t'Your loving child!' and then in beeg letters like a child is print them, C-Y-N-T-H-I-A the name of the leetla girl yes? Are you remembering such a place?" He shook his head blankly. "I must go to Budapest by the first train. Surely I'll find the poor little waif there. You are an angel to write me. And now we've talked so much about my affairs. Tell me about you. What brought you to Vienna?" It was a brusque question and she answered it with a blush of meek confusion that told him more than he had dared to believe. She had followed him like another Ruth. "But tell me, are you did Fehmi Pasha grant you the the talaq?" "I am nobody's hanim now. I am joost me. I am free now." sight of what Mr. Pierpont had affianced af-fianced him to. For he saw before him a short lady whom even a flatterer flat-terer would call plump. So this was sister Jennie! As he stared at her in a daze, she smiled tenderly and said as she pressed his hand and kept it: "Was this one of your jokes sending send-ing up a strange name and asking for my brother? Was it just to surprise sur-prise me?" "Is isn't your brother here?" "Why, no, he's in Servia somewhere some-where in the mountains hunting big game. Don't you remember my telling tell-ing you in Munich? Do you suppose that if he had been where I could reach him I should have accepted all that money from you?" "N-no, I suppose not" "I'm awfully glad to see you," she pattered on. "Do sit down," and she dropped into Minima's place on the divan. "It was awfully embarrassing embar-rassing to me that you should disappear dis-appear so completely, and leave no trace." Knowing nothing else to do, he just shrugged his shoulders and smiled. Meanwhile, sister Jennie sat and purred over him, like an amiable tabby with a disabled mouse between be-tween her paws. As his eyes rolled distressfully he saw brother Charlie steam into the hotel and push to the desk like liner crowding up to a pier. |