She uttered her soft, low laugh. "No; you have quite enough accomplishments, mon ami. Now, if you don't mind, I think we had better walk back and find Mr. and Mrs. Fielding. Perhaps you know—or again perhaps you don't—they live at Shale Court. And I am with them—as Mrs. Fielding's companion. I—" she hesitated momentarily—"have left Lady Jo."
"Oh, I know that," said Saltash. "I've missed you badly. We all have.
When are you coming back to us?"
"I don't know," said Juliet.
He gave her one of his humorous looks. "Next week—some time—never?"
She opened her sun-shade absently. "Probably," she said.
"Rather hard on Lady Jo, what?" he suggested. "Don't you miss her at all?"
"No," said Juliet. "I can't—honestly—say I do."
"Oh, let us be honest at all costs!" he said. "Do you know what Lady Jo is doing now?"
Juliet hesitated an instant, as if the subject were distasteful to her.
"I can guess," she said somewhat distantly.
"I'll bet you can't," said Saltash, with a twist of the eyebrows that was oddly characteristic of him. "So I'll tell you. She's running in an obstacle race, and—to be quite, quite honest—I don't think she's going to win."
There was a moment's pause. Then the man on Juliet's other side spoke, briefly and with decision. "Miss Moore is no longer interested in Lady Joanna Farringmore's doings. Their friendship is at an end."
Juliet made a slight gesture of remonstrance, but she spoke no word in contradiction.
A gleam of malice danced in Saltash's eyes; it was like the turn of a rapier in a practised hand. "Most wise and proper!" he said. "Juliette, I always admired your discretion."
"You were always very kind, Charles Rex," she made grave reply.
CHAPTER III
THE PRICE
They went back up the winding glen, and as they went Lord Saltash talked, superbly at his ease, of the doings of the past few weeks, "since you and that naughty Lady Jo dropped out," as he expressed it to Juliet. He had just recently been to Paris, had motored across France, had just returned by sea from Bordeaux in his yacht, the Night Moth.
"Landed to-day—forgot this unspeakable flower-show—had to put in to get her cleaned up for Cowes—though it's quite possible I shan't go near Cowes when all's said and done. She's quite seaworthy, warranted not to kick in a gale. If anyone wanted her for a cruise—she's about the best thing going."
They reached the shrubbery to be nearly deafened by the band.
"Come through the gardens!" said Saltash, with a shudder. "We must get out of this somehow."
"But my people!" objected Juliet.
"Oh, Mr. Green will go and find them, won't you, Mr. Green?" Saltash turned a disarming smile upon him.
But Green looked straight back without a smile. "Miss Moore is under my escort," he observed. "If she agrees, I think we had better go together."
"And do you agree, Juliette?" enquired Saltash with interest.
Juliet met the mocking eyes with a smile that was certainly unintentional. "They may be in the Castle," she said. "I know they meant to go."
"Good!" he ejaculated. "Then come to the Castle! I will get you tea in my own secret den if such a thing is to be had—tea or a cocktail, ma Juliette!"
"Will you lead the way?" said Juliet, and for a second—only a second—her hand pressed Dick's arm with a quick, confidential pressure that was not without its appeal. "We always follow Charles Rex!" she said.
Saltash chuckled. Plainly the adventure amused him.
They entered the trim gardens, escaping thankfully from the wandering crowd of sight-seers. Saltash led the way with a certain unconscious arrogance of bearing. Somehow, his ugliness notwithstanding, he fitted his surroundings perfectly, save that the white yachting-suit ought to have been fashioned of satin, and a sword should have dangled at his side. The old stone turrets that towered above the blazing parterres gleamed in the hot sunlight—a mediaeval castle of romance.
"What a glorious old place!" said Juliet.
He turned to her. "You have never seen it before?"
"Never," she answered.
He made her a bow that was slightly foreign. There was French blood in his veins. "I give you welcome, maladi," he said, "I and my poor castle are all yours to command."
He made a gallant figure there on his stone terrace. The girl's eyes shone a little, but they turned almost immediately to the other man at her side.
"Beautiful, isn't it, Dick?" she said.
He met her look, and she was conscious of a chill. She had never seen him look so aloof, so cynical. "A temple of delight!" he said.
His manner offended her. She turned deliberately away from him. And again
Lord Saltash chuckled, as though at some secret joke.
They entered by a narrow door at the head of a flight of steps. "This at least is private," declared Saltash, as he took a key from an inner pocket.
"Does no one ever come in here when you are away?" Juliet asked.
"Not by this entrance," he said. "There is another into the Castle itself which is known to a few. It leads into the music room whence Mr. Green will be able to start upon his search."
He threw a mischievous glance at Green who met it with a look so direct, and so unswerving that the odd eyes blinked and turned away.
But curiously a spirit of perversity seemed to have entered into Juliet.
She also looked at Dick. "I wish you would go and find them," she said.
"I know they will be wondering where we are."
His brows went up. She thought he was going to refuse. And then quite suddenly he yielded. "Certainly if you wish it!" he said. "And when they are found?"
"Oh, dump them in the great hall!" said Saltash. "To be left till called for!"
"Charles!" protested Juliet.
He grinned at her—a wicked, monkeyish grin, and threw open the door, disclosing a steep and winding stone stair.
"Will you be pleased to enter!" he said, in the tone of one issuing a royal command.
But she hung for a moment, looking back with a strange wistfulness at the man she was leaving. The imprisoned air came out into the hot sunshine like a cold vapour. She shivered a little.
"Dick!" she said.
He stopped at the foot of the outside steps looking up at her. His eyes were extremely bright, and something within her shrank from their straight regard. It conveyed possession, dominance; almost it conveyed a menace.
"When you have found them, come and—tell me!" she said.
He lifted his hat to her with punctilious courtesy, and turned away. "I will," he said.
"That's a masterful sort of person," observed Saltash, as they mounted the dimly-lit turret stair. "What does he do for a living?"
Juliet hesitated, conscious of a strong repugnance to discuss her lover with this man from her old world whom, strangely, at that moment, she felt that she knew so infinitely better. But she could not withhold an answer to so ordinary a question. Moreover Saltash could be imperious when he chose, and she knew instinctively that it was not wise to cross him.
"By profession," she said slowly at length, "he is—a village schoolmaster."
Saltash's laugh stung, though it was exactly what she had expected. But he qualified it the next moment with careless generosity.
"Quite a presentable cavalier, ma Juliette! And a fixed occupation is something of an advantage at times, n'est-ce-pas?—Je t'aime, tu l'aime! And how soon do you ride away? Or is that question premature?"
Juliet's face burned in the dimness, but she was in front of him and thankfully aware that he could not see it. "I am not answering any more questions, Charles," she said. "Now that you have got me into your ogre's castle, you must be—kind."
"I will be kindness itself," he assured her. "You know I am the soul of hospitality. All I have is yours."
The narrow stair ended at a small stone landing on which was a door. Juliet stepped aside as she reached it, and waited for her host. "It's rather like a prison," she said.
"You won't think so when you get through that door," he said. "By Jove! To think that I've actually got you—you of all people!—here in my stronghold! Do you realize that without my permission you can't possibly get out again?"
Juliet's laugh was absolutely spontaneous. She faced him in that narrow space with the poise and confidence of a queen. The light from a window that pierced the wall above shone down upon her. In that moment she was endowed with an extraordinary beauty that was more of being, of personality, than of feature.
"It is exactly this that I have played for, Charles Rex," she said. "You hold all the cards, mon ami. But—the game is mine."
"How so?" He was looking at her curiously, a dancing demon in his eyes.
She put out her hand to him, and as he took it, sank to the stone floor in a superb curtsy. "Because I claim your gracious protection, my lord the king. I ask your royal favour."
He lifted her hand to his lips as she rose. "You are—as ever—quite irresistible, ma Juliette," he smiled. "But—do you really contemplate marrying this fortunate young man? Because there are limits—even to my generosity. I am not sure that I can permit that."
Her eyes looked straight into his. "You can do—anything you choose to do, Charles Rex," she said; "except one thing."
He made a grimace at her. "I am king in my own castle anyway," he observed, watching her. "And you are at my mercy."
"It is your mercy that I am waiting for," she said, a faint smile at the corners of her lips.
"Ah!" he said, stood a moment longer, contemplating her, then turned abruptly and flung open the door against which he stood.
It led into a winding passage of such a totally different character from the stone staircase they had just mounted that Juliet stood gazing down it for some seconds before she obeyed his mute gesture to pass through. It was thickly carpeted, deadening all sound, and the walls were hung with some heavy material, in the colour of old oak. It was lighted by three long perpendicular slits of windows, let into a twelve-foot thickness of wall. Juliet had a glimpse of many pine trees as she passed them.
The passage ended in heavy curtains of the same dark-brown material. She stopped and looked at her companion.
"What is it?" he said, with a laugh. "Are you afraid of my inner sanctuary?"
He parted the curtains, disclosing a tall oak door. She saw no latch upon it, but his hand went up behind the curtain, and she heard the click of a spring. In a moment the tall door opened before her.
"Go in!" he said easily.
She entered a strange room, oak-panelled, shaped like a cone, lighted only by a glass dome in the roof. It was the most curious chamber she had ever seen. She trod on a tiger-skin as she entered, and noted that the floor was covered with them. There was no chair anywhere, only a long, deep couch, also draped with tiger-skins. Tiger faces glared at her from all directions. She heard the door click behind her and turning realized that it had disappeared in the oak panelling against which her host was standing.
He laughed at her quizzically, "I believe you are frightened."
She looked around her, seeing no exit anywhere. "It is just the sort of freak apartment I should expect you to delight in," she said.
"You wouldn't have come if you had known, would you?" he said, a faint note of jeering in his voice.
"Of course I should!" said Juliet.
"Of course!" he mocked. "I am such a peculiarly safe person, am I not?
Every member of your charming sex trusts me instinctively."
She turned and faced him. "Don't be ridiculous, Charles! You see, I happen to know you."
He looked at her with something of the air of a monkey that contemplates snatching some forbidden thing. "Why did you run away?" he said.
She hesitated. "That's a hard question, isn't it?"
"Oh, don't mind me!" he said. "I don't flatter myself I was the cause."
Her dark brows were slightly drawn. "No, you were not," she said. "It was just—it was Lady Jo herself, Charlie. No one else."
"Ah!" His goblin smile flashed out at her. "Poor erring Lady Jo! Don't be too hard on her! She has her points."
She laid her hand quickly on his arm. "Don't try to defend her! She is quite despicable. I have done with her."
His hand was instantly on hers. He laughed into her eyes. "I'll wager you have a lingering fellow-feeling for her even yet."
"Not since she was reported to have run away with you," countered Juliet.
He laughed aloud. "Ah! She forfeited your sympathy there, did she? Mais, Juliette—" his voice sank suddenly upon a caressing note, "there are few women to whom I could not give happiness—for a time."
"I know," said Juliet, and drew her hand away. "That is why we all admire you so. But even you, most potent Charles, couldn't satisfy a woman who was wanting—some one else."
"You don't think I could make her forget?" he said.
She shook her head, smiling. "When the real thing comes along, all shams must go overboard. It's the rule of the game."
"And this is the real thing?" he questioned.
She made a little gesture as of one who accepts the inevitable. "Je le crois bien," she said softly.
Lord Saltash made a grimace. "And I am to give you up without a thought to this bounder?"
"You would," she replied gently, "if I were yours to give."
"If you were Lady Jo for instance?" he suggested.
"Exactly. If I were Lady Jo." She looked at him with the faint smile still at her lips. "It won't cost you much to be generous, Charles," she said.
"How do you know what it costs?" He frowned at her suddenly. "You'll accuse me of being benevolent next. But I'm not benevolent, and I'm not going to be. I might be to Lady Jo, but not to you, ma chérie,—never to you!" His grin burst through his frown. "Come! Sit down! I'll get you a drink."
She turned to the deep settee, and sank down among tigerskins with a sigh. He opened a cupboard in the panelling of the wall, and there followed the chink of glasses and the cheery buzz of a syphon. In a few moments he came to her with a tall glass in his hand containing a frothy drink. "Look here, Juliette!" he said. "Come to France with me in the Night Moth, and we'll find Lady Jo!"
She accepted the drink and lay back without looking at him. "You always were an eccentric," she said. "I don't want to find Lady Jo."
He sat on the head of the settee at her elbow. "It's quite a fair offer," he said, as if she had not spoken. "You will—eventually—return from Paris, and no one will ever know. In these days a woman of the world pleases herself and is answerable to none. Mais, Juliette!" He reached down and coaxingly held her hand. "Pourquoi pas?"
She lifted her eyes slowly to his face. "I have told you," she said.
"You're not in earnest!" he protested.
She kept her look steadily upon him. "Charles Rex, I am in earnest."
His fingers clasped hers more closely. "But I can't allow it. We can't spare you. And you—yourself, Juliette—you will never endure life in a backwater. You will pine for the old days, the old friends, the old lovers,—as they will pine for you."
"No, never!" said Juliet firmly.
He leaned down to her. "I say you will. This is—a midsummer madness.
This will pass."
She started slightly at his words. The sparkling liquid splashed over. She lifted the glass to her lips, and drank. When she ceased, he took it softly from her, and put it to his own. Then he set down the empty glass and slipped his arm behind her.
"Juliette, I am going to save you," he said, "from yourself."
She drew away from him. "Charles, I forbid that!"
She was breathing quickly but her voice was quiet. There was indomitable resolution in her eyes.
He paused, looking at her closely. "You deny—to me—what you were permitting with so much freedom barely half-an-hour ago to the village schoolmaster?" he said.
Her face flamed. "I have always denied you—that!" she said.
He smiled. "Times alter, Juliette. You are no longer in a position to deny me."
She kept her eyes upon him. "You mean I have trusted you too far?" she said, a deep throb in her voice. "I might have known!"
He shrugged his shoulders. "Life is a game of hazard, is it not? And you were always a daring player. But, Juliette, you cannot always win. This time the luck is against you."
She was silent. Very slowly her eyes left his. She drooped forward as she sat.
He leaned down to her again, his face oddly sympathetic. "After all,—you claimed my protection," he said.
She made a sudden movement. She turned sharply, almost blindly. She caught him by the shoulders. "Oh, Charles!" she said. "Charles Rex! Is there no mercy no honour—in you?"
There was a passion of supplication in her voice and action. As she held him he could have clasped her in his arms. But he did not. He sat motionless, looking at her, his expression still monkey-like, half-wicked, half-wistful.
"Well, you shouldn't tempt me, Juliette," he said. "It isn't fair to a miserable sinner. You were always the cherry just out of reach. Naturally, I'm inclined to snatch when I find I can."
Juliet was trembling, but she controlled her agitation.
"No, that isn't allowed," she said. "It isn't the game. And you never—seriously—wanted me either."
"But I'm never serious!" protested Saltash. "Neither are you. It's your one solid virtue."
"I am serious now," she said.
He looked at her quizzically. "Somehow it suits you. Well, listen, Juliette! I'll strike a bargain with you. When you are through with this, you will come with me for that cruise in the Night Moth. Come! Promise!"
"But I am not—quite mad, Rex!" she said.
He lifted his hands to hers and lightly held them. "It is no madder a project than the one you are at present engaged upon. What? You won't? You defy me to do my worst?"
"No, I don't defy you," she said.
He flashed a smile at her. "How wise! But listen! It's a bargain all the same. You put me on my honour. I put you on yours. Go your own way! Pursue this bubble you call love! And when it bursts and your heart is broken—you will come back to me to have it mended. That is the price I put upon my mercy. I ask no pledge. It shall be—a debt of honour. We count that higher than a pledge."
"Ah!" Juliet said, and suppressed a sudden tremor.
He stood up, gallantly raising her as he did so. "And now we will go and look for your friends," he said. "Is all well, ma chérie? You look pale."
She forced herself to smile. "You are a preposterous person, Charles
Rex," she said. "Yes, let us go!"
She turned with him towards the panelling, but she did not see by what trick he opened again the door by which they had entered. She only saw, with a wild leap of the heart, Dick Green, upright, virile, standing against the dark hangings of the passage beyond.
CHAPTER IV
KISMET
He was breathing hard, as if he had been hurrying. He spoke to her exclusively, ignoring the man at her side.
"Will you come at once? Mrs. Fielding has been taken ill."
She started forward. "Dick! Where is she?"
"Downstairs." Briefly he answered her. "She collapsed in one of the tents. They brought her into the house. She is in the library."
Juliet hastened along the passage. Like Dick, she seemed no longer aware of Saltash's presence. He came behind, a speculative expression on his ugly face.
"Let me go first!" Dick said, as they reached the head of the winding stairs.
Juliet gave place to him without a word. They descended rapidly.
At the foot the door stood open to the terrace. They came again into the blazing sunshine, and here Juliet paused and looked back at Saltash.
He came to her side. "Don't look so alarmed! It's probably only the heat. Do you know the way to the library? Through that conservatory over there is the shortest cut. I suppose I may come with you? I may be of use."
"Of course!" said Juliet. "Thank you very much."
Dick barely glanced over his shoulder. He was already on his way.
They entered the Castle again by the conservatory that Saltash had indicated. It was a mass of flowers, but the public were evidently not admitted here, for it was empty. In the centre a nymph hung over a marble basin under a tinkling fountain. They passed quickly by to an open glass door that led into the house. Here Dick stopped and drew back, looking at Juliet.
"I will wait here," he said.
She nodded and went swiftly past him into the room.
It was a dark apartment, book-lined, chill of atmosphere, with heavy, ancient furniture, and a sense of solitude more suggestive of some monastic dwelling than any ordinary habitation. The floor was of polished oak that shone with a sombre lustre.
Juliet paused for a moment involuntarily upon entering. It was as if a sinister hand had been laid upon her, arresting her. The gloom blinded her after the hot radiance outside. Then a voice—Fielding's voice—spoke to her, and she went forward gropingly.
He met her, took her urgently by the shoulder. "Thank heaven, you're here at last!" he said.
Looking at him, she saw him as a man suddenly stricken with age. His face was grey. He led her to a settee by the high oak fireplace, and there—white, inanimate as a waxen figure—she found Vera Fielding.
Fear pierced her, sharp as the thrust of a knife. She freed herself from Fielding's grip, and knelt beside the silent form. For many awful seconds she watched and listened, not breathing.
"Is she gone?" asked Fielding in a hoarse whisper at last.
She looked up at him. "Get brandy—hot bottles—quick! Send Dick—he's in the conservatory. No, stay! Send Saltash! He's there too. He'll know where to find things. Tell Dick to come here! Have you sent for a doctor?"
"There's been no one to send," he answered frantically. "Some man helped to bring her in here, but she didn't faint till after we got in, and then I couldn't leave her. He went off to look after the crowd going round the Castle."
"All right," Juliet said. "Lord Saltash will see to that. Ask them to come in!"
She was unfastening the filmy gown with steady fingers. Whatever the dread at her heart there was no sign of it apparent in her bearing. She moved without haste or agitation.
At a touch on her shoulder she looked up and saw Dick at her side. "Ah, there you are!" she said. "We want a doctor. Will you see to it? No doubt there's a telephone somewhere. Ask Lord Saltash!"
"In the gun-room," said Saltash. "Door next to this on the left. Name of
Rossiter. Shall I see to it?"
"No—no," she said. "You get some brandy, please—at once!"
They obeyed her orders with promptitude. Dick went straight from the room. Saltash turned to the fireplace, and pressed an electric bell three times very emphatically.
Then he came to Juliet's side. "You ought to lay her flat, Juliette. I know this sort of seizure. Heart of course! My mother died of it."
"Help me to lift her!" said Juliet.
They raised her between them with infinite care and flattened the cushions beneath her. Then Saltash, his queer face full of the most earnest concern began to chafe one of the nerveless hands.
Fielding tramped ceaselessly up and down the room, his head on his chest. Every time he drew near his wife he glanced at her and swung away again, as one without hope.
After a brief interval the door opened to admit a silent footed butler bearing a tray. Saltash turned upon him swiftly.
"Brandy, Billings? That's right. And look here! Find Mrs. Parsons! Tell her a lady has been taken ill in the library! She had better get a bed ready, and have some boiling water handy. Anything else?" He looked at Juliet.
She shook her head. "No, nothing till the doctor comes. I hope he won't be long."
Saltash poured out some brandy. Fielding came to a standstill behind
Juliet, and stood looking on.
"We won't lift her again," whispered Juliet. "Try a spoon!"
He gave it to her, and she slipped it between the white lips. But there was no sign of life, no attempt to swallow.
"She is dead!" said Fielding heavily.
Saltash glanced at him. "I think not," he said gently. "I'm nearly certain I felt her pulse move just now."
The door opened again, and Dick entered. He went straight to the squire, and put his arm round his bent shoulders. "There'll be a doctor here in ten minutes," he said.
Fielding seemed barely to hear the words. "Do you think she'll ever speak again, Dick?" he said.
"Please God she will, sir," said Dick very steadily.
He kept his arm round Fielding, and in a few moments succeeded in drawing him aside. He put him into a chair by the table, poured out some brandy and water, and made him drink it. Looking up a moment later, he found Saltash's odd eyes curiously upon him. He returned the look with a conscious sense of antagonism, but Saltash almost immediately turned away.
There followed what seemed an interminable space of waiting, during which no change of any sort was apparent in the silent figure on the settee. The blatant bray of the band still sounded in the distance with a flaunting gaiety almost intolerable to those who waited. Saltash frowned as he heard it, but he did not stir from Juliet's side.
Then, after an eternity of suspense, the sombre-faced butler opened the door again and ushered in the doctor. Saltash went to meet him and brought him to the settee. Fielding got up and came forward.
Dick stood for a moment, then turned and went back to the conservatory, where a few seconds later Saltash joined him.
"I should like to burn that damn band alive!" he remarked as he did so.
Dick shrugged his shoulders and said nothing.
Again Saltash's eyes dwelt upon him with curiosity. "I want to know you," he said suddenly. "I hope you don't object?"
"I am vastly honoured by your notice," said Dick.
Saltash nodded. "Well, don't be an ass about it! I am a most inoffensive person, I assure you. And it isn't my fault that I was on friendly terms with Mademoiselle Juliette before she forsook the world, etc., etc., and turned to you to fill the void. Do you flatter yourself you are going to marry her by any chance?"
A swift gleam shot up in Dick's eyes. He stiffened involuntarily. "That is a subject I cannot discuss—even with you," he said.
Saltash smiled good-humouredly. "Well, I expected that. But your courtship on the lake this afternoon was so delightfully ingenuous that I couldn't help wondering what your intentions were."
Dick's mouth became a simple hard line. He looked the other man up and down with lightning rapidity ere he replied with significance. "My intentions, my lord, are—honourable."
Saltash bowed with his hand on his heart and open mockery in his eyes. "La pauvre Juliette! And have you told her yet? No, look here! Don't knock me down! There's no sense in taking offence at a joke you can't understand. And it would be bad manners to have a row, with that poor soul in there at death's door. Moreover, if you really want to marry the princess Juliette, it'll pay you to be friends with me."
"I doubt if anything would induce me to be that," said Dick curtly.
"Oh, really? What have I done? No, don't tell me! It would take too long. I am aware I'm a by-word for wickedness in these parts, heaven alone knows why. But at least I've never injured you." Saltash's smile was suddenly disarming again.
"Never had much opportunity, have you?" said Dick.
"No, but I've got one now—quite a good one. I could put an end to this little idyll of yours for instance without the smallest difficulty—if I felt that way."
"I don't believe you!" flashed Dick.
"No? Well, wait till I do it then!" There was amused tolerance in
Saltash's rejoinder. "You'll pipe another tune then, I fancy."
"Shall I?" Dick said. He paused a moment, his eyes, extremely bright, fixed unwaveringly upon the swarthy face in front of him. "If I do—you'll dance to it!" he said with grim assurance.
Saltash smothered a laugh. "Well done, I say! You've scored a point at last! I was waiting for that. You'll like me better now, most worthy cavalier. I daren't suggest a drink under the circumstances, but I'll owe you one." He extended his hand with a royal air. "Will you shake?"
Dick held back. "Will you play the game?" he said.
Saltash grinned. "My own game? Certainly! I always do."
Dick's hand came out to him. Somehow he was hard to refuse. "A straight game?" he said.
Saltash's brows expressed amused surprise. "I always play straight—till
I begin to lose,—chevalier," he said.
"And then—you cheat?" questioned Dick.
"Like the devil," laughed Saltash. "We all do that. Don't you?"
"No," Dick said briefly.
"You don't? You always put all your cards on the table? Come now! Do you?"
Dick hesitated, and Saltash's grin became more pronounced. "All right! You needn't answer," he said lightly. "Do you know I thought you weren't quite as simple as you appeared at first sight. Just as well perhaps. Juliette's cavalier mustn't be too rustic." He stopped to look at Dick appraisingly. "Yes, I'm glad on the whole that your intentions are honourable," he ended with a smile. "I rather doubt if you pull 'em off. But you may—you may."
He turned sharply with the words as if a hand had touched him and faced round upon Juliet as she came out on to the step.
Her face had an exhausted look, but she smiled faintly at the two men as she joined them.
"She is still living," she said. "The doctor gives just a shade of hope. But—" She looked at Saltash—"he absolutely forbids her being moved—at all. I hope it won't be a terrible inconvenience to you."
"It will be a privilege to serve you—or your friends—in any way," said Saltash.
"Thank you," she said. "I am sure Mr. Fielding will be very grateful to you. The doctor is going to send in a nurse. Of course I shall not leave her. She has come to depend upon me a good deal. And we thought of telephoning to her maid to bring everything necessary from Shale Court."
"Of course!" said Saltash kindly. "Look here, my dear! Don't for heaven's sake feel you've got to ask my permission for everything you do! Treat the place and everyone in it as your own!"
"Thank you," she said again. "Then, Charles, if you're sure you don't mind, I'll send for my dog as well."
"What! Christopher Columbus? You've got him with you, have you?" Saltash's smile lighted his dark face. "Lucky animal! Have him over by all means! I shall be delighted to see him."
"You are very kind," she said, and turned with a hint of embarrassment to Dick. "Mr. Fielding says that you will want to be getting back and there is no need to wait. Will you take the little car back to the Court?"
"Certainly," Dick said. "Would you care to give me a list of the things you want the maid to bring?"
"How kind of you!" she said, and hesitated a moment, looking at him. "But I think I needn't trouble you. Cox is very sensible. I can make her understand on the telephone."
He looked back at her, standing very straight. "In that case—I will go," he said. "Good-bye!"
She held out her hand to him. "I—shall see you again," she said, and there was almost a touch of pleading in her voice.
His fingers closed and held. "Yes," he said, and smiled into her eyes with the words—a smile in which determination and tenderness strangely mingled. "You will certainly see me again."
And with that he was gone, striding between the massed flowers without looking back.
"Exit Romeo!" murmured Saltash. "Enter—Kismet!"
But Juliet had already turned away.
CHAPTER V
THE DRIVING FORCE
That Saturday night concert at High Shale entailed a greater effort on Dick's part than any that had preceded it. He forced himself to make it a success, but when it was over he was conscious of an overwhelming weariness that weighed him down like a physical burden.
He said good-night to the men, and prepared to depart with a feeling that he was nearing the end of his endurance. It was not soothing to nerves already on edge to be waylaid by Ashcott and made the unwilling recipient of gloomy forebodings.
"We shan't hold 'em much longer," the manager said. "They're getting badly out of hand. There's talk of sending a deputation to Lord Wilchester or—failing him—Ivor Yardley, the K.C. chap who is in with him in this show."
"Yardley!" Dick uttered the name sharply.
"Yes, ever met him? He took over a directorship when he got engaged to Lord Wilchester's sister—Lady Joanna Farringmore. They're rather pinning their hopes on him, it seems. Do you know him at all?"
"I've met him—once," Dick said. "Went to him for advice—on a matter of business."
"Any good?" asked Ashcott.
"Oh yes, shrewd enough. Hardest-headed man at the Bar, I believe. I didn't know he was a director of this show. They won't get much out of him."
"I fancy they're going to ask you to draw up a petition," said Ashcott.
"Me!" Dick turned on him in a sudden blaze of anger. "I'll see 'em damned first!" he said.
Ashcott shrugged his shoulders. "It's your affair. You're the only man who has any influence with 'em. I'm sick of trying to keep the peace."
Dick checked his indignation. "Poor devils! They certainly have some cause for grievance, but I'm not going to draw up their ultimatum for them. I've no objection to speaking to Yardley or any other man on their behalf, but I'm hanged if I'll be regarded as their representative. They'll make a strike-leader of me next."
"Well, they're simmering," Ashcott said, as he prepared to depart. "They'll boil over before long. If they don't find a responsible representative they'll probably run amuck and get up to mischief."
"Oh, man, stop croaking!" Dick said with weary irritation and went away down the hill.
He took the cliff-path though the night was dark with storm-clouds. Somehow, instinctively, his feet led him thither. There were no nightingales singing now, and the gorse had long since faded in the fierce heat of summer. The sea lay leaden far below him, barely visible in the dimness. And there was no star in the sky.
Heavily he tramped over the ground where Juliet had lingered on that night of magic in the spring, and as he went, he told himself that he had lost her. Whatever the outcome of to-day's happenings, she would never be the same to him again. She had passed out of his reach. Her own world had claimed her again and there could be no return. He recalled the regret in her eyes at parting. Surely—most surely—she had known that that was the end. For her the midsummer madness was over, burnt away like the glory of the gorse-bushes about him. With a conviction that was beyond all reason he knew that they had come to a parting of the ways.
And there was no bond between them, no chain but that which his love had forged. She had pleaded to retain her freedom, and now with bitter intuition he knew wherefore. She had always realized that to which he in his madness had been persistently blind. She had known that there were obstacles insurmountable between them and the happy consummation of their love. She had faced the fact that the glory would depart.
Again he felt the clinging of her arms as he had felt it only that afternoon. Again against his lips there rose her quivering whisper, "Just for to-day, Dick! Just for to-day!" Yes, she had known even then. Even then for her the glory had begun to fade.
He clenched his hands in sudden fierce rebellion. It was unbearable. He would not endure it. This stroke of destiny—he would fight it with all the strength of his manhood. He would overthrow this nameless barrier that had arisen between them. He would sacrifice all—all he had—to reach her. Somehow—whatever the struggle might cost—he would clasp her again, would hold her against all the world.
And then—like a poisoned arrow out of the darkness—another thought pierced him. What if she were indeed of those who loved for a space and passed smiling on? What if the fatal taint of the world from which she had come to him had touched her also, withering the heart in her, making true love a thing impossible? What if she had indeed been fashioned in the same mould as the worthless woman whom she sought to defend?
But that was unthinkable, intolerable. He flung the evil suggestion from him, but it left a burning wound behind. There was no escape from the fact that she was on terms of intimacy with the man with whom that woman's name had been shamefully associated. And—remembering the discomfiture she had betrayed at their meeting—he told himself bitterly that she would have given much to have concealed that intimacy had it been possible.
But here his loyalty cried out that he was wronging her. Juliet—his Juliet of the steadfast eyes and low, sincere voice—was surely incapable of double dealing! Whatever her life in the past had been, however frivolous, however artificial, it had been given to him—perhaps to him alone—to know her as she was. A great wave of self-reproach went over him. How had he dared to doubt her?
The sea moaned with a dreary sound along the shore. A few heavy drops of rain fell around him. Mechanically he quickened his pace. He came at length down the steep cliff-path to the gate that led to the village. And here to his surprise a shuffling footstep told him of the presence of another human being out in the desolate darkness. Dimly he discerned a bulky shape leaning against the rail.
He came up to it. "Robin!" he said sharply.
A low voice answered him in startled accents. "Oh, Dicky! I thought you were never coming!"
"What are you doing here?" Dick said.
He took the boy by the shoulder with the words and Robin cowered away.
"Don't be cross! Dicky, please don't be cross! I only came to look for you," he said with nervous incoherence. "I didn't mean to be out late. I couldn't help it. Don't be cross!"
But Dick was implacable. "You know you've no business out at this hour," he said. "I warned you last time—when you went to The Three Tuns—" He paused abruptly. "Have you been to The Three Tuns to-night?"
"No!" said Robin eagerly.
Dick's hand pressed upon him. "Is that the truth?"
Robin became incoherent again. "I only came to meet you. I didn't think you'd be so late. And it was so hot to-night. And my head ached." He broke off. "Dicky, you're hurting me!"
"You have told me a lie," Dick said.
Robin shrank at his tone. "How did you know?" he whispered awestruck.
Dick did not answer. He shifted his hold from Robin's shoulder to his arm and turned him about. Robin went with him, shuffling his feet and trembling.
Dick led him in grim silence down the path to the village-road, past the Ricketts' cottage, now in darkness, up the hill beyond that led to the school.
Robin went with him submissively enough, but he stumbled several times on the way. As they neared the end of the journey he began to talk again anxiously, propitiatingly.
"I didn't mean to go, Dicky, but I was so hot and thirsty. And I met Jack and I went in with him. There were a lot of fellows there and Jack treated me, but I didn't have very much. My head ached so, and I sat down in a corner and went to sleep till it was closing time. Then old Swag made me get out, so I came to wait for you. I didn't hit him or anything, Dicky. I was quite quiet all the while. So you won't be cross, will you,—not like last time?"
"I am going to punish you if that's what you mean," Dick said, as he opened the garden-gate.
Robin shrank again, shivering like a frightened dog. "But, Dicky, I only—I only—"
"Broke the rule and lied about it," his brother said uncompromisingly.
"You know the punishment for that."
Robin attempted no further appeal. He went silently into the house and blundered up to his room. There was only one thing left to do, and that was to pay the penalty—of which Dick's wrath was infinitely the hardest part to bear.
He crouched down on the floor by the bed to wait. The light from the passage shone in through the half-open door and the great lamp at the lodge-gates of the Court opposite, which was kept burning all night, glared in at the unblinded window, but there was no light in the room. There was something almost malignant to Robin's mind about the searching brilliance of this lamp. He hid his eyes from it, huddling his face in the bed-clothes, listening intently the while for Dick's coming but hearing only the dull thumping of his own heart.
There was no one in the house except the two brothers. A woman came in every day from the village to do the work of the establishment. Now that Jack had found quarters elsewhere there was not a great deal to be done since Robin was accustomed also to making himself useful in various ways. It occurred to him suddenly as he crouched there waiting that Dick had been too hurried to eat much supper before his departure for High Shale that evening. The thought had been in his brain before, but subsequent events had dislodged it. Now, with every nerve alert and pricking with suspense, it returned to him very forcibly. Dicky was hungry perhaps—or consumed with thirst, as he himself had been. And he would certainly go empty to bed unless he, Robin, plucked up courage to go down and wait upon him.
It needed considerable courage, for his instinct was always to hide when he had incurred Dick's anger. Judicial though it invariably was, it was the most terrible thing the world held for him. It shook him to the depths, and to go down and confront it again with the penalty still unpaid was for a long time more than he could calmly contemplate. But as the minutes crept on and still Dick did not come, it was gradually borne in upon him that this, and this alone, was the thing that must be done. It was his job, forced upon him by an inexorable fate. Dick would probably be much more angry with him for doing it, but somehow in a vague, unreasoning fashion he realized that it had got to be done.
Even then it took him a long time to screw himself up to the required pitch of nervous energy required. He ached for the sound of Dick's step on the stairs, but it did not come. And so at last he knew there was no help for it. Whatever the cost, he must fulfil the task that had been laid upon him.
With intense reluctance he uncovered his face, flinching from the stark glare of the lamp across the road, and dragged himself to his feet. It was difficult to move without noise, but he made elaborate efforts to do so. He reached the head of the stairs and hung there listening.
Had he heard a movement below he would have stumbled headlong back to cover, but no sound of any sort reached him. The compelling force urged him afresh. He gripped the stair-rail and crept downward like a stealthy baboon.
The stairs creaked alarmingly. More than once he paused, prepared for precipitate retreat, but still he heard no sound, and gradually a certain desperate hope came to him. Perhaps Dicky was asleep! Perhaps the power that drove him would be satisfied if he collected some things on a tray and left them in the little hall for Dicky to find when he finally came up! If this could be done—and he could get back safe to the sheltering darkness before he found out! He would not mind the subsequent caning, if only he need not meet Dicky face to face again beforehand. Dicky's eyes when they looked at him sternly were anguish to his soul. And they certainly would not hold any kindness for him until the punishment was over. So argued poor Robin's anxious brain as he reached the foot of the stairs and stood a moment under the lamp dimly burning there, summoning strength to creep past the open door of the dining-room.
A candle was flickering on the table, so he was sure Dick must be there. Would he see him pass? Would he call him in? Robin's heart raced with terror at the thought. But no! The urging force drove him in sickening apprehension past the door, and still there was no sound.
He was at the kitchen-door at the end of the passage, his fingers fumbling at the latch when suddenly he remembered that he had no candle. There was no candle to be had! The only one available downstairs was the one Dick had taken into the dining-room. He could not go upstairs again to get another. He had no matches wherewith to explore the kitchen. He stood struck motionless by this fresh problem.
But Dicky was doubtless asleep or he must have heard those creaking stairs! Then there was still a chance. He might creep into the room and take the candle without waking him. He was gaining confidence by the prolonged silence. Dicky must certainly be fast asleep.
With considerably greater steadiness than he had yet achieved he returned to the open door and peeped stealthily in.
Yes, Dick was there. He had flung himself down at the table on which he had set the candle, and he was lying across it with his head on his arms. Asleep of course! That could be the only explanation of such an attitude. Yet Robin in the act of advancing, stopped in sudden doubt with a scared backward movement, his eyes upon one of Dick's hands that was clenched convulsively and quivering as if he were in pain. It certainly did not look like the hand of a man asleep.
The next moment Robin's ungainly form had knocked against the door-handle and Dick was sitting upright looking at him. His face was grey, he looked unutterably tired, his mouth had the stark grimness of the man who endures, asking nothing of Fate.
"Hullo, boy!" he said. "Why aren't you in bed?" Then seeing Robin's unmistakably hang-dog air, "Oh, I forgot! Go on upstairs! I'm coming."
Robin turned about like a kicked dog. But the driving force stopped him on the threshold. He stood a second or two, then turned again with a species of sullen courage.
"May I have the candle?" he said, not looking at Dick.
"What for?" said Dick. "Haven't you got one upstairs?"
Robin stood a moment or two debating with himself, then made a second movement to go. "All right. I'll fetch it."
"Wait a minute!" Dick's voice compelled. "What do you want a candle down here for?"
Robin backed against the door-post with a kind of heavy defiance. "Want to get something—out of the kitchen," he muttered.
"What do you want to get?" said Dick.
Robin was silent, stubbornly, insistently silent, the fingers of one hand working with agitated activity.
"Robin!"
It was the voice of authority. He had to respond to it. He made a lumbering gesture towards the speaker, but his eyes remained obstinately lowered under the shag of hair that hung over his forehead.
Dick sat for a few seconds looking at him, then with a sudden sigh that caught him unawares he got up.
"What did you come down for? Tell me!" he said.
His tone was absolutely quiet, but something in his utterance or the sigh that preceded it—or possibly some swiftly-piercing light of intuition—seemed to send a galvanizing current through Robin. With clumsy impulsiveness he came to Dick and stood before him.
"I was going—to get you—something to eat," he said, speaking with tremendous effort. "You must be—pretty near starving—and I forgot." He paused to fling a nervous look upwards. "I thought you were asleep. I didn't know—or I wouldn't have done it. I—didn't mean to get in the way." His voice broke oddly. He began to tremble. "I'll go now," he said.
But Dick's hand came out, detaining him. "You came down to get me food?" he said.
"Yes," muttered Robin, with his head down. "Thought I'd—put it in the hall—so you'd find it—before you came up."
Dick stood silent for a space, looking at him. His eyes were very gentle and the grimness had gone from his mouth, but Robin could not see that. He stood humped and quivering, expectant of rebuke.
But he recognized the change when Dick spoke. "Thought you'd provide me with the necessary strength to hammer you, eh?" he said, and suddenly his arm went round the misshapen shoulders; he gave Robin a close squeeze. "Thanks, old chap," he said.
Robin looked up then. The adoring devotion of a dumb animal was in his eyes. He said nothing, being for the moment beyond words.
Dick let him go. A clock on the mantelpiece was striking twelve. "You get to bed, boy!" he said. "I don't want anything to eat, thanks all the same." He paused a moment, then held out his hand. "Good-night!"
It was tacit forgiveness for his offence, and as such Robin recognized it. Yet as he felt the kindly grasp his eyes filled with tears.
"I'm—I'm sorry, Dicky," he stammered.
"I'm sorry too," Dick said. "But that won't undo it. For heaven's sake, Robin, never lie to me again! There! Go to bed! I'm going myself as soon as I've had a smoke. Good-night!"
It was a definite dismissal, and Robin turned away and went stumblingly from the room.
His brother looked after him with a queer smile in his eyes. It was Juliet who had taught Robin to say he was sorry. He threw himself into an easy-chair and lighted a pipe. Perhaps after all in his weariness he had exaggerated the whole matter. Perhaps—after all—she might yet find that she loved him enough to cast her own world aside. Recalling her last words to him, he told himself that he had been too quick to despair. For she loved him—she loved him! Not all the fashionable cynics her world contained could alter that fact.
A swift wave of exultation went through him, combating his despair. However heavy the odds,—however formidable the obstacles—he told himself he would win—he would win!
Going upstairs a little later, he was surprised to hear a low sound coming from Robin's room. He had thought the boy would have been in bed and asleep some time since. He stopped at the door to listen.
The next moment he opened it and quietly entered, for Robin was sobbing as if his heart would break.
There was no light in the room save that which shone from the park-gates opposite and the candle he himself carried. Robin was sunk in a heap against the bed still fully dressed. He gave a great start at his brother's coming, shrinking together in a fashion that seemed to make him smaller. His sobbing ceased on the instant. He became absolutely still, his claw-like hands rigidly gripped on the bedclothes, his face wholly hidden. He did not even breathe during the few tense seconds that Dick stood looking down at him. He might have been a creature carved in granite. Then Dick set down his candle, went to him, sat on the low bed, and pulled the shaggy head on to his knee.
"What's the matter, old chap?" he said.
All the tension went out of Robin at his touch. He clung to him in voiceless distress.
Dick's heart smote him. Why had he left the boy so long? He laid a very gentle hand upon him.
"Come, old chap!" he said. "Get a hold on yourself! What's it all about?"
Robin's shoulders heaved convulsively; his hold tightened. He murmured some inarticulate words.
Dick bent over him. "What, boy? What? I can't hear. You haven't been up to any mischief, have you? Robin, have you?" A sudden misgiving assailed him. "You haven't hurt anybody? Not Jack, for instance?"
"No," Robin said. But he added a moment later with a concentrated passion that sounded inexpressibly vindictive, "I hate him! I do hate him! I wish he was dead!"
"Why?" Dick said. "What has he been doing?"
But Robin burrowed lower and made no answer.
Dick sat for a space in silence, waiting for him to recover himself. He knew very well that he had good reason for his rooted dislike for Jack. It was useless to attempt any argument on that point. But when Robin had grown calmer, he returned to the charge very quietly but with determination.
"What has Jack been doing or saying? Tell me! I've got to know."
Robin stirred uneasily. "Don't want to tell you, Dicky," he said.
Dick's hand pressed a little upon him. "You must tell me," he said. "When did you meet him?"
Robin hesitated in obvious reluctance. "It was after supper," he said. "My head ached, and I went outside, and he came down the drive. And he—and he laughed about—about you coming home alone from Burchester, and said—said that your game was up anyhow. And I didn't know what he meant, Dicky—" Robin's arms suddenly clung closer—"but I got angry, because I hate him to talk about you. And I—I went for him, Dicky." His voice dropped on a shamed note, and he became silent.
"Well?" Dick said gravely. "What happened then?"
Very unwillingly Robin responded to his insistence. "He got hold of me—so that I couldn't hurt him—and then he said—he said—" A great sob rose in his throat choking his utterance.
"What did he say?"
There was a certain austerity in Dick's question. Robin shivered as it reached him.
With difficulty he struggled on. "Said that only—a fool—like me—could help knowing that—you hadn't—a chance—with any woman—so long as—so long as—" He choked again and sank into quivering silence.
Dick's hand found the rough head and patted it very tenderly. "But you're not fool enough to take what Jack says seriously, are you?" he said.
Robin stifled a sob. "He said that—afterwards," he whispered. "And he took me along to The Three Tuns—to make me forget it."
"You actually drank with him after that!" Dick said.
"I didn't know what I was doing, Dicky," he make apologetic answer. "It—knocked the wind out of me. You see, I—I'd never thought of that before."
He began to whimper again. Dick swallowed down something that tried to escape him.
"A bit of an ass, aren't you, Robin?" he said instead. "You know as well as I do that there isn't a word of truth in it. Anyhow—the woman I love—isn't—that sort of woman."
Robin shifted his position uneasily. There was that in the words that vaguely stirred him. Dick had never spoken in that strain before. Slowly, with a certain caution, he lifted his tear-stained face and peered up at his brother in the fitful candle-light.
"You do—want to marry Miss Moore then, Dicky?" he asked diffidently.
Dick looked straight back at him; his eyes shone with a sombre gleam that came and went. For several seconds he sat silent, then very steadily he spoke.
"Yes, I want her all right, Robin, but there are some pretty big obstacles in the way. I may get over them—and I may not. Time will prove."
His lips closed upon the words, and became again a single hard line. His look went beyond Robin and grew fixed. The boy watched him dumbly with awed curiosity.
Suddenly Dick moved, gripped him by the shoulders and pulled him upwards. "There! Go to bed!" he said. "And don't take any notice of what Jack says for the future! Don't fight him either! Understand? Leave him alone!"
Robin blundered up obediently. Again there looked forth from his eyes the dog-like worship which he kept for Dick alone. "I'll do—whatever you say, Dicky," he said earnestly. "I—I'd die for you—I would!" He spoke with immense effort, and all his heart was in the words.
Dick smiled at him quizzically. "Instead of which I only want you to show a little ordinary common or garden sense," he said. "Think you can do that for me?"
"I'll try, Dicky," he said humbly.
"Yes, all right. You try!" Dick said, and got up, more moved than he cared to show. He turned to go, but paused to light Robin's candle from his own. "And don't forget I'm—rather fond of you, my boy!" he said, with a brief smile over his shoulder as he went away.
No, Robin was not likely to forget that, seeing that Dick's love for him was his safeguard from all evil, and his love for Dick was the mainspring of his life. But—though his development was stunted and imperfect—there were certain facts of existence which he was beginning slowly but surely to grasp. And one of these—before but dimly suspected—he had realized fully to-night, a fact beyond all questioning learnt from Dick's own lips.
Dick's words: "The woman I love," had sunk deep—deep into his soul. And he knew with that intuition which cannot err that his love for Juliet was the greatest thing life held for him—or ever could hold again.
And the driving force gripped Robin's soul afresh as he lay wide-eyed to the smothering gloom of the night. Whatever happened—whoever suffered—Dicky must have his heart's desire.