CHAPTER XI.

GAINSBOROUGH "BLUE BOY."

Having discounted the romantic element of his thrilling rescue at

Narragansett Pier, Travers Gladwin fell into a moody silence. The more

volatile Barnes felt the influence and strove to fight it off. While

he, too, had been set upon the trail of romance at the behest of his

father, he felt it was too early to indulge in pessimistic reveries,

so he groped for another subject with which to revive the interest of

his friend.

"I say, Travers," he led off, rising from his chair and indicating the

walls with a sweep of his hand, "as I remarked before, you've got a

wonderful collection here."

"Yes," assented the young millionaire without animation, "but, as _I_

said before, I soon got tired of it. The pastime of collecting

pictures became a burden, and I was glad to get abroad and forget

it."

"Well," said Barnes, "I guess the only thing for you to do is to go to

work at something."

"I know it," grumbled Gladwin, "but what's the incentive? I don't want

any more money--what I have now is the biggest sort of a nuisance.

Just see the trouble I'm in for with my lawyer and that man Watkins,

though to tell you the truth I am beginning to enjoy the novelty of

that."

The young man got up and assumed a more lively expression.

"Do you know, Whitney," he ran on, "this travelling incognito isn't

half bad. They are really getting suspicious of me at the Ritz."

"But surely some one there ought to know you."

"Not a soul! It was opened while I was abroad. You know I registered

as Thomas Smith and I even took a chance and went down into the grill

room for lunch. And there, Whitney," cried Gladwin with an explosive

burst of enthusiasm, "I nearly got a thrill--another one like that on

the trolley car. The last place you'd expect it, too, in the midst of

stiff formality and waiters so cold and haughty they might have risen

from the dead."

"I suppose this was the ravishing girl at the cigar counter?" said

Barnes, ironically.

"Nothing of the sort--never smoked a cigar in her life--I mean, that

is, well, something entirely different. But she was a beauty! Golden

bronze hair--Titian never painted anything like it; the bluest eyes

behind the most wonderful dark lashes, creamy white skin"----

"And you followed her to a cloak factory, where you found"----

"Please wait till I finish, Whitney. I followed her nowhere, though

she interested me tremendously. I wish you could have seen her eat."

"Eat?"

"Particularly the grapefruit. By Jove, Barnes, that girl certainly

loves grapefruit! It was fascinating. I couldn't keep my eyes off of

her."

"And did she notice you?" quizzed Barnes, raising his eyebrows.

"She was too busy," came the gloomy rejoinder. "I watched her

steadily, fairly bored her with my eyes--tried to will her to look at

me. They say you can do that, you know--mental telepathy, projecting

thought waves or something of the sort."

"Oh, rot!" cried Barnes, impatiently. "I tried that on a dog once and

I've got the scar yet."

"But I tell you, Whitney, it almost worked. After a time her eyelids

began to flutter and the roses in her cheeks bloomed darker. But just

as I felt sure she would look up and see me--splash! the grapefruit

hit her in the eye!"

"What!" ejaculated Whitney Barnes, wheeling open-mouthed and facing

his friend.

"The juice, I mean," Gladwin laughed ruefully, "and, of course, the

spell was broken. She never looked again. Dash it all, there's some

sort of a lemon in all my romances!"

"You certainly do play in tough luck," sympathized Barnes. "I can see

that you need bucking up, and I think I've got the right kind of

remedy for you. Wait, I'll call Bateato."

Whitney Barnes stepped briskly across the room and pressed a button.

In a twinkling the little Jap appeared.

"Bateato," said Barnes, "has your master any hunting clothes at the

hotel?"

"Ees, sair!" responded the Jap. "Plenty hotel--plenty house. We no

time pack all clothes--go sail too quick."

"Plenty here--splendid!" enthused Barnes. "Pack a bag for him,

Bateato, this instant--enough things to last a couple of weeks."

"What's all this?" cut in Gladwin. "What are you going to do?"

"Never you mind," retorted Barnes, importantly; "you do as I say,

Bateato--I'm going to show your master some excitement. He'll never

get it here in town."

"Ees, sair! I pack him queeck," and Bateato vanished noiselessly,

seemingly to shoot through the doorway and up the broad staircase as

if sucked up a flue.

"But see here"----objected Travers Gladwin.

"Not a word now," his friend choked him off. "If you don't like it you

don't have to stay, but I'm going to take you in hand and show you a

time you're not used to."

"But I don't"----

"Don't let's argue about it," said Barnes, lightly. "You called me in

here to take charge of things and I'm taking charge. Just to change

the subject, tell me something about your paintings. This one, for

instance--who is that haughty looking old chap?"

Whitney Barnes had planted himself with legs spread wide apart in

front of one of the largest portraits in the room, a life-size

painting of an aristocratic looking old man who seemed on the point of

strangling in his stock.

Travers Gladwin turned to the painting and said with an unmistakable

note of pride:

"The original Gladwin, my great-grandfather. Painted more than a

hundred years ago by Gilbert Stuart."

"I guess you beat me, Travers--the original Barnes hadn't discovered

mustard a hundred years ago. But I say, here's a Gainsborough, 'The

Blue Boy.' By George! that's a stunner! Worth a small fortune, I

suppose."

Whitney Barnes had crossed the room and stood before the most striking

looking portrait in the collection, a tall, handsome boy in a vividly

blue costume of the Gainsborough period.

The owner of "The Blue Boy" turned around, cast a fleeting glimpse at

the portrait and turned away with a peculiar grimace.

"You suppose wrong, Whitney," he said, shortly. "That

isn't--so--horribly--valuable."

"What! A big painting like that, by a chap famous enough to have a hat

named after him."

"That was just about the way it struck me at first," answered

Gladwin, "so I begged two old gentlemen in London to let me have it.

Persuaded them to part with it for a mere five hundred pounds, on

condition--close attention, Whitney--that I keep the matter a

secret. I was delighted with my bargain--until I saw _the original_."

"The original?"

"Ah ha! the original. It was quite a shock for me to come face to face

with that and realize that my 'Blue Boy' had a streak of yellow in

him."

"That sounds exciting," cried Barnes. "What did you do? Put the case

in the hands of the police?"

"Not much," denied Gladwin emphatically. "That would have given the

public a fine laugh. It deceived me, so I hung it up there to deceive

others. It got you, you see. But you are the only one I've let into

the secret--don't repeat it, will you?"

"Never!" promised Barnes. "It'll be too much of a lark to hear others

rave over it."

"Thank you," acknowledged the bitten collector, curtly.

Barnes wandered from "The Blue Boy" and signalled out another

painting.

"Who painted this?" he asked.

"That's a Veber--but do you know, Whitney, the more I think of

it--there's something about that grapefruit girl, something gripping

that"----

"I like these two," commented Barnes.

"There's something different about her--something"----

"Who is this by?" inquired Barnes, lost in admiration of a Meissonier.

"A blonde"----

"What?"

"And very young, and I know her smile"----

"Look here, Travers, what are these two worth?"

Gladwin volplaned to earth, climbed out of his sky chariot and was

back in the midst of his art treasures again.

"I beg your pardon," he said hastily. "Which two?"

Barnes pointed to two of the smaller pictures.

"Guess," suggested his host.

"Five thousand."

"Multiply it by ten--then add something."

"No, really."

"Yes, really! That one on the left is a Rembrandt! and the other is a

Corot!"

"My word; they're corkers, eh!"

"Yes, when you know who painted them, and if you happen to have the

eye of a connoisseur."

"And what in creation is this?" exclaimed Barnes, as he stumbled

against the great ornamental chest which stood against the wall just

beneath the Rembrandt and Corot.

"Oh, let's get the exhibition over," said Gladwin, peevishly. "That's

a treasure chest. Cost me a barrel--picked it up in Egypt."

"You never picked it up in your life," retorted Barnes, grasping the

great metal bound chest and striving vainly to lift it. "Anything in

it?" he asked, lifting the lid and answering himself in the negative.

"What's the whole collection worth?" asked Barnes, as he returned to

where his friend was standing, gazing ruefully at "The Blue Boy."

"Oh, half a million or more. I really never kept track."

"Half a million! And you go abroad and leave all these things

unguarded? You certainly are fond of taking chances. It's a marvel

they haven't been stolen before now."

"Nonsense," said Gladwin. "I have a burglar alarm set here, and I'll

wager there aren't half a dozen persons who know the Gladwin

collection is hung in this house."

"Just the same--but I say, Travers, there's the door bell. Were you

expecting anybody else."

Gladwin glanced about him nervously.

"No," he said sharply. "On the contrary, I didn't wish--what the deuce

does it mean?"

"It means some one is at the door."