They both expected to see a room humble almost to poverty–an iron bedstead, perhaps, and such furniture as the under servants in a nobleman’s household are privileged to enjoy. Both were alike surprised at the luxury of the apartment they entered, and which was evidently reserved exclusively for Steadman’s uncle.
It was a sitting-room. The furniture was old-fashioned, but almost as handsome as any in Lady Maulevrier’s apartments. There was a large sofa of most comfortable shape, covered with dark red velvet, and furnished with pillows and foot rugs, which would have satisfied a Sybarite of the first water. Beside the sofa stood a hookah, with all appliances in the Oriental fashion; and half a dozen long cherry-wood pipes neatly arranged above the mantelpiece showed that Mr. Steadman’s uncle was a smoker of a luxurious type.
In the centre of the room stood a large writing table, with a case of pigeon-holes at the back, a table which would not have disgraced a Prime Minister’s study. A pair of wax candles, in tall silver candlesticks, lighted this table, which was littered with papers, in a wild confusion that too plainly indicated the condition of the owner’s mind. The oak floor was covered with Persian prayer rugs, old and faded, but of the richest quality. The window curtains were dark red velvet; and through an open doorway Mary and her husband saw a corresponding luxury in the arrangements of the adjoining bedroom.
The whole thing seemed wild and strange as a fairy tale. The weird and wizened old man, grinning and nodding his head at them. The handsome room, rich with dark, subdued colour, in the dim light of four wax candles, two on the table, two on the mantelpiece. The perfume of stephanotis and tea-roses, blended faintly with the all-pervading odour of latakia and Turkish attar. All was alike strange, bearing in mind that this old man was a recipient of Lady Maulevrier’s charity, a hanger-on upon a confidential servant, who might be supposed to be generously treated if he had the run of his teeth and the shelter of a decent garret. Verily, there was something regal in such hospitality as this, accorded to a pauper lunatic.
Where was Steadman, the alert, the watchful, all this time? Mary wondered. They had met no one. The house was as mute as if it were under the spell of a magician. It was like that awful chamber in the Arabian story, where the young man found the magic horse, and started on his fatal journey. Mary felt as if here, too, there, must be peril; here, too, fate was working.
The old man went to the writing table, pushed aside the papers, and then stooped down and turned a mysterious handle or winch under the knee-hole, and the writing-desk moved slowly on one side, while the pigeon-holes sank, and a deep well full of secret drawers was laid open.
From one of these secret drawers the old man took a bunch of keys, nodding, chuckling, muttering to himself as he groped for them with tremulous hand.
‘Steadman is uncommonly clever–thinks he knows everything–but he doesn’t know the trick of this table. I could hide a regiment of Sepoys in this table, my dear. Well, well, perhaps not Sepoys–too big, too big–but I could hide all the State papers of the Presidency. There are drawers enough for that.’
Hartfield watched him intently, with thoughtful brow. There was a mystery here, a mystery of the deepest dye; and it was for him–it must needs be his task, welcome or unwelcome, to unravel it.
This was the Maulevrier skeleton.
‘Now, come with me,’ said the old man, clutching Mary’s wrist, and drawing her towards the half-open door leading into the bedroom.
She had a feeling of shrinking, for there was something uncanny about the old man, something that might be life or death, might belong to this world or the next; but she had no fear. In the first place, she was courageous by nature, and in the second her husband was with her, a tower of strength, and she could know no fear while he was at her side.
The strange old man led the way across his bedroom to an inner chamber, oak pannelled, with very little furniture, but holding much treasure in the shape of trunks, portmanteaux–all very old and dusty–and two large wooden cases, banded with iron.
Before one of these cases the man knelt down, and applied a key to the padlock which fastened it. He gave the candle to Lord Hartfield to hold, and then opened the box. It seemed to be full of books, which he began to remove, heaping them on the floor beside him; and it was not till he had cleared away a layer of dingy volumes that he came to a large metal strong box, so heavy that he could not lift it out of the chest.
Slowly, tremulously, and with quickened breathing, he unlocked the box where it was, and raised the lid.
‘Look,’ he said eagerly, ‘this is her legacy–this is my little girl’s legacy.’
Lord Hartfield bent down and looked at the old man’s treasure, by the wavering light of the candle; Mary looking over his shoulder, breathless with wonder.
The strong box was divided into compartments. One, and the largest, was filled with rouleaux of coin, packed as closely as possible. The others contained jewels, set and unset–diamonds, emeralds, rubies, sapphires–which flashed back the flickering flame of the candle with glintings of rainbow light.
‘These are all for her–all–all,’ exclaimed the old man. ‘They are worth a prince’s ransom. Those rouleaux are all gold; those gems are priceless. They were the dowry of a princess. But they are hers now–yes, my dear, they are yours–because you spoke sweetly, and smiled prettily, and were very good to a lonely old man–and because you have my mother’s face, dear, a smile that recalls the days of my youth. Lift out the box and take it away with you, if you are strong enough,–you, you,’ he said, touching Lord Hartfield. ‘Hide it somewhere–keep it from _her_. Let no one know–no one except your wife and you must be in the secret.’
‘My dear sir, it is out of the question–impossible that my wife or I should accept one of those coins–or the smallest of those jewels.’
‘Why not, in the devil’s name?’
‘First and foremost, we do not know how you came in possession of them; secondly, we do not know who you are.’
‘They came to me fairly enough–bequeathed to me by one who had the right to leave them. Would you have had all that gold left for an adventurer to wallow in?’
‘You must keep your treasure, sir, however it may have come to you,’ answered Lord Hartfield firmly. ‘My wife cannot take upon herself the burden of a single gold coin–least of all from a stranger. Remember, sir, to us your possession of this wealth–nay, your whole existence–is a mystery.’
‘You want to know who I am?’ said the old man drawing himself up, with a sudden _hauteur_ which was not without dignity, despite his shrunken form and grotesque appearence. ‘Well, sir. I am—-‘
He checked himself abruptly, and looked round the room with a scared expression.
‘No, no, no,’ he muttered; ‘caution, caution! They have not done with me yet; she warned me–they are lying in wait; I mustn’t walk into their trap.’ And then turning to Lord Hartfield, he said, haughtily, ‘I shall not condescend to tell you who I am, sir. You must know that I am a gentleman, and that is enough for you. There is my gift to your wife’–pointing to the chest–‘take it or leave it.’
‘I shall leave it, sir, with all due respect.’
A frightful change came over the old man’s face at this determined refusal. His eyes glowered at Lord Hartfield under the heavy scowling brows; his bloodless lips worked convulsively.
‘Do you take me for a thief?’ he exclaimed. ‘Are you afraid to touch my gold–that gold for which men and women sell their souls, blast their lives with shame, and pain, and dishonour, all the world over? Do you stand aloof from it–refuse to touch it, as if it were infected? And you, too, girl! Have you no sense? Are you an idiot?’
‘I can do nothing against my husband’s wish,’ Mary answered, quietly; ‘and, indeed, there is no need for us to take your money. We are rich without it. Please leave that chest to a hospital. It will be ever so much better than giving it to us.’
‘You told me you were going to marry a poor man?’
‘I know. But he cheated me, and turned out to be a rich man. He was a horrid impostor,’ said Mary, drawing closer to her husband, and smiling up at him.
The old man flung down the lid of his strong box, which shut with a sonorous clang. He locked it, and put the key in his pocket.
‘I have done with you.’ he said. ‘You can go your ways, both of you. Fools, fools, fools! The world is peopled with rogues and fools; and, by heaven, I would rather have to do with the rogues!’
He flung himself into an arm-chair, one of the few objects of furniture in the room, and left them to find their way back alone.
‘Good-night, sir,’ said Lord Hartfield; but the old man made no reply. He sat frowning sullenly.
‘Good-night, sir,’ said Mary, in her gentle voice, breathing infinite pity.
‘Good-night, child,’ he growled. ‘I am sorry you have married an ass.’
This was more than Mary could stand, and she was about to reply with some acrimony, when her husband put his hand upon her lips and hurried her away.
On the landing they met Mrs. Steadman, a stout, commonplace person, who always had the same half-frightened look, as of one who lived in the shadow of an abiding terror, obviously cowed and brow beaten by her husband, according to the Fellside household.
At sight of Lord Hartfield and his wife she looked a little more frightened than usual.
‘Goodness gracious, Lady Mary! how ever did you come here?’ she gasped, not yet having quite realised the fact that Mary had been promoted.
‘We came to please Steadman’s uncle–he brought us in here,’ Mary answered, quietly.
‘But where did you find him?’
‘In the corridor–just by her ladyship’s room.’
‘Then he must have taken the key out of Steadman’s pocket, or Steadman must have left it about somewhere,’ muttered Mrs. Steadman, as if explaining the matter to herself, rather than to Mary. ‘My poor husband is not the man he was. And so you met him in the corridor, and he brought you in here. Poor old gentleman! He gets madder and madder every day.’
‘There is method in his madness,’ said Lord Hartfield. ‘He talked very much like sanity just now. Has your husband had the charge of him long?’
Mrs. Steadman answered somewhat confusedly.
‘A goodish time, sir. I can’t quite exactly say–time passes so quiet in a place like this. One hardly keeps count of the years.’
‘Forty years, perhaps?’
Mrs. Steadman blenched under Lord Hartfield’s steadfast look–a look which questioned more searchingly than his words.
‘Forty years,’ she repeated, with a faint laugh. ‘Oh, dear no, sir, not a quarter as long. It isn’t so many years, after all, since Steadman’s poor old uncle went a little queer in his head; and Steadman, having such a quiet home here, and plenty of spare room, made bold to ask her ladyship if he might give the poor old man a home, where he would be in nobody’s way.’
‘And the poor old man seems to have a very luxurious home,’ answered Lord Hartfield. ‘Pray when and where did Mr. Steadman’s uncle learn to smoke a hookah?’
Simple as the question was, it proved too much for Mrs. Steadman. She only shook her head, and faltered some unintelligible reply.
‘Where is your husband?’ asked Lord Hartfield: ‘I should like to have a little talk with him, if he is disengaged.’
‘He is not very well, my lord,’ answered Mrs. Steadman. ‘He has been ailing off and on for the last six months, but I couldn’t get him to see the doctor, or to tell her ladyship that he was in bad health. And about a week ago he broke down altogether, and fell into a kind of drowsy state. He keeps about, and he does his work pretty much the same as usual, but I can see that it’s too much for him. If you like to come downstairs I can let you through the lower door into the hall; and if he should have woke up since I have left him he’ll be at your lordship’s service. But I’d rather not wake him out of his sleep.’
‘There is no occasion. What I have to say will keep till to-morrow.’
Lord Hartfield and his wife followed Mrs. Steadman downstairs to the low dark hall, where an old eight-day clock ticked with hoarse and solemn heat, and a fine stag’s head over each doorway gave evidence of some former Haselden’s sporting tastes. The door of a small panelled parlour stood half-way open; and within the room Lord Hartfield saw James Steadman asleep in an arm-chair by the fire, which burned as brightly as if it had been Christmas time.
‘He was so chilly and shivery this afternoon that I was obliged to light a fire,’ said Mrs. Steadman.
‘He seems to be sleeping heavily,’ said Hartfield. ‘Don’t awaken him. I’ll see him to-morrow morning before I go to London.’
‘He sleeps half the day just as heavy as that, my lord,’ said the wife, with a troubled air. ‘I don’t think it can be right.’
‘I don’t think so either,’ answered Lord Hartfield. ‘You had better call in the doctor.’
‘I will, my lord, to-morrow morning. James will be angry with me, I daresay; but I must take upon myself to do it without his leave.’
She led the way along a passage corresponding with the one above, and unlocked a door opening into a lobby near the billiard-room.
‘Come, Molly, see if you can beat me at a fifty game,’ said Lord Hartfield, with the air of a man who wants to shake off the impression of some dominant idea.
‘Of course you will annihilate me, but it will be a relief to play,’ answered Mary. ‘That strange old man has given me a shock. Everything about his surroundings is so different from what I expected. And how could an uncle of Steadman’s come by all that money–and those jewels–if they were jewels, and not bits of glass which the poor old thing has chopped up, in order to delude himself with an imaginary treasure?’
‘I do not think they are bits of glass, Molly.’
‘They sparkled tremendously–almost as much as my–our–the family diamonds,’ said Mary, puzzled how to describe that property which she held in right of her position as countess regnant; ‘but if they are real jewels, and all those rouleaux real money, how could Steadman’s uncle become possessed of such wealth?’
‘How, indeed?’ said Lord Hartfield, choosing his cue
CHAPTER XXXVIII.
ON BOARD THE ‘CAYMAN.’
Goodwood had come and gone, a brief bright season of loss and gain, fine gowns, flirtation, lobster en mayonaise, champagne, sunshine, dust, glare, babble of many voices, successes, failures, triumphs, humiliations. A very pretty picture to contemplate from the outside, this little world in holiday clothes, framed in greenery! but just on the Brocken, where the nicest girl among the dancers had the unpleasant peculiarity of dropping a little red mouse out of her mouth–so too here under different forms there were red mice dropping about among the company. Here a hint of coming insolvency; there a whisper of a threatened divorce suit, staved off for awhile, compromises, family secrets, little difficulties everywhere; betrothed couples smilingly accepting congratulations, who should never have been affianced were truth and honour the rule of life; forsaken wives pretending to think their husbands models of fidelity; jovial creatures with ruin staring in their faces; households divided and shamming union; almost everybody living above his or her means; and the knowledge that nobody is any better or any happier than his neighbour society’s only fountain of consolation.
Lady Lesbia’s gowns and parasols had been admired, her engagement had furnished an infinity of gossip, and the fact of Montesma’s constant attendance upon her had given zest to the situation, just that flavour of peril and fatality which the soul of society loveth.
‘Is she going to marry them both?’ asked an ancient dowager of the ever-young type.
‘No, dear Lady Sevenoaks, she can only marry one, don’t you know; but the other is nice to go about with; and I believe it is the other she really likes.’
‘It is always the other that a woman likes,’ answered the dowager; ‘I am madly in love with this Peruvian–no, I think you said Cuban–myself. I wish some good-natured creature would present him to me. If you know anybody who knows him, tell them to bring him to my next afternoon–Saturday. But why does–_chose_–_machin_–Smithson allow such a handsome hanger-on? After marriage I could understand that he might not be able to help himself; but before marriage a man generally has some kind of authority.’
The world wondered a little, just as Lady Sevenoaks wondered, at Smithson’s complacency in allowing a man so attractive as Montesma to be so much in the society of his future wife, yet even the censorious could but admit that the Cuban’s manner offered no ground for offence. He came to Goodwood ‘on his own hook,’ as society put it: and every man who wears a decent coat and is not a welsher has a right to enjoy the prettiest race-course in England. He spent a considerable part of the day in Lesbia’s company; but since she was the centre of a little crowd all the time, there could be no offence in this. He was a stranger, knowing very few people, and having nothing to do but to amuse himself. Smithson was an old and familiar friend, and was in a measure bound to give him hospitality.
Mr. Smithson had recognised that obligation, but in a somewhat sparing manner. There were a dozen unoccupied bedchambers in the Park Lane Renaissance villa; but Smithson did not invite his Cuban acquaintance to shift his quarters from the Bristol to Park Lane. He was civil to Don Gomez: but anyone who had taken the trouble to watch and study the conduct and social relations of these two men would have seen that his civility was a forced civility, and that he endured the Spaniard’s society under constraint of some kind.
And now all the world was flocking to Cowes for the regatta, and Lesbia and her chaperon were established on board Mr. Smithson’s yacht, the _Cayman_; and the captain of the _Cayman_ and all her crew were delivered over to Lesbia to be her slaves and to obey her lightest breath. The _Cayman_ was to lie at anchor off Cowes for the regatta week; and then she was to sail for Hyde, and lie at anchor there for another regatta week; and she was to be a floating-hotel for Lady Lesbia so long as the young lady would condescend to occupy her.
The captain was an altogether exceptional captain, and the crew were a picked crew, ruddy faced, sandy whiskered for the most part, Englishmen all, honest, hardy fellows from between the Nore and the Wash, talking in an honest provincial patois, dashed with sea slang. They were the very pink and pattern of cleanliness, and the _Cayman_ herself from stem to stern was dazzling and spotless to an almost painful degree.
Not content with the existing arrangements of the yacht, which were at once elegant and luxurious, Mr. Smithson had sent down a Bond Street upholsterer to refit the saloon and Lady Lesbia’s cabin. The dark velvet and morocco which suited a masculine occupant would not have harmonised with girlhood and beauty; and Mr. Smithson’s saloon, as originally designed, had something of the air of a _tabagie_. The Bond Street man stripped away all the velvet and morocco, plucked up the Turkey carpet, draped the scuttle-ports with pale yellow cretonne garnished with orange pompons, subdued the glare of the skylight by a blind of oriental silk, covered the divans with Persian saddlebags, the floor with a delicate Indian matting, and furnished the saloon with all that was most feminine in the way of bamboo chairs and tea-tables, Japanese screens and fans of gorgeous colouring. Here and there against the fluted yellow drapery he fastened a large Rhodes plate; and the thing was done. Lady Lesbia’s cabin was all bamboo and embroidered India muslin. An oval glass, framed in Dresden biscuit, adorned the side, a large white bearskin covered the floor. The berth was pretty enough for the cradle of a duchess’s first baby. Even Lesbia, spoiled by much indulgence and unlimited credit, gave a little cry of pleasure at sight of the nest that had been made ready for her.
‘Really, Mr. Smithson is immensely kind!’ she exclaimed.
‘Smithson is always kind,’ answered Lady Kirkbank, ‘and you don’t half enough appreciate him. He has given me his very own cabin–such a dear little den! There are his cigar boxes and everything lovely on the shelves, and his own particular dressing-case put open for me to use–all the backs of all the brushes _repousse_ silver, and all the scent-bottles filled expressly for me. If the yacht would only stand quite still, I should think it more delicious than the best house I ever stayed in: only I don’t altogether enjoy that little way it has of gurgling up and down perpetually.’
Mr. Smithson’s chief butler, a German Swiss, and a treasure of intelligence, had come down to take the domestic arrangements of the yacht into his control. The Park Lane _chef_ was also on board, Mr. Smithson’s steward acting as his subordinate. This great man grumbled sorely at the smallness of his surroundings; for the most luxurious yacht was a poor substitute for the spacious kitchens and storerooms and stillrooms of the London mansion. There was a cabin for Lady Kirkbank’s Rilboche and Lady Lesbia’s Kibble, where the two might squabble at their leisure; in a word, everything had been done that forethought could do to make the yacht as perfect a place of sojourn as any floating habitation, from Noah’s Ark to the Orient steamers, had ever been made.
It was between four and five upon a delicious July afternoon that Lady Kirkbank and her charge came on board. The maids and the luggage had been sent a day in advance, so that everything might be in its place, and the empty boxes all stowed away, before the ladies arrived. They had nothing to do but walk on board and fling themselves into the low luxurious chairs ready for them on the deck, a little wearied by the heat and dust of a railway journey, and with that delicious sense of languid indifference to all the cares of life which seems to be in the very atmosphere of a perfect summer afternoon.
A striped awning covered the deck, and great baskets of roses–pink, and red, and yellow–were placed about here and there. Tea was ready on a low table, a swinging brass kettle hissing merrily, with an air of supreme homeliness.
Mr. Smithson had accompanied his _fiancee_ from town, and now sat reading the _Globe_, and meekly waiting for his tea, while Lesbia took a languid survey of the shore and the flotilla of boats, little and big, and while Lady Kirkbank rhapsodised about the yacht, praising everything, and calling everything by a wrong name. He was to be their guest all day, and every day. They were to have enough of him, as Lesbia had observed to her chaperon, with a spice of discontent, not quite so delighted with the arrangement as her faithful swain. To him the idea was rapture.
‘You have contrived somehow to keep me very much at a distance hitherto,’ he told Lesbia, ‘and I feel sometimes as if we were almost strangers; but a yacht is the best place in the world to bring two people together, and a week at Cowes will make us nearer to each other and more to each other than three months in London;’ and Lesbia had said nothing, inwardly revolting at the idea of becoming any nearer and dearer to this man whom she had pledged herself to marry. She was to be his wife–yes, some day–and it was his desire the some day should be soon: but in the interval her dearest privilege was the power to keep him at a distance.
And yet she could not make up her mind to break with him, to say honestly, ‘I never liked you much, and now we are engaged I find myself liking you less and less every day. Save me from the irrevocable wickedness of a loveless marriage. Forgive me, and let me go.’ No, this she could not bring herself to say. She did not like Mr. Smithson, but she valued the position he was able to give her. She wanted to be mistress of that infinite wealth–she could not renounce that right to which she fancied she had been born, her right to be one of the Queens of Society: and the only man who had offered to crown her as queen, to find her a palace and a court, was Horace Smithson. Without Mr. Smithson her first season would have resulted in dire failure. She might perhaps have endured that failure, and been content to abide the chances of a second season, had it not been for Mary’s triumph. But for Mary to be a Countess, and for Lesbia to remain Lesbia Haselden, a nobody, dependent upon the caprices of a grandmother whose means might after all be but limited–no, such a concatenation as that was not to be endured. Lesbia told herself that she could not go back to Fellside to remain there indefinitely, a spinster and a dependent. She had learnt the true value of money; she had found out what the world was like; and it seemed to her that some such person as Mr. Smithson was essential to her existence, just as a butler is a necessity in a house. One may not like the man, but the post must be filled.
Again, if she were to throw over Mr. Smithson, and speculate upon her chances of next year, what hope had she of doing better in her second season than in her first? The horizon was blank. There was no great _parti_ likely to offer himself for competition. She had seen all that the market could produce. Wealthy bachelors, high-born lovers, could not drop from the moon. Lesbia, schooled by Lady Kirkbank, knew her peerage by heart; and she knew that, having missed Lord Hartfield, there was really no one in the Blue Book worth waiting for. Thus, caring only for those things which wealth can buy, she had made up her mind that she could not do without Horace Smithson’s money; and she must therefore needs resign herself to the disagreeable necessity of taking Smithson and his money together. The great auctioneer Fate would not divide the lot.
She told herself that for her a loveless marriage was, after all, no prodigious sacrifice. She had found out that heart made but a small figure in the sum of her life. She could do without love. A year ago she had fancied herself in love with John Hammond. In her seclusion at St. Bees, in the long, dull August days, sauntering up and down by the edge of the sea, in the melancholy sunset hour, she thought that her heart was broken, that life was worthless without the man she loved. She had thought and felt all this, but not strongly enough to urge her to any great effort, not keenly enough to make her burst her chains. She had preferred to suffer this loss than to sacrifice her chances of future aggrandisement. And now she looked back and remembered those sunset walks by the sea, and all her thoughts and feelings in those silent summer hours; and she smiled at herself, half in scorn, half in pity, for her own weakness. How easily she had learned to do without him who at that hour seemed the better part of her existence. A good deal of gaiety and praise, a little mild flirtation at Kirkbank Castle, and lo! the image of her first lover began to grow dim and blurred, like a faded photograph. A season at Cannes, and she was cured. A week in London, and that first love was a thing of the past, a dream from which the dreamer awaketh, forgetting the things that he has dreamt.
Remembering all this she told herself that she had no heart, that love or no love was a question of very little moment, and that the personal qualities of the man whom she chose for a husband mattered nothing to her, provided that his lands and houses and social status came up to her standard of merit. She had seen Mr. Smithson’s houses and lands; and she was distinctly assured that he would in due course be raised to the peerage. She had, therefore, every reason to be satisfied.
Having thus reasoned out the circumstances of her new life, she accepted her fate with a languid grace, which harmonised with her delicate and patrician beauty. Nobody could have for a moment supposed from her manner that she loved Horace Smithson; but nobody had the right to think that she detested him. She accepted all his attentions as a thing of course. The flowers which he strewed beneath her footsteps, the pearls which he melted in her wine–metaphorically speaking–were just ‘good enough’ and no more. This afternoon, when Mr. Smithson asked her how she liked the arrangements of the saloon and cabin, she said she thought they would do very nicely. ‘They would do.’ Nothing more.
‘It is dreadfully small, of course,’ she said, ‘when one is accustomed to rooms: but it is rather amusing to be in a sort of doll’s house, and on deck it is really very nice.’
This was the most Mr. Smithson had for his pains, and he seemed to be content therewith. If a man will marry the prettiest girl of the year he must be satisfied with such scant civility as conscious perfection may give him. We know that Aphrodite was not altogether the most comfortable wife, and that Helen was a cause of trouble.
Mr. Smithson sat in a bamboo chair beside his mistress, and looked ineffably happy when she handed him a cup of tea. Sky and sea were one exquisite azure–the colours of the boats glancing in the sunshine as if they had been jewels; here an emerald rudder, there a gunwale painted with liquid rubies. White sails, white frocks, white ducks made vivid patches of light against the blue. The landscape yonder shone and sparkled as if it had been incandescent. All the world of land and sky and sea was steeped in sunshine. A day on which to do nothing, read nothing, think nothing, only to exist.
While they sat basking in the balmy atmosphere, looking lazily at that bright, almost insupportable picture of blue sea under blue sky, there came the dip of oars, making music, and a sound of coolness with every plash of water.
‘How good it is of somebody to row about, just to give us that nice soothing sound,’ murmured Lesbia.
Lady Kirkbank, with her dear old head thrown back upon the cushion of her luxurious chair, and her dear little cornflower hat just a thought on one side, was sleeping the sleep of the just, and unconsciously revealing the little golden arrangements which gave variety to her front teeth.
The soothing sound came nearer and nearer, close under the _Cayman’s_ quarter, and then a brown hand clasped the man-ropes, and a light slim figure swung itself upon deck, while the boat bobbed and splashed below.
It was Montesma, who had not been expected till the racing, which was not to begin for two days. A faint, faint rose bloom flushed Lady Lesbia’s cheek at sight of him; and Mr. Smithson gave a little look of vexation, just one rapid contraction of the eyebrows, which resumed their conventional placidity the next instant.
‘So good of you,’ he murmured. ‘I really did not expect you till the beginning of the week.’
‘London is simply insupportable in this weather–most of all for a man born in the Havanas. My soul thirsted for blue water. So I said to myself, This good Smithson is at Cowes; he will give me the run of his yacht and a room at his villa. Why not go to Cowes at once?’
‘The room is at your service. I have only two or three of my people at Formosa, but just enough to look after a bachelor friend.’
‘I want very little service, my dear fellow,’ answered Montesma, pleasantly. ‘A man who has crossed the Cordilleras and camped in the primeval forest on the shores of the Amazon, learns to help himself. So this is the _Cayman_? _Muy deleitoso, mi amigo_. A floating Paradise in little. If the ark had been like this, I don’t think any of the passengers would have wanted the flood to dry up.’
He shook hands with Lady Lesbia as he spoke, and with Lady Kirkbank, who looked at him as if he were part of her dream, and then he sank into the chair on Lesbia’s left hand, with the air of being established for the rest of the day.
‘I have left my portmanteaux at the end of the pier,’ he said lazily. ‘I dare say one of your fellows will be good enough to take them to Formosa for me?’
Mr. Smithson gave the necessary order. All the beauty had gone out of the sea and the sky for him, all the contentment from his mind; and yet he was in no position to rebel against Fate–in no position to say directly or indirectly, ‘Don Gomez de Montesma, I don’t want you here, and I must request you to transfer yourself elsewhither.’
Lesbia’s feelings were curiously different. The very sight of that nervous brown hand upon the rope just now had sent a strange thrill through her veins. She who believed herself heartless could scarce trust herself to speak for the vehement throbbing of her heart. A sense of joy too deep for words possessed her as she reclined in her low chair, with drooping eyelids, yet feeling the fire of those dark southern eyes upon her face, scorching her like an actual flame.
‘Lady Lesbia, may I have a cup of tea?’ he asked; not because he wanted the tea, but only for the cruel delight of seeing if she were able to give it to him calmly.
Her hands shook, fluttered, wandered helplessly, as she poured out that cup of tea and handed it to Montesma, a feminine office which she had performed placidly enough for Mr. Smithson. The Spaniard took the cup from her with a quiet smile, a subtle look which seemed to explore the inmost depth of her consciousness.
Yes, this man was verily her master. She knew it, and he know it, as that look of his told her. Vain to play her part of languid indifference–vain to struggle against her bondage. In heart and spirit she was at his feet, an odalisque, recognising and bowing down to her sultan.
Happily for the general peace, Mr. Smithson had been looking away seaward, with a somewhat troubled brow, while that little cap and saucer episode was being enacted. And in the next minute Lesbia had recovered her self-command, and resumed that graceful languor which was one of her charms. She was weak, but she was not altogether foolish; and she had no idea of succumbing to this new influence–of yielding herself up to this conqueror, who seemed to take her life into his hand as if it were a bit of thistledown. Her agitation of those first few minutes was due to the suddenness of his appearance–the reaction from dulness to delight. She had been told that he was not to be at Cowes till Monday, and lo! he was here at her side, just as she was thinking how empty and dreary life was without him.
He dropped into his place so naturally and easily, made himself so thoroughly at home and so agreeable to every one, that it was almost impossible for Horace Smithson to resent his audacity! Mr. Smithson’s vitals might be devoured by the gnawing of the green-eyed monster, but however fierce that gnawing were, he did not want to seem jealous. Montesma was there as the very incarnation of some experiences in Mr. Smithson’s past career, and he dared not object to the man’s presence.
And so the summer day wore on. They had the yacht all to themselves that evening, for the racing yachts were fulfilling engagements in other waters, and the gay company of pleasure-seekers had not yet fully assembled. They were dropping in one by one, all the evening, and Cowes roads grew fuller of life with every hour of the summer night.
Mr. Smithson and his guests dined in the saloon, a snug little party of four, and sat long over dessert, deep into the dusk; and they talked of all things under heaven, things frivolous, things grave, but most of all about that fair, strange world in far-off southern waters, the sunny islands of the Caribbean Sea, and the dreamy, luxurious life of that tropical clime, half Spanish, half Oriental, wholly independent of European conventionalities. Lesbia listened, enchanted by the picture. What were Park Lane palaces, and Berkshire manors, the petty splendours of the architect and the upholsterer, weighed against a world in which all nature is on a grander scale? Mr. Smithson might give her fine houses and costly upholstery; but only the Tropic of Cancer could give her larger and brighter stars, a world of richer colouring, a land of perpetual summer, nights luminous with fire-flies, gardens in which the fern and the cactus were as forest trees, and where humming-birds flashed among the foliage like living flowers; nay, where the flowers themselves took the forms of the animal world and seemed instinct with life and motion.
‘Yes,’ said Mr. Smithson, with his gentlemanlike drawl, ‘Spanish America and the West Indies are delightful places to talk about. There are so many things one leaves out of the picture–thieves, niggers, jiggers, snakes, mosquitoes, yellow Jack, creeping, crawling creatures of all kinds. I always feel very glad I have been to South America.’
‘Why?’
‘In order that I may never go there again,’ replied Mr. Smithson.
‘I was beginning to hope you would take me there some day,’ said Lesbia.
‘Never again, no, not even for your sake. No man should ever leave Europe after he is five-and-thirty; indeed, I doubt if after that age he should venture beyond the Mediterranean. That is the sea of civilisation. Anything outside it means barbarism.’
‘I hope we are going to travel by-and-by,’ said Lesbia; ‘I have been mewed up in Grasmere half my life, and if you are going to confine me to the shores of the Mediterranean, which is, after all, only a larger lake, for the other half of my life, my existence will be a dull piece of work after all. I agree with what Don Gomez said the other night: “Not to travel is not to live.”‘
They went on deck presently and sat in the summer darkness, lighted only by the stars, and by the lights of the yachts, and the faintly gleaming windows of the lighted town, sat long and late, in a state of ineffable repose. Lady Kirkbank. fortified by the produce of Mr. Smithson’s particular _clos_, and by a couple of glasses of green Chartreuse, slept profoundly. She had not enjoyed herself so much for the last three months. She had been stretched on Society’s rack, and she had been ground in Society’s mill; and neither mind nor body had been her own to do what she liked withal. She had toiled early and late, and had spared herself in no wise. And now the trouble was over for a space. Here were rest and respite. She had done her duty as a chaperon, had provided her charge with the very best thing the matrimonial market offered. She had paid her creditors something on account all round, and had left them appeased and trustful, if not content. Sir George had gone oft alone to drink the waters at Spa, and to fortify himself for Scotland and the grouse season. She was her own mistress, and she could fold her hands and take her rest, eat and drink and sleep and be merry, all at Mr. Smithson’s expense.
The yachts came flocking in next day, like a flight of white-winged sea birds, and Mr. Smithson had enough to do receiving visitors upon the _Cayman_. He was fully occupied; but Montesma had nothing to do, except to amuse Lady Lesbia and her chaperon, and in this onerous task he succeeded admirably. Lesbia found that it was too warm to be on the deck when there were perspiring people, whose breath must be ninety by the thermometer, perpetually coming on board; so she and Lady Kirkbank sat in the saloon, and had the more distinguished guests brought down to them as to a Court; and the shrewder of the guests were quick to divine that no company beyond that of Don Gomez de Montesma was really wanted in that rose-scented saloon.
The Spaniard taught Lady Kirkbank _monte_, which delighted her, and which she vowed she would introduce at her supper parties in the half season of November, when she should be in London for a week or two, as a bird of passage, flitting southwards. He began to teach Lesbia Spanish, a language for which she had taken a sudden fancy; and it is curious what tender accents, what hidden meanings even a grammar can take from such a teacher. Spanish came easily enough to a learner who had been thoroughly drilled in French and Italian, and who had been taught the rudiments of Latin; so by the end of a lesson, which went on at intervals all day, the pupil was able to lisp a passage of Don Quixote in the sweetest Castilian, very sweet to the ear of Don Gomez–a kind of baby language, precious as the first half-formed syllables of infancy to mothers.
Montesma had nothing to do but to amuse himself and his companions all day in the saloon, amidst odours of roses and peaches, in a shadowy coolness made by striped silken blinds; but Mr. Smithson was not so much his own master. That innumerable company of friends which are the portion of the rich man given to hospitality would not let the owner of the _Cayman_ go scot-free.
At a place like Cowes, on the eve of the regatta week, the freelances of society expect to find entertainment; and Mr. Smithson had to maintain his character for princely hospitalities at the sacrifice of his feelings as a lover. Every ripple of Lesbia’s silvery laughter, every deep tone of Montesma’s voice, from the cabin below, sent a pang to his jealous soul; and yet he had to smile, and to order more champagne cup, and to be lavish of his best cigars, albeit insisting that his friends should smoke their cigars in the bows well to leeward, so that no foul breathings of tobacco should pollute his Cleopatra galley.
Cleopatra was very happy meanwhile, sublimely indifferent even to the odours of tobacco. She had her Antony at her feet, looking up at her, as she recited her lesson, with darkly luminous eyes, obviously worshipping her, obviously intent on winning her without counting the cost. When had a Montesma ever counted the cost to himself or others–the cost in gold, in honour, in human life? The records of Cuba in the palmy days of the slave trade would tell how lightly they held the last; and for honour, well, the private hells of island and main could tell their tale of specially printed playing cards, in which the swords or stars on the back of each card had a secret language of their own, and were as finger-posts for the initiated player.
Mr. Smithson had business on shore, and was fain to leave the yacht for an hour or two before dinner. He invited Don Gomez to go with him, but the offer was graciously declined.
‘Amigo, I don’t care even to look at land in such weather. It is so detestably dry,’ he pleaded. ‘It is only the sound of the sea gurgling against the hull that reconciles one to existence. Go, and be happy at your club, and send off those occult telegrams of yours, dearest. I shall not leave the _Cayman_ till bed-time.’
He looked as fresh and cool as if utterly unaffected by the heat, which to a Cuban must have been a merely lukewarm condition of the atmosphere. But he affected to be prostrate, and Smithson could not insist. He had his cards to play in a game which required extremest caution, and there were no friendly indicators on the backs of his kings and aces. He was feeling his way in the dark, and did not know how much mischief Montesma was prepared to do.
When the owner of the yacht was gone Don Gomez proposed an adjournment to the deck for afternoon tea, and the trio sat under the awning, tea-drinking and gossiping for the next hour. Lady Kirkbank told the steward to say not at home to everybody, just as if she had a street door.
‘There is a good deal of the _dolce far niente_ about this,’ said Montesma, presently; ‘but don’t you think we have been anchored in sight of that shabby little town quite long enough, and that it would be rather nice to spread our wings and sail round the island before the racing begins?’
‘It would be exquisite,’ said Lesbia. ‘I am very tired of inaction, though I dearly love learning Spanish,’ she added, with a lovely smile, and a look that was half submissive, half mutinous. ‘But I have really been beginning to wonder whether this boat can move.’
‘You will see that she can, and at a smart pace, too, if I sail her. Shall we circumnavigate the island? We can set sail after dinner.’
‘Will Mr. Smithson consent, do you think?’
‘Why does Smithson exist, except to obey you?’
‘I don’t know if Lady Kirkbank would quite like it,’ said Lesbia, looking at her chaperon, who was waving a big Japanese fan, slowly, unsteadily, and with a somewhat drunken air, the while she slid into dreamland.
‘Quite like what?’ she murmured, drowsily.
‘A little sail.’
‘I should dearly love it, if it didn’t make me sea-sick.’
‘Sea-sick on a glassy lake like this! Impossible,’ said Montesma. ‘I consider the thing settled. We set sail after dinner.’
Mr. Smithson came back to the yacht just in time to dress for dinner. Don Gomez excused himself from putting on his dress suit. He was going to sail the yacht himself, and he was dressed for his work, picturesquely, in white duck trousers, white silk shirt, and black velvet shooting jacket. He dined with the permission of the ladies, in this costume, in which he looked so much handsomer than in the livery of polite life. He had a red scarf tied round his waist, and when at his work by-and-by, he wore a little red silk cap, just stuck lightly on his dark hair. The dinner to-day was all animation and even excitement, very different from the languorous calm of yesterday. Lesbia seemed a new creature. She talked and laughed and flashed and sparkled as she had never yet done within Mr. Smithson’s experience. He contemplated the transformation with wonder not unmixed with suspicion. Never for him had she been so brilliant–never in response to his glances had her violet eyes thus kindled, had her smile been so entrancingly sweet. He watched Montesma, but in him he could find no fault. Even jealousy could hardly take objection to the Spaniard’s manner to Lady Lesbia. There was not a look, not a word that hinted at a private understanding between them, or which seemed to convey deeper meanings than the common language of society. No, there was no ground for fault-finding; and yet Smithson was miserable. He knew this man of old, and knew his influence over women.
Mr. Smithson handed over the management of the yacht without a murmer, albeit he pretended to be able to sail her himself, and was in the habit of taking the command for a couple of hours on a sunny afternoon, much to the amusement of skipper and crew. But Montesma was a sailor born and bred–the salt keen breath of the sea had been the first breath in his nostrils–he had managed his light felucca before he was twelve years old, had sailed every inch of the Caribbean Sea, and northward to the furthermost of the Bahamas before he was fifteen. He had lived more on the water than on the land in that wild boyhood of his; a boyhood in which books and professors had played but small part. Montesma’s school had been the world, and beautiful women his only professors. He had learnt arithmetic from the transactions of bubble companies; modern languages from the lips of the women who loved him. He was a crack shot, a perfect swordsman, a reckless horseman, and a dancer in whom dancing almost rose to genius. Beyond these limits he was as ignorant as dirt; but he had a cleverness which served as a substitute for book learning, and he seldom failed in impressing the people he met with the idea that he, Gomez de Montesma, was no ordinary man.
Directly after dinner the preparations for an immediate start began; very much to the disgust of skipper and crew, who were not in the habit of working after dinner; but Montesma cared nothing for the short answers of the captain, or the black look of the men.
Lesbia wanted to learn all about everything–the name of every sail, of every rope. She stood near the helmsman, a slim graceful figure in a white gown of some soft material, with never a jewel or a flower to relieve that statuesque simplicity. She wore no hat, and the rich chesnut hair was rolled in a loose knot at the back of the small Greek-looking head. Montesma came to her every now and then to explain what was being done; and by-and-by, when the canvas was all up, and the yacht was skimming over the water, like a giant swan borne by the current of some vast strong river, he came and stayed by her side, and they two sat making little baby sentences in Spanish, he as teacher and she as pupil, with no one near them but the sailors.
The owner of the _Cayman_ had disappeared mysteriously a quarter of an hour after the sails were unfurled, and Lady Kirkbank had tottered down to the saloon.
‘I am not going–cabin,’ she faltered, when Lesbia remonstrated with her, ‘only–going–saloon–sofa–lie down–little–Smithson take care–you,’ not perceiving that Smithson had vanished, ‘shall be–quite close.’
So Lesbia and Don Gomez were alone under the summer stars, murmuring little bits of Spanish.
‘It is the only true way of learning a language,’ he said; ‘grammars are a delusion.’
It was a very delightful and easy way of learning, at any rate. Lesbia reclined in her bamboo chair, and fanned herself indolently, and watched the shadowy shores of the island, cliff and hill, down and wooded crest, flitting past her like dream-pictures, and her lips slowly shaped the words of that soft lisping language–so simple, so musical–a language made for lovers and for song, one would think. It was wonderful what rapid progress Lesbia made.
She heard a church clock on the island striking, and asked Don Gomez the hour.
‘Ten,’ he said.
‘Ten! Surely it must be later. It was past eight before we began dinner, and we have been sailing for ever so long. Captain, kindly tell me the time,’ she called to the skipper, who was lolling over the gunwale near the foremast smoking a meditative pipe.
‘Twelve o’clock, my lady.’
‘Heavens, can I possibly have been sitting here so long. I should like to stay on deck all night and watch the sailing; but I must really go and take care of poor Lady Kirkbank. I am afraid she is not very well.’
‘She had a somewhat distracted air when she went below, but I daresay she will sleep off her troubles. If I were you I should leave her to herself.’
‘Impossible! What can have become of Mr. Smithson?’
‘I have a shrewd suspicion that it is with Smithson as with poor Lady Kirkbank.’
‘Do you mean that he is ill?’
‘Precisely.’
‘What, on a calm summer night, sailing over a sea of glass. The owner of a yacht!’
‘Rather ignominious for poor Smithson, isn’t it? But men who own yachts are only mortal, and are sometimes wretched sailors. Smithson is feeble on that point, as I know of old.’
‘Then wasn’t it rather cruel of us to sail his yacht?’
‘Yachts are meant for sailing, and again, sea-sickness is supposed to be a wholesome exercise.’
‘Good-night.’
‘Good-night,’ both good nights in Spanish, and with a touch of tenderness which the words could hardly have expressed in English.
‘Must you really go?’ pleaded Montesma, holding her hand just a thought longer than he had ever held it before.
‘Ah, the little more, and how much it is,’ says the poet.
‘Really and truly.’
‘I am so sorry. I wish you could have stayed on deck all night.’
‘So do I, with all my heart. This calm sea under the starlit sky is like a dream of heaven.’
‘It is very nice, but if you stayed I think I could promise you considerable variety. We shall have a tempest before morning.’
‘Of all things in the world I should love to see a thunderstorm at sea.’
‘Be on the alert then, and Captain Parkes and I will try to oblige you.’
‘At any rate you have made it impossible for me to sleep. I shall stay with Lady Kirkbank in the saloon. Good-night, again.’
‘Good-night.’
CHAPTER XXXIX.
IN STORM AND DARKNESS.
Lesbia found Lady Kirkbank prostrate on a low divan in the saloon, sleepless, and very cross. The atmosphere reeked with red lavender, sal-volatile, eau de Cologne, and brandy, which latter remedy poor Georgie had taken freely in her agonies. Kibble, the faithful Grasmere girl, sat by the divan, fanning the sufferer with a large Japanese fan. Rilboche had naturally, as a Frenchwoman, succumbed utterly to her own feelings, and was moaning in her berth, wailing out every now and then that she would never have taken service with Miladi had she suspected her to be capable of such cruelty as to take her to live for weeks upon the sea.
If this was the state of affairs now while the ocean was only gently stirred, what would it be by-and-by if the tempest should really come?
‘What can you be thinking of, staying on deck all night with those men?’ exclaimed Lady Kirkbank, peevishly. ‘It is hardly respectable.’
She would have been still more inclined to object had she known that Lesbia’s companion had been ‘that man’ rather than ‘those men.’
‘What do you mean by all night?’ Lesbia retorted, contemptuously; ‘it is only just twelve.’
‘Only twelve. I thought we were close upon daylight. I have suffered an eternity of agony.’
‘I am very sorry you should be ill; but really the sea has been so deliciously calm.’
‘I believe I should have suffered less if it had been diabolically rough. Oh, that monotonous flip-flap of the water, that slow heaving of the boat! Nothing could be worse.’
‘I am glad to hear you say that, for Don Gomez says we are likely to have a tempest.’
‘A tempest!’ shrieked Georgie. ‘Then let him stop the boat this instant and put me on shore. Tell him to land me anywhere–on the Needles even. I could stop at the lighthouse till morning. A storm at sea will be simply my death.’
‘Dear Lady Kirkbank, I was only joking,’ said Lesbia, who did not want to be worried by her chaperon’s nervous apprehensions: ‘so far the night is lovely.’
‘Give me a spoonful more brandy, my good creature,’–to Kibble. ‘Lesbia, you ought never to have brought me into this miserable state. I consented to staying on board the yacht; but I never consented to sailing on her.’
‘You will soon be well, dear Lady Kirkbank; and you will have such an appetite for breakfast to-morrow morning.’
‘Where shall we be at breakfast time?’
‘Off St. Catherine’s Point, I believe–just half way round the island.’
‘If we are not at the bottom of the sea,’ groaned Georgie.
They were now in the open Channel, and the boat dipped and rose to larger billows than had encountered her course before. Lady Kirkbank lay in a state of collapse, in which life seemed only sustainable by occasional teaspoonfuls of cognac gently tilted down her throat by the patient Kibble.
Lesbia went to her cabin, but with no intention of remaining there. She was firmly convinced that the storm would come, and she meant to be on deck while it was raging. What harm could thunder or lightning, hail or rain, do to her while he was by to protect her? He would be busy sailing the boat, perhaps, but still he would have a moment now and then in which to think of her and care for her.
Yes, the storm was coming. There was a livid look upon the waters, and the atmosphere was heavy with heat; the sky to windward black as a funeral pall. Lesbia was almost fearless, yet she felt a thrill of awe as she looked into that dense blackness. To leeward the stars were still visible; but that gigantic mass of cloud came creeping slowly, solemnly over the sky, while the shadow flitted fast across the water, swallowing up that ghastly electric glare.
Lesbia wrapped herself in a white cashmere _sortie de bal_ and stole up the companion. Montesma was working at the ropes with his own hands, calling directions to the sailors to shorten and take in the canvas, urging them to increased efforts by working at the ropes with his own hands, springing up the rigging and on deck, flashing backwards and forwards amidst the rigging like a being of supernatural power. He had taken off his jacket, and was clad from top to toe in white, save for that streak of scarlet which tightly girdled his waist. His tall flexible form, perfect in line as a Greek statue of Hermes, stood out against the background of black night. His voice, with its tones of brief imperious command, the proud carriage of his head, the easy grace of his rapid movements, all proclaimed the man born to rule over his fellow-men. And it is these master spirits, these born rulers, whom women instinctively recognise as their sovereign lords, and for whom women count no sacrifice too costly.
In the midst of his activity Montesma suddenly saw that white-robed figure standing at the top of the companion, and flew to her side. The boat was pitching heavily, dipping into the trough of the sea at an angle of forty-five degrees, as it seemed to Lesbia.
‘You ought not to be here,’ said Montesma; ‘it is much rougher than I expected.’
‘I am not afraid,’ she answered; ‘but I will go back to my cabin if I am in your way.’
‘In my way’ (with deepest tenderness): ‘yes, you are in my way, for I shall think of nothing else now you are here. But I believe we have done all that need be done to the yacht, and I can take care of you till the storm is over.’
He put his arm round her as the stem dipped, and led her towards the stern, guiding her footsteps, supporting her as her light figure swayed against him with the motion of the boat. A vivid flash of lightning showed him her face as they stood for an instant leaning against each other, his arm encircling her. Ah, what deep feeling in that countenance, once so passionless; what a new light in those eyes. It was like the awakening of a long dormant soul.
He took the helm from the captain and stood steering the vessel, and calling out his orders, with Lesbia close beside him, holding her with his disengaged arm, drawing her near him as the vessel pitched violently, drawing her nearer still when they shipped a sea, and a great fountain of spray enfolded them both in a dense cloud of salt water.
The thunder roared and rattled, as if it began and ended close beside them. Forked lightnings zigzagged amidst the rigging. Sheet lightning enwrapped those two in a luminous atmosphere, revealing faces that were pale with passion, lips that trembled with emotion. There were but scant opportunity for speech, and neither of these two felt the need of words. To be together, bound nearer to each other than they had ever been yet, than they might ever be again, in the midst of thunder and lightning and dense clouds of spray. This was enough. Once when the _Cayman_ pitched with exceptional fury, when the thunder crashed and roared loudest, Lesbia found her head lying on Montesma’s breast and his arms round her, his lips upon her face. She did not wrench herself from that forbidden embrace. She let those lips kiss hers as never mortal man had kissed her before. But an instant later, when Montesma’s attention was distracted by his duties as steersman, and he let her go, she slipped away in the darkness, and melted from his sight and touch like a modern Undine. He dared not leave the helm and follow her then. He sent one of the sailors below a little later, to make sure that she was safe in her cabin; but he saw her no more that night.
The storm abated soon after daybreak, and the morning was lovely; but Don Gomez and Lady Lesbia did not meet again till the church bells on the island were ringing for morning service, and then the lady was safe under the wing of her chaperon, with her affianced husband in attendance upon her at the breakfast table in the saloon.
She received Montesma with the faintest inclination of the head, and she carefully avoided all occasion of speech with him during the leisurely, long spun-out meal. She was as white as her muslin gown, and her eyes told of a sleepless night. She talked a little, very little to Lady Kirkbank and Mr. Smithson; to the Spaniard not at all. And yet Montesma was in no manner dashed by this appearance of deep offence. So might Francesca have looked the morning after that little scene over the book; yet she sacrificed her salvation for her lover all the same. It was a familiar stage upon the journey which Montesma knew by heart. Here the inclination of the road was so many degrees more or less; for this hill you are commanded to put on an extra horse; at this stage it is forbidden to go more than eight miles an hour, and so on, and so on. Montesma knew every inch of the ground. He put on a melancholy look, and talked very little. He had been on deck all night, and so there was an excuse for his being quiet.
Lady Kirkbank related her impressions of the storm, and talked enough for four. She had suffered the pangs of purgatory, but her natural cheeriness asserted itself, and she made no moaning about past agonies which had exercised a really delightful influence on her appetite. Mr. Smithson also was cheerful. He had paid his annual tribute to Neptune, and might hope to go scot-free for the rest of the season.
‘If I had stayed on deck I must have had my finger in the pie; so I thought it better to go below and get a good night’s rest in the steward’s cabin,’ he said, not caring to confess his sufferings as frankly as Lady Kirkbank admitted hers.
After breakfast, which was prolonged till noon, Montesma asked Smithson to smoke a cigarette on deck with him.
‘I want to talk to you on a rather serious matter,’ he said.
Lesbia heard the words, and looked up with a frightened glance. Could he mean to attempt anything desperate? Was he going to confess the fatal truth to Horace Smithson, to tell her affianced lover that she was untrue to her bond, that she loved him, Montesma, as fondly as he loved her, that their two souls had mingled like two flames fanned by the same current, and thence had risen to a conflagration which must end in ruin, if she were not set free to follow where her heart had gone, free to belong to that man whom her spirit chose for lord and master. Her heart leapt at the hope that Montesma was going to do this, that he was strong enough to break her bonds for her, powerful and rich enough to secure her a brilliant future. Yet this last consideration, which hitherto had been paramount, seemed now of but little moment. To be with _him_, to belong to _him_, would be enough for bliss. Albeit that in such a choice she forfeited all that she had ever possessed or hoped for of earthly prosperity. Adventurer, beggar, whatever he might be, she chose him, and loved him with all the strength of a weak soul newly awakened to passionate feeling.
Unhappily for Lesbia Haselden, Montesma was not at all the kind of man to take so direct and open a course as that which she imagined possible.
His business with Mr. Smithson was of quite a different kind.
‘Smithson, do you know that you have an utterly incompetent crew?’ he said, gravely, when they two were standing aft, lighting their cigarettes.
‘Indeed I do not. The men are all experienced sailors, and the captain ranks high among yachtsmen.’
‘English yachtsmen are not particularly good judges of sailors. I tell you your skipper is no sailor, and his men are fools. If it had not been for me the _Cayman_ would have gone to pieces on the rocks last night, and if you are to cross to St. Malo, as you talked of doing, for the regatta there, you had better sack these men and let me get you a South American crew. I know of a fellow who is in London just now–the captain of a Rio steamer, who’ll send you a crew of picked men, if you give me authority to telegraph to him.’
‘I don’t like foreign sailors,’ said Smithson, looking perplexed and worried; ‘and I have perfect confidence in Wilkinson.’
‘Which is as much as to say that you consider me a liar! Go to the bottom your own way, _mon ami: ce n’est pas mon affaire,_’ said Montesma, turning on his heel, and leaving his friend to his own devices.
Had he pressed the point, Smithson would have suspected him of some evil motive, and would have been resolute in his resistance; but as he said no more about it, Smithson began to feel uncomfortable.
He was no sailor himself, knew absolutely nothing about the navigation of his yacht, though he sometimes pretended to sail her; and he had no power to judge of his skipper’s capacity or his men’s seamanship. He had engaged the captain wholly on the strength of the man’s reputation, guaranteed by certain certificates which seemed to mean a great deal. But after all such certificates might mean very little–such a reputation might be no real guarantee. The sailors had been engaged by the captain, and their ruddy faces and thoroughly British appearence, the exquisite cleanliness which they maintained in every detail of the yacht, had seemed to Mr. Smithson the perfection of seamanship.
But it was not the less true that the cleanest of yachts, with deck of spotless whiteness, sails of unsullied purity, brasses shining and sparkling like gold fresh from the goldsmith’s, might be spiked upon a rock, or might founder on a sand-bank, or heel over under too much canvas. Mr. Smithson was inclined to suspect any proposition of Montesma’s; yet he was not the less disturbed in mind by the assertion.
The day wore on, and the yacht sailed merrily over a summer sea. Mr. Smithson fidgeted about the deck uneasily, watching every movement of the sailors. No boat could be sailing better, as it seemed to him; but in such weather and over such waters any boat must needs go easily. It was in the blackness of night, amidst the fury of the storm, that Montesma’s opinion had been formed. Smithson began to think that his friend was right. The sailors had honest countenances, but they looked horribly stupid. Could men with such vacuous grins, such an air of imbecile good-nature, be capable of acting wisely in any terrible crisis?–could they have nerve and readiness, quickness, decision, all those grand qualites which are needed by the seaman who has to contend with the fury of the elements?
Mr. Smithson and his guests had breakfasted too late for the possibility of luncheon. They were in Cowes Roads by one o’clock. A fleet of yachts had arrived during their absence, and the scene was full of life and gaiety. Lady Lesbia held a _levee_ at the afternoon tea, and had a crowd of her old admirers around her–adorers whose presence in no wise disturbed Horace Smithson’s peace. He would have been content that his wife should go through life with a herd of such worshippers following in her footsteps. He knew the aimless innocence, the almost infantine simplicity of the typical Johnnie, Chappie, _Muscadin, Petit Creve, Gommeux_–call him by what name you will. From these he feared no evil. But in that one follower who gave no outward token of his worship he dreaded peril. It was Montesma he watched, while dragoons with close-cropped hair, and imbecile youths with heads rigid in four-inch collars, were hanging about Lady Lesbia’s low bamboo chair, and administering obsequiously to the small necessities of the tea-table.
It was while this tea-table business was going on that Mr. Smithson took the opportunity of setting his mind at rest, were it possible, as to the merits of Captain Wilkinson. Among his visitors this afternoon there was the owner of three or four racing yachts–a man renowned for his victories, at home and abroad.
‘I think you knew something of my captain, Wilkinson, before I engaged him,’ said Smithson, with assumed carelessness.
‘I know every skipper on board every boat in the squadron,’ answered his friend. ‘A good fellow, Wilkinson–thoroughly honest fellow.’
‘Honest; oh yes, I know all about that. But how about his seamanship? His certificates were wonderfully good, but they are not everything.
‘Everything, my dear fellow,’ cried the other; ‘they are next to nothing. But I believe Wilkinson is a tolerable sailor.’
This was not encouraging.
‘He has never been unlucky, I believe.’
‘My dear Smithson, you are a great authority in the City, but you are not very well up in the records of the yachting world, or you would know that your Captain Wilkinson was skipper on the _Orinoco_ when she ran aground on the Chesil Bank, coming home from Cherbourg Regatta, fifteen lives lost, and the yacht, in less than half an hour, ground to powder. That was rather a bad case, I remember; for though it was a tempestuous night, the accident would never have happened if Wilkinson had not mistaken the lights. So you see his Trinity House papers didn’t prevent his going wrong.’
Good heavens! This was the strongest confirmation of Montesma’s charge. The man was a stupid man, an incapable man, a man to whose intelligence and care human life should never be trusted. A fig for his honesty! What would honesty be worth in a hurricane off the Chesil Beach? What would honesty serve a ship spitted on the Jailors off Jersey? Montesma was right. If the _Cayman_ was to make a trip to St. Malo she must be navigated by competent men. Horace Smithson hated foreign sailors, copper-faced ruffians, with flashing black eyes which seemed to threaten murder, did you but say a rough word to them; sleek, raven-haired scoundrels, with bowie-knives in their girdles, ready for mutiny. But, after all, life is worth too much to be risked for a prejudice, a sentiment.
Perhaps that St. Malo business might be avoided; and then there need be no change in captain or crew. The yacht must be safe enough lying at anchor in the roadstead. By-and-by, when the visitors had departed, and Mr. Smithson was reposefully enjoying his tea by Lady Lesbia’s side, he approached the subject.
‘Do you really care about crossing to St. Malo after this–really prefer the idea to Ryde?’
‘Infinitely,’ exclaimed Lesbia, quickly. ‘Ryde would only be Cowes ever again–a lesser Cowes; and I thought when you first proposed it that the plan was rather stupid, though I did not want to be uncivil and say so. But I was delighted with Don Gomez de Montesma’s amendment, substituting St. Malo for Ryde. In the first place the trip across will be delicious’–Lady Kirkbank gave a faint groan–‘and in the second place I am dying to see Brittany.’
‘I doubt if you will highly appreciate St. Malo. It is a town of many and various smells.’
‘But I want to smell those foreign smells of which one hears much. At least it is an experience. We need not be on shore any longer than we like. And I want to see that fine rocky coast, and Chateaubriand’s tomb on the what’s-its-name. So nice to be buried in that way.’
‘Then you have set your heart on going to St. Malo, and would not like any change in our plan?’
‘Any change will be simply detestable,’ answered Lesbia, all the more decidedly since she suspected a desire for change on the part of Mr. Smithson.
She was in no amiable humour this afternoon. All her nerves seemed strained to their utmost tension. She was irritated, tremulous with nervous excitement, inclined to hate everybody, Horace Smithson most of all. In her cabin a little later on, when she was changing her gown for dinner, and Kibble was somewhat slow and clumsy in the lacing of the bodice, she wrenched herself from the girl’s hands, flung herself into a chair, and burst into a flood of passionate tears.
‘O God! that I were on one of those islands in the Caribbean Sea–an island where Europeans never come–where I might lie down among the poisonous tropical flowers, and sleep the rest of my days away. I am sick to death of my life here; of the yacht, the people–everything.’
‘This air is too relaxing, Lady Lesbia,’ the girl murmured, soothingly; ‘and you didn’t have your natural rest last night. Shall I get you a nice strong cup of tea?’
‘Tea! no. I have been living upon tea for the last twenty-four hours. I have eaten nothing. My mouth is parched and burning. Oh, Kibble!’ flinging her head upon the girl’s buxom arm, and letting it rest there, ‘what a happy creature you are–not a care–not a care.’
‘I’m sure you can’t have any cares, Lady Lesbia,’ said Kibble, with an incredulous smile, trying to smooth the disordered hair, anxious to make haste with the unfinished toilet, for it was within a few minutes of eight.
‘I am full of care. I am in debt–horribly in debt–getting deeper and deeper every day–and I am going to sell myself to the only man who can pay my debts and give me fine houses, and finery like this,’ plucking at the _crepe de chine_ gown, with its flossy fringe, its delicate lace, a marvel of artistic expenditure; a garment which looked simplicity itself, and yet was so cleverly contrived as to cost five-and-thirty guineas. The greatest effects in it required to be studied with a microscope.
‘But surely, dear Lady Lesbia, you won’t marry Mr. Smithson, if you don’t love him?’
‘Do you suppose love has anything to do with marriages in society?’
‘Oh, Lady Lesbia, it would be so unkind to him, so cruel to yourself.’
‘Cruel to myself. Yes, I am cruel to myself. I had the chance of happiness a year ago, and I lost it. I have the chance of happiness now–yes, of consummate bliss–and haven’t the courage to snatch at it. Take off this horrid gown, Kibble; my head is splitting: I shan’t go to dinner.’
‘Oh, Lady Lesbia, you are treading on the pearl embroidery,’ remonstrated poor Kibble, as Lesbia kicked the new gown from under her feet.
‘What does it matter!’ she exclaimed with a bitter little laugh. ‘It has not been paid for–perhaps it never will be.’
The dinner was silent and gloomy. It was as if a star had been suddenly blotted out of the sky. Smithson, ordinarily so hospitable, had been too much disturbed in mind to ask any of his friends to stay to dinner; so there were only Lady Kirkbank, who was too tired to be lively, and Montesma, who was inclined to be thoughtful. Lesbia’s absence, and the idea that she was ill, gave the feast almost a funereal air.
After dinner Smithson and Montesma sat on deck, smoking their cigars, and lazily watching the lights on sea, and the lights on shore; these brilliant in the foreground, those dim in the distance.
‘You can telegraph to your Rio Janeiro friend to-morrow morning, if you like,’ said Smithson, presently, ‘and tell him to send a first-rate skipper and crew. Lady Lesbia has made up her mind to see St. Malo Regatta, and with such a sacred charge I can’t be too careful.’
‘I’ll wire before eight o’clock to-morrow,’ answered Montesma, ‘You have decided wisely. Your respectable English Wilkinson is an excellent man–but nothing would surprise me less than his reducing your _Cayman_ to matchwood in the next gale.’
CHAPTER XL.
A NOTE OF ALARM.
That strange scene in the old house at Fellside made a profound impression upon Lord Hartfield. He tried to disguise his trouble, and did all in his power to seem gay and at perfect ease in his wife’s company; but his mind was full of anxiety, and Mary loved him too well to be for a moment in doubt as to his feelings.
‘There is something wrong, Jack,’ she said, while they were breakfasting at a table in the verandah, with the lake and the bills in front of them and the sweet morning air around them. ‘You try to talk and to be lively, but there is a little perpendicular wrinkle in your forehead which I know as well as the letters of the alphabet, and that little line means worry. I used to see it in the old days, when you were breaking your heart for Lesbia. Why cannot you be frank and confide in me. It is your duty, sir, as my husband.’
‘Is it my duty to halve my burdens as well as my joys? How do I know if those girlish shoulders are strong enough to bear the weight of them?’
‘I can bear anything you can bear, and I won’t be cheated out of my share in your worries. If you were obliged to have a tooth out, I would have one out too, for company.’
‘I hope the dentist would be too conscientious to allow that.’
‘Tell me your trouble, Hartfield,’ she said, earnestly, leaning across the table, bringing her grave intelligent face near to him.
They were quite alone, he and she. The servants had done their ministering. Behind them there was the empty dining-room, in front of them the sunlit panorama of lake and hill. There could not be a safer place for telling secrets.
‘Tell me what it is that worries you,’ Mary pleaded again.
‘I will, dear. After all perfect trust is the best; nay, it is your due, for you are brave enough and true enough to be trusted with secrets that mean life and death. In a word, then, Mary, the cause of my trouble is that old man we saw the other night.’
‘Steadman’s uncle?’
‘Do you really believe that he is Steadman’s uncle?’
‘My grandmother told me so,’ answered Mary, reddening to the roots of her hair.
To this girl, who was the soul of truth, there was deepest shame in the idea that her kinswoman, the woman whom of all the world she most owed reverence and honour, could be deemed capable of falsehood.
‘Do you think my grandmother would tell me an untruth?’
‘I do not believe that man is a poor dependent, an old servant’s kinsman, sheltered and cared for in this house for charity’s sake. Forgive me, Mary, if I doubt the word of one you love; but there are positions in life in which a man must judge for himself. Would Mr. Steadman’s kinsman be lodged as that old man is lodged; would he talk as that old man talks; and last and greatest perplexity of all, would he possess a treasure of gold and jewels which must be worth many thousands?’
‘But you cannot know for certain that those things are valuable; they may be rubbish that this poor old man has scraped together and hoarded for years, glass jewels bought at country fairs. Those rouleaux may contain lead or coppers.’
‘I do not think so, Mary. The stones had all the brilliancy of valuable gems, and then there were others in the finest filagree settings–goldsmith’s work which bore the stamp of an Eastern world. Take my word for it, that treasure came from India; and it must have been brought to England by Lord Maulevrier. It may have existed all these years without your grandmother’s knowledge. That is quite possible; but it seems to me impossible that such wealth should be within the knowledge and the power of a pauper lunatic.’
‘But if that unhappy old man is not a relation of Steadman’s supported here by my grandmother’s benevolence, who can he be, and why is he here?’ asked Mary.
‘Oh, Molly dear, these are two questions which I cannot answer, and which yet ought to be answered somehow. Since that night I have felt as if there were a dark cloud lowering over this house–a cloud almost as terrible in its menace of danger as the forshadowing of fate in a Greek legend. For your sake, for the honour of your race, for my own self-respect as your husband, I feel that this mystery ought to be solved, and all dark things made light before your grandmother’s death. When she is gone the master-key to the past will be lost.’
‘But she will be spared for many years, I hope, spared to sympathise with my happiness, and with Lesbia’s.’
My dearest girl, we cannot hope that. The thread of her life is worn very thin. It may snap at any moment. You cannot look seriously in your grandmother’s face, and yet delude yourself with the hope that she has years of life before her.’
‘It will be very hard to part, just as she has begun to care for me,’ said Mary, with her eyes full of tears.
‘All such partings are hard, and your grandmother’s life has been so lonely and joyless that the memory of it must always have a touch of pain. One cannot say of her as we can of the happy; she has lived her life–all things have been given to her, and she falls asleep at the close of a long and glorious day. For some reason which I cannot understand, Lady Maulevrier’s life has been a prolonged sacrifice.’
‘She has always given us to understand that she was fond of Fellside, and that this secluded life suited her,’ said Mary, meditatively.
‘I cannot help doubting her sincerity on that point. Lady Maulevrier is too clever a woman, and forgive me, dear, if I add too worldly a woman, to be content to live out of the world. The bird must have chafed its breast against the bars of the cage many and many a time when you thought that all was peace. Be sure, Mary, that your grandmother had a powerful motive for spending all her days in this place, and I can but think that the old man we saw the other night had some part in that motive. Do you remember telling me of her ladyship’s vehement anger when she heard you had made the acquaintance of her pensioner?’
‘Yes, she was very angry,’ Mary answered, with a troubled look. ‘I never saw her so angry–she was almost beside herself–said the harshest things to me–talked as if I had done some dreadful mischief.’
‘Would she have been so moved, do you think, unless there was some fatal secret involved in that man’s presence here?’
‘I hardly know what to think. Tell me everything. What is it that you fear?–what is it that you suspect?’
‘To tell you my fears and suspicions is to tell you a family secret that has been kept from you out of kindness all the years of your life–and I hardly think I could bring myself to that if I did not know what the world is, and how many good-natured friends Lady Hartfield will meet in society, by-and-by, ready to tell her, by hints and inuendoes, that her grandfather, the Governor of Madras, came back to England under a cloud of disgrace.’
‘My poor grandfather! How dreadful!’ exclaimed Mary, pale with pity and shame. ‘Did he deserve his disgrace, poor unhappy creature–or was he the victim of false accusation?’
‘I can hardly tell you that, Mary, any more than I can tell whether Warren Hastings deserved the abuse that was wreaked upon him at one time, or the acquittal that gave the lie to his slanderers in after years. The events occurred forty years ago–the story was only half known then, and like all such stories formed the basis for every kind of exaggeration and perversion.’
‘Does Maulevrier know?’ faltered Mary.
‘Maulevrier knows all that is known by the general public, and no more.’
‘And you have married the granddaughter of a disgraced man,’ said Mary, with a piteous look. ‘Did you know–when you married me?’
‘As much as I know now, dear love. If you had been Jonathan Wild’s granddaughter you would have been just as dear to me. I married _you_, dearest; I love _you_; I believe in _you_. All the grandfathers in Christendom would not shake my faith by one tittle.’
She threw herself into his arms, and sobbed upon his breast. But sweet as this assurance of his love was to her, she was not the less stricken by shame at the thought of possible infamy in the past, a shameful memory for ever brooding over her name in the present.
‘Society never forgets a scandal,’ she said: ‘I have heard Maulevrier say that.’
‘Society has a long memory for other people’s sins, but it only avenges its own wrongs. Give the wicked fairy Society a bad dinner, or leave her out of your invitation list for a ball, and she will twit you with the crimes or the misfortunes of a remote ancestor–she will go about talking of your grandfather the leper, or your great aunt who ran away with her footman. But so long as the wicked fairy gets all she wants out of you, she cares not a straw for the misdeeds of past generations.’
He spoke lightly, laughingly almost, and then he ordered the dogcart to be brought round immediately, and he drove Mary across the hills towards Langdale, to bring the colour back to her blanched cheeks. He brought her home in time to give her grandmother an hour for letter-writing before luncheon, while he walked up and down the terrace below Lady Maulevrier’s windows, meditating the course he was to take.
He was to leave Westmoreland next day to take his place in the House of Lords during the last important debate of the session. He made up his mind that before he left he would seek an interview with Lady Maulevrier, and boldly ask her to explain the mystery of that old man’s presence at Fellside. He was her kinsman by marriage, and he had sworn to honour her and to care for her as a son; and as a son he would urge her to confide in him, to unburden her conscience of any dark secret, and to make the crooked things straight, before she was called away.
While he was forecasting this interview, meeting imaginary objections, arguing points which might have to be argued, a servant came out to him with an ochre envelope on a little silver tray–that unpleasant-looking envelope which seems always a presage of trouble, great or small.
‘Lord Maulevrier, Albany, to Lord Hartfield, Fellside, Grasmere.
‘For God’s sake come to me at once. I am in great trouble; not on my own account, but about a relation.’
A relation–except his grandmother and his two sisters Maulevrier had no relations for whom he cared a straw. This message must have relation to Lesbia. Was she ill–dying, the victim of some fatal accident, runaway horses, boat upset, train smashed? There was something; and Maulevrier appealed to his nearest and best friend. There was no withstanding such an appeal. It must be answered, and immediately.
Lord Hartfield went into the library and wrote his reply message, which consisted of six words.
‘Going to you by first train.’
The next train left Windermere at three. There was just time to get a fresh horse put in the dogcart, and a Gladstone bag packed.
CHAPTER XLI.
PRIVILEGED INFORMATION.
Lord Hartfield did not arrive at Euston Square until near eleven o’clock at night. A hansom deposited him at the entrance to the Albany just as the clock of St. James’s Church chimed the hour. He found only Maulevrier’s valet. His lordship had waited indoors all the evening, and had only gone out a quarter of an hour ago. He had gone to the Cerberus, and begged that Lord Hartfield would be kind enough to follow him there.
Lord Hartfield was not fond of the Cerberus, and indeed deemed that lively place of rendezvous a very dangerous sphere for his friend Maulevrier; but in the face of Maulevrier’s telegram there was no time to be lost, so he walked across Piccadilly and down St. James’s Street to the fashionable little club, where the men were dropping in after the theatres and dinners, and where sheafs of bank notes were being exchanged for those various coloured counters which represented divers values, from the respectable ‘pony’ to the modest ‘chip.’
Maulevrier was in the first room Hartfield looked into, standing behind some men who were playing.
‘That’s something like friendship,’ he exclaimed, when he saw Lord Hartfield, and then he hooked his arm through his friend’s, and led him off to the dining room.
‘Come and have some supper, old fellow,’ he said, ‘and I can tell you my troubles while you are eating it. James, bring us a grill, and a lobster, and a bottle of Mumms, number 27, you know.’
‘Yes, my lord.’
‘Sorry to find you in this den, Maulevrier,’ said Lord Hartfield.
‘Haven’t touched a card. Haven’t done half an hour’s punting this season. But it’s a kind of habit with me to wander in here now and then. I know so many of the members. One poor devil lost nine thousand one night last week. Bather rough upon him, wasn’t it? All ready money at this shop, don’t you know.’
‘Thank God, I know nothing about it. And now, Maulevrier, what is wrong, and with whom?’
‘Everything is wrong, and with my sister Lesbia.’
‘Good heavens! what do you mean?’
‘Only this, that there is a fellow after her whose very name means ruin to women–a Spanish-American adventurer–reckless, handsome, a gambler, seducer, duellest, dare-devil. The man she is to marry seems to have neither nous nor spunk to defend her. Everybody at Goodwood saw the game that was being played, everybody at Cowes is watching the cards, betting on the result. Yes, great God, the men at the Squadron Club are staking their money upon my sister’s character–even monkeys that she bolts with Montesma–five to three against the marriage with Smithson ever coming off.’
‘Is this true.’
‘It is as true as your marriage with Molly, as true as your loyalty to me. I was told of it all this morning at the Haute Gomme by a man I can rely upon, a really good fellow, who would not leave me in the dark about my sister’s danger when all the smoking-rooms in Pall Mall were sniggering about it. My first impulse was to take the train for Cowes; but then I knew if I went alone I should let my temper get the better of me. I should knock somebody down–throw somebody out of the window–make a devil of a scene. And this would be fatal for Lesbia. I wanted your counsel, your cool head, your steady common-sense. “Not a step forward without Jack,” I said to myself, so I bolted off and sent that telegram. It relieved my feeling a little, but I’ve had a wretched day.’
‘Waiter, bring me a Bradshaw, or an A B C,’ said Lord Hartfield.
He had eaten nothing but a biscuit since breakfast, but he was ready to go off at once, supperless, if there were a train to carry him. Unluckily there was no train. The mail had started. Nothing till seven o’clock next morning.
‘Eat your supper, old fellow,’ said Maulevrier. ‘After all, the danger may not be so desperate as I fancied this morning. Slander is the favourite amusement of the age we live in. We must allow a margin for exaggeration.’
‘A very liberal margin,’ answered Hartfield. ‘No doubt the man who warned you meant honestly, but this scandal may have grown out of the merest trifles. The feebleness of the Masher’s brain is only exceeded by the foulness of the Masher’s tongue. I daresay this rumour about Lady Lesbia has its beginning and end among the Masher species.’
‘I hope so, but–I have seen those two together–I met them at Victoria one evening after Goodwood. Old Kirkbank was shuffling on ahead, carrying Smithson with her, absorbing his attention by fussification about her carriage. Lesbia and that Cuban devil were in the rear. They looked as if they had all the world to themselves. Faust and Marguerite in the garden were not in it for the expression of intense absorbing feeling compared with those two. I’m not an intellectual party, but I know something of human nature, and I know when a man and woman are in love with each other. It is one of the things that never has been, that never can be hidden.’
‘And you say this Montesma is a dangerous man?’
‘Deadly.’
‘Well, we must lose no time. When we are on the spot it will be easy to find out the truth; and it will be your duty, if there be danger, to warn Lesbia and her future husband.
‘I would much rather shoot the Cuban,’ said Maulevrier. ‘I never knew much good come of a warning in such a case: it generally precipitates matters. If I could play _ecarte_ with him at the club, find him sporting an extra king, throw my cards in his face, and accept his challenge for an exchange of shots on the sands beyond Cherbourg–there would be something like satisfaction’
‘You say the man is a gambler?’
‘Report says something worse of him. Report says he is a cheat.’
‘We must not be dependent upon society gossip,’ replied Lord Hartfield. ‘I have an idea, Maulevrier. The more we know about this man–Montesma, I think you called him—-‘
‘Gomez de Montesma.’
‘The more fully we are acquainted with Don Gomez de Montesma’s antecedents the better we shall be able to cope with him, if we come to handy-grips. It’s too late to start for Cowes, but it is not too late to do something. Fitzpatrick, the political-economist, spent a quarter of a century in South America. He is a very old friend–knew my father–and I can venture to knock at his door after midnight–all the more as I know he is a night-worker. He is very likely to enlighten us about your Cuban hidalgo.’
‘You shall finish your supper before I let you stir. After that you may do what you like. I was always a child in your hands, Jack, whether it was climbing a mountain or crossing the Horse-shoe Fall. I consider the business in your hands now. I’ll go with you wherever you like, and do what you tell me. When you want me to kick anybody, or fight anybody, you can give me the office and I’ll do it. I know that Lesbia’s interests are safe in your hands. You once cared very much for her. You are her brother-in-law now, and, next to me, you are her natural protector, taking into account that her future husband is a cad and doesn’t score.’
‘Meet me at Waterloo at ten minutes to seven to-morrow morning, and we’ll go down to Cowes together. I’m off to find Fitzpatrick. Good night.’
So they parted. Lord Hartfield walked across the Park to Great George Street, where Mr. Fitzpatrick had chambers of a semi-official character, on the first floor of a solemn-looking old house, spacious, gloomy without and within, walls sombre with the subdued colouring of decorations half a century old.
The lighted windows of those first-floor rooms told Lord Hartfield that he was not too late. He rang the bell, which was answered with the briefest delay by a sleepy-looking clerk, who had been taking shorthand notes for Mr. Fitzpatrick’s great book upon ‘Protection _versus_ Free Trade.’ The clerk looked sleepy, but his employer had as brisk an air as if he were just beginning the day; although he had been working without intermission since nine o’clock that evening, and had done a long day’s work before dinner. He was walking up and down the spacious unluxurious room, half office, half library, smoking a cigar. Upon a large table in the centre of the room stood two powerful reading lamps with green shades, illuminating a chaotic mass of books and pamphlets, heaped and scattered all over the table, save just on that spot between the two lamps, which accommodated Mr. Fitzpatrick’s blotting pad and inkpot, a pewter inkpot which held about a pint.
‘How d’ye do, Hartfield? Glad you’ve looked me up at last,’ said the Irishman, as if a midnight call were the most natural thing in the world. ‘Just come from the House?’
‘No; I’ve just come from Westmoreland. I thought I should find you among those everlasting books of yours, late as it is. Can I have a few words alone with you?’
‘Certainly. Morgan, you can go away for a bit.’
‘Home, sir?’
‘Home–well–yes, I suppose it’s late. You look sleepy. I should have been glad to finish the chapter on Beetroot Sugar to-night–but it may stand over for the morning. Be sure you’re early.’
‘Yes, sir,’ the clerk responded with a faint sigh.
He was paid handsomely for late hours, liberally rewarded for his shorthand services; and yet he wished the great Fitzpatrick had not been quite so industrious.
‘Now, my dear Hartfield, what can I do for you?’ asked Fitzpatrick, when the clerk had gone. ‘I can see by your face that you’ve something serious in hand. Can I help you?’
‘You can, I believe, in a very material way. You were five-and-twenty years in Spanish America?’
‘Rather more than less.’
‘Here, there, and everywhere?’
‘Yes; there is _not_ a city in South America that I have not lived in–for something between a day and a year.’
‘You know something about most men of any mark in that part of the world, I conclude?’
‘It was my business to know men of all kinds. I had my mission from the Spanish Government. I was engaged to examine the condition of commerce throughout the colony, the working of protection as against free trade, and so on. Strange, by-the-bye, that Cuba, the last place to foster the slave trade, was of all spots of the earth the first to carry free-trade principles into practical effect, long before they were recognised in any European country.’
‘Strange to me that you should speak of Cuba so soon after my coming in,’ answered Lord Hartfield. ‘I am here to ask you to help me to find out the antecedents of a man who hails from that island.’
‘I ought to know something about him, whoever he is,’ replied Mr. Fitzpatrick, briskly. ‘I spent six months in Cuba not very long before my return to England. Cuba is one of my freshest memories; and I have a pretty tight memory for facts, names and figures. Never could remember two lines of poetry in my life.’
‘Did you ever hear of, or meet with, a man called Montesma–Gomez de Montesma?’
‘Couldn’t have stopped a month in Havana without hearing something about that gentleman,’ answered Fitzpatrick, ‘I hope he isn’t a friend of yours, and that you have not lent him money?’
‘Neither; but I want to know all you can tell me about him.’
‘You shall have it in black and white, out of my Cuban note-book,’ replied the other, unlocking a drawer in the official table; ‘I always take notes of anything worth recording, on the spot. A man is a fool who trusts to memory, where personal character is at stake. Montesma is as well known at Havana as the Morro Fort or the Tacon Theatre. I have heard stories enough about him to fill a big volume; but all the facts recorded there’–striking the morocco cover of the note-book–‘have been thoroughly sifted; I can vouch for them.’
He looked at the index, found the page, and handed the book to Lord Hartfield.
‘Read for yourself,’ he said, quietly.
Lord Hartfield read three or four pages of plain statement as to various adventures by sea and land in which Gomez de Montesma had figured, and the reputation which he bore in Cuba and on the Main.
‘You can vouch for this?’ he said at last, after a long silence.
‘For every syllable.’
‘The story of his marriage?’
‘Gospel truth: I knew the lady.’
‘And the rest?’
‘All true.’
‘A thousand thanks. I know now upon what ground I stand. I have to save an innocent, high-bred girl from the clutches of a consummate scoundrel.’
‘Shoot him, and shoot her, too, if there’s no better way of saving her. It will be an act of mercy,’ said Mr. Fitzpatrick, without hesitation.
CHAPTER XLII.
‘SHALL IT BE?’
While Lord Hartfield sat in his friend’s office in Great George Street reading the life story of Gomez de Montesma, told with the cruel precision and the unvarnished language of a criminal indictment, the hero of that history was gliding round the spacious ballroom of the Cowes Club, with Lady Lesbia Haselden’s dark-brown head almost reclining on his shoulder, her violet eyes looking up at his every now and then, shyly, entrancingly, as he bent his head to talk to her.
The Squadron Ball was in full swing between midnight and the first hour of morning. The flowers had not lost their freshness, the odours of dust and feverish human breath had not yet polluted the atmosphere. The windows were open to the purple night, the purple sea. The stars seemed to be close outside the verandah, shining on purpose for the dancers; and these two–the man tall, pale, dark, with flashing eyes and short, sleek raven hair, small head, noble bearing; the girl divinely lovely in her marble purity of complexion, her classical grace of form–these two were, as every one avowed and acknowledged, the handsomest couple in the room.
‘We’re none of us in it compared with them,’ said a young naval commander to his partner, whereupon the young lady looked somewhat sourly, and replied that Lady Lesbia’s features were undeniably regular and her complexion good, but that she was wanting in soul.
‘Is she?’ asked the sailor, incredulously, ‘Look at her now. What do you call that, if it isn’t soul?’
‘I call it simply disgraceful,’ answered his partner, sharply turning away her head.
Lesbia was looking up at the Spaniard, her lips faintly parted, all her face listening eagerly as she caught some whispered word, breathed among the soft ripples of her hair, from lips that almost touched her brow. People cannot go on waltzing for ten minutes in a dead silence, like automatic dancers. There must be conversation. Only it is better that the lips should do most of the talking. When the eyes have so much to say society is apt to be censorious.
Mr. Smithson was smoking a cigarette on the lawn with a sporting peer. A man to whom tobacco is a necessity cannot be always on guard; but it is quite possible that in the present state of Lady Lesbia’s feelings Smithson would have had no restraining influence had he been ever so watchful. To what act in the passion drama had her love come to-night as