Daredevil

Probably Susan Hawthorne got a lot of her courage and independence from her father, old Smiler Hawthorne, who in his time had been nearly everything and nearly everywhere--a tall, grizzled man who was generally broke but always unbeatable. Anyway, wherever she got it from, she needed it all; for old Hawthorne crossed the Divide one night with the same reckless optimism as he had gone through life. He left her his name and thirty pounds, the rest of his fortune having disappeared only a week before, together with the promoter of a company whose sole asset was a diamond field wherein no diamonds were.

And Susan Hawthorne faced a blank future with a smile that was reminiscent of old Smiler's cheeriest effort, which you only saw when things were very black and the proposition to be tackled was exceeding tough. He was that sort of man, and she was his daughter.

She felt very much alone in the world. She had lost touch with her own friends in the accompanying of her father in his happy-go-lucky aimless globe-trotting; and most of the friends he had picked up himself--and they were legion--were scattered in odd corners of the earth. In any case, she was not one to look for charity. Wherefore she went to Lord Hannassay, because he seemed to be the only friend of her father's who was in England.

She went with some trepidation, and was not unpleasantly surprised, and more than a little nervous, when she found that he was not so inaccessible as his name and position seemed to indicate.

"I remember you--sixteen, weren't you?--queer kid--all eyes and legs. And your father?"

He had a curiously disjointed manner of speaking, conveying the impression that his thoughts moved faster than his mouth could frame them.

"My father died a month ago," she said.

His grim face softened for a moment.

"I'm sorry," he said quietly. "Your father was one of the few men I have ever really liked."

After a while she broached the subject of her visit. It was not a task she relished, for she was desperately afraid he would misunderstand.

His face remained inscrutable, but the blue eyes searched her face.

The fingers of his right hand drummed on the table. She learnt afterwards that this was a trick of his when he was embarrassed.

"What can you do?" he asked. "Shorthand--book-keeping--type-writing--anything?"

"Nothing, I'm afraid." She had realised all along the hopeless inadequacy of her qualifications, and felt unnecessarily small and foolish. "But I could learn."

"There are hundreds of girls who have learnt--still looking for jobs," he said. His finger-tips played an intricate tattoo. "Listen--you're afraid I'll offer you money. Feel insulted if I do--probably walk out in a rage. Still, I wish you'd let me. I've got heaps. I like money--I'd like more--and I don't often give it away. But you're different. I'd have done it for your father, any day--why not for you?"

Strangely enough, she was not annoyed. His nervousness was so amusing. He was obviously as scared of making a faux pas as she was of his making one, and he didn't know how to do it without seeming to.

"I'm sorry," she said. "I'm looking for work, not outdoor relief."

"I know all about that," he said peevishly. "You wouldn't have minded taking it from your father."

"That's different," she said, and he was not foolish enough to attempt to argue the point further.

He turned over some papers, picked up a pencil, and played with it. There was an unusual quality about these little mannerisms of his: they were never jerky and inconsequent, like the fidgeting of a different kind of man. He seemed to employ material objects to assist his thoughts.

"I want a typist," he said at length. "You can get reasonably proficient in a fortnight if you work hard. No need for much speed, anyhow--no dictation. Copying letters, etcetera. You can have the job if you'll be my guest here while you're learning. That's not charity--you'd accept an invitation like that even if you weren't broke. Use the house how you like--I'm going to Geneva. League of Nations conferences--all rot. However ... housekeeper's always here. Your reputation's all right. But while I'm away--no wild parties, mind!"

He issued the order with such a comical seriousness that she all but laughed aloud.

"I'll try to reform," she promised gravely.

The time passed quickly for her. The work was easy and interesting, the hours short. Once or twice it occurred to her that her job was simply a disguise for the charity she dreaded, but her hint of this suspicion was received with such pained surprise that, not unwillingly, she banished the idea. Hannassay came and went, always courteous and correct. She grew to like him, for he thought she detected the sentimentalist masquerading in self-defence as the tyrant.

After a month she began to consider herself an authority on affairs of State, for Lord Hannassay held a high post in the Home Office. It took her nearly three months more to realise that she knew practically nothing.

She was returning from the Home Office one afternoon after delivering some papers when she discovered that she was not as friendless as she had thought, and the discovery was a cheerful surprise. She was walking back along Piccadilly when she nearly collided with a tall young man in a grey flannel suit.

He raised his hat absently, apologised, and was about to pass on when suddenly they stopped dead and stared at one another.

"Je-rusalem!" exclaimed the young man.

He linked his arm in hers in the most natural way in the world, and steered her out of the press towards the portals of the Leroy.

"It's just four," he remarked, "and therefore tea-time. I've not seen you for years, Susan--millions of years!"

They found a table and sat down on either side of it, inspecting one another. Then they both smiled.

"Christopher Arden," she said, "you'll do!"

"And you, by Jeremy! Susan, what do you mean by it? I've written you regularly for the last three years, and you haven't answered a line."

"I might have," she answered demurely, "if you'd put your address on your letters."

His jaw dropped.

"Didn't I?" he demanded.

"Oh, yes!" She smiled. "You put 'Morocco' and 'South Pacific' and 'Nassau' and that sort of thing. Only I didn't think you were notorious enough for that alone to find you."

He grinned.

"Sorry!" he apologised. "Tell me all about this and that."

She told him, and his brown hand went across the table and touched her fingers lightly.