They went together down the hall to the small study which was used occasionally by Emily Weller, the senator’s sister and ruler of his household. The senator was a bachelor and Emily a spinster. She had been a shrewd hostess in a town where a woman can make or break a man by her skill in entertaining. As though being in the room that she used made discussion of her inevitable, Vivian said softly:
“Greg, I am worried and a little frightened. If Aunt Emily weren’t in the hospital, Uncle Bradford wouldn’t be bringing all of that money into the house. He is going to do something rash.”
Her fear showed in her eyes. Greg Cooper bulked above her, conscious of her feminine daintiness, her complete desirability. Some streak of loyalty to his chief made him say what he did not entirely feel.
“Perhaps he’s entitled to do what he wants to do for a change. Emily rides herd on him pretty hard.”
“She has to. Where would he be if she didn’t?”
Greg Cooper shrugged. He didn’t know if it was a good idea for women to dominate men, even for their own good. But he had to admit to his own soul that Emily Weller had a better brain and a sounder judgment than her brother. She was in the hospital now for a minor operation and he had not missed the significance of that fact in connection with the senator’s talk of surprises and the quick conversion of assets into currency. Vivian Dawson gripped his arm.
“It’s that woman upstairs,” she said tensely. “She’s supposed to be my house guest but she never comes near me. He had me invite her and she stays in her room. She’s an adventuress, Greg. He’s going to run away with her.”
“Nonsense.”
“It isn’t nonsense. You can tell by looking at her that she is the calculating type. She used to be an actress. He’s going to take all of his money and run away with her.”
Greg Cooper tried to hold his face in a poker mold. He had drawn conclusions of his own when Mildred Harney was invited to the Weller estate in the absence of Emily Weller, but the senator had loved them and left them before. He wasn’t the marrying type.
“The senator loves his money more than he will ever love any woman,” he said.
Vivian tapped her foot. “But suppose he doesn’t think that the money is his while he stays here? That he has no control over it? That would make a difference, wouldn’t it?”
Greg Cooper met her eyes. “It would,” he said.
“Then that’s the answer. He wants to take his money away where no one else has any say about it except himself. He’s going to take this woman with him. Greg, he mustn’t do it. He mustn’t. Aunt Emily has given him too much. He would leave her penniless.”
She was beating with her small fists against Greg Cooper’s chest and she seemed unaware of what she was doing. She hadn’t mentioned the senator’s name and reputation as a chip in the game — and Greg Cooper did not consider it a very big chip himself. The voters would never send Bradford Weller back into the senate. His political career was done. Political expediency no longer anchored him.
With over a hundred and fifty thousand dollars in cash and a decorative blonde companion, Bradford Weller would be as free as a bird in any country on the globe. In France or England, no scandal would follow or touch him. His money would be his passport.
Vivian Dawson had been looking up into Cooper’s face and he never held a poker expression long when she was around. Sensing the fact that she had scored a point with him, she moved to the other side of the room.
“You’ve got to do something about it, Greg,” she said. “You’re the only one who can.”
Cooper frowned. He wasn’t sure that it was any of his business, past a certain point, to interfere in what might be a family matter of the senator’s. He took a step toward the girl.
“Why worry about it, Vi?” he said huskily. “You’ve never been happy here. I’ve been playing with the offer of a job in Cuba. I’ll take it like a shot if—”
The girl was standing motionless. “You’re asking me to run away from responsibility, Greg?”
He dropped his eyes. “It isn’t your responsibility.”
He felt that he should argue the point with her and prove to her that she was not concerned in what the senator did; but he found that the words wouldn’t come. He wanted to take Vi Dawson out of here and give her a home of her own — his home. But the senator and his piles of currency could not be dismissed with a gesture and a word. There was drama building up in this old house on Mount Vernon Boulevard, drama and, perhaps, tragedy. Vi Dawson was still looking at him.
“Aunt Emily would stop him from running away with a blonde actress and losing his money,” she said, “but we can’t worry her while she is in the hospital. We’ve got to do something ourselves.”
“It’s his life, Vi — and his money.”
“It isn’t. A man can’t take all his money and run out on his wife, can he? Well, Aunt Emily has managed his house for him better than most wives would. She hasn’t any money of her own. He would leave her penniless.”
The girl was becoming angry. Angry girls become unreasonable if they aren’t headed off. Greg Cooper mopped his forehead. He was more at home in a man’s world and he knew how to argue with people like the senator. He was conscious, too, of an inherent handicap — he was by nature reasonable. He could see both sides of an argument so clearly that he couldn’t become steamed up over either side.
“You’ve got to think of the senator himself, too,” she said. “No flashy young woman like Mildred Harney is really in love with an old man like Uncle Bradford. She’ll get all his money and she’ll ruin his reputation and—”
Greg Cooper grinned wryly. “And his friends won’t speak to him and the post office won’t deliver his mail and—” He became suddenly grave and gripped the girl’s shoulders with strong fingers. “I’m not a meddler, Vi. If this girl is going to marry him, I’ve got to stay out. If it is a swindle, I’m going to stay in.”
“And you’ll stop him from running away until you’re sure?”
“That’s a big order.”
“If you don’t, I’ll find some way to do it.”
“How?”
“Some way. He’s my dead mother’s brother. I haven’t any other family left.”
Her voice was breaking. Greg Cooper gripped her by the elbows, lifted her off the floor and kissed her squarely on the mouth before she had time to turn her head. He was a little bit shaken as he set her down and his voice was husky.
“Sit tight, Vi,” he said. “I don’t know what’s up, but whatever it is, I’ll find a way to block it until we know.”
He was thinking of George Arlington more than he was of the glamorous Mildred Harney. Vi Dawson held the tips of her fingers against her lips.
“That’s a promise?” she said.
Cooper nodded solemnly. “It’s a promise.”
Chapter III
A Bargain in Burglary
Mildred Harney was sitting in the parlor with Tim Weller when Greg Cooper came back down the hall with Vi Dawson. The old man was wide awake now and talking in a slow drawl about the old days when actors did their acting on a stage.
“They didn’t can human bodies in celluloid and human voices in wax, then,” he said. “Not in my day.”
The blonde girl laughed. She made a vivid picture with the sunlight streaming through the window on her. She was dressed in shimmery green that molded tightly to her shapely body. She had one leg crossed over the other and she kept the balanced leg swinging. Her teeth were a startling white and she wore her makeup lightly; but for all of her spectacular quality, she did not seem quite real. Vi Dawson sighed.
“She is beautiful,” she said reluctantly. Greg Cooper squeezed her arm.