"I don"t know what you"re talking about," said the captain. He looked at Archie with an expression of distrust and hostility. "And I"ll tell you straight out I don"t like the looks of you. I believe you"re a pal of his."

"No longer," said Archie, firmly. "I mean to say, a chappie who makes you stand on a bally pedestal sort of arrangement and get a crick in the spine, and then doesn"t turn up and leaves you biffing all over the countryside in a bathing suit--"

The reintroduction of the bathing suit motive seemed to have the worst effect on the captain. He flushed darkly.

"Are you trying to josh me? I"ve a mind to soak you!"

"If ye plaze, sorr," cried Officer Donahue and Officer Ca.s.sidy in chorous. In the course of their professional career they did not often hear their superior make many suggestions with which they saw eye to eye, but he had certainly, in their opinion, spoken a mouthful now.

"No, honestly, my dear old thing, nothing was farther from my thoughts--"

He would have spoken further, but at this moment the world came to an end. At least, that was how it sounded. Somewhere in the immediate neighbourhood something went off with a vast explosion, shattering the gla.s.s in the window, peeling the plaster from the ceiling, and sending him staggering into the inhospitable arms of Officer Donahue.

The three guardians of the Law stared at one another.

"If ye plaze, sorr," said. Officer Ca.s.sidy, saluting.

"Well?"

"May I spake, sorr?"

"Well?"

"Something"s exploded, sorr!"

The information, kindly meant though it was, seemed to annoy the captain.

"What the devil did you think I thought had happened?" he demanded, with not a little irritation, "It was a bomb!"

Archie could have corrected this diagnosis, for already a faint but appealing aroma of an alcoholic nature was creeping into the room through a hole in the ceiling, and there had risen before his eyes the picture of J. B. Wheeler affectionately regarding that barrel of his on the previous morning in the studio upstairs. J. B. Wheeler had wanted quick results, and he had got them. Archie had long since ceased to regard J. B. Wheeler as anything but a tumour on the social system, but he was bound to admit that he had certainly done him a good turn now. Already these honest men, diverted by the superior attraction of this latest happening, appeared to have forgotten his existence.

"Sorr!" said Officer Donahue.

"Well?"

"It came from upstairs, sorr."

"Of course it came from upstairs. Ca.s.sidy!"

"Sorr?"

"Get down into the street, call up the reserves, and stand at the front entrance to keep the crowd back. We"ll have the whole city here in five minutes."

"Right, sorr."

"Don"t let anyone in."

"No, sorr."

"Well, see that you don"t. Come along, Donahue, now. Look slippy."

"On the spot, sorr!" said Officer Donahue.

A moment later Archie had the studio to himself. Two minutes later he was picking his way cautiously down the fire-escape after the manner of the recent Mr. Moon. Archie had not seen much of Mr. Moon, but he had seen enough to know that in certain crises his methods were sound and should be followed. Elmer Moon was not a good man; his ethics were poor and his moral code shaky; but in the matter of legging it away from a situation of peril and discomfort he had no superior.

CHAPTER VII.

MR. ROSCOE SHERIRIFF HAS AN IDEA.

Archie inserted a fresh cigarette in his long holder and began to smoke a little moodily. It was about a week after his disturbing adventures in J. B. Wheeler"s studio, and life had ceased for the moment to be a thing of careless enjoyment. Mr. Wheeler, mourning over his lost home-brew and refusing, like Niobe, to be comforted, has suspended the sittings for the magazine cover, thus robbing Archie of his life-work. Mr. Brewster had not been in genial mood of late. And, in addition to all this, Lucille was away on a visit to a school-friend. And when Lucille went away, she took with her the sunshine. Archie was not surprised at her being popular and in demand among her friends, but that did not help him to become reconciled to her absence.

He gazed rather wistfully across the table at his friend, Roscoe Sherriff, the Press-agent, another of his Pen-and-Ink Club acquaintances. They had just finished lunch, and during the meal Sherriff, who, like most men of action, was fond of hearing the sound of his own voice and liked exercising it on the subject of himself, had been telling Archie a few anecdotes about his professional past. From these the latter had conceived a picture of Roscoe Sherriff"s life as a prismatic thing of energy and adventure and well-paid withal--just the sort of life, in fact, which he would have enjoyed leading himself. He wished that he, too, like the Press-agent, could go about the place "slipping things over" and "putting things across." Daniel Brewster, he felt, would have beamed upon a son-in-law like Roscoe Sherriff.

"The more I see of America," sighed Archie, "the more it amazes me. All you birds seem to have been doing things from the cradle upwards. I wish I could do things!"

"Well, why don"t you?"

Archie flicked the ash from his cigarette into the finger-bowl.

"Oh, I don"t know, you know," he said, "Somehow, none of our family ever have. I don"t know why it is, but whenever a Moffam starts out to do things he infallibly makes a bloomer. There was a Moffam in the Middle Ages who had a sudden spasm of energy and set out to make a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, dressed as a wandering friar. Rum ideas they had in those days."

"Did he get there?"

"Absolutely not! Just as he was leaving the front door his favourite hound mistook him for a tramp--or a varlet, or a scurvy knave, or whatever they used to call them at that time--and bit him in the fleshy part of the leg."

"Well, at least he started."

"Enough to make a chappie start, what?"

Roscoe Sherriff sipped his coffee thoughtfully. He was an apostle of Energy, and it seemed to him that he could make a convert of Archie and incidentally do himself a bit of good. For several days he had been, looking for someone like Archie to help him in a small matter which he had in mind.

"If you"re really keen on doing things," he said, "there"s something you can do for me right away."

Archie beamed. Action was what his soul demanded.

"Anything, dear boy, anything! State your case!"

"Would you have any objection to putting up a snake for me?"

"Putting up a snake?"

"Just for a day or two."

"But how do you mean, old soul? Put him up where?"

"Wherever you live. Where do you live? The Cosmopolis, isn"t it? Of course! You married old Brewster"s daughter. I remember reading about it."

"But, I say, laddie, I don"t want to spoil your day and disappoint you and so forth, but my jolly old father-in-law would never let me keep a snake. Why, it"s as much as I can do to make him let me stop on in the place."

"He wouldn"t know."

"There"s not much that goes on in the hotel that he doesn"t know," said Archie, doubtfully.

"He musn"t know. The whole point of the thing is that it must be a dead secret."

Archie flicked some more ash into the finger-bowl.

"I don"t seem absolutely to have grasped the affair in all its aspects, if you know what I mean," he said. "I mean to say--in the first place--why would it brighten your young existence if I entertained this snake of yours?"

"It"s not mine. It belongs to Mme. Brudowska. You"ve heard of her, of course?"

"Oh yes. She"s some sort of performing snake female in vaudeville or something, isn"t she, or something of that species or order?"

"You"re near it, but not quite right. She is the leading exponent of high-brow tragedy on any stage in the civilized world."

"Absolutely! I remember now. My wife lugged me to see her perform one night. It all comes back to me. She had me wedged in an orchestra-stall before I knew what I was up against, and then it was too late. I remember reading in some journal or other that she had a pet snake, given her by some Russian prince or other, what?"

"That," said Sherriff, "was the impression I intended to convey when I sent the story to the papers. I"m her Press-agent. As a matter of fact, I bought Peter-its name"s Peter-myself down on the East Side. I always believe in animals for Press-agent stunts. I"ve nearly always had good results. But with Her Nibs I"m handicapped. Shackled, so to speak. You might almost say my genius is stifled. Or strangled, if you prefer it,"

"Anything you say," agreed Archie, courteously, "But how? Why is your what-d"you-call-it what"s-its-named?"

"She keeps me on a leash. She won"t let me do anything with a kick in it. If I"ve suggested one rip-snorting stunt, I"ve suggested twenty, and every time she turns them down on the ground that that sort of thing is beneath the dignity of an artist in her position. It doesn"t give a fellow a chance. So now I"ve made up my mind to do her good by stealth. I"m going to steal her snake."

"Steal it? Pinch it, as it were?"

"Yes. Big story for the papers, you see. She"s grown very much attached to Peter. He"s her mascot. I believe she"s practically kidded herself into believing that Russian prince story. If I can sneak it away and keep it away for a day or two, she"ll do the rest. She"ll make such a fuss that the papers will be full of it."

"I see."

"Wow, any ordinary woman would work in with me. But not Her Nibs. She would call it cheap and degrading and a lot of other things. It"s got to be a genuine steal, and, if I"m caught at it, I lose my job. So that"s where you come in."

"But where am I to keep the jolly old reptile?"

"Oh, anywhere. Punch a few holes in a hat-box, and make it up a shakedown inside. It"ll be company for you."

"Something in that. My wife"s away just now and it"s a bit lonely in the evenings."

"You"ll never be lonely with Peter around. He"s a great scout. Always merry and bright"

"He doesn"t bite, I suppose, or sting or what-not?"

"He may what-not occasionally. It depends on the weather. But, outside of that, he"s as harmless as a canary."

"Dashed dangerous things, canaries," said Archie, thoughtfully. "They peck at you."

"Don"t weaken!" pleaded the Press-agent "Oh, all right. I"ll take him. By the way, touching the matter of browsing and sluicing. What do I feed him on?"

"Oh, anything. Bread-and-milk or fruit or soft-boiled egg or dog- biscuit or ants"-eggs. You know--anything you have yourself. Well, I"m much obliged for your hospitality. I"ll do the same for you another time. Now I must be getting along to see to the practical end of the thing. By the way, Her Nibs lives at the Cosmopolis, too. Very convenient. Well, so long. See you later."

Archie, left alone, began for the first time to have serious doubts. He had allowed himself to be swayed by Mr. Sherriff"s magnetic personality, but now that the other had removed himself he began to wonder if he had been entirely wise to lend his sympathy and co- operation to the scheme. He had never had intimate dealings with a snake before, but he had kept silkworms as a child, and there had been the deuce of a lot of fuss and unpleasantness over them. Getting into the salad and what-not. Something seemed to tell him that he was asking for trouble with a loud voice, but he had given his word and he supposed he would have to go through with it.

He lit another cigarette and wandered out into Fifth Avenue. His usually smooth brow was ruffled with care. Despite the eulogies which Sherriff had uttered concerning Peter, he found his doubts increasing. Peter might, as the Press-agent had stated, be a great scout, but was his little Garden of Eden on the fifth floor of the Cosmopolis Hotel likely to be improved by the advent of even the most amiable and winsome of serpents? However-- "Moffam! My dear fellow!"

The voice, speaking suddenly in his ear from behind, roused Archie from his reflections. Indeed, it roused him so effectually that he jumped a clear inch off the ground and bit his tongue. Revolving on his axis, he found himself confronting a middle-aged man with a face like a horse. The man was dressed in something of an old-world style. His clothes had an English cut. He had a drooping grey moustache. He also wore a grey bowler hat flattened at the crown-- but who are we to judge him?

"Archie Moffam! I have been trying to find you all the morning."

Archie had placed him now. He had not seen General Mannister for several years--not, indeed, since the days when he used to meet him at the home of young Lord Seacliff, his nephew. Archie had been at Eton and Oxford with Seacliff, and had often visited him in the Long Vacation.

"Halloa, General! What ho, what ho! What on earth are you doing over here?"

"Let"s get out of this crush, my boy." General Mannister steered Archie into a side-street, "That"s better." He cleared his throat once or twice, as if embarra.s.sed. "I"ve brought Seacliff over," he said, finally.

"Dear old Squiffy here? Oh, I say! Great work!"

General Mannister did not seem to share his enthusiasm. He looked like a horse with a secret sorrow. He coughed three times, like a horse who, in addition to a secret sorrow, had contracted asthma.

"You will find Seacliff changed," he said. "Let me see, how long is it since you and he met?"

Archie reflected.

"I was demobbed just about a year ago. I saw him in Paris about a year before that. The old egg got a bit of shrapnel in his foot or something, didn"t he? Anyhow, I remember he was sent home."

"His foot is perfectly well again now. But, unfortunately, the enforced inaction led to disastrous results. You recollect, no doubt, that Seacliff always had a--a tendency;--a--a weakness--it was a family failing--"

"Mopping it up, do you mean? Shifting it? Looking on the jolly old stuff when it was red and what not, what?"

"Exactly."

Archie nodded.

"Dear old Squiffy was always rather-a lad for the wa.s.sail-bowl. When I met him in Paris, I remember, he was quite tolerably blotto."

"Precisely. And the failing has, I regret to say, grown on him since he returned from the war. My poor sister was extremely worried. In fact, to cut a long story short, I induced him to accompany me to America. I am attached to the British Legation in Washington now, you know."

"Oh, really?"

"I wished Seacliff to come with me to Washington, but he insists on remaining in New York. He stated specifically that the thought of living in Washington gave him the--what was the expression be used?"

"The pip?"