CHAPTER III.

A WEEK LATER

“She might have stepped down from that painting!” said Barry,

pointing to a reproduction of part of a wall of the great temple at

Medinet Habu, above the carven mantelpiece of the library.

His father nodded and smiled, but not unkindly. He was strangely like

his son, except that John Cumberland’s curly hair was gray and Barry’s

curly hair was brown.

At the present moment Barry did not look his best, owing to the fact

that a patch of the said curly hair was very neatly shaved and the

corresponding portion of his skull decorated with unattractive

surgical dressing.

They both possessed fresh, healthy colouring and steadfast gray eyes.

Both were virile, real, and would have been unusually handsome except

that both had “the Cumberland nose,” which was quite frankly

tip-tilted. But, in spite of it, there were many girls in New York who

invariably referred to Barry Cumberland as good-looking. And indeed he

was, as his father still remained.

No two men could have seemed more strangely out of place in this

setting. John Cumberland might have passed for an old-fashioned

English squire; Barry was as typical a young man of to-day--sane, fit,

keen--as one could find anywhere in the English-speaking world. Yet

this library more closely resembled one of the Egyptian rooms at the

British Museum than the favourite haunt of a prosperous man of

affairs.

Egypt--unaccountable though it appeared to his friends--was John

Cumberland’s hobby; a hobby in which he had sunk a not inconsiderable

fortune; in which he had sought, and ultimately found, it would seem,

consolation for the loss of Barry’s mother, who had died when Barry

was seven years old.

To-day the Cumberland Collection ranked as the second finest of its

kind in the United States. It was representative of Egyptian

civilization in all its phases--save that it contained no mummies. It

was not confined to the library, but overflowed into practically every

room in the house. Yet nowhere were there any mummies. This was a

concession to Aunt Micky, John Cumberland’s sister, who acted as the

widower’s housekeeper and hostess.

Whereas the loss of his wife had occasioned a wound to John

Cumberland’s heart that only time had healed, the loss by his sister

of the dissolute Count Colonna had left her a grateful if somewhat

embittered woman. The later years of her married life had been years

of hidden misery, during which she had realized to the full that, if

she had married a title, Colonna had married a dowry. Time, however,

had sweetened her even as it had healed her brother. She tasted the

strange fruits of our modern orchard with astonishment but without

dyspepsia, nevertheless firmly declining to remain under the same roof

with a mummy.

“This girl on the balcony seems to have made a tremendous impression

upon you,” said John Cumberland, keenly watching his son across the

library table.

“I can never forget her,” Barry declared; for between these two was

that rare comradeship which makes secrets unnecessary. “I don’t mean

that I have fallen in love at first sight, or anything ridiculous like

that! But I have an intense curiosity to know who she is.”

“You are quite sure,” his father went on, carefully selecting a cigar,

“that the order of events was: the girl and the crash?--not the crash

and the girl? You see what I mean, Barry? You have always had an

interest in these things--” he waved his cigar vaguely in the

direction of the library walls--“which I suppose I have encouraged.

You had it in mind to get back here to supper, and so it is just

possible----”

“I quite see what you mean,” Barry interrupted: “that the girl on the

balcony was the beginning of delirium _after_ I had banged my head?

Well, of course, it’s impossible to explain how I know it, but you are

wrong. I certainly saw her. And what adds to my certainty is the

curious behaviour of the people who took care of me afterward.”

“You mean the man who brought you to the hospital and the one who

towed your car to the garage?”

“Why, certainly!” Barry replied. “As not a thing was stolen, either

from me personally or out of the Rolls, why should these people have

deliberately kept in the background?”

“I see your point,” said his father slowly; “but I rather think there

was only one man concerned.”

“I believe you are right,” Barry agreed; “and I believe that this man

was acting for the girl I saw at the window!”

John Cumberland looked up, fumbling for his lighter.

“Now,” he confessed, “I don’t entirely follow you.”

“I mean, Dad,” Barry explained excitedly, “that she must have seen me.

She was looking at me. If I saw _her_, she certainly saw _me!_”

John Cumberland lighted his cigar.

“Now I begin to follow,” he nodded. “You mean that she didn’t want you

to trace her?”

“Exactly!”

“You are sure she saw you? A flash of lightning such as you describe

would have a very blinding effect.”

“It did,” Barry admitted ruefully, “in _my_ case! But the crash took

place less than twenty yards from the spot where she was standing.”

“Yes,” his father mused; “probably you are right. You think that she

sent this mysterious man with the Studebaker to your assistance, had

you taken to the hospital in Elizabeth, and then had the Rolls towed

to a distant garage, with the idea that you would be unable to find

the spot later? Rather a hazard. How was she to know that you were

unfamiliar with the neighbourhood?”

“She might have thought it worth a chance, at any rate.”

“But the object?” John Cumberland exclaimed. “What could be the

object? Was she very inadequately dressed? I mean was she likely to

feel ashamed of having been seen in such a condition?”

“Why, no,” said Barry reflectively. “She was very strangely dressed,

and, as far as that goes, scantily. But in these days that wouldn’t

upset her. There’s some mystery about it--of this I am certain.

To-morrow I am going exploring. I wish you could come.”

“Unfortunately I can’t,” was the reply. “I have two important

conferences. But if you go, let Hemingway drive you. You have had a

devil of a knock on the head, my boy, and you shouldn’t overtax

yourself.”

Barry, however, had planned to go with Jim Sakers, who claimed to know

the country like the palm of his hand. And on the following morning

the two made an early start, beneath a cloudless sky which lent the

towering buildings of New York an unfamiliar ethereal quality.

Jim Sakers, in appearance and in temperament, was as different from

Barry Cumberland as a Gruyère cheese is different from an ivory

Buddha. He was dark and of a lovable ugliness; practical to a degree

that his friend sometimes found irritating; invariably good-humoured;

and frankly ignorant of everything that could not be dealt with on

Wall Street. An enthusiastic sportsman to whom the Arts were an awful

mystery, he, withal, regarded the moody Barry more tenderly than

Horatio looked upon Hamlet.

Once extricated from the crossword puzzle of New York’s traffic and

clear of Hoboken’s shores, they began to make speed, Jim commenting

continuously upon sights by the way, as was his manner, Barry

answering only in monosyllables and being entirely wrapped up in his

own thoughts. Presently:

“When we get to the house,” he said, “I propose to call.”

“Cheers!” cried Jim. “I hope the Egyptian princess keeps a good

cellar. But what for?”

“To thank her for looking after me. I shall take it for granted that

she did.”

“Wait until we find the house,” Jim warned; “and then, wait until we

get in!”

Barry smiled lightly.

“Of course we shall find the house,” he asserted. “You know the way,

don’t you?”

“Absolutely,” Jim assured him, “as far as the forks. I simply couldn’t

go wrong. But from there onward, I am entirely in your hands. You say

you took the middle road?”

“Yes,” Barry nodded. “The middle one.”

He became lost in thought again, paying so little attention to his

companion’s cheery remarks that presently these ceased, as mile after

mile was left behind and New York seemed to become very remote, in the

peace of the countryside that they were traversing.

And now, undaunted, Jim began to sing, loudly.

“‘_Dear one, the moon is waiting for the sunshine_----’”

“Shut up!” Barry implored. “Don’t sing. Or, if you _must_ sing, sing

the right words. It isn’t ‘the moon’--it’s ‘the world.’”

“Oh!” Jim stared. “I don’t believe it. But, anyway, I like ‘the moon’

better.”

“The tune is all wrong as well.”

“You’re too blamed particular!” said Jim.

Engaged in this argument they came sweeping down a long, straight

road, turned sharply to the right, and Jim pulled up.

“Behold!” he cried, and pointed.

Barry could not conceal his excitement.

“Gad!” he muttered. “It looks all different, now. But, yes, that’s the

road.”

“Middle one, boss?”

“Yes.”

“Very good, boss.”

Jim grinned cheerfully and swung around into the thoroughfare

indicated.

“Tell me when to stop, boss!” he shouted. “‘_Dear one, the moon_…’”

He sang lustily, and inaccurately, for half a mile or more; until:

“Here we are! Left!” Barry shouted.

Jim obediently turned into the narrow way indicated by his companion,

raced along it, and then:

“What’s this?” he exclaimed, and pulled up sharply. A barrier

confronted them. “We’ve got into a private road! And it’s closed for

repairs. Look!” He pointed to the board which clearly stated this

fact. “It’s been closed for a long time, too, from the look of it.

You’ve muddled the contract, you poor nut!”

Barry sat staring blankly ahead. At last:

“Try back,” he suggested. “I can’t make this out.”

Jim grunted, backed out to a gap, turned, and retraced the path to the

high road. Slowing up:

“Now, boss,” he demanded, “what next? Where’s the princess?”

Barry, who had been sitting with knitted brows, looked up sharply.

“Jim,” he declared, “that _was_ the right road--and it was open on the

night I drove along it!”

“We might park the bus and walk,” Jim suggested helpfully.

“No,” Barry replied; “I don’t feel fit enough. Besides----”

“Well?” Jim prompted.

“Why was the road closed? There’s a mystery here, Jim, and I shall

never solve it by blundering in like a bull at a fence.”

“Then what do we do now, boss?” Jim demanded.

“Go home!” was the reply.

“Right!” said Jim, and headed east for New York. “_Once upon a time_,”

he recited, in a loud singsong, “_there was a princess_…”