Ostrander, it seemed, had made a hobby of Swiss cowbells, and said he had two large cartons filled with a collection which he hoped would be the basis for a series of informal talks that he intended to make before various clubs on his return to the United States.
So plausible, so convincing and so charming was Ostrander’s conversation, that Rob Trenton began to fight against becoming an inanimate chattel, a hundred and thirty-six pounds of weight to be distributed in the right rear of the car, balancing the boxes of cowbells which Ostrander had so painstakingly collected.
It was irritating to Rob to feel that he was forcing himself, trying desperately to invest himself with a cloak of conversational charm which was ill-fitting, but he was damned if he was going to sit there and let himself, as well as Linda, be carried away by Ostrander’s magnetism. So he talked and the others listened — Ostrander politely, Linda with a little smile twitching at the corners of her mouth.
Rob felt there was little of merit in what he had to say, but at least he had the satisfaction of knowing that, while he was talking, sheer politeness forced Merton Ostrander to be silent.
Yet well before they had reached the border it was taken for granted by all concerned that Merton Ostrander was to go with them — at least as far as Paris.
Chapter 3
At the hotel in Paris, Rob Trenton found himself sharing a double room with Merton Ostrander, and then, for the first time, realized the enormous amount of personal baggage which Ostrander had managed to pack into the little car.
Not only were there the two cartons of cowbells, as well as a steamer trunk loaded with personal belongings, but there was a heavy chest which Rob had at first thought contained painting materials. However, when Ostrander opened this box, it proved to be a complete set of tools, including an electric drill, files, wrenches and various other mechanical paraphernalia.
All the morning Merton had been puttering around with his baggage, and then in the afternoon a telephone call summoned him to the floor below on a mission about which he did not see fit to consult Trenton.
Ostrander did not immediately return and when Rob entered the bathroom he noticed there were smudges of oil on the washstand. A round, metallic shaving on the floor rolled beneath his foot. The place from which this shaving had dropped was a complete mystery.
Rob decided Ostrander must have been drilling a hole in the frame of the mirror which hung over the washbowl. Then he realized that the shavings must have come from some other source.
Ostrander returned about three o’clock in the afternoon and entered the bathroom almost immediately. He seemed annoyed that Rob had made such a meticulous job of cleaning up.
“You shouldn’t have done that,” he said somewhat impatiently. “You might have known I’d have returned and fixed things up.”
“You didn’t tell me just when you were returning,” Rob said.
“I suppose I left something of a mess,” Ostrander said. “I was oiling some tools.”
Rob said nothing.
Ostrander walked over to the wastebasket, noticed the metal shaving, hesitated for a second or two, then explained. “I was trying out a drill bit. Linda wanted me to fasten the horn on the car more securely. It’s been working loose. We’re driving to Marseilles tomorrow and must get the car ready for loading. I wanted to be certain the drill was sharp.”
“You’ve secured your transportation?” Rob asked.
“Just an hour or two ago,” Ostrander said. “That’s why I went dashing out. There was a chance to pick up a cancellation. I’m sailing an the same ship with you and Linda.”
“Oh,” Rob said tonelessly, “that’s nice.”
That night, about ten o’clock, Rob Trenton wakened from a sound sleep with a burning, metallic taste in the back of his throat. There were terrific pains across his abdomen, and even in the calves of his legs.
During the violent illness and retching which followed, Merton Ostrander was a good Samaritan and big brother rolled into one. He was a solicitous nurse, reassuring, cheerful, optimistic and unbelievably helpful, putting hot compresses on Rob’s stomach, assuring him that it undoubtedly had been the lobster salad at dinner. There had been a piece of tainted lobster in his own salad, Merton remembered, and for that reason he had pushed the whole thing aside. He had been tempted to warn Rob but, since Rob seemed to be enjoying the salad so much, he had refrained, thinking that the one piece of tainted lobster was perhaps only a left-over which had been included by accident.
Rob, remembering that Linda had had a seafood cocktail, insisted that Ostrander should go down, knock on her door, and find out if she was all right.
At first Ostrander ridiculed this suggestion, but finally agreed to give her a ring and when it appeared, after some ten minutes, that there was not the faintest possibility of the hotel switchboard answering, he agreed to run downstairs and tap on her door,
Before he left, however, he opened his medicine kit, which he explained he always carried with him and gave Rob two large white capsules which he felt certain would settle Rob’s stomach now that his system had rid itself of the tainted food.
But a violent fit of retching caused Rob to slip the two capsules into the pocket of his dressing-gown, and then, after a few minutes when Merton Ostrander called through the bathroom door to ask him if the capsules were “staying down”, Rob, rather than waste his waning strength in argument, merely grunted an answer which Ostrander accepted as an affirmative.
So then Ostrander went down to tap on Linda’s door, and Rob, the two capsules still in the pocket of his dressing-gown, staggered over to the bed.
Linda, it seemed, had not only failed to experience any disagreeable symptoms, but she took Rob’s illness much more seriously than either of the two men. Appearing in housecoat and slippers, she insisted that they send for a taxi and rush Rob to the American hospital.
Ostrander quite evidently felt this was a foolish measure as “the worst was now over”, and Rob, weak and shaken, disliked the idea of “making a nuisance of himself”.
Ostrander managed to delay matters by some thirty minutes, but in the end Linda had her way, and Rob found himself bundled into a taxi which Linda had somehow managed to find, and transported to the American hospital, where a young doctor listened to his symptoms and prescribed remedies which Rob felt were merely cumulative.
The upshot of this treatment, however, was that Rob, still weak and sore the next morning, was forced to say good-by to Linda and Merton Ostrander as they started out in the little car for Marseilles.
Ostrander, with genial optimism, patted Rob’s shoulder and assured him he would be able to join them on the boat by catching the night train from Paris.
The doctor gravely shook his head, and for a moment Rob thought there was a hint of moisture in Linda’s eyes as she turned towards the door, but she waved to him as casually as though she expected to see him again within the next hour or two.
That night Rob was still weak with pain, and the doctor seemed genuinely puzzled to account for his condition. The medical ukase definitely and finally forbade Rob to take the night train and the boat was due to sail the next afternoon at four o’clock.
In Rob’s weakened condition, it seemed that the bottom had dropped out of everything. He managed to dictate a telegram to Linda, wishing her bon voyage, and, after some hesitation, included Merton Ostrander in the wire. Then he settled back miserably and tried to fight the black waves of disappointment. The next morning, experiencing a sudden definite resolution, he overcame his vertigo and nausea long enough to pack the necessities of travel, stagger to a taxicab, and catch a plane which deposited him in Marseilles thirty minutes before sailing time. As he wobbled up the gangplank, feeling more dead than alive, the loudspeaker was announcing for the last time “All ashore that’s going ashore.” And he saw above him Merton Ostrander’s face, stamped with an expression of extreme, incredulous surprise.