The Impostor by Edgar Saltus

"Don't say you won't change your mind," Glendenning, with his equine air, was protesting at Camille, whose being put into the street was, of course, entirely figurative.

After the funeral and the rush of reporters who, from the inexperienced girl, had pulled more than they had expected -- the will unsigned and destroyed, the sudden demise, the missing manuscript, the missing money, the missing heir, out of all of which they made very good copy -- after that, the public administrator had stepped in, and notices had appeared announcing that "the People of the State of New York, by the grace of God free and independent, sent greeting to Michael Vulper, whose residence could not, after diligent inquiry, be ascertained, and citing him" and so forth and so forth.

But the greeting of the free and independent people had been ignored; so also had the citation. On the verbiage of both, Mike had appeared to be obscurely, but disdainfully turning his back. Yet, everything being possible, it may have been that neither had reached him; precisely as it may also have been that he was otherwise engaged.

Meanwhile, around the corner, on Riverside Drive, Camille had taken an apartment, furnished it after a fashion of her own, which was partly New York and partly Peking, put herself and the servants into it, and later had gone with Kate Delafield to Aiken.

There various young men had said the same thing to her. But as, from long practice, they had one and all acquired the art of making any subject uninteresting, their conversation had not affected her heart, her dreams, her golf, her runs, or her return. It had been January when she had gone South. Now it was April.

"No," Glendenning repeated. "Don't say it. Changing the mind is cleanly and therefore hygienic. My departed uncle had a room that he used for no other purpose."

Camille, seated in a hand-painted chair, looked out at the moon and at the river, then at the Chinese lamps, at the draped and grand piano, at the portieres, on which silver dragons roamed, and finally at this superior young man, who was also seated.

Between her chair and his, there was a space, which mentally she surveyed. It amounted, she judged, to about thirty-six inches. But in those inches there were miles, thousands of them. If he had been talking from a kloof of inner Africa, he could not have been farther away.

None the less, he represented to her that curious thing which is called a link. He connected her with the past, with the old man whom she had loved, with his son, whom she had liked. And, moreover, he and she now had -- at any rate, he claimed that they had -- interests in common; interests, that is, in the final disposition of the decedent's estate, concerning which he had long since retained a fat shyster named Tatum, to whom he negligently referred as his counsel.

"You don't, perhaps, care for me yet -- " he was saying.

"And that," Camille wickedly cut in, "is such an advantage. I could have no disillusions."

"On the other hand," Glendenning, smoothing his white tie, continued, "you know that I do care for you."

Camille laughed.

"You are so persuasive! Poor Mike wasn't in it with you."

"Why poor? He has only to show up to step into a fortune," retorted Glendenning, who earnestly hoped that Mike would do nothing of the kind; for, if he omitted to, then, after the legal delays, that fortune he, as next of kin, would inherit.

Camille looked down at a floor pillow at her feet, kicked it aside, stood up, and made a pass with her hands.

"I can't account for it, and the fact that I can't torments me. It seems as if it were my fault. When he said he was going away, I should have made him say where. Instead of which, I asked him to write. He never has. Yet he must be somewhere."

Glendenning nodded.

"In the fourth dimension."

Camille turned on him.