“Haskall, the Government explosives man?”
Pamela nodded.
“Even he won’t get it without Government
authority.”
“Now, tell me, Pamela,” Van Teyl went
on—“you’re a far-seeing girl—I
suppose we should get it in the neck from Germany some
day or other, if the Germans won? Why don’t
you hand the formula over to the British, and give
them a chance to get ahead?”
“That’s a sensible question, Jimmy, and
I’ll try to answer it,” Pamela promised.
“Because when once the shells are made and used,
the secret will be gone. I think it very likely
that it would enable England to win the war; but,
you see, I am an American, not English, and I’m
all American. I have been in touch with things
pretty closely for some time now, and I see trouble
ahead for us before very long. I can’t exactly
tell you where it’s coming from, but I feel it.
I want America to have something up her sleeve, that’s
why.”
“You’re a great girl, Pamela,” her
brother declared. “I’m off downtown,
feeling a different man. And, Pamela, I haven’t
said much, but God bless you, and as long as I live
I’m going as straight as a die. I’ve
had my lesson.”
He bent over her a little clumsily and kissed her.
Pamela walked to the door with him.
“Be a dear,” she called out, “and
come back early. And, Jimmy!” ...
“Hullo?’”
“Put things right at the office at once,”
she whispered with emphasis. “Fischer hasn’t
found out yet. I sent him a message this morning,
thanking him for the carnations, and asking him to
walk with me in the park after breakfast, I shall
keep him away till lunch time, at least.”
The young man looked at her, and at Nikasti, who out
in the corridor was holding his hat and cane.
Then he chuckled.
“And they say that things don’t happen
in New York!” he murmured, as he turned away.
An elderly New Yorker, a man of fashion, renowned
for his social perceptions, pressed his companion’s
arm at the entrance to Central Park and pointed to
Pamela.
“There goes a typical New York girl,”
he said, “and the best-looking I’ve seen
for many a long day. You can go all round Europe,
Freddie, and not see a girl with a face and figure
like that. She had that frank way, too, of looking
you in the eyes.”
“I know,” the other assented. “Gibson’s
girls all had it. Kind of look which seems to
say—’I know you find me nice and I
don’t mind. I wonder whether you’re
nice, too.’”
Pamela strolled along the park with Fischer by her
side. She wore a tailor-made costume of black
and white tweed, and a smart hat, in which yellow
seemed the predominating colour. Her shoes, her
gloves, the little tie about her throat, were all
the last word in the simple elegance of suitability.
Fischer walked by her side—a powerful,
determined figure in a carefully-pressed blue serge
suit and a brown Homburg hat. He wore a rose
in his buttonhole, and he carried a cane—both
unusual circumstances. After fifty years of strenuous
living, Mr. Fischer seemed suddenly to have found a
new thing in the world.
