“Forgive me,” said Dick, abashed. He pocketed the money and ran out, and an hour later had secured a fine suite of rooms for the following evening.
Madame Rigby was not there when he returned. Suffused with feelings of dread, he peered into Jack’s cabinet. Jack opened his eyes and looked at him, as though inquiringly. Dick heard the door opening behind him, and, closing the cabinet with an air of guilt, turned to see Madame Rigby entering the room.
“Where have you been?” said Dick.
“Mailing a letter,” she replied. “Did you do as I told you?”
“Yes, ma’am,” said Dick. He dug in his pocket and found the receipt, which he handed to her. Madame Rigby took it eagerly, studied it a moment, and then tucked it away in her reticule.
“Now, Dick,” she said, “I’m going to be busy all day tomorrow, so you’ll have to mind the exhibition yourself. See that you telephone the moving men and engage a van for Monday.”
“Yes, ma’am,” said Dick. “Shall I take Jack with me tomorrow?”
“No,” said Madame Rigby.
This filled Dick with suspicions so horrible he was scarcely able to name them even to himself; how much less, then, was he able to utter them to the composed and masterful woman who stood before him?
Long he lay awake that night in shameful torments, before falling into uneasy slumbers full of dreams of Evangeline: as a dainty and gossamer-winged butterfly trapped in the net of a squat spider, or as a tiny, jointed doll waltzing round and round in the arms of Professor Honorius, or bound in a straitjacket as she screamed, and screamed again without cease.
During the long streetcar ride the next morning, Dick was so dogged by the fantastic horrors of the previous night that he felt obliged to go straight to the bar, upon his arrival at Cliff House, and fortify himself with a stiff drink.
The whiskey braced him enough to enable him to open the exhibition for the day, but did not quiet his misgivings. As soon as the doors had been opened and visitors were filing through, Dick went back down to the bar and had another whiskey, and then another. By noon, the accumulated effects of four whiskies with a breakfast of stale pretzels had reduced Dick to a sorry condition indeed.
Unable to bear his apprehension any longer, Dick then pulled out a memorandum book and, tearing out its blank back pages, wrote in pencil a long and somewhat incoherent letter. In it he revealed as much as he understood of Madame Rigby’s melancholy history, as well as the truth of Jack’s extraordinary origins, in some detail. He ended with the earnest assurance that he disclosed these things only to spare Evangeline greater shock and humiliation.
Having acquired an envelope from the proprietor of the souvenir stand, Dick ventured out and caught a streetcar, and spent an unsteady eternity rattling across town. At last he spotted the Palace Hotel and leaped off in mid-block, under the nose of an affronted draft horse. Leaving chaos in his wake, he lurched into the vast hotel lobby and slid the envelope over the desk, with a slurred request that it might be delivered to suite 507, when the party for whom it had been reserved should check in.
Dick meant to return then to his duties at Cliff House. He may have done so; he certainly got as far as the bar there, but his next clear memory was of being at Sutro’s Baths, struggling into a woolen bathing costume that seemed to have been made for a one-legged man. The clearest memory after that was of being held upright in an ice-cold shower bath by a pair of muscular attendants.
At some point after that Dick found himself on the floor of the workshop, and made his way on hands and knees to the far wall. There he meant to pull down the window-drapes to serve as blankets, but somehow failed to do so. He attempted to get Jack to help him, but the doors of the cabinet were standing ajar; nothing was in there but the long, brass key, which seemed to have fallen to the floor and been overlooked. Dick put the key in his pocket and, weeping for the sorrow and the pity of it all, curled up and went to sleep.
“Well! You’re some pretty picture, aren’t you?” said a voice, high-up and distant and yet shockingly loud. Dick groaned and opened his eyes. He was greeted by the spectacle of a giantess looming above him, arms akimbo, smiling widely.
He lay there, stupefied, until Madame Rigby flung open the drapes and let in the light of broad noon. He flung up an arm to shield himself from its poisonous brilliance, and as he did so realized that he had failed to close down the exhibition, or to empty the coin boxes either, on the previous night.
“Oh, ma’am—I’m so awfully sorry—It won’t ever happen again!” he said.
“Why, that’s all right,” said Madame Rigby, lighting a cigarette. “By rights I ought to fire you, but I’m feeling the most extraordinary peace today. Take your time getting up, Dick; no need to hurry. We don’t sail until this afternoon.”
Dick sat up. As he did so a newsboy screamed out, very nearly under the window:
“EXTRA! Congressman Gookin dead! Fremont T. Gookin suicide suspected!”
“What?” said Dick, as the floor seemed to roll like the breakers at Ocean Beach. Madame Rigby laughed quietly.
“ ‘Suspected?’ ” she said scornfully. “Why, he had the gun in his hand. They found him stretched out in front of his dressing-room mirror. At least, that’s what the morning edition says.” She held it up for Dick to see. “Care to read for yourself? There’s no mention of anyone finding my letter, though; so I suppose he had the good sense to burn it first.”
“What letter?”
“The one I left for him, when I called in a cab for Miss Evangeline,” Madame Rigby replied. “Don’t you remember? We were going to assist her in her escape. We drove straight to the chapel.”
Dick scrambled to his feet, as memory overtook him. He cast a swift glance at Jack’s cabinet; its doors still stood open, revealing its emptiness.
“Where’s Jack?” he shouted.
Madame Rigby’s smile widened further still, giving her something of the air of a happy crocodile.
“On his honeymoon,” she said, and roared with laughter as Dick staggered backward.
“Oh—oh, heaven! You old witch! Oh, how could you?” Dick gasped. “I’ll go to the police!”
“Oh, no, you won’t,” said Madame Rigby. “Just you think for a moment about your future, mister. I can teach you all I know; the world will be your oyster. I’ve booked us a pair of berths on the Belle Etoile, and we’ll be sailing off to Paris long before that girl stops screaming.
“You can stay here, if you like; but you’ll have a real hard time convincing anyone you weren’t my accomplice. Didn’t I tell you that, whatever happened, I’d come out the winner? Well, I have.”
Jack stared at her, breathing hard. At last he said:
“But—the exhibition—Jack—”
Madame Rigby waved her hand impatiently. “Trash. I built ’em for one purpose; well, that purpose is served.” She cast a glance at the newspaper, and smiled again. “And well served too. I’ll build something new and better next time—”
The door was thrown open.
Evangeline stood on the threshold, looking pale but determined. Madame Rigby glared at her like a startled cat; but smiled nonetheless, after a moment’s silence, and drew on her cigarette.
“Why, Evangeline dear,” she said. “So sorry to hear about your papa.”
“It was scarcely a surprise,” said Evangeline coolly. “He was being blackmailed by at least three women, and with the re-election coming up their demands were becoming importunate. Or so I should judge from his bank withdrawals. I really do fear you cannot take all the credit for his untimely death.”
Madame Rigby’s smile froze.
“Miss Gookin—I had nothing to do with—” Dick began, but she stopped him with a raised hand.
“Mrs. Rigby, if you please. You haven’t asked after Jack, dear mother-in-law! And may I say I cannot thank you enough for your kindness yesterday? I confess to being a little astonished on my wedding night, but what married woman is not? I soon came to realize my good fortune. For, you see, Jack is so perfectly the sort of husband I had wanted; so patient, and understanding, and obedient. And untiring,” added Evangeline, as a lovely flush came into her cheeks.