He asked Gillian to sing and she complied. He told her her voice was charming, but he knew quite well in his own mind that it was distinctly second-class. Any success that could have come to her in the profession she had adopted would have been won by her face, not her voice.
He was not particularly anxious to see young Burns again so presently he rose to go. It was at that moment that his attention was attracted by an ornament on the mantelpiece which stood out among the other rather gimcrack objects like a jewel on a dust heap.
It was a curving beaker of thin green glass, long-stemmed and graceful, and poised on the edge of it was what looked like a gigantic soap bubble, a ball of iridescent glass. Gillian noticed his absorption.
"That's an extra wedding present from Phil. It's rather pretty, I think. He works in a sort of glass factory."
"It is a beautiful thing," said Mr. Satterthwaite reverently. "The glass blowers of Murano might have been proud of that."
He went away with his interest in Philip Eastney strangely stimulated. An extraordinarily interesting young man. And yet the girl with the wonderful face preferred Charlie Burns. What a strange and inscrutable universe!
It had just occurred to Mr. Satterthwaite that, owing to the remarkable beauty of Gillian West, his evening with Mr. Quin had somehow missed fire. As a rule, every meeting with that mysterious individual had resulted in some strange and unforeseen happening. It was with the hope of perhaps running against the man of mystery that Mr. Satterthwaite bent his steps toward the Arlecchino Restaurant where once, in the days gone by, he had met Mr. Quin and which Mr. Quin had said he frequented.
Mr. Satterthwaite went from room to room at the Arlecchino, looking hopefully about him, but there was no sign of Mr. Quin's dark, smiling face. There was, however, somebody else. Sitting at a small table alone was Philip Eastney.
The place was crowded and Mr. Satterthwaite took his seat opposite the young man. He felt a sudden strange sense of exultation, as though he were caught up and made part of a shimmering pattern of events. He was in this thing--whatever it was. He knew now what Mr. Quin had meant that evening at the opera. There was a drama going on, and in it was a part, an important part, for Mr. Satterthwaite. He must not fail to take his cue and speak his lines.
He sat down opposite Philip Eastney with the sense of accomplishing the inevitable. It was easy enough to get into conversation. Eastney seemed anxious to talk. Mr. Satterthwaite was, as always, an encouraging and sympathetic listener. They talked of the war, of explosives, of poison gases. Eastney had a lot to say about these last, for during the war he had been engaged in their manufacture. Mr. Satterthwaite found him really interesting.
There was one gas, Eastney said, that had never been tried. One whiff of it was deadly. He warmed to animation as he spoke.
Having broken the ice, Mr. Satterthwaite gently turned the conversation to music. Eastney's thin face lit up. He spoke with the passion and abandon of the real music lover. They discussed Yoaschbim, and the young man was enthusiastic. Both he and Mr. Satterthwaite agreed that nothing on earth could surpass a really fine tenor voice. Eastney as a boy had heard Caruso, and he had never forgotten it.
"Do you know that he could sing to a wine glass and shatter it?" he demanded.
"I always thought that was a fable," said Mr. Satterthwaite, smiling.
"No, it's gospel truth, I believe. The thing's quite possible. It's a question of resonance."
He went off into technical details. His face was flushed and his eyes shone. The subject seemed to fascinate him, and Mr. Satterthwaite noted that he seemed to have a thorough grasp of what he was talking about. The older man realized that he was talking to an exceptional brain, a brain that might almost be described as that of a genius. Brilliant, erratic, undecided as yet as to the true channel to give it outlet, but undoubtedly genius.
And he thought of Charlie Burns and wondered at Gillian West.
It was with quite a start that he realized how late it was getting, and he called for his bill. Eastney looked slightly apologetic.
"I'm ashamed of myself--running on so," he said. "But it was a lucky chance sent you along here tonight. I--I needed someone to talk to this evening."
He ended his speech with a curious little laugh. His eyes were still blazing with some subdued excitement. Yet there was something tragic about him.
"It has been quite a pleasure," said Mr. Satterthwaite. "Our conversation has been most interesting and instructive to me."
He then made his funny, courteous little bow and passed out of the restaurant. The night was a warm one and as he walked slowly down the street a very odd fancy came to him. He had the feeling that he was not alone--that someone was walking by his side. In vain he told himself that the idea was a delusion--it persisted. Someone was walking beside him down that dark, quiet street, someone whom he could not see. He wondered what it was that brought the figure of Mr. Quin so clearly before his mind. He felt exactly as though Mr. Quin were there walking beside him, and yet he had only to use his eyes to assure himself that it was not so, that he was alone.
But the thought of Mr. Quin persisted, and with it came something else, a need, an urgency of some kind, an oppressive foreboding of calamity. There was something he must do--and do quickly. There was something very wrong, and it lay in his hands to put it right.
So strong was the feeling that Mr. Satterthwaite forebore to fight against it. Instead, he shut his eyes and tried to bring that mental image of Mr. Quin nearer. If he could only have asked Mr. Quin--but even as the thought flashed through his mind he knew it was wrong. It was never any use asking Mr. Quin anything. "The threads are all in your hands"--that was the kind of thing Mr. Quin would say.
The threads. Threads of what? He analyzed his own feeling and impressions carefully. That presentiment of danger, now. Whom did it threaten?
At once a picture rose up before his eyes, the picture of Gillian West sitting alone listening to the wireless.
Mr. Satterthwaite flung a penny to a passing newspaper boy, and snatched at a paper. He turned at once to the London Radio program. Yoaschbim was broadcasting tonight, he noted with interest. He was singing "Salve Dimora" from _Faust_ and afterward a selection of his folk songs: "The Shepherd's Song," "The Fish," "The Little Deer," etc.
Mr. Satterthwaite crumpled the paper together. The knowledge of what Gillian was listening to seemed to make the picture of her clearer. Sitting there alone--
An odd request, that, of Philip Eastney's. Not like the man, not like him at all. There was no sentimentality in Eastney. He was a man of violent feeling, a dangerous man, perhaps--
Again his thoughts brought up with a jerk. _A dangerous man_--that meant something. "_The threads are all in your hands._" That meeting with Philip Eastney tonight--rather odd. A lucky chance, Eastney had said. Was it chance? Or was it part of that interwoven design of which Mr. Satterthwaite had once or twice been conscious this evening?
He cast his mind back. There must be _something_ in Eastney's conversation, some clue there. There must, or else why this strange feeling of urgency? What had he talked about? Singing, war work, Caruso.
Caruso--Mr. Satterthwaite's thoughts went off at a tangent. Yoaschbim's voice was very nearly equal to that of Caruso. Gillian would be sitting listening to it now as it rang out true and powerful, echoing round the room, setting glasses ringing--
He caught his breath. Glasses ringing! Caruso, singing to a wine glass and the wine glass breaking. Yoaschbim singing in the London studio and in a room over a mile away the crash and tinkle of glass--not a wine glass, a thin, green, glass beaker. A crystal soap bubble falling, a soap bubble that perhaps was not empty--
It was at that moment that Mr. Satterthwaite as judged by passers-by suddenly went mad. He tore open the newspaper once more, took a brief glance at the wireless announcements, and then began to run for his life down the quiet street. At the end of it he found a crawling taxi and, jumping into it, he yelled an address to the driver and the information that it was life or death to get there quickly. The driver, judging him mentally afflicted but rich, did his utmost.
Mr. Satterthwaite lay back, his head a jumble of fragmentary thoughts, forgotten bits of science learned at school, phrases used by Eastney that night. Resonance--natural periods--if the period of the force coincides with the natural period--there was something about a suspension bridge, soldiers marching over it, and the swing of their stride being the same as the period of the bridge. Eastney had studied the subject. Eastney knew. And Eastney was a genius.
At 10:45 Yoaschbim was to broadcast. It was that now. Yes, but the _Faust_ had to come first. It was "The Shepherd's Song," with the great shout after the refrain, that would--that would--do what?