CHAPTER III.

When midnight failed to usher Claudius home, the desirous Suzanne grew fretful. On the rare occasions when he had gone out alone at night, she had not retired until his return, this being part of her theory of conquest by erosion, She hoped so to habituate him to her companionship at any hour as to make it indispensable. Her brother seemed to have managed it, so why not she?

It is only fair to say that her efforts were by no means the result of her ambitions for material benefits alone. Claudius inspired her amative emotions in full. She really wanted him very badly. Everything about him appealed to her—his bright, scientific mind, his clean, vigorous body, and his clear, childish soul. She felt, also, his undemonstrative, but intense social superiority to all of the men she had known, Everything about him was of the best, It made her feel a little tarnished, sometimes, although she actually was not tarnished at all. It was merely that Claudius was much her social superior.

Midnight having passed, Suzanne decided that it might look too proprietary were she to remain up any longer. Hitherto she had always had a book or needlework as a pretext, if Claudius had stopped to reflect upon her waiting up, which he never had. And yet Suzanne was very loath to go to bed without some reward for a long, lonely evening. She had never succeeded in making friends with Cocky, Pussy, Polly, and Cholly. Cocky politely avoided her; Pussy flung back her advances with a baleful yellow stare; Polly sidled to the far end of his T-perch, lifted his shoulders, and screamed “Yah!” and Cholly served her brother and her with the human responsiveness of a vacuum cleaner.

Suzanne arose from her morris chair, stepped out on the veranda, and looked up at the fat, full moon. She felt nervous and in need of something and, as if directed by animal instinct, she reentered the house, stepped across the court to Claudius' room—the door of which was open—snapped on the light, and stood looking in with the covetousness of a cat regarding the canary cage. The room exhaled a well-groomed masculinity, unmarred by the effete top dressing of Perkins' preparations. These were never entirely absent from Claudius' person and effects. He lived and moved and had his being in an aura of scent, like a yogi in his effulgence. But it was an agreeable medley of odors and impassioned the suffering Suzanne.

She stared into the room, and it mocked her, There was a certain elemental spirit of Cholly about its perfect cleanliness and order, and this stuck out a long and pointed tongue at her.

“Don't you wish you could?” it derided, as her eyes passed from one polished corner of the temple to another, finally to rest on the big brass bed, with its snowy linen, freshly changed that day, turned back with precision. Suzanne had never realized the extreme tidiness of the well-valeted bachelor. Few girls are really so well garnished. As for married folk, they usually have other things to think about than the exact military alignment of a dozen pairs of highly polished shoes. Some of Claudius' now turned up their noses at Suzanne, who was wondering if it would ever be her privilege to set them straight.

[Illustration: “If there's any one thing that get's my goat,” said he, “it's any hint o' scandal aimed at my womenfolks. I just been through one divorce action on that account, as Syd, here, can tell you.”

It was at this moment that, as if to throw brine on the scars resulting from the flagellation of her feelings, there rippled through the suddenly opened front door of the Casa Pompeiana a girlish laugh, swept in, as it were, by a rush of crisp autumn air. Suzanne's start was that of a cat at a near-by handclap. She snapped off the light guiltily, knowing that Claudius must have seen it shimmering through the slits of the iron shutters; then spun about to see an extremely youthful and radiant girl, in a fawn-covered opera cloak with a fur collar, standing at the entrance to the peristyle with Claudius' square, genial face showing over her shoulder.

One must admit that it was trying for Suzanne. She was certainly entitled to great credit for the aplomb with which she met the situation. Claudius, in his little-boyish way, described precisely what had happened, taking Clarissa's presence in his house as much for granted as might a sea captain that of a rescued castaway. There was really nothing for the amazed Suzanne to say. Claudius' dispensations of his own affairs had the cheerful finality of a falling tree. So, in loco chaperonis, Suzanne placed the new household pet in the remaining guest room and, having tucked her up with gentle hands which itched to strangle her, came out to compliment Claudius on his find.

“But what in the world is she going to do?” asked Suzanne.

“Blessed if I know,” Claudius answered contentedly. “However, there's no hurry. She's very young.”

Suzanne regarded him strangely.

“Why don't you adopt her?” she asked, with uncontrollable sarcasm; then stared amazed at Claudius as he whirled about with a beaming face.

“There you've struck it!” said he enthusiastically. “I knew you would, with your bright, active mind, Suzanne! That's precisely what I've made up my mind to do.”

“? …? …? …?” said Suzanne's mouth and eyes.

“I had it all worked out before we left Del's,” said Claudius eagerly. “Now just see how things happen. You remember that book I was glued to about a month ago?”

“'Van Duyven's Ward'?” Suzanne asked, and raised her eyebrows. She had discovered Claudius' curious vulnerability.

“Yes. You wouldn't read it, you know—said it was trash. Well, all the same, that book made a big impression on me. This chap Van Duyven, a clubman and man-about-town, with a decent independent income, has never wanted to marry—is pretty cynical about matrimony, and likes his freedom and all that. But he's not a bad sort, and has perfectly good sense, and when he reaches his fortieth birthday, he begins to think that maybe he has missed something. There's a woman of about his own age that's always been in love with him, but he's never seemed to think of her in that light, though all their friends know that she's crazy about him and has never married on his account.

“Well, the night of his fortieth birthday, he goes out to celebrate all by himself—wants to think matters over. In the course of the evening, he meets this poor little waif of a girl, and at first—well, sort of picks her out for his prey, don't you know? But while they're at supper, she tells him her story, and he gets sorry for her and finally ends up by adopting her. Then she falls in love with him, of course, and there's a whole lot of truck that I skipped. But in the end——”

“He marries her, of course,” said Suzanne.

“No, she gets it into her head that this other woman could make him a lot happier, so she engineers it in some way or other to get 'em clinched, and then swims out to sea and drowns herself. All that long-suffering sentimental rot gets past me unfiltered. The part that appealed to my imagination was their life for a while after he'd adopted her. It was perfectly charming—sort of an idyl. You see, he was just twice her age, and looked on her as a sort of ready-made grown-up daughter—just what he'd always wanted. She was fresh and pretty and sweet and entertaining and kept him cheered up and made him take a new interest in things. I thought at the time how bully it must have been, and finally nothing would do but I must scare up a girl and adopt her. But that's not so easy as it sounds, and finally I gave up the idea. Then to-night, while talking with Clarissa, it all came back twice as strong.” He gave a short laugh.

“What does she think about it?” Suzanne asked.

“Oh, she's game.” Claudius laughed again boyishly, as if at some amusing recollection. “Oh, I s'pose it's all nonsense and couldn't be managed at all, but just the same, there's no reason why we shouldn't have the fun of making believe.” He reached down to tug caressingly at the silky ears of Cocky, who was standing very still, his head against Claudius' knee. “Anyhow, there's nothing to prevent my offering her sanctuary for the time being, poor kid. Well, the winks for mine. Nighty-night.”

And with a cheerful nod, he lounged into the forbidden land.