Jiiiiiiiiii<i^^^^^^ 
 

 CORNELL 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 BOUGHT WITH THE INCOME 
 OF THE SAGE ENDOWMENT 
 FUND GIVEN IN 1891 BY 
 
 HENRY WILLIAMS SAGE 
 
 \ 
 
Cornell University Library 
 PS 1042.A94 
 
 3 1924 022 113 462 
 
Cornell University 
 Library 
 
 The original of tliis book is in 
 tlie Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924022113462 
 
THE AVALANCHE 
 
BY MRS. ATHERTON 
 
 HISTORICAL 
 THE CONQUEROR 
 CALIFORNIA: An Intimate History 
 WAR BOOK 
 THE LIVING PRESENT 
 
 FICTION 
 California 
 BEFORE THE GRINGO CAME. Containing "Resdnoii" 
 (iSo6) and "The Doomswoman" (1S40) 
 
 THE SPLENDID IDLE FORTIES (1800-46) 
 
 A DAUGHTER OF THE VINE (The Sixties) 
 
 AMERICAN WIVES AND ENGLISH HUSBANDS (The 
 Eighties') 
 
 THE CALIFORNIANS (The Eighties) 
 
 A WHIRL ASUNDER (The Nineties) 
 
 ANCESTORS (Present) 
 
 THE VALIANT RUNAWAYS: A Book for Boys (1840) 
 
 In Other Parts of the World 
 THE WHITE MORNING 
 MRS. BALFAME 
 
 PERCH OF THE DEVIL (Montana) 
 TOWER OF IVORY (Munich) 
 
 JULIA FRANCE AND HER TIMES (B. W. I. and Eng- 
 land) 
 
 RULERS OF KINGS (Austria, Hungary and the Adiron- 
 dacks) 
 
 THE TRAVELLING THIRDS (Spain) 
 
 THE GORGEOUS ISLE (Nevis, B. W. I.) 
 
 SENATOR NORTH (Washington) 
 
 PATIENCE SPARHAWK AND HER TIMES (Monterey, 
 California, and New York) 
 
 THE ARISTOCRATS (The Adirondacks) 
 
 THE BELL IN THE FOG: Short Stories of Various 
 Climes and Phases 
 
THE 
 
 AVALANCHE 
 
 A MYSTERY STORY 
 
 BY 
 
 GERTRUDE ATHERTON 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY 
 
 PUBUSHEES 
 
Copyright, 1919, by 
 Gertrude Atherton 
 
 All rights reserved, including that of 
 
 translation into foreign 
 
 languages 
 
 Phin'ted rM U. S. A. 
 
TO 
 
 CHARLES HANSON TOWNE 
 
THE AVALANCHE 3 
 
 had a franc in her pocket, and they had lived 
 in a suite of the old family viUa on one of the 
 hills of Eouen, Madame Delano paying heir 
 brother for their lodging, and dressing herself 
 and Helene with the aid of a half paralyzed 
 seamstress with a fiery red nose. Ma foi! It 
 was the nightmare of her yonth, that nose and 
 that croaking voice. But the woman had fin- 
 gers, and a taste ! And her mother could have 
 concocted a smart evening frock out of an old 
 window curtain. 
 
 But the petted little daughter was never 
 asked to go out and buy a spool of thread, much 
 less was she consulted in the household econo- 
 mies. All she noticed was that her clothes were 
 smarter than Cousin Marthe's, who had a real 
 dressmaker, and was subject to fits of jealous 
 sulks. No wonder that when money was poured 
 into her lap out in this wonderful California 
 she had assumed that it was made only to 
 spend. 
 
 But she would learn ! She would learn ! She 
 would ask her mother that very day to initiate 
 her into the fascinating secrets of personal 
 'economies, teach her how to portion out her 
 
4 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 quarterly allowance between her wardrobe, 
 club dues, charities, even her private auto- 
 mobile. 
 
 This last heroic suggestion was her own, and 
 although her husband protested he finally 
 agreed; it was well she should learn just what 
 it cost to be a woman of fashion in San Fran- 
 cisco, and the allowance was very generous. 
 His old steward, Mannings, ran the household, 
 although as he went through the form of lay- 
 ing the bUls before his little mistress on the 
 third of every month, she knew that the up- 
 keep of the San Francisco house and the Bur- 
 lingame villa ran into a small fortune a year. 
 
 "It is not that I am threatened with financial 
 disaster," Euyler had said to her. "But San 
 Francisco has not recovered yet, and it is im- 
 possible to say just when she will recover. I 
 want to be absolutely sure of my expenditures." 
 
 She had promised vehemently, and, as far as 
 he knew, she had kept her promise. He had 
 received no more bills, and it was obvious that 
 her haughty chauffeur was paid on schedule 
 time, until, seized with another economical 
 
THE AVALANCHE 5 
 
 Bpasm, slie sold her car and bought a small elec- 
 tric which, she could drive herself. 
 
 Buyler, little as he liked his mother-in-law, 
 was intensely grateful to her for the dexterity 
 with which she had adjusted Helene's mind to 
 the new condition. She even taught her how 
 to keep books in an elemental way and balanced 
 them herself on the first of every month. As 
 Helene Euyler had a mind as quick and supple 
 as it was cultivated in les graces., she soon 
 ceased to feel the chafing of her new harness, 
 although she did squander the sum she had re- 
 served for three months mere pocket money 
 upon a haj which was sent to the house by her 
 wily milliner on the first day of the second 
 quarter. She confessed this with tears, and 
 her husband, who thought her f emiuiue passion 
 for hats adorable, dried her tears and took her 
 to the opening night of a new play. But he 
 did not furnish the pathetic little gold mesh 
 bag, and as he made her promise not to borrow, 
 she did not treat her friends to tea or ices at 
 any of the fashionable rendezvous for a month. 
 Then her native French thrift came to her aid 
 and she sold a superfluous gold purse, a wed' 
 
6 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 ding present, to an envious friend at a hand- 
 some bargain. 
 
 That was ancient history now. It was twenty 
 months since Price had received a bill, and 
 secret inquiries during the past two had satis- 
 fied him that his wife's name was written in 
 the books of no shop in San Francisco that she 
 would condescend to visit. Therefore, this mad- 
 dening but intangible barrier had nothing to 
 do with a change of habit that had not caused 
 an hour of tears and sulks. Helene had a quick 
 temper but a gay and sweet disposition, nor- 
 mally' high spirits, little apparent selfishness, 
 and a naive adoration of masculine superiority 
 and strength; altogether, with her high bred 
 beauty and her dignity in public, an enchant- 
 ing creature and an ideal wife for a busy man 
 of inherited social position and no small de- 
 gree of pride. 
 
 But all this lovely equipment was blurred, 
 almost obscured at times, by the shadow that 
 he was beginning to liken to the San Francisco 
 fogs that drifted through the Golden Gate and 
 settled down into the deep hollows of the Marin 
 hills; moving gently but restlessly even there, 
 
THE AVALANCHE 7 
 
 like ghostly floating tides. He could see them 
 from his library window, where he often fin- 
 ished his afternoon's work with his secretaries. 
 But the fog drifted back to the Pacific, and 
 the shadow that encompassed his wife did not, 
 or rarely. It chilled their ardors, even their 
 serene domesticity. She was often as gay and 
 impulsive as ever, but with abrupt reserves, 
 an implication not only of a new maturity of 
 spirit, but of watchfulness, even fear. She had 
 once gone so far as to give voice passionately 
 to the dogma that no two mortals had the right 
 to be as happy as they were; then laughed 
 apologetically and "guessed" that the old Puri- 
 tan spirit of her father's people was coming to 
 life in her Gallic little soul ; then, with another 
 change of mood, added defiantly that it was 
 time America were rid of its baneful inherit- 
 ance, and that she would be happy to-day if the 
 skies fell to-morrow. She had flung herself 
 into her husband's arms, and even while he 
 embraced her the eyes of his spirit searched for 
 the girl wife who had fled and left this more 
 subtly fascinating but incomprehensible crea- 
 ture in her place. 
 
8 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 The morning was Sunday and lie sat in the 
 large window of his library that overlooked the 
 Bay of San Francisco. The house, which stood 
 on one of the highest hills, he had bought and 
 remodeled for his bride. The books that lined 
 these walls had belonged to his Ruyler grand- 
 father, bought in a day when business men had 
 time to read and it was the fashion for a gen- 
 tleman to cultivate the intellectual tracts of 
 his brain. The portraits that hung above, 
 against the dark paneling, were the work of 
 his mother's father, one of the celebrated por- 
 trait painters of his time, and were replicas of 
 the eminent and mighty he had painted. Ma- 
 harajas, kings, emperors, famous diplomats, 
 men of letters, artists of his own small class, 
 statesmen and several of the famous beauties 
 of their brief day; these had been the favorite 
 grandson's inheritance from Masewell Price, 
 and they made an impressive frieze, unique in 
 the splendid homes of the city of Ruyler 's adop- 
 tion. 
 
 He had brought, them from New York when 
 
THE AVALANCHE 9 
 
 lie had decided to live in California, and hung 
 them in his bachelor quarters. He had soon 
 made up his mind that he must remain in San 
 Francisco for at least ten years if he would 
 maintain the business he had rescued from the 
 disaster of 1906 at the level where he had, by 
 the severest application of his life, placed it by 
 the end of 1908. Meanwhile he had grown to 
 like San Francisco better than he would have 
 believed possible when he arrived in the 
 wrecked city, still smoking, and haunted with 
 the subtle odors of fires that had consumed 
 more than products of the vegetable kingdom. 
 The vast ruin with its tottering arches and 
 broken columns, its lonely walls looking as if 
 bitten by prehistoric monsters that must haunt 
 this ancient coast, the soft pastel colors the 
 great fire had given as sole compensation for 
 all it had taken, the grotesque twisted masses 
 of steel and the aged gray hills that had looked 
 down on so many fires, had appealed powerfully 
 to his imagination, and made him feel, when 
 wandering alone at night, eus if his brain cells 
 were haunted by old memories of Antioch when 
 Nature had annihilated in an instant what man 
 
10 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 had lavished upon her for centuries. Nowhere, 
 not even in what was left of ancient Rome, had 
 he ever received such an impression of the age 
 of the world and of the nothingness of man as 
 among the ruins of this ridiculously modem 
 city of San Francisco. It fascinated him, but 
 he told himself then that he should leave it 
 without a pang. He was a New Yorker of the 
 seventh generation of his house, and the rest of 
 the United States of America was merely in- 
 cidental. 
 
 The business, a branch of the great New York 
 firm founded in 1840 by an ancestor grown 
 weary of watching the broad acres of Euyler 
 Manor automatically transmute themselves into 
 the yearly rent-roll, and reverting to the energy 
 and merchant instincts of his Dutch ancestors, 
 had been conducted skillfully for the thirty 
 years preceding the disaster by Price's uncle, 
 Dryden Euyler. But the earthquake and fire in 
 which so many uninsured millions had vanished, 
 had also wrecked men past the rebounding age, 
 and Dryden Ruyler was one of them. He might 
 have borne the destruction of the old busiaess 
 buUding down on Front Street, or even the tem- 
 
THE AVALANCHE n 
 
 porary sta^ation of tra4e, but wlieii tlie Pacific 
 Union Clnb disappeared in the raging furnace, 
 and, like many of his old cronies who had no 
 home either in the country or out in the West- 
 em Addition, he was driven, over to Oakland 
 for lodgings, this ghastly clima;x of horrors — 
 he escaped in a milk wagon after sleeping for 
 two nights without shelter on the hare hills 
 behind San Francisco, while the fire roared its 
 defiance to the futUe detonations of dynamite, 
 and his staatica was as fiery as the atmosphere 
 — ^had broken the old man's spirit, and he had 
 announced his detennination to return to Euy- 
 ler-on-Hudson and die as a gentleman should. 
 There was no question of Price's father, Mor- 
 gan Euyler, leaving New York, even if he had 
 contemplated the sacrifice for a moment; that 
 his second son and general manag'er of the sev- 
 eral branches of the great business of Euyler 
 and Sons — as integral a, part of the ancient his- 
 tory of San Francisco a§ of the CQmparatively 
 modern history of New York — should, go, was 
 so much a matter of course that Price had taken 
 the first Overland train that left New York 
 
,12 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 after the receipt of his uncle's despairing tele- 
 gram. 
 
 In spite of the fortime behind him and his 
 own expert training, the struggle to rebuild the 
 old business to its former standard had been 
 unintermittent. The terrific shock to the city's 
 energies was followed by a general depression, 
 and the insane spending of a certaia class of 
 San Franciscans when their insurance money 
 was paid, was like a brief last crackling La a 
 cold stove, and, moreover, was of no help to the 
 wholesale houses. 
 
 But Price Ruyler, like so many of his new 
 associates in like case, had emerged triumph- 
 ant ; and with the unqualified approval and re- 
 spect of the substantial citizens of San Fran- 
 cisco. 
 
 It was this position he had won in a com- 
 munity where he had experienced the unique 
 sensation of being a pioneer in at the rebirth 
 of a great city, as well as the outdoor sports 
 that kept him fit, that had endeared California 
 to Ruyler, and in time caused him whim- 
 sically to visualize New York as a sternly ac- 
 cusing instead of a beckoning finger. Long be- 
 
THE AVALANCHE 13 
 
 fore he found time to play polo at BurUngame 
 lie had conceived a deep respect for a climate 
 where a man might ride horseback, shoot, drive 
 a racing car, or tramp, for at least eight months 
 of the year with no menace of sudden downpour, 
 and hardly a change in the weight of his clothes. 
 
 To-day the rain was dashing against his win- 
 dows and the wind howled about the exposed 
 angles of his house with that personal fury of 
 assault with which storms brewed out in the 
 vast wastes of the Pacific deride the enthu- 
 siastic baptism of a too confident explorer. All 
 he could see of the bay was a mad race of white 
 caps, and dark blurs which only memory as- 
 sured him were rocky storm-beaten islands; 
 mountain tops, so geological tradition ran, 
 whose roots were in an unquiet valley long since 
 dropped from mortal gaze. 
 
 The waves were leaping high against the old 
 forts at the entrance to the Golden Gate, and 
 occasionally he saw a small craft drift peril- 
 ously near to the rocks. But he loved the wild 
 weather of San Francisco, for he was by na- 
 ture an imaginative man and he liked to think 
 that he would have followed the career of let- 
 
14 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 ters had not the traditions of the great com- 
 mercial house of Etiyler and Sons, forced him to 
 carry on the burden. 
 
 The men of his family had never been idlers 
 since the recrudescence of ancestral energy in 
 the person of Morgan Ruyler I ; it was no part 
 of their prdfound sense of aristocracy to re- 
 tire on inherited or invested wealth; they be- 
 lieved that your fine American of the old stock 
 should die in harness; and if the harness had 
 been fashioned and elaborated by ancestors 
 whose portraits hung in the Chamber of Com- 
 merce, all the more reason to keep it spic and 
 up to date instead of letting it lapse into those 
 historic vaults where so many once honored 
 names lay rotting. They were a hard, tight- 
 fisted lot, the Euylers, and Price in one secluded 
 but cherished wing of his mind was unlike them 
 only because his mother was the daughter of 
 Masefield Price and would have been an artist 
 herself if her scandalized husband would have 
 consented. Morgan Euyleir IV had overlooked 
 his father-in-law's divagation from the ortho- 
 dox standards of his own family because he had 
 been a spectafcular filiancial success; bringing 
 
THE AVALANCHE 15 
 
 home ropes of enormous pearls from India in 
 addition to the fantastic sums paid him by en- 
 raptured native princes. But while Morgan 
 Euyler believed that rich men should work and 
 make their sons work, if only because an idle 
 class was both out of place in a republic and 
 conducive to unrest in the masses, it was quite 
 otherwise with women. They were for men to 
 shelter, and it was their sole duty to be useful 
 in the home, and, wherever possible, ornamen- 
 tal in public. Nor had he the least faith in fe^ 
 male talent, 
 
 Marian Euyler had yielded the point and de- 
 parted hopefully for a broader sphere "whefh 
 her second and favorite son was eight. Morgan 
 Euyler married again as soon as convention 
 would permit, this time carefully selecting a 
 wife of the soundest New York predispositions 
 and with a personal admiration of Queen Vic- 
 toria; and he had watched young Price like an 
 affectionate but inexorable parent hawk until 
 the young man followed his brother — a quintes- 
 sential Euyler — ^into the now historic firm. 
 However, he suffered little from anxiety. Price, 
 too, was conservative, intensely proud of the 
 
i6 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 family traditions, an almost impassioned work- 
 er, and unselfish as men go. Two sons in every 
 generation must enter the firm. It was not in 
 the Ruyler blood to take long chances. 
 
 m 
 
 Life out here in California had been too hur- 
 ried for more than fleeting moments of self- 
 study, but on this idle Sunday morning Price 
 Ruyler 's perturbed mind wandered to that in- 
 ner self of his to which he once had longed to 
 give a freer expression. It was odd that the 
 conservative training, the rigid traditions of 
 his family, conventional, old-fashioned, Puri- 
 tanical, as became the best stock of New York, 
 a stock that in the Ruyler famUy had seemed to 
 carry its own antidote for the poisons ever seek- 
 ing entrance to the spiritual conduits of the 
 rich, had left any place for that sentimental 
 romantic tide in his nature which had swept 
 him into marriage with a girl outside of his own 
 class; a girl of whose family he had known 
 practically nothing until his outraged father 
 had cabled to a correspondent in Paris' to make 
 investigation of the Perrin family of Rouen, 
 
THE AVALANCHE 17 
 
 to which the girl's mother claimed to belong. 
 
 The inquiries were satisfactory; they were 
 quite respectable bourgeois, silk merchants in a 
 small way — although at least two strata be- 
 low that haute bourgeoisie which now regarded 
 itself as the real upper class of the Republique 
 Fraugaise, A true Euyler, however, would 
 have fled at the first danger signal, never have 
 reached the point where inquiries were in order. 
 
 California was replete with charming, beau- 
 tiful, and superlatively healthy girls; the cli- 
 mate produced them as it did its superabun- 
 dance of fruit, flowers, and vegetables. But 
 they had left Price Euyler untroubled. He had 
 been far more interested watching San Fran- 
 cisco rise from its ruins, . transformed almost 
 overnight from a picturesque but ramshackle 
 city, a patchwork of different eras, into a staid 
 metropolis of concrete and steel, defiant alike 
 of earthquake and fire, ^et^had liked the new 
 experience of being a pioneer, which so subtly 
 expanded his starved ego that he had, by un- 
 conscious degrees, made up his mind to remain 
 out here as the permanent head of the San 
 Francisco House; and in time, no doubt, marry 
 
i8 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 one of these fiile, hardy, frank, out-of-door, 
 wholly nnsnbtle California girls. Moreover, he 
 had found in San Francisco several New York- 
 ers as well as Englishmen of his own class^- 
 notably John Gwyhne, who had thrown over one 
 of the greatest of English peerages to follow 
 his personal tastes in a legislative career — all 
 of whom had settled down into that free and 
 independent life from motives not dissimilar 
 from his own. 
 
 But he had ceased to be an untroubled spirit 
 from the moinent he met Helene Delano. He 
 had gone down to Monterey for polo, and he 
 had forgotten the dinner to which he had 
 brought a keen appetite, and stared at her as 
 she entered the immense dining room with her 
 mother. 
 
 It was not her beauty, although that was con- 
 siderable, that had summarily transposed his 
 gallant if cool admiration f of" all charming well 
 bred women into a submerging recognition of 
 woman in particuliar; it was her linlikehess to 
 any of the girls he had been riding, dancing, 
 playing golf and tennis with during the past 
 year and a half (for two years after his arrival 
 
THE AVALANCHE 19 
 
 he had eeen nothing of society \vhatever). Later 
 that evening he defined this dissimilarity from 
 the American girl as the result not oiily of her 
 French blood but of her Eiiropean training, 
 her qniet seclnded girlhood in a provincial town 
 of great beailty, where she had received a 
 leisurely education rare in the United States, 
 seen or read little of the great world (she had 
 visited Paris only twice and briefly), her mind 
 charmingly developed by conscientious tutors. 
 But at the moment he thought that the com- 
 pelling power lay in some deep subtlety of eye, 
 her little air of lofty aloofness, her classic small 
 features in a small face, and the top-heavy 
 masses of blue black hair which she carried with 
 a certain naive pride as if it were her only 
 vanity; in her general unlikeness to the gray- 
 eyed fair-haired American-^a type to which 
 himself belonged. Her only poiat in common 
 with this fashionable set patronizing Del Monte 
 for the hour, wias the ineffable style with which 
 she wore her perfect little white frook; an 
 American inheritance, he assumed after he knew 
 her; for, as he recalled provincial French 
 women, style was not their strong point. 
 
20 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 Wlien he met her eyes some twenty minutes 
 later, he dismissed the impression of subtlety, 
 for their black depths were quick with an eager 
 wonder and curiosity. Later they grew wist- 
 ful, and he guessed that she knew none of these 
 smart folk, down, like himself, for the tourna- 
 ment; people who were chattering from table 
 to table like a large family. That some of his 
 girl acquaintances were interested in the young 
 stranger he inferred from speculative and ap- 
 praising eyes that were turned upon her from 
 time to time. 
 
 Price, with some irony, wondered at their 
 curiosity. The San Francisco girl, he had dis- 
 covered, possessed an extra sense all her own. 
 There was no lofty indifference about her. She 
 had the worth-while stranger detected and tabu- 
 lated and his or her social destiny settled be- 
 fore the Eastern train had disgorged its con- 
 tents at the Oakland mole. And even the im- 
 mense florid mother of this lovely girl, with her 
 own masses of snow white. hair dressed in a' 
 manner becoming her age, and a severe gown of 
 black Chantilly net, relieved by the merest trifle 
 of jet, looked the reverse of the nondescript 
 
THE AVALANCHE 2i 
 
 tourist. The girl wore white embroidered silk 
 muslin and a thin gold chain with a small ruby 
 pendant. She was rather above the average 
 height, although not as tall as her mother, and 
 if she were as thin as fashion commanded, her 
 bones were so small that her neck and arms 
 looked almost plump. Her expressive eyes were 
 as black as her hair, and her only large feature. 
 Her skin was of a quite remarkably pure white- 
 ness, although there was a pink color in her lipg^ 
 and cheeks. The older men stared at her more 
 persistently than the younger ones, who hked 
 their own sort and not girls who looked as if 
 they might be "booky" and "spring things on a 
 fellow." 
 
 There was a ball in the evening and once 
 more mother and daughter sat apart, while the 
 flower of San Francisco — an inclusive term for 
 the select circles of Menlo Park, Atherton, Bur- 
 lingame, San Mateo, far San Kafael and Belve- 
 dere — romped as one great family. Newport, 
 Euyler reflected for the twentieth time, did it 
 no better. To the stranger peering through the 
 magic bars they were now as insensible as be- 
 
22 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 fitted their ooda These two people knew no-, 
 body and thftt was the end of it. 
 
 IV 
 
 But Price noted that now the girl's eyes were 
 merely wistful, and once or twice he saw thena 
 fiU with tears. As three of the dowagers merely 
 sniffed when he sought possible Lof ormation, he 
 finally had recourse to the manager of the hotel, 
 D. V. Bummer. They were a Madame and 
 Mademoiselle Delano from Rouen, and had been 
 at the hotel for a fortnight, not seemiiig to miud 
 its comparative emptiness, but enjoying the sea 
 bathing and the drives. The girl rode, and went 
 out every morning with a groom. 
 
 "But didn't they bring any letters?" asked 
 Euyler. "They are ladies and one letter would 
 have done the business. That poor girl is hav- 
 ing the deuce of a time." 
 
 "D. v.," who knew "everybody" in Cali- 
 fornia, and aU their secrets, shook his head. 
 " 'Fraid not The French maid told the floor 
 valet that although the father was American — 
 from New England somewheres-!r--and the girl 
 bom in California, accidentally as it were, she 
 
THE AVALANCHE 23 
 
 had lived in France all her life — she's just 
 eighteen — ^never crossed the ocean before. Can 
 yon beat it? Until last month, and then they 
 came from Hong Kong-^taking a trip round the 
 world in good old style. The madame, wjso 
 scarcely opens her mouth, did condescend to tell 
 me that she had admired California vfery much 
 when she was here before, and intended to 
 travel all over the state. Perhaps I met her in 
 that far off loHg ago, for I was managing a 
 hotel in San Francisco about that time, and her 
 face haunts me somehow---although when fea- 
 tures get all swallowed up by fat like that you 
 can't locate them. The girl, too, reminds me 
 of some one, but of course she was in arms when 
 she left and as I ain't much on cathedrals I 
 never went to Eouen. Of course if s the old 
 trick, bringing a pretty girl to a fashionable 
 watering place to marry her off, but these folks 
 are not poor. Not what we'd call rich, perhaps, 
 but good and solid. I don't fall for the old 
 lady J she's a cool proposition or I miss my 
 guess, but the girl's all right. I've seen too 
 many girls in this Mecca for adventurous fe- 
 males and never made a mistake yet. I wish 
 
24 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 some of our grand dames would extend the glad 
 hand. But I'm afraid they won't. Terrible 
 exclusive, this bunch." 
 
 Euyler scowled and walked back to the ball- 
 room. The exclusiveness of this young society 
 on the \r^rong side of the continent sometimes 
 made him homesick and sometimes made him 
 sick. He saw little chance for this poor girl to 
 enjoy the rights of her radiant youth if her 
 mother had not taken the precaution to bring 
 letters. France was full of Califoimians. 
 Many lived there. Surely she must have met 
 some one she could have made use of. It was 
 tragic to watch a pathetic young thing staring 
 at two or three hundred young men and maid- 
 ens disporting themselves with the natural 
 hilarity of youth, and but few of them too ill- 
 natured to welcome a young and lovely stranger 
 if properly introduced. 
 
 He experienced a desperate impulse to go up 
 to the mother and offer her the hospitality of 
 the evening, ask her to regard him as her host. 
 But Madame Delano had a frozen eye, and no 
 doubt orthodox French ideas on the subject of 
 
THE AVALANCHE 25 
 
 young girls. A moment later his eye fell on 
 Mrs. Ford Thornton. 
 
 "Foi-dy" was many times a millionaire, and 
 his handsome intelligent wife lived the life of 
 her class. But she was far less conservative 
 than any woman Price had met in San Fran- 
 cisco. Although she was no Iqnger young he 
 had more than once detected symptoms of a 
 wild and insurgent spirit, and an impatient con- 
 tempt for the routine she was compelled to fol- 
 low or go into retirement. She was always 
 leaving abruptly for Europe, and every once ia 
 a while she did something quite uncanonical; 
 enjoying wickedly the consternation she caused 
 among the serenely regulated, and betrajdng to 
 the keen eyes of the New Yorker an ironic ap- 
 preciation of the immense wealth which enabled 
 her to do as she chose, answerable to no one. 
 Her husband was uxorious and she had no chil- 
 dren. She had seemed to Price more restless 
 than usual of late and showing unmistakable 
 signs of abrupt departure. (He was sure she 
 dusted the soles of her boots as she looked the 
 door of drawing-room A.) Perhaps to-night 
 she might be in a schismatic mood. 
 
26 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 She was standing apart, a tall, dark, almost 
 fiercely haughty woman, but dressed with a cer- 
 tain arrogant simplicity, without jewels, her 
 hair in a careless knot at the base of her head. 
 There were times when she was impeccably 
 groomed, others when she looked as if an in- 
 furiated maid bad left her helpless. She was, 
 as Euyler well knew, a kind and generous 
 woman (in certain of her moods), with whom 
 the dastardly cradle fates had experimented, 
 hoping for high drama when the whip of life 
 snapped once too often. Perhaps she had 
 found her revenge as well as her consolation in 
 cheating them. 
 
 It was CAddent to Price that she had been 
 snubbing somebody, for a group of matrons, 
 flushed and drawn apart, were whispering re- 
 sentfully. Price Ruyler stood in no awe of 
 her. He could match her arrogance, and he 
 liked and admired her more than any of his 
 new friends. They quarreled furiously but she 
 had never snubbed him. 
 
 He walked over to her, his cool gray eyes lit 
 with the pleasure in seeing her that she had 
 learned to expect. "Grood evening, oh, Queen 
 
THE AVALANCHE 27 
 
 of the Pacific," he said lightly. "You are look- 
 ing quite wonderful as usual. Are you stand- 
 ing alone almost in the middle of the room to 
 emphasize the — difference?" 
 
 "I am in no mood for compliments, satiric or 
 otherwise." She looked him over with cool 
 penetration. "I may not massage or have my 
 old cuticle ripped off. If I choose to look my age 
 you must admit that it gives me one more claim 
 to originality." 
 
 "You should have let the world know long 
 since just how original you are, instead of set- 
 tling down into the leadership of San Francisco 
 society " 
 
 He enjoyed provoking her. Her dark nar- 
 row eyes opened and flashed as they must 
 have done in their unchastened youth. "Don't 
 dare call me the leader of this — ^this !" 
 
 "Granted. But the fact remains that your 
 word alone is law. Therefore I am about to 
 ask you to forget that I am a bungHng diplo- 
 mat and do a kind act. For once you would be 
 able to be both kind and original." 
 
 "I did not know you went in for charities. 
 I am sick of shelling out." 
 
28 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 "My only part in charities is shelling out." 
 
 "Well, come to the point. What do you 
 want?" 
 
 "I want you to go over to that lady — Madame 
 Delano, her name is — sitting beside that beau- 
 tiful girl, and introduce yourself and then me. 
 They are strangers and I'd like to give them a 
 good time." 
 
 * ' How disinterested of you ! ' ' She looked the 
 isolated couple over. "The girl is aU right, but 
 I don't like the mother. She is well dressed — 
 oh, correct from tip to toe — ^but not quite the 
 lady." 
 
 Euyler's cool insolent gaze swept the dado 
 of amiable overfed ladies who fanned them- 
 selves against the wall. 
 
 "None of that ! You know that I do not tol- 
 erate the New York attitude. At least we know 
 who ours are ; they came into their own respec- 
 tably, and with no uncertain touch. Of course 
 it is stupid of them to get fat. Naturally it 
 makes them look hourgeoise. But this is a laay 
 climate. As to that woman : there is something 
 about her I do not like. She is aggressively 
 not massaged, not made up. Only a woman of 
 
THE AVALANCHE 29 
 
 assured position can afford to be mid-Victoriani 
 It is now quite tlie smart thing to make up." 
 
 "No doubt her position is assured in her own 
 provincial town. It will be easy enough to drop 
 her if she doesn't go down. You can't deny 
 that the girl is all right — and a sweet pathetic 
 figure." 
 
 "If the girl marries one of our boys — and no 
 doubt that is what she was brought here for — 
 we shall not be able to get rid of the mother, 
 "We've tried that and failed." 
 
 At that moment Euyler's eyes met those of 
 the girl. They flashed an irresistible appeal. 
 He drew a short breath. How different she 
 looked! She radiated a subtle promise of per- 
 fect companionship. Price Ruyler did what all 
 men will do until the ^nd of time. He made up 
 his mind that he had found his woman and with- 
 out vocal assistance. 
 
 Mrs. Thornton, who had been watching the 
 unusual mobility of his face, met his eyes with 
 a satirical smile in her own, her thin red curl- 
 ing lips drawn almost straight for a moment. 
 She had played with the fancy, before anger 
 banished it, that if she had been twenty years 
 
30 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 younger. . . . Men had fallen madly in love 
 with, her in her own day. . . . She detected the 
 symptoms in this man at once. Her savage 
 will compelled her to accept accumulating years 
 without a concession. But she had forgotten 
 nothing. 
 
 Euyler may have read her thoughts. 
 
 "You know," he said, with an attempt at 
 lightness, although the coast wind tan, which 
 was his only claim to coloring, had paled a lit- 
 tle, "that girl reminds me so much of you that 
 I have made up my mind to marry her. I don't 
 care who she is. If you don't help me to meet 
 her conventionally I'll manage somehow, but I 
 should hate to practice any subterfuges on the 
 woman I intend to make my wife." 
 
 For a moment he had the sensation of being 
 pinned to the wall by that narrow concentrated 
 gaze. Then Mrs. Thornton swung on her heel. 
 "I'll do it," she said. 
 
 She walked across the room with the supple 
 grace her slender figure had never lost and sat 
 down beside the older woman. In a moment the 
 astonished dowagers who had "suffered from 
 her fiendish temper all evening," saw her talk- 
 
THE AVALANCHE 31 
 
 ing with spontaneous graciousness to botli the 
 strangers. Madame Delano was at first more 
 distant and reserved than Mrs. Thornton had 
 ever been, manifestly betraying all the sus- 
 picion and unsocial instincts of her class; but 
 she thawed, and the two women chatted, while 
 once more the girl's eyes wandered to the 
 dancers. 
 
 When Mrs. Thornton had tormented Ruyler 
 for quite fifteen minutes she beckoned to him 
 imperiously. A moment later he was whirling 
 the girl down the ball room and thrilling at her 
 
 contact. 
 
 y 
 
 The wooing had been as headlong as his fall- 
 ing in love. Helene Delano had a deep sweet 
 voice, which completed the conquest during the 
 hour they spent in the grounds under the shelter 
 of a great palm, until hunted down by a horri- 
 fied parent. 
 
 Helene talked frankly of her life. Her mother 
 had been visiting relatives in a small New Eng- 
 land town — Holbrook Centre, she believed it 
 was called, but hard American names did not 
 cling to her memory — she loved the soft Latin 
 
32 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 and Indian names in California — and there she 
 had met and married her father, James Delano. 
 They were on their way to Japan when business 
 detained him in San Francisco much longer 
 than he had expected and she was bom. She 
 believed that he had owned a ranch that he 
 wanted to sell. He died on the voyage across 
 the Pacific and her mother had returned to live 
 among her own people in Rouen — ^very plain 
 bourgeois, Hut of a respectability, Oh, la ! la ! 
 
 "But it was a tiresome life for a young girl 
 with American blood in her, monsieur." Her 
 mother's income from her husband's estate was 
 not large, but they lived in a wing of the old 
 house and were very comfortable. From her 
 window there was a lovely view of the Seine 
 winding off to Paris. "Oh, monsieur, how I 
 used to long to go to Paris ! America was too 
 far. I never even dreamed of it. But Paris! 
 And only two little glimpses of it — ^the last 
 when we spent a fortnight there before sailing, 
 to get me some nice frocks. ..." 
 
 She had studied hard — but hard! She knew 
 four languages, she told Euyler proudly. "I 
 had no dot then, you see. It was possible I 
 
THE AVALANCHE 33 
 
 miglit have to teacli one day. A governess in 
 England, Oh, la! la!" 
 
 But six months ago a good old uncle had died 
 and left them some money. She would have a 
 little dot now, and they could travel. Maman 
 said she would not have a large enough dot to 
 make a fine marriage in France, but that the 
 English and American men were more roman- 
 tic. They went first to the Orient, as there were 
 many Englishmen of good family to be met 
 there. "But maman is difficult to please," she 
 added with her enchanting artlessness, "as dif- 
 ficult as I myself, monsieur. I wish to fall in 
 love like the American girls. Maman says it 
 is not necessary, but I am half American, so, 
 why not? There was an English gentleman 
 with a nice title in Hong Kong and maman was 
 quite pleased with him until she discovered that 
 he gambled or did something equally horrid and 
 she bought our tickets for San Francisco right 
 away." 
 
 Yes, she was enjoying her travels, but she 
 was a little lonesome; in Bouen at least she had 
 her cousins. For the first time in her life she 
 was talking to a yoxmg man alone; even on the 
 
34 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 steamer she was not permitted to speak to any 
 of the nice young men who looked as if they 
 would like her if only maman would relent. 
 
 "In our ugly old rooms in Rouen maman 
 cherished me like some rare little flower in an 
 old earthen pot," she added quaintly. "Now 
 the pot has tinsel and tissue paper round it, 
 but until to-night I have felt as if I might just 
 as well be an old cabbage." 
 
 But it had been heaven to dance with a young 
 man who was not a cousin ; and to sit out alone 
 with him in the moonlight, Oh, grace a Dieu! 
 
 Traveling she had read modern novels for 
 the first time. There were many in the ship's 
 library, oh, but dozens ! and she knew now how 
 American and English girls enjoyed life. Her 
 mother had been iU nearly all the way over. 
 She had given her word not to speak to any one, 
 but maman had been ignorant of the library re- 
 plete with the novelists of the day, and although 
 she was not untruthfid, enfin, she saw no reason 
 to ask her too anxious parent for another pro- 
 hibition and condemn herself to yawn at the 
 sea. 
 
 Euyler proposed at the end of a week. She 
 
THE AVALANCHE 35 
 
 was the only really innocent, unspoiled, unself- 
 conscious girl he had ever met, almost as old- 
 fashioned as his great grandmother must have 
 been. Not that he set forth her virtues to bol- 
 ster his determination to marry a girl of no 
 family even in her own. country; he was madly 
 in love, and life without her was unthinkable; 
 but he tabulated the thousand points to her 
 credit for the benefit of his outraged father. 
 
 He did not pretend to like Madame Delano. 
 She was a hard, calculating, sordid old bour- 
 geoise, but when he refused the little dot she 
 would have settled upon Helene, he knew that 
 he had won her friendship and that she would 
 give him no trouble. She was not a mother-in- 
 law to be ashamed of, for her manners were 
 coldly correct, her education in youth had evi- 
 dently been adequate, and in her obese way she 
 was imposing. She gave him to understand 
 that she had no more desire to live with her 
 son-in-law than he with her, and established 
 herself in a small suite in the Palace Hotel. 
 After a ''lifetime" in a provincial town, econ- 
 omizing mercilessly, she felt, she remarked in 
 one of her rare expansive moments, that she 
 
36 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 had earned the right to look on at life in a great 
 hotel. 
 
 The rainy season she spent in Southern Cali- 
 fornia, moving from one large hotel crowded 
 with Eastern visitors to another. This nncom- 
 mon self -indulgence and her devotion to Helena 
 were the only weak spots Buyler was able to 
 discover in that cast-iron character. She sel- 
 • dom attended the brilliant entertainments of 
 her daughter and refused the endowed car of- 
 fered by her son-in-law. Helene married to the 
 best parti in San Francisco and quite happy, 
 she seemed content to settle down into the role 
 of the onlooker at the kaleidoscope of life. She 
 spent eight hours of the day and evening seated 
 in an arm chair in the court of the Palace Hotel, 
 and for air rode out to the end of the California 
 Street car line, always on the front seat of the 
 dummy. She was dubbed a "quaint old party" 
 by her new acquaintances and left to her own 
 devices. If she didn't want them they could 
 jolly well do without her. 
 
THE AVALANCHE 37 
 
 VI 
 
 Helene's social success was immediate and 
 permanent. Califormans rarely do things by 
 halves. Society was no exception. She had 
 "walked off" with the most desirable man in 
 town, but they were good gamblers. When, they 
 lost they paid. She had married into "their 
 set." They had accepted her. She was one 
 of them. No secret order is more loyal to its 
 initiates. 
 
 During that first year and a half of ideal 
 happiness Euyler, in what leisure he could 
 command, found Helene's rapidly expanding 
 mind as companionable as he had hoped; and 
 the girlish dignity she never lost, for all her 
 naivete and vivacity, gratified his pride and 
 compelled, upon their second brief visit to New 
 York, even the imqualified approval of his f am- 
 
 iiy. 
 
 She had inherited all the subtle adaptability 
 of her father's race, nothing of the cold and 
 rigid narrowness of her mother's class. Price 
 had feared that her lively mind might reveal 
 disconcerting shallows, but these little voids 
 
38 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 were but tlie divine hiatuses of youth. He 
 sometimes wondered just how strong her char- 
 acter was. There were times when she showed 
 a pronounced inclination for the line of least 
 resistance . . . but her youth . . . her too shel- 
 tered bringing up . . . those drab cramped 
 years ... no wonder. . . . 
 
 He was glad on the whole that his was the 
 part to mold. Nevertheless, he had his in- 
 consistencies. Unlike many men of strong will 
 and driving purpose he liked strength of char- 
 acter and pronounced individuality in women; 
 and he, too, had had fleeting visions of what 
 life might have been had Flora Thornton en- 
 tered life twenty years later. He had been quite 
 sincere in telling her that the young stranger 
 reminded him of the most powerful personality 
 he had met in California, and he believed that 
 within a reasonable time Helene would be as 
 variously cultivated, as widely, if less erratic- 
 ally developed. But was there any such insur- 
 gent force iu her depths? It was not within the 
 possibilities that at any time in her life Flora 
 Thornton had been pliable. 
 
 A man had little time to study his wife in 
 
THE AVALANCHE 39 
 
 California these days. Or at any time? He 
 sometimes wondered. Certainly happy mar- 
 riages were rare and divorces many. Fine 
 weather nearly all the year round played the 
 deuce with domesticity, and his business could 
 not be neglected for the long vacation abroad to 
 which they both had looked forward so 
 ardently. 
 
 Sometimes, even before this vague gray mist 
 had risen between them, he had had moments 
 of wondering whether he knew his wife at all. 
 How could a man know a woman who did not 
 yet know herself! He sighed and wished he 
 had more time to explore the uncharted seas 
 of a woman's soul. 
 
 But the cause of the change in her was some- 
 thing far less picturesque, something concrete 
 and sinister. He felt sure of that. . . . 
 
 vn 
 
 Unless — but that was ridiculous! Impossi- 
 ble! 
 
 He sprang to his feet, incredulous, disgusted 
 at the mere thought. 
 
 But why not ? She was very young, and older 
 
40 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 and wiser women were afflicted with inconsist- 
 encies, little tenacious desires and vanities 
 never quite to be grasped by the elemental male. 
 
 He went over to a bookcase containing heavy 
 works of reference and pressed his index finger 
 into the molding. It swung outward, reveal- 
 ing the door of a safe. He manipulated the 
 combination, took from a drawer of the interior 
 a box, opened it and stared at a magnificent 
 Burmah ruby. It was or had been a royal 
 jewel, presented to Masewell Price by one of 
 the great princes of India whose portrait he 
 had painted. The pearls had all been captured 
 long since by Price's sisters and by Morgan V. 
 for his wife ; but this ruby his mother had given 
 him as she lay dying. She had bidden him leave 
 it in his father's safe until he was out of col- 
 lege, and then keep it as closely in his personal 
 possession as possible. It would be turned over 
 to him with the rest of his private fortune, 
 
 "Never let any woman wear it," she had 
 whispered. "It brings luck to men but not to 
 women. Nothing could have affected my luck 
 one way or the other — ^I was bom to have noth- 
 ing I wanted, but you, dear little boy. Keep 
 
THE AVALANCHE 41 
 
 it for your luck and in a safe place, but near 
 you." 
 
 He had looked back upon this scene as he 
 grew older as the mere expression of a whim 
 of dissolution, but it had made so deep an im- 
 pression upon him at the time that insensibly 
 the words sank into his plastic mind creating 
 a superstition that refused to yield to reason. 
 The ruby was Helene's birthstone and she was 
 passionately fond of it. She had begged and 
 coaxed to wear this jewel, and upon one occa- 
 sion had stamped her little foot and sulked 
 throughout the evening. He had given her a 
 ruby bar, had the clasp of her pearl necklace 
 set with rubies, and last Christmas had pre- 
 sented her with a small but fine "pigeon blood" 
 surrounded with diamonds. These had enrap- 
 tured her for the moment, but she had always 
 circled back to the historic stone, over which 
 her indulgent husband was so unaccountably 
 obstinate. 
 
 Until lately. He recalled that for several 
 months she had not mentioned it. Could she 
 have been indulging ia a prolonged attack of in- 
 terior sulks, which affected her spirits, dimmed 
 
42 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 her radiant personality? He abominated the 
 idea but admitted the possibility. She would 
 not be the first person to be the victim of a 
 secret but furious passion for jewels. He re- 
 called a novel of Hichens; not the matter but 
 the central idea. Authors of other races had 
 used the same motive. Well, if his wife had an 
 abnormal streak in her the sooner he found out 
 the truth the better. 
 
 He closed the door of the safe, swung the 
 bookcase into place, slipped the ruby with its 
 curious gold chain that looked massive but 
 hardly weighed an ounce, into his pocket, rang 
 for a servant and told him to ask Mrs. Euyler 
 to come down to the library as soon as she was 
 dressed. 
 
CHAPTER n 
 
 RUYLER sighed as lie heard his wife walk 
 down the hall. There had been a time 
 when she came running like a child at his sum- 
 mons, but in these days she walked with a 
 leisurely dignity which to his possibly morbid 
 ear betrayed a certain crab-like disposition in 
 her little high heels to slip backward along the 
 polished floor. 
 
 She came in smiling, however, and kissed him. 
 quickly and warmly. Her extraordinary hair 
 hung down iu two long braids, their blue black- 
 ness undulating among the soft folds of her 
 thin pink negligee. For the first time Ruyler 
 realized that pink was Helene's favorite color; 
 she seldom wore anything else except white or 
 black, and then always relieved with pink. And 
 why not, with that deep pink blush in her white 
 cheeks, and the velvet blackness of her eyes? 
 People stiU raved over Helene Ruyler 's "oolor- 
 
 43 
 
44 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 ing," and Price told himself once more as she 
 stood before him, her little head dragged back 
 by the weight of her plaits, her slender throat 
 crossed by a narrow line of black velvet, that 
 he had married one of the most beautiful girls 
 he had ever seen. 
 
 He was seized with a sudden sharp pang of 
 jealousy and caught her in his arms roughly, 
 his gray eyes almost as black as hers. 
 
 "Tell me," he exclaimed, and the new fear 
 almost choked him, "does any other man inter- 
 est you — ^the least little bit?" 
 
 She stared at him and then burst into the 
 most natural laugh he had heard from her for 
 months. "That is simply too funny to talk 
 about." 
 
 "But I am able to give you so little of my 
 time. Working or tired out at night — letting 
 you go out so much alone — but I haven't the 
 heart to insist that you yawn over a book, while 
 I am shut up here, or too fagged to talk even 
 to you. Life is becoming a tragedy for business 
 men — if they've got it in them to care for any- 
 thing else." 
 
 "Well, don't add to the tragedy by culti- 
 
THE AVALANCHE 45 
 
 vating jealousy. I've told you that I am per- 
 fectly willing to give up Society and sit like 
 Dora holding your pens — or filling your foun- 
 tain pen — ^no, you dictate. What chance has a 
 woman in a business man's life?" 
 
 "None, alas, except to look beautiful and be 
 happy. Are you that?— the last I mean, of 
 course!" 
 
 She nestled closer to him and laughed again. 
 "More so than ever. To be frank you have 
 completed my happiness by being jealous.. I 
 have wondered sometimes if it were a compli- 
 ment — ^your being so sure of me." 
 
 "That's my idea of love." 
 
 "Well, it's mine, too. But if you want me 
 to stay home " 
 
 ' ' Oh, no ! You are fond of society? Eeally, I 
 mean? Why shouldn't you be? — a young 
 thing " 
 
 "What else is there? Of course, I should 
 enjoy it much ruore if you were always with me. 
 Shall we never have that year in Europe to- 
 gether?" 
 
 "God knows. Something is wrong with the 
 world. It needs reorganizing — from the top 
 
46 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 down. It is inliuinan, the way even ricli men 
 have to work — to remain rich! But sit down." 
 
 He led her over to a chair before the window. 
 The storm was decreasing in violence, the heavy 
 curtain of rain was no longer tossed, but falling 
 in straight intermittent Unes, and the islands 
 were coming to life. Even the high and heavy 
 crest of Mount Tamalpais was dimly visible. 
 
 "It is the last of the storms, I fancy. Spring 
 is overdue," said Price, who, however, was 
 covertly watching his wife's face. Her color 
 had faded a little, her lids drooped over eyes 
 that stared out at the still turbulent waters. 
 
 "I love these San Francisco storms," she 
 said abruptly. "I am so glad we have these few 
 wild months. But Mrs. Thornton has worried 
 and so have we. Her fete at San Mateo comes 
 off on the fourteenth, the first entertainment 
 she has given since her return, and it would be 
 ghastly if it rained. It should be a wonderful 
 sight — those grounds — everybody in fancy 
 dress with little black velvet masks. Don't you 
 think you can go?" 
 
 "The fourteenth? I'll try to make it. Who 
 are you to be?" 
 
THE AVALANCHE 47 
 
 "Beatrice d'Este — in a court gown of black 
 tissue instead of velvet, witli just a touch of 
 pink — oh, but a wonderful creation ! I designed 
 it myself. We are not bothering too much about 
 historical accuracy." 
 
 "How would you like this for the touch of 
 pink?" He took the immense ruby from his 
 pocket and tossed it into her lap. 
 
 For a moment she stared at it with expanding 
 eyes, then gave a Kttle shriek of rapture and 
 flung herself into his arms, the child he had 
 married. 
 
 "Is it true? But true? Shall I wear this 
 wonderful thing? The women will die of 
 jealousy. I shall feel like an empress — ^but 
 more, more, I shall wear this lovely thing — ^I, I, 
 Helene Ruyler, bom Perrin, who never had a 
 franc in her pocket in Rouen! Price! Have 
 you changed your mind — ^but no ! I cannot be- 
 lieve it." 
 
 That was it then! He watched her mobile 
 face sharply. It expressed nothing but the ex- 
 cited rapture of a very young woman over a 
 magnificent toy. There was none of the mor- 
 bid feverish passion he had dreadfully antici- 
 
48 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 pated. His spirits felt ligliter, althougli he 
 sighed that a bauble, even if it were one of the 
 finest of its kind in the world, should have pro- 
 jected its sinister shadow between them. It 
 had a wicked history. But Helene saw no 
 shadows. She held it up to the light, peered 
 into it as it lay half concealed in the cup of her 
 slender white hands, fondled it against her 
 cheek, hung the chain about her neck. 
 
 "How I have dreamed of it," she murmured. 
 "How did you come to change your mind?" 
 
 "I thought it a pity such a fine jewel should 
 live forever in a safe; and it will become you 
 above all women. Nature must have had you 
 in her eye when she designed the ruby. I had a 
 sudden vision . . . and made up my mind that 
 you should wear it the first time I was able to 
 take you to a party. I must keep the letter of 
 my promise." 
 
 "And I can only wear it when you are with 
 me?" 
 
 "I am afraid so." 
 
 "I'm you, if there is anything in the mar- 
 riage ceremony." Then she kissed him im- 
 pulsively. "But I won't be a little pig. And 
 
THE AVALANCHE 49 
 
 I can tell everybody between now and tbe 
 Thornton fete that I am going to wear it, and I 
 can think and dream of my triumph meanwhile. 
 But why didn't you let me know you were down ? 
 It is Sunday, our only day. I overslept shock- 
 ingly. I didn't get home till two." 
 
 ' ' Two 1 Do you dance until two every night ? ' ' 
 "What else? They lead such a purposeless 
 life out here. We sometimes have classes — ^bnt 
 they don't last long. I have almost forgotten 
 that I once had a serious mind. But what would 
 you? It is either society or suffrage. I won't 
 be as serious as that yet. I mean to be young — 
 but young! for five more years. Then I shall 
 become a 'leader,' or vote for the President, or 
 ride on a float in a suffrage parade dressed as 
 the Goddess of Liberty, with my hair down." 
 
 He laughed, more and more relieved. "Yes, 
 please remain young until you are twenty-five. 
 By that time I hope the world will have ad- 
 justed itself and I shall have the leisure to com- 
 panion you. Meanwhile, be a child. It is very 
 refreshing to me. Come. I must lock this thing 
 up. I have an interview here with Spaulding 
 in about ten minutes." 
 
so THE AVALANCHE 
 
 She gave it up reluctantly, kissing it much 
 as she had kissed him during their engagement ; 
 warm, lingering, but almost impersonal kisses. 
 The ruby seemed miraculously to have restored 
 her beaten youth. 
 
 She sat on the edge of a chair as he opened 
 the safe and placed the jewel in its box and 
 drawer. 
 
 "There is one other thing I wanted to ask," 
 he said as he rose. "Is your allowance suffi- 
 cient? It has sometimes occurred to me that 
 you wanted more — for some feminine extrava- 
 gance." 
 
 The light went out of her face. He wondered 
 whimsically if he had locked it in with the ruby, 
 and once more he was conscious that something 
 intangible floated between them. But she looked 
 at him squarely with her shadowed eyes. 
 
 "Oh, one could spend any amount, of course, 
 but I really have quite enough." 
 
 "You shall have double your present allow- 
 ance when these cursed times improve. And I 
 have always intended to settle a couple of hun- 
 dred thousand on you — a quarter of a million — 
 as soon as I could realize without loss on cer- 
 
THE AVALANCHE 51 
 
 tain investments. But one day I want you to 
 be quite independent." 
 
 Her eyes had opened very wide. "A quar- 
 ter of a million? And it would be all my own? 
 I could do anything with it I liked?" 
 
 "Well — ^I think I should put it in trust. I 
 haven't much faith in the resistance of your sex 
 to tempting investments promising a high rate 
 of interest." 
 
 "I have heard you say that when rich men 
 die the amount of worthless stock found in their 
 safe deposit boxes passes belief." 
 
 "Quite true. But that is hardly an argument 
 in favor of trusting an even more inexperienced 
 sex with large sums of money." 
 
 She laughed, but less naturally than when he 
 had been seized with an unwonted spasm of 
 jealousy. "You will always get the best of me 
 in an argument," she said with her exquisite 
 politeness. ' ' Really, I think I love being wholly 
 dependent upon you. Here comes your de- 
 tective. What a bore. But at least we lunch 
 together if we do have company. And thank 
 you, thank you a thousand times for promising 
 I shall wear the ruby at last." 
 
52 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 She slipped her hand into his for a second, 
 then left the room, smiling over her shoulder, 
 as the locally celebrated "Jake" Spaulding en- 
 tered. Both Euyler and his general manager 
 had thought it best to have their cashier 
 watched. There were rumors of gambling and 
 other road house diversions, and they proposed 
 to save their man to the firm, if possible ; if not, 
 to discharge him before he followed the usual 
 course and involved Euyler and Sons in the loss 
 of thousands they could ill afford to spare. 
 
CHAPTER in 
 
 ON the following day Ruyler, -who had 
 looked upon the whirlwind of passion 
 that had swept him into a romantic and un- 
 worldly marriage, as Hkely to remain the one 
 brief drama of his prosaic business man's life, 
 began dimly to apprehend that he was hover- 
 ing on the edge of a sinister and complicated 
 drama whose end he could aa little foresee as 
 he could escape from the hand of Fate that was 
 pushing him inexorably forward. When Fate 
 suddenly begins to take a dramatic interest in 
 a man whose course has run like a yacht before 
 a strong breeze, she precipitates him toward 
 one half crisis after another in order to con- 
 fuse his mental powers and render him wholly 
 a puppet for the final act. These little Earth 
 histrionics are arranged no doubt for the weary 
 
 gods-, who hardly brook a mere mortal rising 
 
 £3 
 
54 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 triumphantly above the malignant moods of the 
 master playwright 
 
 He lunched at the Pacific Union Club and 
 caught the down-town California Street cable 
 car as it passed, finding his favorite seat on the 
 left side of the "dummy" unoccupied. He was 
 thinking of Helene, a little disappointed, but on 
 the whole vastly relieved, congratulating him- 
 self that, no longer haunted, he could give his 
 mind wholly to the important question of the 
 merger he contemplated with a rival house that 
 had limped along since the disaster, but had at 
 last manifested its willingness to accept the 
 offer of Euyler and Sons. 
 
 It was a moment before he realized that his 
 mother-in-law occupied the front seat across the 
 narrow space, and even before he recognized 
 that large bulk, he had registered something 
 rigid and tense in its muscles; strained in its 
 attitude. When he raised his eyes to the face 
 he found himself looking at the right cheek in- 
 stead of the left, and it was pervaded by a sickly 
 green tint quite unlike Madame Delano's florid 
 color. She was listening to a man who sat just 
 behind her on the long seat that ran the length 
 
THE AVALANCHE 55 
 
 of the dummy. Although the day was clear, 
 there was still a sharp wind and no one else sat 
 outside. 
 
 Euyler knew the man by sight. Before the 
 fire he had owned some of the most disreputable 
 houses in the district the car would pass on its 
 way to the terminus. The buildings were un- 
 insured, and he had made his living since as a 
 detective. Even his political breed had gone 
 out of power in the new San Francisco, but he 
 was well equipped for a certain type of detec- 
 tive work. He had a remarkable memory for 
 faces and could pierce any disguise, he was as 
 persistent as a ferret, and his knowledge of the 
 underworld of San Francisco was illimitable. 
 But his chief assets were that he looked so lit- 
 tle like a detective, and that, so secretive were 
 his methods, his calling was practically un- 
 known. He had set up a cheap restaurant with 
 a gambling room behind at which the police 
 winked, although pretending to raid him now 
 and again. He was a large soft man with pen- 
 dulous cheeks streaked with red, a predatory 
 nose, and a black overhanging mustache. His 
 name was 'Gene Bisbee, and there was a tradi- 
 
56 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 tion that in his younger days he had been hand- 
 some, and irresistible to the women who had 
 made his fortune. 
 
 Euyler was absently wondering what his 
 haughty mother-in-law could have to say to such 
 a man when to his amazement Bisbee planted 
 his elbow in the pillow of flesh just below 
 Madame Delano's neck, and said easily: 
 
 "Oh, come off, Marie. I'd know you if you 
 were twenty years older and fifty pounds 
 heavier — and that's going some. Bimmer and 
 two or three others are not so sure — won't bet 
 on it — for twenty years, and, let me see — ^you 
 weighed about a hundred and thirty-five — per- 
 fect figger — in the old days. Must weigh two 
 seventy-five now. That makes one forty-five 
 pounds extra. Well, that and time, and white 
 hair, would change pretty near any woman, par- 
 ticularly one with small features. You look a 
 real old lady, and you can't be mor'n forty-five. 
 How did you manage the white hair ? Bleach ? ' ' 
 
 Euyler felt his heart turn over. The frozen 
 blood pounded in his brain and distended his 
 own muscles, his mouth unclosed to let his 
 breath escape. Then he became aware that the 
 
THE AVALANCHE 57 
 
 "woman had recovered herself and moved for- 
 ward, displacing the familiar elbow. She turned 
 imperiously to the motorman. 
 
 ' ' Stop at the corner, ' ' she said. * ' And if this 
 man attempts to follow me please send back a 
 policeman. He is intoxicated." 
 
 The car stopped at the comer of the street 
 opposite the site of the old Saint Mary's Cathe- 
 dral, a street where once had been that row of 
 small and evil cottages where French women, 
 painted, scantily dressed in a travesty of the 
 evening gown, called to the passer-by through 
 the slats of old-fashioned green shutters. That 
 had been before Euyler's day, but he knew the 
 history of the neighborhood, and this man's in- 
 terest in it. He was not surprised to hear Bis- 
 bee laugh aloud as Madame Delano, who 
 stepped off the car with astonishing agility, 
 waddled down the now respectable street. But 
 she held her head majestically and did not look 
 back. 
 
 Ruyler squared his back lest the man, glanc- 
 ing over, recognize him. That would be more 
 than he could bear. As the car reached Front 
 Street he sprang from the dummy and walked 
 
58 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 rapidly north to Euyler and Sons. He locked 
 himself in his private office, dismissing his 
 stenographer with the excuse that he had im- 
 portant business to think out and must not be 
 
 disturbed. 
 
 n 
 
 But business was forgotten. He was as 
 nearly in a state of panic as was possible for 
 a man of his inheritance and ordered life. He 
 belonged to that class of New Yorker that 
 looked with cold disgust upon the women of 
 commerce. So far as he knew he had never ex- 
 changed a word with one of them, and had often 
 listened with impatience to the reminiscences 
 of his San Francisco friends, now married and 
 at least intermittently decent, of the famous 
 ladies who once had reigned in the gay night 
 life of San Francisco, 
 
 And his mother-in-law! The mother of his 
 wife! 
 
 Her name was Marie. In that chaos of flesh 
 an interested eye might discover the ruins of 
 beauty. Her hair, he knew, had been black. 
 He recalled the terror expressed in every line 
 of that mountainous figure — which may well 
 
THE AVALANCHE 59 
 
 have been perfect twenty years ago. The green 
 pallor of her cheek! And he had long felt, 
 rather than knew, that she possessed magnifi- 
 cent powers of bluff. Her dignified exit had 
 been no more convincing to him than to Bisbee. 
 
 He went back over the past and recalled all 
 he knew of the woman whose daughter he had 
 married. She had visited the United States 
 about twenty-one years ago, met and married 
 Delano, and remaiaed in San Francisco two or 
 three months on their way to Japan. Delano 
 had died on the voyage across the Pacific, been 
 buried at sea, and his widow had returned to 
 her family in Rouen and settled down in her 
 brother's household. 
 
 This was practically all he knew, for it was 
 all that Helene knew, and Madame Delano never 
 wasted words. It had not occurred to him to 
 question her. Their status in Rouen was estab- 
 lished, and if not distinguished it was indubi- 
 tably respectable and not remotely suggestive 
 of mystery. 
 
 Price, con"vdnced that Helene 's father must 
 have been a gentleman, recalled that he had 
 asked her one day to tell him something of the 
 
6o THE AVALANCHE 
 
 Delanos, but Ms wife had replied vaguely that 
 she believed her mother had been too sad to 
 talk about him for a long while, and then prob- 
 ably had got out of the habit. She knew noth- 
 ing more than she already had told him. 
 
 It came back to him, however, that several 
 times his wife's casual references to the past, 
 and particularly regarding her parents, had not 
 dove-tailed, but that he had dismissed the im- 
 pression ; attributing it to some lapse in his own 
 attention. He had a bad habit of listening and 
 thinking out a knotty business problem at the 
 same time. And there is a curious inhibition 
 in loyal minds which forbids them to put two 
 and two together until suspicion is inescapably 
 aroused. 
 
 He had a very well ordered mind, furnished 
 with innumerable little pigeon holes, which flew 
 open at the proper vibration from his admirable 
 memory. He concentrated this memory upon 
 a little bureau of purely personal receptacles 
 and before long certain careless phrases of his 
 wife stood in a neat row. 
 
 She had mentioned upon one occasion that 
 she thought she must have been about five when 
 
THE AVALANCHE 61 
 
 she arrived in Rouen, and remembered her first 
 impression of the Cathedral as well as the boats 
 on the Seine at night. And Cousin Pierre had 
 taken her up the river one Sunday to the church 
 on the height which had been built for a statue 
 of the Virgin that had been excavated there, 
 and bade her kneel and pray at this station for 
 what she wished most. She had prayed for a 
 large wax doU that said papa and mama, and 
 behold, it had arrived the next day. 
 
 Madame Delano had told him unequivocally 
 that she had gone directly to Eouen after 
 her husband's death . . . but again, although 
 Helene remembered arriving in Rouen with her 
 mother, she must have been left for a time else- 
 where, for Helene had another memory — of a 
 convent, where she had tarried for what seemed 
 a very long time to her childish mind. Could 
 she have been sent to a convent from the house 
 in Rouen when she was so little that her mem- 
 ories of that first sojourn were confused? And 
 why? The family had apparently been fond of 
 "la petite Americaine," and even if her devoted 
 mother had been obliged to leave her for several 
 years it is doubtful if they would have sent so 
 
62 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 young a child to a convent. Eack his memory 
 as he would he could recall no allusion to such 
 a journey, to any separation between mother 
 and child after they were established in Rouen. 
 
 But he did remember one of Madame De- 
 lano's few references to the past, which might 
 suggest that she had left the child somewhere 
 while she went home to make peace with her 
 family to get her bearings. Her brother had 
 not approved of her marrying an American. 
 "But," she had added graciously, "you see I 
 had no such prejudice. Neither now nor then, 
 James was the best of husbands." 
 
 "James!" "Jim." 
 
 He had heard the name Jim as he boarded 
 the dummy, uttered in extremely familiar ac- 
 cents ; by Bisbee, of course. Yes, and something 
 else. "We all felt bad when he croaked." 
 
 His feverishly alert memory darted to an- 
 other pigeon hole and exhumed another treas- 
 ure. Some ten or twelve months ago he had 
 been obliged to go to a northern county on busi- 
 ness that involved buying up smaller concerns, 
 and would keep him away for a fortnight or 
 more. He had taken Helene, and as they were 
 
THE AVALANCHE 63 
 
 motoring through one of the old towns she had 
 leaned forward with a little gasp exclaiming : 
 
 "How exactly like! If I didn't know that I 
 had never been in California before except 
 merely to be bom here I could vow that is where 
 I lived with the dear nuns." 
 
 He had asked idly: "Where was your con- 
 vent ? ' ' and she had shaken her head, ' * Maman 
 says I never was in a convent, that I dreamed 
 it." She had lifted to Euyler a puzzled face. 
 "I remember she punished me once, when I 
 was about seven and persisted in talking about 
 the convent— I suppose I had forgotten it for a 
 time in the new life, and something brought it 
 back to me. But it is the most vivid memory 
 of my childhood. Do you think I could have 
 been one of those uncanny children that live in 
 a dream world? I hope not. I like to think I 
 am quite normal and full to the brim of com- 
 mon sense." He had laughed and told her not 
 to worry. He had lived in a dream world him^ 
 self when he was little. 
 
 The conviction grew upon him as he sat there 
 that Helene had spent the first fite years of her 
 life at the Ursuline Convent in St. Peter. What 
 
64 THE AVALAltJCHE 
 
 had her mother — ^young and beautiful — been 
 doing during those years, the years of a moth- 
 er's most anxious devotion and pleasurable in- 
 terest? He searched his memory for Club remi- 
 niscences of a Marie Delano of twenty years 
 earlier, or less. No such name rewarded his 
 mental explorations, and Marie Delano was not 
 a name likely to escape. 
 
 He exclaimed aloud at his stupidity. The 
 astute French woman was hardly likely to re- 
 turn to the scene of her former triumphs with 
 an innocent young daughter and an infamous 
 name. Nor, apparently, had she carried it to* 
 Rouen after she had manifestly foresworn vice 
 for the sake of her child, even to the length of 
 resigning herself to the dullness of a provincial 
 town. 
 
 But "Jim"? Her husband? Could Bisbee 
 have referred to some other Jim who had 
 "croaked" recently? Such women have more 
 than one Jim in their voluminous lives. 
 
 Buyler had that order of mental tempera- 
 ment to which dubiety is the one unendurable 
 condition; he had none of that cowardice which 
 postpones an unpleasant solution until the in- 
 
THE AVALANCHE 65 
 
 evitable moment. Whatever this hideous mys- 
 tery he would solve it as quickly as possible 
 and then put it out of his life. Beyond question 
 poor Helene was the victim of blackmail; that 
 was the logical explanation of her ill-concealed 
 anxiety — misery, no doubt ! 
 
 He wished she had had the courage to come 
 directly to him, but it was idle to expect the 
 resolution of a woman of thirty in a child of 
 twenty. It was apparent that she had even 
 tried to shield her mother, for that Madame 
 Delano had been caught unaware to-day was in- 
 disputable. 
 
 What incredible impudence — or courage? — ^to 
 return here! There were other resorts in the 
 South and on the Eastern Coast where a pretty 
 girl might reap the harvest of innocent and 
 lovely youth. 
 
 Once more his mind abruptly focused itself. 
 
 Shortly after his marriage Madame Delano 
 had asked him casually if he could inform her 
 as to the reliability of a certain firm of lawyei s, 
 Lawton, Cross and Co. She "thought of buy- 
 ing a ranch," and the firm had been suggested 
 
66 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 to her by some one or other of these rich people. 
 She also wished to make a will. 
 
 He had replied as casually that it was a lead- 
 ing firm, and forgotten the i:ucident promptly. 
 He recalled now that several times he had seen 
 his mother-in-law coming ont of the Monadnock 
 Building, where this firm had its offices. He 
 had upon one occasion met he." in the lift and 
 she had explained with unaccustomed volubility 
 that she was still thinking of buying a ranch,, 
 possibly in Napa County. She understood that 
 quite a fortune night be made in fruit, and it 
 would be a diverting interest for her old age. 
 Possibly she might encourage a favorite nephew 
 to come out and help her run it. 
 
 Ruyler, who had been absorbed in his own 
 affairs and hated the sight of any woman dur- 
 ing business hours, had felt like telling her that 
 if she wanted to sink her money in a ranch, that 
 was as good a way to get rid of it as any, but 
 had merely nodded and left the elevator. He 
 was not the man to give any one unasked ad- 
 vice and be snubbed for his pains. 
 
 If "Jim" was her husband and had 
 "croaked" some two years since, what more 
 
THE AVALANCHE 67 
 
 natural than that she had been obliged to come 
 to California and settle his estate? Lawton 
 and Cross would keep her secret, as California 
 lawyers, with or without blackmail, had kept 
 many others ; perhaps she was an old friend of 
 Lawton's. He had been a "bird" in his time. 
 
 Undoubtedly this was the solution. Other- 
 wise she never would have risked the return 
 to San Francisco, even with her changed ap- 
 pearance. 
 
 ni 
 
 It was time to dismiss speculation and pro- 
 ceed to action. He rang up detective headquar- 
 ters and asked Jake Spaulding to come to him 
 at once. 
 
 Spaulding began: "But the matter ain't 
 ripe yet, boss. Nothin' doin' last night " 
 
 But Euylet cut him short "Please come im- 
 mediately—no, not here. Meet me at Long's." 
 
 He left the building and walked rapidly to a 
 well-known bar where estimable citizens, even 
 when impervioua to the seductions of cocktail 
 and highball, often met in private soundproof 
 rooms to discuss momentous deals, or iavoke 
 the aid of detectives whose appearance in home 
 
68 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 or office might cause the wary bird to fly away. 
 
 The detective did not drink, so Euyler or- 
 dered cigars, and a few moments later Spauld- 
 ing strolled in. His physical movements always 
 belied his nervous keen face. He was the an- 
 tithesis of 'Gene Bisbee. AU honest men com- 
 pelled to have dealings with him liked and 
 trusted him. A rich man could confide a dis- 
 graceful predicament to his keeping without 
 fear of blackmail, and a poor man, if his cause 
 were interesting, might command his services 
 with a nominal fee. He loved the work and 
 regarded himself as an artist, inasmuch as he 
 was exercising a highly cultivated gift, not 
 merely pursuing a lucrative profession. He 
 sometimes longed, it is true, for worthier ob- 
 jects upon which to lavish this gift, and he 
 found them a few years later when the world 
 went to war. He was one of the most valuable 
 men in the Federal Secret Service before the 
 end of 1915. 
 
 "What's up?'- he asked, as he took posses- 
 sion of the most comfortable chair in the little 
 room and lit a cigar. "You look as if you 
 
THE AVALANCHE 69 
 
 hadn't slept for a week, and you were lookin' 
 fine yesterday." 
 
 "Do you mind if I only half confide in you? 
 It's a delicate matter. I'd like to ask you a few 
 questions and may possibly ask you to find the 
 answer to several others." 
 
 "Fire away. Curiosity is not my vice. I'll 
 only call for a clean breast if I find I can't work 
 in the dark." 
 
 ' ' Thanks. Do — do you remember any woman 
 uf the town named — Marie Delano ? ' ' He swal- 
 lowed hard but brought it out. "Who may 
 have flourished here fifteen or twenty years 
 ago?" 
 
 Spaulding knew that Ruyler's wife had been 
 named Delano, but he refrained from whistling 
 and fixed his sharp honest blue eyes on the 
 opposite wall. 
 
 "Nope. Sounds fancy enough, but she was 
 no Queen of the Eed Light District in S. F." 
 
 "I was convinced she could not have been 
 known under that name. Do you know of any 
 woman of that sort who was married — pos- 
 sibly — to a man whose first name was James — 
 Jim — and who left abruptly, while she was still 
 
70 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 young and handsome, just about fifteen years 
 ago?" 
 
 "Lord, that's a poser! Do you mean to say 
 she married and retired — landed some simp? 
 They do once in a while. Could tell you queer 
 things about certain ancestries in this old 
 town. ' ' 
 
 "No — ^I don't think that was it. I have rea- 
 son to think she had been married for at least 
 six years before she left. Can't you think of 
 any Marie who was married to a Jim— in — ^in 
 that class of life?" 
 
 "I was pretty much of a kid fifteen years 
 ago, but I can recall quite a few Maries and 
 even more Jims. But the Jims were much too 
 wary to marry the Maries. Try it again, part- 
 ner. Let us approach from another angle. 
 What did your Marie look like?" 
 
 "She must have been tall — uncommonly tall 
 — ^with black hair and small features; black 
 eyes that must have been large at that time. I 
 — I — ^believe she had a very fine figure." 
 
 "What nationality?" 
 
 "French." 
 
 The detective recrossed his legs. "French. 
 
THE AVALANCHE 71 
 
 Oh, Lord! The town was fairly overrun with 
 them. Made you think there was nothing in all 
 this talk about gay Paree. AU the ladybirds 
 seemed to have taken refuge here. You have 
 no idea of her last name?" 
 
 "It might have been Perrin." 
 
 "Never. Not after she got here and set up 
 in business. More likely Lestrange or Dela- 
 court " 
 
 "Was there a Delacourt?" 
 
 ' ' Not that I remember. I don't see light any- 
 where. Of course it won't take me twenty-four 
 hours to get hold of the history and appearance 
 of every queen who was named Marie fifteen 
 years ago, and your description helps a lot. 
 Records were burned, but some of the older 
 men on the force are walking archives. For 
 the matter of that you might draw out some old 
 codger in your club and get as much as I can 
 give you " 
 
 "Eather not! I think I'U have to give you 
 my confidence." 
 
 "Much the shortest and straightest route. 
 Just fancy you're takin' a nasty dose of medi- 
 cine for the good of your health. I guess this 
 
72 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 is a case where I can't work in the dark." 
 
 "Have you ever noticed an elderly woman 
 seated in the court of the Palace Hotel — im- 
 mensely stout?" 
 
 "I should say I had. One of the sights of 
 S. F, Why — of course — she's your mother-in- 
 law!" 
 
 "Has there been any talk about her?" 
 
 ' ' Some comment on her size. And her child- 
 like delight in watchin' the show." 
 
 "Nothiag else? No one has claimed to rec- 
 ognize her?" 
 
 Spaulding sat up straight, his nose pointing. 
 "Eeeognize her? What d'you mean?" 
 
 "I mean that I overheard a conversation — 
 one-sided — to-day on the California Street 
 dummy, in which Bisbee accused Madame De- 
 lano practically of what I have told you. At 
 least that is the way I interpreted it. He called 
 her Marie, alluded ia an unmistakable manner 
 to a disgraceful past in which he had known 
 her intimately, and was confident that he recog- 
 nized her in spite of her flesh and white hair. 
 I am positive that she recognized him, although 
 she was clever enough not to reply." 
 
THE AVALANCHE 73 
 
 "Jimminy! The plot thickens. That scoun- 
 drel never forgot a face in his life. I don't 
 train with him — not by a long sight — so if 
 there's been any talk in his bunch, I naturally 
 wouldn't have heard it. You say her name is 
 Marie now?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "And Perrin is her real name?" 
 
 "She comes of a well-known family of Rouen 
 of that name. She lived there with her chUd for 
 at least thirteen years before her return to 
 California. Of that I am certain. Her daugh- 
 ter is now twenty. I wish to know where she 
 kept that chUd during the first five years of its 
 life. I have reason to think it was in the Ursu- 
 line Convent at St. Peter." 
 
 "That's easy settled. And you think the fa- 
 ther's first name was Jim?" 
 
 "She told me that his name was James De- 
 lano. Also that he died within the first year 
 of their marriage, when the child was two 
 months old, during the voyage to Japan. That 
 may be, but I can see no reason for her return- 
 ing here unless he died more recently and the 
 
74 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 settlement of Ms estate demanded her pres- 
 ence." 
 
 "Pretty good reasoning, particularly if you 
 are sure she stayed here until the child was 
 five. Some of them have pretty decent instincts. 
 She may have made up her mind to give the 
 kid a chance, and returned to her relations. Of 
 course we must assume that they knew nothing 
 of her life." 
 
 "I am positive they did not. But there had 
 been some sort of estrangement. I have been 
 given to understand that it was because she 
 married an American. Of course she may not 
 have written to them at all for six or seven 
 years. Her story is that she was visiting other 
 relatives in a place called Holbrook Centre, 
 Vermont, and met this man and married him. 
 Then that he was detained by business in San 
 Francisco for several months, and the child 
 born here." 
 
 "Good commonplace story. Just the sort 
 that is never questioned. Of course if she did 
 not correspond with her family during all that 
 time she could adopt any name for her return 
 to respectability that she chose. Delano wasn't 
 
THE AVALANCHE 75 
 
 lier name out here. That's certain. What line 
 do yon intend to take? After I've delivered the 
 facts?" 
 
 "My object is to have the child's legitimacy 
 established, if possible, then see that Madame 
 Delano leaves California forever. I think that 
 she could be terrified by a threat of blackmail. 
 I can't imagine the mere chance of recognition 
 worrying her, for I should say she had as much 
 courage as presence of mind. But her passion 
 is money. If she thought there was any dan- 
 ger of being forced to hand over what she has 
 I fancy she would get out as quickly as pos- 
 sible. She is an intelligent woman and I im- 
 agine she has taken a sardonic pleasure in sit- 
 ting out in full view of San Francisco, and get- 
 ting away with it." 
 
 "And marrying her girl to the greatest catch 
 in California," thought the detective, but he 
 said: 
 
 "I believe you're dead right, although, of 
 course, there may be nothing in it. Even 'Gene 
 Bisbee might be mistaken, pryin' a gazelle out 
 of an elephant like that Now, tell me all you 
 know. ' ' 
 
 When Ruyler had covered every point Spauld- 
 
76 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 ing nodded. "It's possible this Jim was tiie 
 maquereau and she made him marry her for the 
 sake of the child. Doubt if the date can be 
 proved except through the lawyers, and it will 
 be hard to make them talk. Of course if there 
 is a Holbrook Centre and she was married 
 there — but I have my doubts. The point is that 
 he evidently married her if she is settlin' up his 
 estate. I'll find out what Jims have died within 
 the last three years or so. That's easy. The 
 direct route to the one we want is through St. 
 Peter. I'U go up to-night." 
 "And you'll report to-morrow?" 
 "Yep. Meet me here at six P.M. Lucky the 
 man seems to have died after the fire. I'U set 
 some one on the job of searching death records 
 right away." 
 
CHAPTER ly 
 
 T3 UYLER liad talf promised to go to a din- 
 ■■- *-' ner that night at the house of John 
 Gwynne, whose wife would chaperon his wife 
 afterward to the last of the Assembly dances. 
 
 Gwynne was his English friend who had 
 abandoned the ancient title inherited untimely 
 when he was making a reputation ia. the House 
 of Commons, and become an American citizen 
 in California, where he had a large ranch orig- 
 inally the property of an American grand- 
 mother. His migration had been justified in his 
 own eyes by his ready adaptation to the land 
 of his choice and to the opportunities offered 
 in the rebuilding of San Francisco after the 
 earthquake and fire, as well as in the renovation 
 of its politics. He had made his ranch profit- 
 able, read law as a stepping-stone to the politi- 
 cal career, and had just been elected to Con- 
 gress. Ruyler was one of his few intimate 
 
 77 
 
is THE AVALANCHE 
 
 friends and liad promised to go to this fare- 
 well dinner if possible. A place would be kept 
 vacant for him until the last minute. 
 
 Gwynne bad married Isabel Otis,* a Calif or- 
 nian of distinguished beauty and abilities, 
 whose roots were deep in San Francisco, al- 
 though she had "run a ranch" in Sonoma 
 County. The Gwynnes and the Thorntons un- 
 til Ruyler met Helene had been the friends 
 whose society he had sought most in his rare 
 hours of leisure, and he had spent many sum- 
 mer week-ends at their country homes. He had 
 hoped that the intimacy would deepen after his 
 marriage, but Helene during the past year had 
 gone almost exclusively with the younger set, 
 the "dancing squad"; natural enough consid- 
 ering her age, but Ruyler would have expected 
 a girl of so much intelligence, to say nothing of 
 her severe education, to have tired long since 
 of that artificial wing of society devoted solely 
 to froth, and gravitated naturally toward the 
 best the city afforded. But she had appeared 
 to like the older women better at first than 
 
 * See "Ancestors." 
 
THE AVALANCHE 79 
 
 later, althougli she accepted their invitations 
 to large dinners and dances. 
 
 Enyler made up his mind to attend this din- 
 ner at Gwynne's, and telephoned his acceptance 
 before he left Long's. Business or no business, 
 he should be his wife's bodyguard hereafter. 
 There were blackmailers in society as out of it, 
 and it was possible that his ubiquity would 
 frighten them off. Whether to demand his 
 wife's confidence or not he was undecided. Bet- 
 ter let events determine. 
 
 "When he arrived at home he went directly to 
 Helene's room, but paused with his hand on the 
 knob of the door. He heard his mother-in-law's 
 voice and she was the last person he wished 
 to meet until he was in a position to tell her to 
 leave the country. He was turning away im- 
 patiently when Madame Delano lifted her hard 
 incisive tones. 
 
 "And you promised me!" she exclaimed pas- 
 sionately. "I trusted you. I never be- 
 lieved " 
 
 Price retreated hurriedly to his own room, 
 
8o THE AVALANCHE 
 
 and it was not until he had taken a cold shower 
 and was half dressed that he permitted himself 
 to think. 
 
 That wretch had known, then! It was she 
 who had been blackmailing her daughter. And 
 the poor child had been afraid to confide in him, 
 to ask him for money. No wonder her eyes had 
 flashed at the prospect of a fortune of her 
 own. . . . 
 
 An even less welcome ray illuminated his 
 mind at this point. His wife was not unversed 
 in the arts of dissimulation herself. True, she 
 was French and took naturally to diplomatic 
 wiles; true, also, the instinct of self-preserva- 
 tion in even younger members of a sex that 
 man in his centuries of power had made, super- 
 ficially, the weaker, was rarely inert. 
 
 What woman would wish her husband to know 
 disgraceful ancestral secrets which were no 
 fault of hers ? A much older woman would not 
 be above entombing them, if the fates were 
 kind. But it saddened him to think that his 
 wife should be rushed to maturity along the 
 devious way. Poor child, he must win her con- 
 fidence as quickly as his limping wits would 
 
THE AVALANCHE 81 
 
 permit and shift her burden to his own shoul- 
 ders. 
 
 Having learned through the medium of the 
 house telephone that his mother-in-law had de- 
 parted, he knocked at his wife's door. She 
 opened it at once and there was no mark of agi- 
 tation on her little oval face under its proudly 
 carried crown of heavy braids. She was look- 
 ing very lovely in a severe black velvet gown 
 whose texture and depth cunningly matched her 
 eyes and threw into a relief as artful the white 
 purity of her skin and the delicate pink of lip 
 and cheek. 
 
 She smiled at him brilliantly. "It can't be 
 true that you are going with me?" 
 
 "I've reformed. I shall go with you every- 
 where from this time forth. But I thought I 
 heard your mother's voice when I came in " 
 
 "She often comes in about dressing time to 
 see me in a new frock. How heavenly that you 
 wiU always go with me." Her voice shook a 
 little and she leaned over to smooth a possible 
 wrinkle in her girdle. 
 
 "WiU you come down to the library? We 
 are rather early." 
 
82 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 He went directly to the safe and took out the 
 ruby and clasped the chain about her neck. The 
 chain was long and the great jewel took a deeper 
 and more mysterious color from the somber 
 background of her bodice. 
 
 Helene gasped. "Am I to wear it to-night? 
 That would be too wonderful. This is the last 
 great night in town." 
 
 "Why not? I shall be there to mount guard. 
 You shall always wear it when I am able to go 
 out with you." 
 
 She lifted her radiant face, although it re- 
 mained subtly immobile with a new and almost 
 formal self-possession. "I am even more de- 
 lighted than I was yesterday, for at the fete 
 there will be so much novelty to distract atten- 
 tion. You always think of the nicest possible 
 things." 
 
 When they were in the taxi he put his arm 
 about her. 
 
 "I wonder," he began gropingly, "if you 
 would mind not going out when I cannot go with 
 you? I'll go as often as I can manage. There 
 are reasons " 
 
THE AVALANCHE 83 
 
 He felt her light body grow rigid. "Rea- 
 sons? You told me only yesterday " 
 
 "I know. But I have been thinking it over. 
 That is rather a fast lot you run with. I know, 
 of course, they are F.F.C.'s, and all the rest 
 of it, but if I ever drove up to the Club House 
 in Burlingame in the morning and saw you sit- 
 ting on the veranda smoking and drinking gin 
 fizzes " 
 
 "You never will! I could not swallow a gin 
 fizz, or any nasty mixed drink. And although 
 I have had my cigarette after meals ever since 
 I was fifteen, I never smoke in public. ' ' 
 
 "I confess I cannot see you in the picture that 
 rose for some perverse reason in my mind ; but 
 — ^well, you really are too young to go about so 
 much without your husband " 
 
 "I am always chaperoned to the large af- 
 fairs. Mrs. Gwynne takes me to the Fairmont 
 to-night." 
 
 I know. But scandal is bred in the marrow 
 of San Francisco. Its social history is founded 
 upon it, and it is almost a matter of principle 
 to replace decaying props. Do you mind so 
 much not going about unless I can be with you ? ' ' 
 
84 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 "No, of course not." Her voice was sweet 
 and submissive, but her body did not relax. 
 She added graciously: "After all, there are so 
 many luncheons, and we often dance in the aft- 
 ernoon." 
 
 He had not thought of that! What avail to 
 guard her merely in the evening? It was not 
 her life that was in danger. . . . 
 
 And he seemed as immeasurably far from ob- 
 taining her confidence as before. He had always 
 understood that the ways of matrimonial diplo- 
 macy were strewn with pitfalls and wished that 
 some one had opened a school for married men 
 before his time. 
 
 He made another clumsy attempt. The cab 
 was swift and had almost covered the long dis- 
 tance between the Western Addition and Eus- 
 sian HOI. "Other things have worried me. 
 You are so generous. Society here as elsewhere 
 has its parasites, its dead beats, trying to limp 
 along by borrowing, gambling, 'amusing,' doing 
 dirty work of various sorts. It has worried me 
 lest one or more of these creatures may have 
 tried to impose on you with hard luck tales — 
 borrow " 
 
THE AVALANCHE 85 
 
 She laughed hysterically. "Price, you are 
 too funny ! I do lend occasionally — ^to the girls, 
 when their allowance runs out hefore the first 
 of the month ; but I don't know any dead beats. ' ' 
 
 He plunged desperately. "Your mother's 
 voice sounded rather agitated for her. Of 
 course I did not stop to listen, but it occurred 
 to me that she may have been gambling in 
 stocks, or have got into some bad land deal. 
 She is so confoundedly close-mouthed — ^if she 
 wants money send her to me." 
 
 Helene sat very straight. Her little aquiline 
 profile against the passing street lights was as 
 aloof as imperial features on an ancient coin. 
 
 "Really, Price, I don't think you can be as 
 busy as you pretend if you have time to indulge 
 in such flights of imagination. Maman has 
 never tried to borrow a penny of me, and she is 
 the last person on earth to gamble in stocks or 
 any thing else. Or to buy land except on expert 
 advice. I think she has given up that idea, any- 
 how. She said this evening she thought it was 
 time for her to visit our people in Bouen." 
 
 ' * Oh, she did ! Helene, I must tell you frankly 
 that I heard her reproach you for having 
 
86 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 broken a promise, and slie spoke with deep feel- 
 ing." 
 
 It was possible that the Roman profile turned 
 white, but in the dusk of the car he could not 
 be sure. His wife, however, merely shrugged 
 her shoulders and replied calmly: 
 
 "My dear Price, if that has worried you, why 
 didn 't you say so at once ? I am rather ashamed 
 to tell you, all the same. Maman has been at 
 me lately to persuade you to let her have the 
 ruby for a week. She is dreadfully super- 
 stitious, poor maman, and is convinced it would 
 bring her some tremendous good fortune " 
 
 "I have never met a woman who, I could 
 swear, was freer from superstition " 
 
 Price closed his lips angrily. Of what use 
 to tax her feminine defenses further? He had 
 known her long enough to be sure she would 
 rather tell the truth than lie. It was evident 
 that she had no intention of lowering her bar- 
 riers, and he must play the game from the other 
 end : get the proof he needed and engineer his 
 mother-in-law out of the United States. 
 
 Some time, however, he would have it out 
 with his wife. Being a business man and al- 
 
THE AVALA'iCHE 87 
 
 ways alert to outwit the other man, he wanted 
 neither intrigne nor mystery in his home, but a 
 serene happiness founded upon perfect confi- 
 dence. He foimd it impossible to remain ap- 
 palled or angry at his wife's readiness of re- 
 source in guarding a family secret that must 
 have shocked the youth in her almost out of 
 existence. 
 
 He patted her hand, and felt its chill within 
 the glove. 
 
 "It was like you never to have mentioned 
 it," he murmured. "For, of course, it is quite 
 impossible." 
 
 "That is what I told her decidedly to-night, 
 and I do not think she will ask again. It hurts 
 me to refuse dear maman anything. Her devo- 
 tion to me has been wonderful — ^but wonderful, ' ' 
 she added on a defiant note. 
 
 "A mother's devotion, particularly to a girl 
 of your sort, does not make any call upon my 
 exclamation points. But here we are." 
 
 rn 
 
 The car rolled up the graded driveway 
 Gwynne had built for the old San Francisco 
 
88 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 house that before his day had been approached 
 by an almost perpendicular flight of wooden 
 steps. They were late and the company had as- 
 sembled : the Thorntons, Trennahans, and eight 
 or ten young people, all of whom would be chap- 
 eroned by the married women to the dance at 
 the Fairmont. 
 
 Russian Hill had escaped the fire, but Nob 
 HiU had been burnt down to its bones, and the 
 Thorntons and Trennahans had not rebuilt, pre- 
 ferring, like many others, to live the year round 
 in their country homes and use the hotels in 
 winter. 
 
 The moment Helene entered the drawing-room 
 it was evident that the ruby was to make as 
 great a sensation as the soul of woman could 
 desire. Even the older people flocked about 
 her and the girls were frank and shrill in their 
 astonishment and rapture. 
 
 "Helene! Darling! The duckiest thing — ^I 
 never saw anything so perfectly dandy and 
 wonderful! I'd go simply mad! Do, just let 
 me touch it! I could eat it!" 
 
 Mrs. Thornton, who at any time scorned to 
 conr-eal envy, or pretend indifference, looked at 
 
THE AVALANCHE 89 
 
 the great buming stone witli a sigh and turned 
 to her hnsband. 
 
 "Why didn't you manage to get it for me?" 
 she demanded. "It would be far more suitable 
 — a magnificent stone like that ! — on me than on 
 that baby." 
 
 "My darling," murmured Ford anxiously, 
 "I never laid eyes on the thing before, or on 
 one like it. I'll find out where Euyler got it, 
 and try " 
 
 "Do you suppose I'd come out with a dupli- 
 cate ? You should have thought of it years ago. 
 You always promised to take me to India." 
 
 "It should be on you!" He gazed at her 
 adoringly. Her hair was dressed in a high and 
 stately fashion to-night. She wore a gown of 
 gold brocade and a necklace and little tiara of 
 emeralds and diamonds; she was looking very 
 handsome and very regal. Thornton was a thin, 
 dark, nervous wisp of a man, who had borne his 
 share of the burdens laid upon his city in the 
 cataclysm of 1906, but if his wife had demanded 
 an enormous historic ruby he would have done 
 his best to gratify her. But how the deuce 
 could a man 
 
90 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 Mrs. Gwyime was holding the stone in her 
 hand and smiling into its flaming depths -with- 
 out envy. She was one of those women of daz- 
 zling white skin, black hair and blue eyes, who, 
 when wise, never wear any jewels but pearls. 
 She wore the Grwynne pearls to-night and a 
 shimmering white gown. 
 
 Ruyler glanced round the fine old room with 
 the warm feeling of satisfaction he always ex- 
 perienced at a San Francisco function, where 
 the women were almost as invariably pretty as 
 they were gay and friendly. He did not like 
 the younger men he met on these occasions as 
 well as he did many of the older ones ; the seri- 
 ous ones would not waste their time on society, 
 and there were too many of the sort who were 
 asked everywhere because they had made a cult 
 of fashion, whether they could afford it or not. 
 A few were the sons of wealthy parents, and 
 were more dissipated than those obliged to 
 "hold down" a job that provided them with 
 money enough above their bare living expenses 
 to make them useful and presentable. 
 
 Ruyler looked upon both sorts as cumberers 
 of the earth, and only tolerated them in his own 
 
THE AVALANCHE 91 
 
 house when his wife gave a party and dancing 
 men must he had at any price. 
 
 There was one man here to-night for whom 
 he had always held particular detestation. 
 His name was Nicolas Doremus. He was a 
 broker in a small way, hut Euyler guessed that 
 he made the best part of his income at bridge, 
 possibly poker. He lived with two other men 
 in a handsome apartment in one of the new 
 buildings that were changing the old skyline of 
 San Francisco. His dancing teas and suppers 
 were admirably appointed and the most exclu- 
 sive people went to them. 
 
 Euyler knew his history in a general way. 
 His father had made a fortune in "Con. Vir- 
 ginia" in the Seventies, and his mother for a 
 few years had been the social equal of the 
 women who now patronized her son. But un- 
 fortunately the gambling microbe settled down 
 in Harry Doremus' veins, and shortly after his 
 son was bom he engaged his favorite room at 
 the Cliff House and blew out his brains. His 
 wife was left with a large house, which as a last 
 act of grace he had forborne to mortgage and 
 made over to her by deed. She immediately 
 
92 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 advertised for boarders, and as her cooking was 
 excellent and she had the wit to drop out of 
 society and give her undivided attention to busi- 
 ness, she prospered exceedingly. 
 
 She concentrated her ambitions upon her only 
 child; sent him to a private school patronized 
 by the sons of the wealthy, and herself taught 
 him every ingratiating social art. She wanted 
 him to go to college, but by this time "Nick" 
 was nineteen and as highly developed a snob as 
 her maternal heart had planned. Knowing that 
 he must support himself eventually, he was de- 
 termined to begin his business career at once, 
 and believed, with some truth, that there was a 
 prejudice in this broad field against college 
 men. He entered the brokerage firm of a bach- 
 elor who had occupied Mrs. Doremus' best suite 
 for fifteen years, and made a satisfactory clerk, 
 the while he cultivated his mother's old friends. 
 
 /Then Mrs. Doremus died he sold the house 
 and good will for a considerable sum, and, com- 
 bining it with her respectable savings, formed 
 a partnership with two other young fellows, 
 whose fathers were rich, but old-fashioned 
 enough to insist that their sons should work. 
 
THE AVALANCHE 93 
 
 Nick did most of the work. His partners, dur- 
 ing the rainy season, sat with their feet on the 
 radiator and read the popular magazines, and 
 in fine weather upheld the out-door traditions 
 of the state. 
 
 The firm had a slender patronage, as Ruyler 
 happened to know, but Doremus was a member 
 of the Pacific Union Club, and although he dined 
 out every night, he must have spent six or seven 
 thousand a year. It was amiably assumed that 
 his social services, — ^he played and sang and 
 often entertained exacting groups throughout 
 an entire evening — ^his fetching and carrying 
 for one rich old lady, accounted for his ability to 
 keep out of debt and pay for his many extrava- 
 gances ; but Ruyler knew that he was principally 
 esteemed at the small green table, and he 
 vaguely recalled as he looked over his head to- 
 night that he had heard disconnected murmurs 
 of less honorable sources of revenue. 
 
 As Ruyler turned away with a frown he met 
 Gwynne's eyes traveling from the same direc- 
 tion. "I didn't ask him," he said apologetic- 
 ally. "Hate men too well dressed. Looks as if 
 he posed for tailors ' ads in the weeklies. Never 
 
94 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 could stand the social parasite anyhow, but 
 Aileen. Lawton asked Isabel to let her bring him, 
 as they are going to open the ball to-night with 
 some new kind of turkey trot. 
 
 "Glad I'm off for Washington. California's 
 the greatest place on earth in the dry sea- 
 son, but I'd have passed few winters here if it 
 hadn't been for the work we all had to do, and 
 even then it would have been heavy going with- 
 out my wife's companionship." 
 
 Euyler sighed. Should he ever enjoy his 
 wife's companionship? And into what sort of 
 woman would she develop if forced along 
 crooked ways by ugly secrets, blackmail, per- 
 petual lying and deceit? He longed impatiently 
 for the decisive interview with Spaulding on the 
 morrow. Then, at least he could prepare for 
 action, and, after all, even of more importance 
 now than winning his wife's confidence and sav- 
 ing her from mental anguish, was the averting 
 of a scandal that would echo across the conti- 
 nent straight into the ears of his half-recon- 
 ciled father. 
 
THE AVALANCHE 95 
 
 rv 
 
 It was about halfway through dinner that the 
 primitive man in him routed every variety of 
 apprehension that had tormented him since two 
 o'clock that afternoon. 
 
 Trennahan, another distinguished New 
 Yorker, who had made his home in California 
 for many years, had taken in Mrs. Grwynne, and 
 his Spanish California wife sat at the foot of 
 the table with the host. Ford had been given a 
 lively girl, Aileen Lawton, to dissipate the 
 financial anxieties of the day, and, to Ruyler's 
 satisfaction, Mrs. Thornton had fallen to his lot 
 and he sat on the left of Isabel. In this little 
 group at the head of the table, his chosen in- 
 timates, who were more interested in the affairs 
 of the world than in Consummate California, 
 Ruyler had forgotten his wife for a time and 
 had not noticed with whom she had gone in to 
 dinner. 
 
 But during an interval when Mrs. Thorn- 
 ton's attention had been captured by the man 
 on her right, and the others drawn into a dis- 
 cussion over the merits of the new mayor. Price 
 
96 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 became aware that Doremus sat beside his wife 
 halfway down the table on the opposite side, 
 and that they were talking, if not arguing, in 
 a low tone, oblivious for the moment of the com- 
 pany. 
 
 The deferential bend was absent from the 
 neck of the adroit social explorer, his head was 
 alertly poised above the lovely young matron 
 whose beauty, wealth, and foreign personality, 
 to say nothing of the importance of her hus- 
 band, gave her something of the standing of 
 royalty in the aristocratic little republic of San 
 Francisco Society. There was a vague threat 
 in that poise, as if at any moment venom might 
 dart down and strike that drooping head with 
 its crown of blue-black braids. Suddenly Helene 
 lifted her eyes, full of appeal, to the round pale 
 blue orbs that at this moment openly expressed 
 a cold and ruthless mind. 
 
 Ruyler endeavored to piece together those 
 disconnected whispers — ^letters discovered or 
 stolen — ^blackmail — ^but such whispers were 
 too often the whiffs from energetic but empty 
 minds, always floating about and never seem- 
 ing to bring any culprit to book. 
 
THE AVALANCHE 97 
 
 Had tMs man got hold of his wife's secret? 
 
 But this merely sequacious thought was 
 promptly routed. The young man, who was un- 
 deniably good looking and was rumored to pos- 
 sess a certain cold charm for women — although, 
 to be sure, the wary San Francisco heiress had 
 so far been impervious to it — was now leaning 
 over Mrs. Price Euyler with a coaxing possess- 
 ive air, and the appeal left Helene's eyes as she 
 smiled coquettishly and began to talk with her 
 usual animation; but still in a tone that was 
 little more than a murmur. 
 
 She moved her shoulder closer to the man 
 she evidently was bent upon fascinating, and 
 her long eyelashes swept up and down while her 
 black eyes flashed and her pink color deepened. 
 
 There was a faint amusement mixed with 
 Doremus' habitual air of amiable deference, and 
 somewhat more of assurance, but he was as 
 absorbed as Helene and had no eyes for Janet 
 Maynard, on his left, whose fortune ran into 
 millions. 
 
 For a moment Euyler, who had kept his nerve 
 through severEil years of racking strain which 
 even an American is seldom called upon to sur- 
 
98 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 vive, wondered if lie were losing his mind. To 
 business and all its fluctuations and even ab- 
 normalities, be bad been bred ; there was prob- 
 ably no condition possible in the world of finance 
 and commerce which could shatter his self-pos- 
 session, cloud his mental processes. But his 
 personal life had been singularly free of storms. 
 Even his emotional upheaval, when he had 
 fallen completely in love for the first time, had 
 lacked that torment of uncertainty which might 
 have played a certain havoc, for a time, with 
 those quick unalterable decisions of the busi- 
 ness hour; and even his engagement had only 
 lasted a month. 
 
 It was true that during the past six months 
 he had worried off and on about the shadow 
 that had fallen upon his wife's spirits and af- 
 fected his own, but, when he had had time to 
 think of it, before yesterday morning, he had 
 assumed it was due to some phase of feminine 
 psychology which he had never mastered. That 
 she could be interested in another man never 
 had crossed his mind, in spite of his passing 
 flare of jealousy. She was still passionately in 
 
THE AVALANCHE 99 
 
 love with him, for all her vagaries — or so he 
 had thought 
 
 Ruyler was conscious of a riotous confusion 
 of mind that really made him apprehensive. 
 Had he witnessed that scene on the dummy — 
 this afternoon? — it seemed a long while ago — 
 had he heard those portentous words of his 
 mother-in-law to his wife? — had they meant 
 that she had warned her daughter against the 
 bad blood in her veins, extracted a promise — 
 broken ! — to walk in the narrow way of the duti- 
 ful wife — ^mercifully spared by a fortunate mar- 
 riage the terrible temptations of the older 
 woman's youth? Had Helene confessed ... in 
 desperate need of help, advice? . . . Doremus 
 was just the bounder to compromise a woman 
 and then blackmail her. . . . Good God ! What 
 was it? 
 
 For all his mental turmoil he realized that 
 here alone was the only possible menace to his 
 life's happiness. His mother-in-law's past was 
 a bitter pill for a proud man to swallow, and 
 there was even the possibility of his wife's il- 
 legitimacy, but, after all, those were matters be- 
 
loo THE AVALANCHE 
 
 longing to the past, and the past quickly re 
 ceded to limbo these days. 
 
 Even an open scandal, if some one of the 
 offal sheets of San Francisco got hold of th3 
 story and published it, would be forgotten in 
 time. But this — if his wife had fallen in love 
 with another man — and women had no discrimi- 
 nation where love was concerned — (if a decent 
 chap got a lovely girl it was mainly by luck; 
 the rotters got just as good) — ^then indeed he 
 was in the midst of disaster without end. The 
 present was chaos and the future a blank. He 'd 
 enlist in the first war and get himself shot. . . . 
 
 Helene had a charming light coquetry, wholly 
 French, and she exercised it indiscriminately, 
 much to the delight of the old beaux, for she 
 loved to please, to be admired; she had an in- 
 nocent desire that all men should think her 
 quite beautiful and irresistible. Even her hus- 
 band had never seen her in an unbecoming des- 
 habille; she coquetted with him shamelessly, 
 whenever she was not too gloriously serious and 
 intent only upon making him happy. Until 
 lately 
 
 This was by no means her ordinary form. 
 
THE AVALANCHE loi 
 
 He had come upon too many couples in remote 
 corners of conservatories, had been a not xm- 
 accomplished principal in his own day . . . 
 there was, beyond question, some deep under- 
 standing between her and this man. 
 
 Suddenly Euyler's gaze burned through to 
 his wife's consciousness. She moved her eyes 
 to his, flushed to her hair, then for a moment 
 looked almost gray. But she recovered herself 
 immediately and further showed her remarkable 
 powers of self-possession by turning back to her 
 partner and talking to him with animation in- 
 stead of plunging into conversation with the 
 man on her right. 
 
 At the same moment Ruyler became subtly 
 aware that Mrs. Thornton was looking at his 
 wife and Doremus, and as his eyes focused he 
 saw her long, thin, mobile mouth curl and her 
 eyes fill with open disdain. The mist in his 
 brain fled as abruptly as an inland fog out in 
 the bay before one of the sudden winds of the 
 Pacific. In any case, his mind hardly could 
 have remained in a state of confusion for long ; 
 but that his young wife was being openly con- 
 temned by the cleverest as well as the most 
 
102 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 powerful woman in San Francisco was enough, 
 to restore his equilibrium in a flash. Whatever 
 his wife's indiscretions, it was his business to 
 protect her until such time as he had proof of 
 more than indiscretion. And in this instance he 
 should be his own detective. 
 
 He turned to Mrs. Thornton. 
 
 "Going on to the Fairmont?" he asked. 
 
 "Oh, yes, I have a new gown — ^have you ad- 
 mired it? Arrived from Paris last night — and 
 I am chaperoning two of these girls. You are 
 not, of course?" 
 
 "I did intend to, but it's no go. StiU, I may 
 drop in late and take my wife home " 
 
 "Let me take her home." Was his imagina- 
 tion morbid, or was there something both per- 
 emptory and eager in Mrs. Thornton's tones? 
 "I'm stopping at the Fairmont, of course, but 
 Fordy and I often take a drive after a hot 
 night and a heavy supper." 
 
 "If you would take her home in case I miss 
 it. I must go to the ofl&ce " 
 
 "I'd like to. That's settled." This time her 
 tones were warm and friendly. Ruyler knew 
 that Mrs. Thornton did not like his wife, but 
 
THE AVALANCHE 103 
 
 her friendliness toward him, since her return 
 from Europe three or four months ago, had in- 
 creased, if anything. His mind was now work- 
 ing with its accustomed keen clarity. He re- 
 called that there had been no surprise mixed 
 with the contempt in her regard of his wife and 
 Doremus. . . . He" also recalled that several 
 times of late when he had met her at the Fair- 
 mont — ^where he often lunched with a group of 
 men — she had regarded him with a curious oon- 
 sideriag glance, which he suddenly vocalized 
 as: "How long?" 
 
 This affair had been going on for some time, 
 then. Either it was common talk, or some cir- 
 cumstance had enlightened Mrs. Thornton 
 alone. 
 
 He glanced around the table. No one ap- 
 peared to be taking the slightest notice of one 
 of many flirtations. At least, whatever his 
 wife's infatuation, he could avert gossip. Mrs. 
 Thornton might be a tigress, but she was not a 
 cat. 
 
 "When do you go down to Burlingame?" 
 she asked. 
 
 "Not for two or three weeks yet. I don't 
 
104 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 fancy merely sleeping in tlie country. But by 
 that time things will ease up a bit and I can 
 get down every day in time to have a game of 
 golf before dinner." 
 
 "Shall Mrs. Ruyler migrate with the rest?" 
 
 "Hardly." 
 
 "It will be dull for her in town. No reflec- 
 tions on your charming society, but of course 
 she does not get much of it, and she will miss 
 her young friends. After all, she is a child and 
 needs playmates." 
 
 Euyler darted at her a sharp look, but she was 
 smiling amiably. Doremus and the men he 
 lived with in town had a bungalow at Bur- 
 lingame and they bought their commutation 
 tickets at precisely the fashionable moment. 
 ' ' She will stay in town, ' ' he said shortly. ' ' She 
 needs a rest, and San Francisco is the healthiest 
 spot on earth." 
 
 "But trying to the nerves when what we in- 
 accurately call the trade winds begin. "Why not 
 let her stay with me? Of course she would be 
 lonely in her own house, and is too young to stay 
 there alone anyhow, but I'd like to put her up, 
 and you certainly could run down week-ends — 
 
THE AVALANCHE 105 
 
 possibly oftener. American men are always ob- 
 sessed witb tbe idea tbat tbey are twice as busy 
 as tbey really are." 
 
 "You are too good. I'll put it up to Helena. 
 Of course it is for ber to decide. I'd like it 
 migbty well." But grateful as be was, bis un- 
 easiness deepened at ber evident desire to place 
 her forces at bis disposal. 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 AND you won't take me to the party?" He- 
 lene pouted charmingly as her husband 
 laid her pink taffeta wrap over her shoulders. 
 "I thought you said you might make it, and it 
 would he too delightful to dance with you once 
 more." 
 
 "I'm afraid not. The Australian mail came 
 in just as business closed and it's on my mind. 
 I want to go over it carefully before I dictate 
 the answers in the morning, and that means two 
 or three hours of hard work that will leave me 
 pretty well fagged out. Mrs. Thornton has of- 
 fered to take you home." 
 
 "I hate her." 
 
 "Oh, please don't l"Ruyler smiled into her 
 somber eyes. "She wants the drive, and it 
 would be taking the Gwynnes so far out of the 
 way. Mrs. Thornton very kindly suggested it. ' ' 
 
 "I hate her," said Helene conclusively. "I 
 
 106 
 
THE AVALANCHE 107 
 
 wish now I'd kept my own car. Then I could 
 always go home alone." 
 
 "You shall have a car next winter. And this 
 time I shall not permit you to pay for it out 
 of your allowance — ^which in any case I hope to 
 increase by that time." 
 
 Her eyes flamed, but not with anger. "Then 
 I'll sell my electric to Aileen Lawton right 
 away. We have the touring car in the coun- 
 try, and she has been trying to make her father 
 buy her an electric " 
 
 "I'm afraid you 'U be disappointed in your 
 bargain. Second-hand cars, no matter what 
 their condition, always go at a sacrifice, and old 
 Lawton is a notorious screw. Better not let it 
 go for two or three hundreds; you look very 
 sweet driving about in it. . . . Oh, by the way 
 — I had forgotten. ' ' He slipped his hand under 
 her coat, unfastened the chain and slipped the 
 jewel into his pocket. "I am sorry," he said, 
 with real contrition, "and almost wish I had 
 forgotten the thing; but I am a little super- 
 stitious about keeping that old promise." 
 
 She laughed. "And yet you will not permit 
 poor maman a little superstition of her own! 
 
io8 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 But I am rather glad. Everybody at tlie ball 
 ■will hear of the ruby, and I shall be able to keep 
 them in suspense until the Thornton fete. Good 
 night. Don't work too hard. Couldn't you get 
 there for supper?" 
 " 'Fraid not." 
 
 He did go down to the office and glance 
 through the Australian mail, but at a few mo- 
 ments before twelve he took a California Street 
 car up to the Fairmont Hotel and went directly 
 to the ballroom. Mrs. Thornton was standing 
 just within the doorway, but came toward him 
 with lifted eyebrows. 
 
 "This is like old times," she said playfully. 
 
 "I found less mail than I expected and 
 thought I would come and have a dance with 
 my wife." His eyes wandered over the large 
 room, gayly decorated, and filled with dancing 
 couples. 
 
 Mrs. Thornton laughed. "A belle like your 
 wife? She is always engaged for every dance 
 on her program before she is halfway down this 
 corridor." 
 
THE AVALANCHE 109 
 
 "Oh, well, husbands have some rights. I'll 
 take it by force. I don't see her— she must be 
 sitting out." 
 
 Mrs. Thornton slipped her arm through his. 
 "This dance has just begun. Walk me up and 
 down. I am tired of standing on one foot." 
 
 They strolled down the corridor and through 
 the large central hall. Older folks sat or stood 
 in groups; a few young couples were sitting 
 out. Euyler did not see his wife, and concluded 
 she had been resting at the moment in the 
 dowager ranks against the wall of the ballroom. 
 The music ceased sooner than he expected and 
 Mrs. Thornton, who had been talking with ani- 
 mation on the subject of several fine pictures 
 she had bought while abroad for the Museum 
 in Golden Gate Park, including one by Mase- 
 field Price, broke off with an impatient exclama- 
 tion: "Bother! I must run up to my room at 
 once and telephone. Wait for me here." 
 
 She steered him toward a group of men. 
 "Mr. Gwynne, keep Mr. Ruyler from causing a 
 riot in the ballroom. He insists upon dancing 
 with his wife. Hold him by force." 
 
 They were standing near the staircase and 
 
no THE AVALANCHE 
 
 some distance from the lift. Mrs. Thornton ran 
 up the stairs, pausing for an irresistible mo- 
 ment and looking down at the company. As she 
 stood there, poised, she looked a royal figure 
 with her cloth of gold train covering the steps 
 below her and her high and flashing head. 
 "Wait for me," she said, imperiously to Price. 
 "I cannot meander down that corridor, de- 
 serted and alone." 
 
 Euyler smiled at her, but said to Gwynne; 
 "I'll just go and engage my wife for a dance 
 and be back in a jiffy " 
 
 Gwynne clasped his hand about Ruyler's arm. 
 "Just a moment, old chap. I want your opin- 
 ion " 
 
 "But there is the music again. I'll be knock- 
 ing people over " 
 
 "You will if you go now, and there'll be danc- 
 ing for hours yet. Your wife has been dividing 
 up — ^now, tell me if you back me in this proposi- 
 tion or not. I'm going to Washington to repre- 
 sent you fellows " 
 
 But Euyler had broken politely away and was 
 walking down the long corridor. When he ar- 
 rived at the ballroom he saw at a glance that 
 
THE AVALANCHE in 
 
 his wife was not there, for the floor was only- 
 half filled. But there were other rooms where 
 dancers sat in couples or groups when tired. 
 He went hastily through all of them, but saw 
 nothing of his wife. Nor of Doremus. 
 
 Mrs. Thornton had gone in search of her. 
 
 And Gwynne knew. 
 
 This time the hot blood was pounding in his 
 head. He felt as he imagined madmen did when 
 about to run amok. Or quite as primitive as 
 any Calif omian of the surging "Fifties." 
 
 He was in one of the smaller rooms and he sat 
 down in a comer with his back to the few peo- 
 ple in it and endeavored to take hold of him- 
 self; the conventional training of several life- 
 times and his own intense pride forbade a scene 
 in public. But his curved fingers longed for 
 Doremus' throat and he made up his mind that 
 if his awful suspicions were vindicated he would 
 beat his wife black and blue. That was far 
 more sensible and manly than running whining 
 to a divorce court. 
 
 The effort at self-control left him gasping, 
 but when he rose from his shelter he was out- 
 wardly composed, and determined to seek 
 
112 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 Gwynne and force the truth from him. He 
 would not discuss his wife with another woman. 
 And whatever this hideous tragedy brooding 
 over his life he would go out and come to grips 
 with it at once. 
 
 ret 
 
 And in the corridor he saw his wife chatting 
 gayly with a group of young friends. Her color 
 was paler than usual, perhaps, but that was not 
 uncommon at a party, and otherwise she was 
 as unruffled, as normal in appearance and man- 
 ner, as when they had parted at the Gwynnes'. 
 
 Nevertheless, he went directly up to her, and 
 as she gave a little cry of pleased surprise, he 
 drew her hand through his arm. "Come!" he 
 said imperiously. "You are to dance this with 
 me. I broke away on purpose " 
 
 "But, darling, I am full up " 
 
 "You have skipped at least two. I have been 
 
 looking everywhere for you " 
 
 "Polly Eoberts dragged me upstairs to see 
 
 the new gowns M. Dupont brought her from 
 
 Paris. They came this afternoon — so did Mrs. 
 
 Thornton 's^but of course I'll dance this with 
 
THE AVALANCHE 113 
 
 you. You don't look well," she added anx- 
 iously. "Aren't you?" 
 
 "Quite, but rather tired — ^mentally. I need a 
 dance. ..." 
 
 He wondered if slie had gently propelled Tiitti 
 down the corridor. They were some distance 
 from the group. It was impossible for him to 
 go back and ask if his wife's story were true. 
 Mrs. Thornton was nowhere to be seen, neither 
 in the corridor nor ia the ballroom. Nor was 
 Doremus. He set his teeth grimly and managed 
 to smile down upon his wife. 
 
 "I shall insist upon having more than one," 
 he said gallantly. "At least three hesitations. ' ' 
 
 She drew in her breath with a mock sigh and 
 swept from under her long lashes a glance that 
 still had the power to thrUl him. "Outrageous, 
 but I shall try to bear up," and the next mo- 
 ment they were giving a graceful exhibition of 
 the tango. 
 
 "I don't see your friend Doremus," he said 
 casually, as he stood fanning her at the end of 
 the dance. 
 
 She lifted her eyebrows haughtily. "My 
 friend? That parasite?" 
 
114 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 "You seemed very friendly at dinner." 
 
 "I usually am with my dinner companion. 
 One's hostess is to be considered. Oh — I re- 
 member — he was telling me some very amusing 
 gossip, although he teased me into fearing he 
 wouldn't. Now, if you are going to dance this 
 hesitation with me you had better whirl me off. 
 It is Mr. Thornton's, and I see him coming." 
 
 Euyler did not see Doremus until supper was 
 half over and then the young man entered the 
 dining-room hurriedly, his usually serene brow 
 lowering and his lips set. He walked directly 
 up to Helene. 
 
 "Beastly luck!" he exclaimed. "Hello, Euy- 
 ler. Didn't know you honored parties any more. 
 I had to break away to meet the Overland train 
 — ^beastly thing was late, of course. Then I had 
 to take them to five hotels before I could settle 
 them. They had two beastly little dogs and the 
 hotels wouldn't take them in and they wouldn't 
 give up the dogs. Some one ought to set up a 
 high-class dog hotel. Sure it would pay. But 
 you'll give me the first after supper, won't 
 you?" 
 
 'Helene gave him a casual smile that was a 
 
THE AVALANCHE 115 
 
 poor reward for his elaborate apology. "So 
 sorry," she said with the sweet distant man- 
 ner in which she disposed of bores and climb- 
 ers, "bnt Mr. Euyler and I are both tired. "We 
 are going home directly after supper." 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 ON the following day at six o'clock Ruyler 
 went to Long's to meet Jake Spaulding. 
 By a supreme effort of will lie had put his pri- 
 vate affairs out of his mind and concentrated 
 on the business details which demanded the most 
 highly trained of his faculties. But now he felt 
 relaxed, almost languid, as he walked along 
 Montgomery Street toward the rendezvous. He 
 met no one he knew. The historic Montgomery 
 Street, once the center of the city's life, was al- 
 most deserted, but half rebuilt. He could saun- 
 ter and think undisturbed. 
 
 What was he to hear? And what bearing 
 would it be found to have on his wife's conduct? 
 
 He had gone to sleep last night as sure as a 
 man may be of anything that his wife was no 
 more interested in Doremus than in any other 
 of the young men who found time to dance at- 
 tendance upon idle, bored, but virtuous wives. 
 
 116 
 
THE AVALANCHE 117 
 
 If the man knew her secret and were endeav- 
 oring to exact blackmail he wonld pay his price 
 with joy — after thrashing him, for he would 
 have sacrificed the half of his fortune never to 
 experience again not only the demoralizing at- 
 tack of jealous madness of the night before, 
 which had brought in its wake the uneasy doubt 
 if civilization were as far advanced as he had 
 fondly imagined, but the sensation of amaaed 
 contempt which had swept over him at the din- 
 ner table as he had seen his wife, whom he had 
 believed to be a woman of instinctive taste and 
 fastidiousness, manifestly upon intimate terms 
 with a creature who should have been walking 
 on four legs. Better, perhaps, the desire to kill 
 a woman than to despise her— — 
 
 He slammed the door when he entered the lit- 
 tle room reserved for him, and barely re- 
 strained himself from flinging his hat into a 
 corner and breaking a chair on the table. His 
 languor had vanished. 
 
 Spaulding followed him immediately. 
 
 "Howdy," he said genially, as he pushed his 
 own hat on the back of his head and bit hun- 
 grily at the end of a cigar. "Suppose you've 
 
ii8 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 been impatient — ^unless too busy to think about 
 it." 
 
 "I'd like to kno-w what you've found out as 
 quickly as you can tell mo." 
 
 "Well, to begin with the kid. I had some 
 trouble at the convent. They're a close- 
 mouthed lot, nuns. But I frightened them. 
 Told them it was a property matter, and unless 
 they answered my questions privately they'd 
 have to answer them in court. Then they came 
 through." 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 Spaulding lit his cigar and handed the match 
 to Ruyler, who ground it under his Leel. 
 
 "Just about nineteen years ago a French- 
 woman, giving her name as Madame Dubois, ar- 
 rived one day with a child a year old and asked 
 the nuns to take care of it, promising a fancy 
 payment. The child had been on a farm with 
 a wet-nurse (French style), but Madame Du- 
 bois wanted it to learn from the first to speak 
 proper English and French, and to live in a 
 refined atmosphere generally from the time it 
 was able to take notice. She said she was on 
 the stage and had to travel, so was not able to 
 
THE AVALANCHE 119 
 
 give the kid the attention it should have, and 
 the doctor had told her that traveling was bad 
 for kids that age, anyhow. Her lawyers would 
 pay the haby's board on the first of every 
 month " 
 
 "Who were the lawyers?" 
 
 "Lawton and Cross." 
 
 "I thought so. Goon." 
 
 "The nuns, who, after all, knew their Cali- 
 fornia, thought they smelt a rat, for the woman 
 was extraordinarily handsome, magnificently 
 dressed ; the Mother Superior — ^who is a woman 
 of the world, all right — read the newspapers, 
 and had never seen the name of Dubois — and 
 knew that only stars drew fat salaries. She 
 asked some sharp questions about the father, 
 and the woman replied readily that he was a 
 scientific man, an inventor, and — ^well, it was 
 natural, was it not? they did not get on very 
 well. He disliked the stage, but she had been 
 on if before she married him, and dullness and 
 want of money for her own needs and her 
 child's had driven her back. He had lived in 
 Los Angeles for a time, but had recently gone 
 East to take a high-salaried position. It was 
 
120 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 with his consent that she asked the nuns to take 
 the child — possibly for two or three years. 
 "When she was a famous actress and could leave 
 the road, she would keep house for her husband 
 in New York, and make a home for the child. 
 
 "The Mother Superior, by this time, had 
 made up her mind that the father wished the 
 child removed from the mother's influence, and 
 although she took the whole yam with a bag of 
 salt, the child was the most beautiful she had 
 ever seen, and obviously healthy and amiable. 
 Moreover, the convent was to receive two hun- 
 dred dollars a month " 
 
 "What?" 
 
 "Exactly. Can you beat it? The Mother 
 Superior made up her mind it was her duty to 
 bring up the little thing in the way it should go. 
 As the woman was leaving she said something 
 about a possible reconciliation with her family, 
 who lived in France ; they had not written her 
 since she went on the stage. They were of a 
 respectability! — of the old tradition! But if 
 they came round she might take the child to 
 them, if her husband would consent. She should 
 like it to be brought up in France- — - 
 
THE AVALANCHE 121 
 
 "Here the Mother Superior interrupted her 
 sharply. "Was her husband a Frenchman? And 
 she answered, no doubt before she thought, for 
 these people always forget something, that no, 
 he was an American — ^her family, also, detested 
 Americans. The Mother Superior once more 
 iaterrupted her glibness. How, then, did he 
 have a French name? Oh, but that was her 
 stage name — she always went by it and had 
 given it without thinking. What was her hus- 
 band's name? After a second's hesitation she 
 stupidly give the name Smith. I can see the 
 mouth of the Mother Superior as it set in a 
 grim line. 'Very well,' said she, 'the child's 
 name is Helene Smith' ; and although the woman 
 made a wry face she was forced to submit. 
 
 "The child remained there four years, and 
 the Mother Superior had some reason to believe 
 that 'Madame Dubois' spent a good part of that 
 time in San Francisco. She came at irregular 
 intervals to see the child — always in vacation, 
 when there were no pupils in the convent, and 
 always at night. The Mother Superior, how- 
 ever, thought it best to make no investigations, 
 for the child throve, they were all daffy about 
 
122 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 her, and the money came prompf y on the first 
 of every month. When the motht-r came she al- 
 ways brought a trunk full of fine underclothes, 
 and left the money tor a new uniform. Then, 
 one day, Madame Dubois arrived in widow's 
 weeds, said that her husband was dead, leaving 
 her quite well off, and that she was returning to 
 France." 
 
 "And Madame Delano's story is that he died 
 on the way to Japan — if it is the same wom- 
 an " 
 
 "Haven't a doubt of it myself. I did a little 
 cabling before I left last night to a man I know 
 in Paris to find out just when Madame Delano 
 returned with her child to live with her family 
 in Eouen. He got busy and here is his answer 
 — just fifteen years ago almost to the minute." 
 
 "Then who was her husband?" 
 
 "There you've got me — so far. He was no 
 ' scientist, who later accepted a high-salaried po- 
 sition.' A decent chap of that sort would have 
 written to his child, paid her board himself, 
 most likely taken it away from the mother " 
 
 "But she may have kidnapped it " 
 
 "People are too easy traced in this State — 
 
THE AVALANCHE 123 
 
 especially that sort. Nor do I believe she was 
 an actress. There never was any actress of that 
 name — not so you'd notice it, anyhow, and that 
 woman would have been known for her looks 
 and height even if she couldn't act. Moreover, 
 if she was an actress there would be no sense in 
 giving the nuns a false name, since she had ad- 
 mitted the fact. No, it's my guess that she was 
 something worse." 
 
 "Well, I've prepared myself for anything." 
 
 "I figure out that she was the mistress of one 
 of our rich highfliers, and that when he got tired 
 of her he pensioned her off, and she made up 
 her mind to reform on account of the kid, and 
 went back to Eouen, and proceeded to identify 
 herself with her class by growing old and shape- 
 less as quickly as possible. She must have 
 adopted the name Delano in New York before 
 she bought her steamer ticket, for although I've 
 had a man on the hunt, the only Delanos of that 
 time were eminently respectable " 
 
 "Why are you sure she was not a — ^well — 
 woman of the town?" 
 
 "Because, there again — ^there's no dame of 
 that time either of that name or looks — ^neither 
 
124 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 Dubois nor Delano. Of course, they come and 
 go, but there's every reason to think she stayed 
 right on here in S. F. Of course, I've only had 
 twenty-four hours — ^I'll find out in another 
 twenty-four just what conspicuous women of 
 fifteen to twenty years ago measure up to what 
 she must have looked like — I got the Mother 
 Superior to describe her minutely: nearly six 
 feet, clear dark skin with a natural red color 
 — no make-up; very small features, but well 
 made — nose and mouth I'm talking about. The 
 eyes were a good size, very black with rather 
 thin eyelashes. Lots of black hair. Stunning 
 figure. Rather large ears and hands and feet. 
 She always dressed in black, the handsomest 
 sort. They generally do. " 
 
 "Well?" asked Euyler through his teeth. He 
 had no doubt the woman was his mother-in-law. 
 ' ' The Jameses ? What of them ? ' ' 
 
 "That's the snag. Rest is easy in compari- 
 son. Innumerable Jameses must have died 
 about that time, to say nothing of all the way 
 along the line, but while some of the records 
 were saved in 1906, most went up in smoke. 
 Moreover, there's just the chance that he didn't 
 
THE AVALANCHE 125 
 
 die here. But that's going on the supposition 
 that the man died when she left California, 
 which don't fit our theory. I still think he died 
 not so very long before her return to Cali- 
 fornia, and that she probably came to collect a 
 legacy he had left her. Otherwise, I should 
 think it's about the last place she would have 
 come to. I put a man on the job before I left 
 of collecting the Jameses who've died since the 
 fire. Here they are." 
 He took a list from his pocket and read : 
 "James Hogg, bookkeeper — races, of course. 
 James Fowler, saloon-keeper. James Despard, 
 called 'Frenchy,' a clever crook who lived on 
 blackmail — said to have a gift for getting hold 
 of secrets of men and women in high society 
 
 and squeezing them good and plenty " 
 
 He paused. "Of course, that might be the 
 man. There are points. I 'U have his life looked 
 into, but somehow I don't believe it. I have a 
 hunch the man was a higher-up. The sort of 
 woman the Mother Superior described can get 
 the best, and they take it. To proceed : James 
 Dillingworth, lawyer, died in the odor of sanc- 
 tity, but you never can tell; I'll have him in- 
 
126 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 vestigated, too. James Maston — ^I haven't had 
 time to have had the private lives of any of 
 these men looked into, but I knew some of them, 
 and Maston, who was a journalist, left a wife 
 and three children and was little, if any, over 
 thirty. James Cobham, broker — ^he was getting 
 on to fifty, left about a million, came near being 
 indicted during the Graft Prosecutions, and al- 
 though his wife has been in the newspapers as 
 a society leader for the last twenty years, and 
 he was one of the founders of Burlingame, and 
 then was active in changing the name of the high 
 part to Hillsboro when the swells felt they 
 couldn't be identified with the village any 
 longer, and he handed out wads the first of 
 every year to charity, there are stories that he 
 came near being divorced by his haughty wife 
 about fifteen years ago. Of course, those men 
 don't parade their mistresses openly like they 
 did thirty years ago — I mean men with any so- 
 cial position to keep up. But now and again the 
 wife finds a note, or receives an anonymous let- 
 ter, and gets busy. Then it's the divorce court, 
 unless he can smooth her down, and promises 
 reform. Cobham seems to me the likeliest man, 
 
THE AVALANCHE 127 
 
 and I'm going to start a tliorougli investigation 
 to-morrow. These other Jameses don't hold out 
 any promise at all — grocers, clerks, butchers. 
 It's the list in hand I'll go by, and if nothing 
 pans out — ^well, we'll have to take the other cue 
 she threw out and try Los Angeles." 
 
 "Do you know anything about a man named 
 Nicolas Doremus?" asked Ruyler abruptly. 
 
 "The society chap? Nothing much except 
 that he don't do much business on the street 
 but is supposed to be pretty lucky at poker and 
 bridge. But he runs with the crowd the police 
 can't or don't raid. I've never seen or heard 
 of him anywhere he shouldn't be except with 
 swell slumming or roadhouse parties. He's 
 never interested me. If Society can stand that 
 sort of bloodsucking tailor's model, I guess I 
 can. Why do you ask? Grot anything to do 
 with this case?" 
 
 "I have an idea he has found out the truth 
 and is blackmailing my wife. You might watch 
 him." 
 
 "Good point. I will. And if he's found out 
 the truth I guess I can." 
 
CHAPTER Vn 
 
 HELENS, as Ruyler had anticipated, re- 
 fused positively to accept Mrs. Thorn- 
 ton's invitation. 
 
 "Do you think I'd leave you — ^to come home 
 to a dreary house every night? Even if I don't 
 see much of you, at least you know I'm there; 
 and that if you have an evening off you have 
 only to say the word and I'll break any engage- 
 ment — ^you have always known that!" 
 
 Euyler had not, but she looked so eager and 
 sweet — she was lunching with him at the Palace 
 Hotel on the day following his interview with 
 Spaulding — that he hastened to assure her af- 
 fectionately that the certainty of his wife's de- 
 sire for his constant companionship was both 
 his torment and his consolation. 
 
 Helene continued radiantly: 
 
 "Besides, darling, Polly Roberts is staying 
 on. Rex can't get away yet." 
 
 128 
 
THE AVALANCHE 129 
 
 "Polly Eoberts is not nearly good enough for 
 you. She hasn't an idea in her head and lives 
 on excitement " 
 
 Helene laughed merrily. "You are quite 
 right, but there's no harm in her. After all, 
 unless one goes in for charities (and I can't, 
 Price, yet; besides the charities here are won- 
 derfully looked after), plays bridge, has babies, 
 takes on suffrage — what is there to do but play? 
 I suppose once life was serious for young 
 women of our class; but we just get into the 
 habit of doing nothing because there's nothing 
 to do. Take to-morrow as an example : I sup- 
 pose Polly and I will wander down to The 
 Louvre in the morning and buy something or 
 look at the new gowns M. Dupont has just 
 brought from Paris. 
 
 "Then we'll lunch where there's lots of life 
 and everybody is chatting gayly about nothing. 
 
 "Then we'll go to the Moving Pictures unless 
 there is a matinee, and then we'll motor out to 
 the Boulevard, and then back and have tea some- 
 where. 
 
 "Or, perhaps, we'll motor down to the Club at 
 Burlingame for lunch and chatter away the day 
 
130 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 on the veranda, or dance. This afternoon we'll 
 probably ling up a few that are still in town 
 and dance in Polly's parlor at the Fairmont." 
 
 Helene's Up curled, her voice had risen. "With 
 all her young enjoyment of wealth and position, 
 she had been bred in a class where to idle is a 
 crime. "Just putting in time — ^time that ought 
 to be as precious as youth a^ad high spirits and 
 ease and popularity! But what is one to do] 
 I have no talents, and I'd lose caste in my set 
 if I had. I don't wonder the Socialists hate us 
 and want to put us all to work. No doubt we 
 should be much happier. But now — even if you 
 retired from business, you'd spend most of your 
 time on the links. We poor women wouldn't be 
 much better off." 
 
 "It does seem an abnormal state of affairs; 
 I've barely given it a thought, it has always 
 been such a pleasure to find you, after a hard 
 day's work, looking invariably dainty, and 
 pretty, and eloquently suggestive of leisure and 
 repose. But — ^to the student of history — ^I sup- 
 pose it is a condition that cannot last. There 
 must be some sort of upheaval due. Well, I 
 hope it will give me more of your society." 
 
THE AVALANCHE 131 
 
 They smiled at each other across the little 
 table in perfect confidence. They were lunching 
 in the court, and after she had blown him a kiss 
 over her glass of red wine, her eyes happened 
 to travel in the direction of the large dining- 
 room. She gave a little exclamation of distaste. 
 
 ' ' There is maman lunching with that hateful 
 old Mr. Lawton. He was ia her sitting-room 
 when I ran in to call on her yesterday, and 
 nearly snapped my head off when I asked him 
 if he wouldn't buy my electric for Aileen. He 
 said it was time she began to learn a few econo- 
 mies instead of more extravagances. Poor 
 darling Aileen. She has to stay in town, too, 
 for he won't open the house in Atherton until 
 he is ready to go down himself every night." 
 
 "Is he an old friend of your mother's?" 
 
 "She and Papa met him when they were here, 
 and Mrs. Lawton was very kind when I was 
 bom. It's too bad Mrs. Lawton 's dead. She'd 
 be a nice friend for maman." 
 
 "Perhaps your mother is asking Mr. Law- 
 ton's advice about the investment of money." 
 
 He had been observing his wife closely, but 
 it was more and more apparent that if Mr. Law- 
 
132 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 ton held the key to her mother's past she had 
 not been informed of the fact. She answered 
 indifferently: 
 
 "Possibly. One can get much higher interest 
 out here than in France, and maman would 
 never invest money without the best advice. 
 She loves me, but money next. Oh, la ! la ! " 
 
 "Has she said anything more about going 
 back to Rouen?" 
 
 "I didn't have a word with her alone yester- 
 day, but I'll ask her to-day. Poor maman! I 
 fancy the novelty has worn off here, and she 
 would really be happier with her own people 
 and customs. She hates traveling, like all the 
 French; but don't you think that, after a bit we 
 shall be able to go over to Europe at least once 
 a year?" 
 
 "I am sure of it. And while I am attending 
 to business in London you could visit your 
 mother in Eouen. Tell her that one way or 
 another I'll manage it." 
 
 And this seemed to him an ideal arrange- 
 ment! 
 
THE AVALANCHE 133 
 
 n 
 
 When they left the table and walked through 
 the more luxurious part of the court, they saw 
 Madame Delano alone and enthroned as usual 
 in the largest but most upright of the arm- 
 chairs. And as ever she watched under her 
 fat drooping eyelids the passing throng of 
 smartly dressed women, hurrying men, saunter- 
 ing, staring tourists. Here and there under the 
 palms sat small groups of men, leaning forward, 
 talking in low earnest tones, their faces, whether 
 of the keen, narrow, nervous, or of the fleshy, 
 heavy, square-jawed, unimaginative, aggressive, 
 ruthless type, equally expressing that intense 
 concentration of mind which later would make 
 their luncheon a living torment. 
 
 Helene threw herself into a chair beside her 
 mother and fondled her hand. Euyler not^d 
 that after Madame Delano's surprised smile of 
 welcome she darted a keen glance of apprehen- 
 sion from one to the other, and her tight little 
 mouth relaxed uncontrollably in its supporting 
 walls of flesh. But she lowered her lids imme- 
 diately and looked approvingly at her daughter. 
 
134 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 who in her new gown of gray, with gray hat and 
 gloves and shoes, was a dainty and refreshing 
 picture of Spring. Then she looked at Ruyler 
 with what he fancied was an expression of re- 
 lief. 
 
 "I wonder yon do not do this oftener," she 
 said. 
 
 "I never know until the last moment when or 
 where I shall be able to take lunch, and then I 
 often have to meet three or four men. Such is 
 life in the city of your adoption. ' ' 
 
 "There is no city in the world where women 
 are so abominably idle and useless!" And at 
 the moment, whatever Madame Delano may 
 have been, her voice and mien were those of a 
 virtuous and outraged bourgeoise. "You are 
 all very well, Ruyler, but if I had known what 
 the life of a rich young woman was in this town, 
 I'ct have married Helene to a serious young man 
 of her own class in Rouen ; a husband who would 
 have given her companionship in a normal civ- 
 ilized life, who would have taken care of her 
 as every young wife should be taken care of, 
 and who would have insisted upon at least two 
 children as a matter of coi-r'^f?. With us The 
 
THE AVALANCHE 135 
 
 Family is a religion. Here it is an incident 
 where it is not an accident." 
 
 Euyler, who was still standing, looked down 
 at his mother-in-law with profound interest. 
 He had never heard her express herself at snch 
 length before. "Do you think I fail as a hus- 
 band ?" he asked humbly. "God knows I 'd like 
 to give my wife about two-thirds of my time, 
 but at least I have perfect confidence in her. I 
 should soon cease to care for a wife I was ob- 
 liged to watch." 
 
 "Young things are young things." Madame 
 Delano looked at Helene, who had turned very 
 white and had lowered her own lids to hide the 
 consternation in her eyes. But as her mother 
 ceased speaking she raised them in swift appeal 
 to Ruyler. 
 
 "Maman says I coquette too much," she said 
 plaintively, and Price wondered if a slight 
 movement under the hem of Madame Delano's 
 long skirts meant that the toe of a little gray 
 shoe were boring into one of the massive 
 plinths of his mother-in-law. "But tell him, 
 maman, that you don't really mean it. I can't 
 have Price jealous. That would be too humiliat- 
 
136 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 ing, I'm afraid I do flirt as naturally as I 
 breathe, but Price knows I haven't a thought 
 for a man on earth but him." The color had 
 crept back into her cheeks, but there was stiU 
 anxiety in her soft black eyes, and Price was 
 sure that the little pointed toe once more made 
 its peremptory appeal. 
 
 Madame Delano looked squarely at her son- 
 in-law. 
 
 "That's all right — so far," she said grimly. 
 "Helene is devoted to you. But so have many 
 other young wives been to busy American hus- 
 bands. Now, take my advice, and give her more 
 of your companionship before it is too late. 
 Watch over her. There always comes a time — 
 a turning-point — ^European husbands under- 
 stand, but American husbands are fools. 
 Woman's loyalty, fed on hope only, turns to e- 
 sentment; and then her separate life begins. 
 Now, I've warned you. Go back to your office, 
 where, no doubt, your clerks are hanging out of 
 the windows, wondering if you are dead and the 
 business wrecked. I want to talk to Helene." 
 
THE AVALANCHE 137 
 
 m 
 
 In spite of Ms wise old French mother-in- 
 law's insinuations, Ruyler felt lighter of heart 
 as he left the hotel and walked toward his office 
 than he had since Sunday. Of two things he 
 was certain: there was no ugly understanding 
 between the mother and daughter over that un- 
 speakable past, and Madame Delano's new at- 
 titude toward her daughter was merely the re- 
 sult of an over-sophisticated mother's appre- 
 hensions : those of a woman who was looking in 
 upon smart society for the first time and found 
 it alarming, and — unwelcome, but inevitable 
 thought — peculiarly dangerous to a young and 
 beautiful creature with wUd and lawless blood 
 in her veins. 
 
 However, it was patent that so far her ap- 
 prehensions were merely the result of a rare 
 imaginative flight, the result, no doubt, of her 
 own threatened exposure. Once more he ad- 
 mired her courage in returning to San Fran- 
 cisco, and as he recalled the covert air of cyni- 
 cal triumph with which she had accepted his 
 offer for her daughter's hand, he made no doubt 
 
138 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 that one object had been to play a sardonic joke 
 on the dty she must hate. 
 
 He renewed his determination to keep what 
 guard he could over his young wife, and won- 
 dered if his brother Harold, who also had 
 elected to enter the old firm, could not be in- 
 duced to come out and take over a certain share 
 of the responsibility. The young man had paid 
 him a visit a year ago and been enraptured 
 with life in California. 
 
 True, he was accustomed to make quick de- 
 cisions without consulting any one, and he 
 should find a partner irksome, but he was be- 
 ginning to realize acutely that business, even to 
 an American brain, packed with its traditions 
 and energies, was not even the half of life, 
 should be a means not an end; he set his teeth 
 as he walked rapidly along Montgomery Street 
 and vowed that he would keep his domestic 
 happiness if he had to retire on what was avail- 
 able of his own fortune. He even wondered if 
 it would not be wise to buy a fruit ranch, where 
 he and Helene could share equally in the man- 
 agement, and begia at oncei to raise a family. 
 They both loved outdoor life, and this life of 
 
THE AVALANCHE 139 
 
 complete frivolity, in wMeh she seemed to be 
 hopelessly emneshed, might before long corrode 
 her nature and blast the mental aspirations that 
 still survived in that nntended soil. When this 
 great merging deal was over he should be free 
 to decide. 
 
CHAPTER Vni 
 
 HE arrived at home on the following after- 
 noon at six and was immediately rung up 
 by Spaulding, who demanded an interview. It 
 was not worth while going down town again, as 
 Helene was out and would no doubt return only 
 in time to dress for dinner. They were to dine 
 at half -past seven and go to the play afterward. 
 He told Spaulding to take a taxi and come to 
 the house. 
 
 Nothing had occurred meanwhile to cause him 
 anxiety. He had taken Helene out to the Cliff 
 House to dinner the night before, and after- 
 ward to see the road-houses, whose dancing is 
 so painfully proper early in the evening. Polly 
 Roberts had come into the most notorious of 
 them at eleven, chaperoning a party, which in- 
 cluded Aileen Lawton, a girl as restless and 
 avid of excitement as herself. Rex Roberts 
 
 and several other young men had been in at- 
 
 140 
 
THE AVALANCHE 141 
 
 tendance, and Polly had begged Ruyler to stay 
 on and let his wife see something of "real 
 life." 
 
 * ' This is one of the sights of the world, you 
 know," she said, puffing her cigarette smoke 
 into his face. "It's too middle-class to be 
 shocked, and not to see occasionally what you 
 really cannot get anywhere else. Why, there'll 
 even be a lot of tourists here later on, and these 
 dancers don't do the real Apache until about 
 one. At least leave Helene with me, if you care, 
 more for bed than fun." 
 
 But Ruyler had merely laughed and taken his 
 wife home. Helene had made no protest ; on the 
 contrary had put her arm through his iu the ear 
 and her head on his shoulder, vowing she was 
 worn out, and glad to go home. It was only 
 afterward that it occurred to him that she had 
 clung to him that night 
 
 Spaulding entered the library without taking 
 off his hat, and chewing a toothpick vigorously. 
 He began to talk at once, stretching himself out 
 in a Morris chair, and accepting a cigar. This 
 time Price smoked with him. 
 
 "Well," said the detective, "it's like the 
 
142 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 game of button, button, who's got the button? 
 Sometimes I think I'm getting a little warmer 
 and then I go stone cold. But I've found out a 
 few things, anyhow. How tall should you say 
 Madame Delano is? I've only seen her sitting 
 on her throne there in the Palace Court lookin' 
 like an old Sphinx that's havin' a laugh all to 
 herself." 
 
 "About five feet ten." 
 
 "The Mother Superior said six feet, but no 
 doubt when she had figger instead of flesh she 
 looked taller. Well, I've discovered no less 
 than five tall handsome brunettes that sparkled 
 here in the late Eighties and early Nineties, 
 but it's the deuce and all to get an exact de- 
 scription out of anybody, especially when quite 
 a few years have elapsed. Most people don't 
 see details, only effects. That's what we de- 
 tectives come up against all the time. So, 
 whether these ladies were five feet eight, five 
 feet ten, or six feet, whether they had large fea- 
 tures or small, big hands and feet or fine points, 
 or whether they added on aU the inches they 
 yearned for by means of high heels or style, is 
 beyond me. But here they are." 
 
THE AVALANCHE 143 
 
 He took Ms neat little note-book from his 
 pocket and was about to read it, when Euyler 
 interrupted biTn, 
 
 "But surely you know whether these women 
 were French or not?" 
 
 "Aw, that's just what you can't always find 
 out. Lots of 'em pretend to be, and others — if 
 they come from good stock in the old country — 
 want you to forget it. But the queens generally 
 run to French names, as havin' a better com- 
 mercial value than Mary Jane or Ann Maria- 
 One of these was Marie Gamett, who wasn't 
 much on her own but spun the wheel in Jim's 
 joint down on Barbary Coast, which was raided 
 just so often for form's sake. She always made 
 a quick getaway, was never up in court, and died 
 young. Gabrielle ran an establishment down 
 on Geary Street and was one of the swellest 
 lookers and swellest togged dames in her pro- 
 fession till the drink got her. I can't find that 
 she ever hooked up to a James or any one else. 
 Pauline-Marie was another razzle-dazzle who 
 swooped out here from nowhere and burrowed 
 into quite a few fortunes and put quite a few 
 of our society leaders into mourning. She dis- 
 
144 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 appeared and I can't trace her, but slie seems 
 to have been the handsomest of the bunch, and 
 was fond of showing herself at first nights, 
 dressed straight from Paris, until some of our 
 war-hardened 'leaders' called upon the man- 
 agers in a body and threatened never to set foot 
 inside their doors again unless she was kept out, 
 and the managers succumbed. Then there was 
 the friend of a ridi Englishman, whose first 
 name I haven't been able to get hold of. They 
 lived first at Santa Barbara, then loafed up and 
 down the coast for a year or two, spending quite 
 a time in San Francisco. She was 'foreign 
 looking' and a stunner, all right. All of these 
 
 dames drifted out about the same time " 
 
 ""What was the Englishman's name?" 
 "J. Horace Medford. Front name may or 
 may not have been James. I doubt if his name 
 could be found on any deeds, even in the south, 
 where there was no fire. He doesn't seem to 
 have bought any property or transacted any 
 business. Just lived on a good-sized income. 
 Of course, all the hotel registers here were 
 burnt, but I wired to Santa Barbara and Mon- 
 terey and got what I have given you. 
 
THE AVALANCHE 145 
 
 ' ' He had a yacht, and he took the woman with 
 him everywhere. There was always a flutter 
 when they appeared at the theater. Of course 
 she went by his name, but as he never presented 
 a letter all the time he was here and it was quite 
 obvious he could have brought all he wanted, 
 and as men are always 'on' anyhow, there was 
 but one conclusion." 
 
 "Where did he bank? They might have his 
 full name." 
 
 "Bank of California, but his remittances 
 were sent to order of J. Horace Medford, and, 
 of course, he signed his cheques the same way." 
 
 "That sounds the most Hkely of the lot 
 — and the most hopeful." 
 
 "Weh, haven't handed you the fifth yet, and 
 to my mind she's the most likely of all. Ever 
 hear of James Lawton's trouble with his wife ? ' ' 
 
 "Trouble? I thought she died." 
 
 "She — did — ^not. She went East suddenly 
 about fifteen years ago, and soon after a notice 
 of her death appeared in the San Francisco 
 papers. But there was a tale of woe (for old 
 Lawton) that I doubt if most of her own crowd 
 had even a suspicion of." 
 
146 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 "Good heavens I" Euyler recalled tlie ap- 
 parent intimacy of his mother-ia-law and the 
 senior member of the respectable firm of Law- 
 ton and Cross. If "Madame Delano" were the 
 former Mrs. Lawton, how many things would 
 be explained. 
 
 "This woman's name was Marie all right, 
 and she was French, although she seems to 
 have been adopted by some people named Du- 
 bois and brought up in California. She was 
 quite the proper thing in high society, but the 
 trouble was that she liked another sort better. 
 She was a regular fly-by-night. It began when 
 Norton Moore, a rotten limb of one of the 
 grandest trees in San Francisco Society — so re- 
 spectable they didn't know there was any side 
 to life but their own — sneaked Mrs. Lawton 
 and three girls out of his mother's house one 
 night when she was givin' a ball, put 'em in a 
 hack and took 'em down to Gabrielle's. There 
 they spent an hour lookin' at Gabrielle's swell 
 bunch dressed up and doLn' the grand society 
 act with some of the men-about-town. Then 
 they danced some and opened a bottle or two. 
 
 "I never heard that this little jaunt hurt the 
 
THE AVALANCHE 147 
 
 girls any, but it woke up something in Mrs. 
 Lawton. After that — ^well, there are stories 
 without end. Won't take up your time tellin' 
 them. The upshot was that one night Lawton, 
 who took a fling himself once in a while, met 
 her at Gabrielle's or some other joint, and she 
 went East a day or two after. I suppose he 
 didn't get a divorce, partly on accoimt of the 
 kid — ^Aileen — partly because he had no inten- 
 tion of trying his luck again." 
 
 "But is there any evidence that she had an- 
 other child — ^that she hid away?" 
 
 "No, but it might easy have been. This life 
 went on for about eight years, and it was at 
 least five that she and Lawton merely lived 
 under the same roof for the sake of Aileen. 
 They never did get on. That much, at least, 
 was well known. It might easy be " 
 
 Euyler made a rapid calculation. Aileen 
 Lawton was just about three years older than 
 Helene. She was fair like her father; There 
 was no resemblance between her and his wife, 
 but the intimacy between them had been spon- 
 taneous and had never lapsed. She had grown 
 up quite unrestrained and spoilt, and broken 
 
148 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 three engagements, and was always rushing 
 about proclaiming in one breath that California 
 was the greatest place on earth and in the next 
 that she should go mad if she didn't get out and 
 have a change. Another grievance was that 
 although her father let her have her own way, 
 or rather did not pretend to control her, he gave 
 her a rather niggardly allowance for her per- 
 sonal expenses and she was supposed to be 
 heavily in debt. Euyler thought he could guess 
 where a good deal of his wife's spare cash 
 had gone to. He disliked Aileen Lawton as 
 much as he did Polly Roberts; more, if any- 
 thing, because she might have been clever and 
 she chose to be a fool. Both of these intimate 
 friends of his wife were the reverse of the su- 
 perb outdoor type he admired. 
 
 "Good Lord!" he said. "I don't think 
 there's much choice." 
 
 But in a moment he shook his head. "Too 
 many things don't connect. Where did she get 
 the money to go to her relations in Rouen " 
 
 "He pensioned her off, of course." 
 
 "And the child? How did he consent to let 
 
THE AVALANCHE 149 
 
 her return here with a daughter he probably 
 never had heard of " 
 
 "I figger out, either that she came into some 
 money from a relation over in France, or else 
 she has something on the old boy, and wanting 
 to come back here and marry her daughter, she 
 held him up. He's a pillar of the church, been 
 one of the Presidents of the Pacific-Union 
 Club, has argued cases before the Supreme 
 Court that have been cabled all over the coun- 
 try. "When a man of that sort gets to Law- 
 ton's time of life he don't want any scandals," 
 
 "All the same," said Euyler positively, "I 
 don't believe it. I think it far more Kkely that 
 he was a friend of Madame Delano's husband 
 — assuming that she had one — and that some 
 money was left with him in trust for her or the 
 child." 
 
 "Well, it may be, but I incline to Law- 
 ton " 
 
 "There's one person would know " 
 
 " 'Gene Bisbee. But I never went to that 
 bunch yet for any information, and I don't go 
 this time except as a last resort. Of course he 
 knows, and that is one reason I believe she is 
 
ISO THE AVALANCHE 
 
 Mrs. Lawton. He was Gabrielle's maqnereau 
 for years — "when he 'd wrung enough, out of her 
 lie set up for himself — ^Well, I ain't through yet, 
 by a long sight. Beliefs ain't proof." He rose 
 slowly from the deep chair, stretched himself, 
 and settled his hat firmly on his head. 
 
 ""What's this I hear about a wonderful ruby 
 your wife wore up to Gwynne's the other 
 night? Gosh! I'd like to see a sparkler like 
 that." 
 
 "Why, by all means." 
 
 Ruyler swung the bookcase outward, opened 
 the safe and handed him the ruby. Spaulding 
 regarded it with bulging eyes, and touched it 
 with his finger tips much as he would a new- 
 bom babe. "Some stone!" he said, as he 
 handed it back, "but why in thunder don't you 
 keep it in a safe deposit box? There are crooks 
 that can crack any safe, and if they got wise to 
 this — oh, howdy, ma'am " 
 
 Helena had come ia and stood behind the two 
 men. 
 
 Spaulding snatched off his hat and she 
 acknowledged her husband's introduction gra- 
 ciously. She was dressed for the evening in 
 
THE AVALANCHE 151 
 
 white. Her eyes looked abnormally large, and 
 she kept dropping her lids as if to keep them 
 from settiag in a stare. Her lovely month with 
 its soft curves was faded and set. The whole 
 face was almost as stiff as a mask, and even her 
 graceful body was rigid. Euyler saw Spaulding 
 give her a sharp "sizing-up" look, as he mur- 
 mured, 
 
 "Well, so long. Guv. See you to-morrow. 
 Hope the man '11 turn out aU right after all." 
 
 "I hope so. He's a good chap otherwise." 
 
 "Good night, ma'am. Tell your husband to 
 put that ruby in a safe deposit box." 
 
 "Oh, nobody knows the safe is there except 
 Mr. Euyler and myself " 
 
 "There have been safes hidden behind book- 
 cases before," said Spaulding dryly. "And 
 crooks, like aU the other pests of the earth, just 
 drift naturally to this coast. If I were you I'd 
 have a detective on hand whenever you wear 
 that bit 0' glass — ^not at a friendly affair like 
 the Gwynnes' dinner, of course, but " 
 
 "Good idea!" exclaimed Euyler. "My wife 
 will wear the ruby to the Thornton fete on the 
 fourteenth. Will you be on hand to guard it?" 
 
152 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 "Won't I? About half our force is engaged 
 for that blow-out, but no one but yours truly 
 shall be guardian angel for the ruby. Well, 
 good night once more, and good luck." 
 
 As soon as the detective had gone Euyler 
 drew his wife to him anxiously. "What is it, 
 Helene? You look — ^well, you don't look your- 
 self!" 
 
 "I have a headache," she said irritably. 
 "Perhaps I'm developing nerves. I do wish 
 you would take me to New York. Other women 
 get away from this town once in a while." 
 
 "But you told me on Sunday that you adored 
 California, that it was like fairy land " 
 
 ' ' Oh, all the women out here bluff themselves 
 and everybody else just so long and then sud- 
 denly go to pieces. It's a wonderful state, but 
 what a life ! What a life ! Surely I was made 
 for something better. I don't wonder " 
 
 "What?" he asked sharply. 
 
 "Oh, nothing. I feel ungrateful, of course. 
 I really should be quite happy. Think if I had 
 to go back to Rouen to live — after this taste of 
 
THE AVALANCHE 153 
 
 freedom, and beauty — for California has all the 
 beauties of youth as well as its idiocies and 
 vices " 
 
 "There is not the remotest danger of your 
 ever being obliged to live in Rouen again " 
 
 "Oh, I don't know. You might get tired of 
 me. We might fight like eat and dog for want 
 of common interests, of something to talk about. 
 You would never take to drink like so many of 
 the men, but iTMght — ^well, I'm glad dinner is 
 ready at last." \ 
 
 But she played with her food. That she was 
 repressing an intense and mounting excitement 
 Euyler did not doubt, and he also suspected that 
 she wished to broach some particular subject 
 from which she turned in panic. They were 
 alone after coffee had been served, and he said 
 abruptly : 
 
 "What is it, Helene? Do you want money? 
 I have an idea that Polly Roberts and Aileen 
 Lawton borrow heavily from you, and that they 
 may have cleaned you out completely on the 
 first " 
 
 "How dear of you to guess — or rather to get 
 so close. It's worse than that. I — that is — ^ 
 
154 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 well— poor PoUy went qxiite mad over a pearl 
 necklace at Shreve's and they told her to take 
 it and wear it for a few days, thinking, I sup- 
 pose, she would never give it up and would get 
 the money somehow. She — oh, it's too dreadful 
 — she lost it — and she dares not tell Rex — he's 
 lost quite a lot of money lately — and she's mad 
 with fright — and I told her " 
 
 "Where did she lose it? It's not easy to lose 
 a necklace, especially when the clasp is new." 
 
 "She thinks it was stolen from her neck at 
 the theater — ^you heard what that man said." 
 
 "Ah! What was the price of the necklace?" 
 
 "Twenty thousand dollars. The pearls 
 weren't so very large, of course, but PoUy never 
 had had a pearl necklace " 
 
 "I'll let her have the money to pay for it on 
 one condition — that it is a transaction between 
 Roberts and myself " 
 
 "No! No! Not for anything!" 
 
 "I've lent him money before " 
 
 ' ' But he 'd never forgive Polly. He — ^he 's one 
 of those men who make an awful fuss on the 
 first of ev^ry month when his wife's bills come 
 
THE AVALANCHE 155 
 
 "There must be a bass ctorus on the first of 
 every month in San Francisco- " 
 
 "Oh, please don't jest She must have this 
 money." 
 
 ' * She may have it — on those terms. I'll have 
 no business deahngs with women of the Polly 
 Roberts sort That would be the last I'd ever 
 see of the twenty thousand " 
 
 "I never thought you were stingy!" 
 
 Euyler, in spite of his tearing anxiety, 
 laughed outright "Is that your idea of how; 
 the indulgent American husband becomes 
 rich?" 
 
 "Oh — of course I wouldn't have you lose 
 such a sum. I really have learned the value of 
 money in the abstract, although I can't care for 
 it as much as men do." 
 
 "I have no great love of money, but there is 
 a certain difference between a miser and a level- 
 headed business man " 
 
 "Price, I must have that money. Polly — ■ 
 oh, I am afraid she wiU Mil herself!" 
 
 "Not she. A more selfish little beast never 
 breathed. She'll squeeze the money out of some 
 
156 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 one, never fear! But I think I'll lock up your 
 jewels in case you are tempted to raise money 
 on them for her — Darling!" 
 Helene, without a sound, had fainted. 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 
 THEY had intended to go to the theater but 
 Ruyler put her to bed at once. He of- 
 fered to read to her, but she turned her back on 
 him with cold disdain, and he went to the little 
 invisible cupboard where she kept her own 
 jewels and took out the heavy gold box which 
 had been the wedding present of one of his 
 California business friends who owned a quartz 
 mine. 
 
 "I shall put this in the safe," he said in- 
 cisively, "for, whUe I admire your stanchness 
 in friendship, even for such an unworthy ob- 
 ject as Polly Roberts, I do not propose that my 
 wife shall be selling or pawning her jewels for 
 any reason whatever. Think over the proposal 
 I made downstairs. If Polly is willing I'll lend 
 Roberts the money to-morrow." 
 
 She had thrown an arm over her face and 
 she made no reply. He went down stairs and 
 
 157 
 
158 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 put the box in the safe. It occurred to him 
 that she had watched him open and close the 
 safe several times but she certainly never had 
 written the combination down, and it had taken 
 him a long while to commit it to memory him- 
 self. 
 
 He had glanced over the contents of the box 
 before he locked it in. The jewels were all 
 there, the string of pearls that he had given 
 her on their marriage day, a few wedding pres- 
 ents, and several rings and trinkets he had 
 bought for her since. The value was perhaps 
 twenty thousand dollars, for he had told her 
 that shejmust wait several years before he could 
 give her the jewels of a great lady. "When she 
 was thirty, and really needed them to make up 
 for fading charms — it had been one of their 
 pleasant little jokes. 
 
 As Ruyler set the combination he sighed and 
 wondered whether their days of joking were 
 over. Their life had suddenly shot out of focus 
 and it would require all his ingenuity and pa- 
 tience, aided by friendly circumstance, to swing 
 it into line again. He did not believe a word of 
 the necklace story. Somebody was blackmail- 
 
THE AVALANCHE 159 
 
 ing the poor child. If he could only find out 
 who! He made up his uaind suddenly to put 
 this problem also in the hands of Spaulding for 
 solution. The question of his mother-in4aw's 
 antecedents was important enough, but that of 
 his wife's happiness and his own was para- 
 mount. 
 
 He decided to go to the theater himself, for 
 he was in no condition for sleep or the society 
 of men at the club, nor could any book hold his 
 attention. He prayed that the play would be 
 reasonably diverting. 
 
 He walked down town and as he entered the 
 lobby of the Columbia at the ©lose of the first 
 act he saw 'Gene Bisbee and D. V. Bimmer, 
 who was now managing a hotel in San Fran- 
 cisco, standing together. He also saw Bisbee 
 nudge Bimmer, and they both stared at him 
 openly, the famous hotel man with some sym- 
 pathy in his wise secretive eyes, the reformed 
 peer of the underworld with a certain specula- 
 tive contempt. 
 
 Euyler, to his intense irritation, felt himself 
 flushing, and wondered if the man's regard 
 might be translated : ' ' Just how much shall I 
 
i6o THE AVALANCHE 
 
 be able to touch, him for ? ' ' He wished he would 
 show his hand and dissipate the damnable web 
 of mystery which Fate seemed weaving hourly 
 out of her bloated pouch, but he doubted if Bis- 
 bee, or whoever it was that tormented his wife, 
 would approach him save as a last resource. 
 They were clever enough to know that her keen- 
 est desire would be to keep the disgraceful past 
 from the knowledge of her husband, rather than 
 from a society seasoned these many years to 
 erubescent pasts. 
 
 Moreover it is always easier to blackmail a 
 woman than a man, and Price Euyler could not 
 have looked an easy mark to the most optimistic 
 of social brigands. 
 
 He found it impossible to fix his mind on the 
 play; the cues of the first act eluded him, and 
 the characters and dialogue were too common- 
 place to make the story intelligible. 
 
 At the end of the second act Ruyler made up 
 his mind to go home and try to coax his wife 
 back into her customary good temper, pet her 
 and make her forget her little tragedy. He still 
 hesitated to broach the subject to her directly, 
 but it was possible that by some diplomatically 
 
THE AVALANCHE 161 
 
 analogous tale he could surprise her into teUing 
 him the truth. 
 
 During the long drive he turned over in his 
 mind the data Spaulding had placed before him 
 during the afternoon. He rejected the theory 
 that Madame Delano was Mrs. Lawton as ut- 
 terly fantastic, but admitted a connection. 
 Helene had spoken more than once of Mrs. Law- 
 ton's kindness to "maman" when her baby was 
 bom during her "enforced stay in San Fran- 
 cisco," and it was quite possible that the two 
 had been friends, and that the young mother 
 had adopted the name of Dubois when calling 
 upon the nuns of the convent at St. Peter, either 
 because it would naturally occur to her, or 
 from sonje deeper design which he could not 
 fathom. . . . 
 
 Yes, the connection with Mrs. Lawton was 
 indisputable and it remained for him to "figger 
 out" as Spaulding would say, which of these 
 women, the gambler's wife, the notorious 
 "Madam," Gabrielle, the briefly coruscating 
 Pauline Marie, or the Englishman's mistress, a 
 woman of Mrs. Lawton 's position would be most 
 likely to befriend. 
 
i62 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 The first three might be dismissed without 
 argument. She had been no frequenter of 
 "gambling joints" whatever her peccadilloes; 
 Gabrielle, he happened to know, had died some 
 eight or ten years ago, and Mademoiselle Paul- 
 ine Marie, if she had had a child, which was 
 extremely doubtful, was the sort that sends 
 unwelcome offspring post haste to the foundling 
 asylum. 
 
 There remained only the spurious Mrs. Med- 
 ford, and she was the probability on all counts. 
 What more likely than that she and Mrs. Law- 
 ton had met at one of the great winter hotels 
 in Southern Calif omia, and foregathered? 
 Certainly they would be congenial spirits. 
 
 When the baby came Mrs. Lawton would 
 naturally see her through her trouble, and ad- 
 vise her later what to do with the child. No 
 doubt, Medf ord found it in the way. 
 
 After that Euyler could only fumble. Did 
 Medford desert the woman, driving her on the 
 stage? — or elsewhere? Did they start for 
 Japan, and did he die on the voyage? Did he 
 merely give the woman a pension and tell her to 
 go back to Eouen, or to the devil? It was posi- 
 
THE AVALANCHE 163 
 
 tive that when Helene was five years old 
 Madame Delano had gone back to her relatives 
 with some trumped up story and been received 
 by them. 
 
 Moreover, this theory coincided with his 
 belief that Helene 's father was a gentleman. 
 No doubt he had been already married when he 
 met the young French girl, superbly handsome, 
 and intelligent — possibly at one of the French 
 watering places^ even in Rouen itself, swarming 
 with tourists in Summer. They might have met 
 in the spacious aisles of the Cathedral, she risen 
 from her prayers, he wandering about, Bae- 
 deker in hand, and fallen in love at sight. One 
 of Earth's million romances, regenerating the 
 aged planet for a moment, only to sink back 
 and disappear fnto her forgotten dust. 
 
 His own romance? What was to be the end 
 of that! 
 
 But he returned to his argument. He wanted 
 a coherent story to tell his wife, and he wanted 
 also to believe that his wife's father had been 
 a gentleman. 
 
 Medford, like so many of his eloping kind, 
 had made instinctively for California with the 
 
i64 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 beautiful woman lie loved but could not marry. 
 Santa Barbara, Ruyler had beard, had been 
 the favorite haven for two generations of 
 couples fleeing from irking bonds in the so- 
 cieties of England and the contiaent of Europe. 
 Southern California combined a wild independ- 
 ence with a languor that blunted too sensitive 
 nerves, offered an equable climate with months 
 on end of out of door life, boatiug, shooting, 
 riding, driving, motoring, romantic excursions, 
 and even sport if a distinguished looking couple 
 played the game well and told a plausible 
 story. 
 
 Breeding was a part of Euyler's religion, as 
 component in his code as honor, patriotism, 
 loyalty, or the obligation of the strong to pro- 
 tect the weak. Far better the bend sinister in 
 his own class than a legitimate parent of the 
 type of 'Gene Bisbee or D. V. Bimmer. Euyler 
 was a "good miser" when business required 
 that particular form of diplomacy, and the fa- 
 miliarities of Jake Spaulding left his nerves un- 
 scathed, but in bone and brain cells he was of 
 the intensely respectable aristocracy of Man- 
 hattan Island and he never forgot it. He had 
 
THE AVALANCHE 165 
 
 surrendered to a girl of no position witlioiit 
 a struggle, and made her his wife, but it is 
 doubtful if be would even have fallen in love 
 with her if she had been underbred in appear- 
 ance or manner. He had never regretted his 
 marriage for a moment, not even since this 
 avalanche of mystery and portending scandal 
 had descended upon him; if possible he loved 
 his troubled young wife more than ever — ^with 
 a sudden instinct that worse was to come he 
 vowed that nothing should ever make him love 
 her less. 
 
 When he arrived at his house he found two 
 notes on the hall table addressed to himself. 
 The first was from Helene and read: 
 
 "Polly telephoned that she would send her 
 car for me to go down to the Fairmont and 
 dance. I cannot sleep so I am going. She can- 
 not sleep either! Forgive me if I was cross, 
 but I am terribly worried for her. Don't wait 
 up for me. Helene." 
 
 He read this note with a frown but without 
 surprise. It was to be expected that she would 
 seek excitement untU her present fears were 
 allayed and her persecutors silenced. 
 
i66 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 He deterinined to order Spaulding to have 
 her shadowed constantly for at least a fort- 
 night and note made of every person in whose 
 company she appeared to be at aU uneasy, 
 whether they were of her own set or not. It 
 would also be worth while to have Madame De- 
 lano 's rooms watched, for it was possible that 
 she would summon Helene there to meet Bisbee 
 or others of his ilk. 
 
 Then he picked up the other note. It was 
 from Spaulding, and as he read it all his fine- 
 spun theories vanished and once more he was 
 adrift on an uncharted sea without a land- 
 mark in sight. 
 
 "Dear Sir," began the detective, who was 
 always formal on paper. "I've just got the 
 information required from Holbrook Centre. 
 We didn't half believe there was such a place, 
 if you remember? Well there is, and accord- 
 ing to the parish register Marie Jeanne Perrin 
 was married to James Delano on July 25th, 
 1891. She was there, visiting some French re- 
 lations — 'they went back soon after-— and he 
 had left there when he was about sixteen and 
 had only come back that once to see his mother, 
 
THE AVALANCHE 167 
 
 who was dying. Nothing seems to have been 
 known about him in his home town except a 
 sort of rumor that he was a bad lot and lived 
 somewheres in California. Can you beat it! 
 But don't think I'm stumped. I'm working on 
 a new line and I'm not going to say another 
 word until I've got somewheres. 
 
 "Yours truly, 
 
 "J. Spaxildestg. " 
 "Delano's father was a Forty-niner, and 
 lived in California till 1860, when he wept home 
 to H. C. and died soon after. There were wild 
 stories about him, too." 
 
(CHAPTER X 
 
 DUEIN& tlie next few days Euyler saw lit- 
 tle of his wife. He was obliged to take 
 two business trips out of town and as he could 
 not return until ten o'clock at night he advised 
 her to have company to dinner and take her 
 guests to the play. But she preferred to dine 
 with Polly Eoberts and Aileen Lawton, and 
 she spent her days for the most part at Bur- 
 lingame, motoring down with one or more of 
 her friends, or sent for by some enthusiastic 
 girl admirer already established there for the 
 summer. 
 
 Euyler was quite willing to forego tempo- 
 rarilj his plan of personal guardianship, as the 
 more she roamed abroad unattended the better 
 could Spaulding watch her associates. The de- 
 tective had his agents in society, as well as in 
 the Palace Hotel, and on the third day he sent 
 
 a brief note to Euyler announcing that he had 
 
 168 
 
THE AVALANCHE 169 
 
 "lit on to something" that would make his em- 
 ployer's "hair curl, but no more at present 
 from yours truly." 
 
 "This time," he added, "I'm on the right 
 track and know it. No more fancy theories. 
 But I won't say a word tiU I can deliver the 
 goods. Give your wife all the rope you can." 
 
 Price and Helene met briefly and amiably and 
 she did not again broach the subject of the loan 
 for her friend, nor did she ask for her jewels. 
 It was apparent that she was proudly deter- 
 mined to conceal whatever terrors or even wor- 
 ries that might haunt her, but the effort de- 
 prived her of all her native vivacity; she was 
 almost formal in maimer and her white face 
 grew more like a classic mask daily. 
 
 On the evening before the Thornton fete, 
 however, Price was able to dine at home. They 
 met at table and he saw at once that she either 
 had recovered her spirits or was making a de- 
 liberate attempt to create the impression of a 
 carefree young woman happy in a tete-a-tete 
 dinner with a busy husband. 
 
 Her talk for the most part was of the great 
 entertainment at San Mateo. The weather 
 
170 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 promised to be simply magnificent. Wasn't 
 that exactly like Flora Thornton's luck? The 
 immense grounds were simply swarming with 
 workmen; wagon-loads of all sorts of things 
 went through the gates after every train — sim- 
 ply one procession after another; but no one 
 else could so much as get her nose through those 
 gates. 
 
 Helene, with all her old chUdish glee, related 
 how she and Aileen, Polly (who apparently had 
 forgotten her impending doom), and two or 
 three other girls, had called up Mrs. Thornton 
 on the telephone every ten minutes for an hour 
 — ^pretending it was long distance to make sure 
 of a personal response — and begged to be al- 
 lowed to go over and see the preparations, un- 
 til finally, in a towering rage, her ladyship had 
 replied that if they called her again she would 
 withdraw her invitations. 
 
 "How we did long for an airship. It would 
 have been such fun, for she does so disapprove 
 of aU of us ; thinks us a little flock of silly geese. 
 Well, we are, I guess, but wasn't she one her- 
 self once? She has a pretty hard time even 
 
THE AVALANCHE 171 
 
 now making life interesting for herself — out 
 iiere, anyhow. 
 
 "Yesterday we motored down to Menlo and 
 dropped in at the Maynards. There were a lot 
 of the props of San Francisco society, all as 
 rich as crcesus, sitting on the veranda crochet- 
 ing socks or sacks for a crop of new babies that 
 are due. One or two were hemstitching lawn, 
 or embroidering a monogram, or something else 
 equally useless or virtuous. They were talking 
 mild gossip, and didn't even have powder on. 
 It was ghastly " 
 
 "Helene," said Ruyler abruptly, "what do 
 you think is the secret of happiness — 1 mean, 
 of course, the enduring sort — ^perhaps content 
 would be the better word. Happiness is too de- 
 pendent upon love, and love was never meant 
 for daily food. You are not by nature frivo- 
 lous, and you are capable of thought. Have 
 you ever given any to the secret of content?" 
 
 "Yes, work," she answered promptly. "Ev- 
 erybody should have his daily job, prescribed 
 either by the state or by necessity; but some- 
 thing he must do if both he and society would 
 continue to exist." 
 
172 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 Euyler. elevated Ms eyebrows and looked at 
 iier curiously. "Socialism. I didn't know you 
 had ever heard of it." 
 
 "AUeen and I are not such fools as we look 
 — as you were good enough to intimate just 
 now. We went to a series of lectures early last 
 winter over at the University, on Socialism — 
 a lot of us formed a class, but all except Aileen 
 and I dropped out. 
 
 "We continued to read for a time after the 
 lectures were over, but of course that didn't 
 last. One drops everything for want of stimu- 
 lus, and when one begins to flutter again one is 
 lost. 
 
 "But I heard and read and thought enough 
 to deduce that the only vital interest in life 
 after one's secret happiness — ^which one would 
 not dare spread out too thin if one could in this 
 American life — ^is necessary work well done. 
 And that is quite different from those fussy in- 
 terests and fads we create or take up for the 
 sake of thinking we are busy and interested. 
 
 "Polly's mother once told me she never was 
 so happy in her life as during those weeks after 
 the earthquake and fire when aU the servants 
 
THE AVALANCHE 173 
 
 had mn away and she had to cook for the fam- 
 ily out in the street on a stove they bought 
 down in a little shop in Polk Street and set up 
 and surrounded on three sides by 'inside 
 blinds.' She happened to have a talent for 
 cookii;g, and without her the family would have 
 starved. Polly tied a towel round her head and 
 did the housework, or stood in a line and got 
 the daily rations from the Government. She 
 never thought once of " 
 
 "Of what?" 
 
 "Oh, of doing anything rather than expire 
 of boredom. She and Eex had been married a 
 year and were living at home. Eex and' Mr. 
 Carter helped excavate down in the business 
 district, as the working class wouldn't lift a fin- 
 ger as long as the Government was feeding 
 them." 
 
 "There you are! Their ideal is complete 
 leisure, and that of our delicate products of the 
 highest civilization — compulsory jobs! What 
 does progress mean but the leisure to enjoy the 
 arts and all the finer fruits of progress? "What 
 else do we men really work for?" 
 
 *' Progress has gone too far and defeated its 
 
174 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 own ends. Every healthy human being should 
 be forced to work six hours a day. 
 
 "That would leave eight for sleep and ten 
 for enjoyment of the arts and luxuries. Then 
 we reaUy should enjoy them, and if we couldn't 
 have them unless we did our six hours' stint, 
 ennui and the dissipations that it breeds would 
 be unknown. 
 
 "I can tell you it is demoralizing, disinte- 
 grating, to wake up morning after morning — 
 about ten o'clock! — and know that you have 
 nothing worth while to do for another day — 
 for all the days ! — ^that you have no place in the 
 world except as an ornament! Women of lim- 
 ited incomes and a family of growing children 
 have enough to do, of course — ^too much — they 
 never can feel superfluous and demoralized — : 
 except by envy — ^but as for us ! Why, I can tell 
 you, it is a marvel we don't all go straight to 
 the devil." 
 
 They were alone with the coffee, and she was 
 pounding the table with her little fist. Her 
 cheeks were deeply flushed and her black som- 
 ber eyes were opening and closing rapidly, asi 
 
THE AVALANCHE 175 
 
 if alternately magnetized by some ugly vision 
 and sweeping it aside. 
 
 Price watched her with, deep interest and 
 deeper anxiety. "A good many women go to 
 the devil," he said. "But you are not that 
 sort." 
 
 "Oh, I don't know. I never could get up 
 enough interest in another man to solve the 
 problem in the usual way — ^but there are other 
 resources — ^I — well " 
 
 "What?" Price sat up very straight. 
 
 "Oh, dance ourselves into tuberculosis," she 
 said lightly, and dropping her eyelashes. "And 
 tuberculosis of the mind, certainly. On the 
 whole, I think I prefer physical to spiritual 
 death. . . . 
 
 "However — ^I found out one thing to-day. 
 The dancing is to be out of doors. There will 
 be an immense arbor or something of the sort 
 erected on the lawn above the sunken garden. 
 My gown is a dream and I shall wear the ruby. ' ' 
 
 "Yes," he said smiling. "You shall wear 
 the ruby. But you must expect me to keep very 
 close to you " 
 
 "The closer the better." She smiled charm- 
 
175 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 kigly. "Have you tried on your costume?" 
 "I haven't even looked at it. "Who am I?" 
 "Caesar Borgia. You are not mucli like him 
 yourself, darling, but I thought he was not so 
 very unlike modern American business men, as 
 a whole." 
 
 Ruyler laughed. "Why not Machiavelli? 
 But as no doubt it is black velvet, much puffed 
 and slashed, I may hope it will be becoming to 
 my nondescript fairness. You must promise not 
 to wander off for long walks with any of your 
 admirers. Not that I fear the admirers, but 
 the thieves that are bound to get into that 
 crowd one way or another. They have a way 
 of unclasping necklaces even of the most cir- 
 cumspect wives in the company of not too ab- 
 sorbing men." 
 
 Her eyes opened and flashed, but he had no 
 time to analyze that fleeting expression before 
 she was promising volubly not to wander from 
 the illuminated spaces. 
 
 n 
 
 He interrupted her suddenly. They were in 
 the library now, and sat down on a little sofa 
 
THE AVALANCHE 177 
 
 in front of the window. The moon was high 
 and brilliant and the great expanse of water 
 with the high clusters of lights on the islands, 
 the sharp hard silhouette of the encircling 
 mountains, the green and silver stars so high 
 above, the moving golden dots of an incoming 
 liner from Japan, the long rows of arc lights 
 along the shore, made a landscape of the night 
 that Mrs. Thornton with all her millions hardly 
 could rival. 
 
 "Are you not grateful for this?" he asked 
 whimsically and a little wistfully. 
 
 "Oh, Price, dear, I am more grateful than 
 you will ever know. I have not a fault on earth 
 to find with you. You would be the prince of the 
 fairy tale if you were not so busy. 
 
 "But that is the tragedy. You are busy — 
 I am not." 
 
 "Well, let us have the personal solution — 
 one that fits ourselves. You have time to think 
 it out. I, alas! have not." He took her hand 
 and fondled it, hoping for her confidence. 
 
 "I don't know." She had a deep rich voice 
 and she could make it very intense. "I only 
 know there must — ^must — ^be a change — if-^if — 
 
lyS THE AVALANCHE 
 
 I am to Can't you take me abroad for a 
 
 year? That might not be work, but at least I 
 should be learning something — ^I have traveled 
 almost not at all — and, at least, I should have 
 you." 
 
 "But later? Most of your friends have spent 
 a good deal of time in Europe. I doubt if any 
 state in the Union goes to Europe as often as 
 California! They are all the more discon- 
 tented when they come back here to vegetate — 
 as Mrs. Thornton would express it. 
 
 "It would be a blessed interval, but no more." 
 
 "We should have time to think out a new 
 and different life. . . . 
 
 "You know — in the class I come from — ^in 
 France — the women are the partners of their 
 husbands. Even in the higher bourgeoisie, that 
 is, where they still are in business, not living 
 on great inherited fortunes 
 
 "My uncle had a small sili house in Rouen, 
 and my aunt kept the books and attended to all 
 the correspondence. He always said she was 
 the cleverer business man of the two; but 
 French women have a real genius for business. 
 
THE AVALANCHE 179 
 
 Some of our great ladies help their husbands 
 manage their estates. 
 
 "It is only the few that live for pleasure and 
 glitter in the most glittering city in the world 
 that have furnished the novelists the material 
 to give the world a false impression of France. 
 
 "The majority live such sober, useful, busy 
 lives that only the highest genius could make 
 people read about them. 
 
 "Of course, young girls dream of something 
 far more brilliant, and wait eagerly for the hus- 
 band who shall deliver them from their narrow 
 restricted little spheres . . . perhaps take them 
 to the great world of Paris; but they settle 
 down, even m Paris, and devote themselves to 
 their husbands' interests, which are their 
 own, and to their children. . . . 
 
 "That is it ! They are indispensable — ^not as 
 women, but as partners. I barely know what 
 your business is about — only that you are in 
 some tremendous wholesale commission thing 
 with tentacles that reach half round the world. 
 
 "Only the wives of politicians are any real 
 help to their husbands in this country. Isabel 
 Gwynne ! "What a help she will be — ^has been—: 
 
i8o THE AVALANCHE 
 
 to Mr. Gwynne. But then she was always busy. 
 "When her uncle died he left her that little ranch 
 and scarcely anything else, she took to raising 
 chickens — ^not to fuss about and fill in her time, 
 but to keep a roof over her head and have 
 enough to eat and wear. I doubt if she ever 
 was bored in her life." 
 
 "I can't take you into the business, sweet- 
 heart," said Euyler slowly. "For that would 
 violate the traditions of a very old conservative 
 house. But I can quite see that something must 
 be done. . . . 
 
 "I married you to make you happy and to 
 be happy myself. I do not intend that our mar- 
 riage shall be a failure. It is possible that 
 Harold would consent to come out here and take 
 my place. The business no longer requires any 
 great amount of initiative, but the most unre- 
 mitting vigilance. I have thought — ^it has 
 merely passed through my mind — ^but you 
 might hate it — how would you like it if I bought 
 a large fruit ranch, several thousand acres, and 
 put up a canning factory besides? I would 
 make you a full partner and you would have to 
 
THE AVALANCHE 181 
 
 give to yoTir share of the work considerably 
 more than six hours of the day- 
 
 "We could build a large, plain, comfortable 
 house, take all our books and pictures, subscribe 
 to all the newspapers, magazines and reviews, 
 keep up with everything that is going on in the 
 world, ^ave house parties once in a while, come 
 to town for a few weeks in summer for the 
 plays. 
 
 "We should live practically an out-of-door 
 life— if you preferred we could buy a cattle 
 ranch in the soutL That would mean the 
 greater part of the day in the saddle 
 
 "How does it appeal to you?" 
 
 He had turned off the electricity, but as he 
 fumbled with his embryonic idea he saw her 
 eyes sparkle and a light of passionate hope 
 dawn on her face. 
 
 "Oh, I should love it! But love it! Espe- 
 cially the fruit ranch. That would be like 
 France — our orchards are as wonderful as 
 yours, even if nothing could be as big as a Cali- 
 fornia ranc h "^ 
 
 ^'That is, if it would not be a makeshift. 
 Another form of playing at life." 
 
i82 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 "I can assure you that we will have to make 
 it pay or go to the wall. My father would prob- 
 ably disinherit me, for it would be breaking 
 another tradition, and he compliments me by 
 believing that I am the best business man in the 
 firm at present. 
 
 "My only capital would be such of my for- 
 tune as is not tied up in the House — about a 
 hundred thousand dollars in Government bonds. 
 Of course, in time, if all goes well, and Cali- 
 fornia does not have another setback — if busi- 
 ness improves all over the world — I shall be 
 able to take the rest of my money out, that I put 
 into this end of the business after the fire ; but 
 that may be ten years hence. I shouldn't even 
 ask for interest on it — that would be the only 
 compensation I could offer for deserting the 
 firm. 
 
 "Perhaps I had better buy a cattle ranch. 
 Then, if we fail, I shall at least have had the 
 training of a cowboy and can hire out. ' ' 
 
 Helene laughed and clapped her hands. 
 "Fail? You? But I should help you to make 
 it a success — ^I should be really necessary!" 
 
THE AVALANCHE 183 
 
 "Indispensable. Either yon or another part- 
 er." 
 "No! No! I shall be the partner " 
 
 "And you mean that you would be williag 
 to buiy your youth, your beauty, on a ranch? 
 I have heard bitter confidences out here from 
 women forced to waste their youth on a ranch. 
 You are one of the fine flowers of civiliza- 
 tion " 
 
 "That soon wither in the hothouse atmos- 
 phere. I wish to become a hardy annual. And 
 when the ranch was running liiie a clock we 
 could take a month or two in Europe every year 
 or so " 
 
 "Rather! And I could show you off — — 
 Bother ! I '11 not answer. ' ' 
 
 The telephone bell on the little table in the 
 corner (his own private wire) rang so insist- 
 ently that Euyler finally was magnetized re- 
 luctantly across the room. He put the receiver 
 to his ear and asked, "Well?" in his most in- 
 hospitable tones. 
 
 The answer came in Spaulding's voice, and in 
 a moment he sat down. 
 
 At the end of ten minutes he hung the re- 
 
i84 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 ceiver on the hook and returned to find Helene 
 standing by the window, all the light gone from 
 her eyes, staring out at the hard brilliant 
 scene with an expression of hopelessness that 
 had relaxed the very muscles of her face. 
 
 Ruyler was shocked, and more apprehensive 
 than he had yet been- * ' Helene ! " he exclaimed. 
 ''What is the matter? Surely you may confide 
 in me if you are in trouble." 
 
 "Oh, but I am not," she replied coldly. "Did 
 I look odd? I was just wondering how many 
 really happy people there were behind those 
 lights — over on Belvedere, at Sausalito— the 
 lights look so golden and steady and sure — ^and 
 glimpses of interiors at night are always so fas- 
 cinating — ^but I suppose most of the people are 
 commonplace and just dully discontented " 
 
 "Well, I am afraid I have something to tell 
 you that hardly will restore your delightful 
 gayety of a few moments ago. I am sorry^-but 
 —well, the fact is I must leave for the north 
 to-morrow morning and hardly shall be able to 
 return before the next night. I am really dis- 
 tressed. I wanted so much to take yon to-mor- 
 row night " 
 
THE AVALANCHE 185 
 
 * * And I can 't wear tke ruby ? ' ' Her voice was 
 shrill. Euyler wondered if his stimulated im- 
 agination fancied a note of terror in it. 
 
 "I — ^I — ^am afraid not — darling " 
 
 "But that Spaulding man wiU be there to 
 watch " 
 
 "Unfortunately — ^I forgot to tell you — ^he 
 cannot go — ^he is on an important case. Besides 
 — ^when I make a promise I usually keep it." 
 
 "But — but " She stammered as if her 
 
 brain were confused, then turned and pressed 
 her face to the window. "I suppose nothing 
 matters," she said dully. "Perhaps you will 
 let me wear my own little ruby. After all, that 
 was maman's, and she gave it to me before I 
 was married. I should like to wear one jewel. " 
 
 "You shall have aU your jewels, if you will 
 promise not to give them to PoUy Eoberts or 
 any one else." 
 
 "I promise." 
 
 He went over and opened the safe, and when 
 he rose with the gold jewel case he saw that 
 she was standing behind him. Once more it 
 flitted through his mind that she had watched 
 him manipulate the combination several times, 
 
i86 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 but he had little confidence in any but a pro, 
 fessional thief's ability to memorize such an in- 
 volved assortment of figures as had been in- 
 vented for this particular safe. It was only 
 once in a while that he was not obliged to refer 
 to the key that he carried in his pooketbook. 
 
 Nor was she looking at the safe, but staring 
 upward at a maharajah, covered with pearls 
 of fantastic size. She took the box from his 
 hand with a polite word of thanks, offered her 
 cheek to be kissed, and left the room. 
 
 Price threw himself into a chair and re- 
 hearsed the instructions Spaulding had given 
 him. 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 
 IT was half-past eleven when Ruyler and 
 Spaulding, masked and wearing colored silk 
 dominoes, entered the great gates of the Thorn- 
 ton estate in San Mateo, the detective merely 
 displaying something in his pahn to the stern 
 guardians that kept the county rabble at bay. 
 
 The mob stood o'ff rather grumblingly, for 
 they would have liked to get closer to that gor- 
 geous mass of light they could merely glimpse 
 through the great oaks of the lower part of the 
 estate, and to the music so seductive in the dis- 
 tance. 
 
 They were not a rabble to excite pity, by any 
 means. A few ragged tramps had joined the 
 crowd, possibly a few pickpockets from the city, 
 watching their opportunity to slip in behind one 
 of the automobiles that brought the guests from 
 the station or from the estates up and down 
 the valley. They were, for the most part, trades- 
 
 187 
 
i88 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 people from the little towns — San Mateo, Red- 
 wood City — or the wives of the proletariat — or 
 the servants of the neighboring estates. But, 
 although they grumbled and envied, they made 
 no attempt to force their way in; it was only 
 the light-fingered gentry the police at the great 
 iron gates were on the lookout for. 
 
 Euyler, if his mind had been less harrowed 
 with the looming and possibly dire climax of 
 his own secret drama, would have laughed aloud 
 at this melodramatic entrance to the grounds 
 of one of his most intimate friends. He and 
 Spaulding had walked from the train, but they 
 were not detained as long as a gay party 
 of young people from Atherton, who teased 
 the police by refusing to present their cards or 
 lift their masks. Euyler knew them all, but 
 they finally sped past him without even a glance 
 of contempt for mere foot passengers, even 
 though they looked like a couple of dodging con- 
 spirators. 
 
 He had met Spaulding at the station iu San 
 Francisco, and private conversation on the 
 crowded train had been impossible. When they 
 had walked a few yards along the wide avenue. 
 
THE AVALANCHE 189 
 
 as brilliant as day with its thousands of colored 
 lights concealed in the astonished pines, Ruy- 
 ler sat deliberately down upon a bench and mo- 
 tioned the detective to take the seat beside him. 
 
 "It is time you gave me some sort of a hint," 
 he said. "After all, it is my affair " 
 
 "I know, but as I said, you might not approve 
 my methods, and if you balk, aU is up. We've 
 got the chance of our lives. It's now or never. ' ' 
 
 "I do not at all like the idea that you may be 
 forcing me into a position where I may find my- 
 self doing something I shall be ashamed of for 
 the rest of my life." 
 
 Ruyler's tone was haughty. He did not rel- 
 ish being led round by the nose, and his nerves 
 were jumping. 
 
 "Now! Now!" said Spaulding soothingly, as 
 he lit a cigar. "When you hire a detective you 
 hire him to do things you wouldn't do yourself; 
 and if you won't give him the little help he's 
 got to have from you or quit, what's the use of 
 hiring him at all? 
 
 "I know perfectly well that nothing but your 
 own eyes would convince you of what it's up 
 to me to prove — to say nothing of the fact that 
 
igo THE AVALANCHE 
 
 I count on yonr entrance at the last minute to 
 put an end to tlie whole bad business. For it 
 is a bad business — ^believe me. But not a word 
 of that now. You couldn't pry open my lips 
 with a five dollar Havana." 
 
 "Well — ^you say you had a talk with Madame 
 Delano to-day. Surely you can teU me some of 
 the things you have discovered." 
 
 "A whole lot. I've been waiting for the 
 chance. Not that I got anything out of her. 
 She's one grand bluffer and no mistake. I take 
 off my hat to her. When I told her that I could 
 lay hands on the proof that she was Marie Grar- 
 nett — although Jim had married her in his home 
 town under his own name — ^and that she'd gone 
 home to France with the kid when it was five, 
 taking the cue from her friend, Mrs. Lawton, 
 and sending word back she was dead " 
 
 "You were equally sure a few days ago that 
 she was Mrs. Lawton " 
 
 "That was just my constructive imagination 
 on the loose. It was a lovely theory, and I sort 
 of hung on to it. But I had no real data to go 
 on. Now I've got the evidence that Jim Gar- 
 nett died two months before the fire burnt up 
 
THE AVALANCHE 191 
 
 pretty nearly all the records, and that his body 
 was shipped back to Holbrook Centre to be 
 buried in the family plot. Yon see, he was sick 
 for some time out on Pacific Avenue, and his 
 death was registered where the fire didn't 
 go " 
 
 "But what put you on?" asked Euyler im- 
 patiently. "I should almost rather it had been 
 any one else. He seems to have been about as 
 bad a lot as even this town ever turned out." 
 
 "He was, all right, and his father before him, 
 although they came from mighty fine folks back 
 east. His father came out in '49 with the gold 
 rush crowd, panned out a good pile, and then, 
 liking the life — San Francisco was a gay little 
 burg those days — opened one of the crack gam- 
 bling houses down on the Old Plaza. Plate 
 glass windows you could look through from out- 
 side if you thought it best to stay out, and see 
 hundreds of men playing at tables where the 
 gold pieces — often slugs — ^were piled as high as 
 their noses, and hundreds more walking up and 
 down the aisles either waiting for a chance to 
 sit, or hoping to appease their hunger with the 
 sight of so much gold. They didn't try any 
 
192 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 funny business, for every gambler bad a six- 
 sbooter in bis bip pocket, and sometimes on tbe 
 table beside bim. 
 
 "Sometimes men would walk out and sboot 
 tbemselves on tbe sidewalk in front of tbe win- 
 dows, and not a soul inside would so mucb as 
 look up. Well, Delano tbe first bad a sbort life 
 but a merry one. He couldn't keep away from 
 tbe tables bimself, and first tbing be knqw be 
 was broke, sold up. He went back to tbe mines, 
 but bis luck bad gone, aud bis wife — she bad 
 followed bim out bere — persuaded bim to go 
 back borne and live in tbe old bouse, on a little 
 income sbe bad ; and be bored all tbe neighbors 
 to deatb for a few years about 'early days in 
 California' until be dropped off. Her name was 
 Mary Gramett. 
 
 "That's what put me on — ^tbe Gr. in the mid- 
 dle of tbe name of the man Madame Delano 
 married. I telegraphed to Holbrook Centre to 
 find out what his middle name was, and after 
 that it was easy. I also found out that be was 
 bom in California, and I guess that old wild 
 life was in his blood. He stood Holbrook Cen- 
 tre until be was sixteen, and then homed back 
 
THE AVALANCHE 193 
 
 and took up the trade lie just 'naturally had in- 
 herited. 
 
 "I figger out that he didn't tell his wife the 
 truth when he married her back there, not until 
 he was on the train pretty close to S. F., and 
 then he told her because he couldn't help him- 
 self. She couldn't help herself, either, and be- 
 sides she was in love with him. He was a hand- 
 some, distinguished lookin' chap, and he kept 
 right on bein' a fascinator as long as he lived, 
 
 "I guess that's the reason she left him in the 
 end. She stood for the gambling joint, and, al- 
 though she had a cool sarcastic way with her 
 that kept the men who fell for her at a distance, 
 she was a good decoy, and she looked a regular 
 queen at the head of the green table. She was 
 chummy with Jim's intimates, two of whom 
 were D. V. Bimmer and 'Gene Bisbee, but even 
 'Gene didn't dare take any liberties with her. 
 
 "It was natural that a woman brought up as 
 she had been should have kept her child out of 
 it, and I figger that she got disgusted with Jim 
 and came to the full sense of her duty to the 
 poor kid about the same time. But she didn't 
 go until Jim settled so much a month on her 
 
194 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 through old Lawton — ^who used to amuse him- 
 self at Gamett's a good deal in those days, and 
 who T^as one of her best friends. 
 
 "Well, she also got Garnett to make a curious 
 sort of a will, leaving his money to James Law- 
 ton, to 'dispose of as agreed upon.' She had 
 a thrifty business head, had that French dame, 
 and she had made him buy property when he 
 was flush, and put it in her name, although she 
 gave a written agreement never to sell out as 
 long as he lived. 
 
 "He agreed to let her go because he was 
 dippy about another skirt at the time, and, be- 
 sides, she played on his family pride — lineal de- 
 scendant of the Delanos, Gametts, and so forth. 
 He'd never seen the kid after it was taken to 
 the convent, but I guess he liked the idea, aU 
 righv, of its being brought up wearing the old 
 name, and gettin' rid of Marie at the same time. 
 
 "She was too canny to leave him a loophole 
 for divorce, even in California; but I guess that 
 didn't worry him much. 
 
 "If the earthquake and fire hadn't come so 
 soon after the will was probated there might 
 have been a lot of speculation about it, among 
 
THE AVALANCHE 195 
 
 men, at least. Those old gossips in tHe Club 
 windows would soon have been putting two and 
 two together ; but the calamity that burnt up aJl 
 the Club windows, just swept it clean out of 
 their heads. 
 
 "I figger out that old Lawton continued to 
 pay Madame Delano the income she'd been 
 havin' both from Jim and her properties, out 
 of his own pocket, until the city was rebuilt and 
 he could settle the estate. He had to borrow 
 the money to rebuild the houses Jim had put 
 up on his wife's property, and when things got 
 to a certain pass he wrote Madame D. to come 
 along and take over her property. She'll be 
 good and rich one of these days, when all the 
 mortgages are paid off and Lawton paid back, 
 but it was wise for her to stay on the job. Law- 
 ton is dead straight, but his partner is sowing 
 wild oats in his old age — good old S. F. style, 
 and I guess it ain't wise to tempt him. too far. 
 Get me?" 
 
 "It's atrocious!" 
 
 "Oh, not nearly so bad as it might be. Just 
 think, if it had been Gabrielle, or Pauline-Ma- 
 rie, or even Mrs. Lawton. That's the worst 
 
196 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 kind of bad blood for a woman to inherit. Ma- 
 rie Garnett hung on like grim death, to what the 
 grand society yon move in pretends to value 
 most, and the Lord knows she'll never lose it 
 now. 
 
 "Nor need there be any scandal to drive your 
 family to suicide. The thing to do is to hustle 
 Madame Delano out pf San Francisco. She'll 
 go, all right, with you to look after her inter- 
 ests. She don't fancy being recognized and 
 blackmailed, or I miss my guess. You may have 
 to pay Bisbee something, but D. V.'s not that 
 sort, and I don't think anybody else is on. If 
 they've suspected they'll soon forget it when 
 the old lady disappears from the Palace Hotel. 
 Gee, but she has a nerve." 
 
 "She is an old cynic. If she had any snob- 
 bery in her she'd be here to-night, rubbing el- 
 bows with the women who never knew of her 
 existence twenty years ago, although th«ir hus- 
 bands did. It has satisfied her ironic French 
 soul to sit in the court of the Palace Hotel day 
 after day and defy San Francisco to recognize 
 Marie Garnett in the obese Madame Delano, 
 whose daughter is one of the great ladies of 
 
THE AVALANCHE 197 
 
 the city to whose underworld she once belonged, 
 and from whose filthy profits she derives her 
 income. Good God!" 
 
 He sat forward and clutched his head, but 
 Spaulding, who had drawn out his watch, tapped 
 him on the shoulder. 
 
 "Come on," he said. "Time's gettin' short. 
 The stunt is to be pulled off just before sup- 
 per." 
 
CHAPTER Xn 
 
 THEY walked rapidly up the close avenue 
 — planted far back in the Fifties by Ford 
 Thornton's grandfather — ^the blaze of light at 
 the end of the long perspective growing wider 
 and wider. As they emerged they paused for a 
 moment, dazzled by the scene. 
 
 The original home of the Thorntons had been 
 of ordinary American architecture and covered 
 with ivy ; it might have been transplanted from 
 some old aristocratic village in the East. Flora 
 Thornton had maintained that only one style 
 of architecture was appropriate in a state set- 
 tled by the Spaniards, and famous for its mis- 
 sions of Moorish architecture. Fordy loved the 
 old house, but as he denied his wife nothing he 
 had given her a million, three years before the 
 fire which so sadly diminished fortunes, and 
 told her to build any sort of house she pleased ; 
 
 198 
 
THE AVALANCHE 199 
 
 if she would only promise to live in it and not 
 desert him twice a year for Europe. 
 
 The immense structure, standing on a knoll, 
 bore a certain resemblance to the Alhambra, 
 with its heavy square towers; its arched gate- 
 ways leading into courtyards with fountains or 
 sunken pools, the red brown of the stucco which 
 looked like stone and was not. To-night it was 
 blazing with lights of every color. 
 
 So were the ancient oaks, which were old 
 when the Alhambra was built, the shrubberies, 
 the vast rose garden. The surface of the pool 
 in the sunken garden reflected the green or red 
 masses of light that shot up every few moments 
 from the four corners of the terrace surround- 
 ing it. On the lawn just above and to the right 
 of the house, a platform had been built for danc- 
 ing; it was enclosed on three sides with an ar- 
 bor of many alcoves, lined with flowers, soft 
 lights concealed in depending clusters of 
 granges. 
 
 And everywhere there were people dressed 
 in costumes gorgeous, picturesque, impres- 
 sive, historic, or recklessly invented, but 
 suggesting every era when dress counted at ai/. 
 
200 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 They danced on the great platform to the 
 strains of the invisible band, strolled along the 
 terraces above the sunken garden, wandered 
 through the groves and "grounds," or sat in 
 the windows of the great house or in its courts. 
 All wore the little black velvet mask prescribed 
 by Mrs. Thornton, and created an illusion that 
 transported the imagination far from Cali- 
 fornia. Euyler had a whimsical sense of being 
 on another star where the favored of the differ- 
 ent periods of Earth had foregathered for the 
 night. 
 
 But there was nothing ghostly in the shrill 
 chatter as incessant as the twitter of the agi- 
 tated birds, who found their night snatched 
 from them and hardly knew whether to scold or 
 joia in the chorus. 
 
 Euyler had always protested against the 
 high-pitched din made by even six American 
 women when gathered together, and to the in- 
 fernal racket at any large entertainment; but 
 to-night he sighed, forgetting his apprehensions 
 for the moment. 
 
 He had exquisite memories of these lovely 
 grounds ; he atid Helene had spent several days 
 
THE AVALANCHE 201 
 
 with Mrs. Thornton during their engagement, 
 and she had lent them the house for their honey- 
 moon; he would have liked to wander through 
 the pleasant spaces with his wife to-night and 
 make love to her, instead of spying on her in 
 the company of a detective. 
 
 For that, he was forced to conclude, was what 
 he had been brought for. Spauldiag had men- 
 tioned her name casually, when telling him that 
 he must be on hand to nab the "party" who 
 was at the bottom of the whole trouble; but 
 Spaulding hardly could have watched the per- 
 son who was blackmailing without including her 
 in his surveillance. He wished now that he had 
 left that part of the mystery to take care of 
 itself, trusting to his mother-ia-law's departure 
 to relieve the situation. No doubt she would 
 have told him the tenth herself rather than 
 leave her daughter to the mercy of the men 
 who knew her secret. 
 
 But he was stUl far from suspeeting the 
 worst of the truth. 
 
 There were a nimiber of men in fancy domi- 
 noes; he and Spaulding crossed the lawn in 
 front of the house imchaUenged and, passing 
 
202 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 under the fro-wning archway, entered the first 
 of the courts. 
 
 The oblong sunken pool was banked with 
 myrtle, and above, as well as in the great inner 
 court with the fountain, there were narrow ar- 
 caded windows with fluttering silken curtains. 
 Mrs. Thornton had too satiric a sense of humor 
 to have had the famous arabesques of the Al- 
 hambra reproduced any more than the massive 
 coats-of-arms above the arches, but the walls 
 were delicately colored, the slender columns 
 looked like old ivory, and the greatest of the 
 local architects had been entirely successful ia 
 combining the massiveness of the warrior 
 stronghold with the airy lightness and spacious- 
 ness of the pleasure house. 
 
 The bedrooms, Euyler told Spaulding, were 
 all as modem as they were luxurious, and the 
 library, living-rooms, and dining-room, were in 
 the best American style. Fordy had rebelled 
 at too much "Spanish atmosphere," his blood 
 being straight Anglo-Saxon, and Mrs. Thorn- 
 ton always knew when to yield. Nevertheless, 
 Flora Thornton had built the proper setting for 
 her barbaric beauty, and, possibly, spirit. 
 
THE AVALANCHE 203 
 
 People were sitting about the courts on piles 
 of colored silken cushions, those that had got 
 themselves up in Eastern costumes having 
 drifted naturally to the suitable surroundings } 
 for, after all, the Moors had been Mohamme- 
 dans. 
 
 "Don't let's hang round here," said the de- 
 tective, "and don't stand holding yourself like 
 a ramrod — like that gent out there with the 
 ruff that must be taking the skia off his chin. 
 I kinder thought I'd like to see the whole show, 
 but we'd best go now and wait for our little 
 turn." 
 
 He led the way round the building to the rear 
 of the southwest tower. There was a little 
 grove of jasmine trees just beneath it, that 
 made the air overpoweringly sweet, but there 
 were no lights on this side, as the garages, 
 stables, vegetable gardens, and servants' quar- 
 ters would have destroyed the picture. 
 
 Spaulding glanced about sharply, but there 
 was not even a strolling couple, and even the 
 moon was shining on the other side of the heavy 
 mass of buildings. 
 
 "Now, listen," he said. "You see this win- 
 
204 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 dow?" — ^he indicated one directly over their 
 heads. "At exactly one o'clock, when every- 
 body is flocking to the supper tables on the ter- 
 races, I expect some one to lean out of that win- 
 dow and talk to some one who will be waiting 
 just below. There may be no talk, but I think 
 there will be, and I want you to listen to every 
 word of it without so much as drawing a long 
 breath, no matter what is said, until I grab your 
 elbow — ^like this — then I want you to put up 
 your hand in a hurry while I'm also attendin' 
 to business. 
 
 "That's aU I'll say now. But by the time a 
 few words have been said, later, I guess you'll 
 be on. 
 
 "Now, we must resign ourselves to a long 
 wait without a smoke and to keeping perfectly 
 still. I dared not risk comin' any later for fear 
 the others might be beforehand, too." 
 
 Euyler ground his teeth. He felt ridiculous 
 and humiliated. It was no compensation that 
 he was holding up the wall of a stucco Moorish 
 palace and that some three hundred masked 
 people in fancy dress were within earshot . . . 
 or did the way he was togged out make him feel 
 
THE AVALANCHE 205 
 
 all the more absurd? The whole thing was 
 beastly un-American. . . . 
 
 But, was it, after all? If he and Helene had 
 been here together to-night, not married and 
 harrowed, but engaged and quick with romance, 
 would he have thought it absurd to conspire and 
 maneuver to separate her from the crowd and 
 snatch a few moments of heavenly solitude? 
 Would he have despised himself for suffering 
 torments if she flouted him or for wanting to 
 murder any man who balked him? 
 
 Love, and all the passions, creative and de- 
 structive, it engendered, all the sentiments and 
 follies and crimes, to say nothing of ambition 
 and greed and the lust to kiU in war — these 
 were instincts and traits that appeared ia man- 
 kind generation after generation, in every cor- 
 ner civilized and savage of the globe. The 
 world changed somewhat in form during its 
 progress, but never in substance. 
 
 And mystery and intrigue were equally a part 
 of life, as indigenous to the Twentieth Century 
 as to those days long entombed in history when 
 the troops of Ferdinand and Isabella sat down 
 on the plain before Grenada. 
 
2o6 IHE AVALAMCHJj; 
 
 Plot and melodrama were in every life; in 
 some so briefly as hardly to be recognized, in 
 others — ^in that of certain men and women 
 in the public eye, for instance — they were al- 
 most in the nature of a continuous perform- 
 ance. 
 
 In these days men took a bath morning and • 
 evening, ate daintily, had a refined vocabulary 
 to use on demand, dressed in tweeds instead of 
 velvet. There were longer intervals between 
 the old style of warfare when men were always 
 plugging one another full of holes in the name 
 of reUgion or disputed territory, merely to 
 amuse themselves with a tryout of Right against 
 Might, or to gratify the insane ambition of 
 some upstart like Napoleon. To-day the busi- 
 ness world was the battlefield, and it was his 
 capital a man was always healing, his poor 
 brain that collapsed nightly after the strain and 
 nervous worry of the day. 
 
 It suddenly felt quite normal to be here flat- 
 tened against a waU waiting for some impos- 
 sible denouement. 
 
 Nevertheless, he was sick with apprehension. 
 
 Would it merely be the prelude to another 
 
THE AVALANCHE 207 
 
 drama? "Was his life to be a series of unwrit- 
 ten plays, of which he was both the hero and 
 the bewildered spectator? Or would it bring 
 him calm, the terrible calm of stagnation, of an 
 inner life finished, sealed, buried? 
 
 It was inevitable in these romantic surround- 
 ings and conditions that he should revert to his 
 almost forgotten jealousy. Suppose Spaulding 
 had stumbled upon something. . . . But he had 
 been asked for no such evidence. ... It would 
 be a damnable liberty. ... It might be inex- 
 tricably woven with the business in hand- . . . 
 There were other men besides Doremus whom 
 Helene saw constantly. . . . Spauldiag may 
 have seen his chance to nip the thing in the bud, 
 and had taken the risk. . . . 
 
 He felt the detective's lips at his ear: "Hear 
 anythiag? Move a little so's you can look up." 
 
 Euyler heard his wife's voice above him, then 
 Aileen Lawton's. He parted the branches and 
 saw the two girls lean over the low sUl of the 
 casement. Both had removed their masks, but 
 their faces were only dimly revealed. Their 
 voices, however, were distinct enough, and his 
 wife's was dull and flat. 
 
2o8 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 "Oh, I can't," she said. "I can't. 
 
 "Well, you'll just jolly well have to. You've 
 got it, haven't you?" 
 
 "Oh, yes, I've got it!" 
 
 "Well, he'll never suspect you." 
 
 "IshaUteUhim." 
 
 "Tell him? You little fooL And give us all 
 away?" 
 
 "I'd mention no other names." 
 
 "As if he wouldn't probe until he found out. 
 Don't you know Price Euyler yet? My father 
 said once he'd have made a great District At- 
 torney. What's the use of telUng him later, for 
 that matter ? Why not now ? ' ' 
 
 ' ' I haven 't the courage yet. I might have one 
 day — at just the right moment. I never thought 
 I was a coward." 
 
 "You're just a kid. That's what's the mat- 
 ter. We ought to have left you out. I told 
 Polly that " 
 
 "You couldn't! Oh, don't you see you 
 couldn't. That's the terrible part of it! Left 
 me out? I'd have found my way in." 
 
 "I'm not so sure. You were interested in 
 heaps of things, and in love, and all that " 
 
THE AVALANCHE 209 
 
 "Oh, I'd like to excuse myself by blaming it 
 on being bored, and tired of trying to amuse my- 
 self doing nothing worth while, but it's bad 
 blood, that's what it is, bad blood, and you 
 know it, if none of the others do." 
 
 "Oh, I'm not one of your heredity fiends. 
 When did your mother tell you?" 
 
 "Only the other day." 
 
 "Well, she ought to have told you long ago. 
 I believe you'd have kept out if you'd known." 
 
 ' * Wouldn't I ? But of course she hated to tell 
 the truth to me " 
 
 "Well, if I'd known that you didn't know I'd 
 have told you, all right. I wormed it out of Dad 
 soon after you arrived, and at first I thought 
 it was a good joke on Society, to say nothing of 
 Price Ruyler, with his air of God having cre- 
 ated heaven first, maybe, but New York just 
 after. Then I got fond of you and I wouldn't 
 have told for the world. But I would have put 
 you on your guard if I'd known." 
 
 ' * Oh, it doesn 't matter. Even if Price doesn 't 
 find out about this, if he learns the other — ^who 
 my father was, and that awful men have recog- 
 
210 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 nized my mother — ^I suppose he'll hate me, and 
 
 in time I'll go back to Rouen " 
 
 "Now, you don't think as ill as that of him, 
 do you? He makes me so mad sometimes I 
 could spit in his face, but if he's one thing he's 
 true blue. He's the straight masculine type 
 with a streak of old romance that would make 
 him love a woman the more, the sorrier he was 
 for her, and the weaker she was — ^I mean so 
 long as she was young. After this, just get to 
 work on your character, kid. "When you're 
 thirty maybe he won't feel that it's his whole 
 duty to protect you. You'll never be hard and 
 seasoned like me, nor able to take care of your- 
 self. I like danger, and excitement, and uncer- 
 tainty, and mystery, and intrigue, and lying, 
 and wriggling out of tight places. I'd have 
 gone mad in this hole long ago, if I hadn't, for 
 I don't care for sport. But you were intended 
 to develop into what is called a 'fine woman,' 
 surrounded by the right sort of man meanwhile. 
 And Price Euyler is the right sort. I'll say 
 that much for him. He'd have driven me to 
 drink, but he's just your sort " 
 
THE AVALANCHE 2U 
 
 "And what am I doing? I am the most de- 
 graded woman in "the world." 
 
 "Oh, no, you're not. Not by a long sight. 
 You don't know how much worse you could be. 
 One woman who is here to-night I saw lying 
 dead drunk in the road between San Mateo and 
 Burlingame the other day when I was driving 
 with Alice Thorndyke, and Alice is having her 
 fourth or fifth lover, I forget which " 
 
 "They are no worse than I." 
 
 "Listen. He's coming. Got it ready?" 
 
 "I can't." 
 
 "You must. He'll hound you in the Merry 
 Tattler until the whole town knows you're a 
 welcher, and not a soul would speak to you. 
 That is the one unpardonable sin " 
 
 "I wish I'd told Price " 
 
 "Oh, no, you don't. This is just a lovely way 
 out. Glad he had the inspiration. Hello, 
 Nick." 
 
 A man had groped his way between the trees 
 and ^tood just under the window. 
 
 "What are you doing here?" asked Doremus 
 sourly. 
 
 "Witness, witness, my dear Nick, Besides, 
 
212 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 poor Helene never would have come alone, so 
 there yon are." 
 
 "To hell with all this melodramatic business. 
 It could have been done anywhere " 
 
 "Not much. Dark comers for dark doings." 
 
 "Well, hand it over." 
 
 Ruyler had given his brain an icy shower 
 bath as soon as he heard his wife's voice, and 
 was now as cool and alert as even the detective 
 could have wished. He did not wait for the 
 promised impulse to his elbow; his hand shot 
 up just ahead of Doremus's and closed over his 
 wife's hand, which, he felt at once, held the ruby. 
 At the same moment Spaulding caught Doremus 
 by his medieval collar and shook him until the 
 man's teeth chattered, then he slapped his face 
 and kicked him. 
 
 "Now, you," he said standing over the pant- 
 ing man, who was mopping his bleeding nose, 
 and holding the electric torch so that it would 
 shine on his own face. "You get out of Cali- 
 fornia, d'you hear? You're a gambler and a 
 blackmailer and a panderer to old women, and 
 I've got some evidence that would drag you into 
 court however it turned out, so's you'd find this 
 
THE AVALANCHE 213 
 
 town a live gridiron. So, git, while you can. 
 Go wiiile the going's good." 
 
 Doremus, too shaken to reply, slunk off, and 
 Spauldiug after a glance upward, left as si- 
 lently. 
 
CHAPTER Xm 
 
 AILEEN had shrieked and fled. Ruyler 
 stood in the room with the ruby in his 
 open hand. He saw that Helene was standing 
 quite erect before him. She had made no at- 
 tempt to leave the room, nor did she appear to 
 be threatened with hysterics. 
 
 He groped nntil he fonnd the electric but- 
 ton. The room, as Euyler had inferred, was 
 Mrs. Thornton's winter boudoir, a gorgeous 
 room of yellow brocade and oriental stuffs. 
 
 "WUl you sit down?" he asked. 
 
 Helene shook her head. She was very white 
 and she looked as old as a young actress who 
 has been doing one night stands for three 
 months. Behind the drawn mask of her face 
 there was her Ludestructible youth, but so faint 
 that it thought itself dead. 
 
 She looked at her hands, which she twisted 
 together as if they were cold. 
 
 214 
 
THE AVALANCHE 215 
 
 "Will you teU me the truth now?" asked 
 Price. 
 
 "Don't you guess it?" 
 
 "When I came here to-night I believed that 
 you were the victim of blackmail. I was not 
 watching you — ^I hope you will take my word 
 for that. We — ^I had a detective on the case — 
 Spaulding merely wanted to nab the man who 
 was blackmailing you " 
 
 "Do you still believe that?" 
 
 "I overheard your conversation with Aileen 
 Lawton. I don't know what to believe." 
 
 "I am a gambler. My father was a gambler. 
 He kept a notorious place in San Francisco. 
 His name out here was James Gamett. My 
 grandfather was a gambler. He was even more 
 spectacular ' ' 
 
 "I know all that Don't mind." 
 
 "You knew it?" For the first time she 
 looked at him, but she turned her eyes away at 
 once and stared at the oblong of dark framed 
 by the window. "Why " 
 
 "Spaidding told me to-night only." 
 
 "Mother told me a week or so ago. She'd 
 been recognized. Shortly after I married, when 
 
2i6 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 she found out how the women played bridge and 
 poker here, she made me promise I'd never 
 touch a card, never play any sort of gambling 
 game. I promised readily enough, and I 
 thought nothing of her insistence. Maman was 
 old-fashioned in many ways — I mean the life we 
 lived in Eouen was so different from this that I 
 could understand how many things would 
 shock her. I never thought about it — ^but — it 
 was about six months ago — ^you were away for 
 a week and I stayed with Polly Eoberts at the 
 Fairmont. I knew of course that she played 
 and that Aileen and a lot of the others did, but 
 I hadn't given the matter a thought. One heard 
 nothing but bridge, bridge, bridge. I was sick 
 of the word. 
 
 "But I found they played poker. Polly and 
 Aileen, Alice Thomdyke, Janet Maynard, Mary 
 Kimball, Nick Doremus, Eex and one or two 
 other men who could get off in the afternoons. 
 
 "I never had dreamed any one in society 
 played for such high stakes. Janet Maynard 
 and Mary Kimball could afford it, but Polly 
 and Alice and Aileen couldn't. Still they often 
 won — enough, anyhow, to clean up and go on. 
 
THE AVALANCHE 217 
 
 D'oremus is a wonderful player. That is how 
 I got interested, watching him after he had ex- 
 plained the game to me. 
 
 "It was a long time before I was persuaded 
 to take a hand. It was so interesting just to 
 watch. And not only the game, but their faces. 
 Some would have a regular 'poker face,' others 
 would give themselves away. Once Aileen had 
 the most awful hysterics. We were afraid some 
 one outside would hear her; the deadening was 
 burnt out of the walls of the Fairmont at the 
 time of the fire. But we were in the middle 
 room of the suite. 
 
 "Nick told her in his dreadful cold expres- 
 sionless voice that if she ever did that again 
 he'd never play another game with her. That 
 meant that they'd all drop her, and she came 
 to and promised, and she kept her word. Poker 
 is the breath of life to her. I think she'd be- 
 come a drug fiend if she couldn't have it. 
 
 "At last they persuaded me to play. "We 
 were playing at Nick's, and after a light dinner 
 served by his Jap, we went right on playing 
 until midnight. I never thought of you or any- 
 thing. I seemed to respond with every nerve 
 
2i8 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 in my body and brain. I won and won and won, 
 and even when I lost I didn't mind. The sen- 
 sation, the tearing excitement just under a per- 
 fectly cool brain was wonderful. 
 
 "I only ceased to enjoy it when I realized 
 what it meant. When I couldn't keep away 
 from it. When I lived for the hour when we 
 would meet, — at Polly's, or at Nick's or at 
 Aileen's — any of the places where we were sup- 
 posed to be dancing, but where there was no 
 danger of being found out. Of course I dared 
 not have them at home, and the others lived with 
 their families, or had too many servants. . . . 
 
 "i came fully to my senses one day when Nick 
 told me 1 was a bom gambler if ever there was 
 one. Then, when t realised, I became desper- 
 ately unhappy. 
 
 "I was the slave of a thing. I was deceiving 
 you. When I was at the table I loved poker 
 better than you, better than anything on earth. 
 When I was alone I hated it. But I couldn't 
 break away. Besides, I didn't always win. I 
 had to play in the hope of winning back. Or 
 if I won a lot it was a point of honor to go on 
 and play again and give them their chance. 
 
THE AVALANCHE 219 
 
 "Mrs. Thornton found out. She gave me a 
 terrible talking to. I am afraid I was very in- 
 solent. 
 
 "But she came up that night of the Assembly 
 and warned me tkat you were down stairs. I 
 was playing in Polly's room. We had all 
 danced two or three times and then slipped up 
 to the next floor by different stairs and lifts. 
 I liked her better then. Of course she did it for 
 your sake, not mine. But she's a good sort, not 
 a cat. 
 
 "You have not noticed, but I have not bought 
 a new gown this season except that little gray 
 one and this — ^which was made in the house. I 
 dared not pawn my jewels, for fear you would 
 miss them. 
 
 "I have been iu hell. 
 
 "Then^it was that evening you heard 
 maman reproach me for breaking my promise — 
 I had lost a dreadful lot of money and Nick 
 had scurried round and borrowed it for me. I 
 didn't know then that he meant all the time 
 to get hold of the ruby — ^I am sure now that he 
 cheated and made me lose. 
 
 "Well, I sent the maid away that night and 
 
220 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 told maman. She was nearly off her head. I 
 never saw her excited before. Then she tol^ 
 me the truth. I felt as if I had been turned to 
 stone. But I felt suddenly cool and wary. I 
 knew I must keep my head. It was as if my 
 father had suddenly come alive in my brain. I 
 had never lied to you before, merely put you 
 off. But how I lied that night! I felt possessed. 
 But I knew I must not be found out, and I made, 
 up my mind to stop playing as soon as I came 
 out even. If I had known that my father and 
 my grandfather had been gamblers I never 
 should have touched a card. I'd far rather 
 have drunk poison. 
 
 "I made up my mind then and there to stop 
 and I felt quite capable of it. But I had to go 
 on and square myself, for I owed that money 
 to Nick. But when I played it was with my 
 head only. All the fever had gone out of my 
 veins. I loathed it. I loathed still more de- 
 ceiving you. 
 
 "I won and won and won. I thought I was 
 delivered. I was almost happy again. Some" 
 day I meant to tell you — ^when it was all over. 
 
 ' ' Then I began to lose horribly. Thousands. 
 
THE AVALANCHE 221 
 
 It ran up to twenty thousand. I did not betray 
 myself, and the girls thought I had money of my 
 own and could pay my losses quite easily. They 
 didn't know that Nick always helped me out. 
 He was never the least bit in love with me — ^he 
 couldn't love any woman — ^but he said I played 
 such a wonderful game and was such a sport, 
 never lost my head, that he wouldn't lose me for 
 the world — ^when I threatened to stop and never 
 play again. 
 
 "But all the time he wanted the ruby. I 
 found that out when he told me he must have 
 the money inside of a week; he'd taken it out of 
 his business, and it really belonged to his part- 
 ners, and they'd find him out and send him to 
 prison 
 
 "1 offered him my jewels. They would have 
 brought half their value at least. I could have 
 told you they were stolen — only one more lie. 
 It was then he said he must have the ruby. He 
 had known about it ever since you came out 
 here, but after he saw it on me that night at 
 the Gwynnes' he was more than ever deter- 
 mined to have it. 
 
 "I laughed at him at first. It seemed pre- 
 
222 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 posterous that he could demand a ruby worth, 
 two or three hundred thousand dollars in pay- 
 ment for a debt of twenty thousand. I thought 
 of selling my jewels and furs and laces, or 
 pawning them and reiising the amount — ^he only 
 had my I. 0. U. for that sum. But I didn't know 
 where to go. So I told Aileen. She wouldn't 
 hear of my disposing of my things, said it would 
 be all over town in twenty-four hours. She 
 advised me to get the twenty thousand out of 
 you on one pretext or another. 
 
 "I tried. You wiU remember. Then Nick 
 began to haunt me. He whispered in my ear 
 wherever we met. I was nearly frantic. He 
 said he could hold me up to shame without com- 
 promising himself. I had written him some 
 frantic letters, and he said they read just like — 
 like — ^the other thing. 
 
 "I felt perfectly helpless. I knew that even 
 if I did manage to pawn the jewels, you would 
 miss them from the safe and trace them. I 
 ceased to feel cool. I nearly went off my head. 
 But I stopped gambling. I felt sure by this 
 time that he could make me lose, but I couldn't 
 prove it. Aileen told me I must give him the 
 
THE AVALANCHE 223 
 
 ruby. He promised me before Aileen that he 
 would give me back my I. 0. XJ.'s as well as my 
 notes if I would hand over the ruby. He knew 
 I was to wear it to-night. 
 
 "Finally I gave in. Yesterday Nick called 
 me up on the telephone and told me to come 
 down to the California Market to lunch, and to 
 bring Aileen. He told me there that unless I 
 promised to give him the ruby to-night, and 
 kept my word, he 'd either give my I. 0. U. 's and 
 my notes to you or to the Merry Tattler. He 
 didn't care which. I could have my choice. 
 
 "I said I would do it. But it was terribly 
 conspicuous. Everybody would notice when it 
 was gone. He said I must conceal it anyhow 
 until we unmasked after supper, and then I 
 could pretend I had lost it. He discussed sev- 
 eral plans for having me slip it to him, but it 
 was Aileen who insisted we should come here. 
 Mrs. Thornton never opens her boudoir at a 
 party. Everywhere else would be a blaze of 
 light. In this dark comer we should be safe, 
 especially if lie came from the outside and I 
 from inside. How did your detective find out! ' ' 
 
224 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 "I think Aileen did a decent thing for once 
 in her life." 
 
 She went on in her monotonous voice. "I 
 felt reckless after that and I really was gay and 
 ahnost happy at dinner last night. The die was 
 cast. I didn't much care for anything. I 
 thought perhaps it was my last night with you 
 — ^that when I told you I had lost the ruby you 
 would suspect and turn me out of your house, 
 tell maman to take me back to Rouen. 
 
 "Then came that awful moment when you 
 said you had to go away and I could not wear 
 it. For a few moments I thought I should 
 scream and tell you everything. But I was both 
 too proud and too much of a coward. Then I 
 knew I should have to rob the safe, and some- 
 how I hated that part more than anything else. 
 I did it just ten minutes before Eex and Polly 
 called for me to motor down here. It had 
 seemed the most horrible thing in the world to 
 be a gambler, but it was worse to be a thief. 
 
 "I remembered the combination perfectly. I 
 have that sort of memory: it registers photo- 
 graphicEilIy- I had seen you move the com- 
 bination several times. Perhaps I deliberately 
 
THE AVALANCHE 225 
 
 registered it. I can't say. I have lived in such 
 a maze of intrigue lately. I can't say. That is 
 all — except that I didn't get the letters and the 
 other things." 
 
 ' ' He had an envelope in one hand. Spaulding 
 has it beyond a doubt. ' ' 
 
CHAPTER XIV: 
 
 THERE -was silence for a moment and then 
 Price said awkwardly: "It is a pity you 
 haven't the chain or you could wear the ruby 
 for the rest of the evening." 
 
 She turned her eyes from the window and 
 stared at him. "I have the chain — " She 
 raised her hand to the tip of her bodice — ^"but 
 — ^but — ^you can't mean — ^it isn't possible that 
 you can forgive me." 
 
 "I think I have taken very bad care of you. 
 What are you, after aU, but a brilliEint child 1 
 I am thirty-three " 
 
 He suddenly tore off his domino with a feel- 
 ing of rage, and thrust his hands into his 
 friendly pockets. He had never made many 
 verbal protestations to her, although the most 
 exacting wife could have found no fault with 
 his love-making. But to-night he felt dumb; 
 he was mortally afraid of appearing high and 
 noble and magnanimous. 
 
 226 
 
THE AVALANCHE 227 
 
 "You see, things always happen during the 
 first years of married life. Perhaps more hap- 
 pens — I mean in a pettier way — ^when the man 
 has leisure and can see too much of his wife. 
 In my case — our case — ^it was the other way — 
 and something almost tragic happened. So I 
 vote we treat it casually, as something that 
 must have heen expected sooner or later to dis- 
 turb our — our — even tenor — and forget it." 
 
 "Forget it?" 
 
 * ' Well, yes. I can if you can. ' ' 
 
 "And can you forget who I am?" 
 
 "You are exactly what you were before those 
 scoundrels recognized your mother, and — ^and 
 — set me going. Of course I had to find out the 
 truth. I thought you knew and tried to make 
 you tell me. But you wouldn't — couldn't — ^and 
 I had to employ Spaulding." 
 
 "Do you mean you would have married me if 
 you had known the truth at the time!" 
 
 "Bather." 
 
 "And — ^but — ^I told you — ^I became a regnlar 
 gambler." 
 
 He could not help smiling. "I have no fear 
 of your gambling again. And I don't fancy 
 
228 THE AVALANCHE 
 
 you were a bit wors6 than, the others who had 
 no gambling blood in them — all the world has 
 that. Gambling is about the earliest of the 
 vices. I — ^if — ^you wouldn't mind promising — ^I 
 know you will keep it." 
 
 "Nothing under heaven would induce me to 
 play again. But — ^but — ^I opened your safe like 
 a thief and stole " 
 
 "Oh, not quite. After all it was yours as 
 much as mine. If I had died without a will you 
 would have got it. 
 
 "Of course — ^I know what you mean — ^but 
 men have always driven women into a comer, 
 and they have had to get out by methods of 
 their own. I wish now I had given you the 
 twenty thousand. I prefer you should accept 
 my decision that it was all my fault. Give me 
 the chain." 
 
 She drew it from her bosom and handed it 
 to him. He fastened the ruby in its place and 
 threw the chain over her neck. The great jewel 
 lit up the front of her somber gown like a sud- 
 den torch in a cavern. 
 
 The stem despair of H^lene's tragic mask re- 
 
THE AVALANCHE 229 
 
 laxed. She dropped her face into her hands and 
 began to sob. Then Euyler was himself again. 
 He picked her up in his arms and settled com- 
 fortably into the deepest of the chairs. 
 
 ISE END