Part Third - Scene 1

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_ SCENE I: MRS. ROBERTS, DR. LAWTON, MRS. CRASHAW, MR. BEMIS, YOUNG MR. AND MRS. BEMIS

MRS. ROBERTS, surrounded by her guests, and confronting from her sofa. Mr. BEMIS, who still remains sunken in his armchair, has apparently closed an exhaustive recital of the events which have ended in his presence there. She looks round with a mixed air of self-denial and self-satisfaction to read the admiration of her listeners in their sympathetic countenances.

DR. LAWTON, with an ironical sigh of profound impression: 'Well, MRS. ROBERTS, you are certainly the most lavishly hospitable of hostesses. Every one knows what delightful dinners you give; but these little dramatic episodes which you offer your guests, by way of appetizer, are certainly unique. Last year an elevator stuck in the shaft with half the company in it, and this year a highway robbery, its daring punishment and its reckless repetition--what the newspapers will call "A Triple Mystery" when it gets to them--and both victims among our commensals! Really, I don't know what more we could ask of you, unless it were the foot-padded footpad himself as a commensal. If this sort of thing should become de rigueur in society generally, I don't know what's to become of people who haven't your invention.'

MRS. ROBERTS: 'Oh, it's all very well to make fun now, Dr. Lawton; but if you had been here when they first came in--'

YOUNG MRS. BEMIS: 'Yes, indeed, I think so too, Mrs. Roberts. If Mr. Bemis--Alfred, I mean--and papa hadn't been with me when you came out there to prepare us, I don't know what I should have done. I should certainly have died, or gone through the floor.' She looks fondly up into the face of her husband for approval, where he stands behind her chair, and furtively gives him her hand for pressure.'

YOUNG MR. BEMIS: 'Somebody ought to write to the Curwens--Mrs. Curwen, that is--about it.'

MRS. BEMIS, taking away her hand: 'Oh yes, papa, DO write!'

LAWTON: 'I will, my dear. Even Mrs. Curwen, dazzling away in another sphere--hemisphere--and surrounded by cardinals and all the other celestial lights there at Rome, will be proud to exploit this new evidence of American enterprise. I can fancy the effect she will produce with it.'

MRS. ROBERTS: 'And the Millers--what a shame they couldn't come! How excited they would have been!--that is, Mrs. Miller. Is their baby very bad, Doctor?'

LAWTON: 'Well, vaccination is always a very serious thing--with a first child. I should say, from the way Mrs. Miller feels about it, that Miller wouldn't be able to be out for a week to come yet.'

MRS. ROBERTS: 'Oh, how ridiculous you are, Doctor!'

BEMIS, rising feebly from his chair: 'Well, now that it's all explained, MRS. ROBERTS, I think I'd better go home; and if you'll kindly have them telephone for a carriage--'

MRS. ROBERTS: 'NO, indeed, Mr. Bemis! We shall not let you go. Why, the IDEA! You must stay and take dinner with us, just the same.'

BEMIS: 'But in this state--'

MRS. ROBERTS: 'Oh, never mind the STATE. You look perfectly well; and if you insist upon going, I shall know that you bear a grudge against Edward for not arresting him. Wait! We can put you in perfect order in just a second.' She flies out of the room, and then comes swooping back with a needle and thread, a fresh white necktie, a handkerchief, and a hair-brush. 'There! I can't let you go to Edward's dressing-room, because he's there himself, and the children are in mine, and we've had to put the new maid in the guest-chamber--you ARE rather cramped in flats, that's true; that's the worst of them--but if you don't mind having your toilet made in public, like the King of France--'

BEMIS, entering into the spirit of it: 'Not the least; but--' He laughs, and drops back into his chair.

MRS. ROBERTS, distributing the brush to young Mr. BEMIS, and the tie to his wife, and dropping upon her knees before Mr. BEMIS: 'Now, Mrs. Lou, you just whip off that crumpled tie and whip on the fresh one, and, MISTER Lou, you give his hair a touch, and I'll have this torn button-hole mended before you can think.' She seizes it and begins to sew vigorously upon it.

MRS. CRASHAW: 'Agnes, you are the most ridiculously sensible woman in the country.'

LAWTON, standing before the group, with his arms folded and his feet well apart, in an attitude of easy admiration: 'The Wounded Adonis, attended by the Loves and Graces. Familiar Pompeiian fresco.'

MRS. ROBERTS, looking around at him: 'I don't see a great many Loves.'

LAWTON: 'She ignores us, Mrs. Crashaw. And after what you've just said!'

MRS. ROBERTS: 'Then why don't you do something?'

LAWTON: 'The Loves NEVER do anything--in frescoes. They stand round and sympathise. Besides, we are waiting to administer an anaesthetic. But what I admire in this subject even more than the activity of the Graces is the serene dignity of the Adonis. I have seen my old friend in many trying positions, but I never realised till now all the simpering absurdity, the flattered silliness, the senile coquettishness, of which his benign countenance was capable.'

MRS. ROBERTS: 'Don't mind him a bit, Mr. Bemis; it's nothing but--'

LAWTON: 'Pure envy. I own it.'

BEMIS: 'All right, Lawton. Wait till--'

MRS. ROBERTS, making a final stitch, snapping off the thread, and springing to her feet, all in one: 'There, have you finished, Mr. and Mrs. Lou? Well, then, take this lace handkerchief, and draw it down from his neck and pin it in his waistcoat, and you have--'

LAWTON, as Mr. Bemis rises to his feet: 'A Gentleman of the Old School. BEMIS, you look like a miniature of yourself by Malbone. Rather flattered, but--recognisable.'

BEMIS, with perfectly recovered gaiety: 'Go on, go on, Lawton. I can understand your envy. I can pity it.'

LAWTON: 'Could you forgive Roberts for not capturing the garotter?'

BEMIS: 'Yes, I could. I could give the garotter his liberty, and present him with an admission to the Provident Woodyard, where he could earn an honest living for his family.'

LAWTON, compassionately: 'You ARE pretty far gone, Bemis. Really, I think somebody ought to go for Roberts.'

MRS. ROBERTS, innocently: 'Yes, indeed! Why, what in the world can be keeping him?' A nursemaid enters and beckons Mrs. Roberts to the door with a glance. She runs to her; they whisper; and then Mrs. ROBERTS, over her shoulder: 'That ridiculous great boy of mine says he can't go to sleep unless I come and kiss him good-night.'

LAWTON: 'Which ridiculous great boy, I wonder?--ROBERTS, or Campbell? But I didn't know they had gone to bed!'

MRS. BEMIS: 'You are too bad, papa! You know it's little Neddy.'

MRS. ROBERTS, vanishing: 'Oh, I don't mind his nonsense, Lou. I'll fetch them both back with me.'

LAWTON, after making a melodramatic search for concealed listeners at the doors: 'Now, friends, I have a revelation to make in Mrs. Roberts's absence. I have found out the garotter--the assassin.'

ALL THE OTHERS: 'What!'

LAWTON: 'He has been secured--'

MRS. CRASHAW, severely: 'Well, I'm very glad of it.'

YOUNG BEMIS: 'By the police?'

MRS. BEMIS, incredulously: 'Papa!'

BEMIS: 'But there were several of them. Have they all been arrested?'

LAWTON: 'There was only one, and none of him has been arrested.'

MRS. CRASHAW: 'Where is he, then?'

LAWTON: 'In this house.'

MRS. CRASHAW: 'Now, Dr. LAWTON, you and I are old friends--I shouldn't like to say HOW old--but if you don't instantly be serious, I--I'll carry my rheumatism to somebody else.'

LAWTON: 'My DEAR MRS. CRASHAW, you know how much I prize that rheumatism of yours! I will be serious--I will be only too serious. The garotter is Mr. Roberts himself.'

ALL, horror-struck: 'Oh!'

LAWTON: 'He went out without his watch. He thought he was robbed, but he wasn't. He ran after the supposed thief, our poor friend Bemis here, and took Bemis's watch away, and brought it home for his own.'

YOUNG BEMIS: 'Yes, but--'

MRS. BEMIS: 'But, papa--'

BEMIS: 'How do you know it? I can see how such a thing might happen, but--how do you know it DID?'

LAWTON: 'I divined it.'

MRS. CRASHAW: 'Nonsense!'

LAWTON: 'Very well, then, I read of just such a ease in the Advertiser a year ago. It occurs annually--in the newspapers. And I'll tell you what, Mrs. Crashaw--Roberts found out his mistake as soon as he went to his dressing-room; and that ingenious nephew of yours, who's closeted with him there, has been trying to put him up to something--to some game.'

MRS. CRASHAW: 'Willis has too much sense. He would know that Edward couldn't carry out any sort of game.'

LAWTON: 'Well, then, he's getting Roberts to let HIM carry out the game.'

MRS. CRASHAW: 'Edward couldn't do that either.'

LAWTON: 'Very well, then, just wait till they come back. Will you leave me to deal with Campbell?'

MRS. CRASHAW: 'What are you going to do?'

YOUNG BEMIS: 'You mustn't forget that he got us out of the elevator, sir.'

MRS. BEMIS: 'We might have been there yet if it hadn't been for him, papa.'

MRS. CRASHAW: 'I shouldn't want Willis mortified.'

BEMIS: 'Nor Mr. Roberts annoyed. We're fellow-sufferers in this business.'

LAWTON: 'Oh, leave it to me, leave it to me! I'll spare their feelings. Don't be afraid. Ah, there they come! Now don't say anything. I'll just step into the anteroom here.' _

Read next: Part Third: Scene 2

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