CHAPTER XVIII
BATTLING OLD BONES
They journeyed to Paris by the night mail. He was waiting for heron the platform when she descended from the wagon lit in the Garedu Nord. Sleepy passengers crowded with them into the customsdepartment. She, alone among them all, was smiling brightly, as ifthe world could be sweet at an hour when, by all odds, it shouldbe sleepiest.
"I was up and on the lookout for you at Amiens," he declared, asthey walked off together. "You might have got off there, you know,"with a wry grin.
"I shall not run away from you again, Brandon," she said earnestly."I promise, on my honour."
"By Jove," he cried, "that's a relief!" Then he broke into a happylaugh.
"I shall go to the Ritz," she said, after her effects had beenexamined and were ready for release.
"I thought so," he announced calmly. "I wired for rooms before Ileft London."
"Really, this is ridic--"
"Don't frown like that, Hetty," he pleaded.
As they rattled and bounced over the cobble-stones in a taxi-metreon the way to the Place Vendome, he devoted the whole ofhis conversation to the delicious breakfast they were to have,expatiating glibly on the wonderful berries that would come firstin that always-to-be-remembered meal. She was ravenously hungryby the time they reached the hotel, just from listening to hisdissertation on chops and rolls and coffee as they are served inParis, to say nothing of waffles and honey and the marmalade thatno Englishman can do without.
Alone in his room, however, he was quite another person. His calmassurance took flight the instant he closed the door and moodilybegan to prepare for his bath. Resolution was undiminished, butthe facts in the case were most desolating. Whatever it was thatstood between them, there was no gainsaying its power to influencetheir lives. It was no trifle that caused her to take this secondflight, and the sooner he came to realise the seriousness ofopposition the better.
He made up his mind on one point in that half-hour before breakfast:if she asked him again to let her go her way in peace, it was onlyfair to her and right that he should submit to the inevitable. Sheloved him, he was sure of it. Then there must be a very good reasonfor her perplexing attitude toward him. He would make one moreattempt to have the truth from her. Failing in that, he would acceptthe situation as hopeless, for the time being at least. She shouldknow that he loved her deeply enough for that.
She joined him in the little open-air cafe, and they sat down ata table in a remote corner. There were few people breakfasting. Inher tender blue eyes there was a look of sadness that haunted him,even as she smiled and called him beloved.
"Hetty, darling," he said, leaning forward and laying his hand onhers, "can't you tell me what it is?"
She was prepared for the question. In her heart she knew the timehad come when she must be fair with him. He observed the pallorthat stole, into her warm, smooth cheeks as she regarded him fixedlyfor a long time before replying.
"There is only one person in the world who can tell you, Brandon.It is for her to decide. I mean Sara Wrandall."
He felt a queer, sickening sensation of uneasiness sneak intoexistence. In the back of his mind, a hateful fear began to shapeitself. For a long time he looked into her sombre eyes, and as helooked the fear that was hateful took on something of a definiteshape.
"Did you know her husband?" he asked, and somehow he knew what theanswer would be.
"Yes," she replied, after a moment. She was startled. Her lipsremained parted.
He watched her closely. "Has this--this secret anything to do withChallis Wrandall?"
"It has," said she, meeting his gaze steadily.
His hands clutched the edge of the table in a grip that turned theknuckles white.
"Hetty!" he cried, in a hoarse whisper. "You--can't mean that you--"
"You must go to Sara," she cried hurriedly. "Haven't I told youthat she is the one--"
"Were you in love with that infernal scoundrel?" he demandedfiercely.
"Sara knows everything. She will tell you--"
"Were you carrying on an affair with him while professing to bethe friend of his wife? Tell me that! Did she find you out and--"
"Oh, Brandon, why will you persist?" she cried, her eyes aflame."I can tell you no more. Why do you glare at me as if I werethe meanest thing on earth? Is this love? Is this your idea ofgreatness? Isn't it enough for you to know that Sara is my loyal,devoted friend; that she--"
"Wait!" he commanded darkly. "Is it possible that she did notdiscover your secret until the day you left her house so abruptly?Does that explain your sudden departure?"
"I can answer that," she said quietly. "She has known everythingfrom the day I met her. I have not said anything, Brandon, to leadyou to believe that I was in love with Challis Wrandall, have I?"
His eyes softened. "No, you haven't. I--I hope you will forget whatI said. You see, I knew Wrandall's reputation. He had no sense ofhonour. He--"
"Well, I HAVE!" she said levelly.
He flushed. "I am a beast! I'll put it in this way, then: Was hein love with you?"
"You are still unfair. I shall not answer."
He was silent for a long time. "And Sara's lips are sealed," hemused, still possessed of doubts and fears.
"Until she elects to tell the story, dearest love, my lips are alsosealed. I love you better than anything else in all this world. Icould willingly offer up my life for you, but--well, my life doesnot belong to me. It is Sara's."
"For heaven's sake, Hetty, what is all this?" he cried in desperation.
"I can say no more. It is useless to insist, Brandon. If you canwrest the story from her, all well and good. You will hate me then,dear love. But it cannot be helped. I am prepared."
"Tell me this much: when you refused to marry Leslie, was yourcourse inspired by what had happened in--in connection with ChallisWrandall?"
"You forget that it is YOU that I love," she responded simply.
"But why should Sara urge you to marry Leslie if there is anything--"
"Hush! Here is the waiter. Come to my sitting-room after breakfast.I have something to say to you. We must come to a definiteunderstanding. This cannot go on."
He was with her for an hour in that pinched little sitting-room,and left her there without a vestige of rancour in his soul. Shewould not give an inch in the stand she had taken, but somethingimmeasurably great in his make-up rose to the occasion and he wentforth with the conviction that he had no right to demand more ofher than she was ready to give. He was satisfied to abide by herdecision. The spell of her was over him more completely than everbefore.
Two days later he saw her off at the Gare de Lyons, bound forInterlaken. There was a complete understanding between them. Shewanted to be quite alone in the Alpine town; he was not to followher there. She had reserved rooms at the Schweitzerhof, and thewindows of her sitting-room looked straight up the valley to thesnow-covered crest of the Jungfrau. She remembered these rooms; asa young girl she had occupied them with her father and mother. Bysome hook or crook, Booth arranged by wire for her to have themagain, not an easy matter at that season of the year. Later shewas to go on to Lucerne, and then to Venice.
The slightest shred of hope was left for Booth. Even though he mightaccomplish the task he had set unto himself--the conquest of Sarain respect to the untold story--he still had Hetty's dismal prophecythat after he learned the truth he would come to see why they couldnot be married. But he would not despair.
"We'll see," was all that he said in response to her forlorn crythat they were parting for ever. There was a grimness in the wayhe said it that gave her something to cherish during the monthsto come; the hope that he WOULD come back and take her in spite ofherself.
He sailed from Cherbourg on the first steamship calling there.Awake, he thought of her; asleep, he dreamed of Challis Wrandall.There was something uncanny in the persistence with which thatruthless despoiler of peace forced his way into his dreams, to theabsolute exclusion of all else. The voy
age home was made horridby these nightly reminders of a man he scarcely knew, yet dreaded.He became more or less obsessed by the idea that an evil spell haddescended upon him in the shape of a ghostly influence.
The weeks passed slowly for Hetty. There were no letters fromSara, but an occasional line or so from Mr. Carroll. She had madeBrandon Booth promise that he would not write to her, nor was heto expect anything from her. If her intention was to cut herselfoff entirely from her recent world and its people, as she mighthave done in another way by pursuing the time-honoured and rathercowardly plan of entering a convent, she was soon to discover thatsuccess in the undertaking brought a deeper sense of exile thanshe could have imagined herself able to endure at the outset. Shefound herself more utterly alone and friendless than at any time inher life. The chance companions she formed at Interlaken,--despitea well-meant reserve,--served only to increase her feeling ofloneliness and despair. The very natural attentions of men, youngand old, depressed her, instead of encouraging that essentiallyfeminine thing called vanity. She lived as one without an aim,without a single purpose except to close one day that she mightbegin the next.
After a time, she went on to Lucerne. Here the life on the surfacewas gayer, and she was roused from her state of lethargy in spiteof herself. Once, from her little balcony in the National, shesaw two of her old acquaintances in the chorus at the Gaiety. Theywere wearing many pearls. Another time, she met them in the street.She was rather quietly dressed. They did not notice her. But theprosperous Hebraic gentlemen who attended them were not so careless.
One day a card was brought to her rooms. For the next two weeksshe had a true and unavoidable friend in Lucerne. It would appearthat Mrs. Rowe-Martin had not been apprised of the rift in theWrandall lute. She had no reason to consider the exclusive MissCastleton as anything but the most desirable of companions. Mrs.Rowe-Martin was not long in finding out (though how she did it,heaven knows!), that Lord Murgatroyd's grandniece was no longerthe intimate of that impossible person, Sara Gooch. She couldn'tthink of Sara without thinking of Gooch.
But at last Mrs. Rowe-Martin departed, much to Hetty's secretrelief, but not before she had increased the girl's burthens byintroducing her into a cold-nosed cosmopolitan set from which therewere but three ways of escape. She refused to marry one of them,denied another the privilege of making love to her, and declinedto play auction bridge with all of them. They were not long indropping her, although it must be said there was real regret amongthe men.
From Mrs. Rowe-Martin and others she heard that Mrs. Redmond Wrandalland Vivian were to be in Scotland in October, for somebody-or-other'schristening, and that Leslie had been doing some really wonderfulflying at Pau.
"I am SO glad, my dear," said Mrs. Rowe-Martin, "that you refusedto marry Leslie. He is a cad. Besides, you would have been in aperpetual state of nerves over his flying."
Of Sara, there was no news, as might have been expected. Mrs. Rowe-Martinmade it very clear that Sara was a respectable person,--but heavens!
The chill days of autumn came and the crowd began to dwindle. Hettymade preparations to join in the exodus. As the days grew short andbleak, she found herself thinking more and more of the happy-hearted,symbolic dicky-bird on a faraway window ledge. His life was neithera travesty nor a tragedy; hers was both of these.
Something told her too that Brandon Booth had wormed the truth outof Sara, and that she would never see him again. It hurt her tothink that while Sara believed in her, the man who loved her didnot. It is a way men have.
On the eve of her departure, an event transpired that was to alterthe whole course of her life; or, more properly speaking, it wasdestined to put her back into an old groove.
She was walking along the quay, in the dusk of early evening, hermind full of the next day's journey over the mountains to Milan.The wind was cold; about her neck there was a boa of white ostrichfeathers, one end of which fluttered gaily over her shoulder. Shewas continually turning half-way about against the wind to reclaimthe truant end of the boa. It was in the act of doing so on oneoccasion that her attention was drawn to two men who saunteredacross the avenue from the approach to the Schweitzerhof.
She stopped still in her tracks, petrified by amazement--and alarm,if we may anticipate the sensation by a second or two.
One of the men was Leslie Wrandall, the other--her own father!
In a flash came the impulse to avoid them, to fly before theyrecognised her. But even as she turned and started off with asudden acceleration of speed, a shout assailed her ears, and thencame the swift rush of footsteps over the hard pavement.
"Hetty! As I live!" cried Leslie, planting himself in front ofher. His astonishment alone kept him from laying hands upon her,to make sure that she was really there. "Well, of all the--"
She extended her hand. "This is a surprise," she said, with admirablecontrol. "I hadn't the faintest notion you were in Lucerne."
"By Jove!" he mumbled, shaking hands with her but still dazed anduncertain. He suddenly remembered his companion. Turning with ashout, he brought the soldierly, middle-aged gentleman about-facewith scant ceremony. "Hey! Colonel Castleton! See who's here!Doesn't this bowl you over completely?"
Colonel Castleton, sallow, ascetic, deliberate in his movements,raised his glass to his eye as he came toward them.
"'Pon my soul!" burst from his astonished lips a second afterward.He stopped short and his jaw dropped in a most unmilitary fashion."'Pon my soul! It CAN'T be my daughter!" He seemed to be havingdifficulty not only with his head but with his feet; neither appearedto be operating intelligently. As a matter of fact, he stood for aninstant on his toes and then on his heels. He was perilously nearto being bowled over completely and literally.
Hetty was the first to recover. She advanced with a fair assumptionof warmth in her manner. Her heart, belying her, was as cold asice.
"Father!" she cried, holding out her hands.
He grasped them, and looked wildly about.
"Kiss me!" she whispered imperatively.
He stooped and brushed her cheek with his long moustache.
"Good God!" he muttered, still incredulous.
She turned to the excited Leslie with a quavering smile on herlips.
"We haven't seen each other in twelve years, Mr. Wrandall," shesaid.
"'Pon my soul!" added her father for the third time, thereby reachingthe limit of emphasis, having placed it differently each time.
Leslie surprised himself by rising to the occasion. It occurred tohim that they would like to be alone for a little while at least.
"Then, I'll stroll on, Colonel," he said. "By Jove!" The mildexpletive was a tribute to Providence.
Not a word was spoken by father or daughter until Wrandall was manyrods away.
"Where did you meet Leslie Wrandall?" she demanded, showing whichway her thoughts ran. They were far from filial.
"Aviation field--somewhere," said he in a vague sort of way. "Pau,I dare say. What are you doing here? I hear you've cut loose fromWrandall's sister-in-law. Was that a sensible thing to do?"
"I fancy you've been misinformed," said she in an emotionless voice,but offered no further word of explanation.
"Shan't we sit down here on this bench, my dear?" suggested theColonel, distinctly ill at ease.
"For the sake of appearances, yes," she assented.
Leslie, looking over his shoulder from a distance, saw them sittingtogether on one of the outer benches.
"By Jove!" he said to himself once more, this time with accumulativeperplexity.
"See here, Hetty, my child," began the Colonel nervously, "it's allnonsense your taking the stand you do toward me. I am your father.I repeat, it's all nonsense--damned nonsense. You've got to--"
"Has it taken you all these years to find out that it's nonsense?"she demanded, her eyes flashing. "It's no good arguing, father. Idon't like you. There is a very good reason why I should despiseyou. We won't go into it. After this meeting, we go our separateways again. This, it seem
s, was unavoidable. I shan't ask anythingof you, and I advise you to ask nothing of me."
"My God, that a child should utter such words to a father!" hegroaned.
"A father!" she cried so scornfully that he must have shrivelledhad he been any one else but Colonel Castleton of the Indian Corps.As it was, he had the grace to turn a very bright red. "A noblefather you have been! And what a splendid, self-sacrificing husbandyou were. No! I can't forget how my mother lived and died. Youcall it nonsense. Well, I call it something else. You took a mosteffective way to punish my poor mother for having the temerity tomarry an English gentleman. Thank God, I have my mother to lookback to for my own ideas of gentility."
"You never understood the way things went wrong between your motherand me," he said harshly. "She wasn't all you may be pleased tothink she was. She--"
"How dare you insinuate--"
"She chucked me. That's the sum and sub--"
"Oh, I was old enough to know that she left you--chucked you, ifyou will--and to know why she did it. I--I suppose you are lookedupon by--these people here--Leslie Wrandall and every one else, asa fine English gentleman, a cousin of the great Lord Murgatroyd.Are you?"
"Confound you, Hetty, how dare you use such a tone in speaking tome?" he exclaimed.
"They THINK you are a gentleman, do they?"
"THINK? Why, dammit, I am a gentleman. The only ungentlemanly thingI ever did in my life was to--" He checked the angry words, bitinghis lips to keep them down.
"Was to desert your wife," she supplied scathingly.
"No! To marry her!" He blurted it out in his rage.
"Oh!" she cried, shrinking farther away from him, cut to the quick.
He regarded her with cold, fishy eyes. She was uncommonly pretty,he was bound to admit that. Her mother's eyes, her mother's exquisiteskin, but singularly like certain Castleton portraits that he knew.It somehow galled him to find that there was quite as much of theblue-blooded Castleton in her as there was commonplace Glynn; galledhim more particularly because she was his own flesh and blood afterall and, in spite of that, could taunt him with it.
"I didn't mean to hurt you, Hetty," he said, to his own surprise.The touch of tenderness had a brief life. He scowled an instantlater. "We won't discuss the past, if you please. God knows I don'twant to dig up rotten bones. You are against your own father. That'senough for me. I shan't impose myself upon you. You--"
"Why couldn't you have treated her with--" began Hetty hotly.
"Sh! No more of that, I say. I will not be upbraided by my own child.Now, see here, what do you mean by letting a chance like that getaway from you?" He jerked his head in the direction Leslie hadtaken.
"Chance?"
"Yes. This Wrandall fellow. 'Gad, I've known him less thana fortnight and he's told me every secret he ever knew. Why don'tyou marry him? He's not a bad sort."
"That is my affair," said she coldly.
"I'd take him like a shot if I was a gel in your shoes."
"He told you I had refused to marry him?"
"A hundred times."
"Did you reward his confidence by relating the WHOLE history ofthe Castleton family?"
He stared at her. "Good Lord, do you think I'm an ass?"
"What have you told him?"
"Nothing. I permitted him to do all the telling. He gave me a highlycommendable account of myself, of you, of the fine old family ofGlynns and--God knows what all. He restored my pride, 'pon my soulhe did." The Colonel laughed as he twisted his moustache with ironicfondness.
She was quite still for a minute or two. "I heard you were inEngland," she said, changing the subject.
"It may interest you to know that the old man overlooked uscompletely," he said, striking the calf of his leg with his thinwalking-stick.
"Why should he leave anything to you?"
"And why not, curse him?" he growled. "Am I not his brother's son?What do you mean by asking a question like that?"
"I think I will say good-bye to you now, father," she saiddeliberately. "We may never see each other again." She arose andstood before him, cold and proud, without a spark of emotion inher eyes.
He sat still, looking up at her in surprise. "Do you think you'redoing the right thing, Hetty?" he asked, annoyed in spite ofhimself. "Remember that I am your father. I can and will overlookall you have said and done--"
"If you will go to her grave and kneel there and ask her pardon, Imay think differently of you because, after all, I am your daughter.You will not find her buried among the stately Castletons, but ina poor little spot far, far away from them. I can tell you how tofind it. You have never inquired, I suppose?"
His eyes narrowed. "By Jove, you are a mean little beggar!"
"Mean?" she cried, clenching her hands. Then she laughed suddenly,shrilly. "Oh, if my mother could hear you say that to me!"
"Damme!" he exclaimed, coming to his feet in considerable agitation."Do you want people to hear us ragging each other? Don't go intohysterics, Hetty! See here, do you forget that I have written toyou--loving letters they were--from the heart--written, I say, overand over again and what do I get in return? Not a single stroke ofthe pen from you, except the note a year ago telling me where youwere and--"
"And that was merely to relieve your anxiety when you found I'dgiven up my work on the stage and might become a burden on you.Oh, I read between your lines."
"Nothing of the sort. I never wanted you to go on the stage. Whyhave you persistently refused to answer my subsequent letters?"
"Because I read between the lines in all of them," she said levelly.
"You have no right to say that I expected you to get money out ofthat bally Wrandall woman--the goods merchant's daughter. That'sdownright insulting in you. I shan't let it go undefend--"
"You knew I couldn't lend you a thousand pounds, father," said she,very slowly and distinctly.
He coughed, perhaps in apology to her but more than likely tohimself.
"You are at liberty," she went on, "to tell Mr. Leslie Wrandallall there is to tell about me. He doesn't know, but it won't mattermuch if he does have the truth concerning me. Tell him all if youlike."
"My child," said he, with a fine display of wounded dignity, "I amnot quite the rotter you think I am."
He did not feel called upon to explain to her that he had alreadyborrowed a thousand pounds from her disappointed suitor, and wassetting his nets for another thousand or two.
"It really won't matter," she said wearily. "Good-bye. I am leavingat nine to-morrow for Italy."
"See you at dinner? Or afterward, just for a--"
"I think not. I do not care to see Mr. Wrandall."
"Think it over again, Hetty. Don't--"
"Oh, father! How can you say such things to me?" she cried, a breakin her voice.
"Good God, my dear, isn't it natural for a father to want to seehis daughter well provided for?"
She turned away.
"I am contemplating a visit to the States shortly," he remarked,following after her.
She whirled on him. "What!"
"Young Wrandall has asked me over for a month or two about thefirst of the year. His people are in Scotland now, I hear."
"Are you THROUGH with India?" she asked in a very low voice.
"Resigned," said he succinctly.
"TRULY?"
He flushed and muttered an oath. She understood. He had been "kickedout!"
"Hello!" called out a sprightly voice from the gathering darkness,and the next moment Leslie joined them. "Have dinner with usto-night, Hetty? Just the three of us. Please do."
"No, thank you, Mr. Wrandall. I am getting ready to leave to-morrow.Packing and all that sort of thing."
"Did Colonel Castleton tell you that I'm off for New York on Saturday?Mother and Viv are to get the boat at Southampton. I thought you'dbe interested to know what's just turned up over there?"
"What has happened?" she cried quickly.
Leslie hesitated. A curious gleam stole into his eyes. Wa
s it oftriumph?
"Father's got rather old-fashioned ideas about certain things," heobserved, by way of preface. "He writes that Sara is contemplatinga second venture into the state of wedded bliss."
Hetty stared at him. "I--I don't believe it," she said flatly. "Howcan it be possible? She sees no one."
He laughed. "You're wrong there," said he mendaciously. "She's beenseeing a great deal of a certain mutual friend of ours--all summerlong."
"You mean?"
"Brandon Booth. Father says that rumour has it they are to bemarried after the holidays. I fancy he needed consolation, afterwhat happened to him earlier in the year. He was pretty hard hit,believe me." After a moment, he went on boldly: "I ought to be ina position to sympathise with him, I suppose, but I don't. It isn'tin me to--"
"You say they are to be married?" cried Hetty, dazed and bewildered.
They had fallen behind Colonel Castleton, who walked on stifflyahead of them.
Leslie treated her to his most engaging smile.
"Looks very Goochy, doesn't it? I'm coming to believe more thanever that blood will tell. Sara knew what she was doing when shecleared her decks for action a few months ago. 'Gad, I understandnow why she was so eager to bring off the--well, another match weknow about. Pretty canny, eh?"
"It is incredible," said she, with unnecessary vehemence.
"Not in the least. Clever person, Sara is. Sets her heart on a thing,and--woof! she gets it, whether or no. Now, don't misunderstandme. I'm fond of Brandon Booth. We all are. We don't object to himas a sort of family attachment. But if she's going to marry him,we want to know where we stand in a business way. You see, he willnot only step into my brother Chal's shoes at home, but at theoffice. And, heaven knows, Brandy is not a good business man. He'sgreat on portraits, but--I beg pardon!"
"I must leave you here, Mr. Wrandall. Good-bye!"
"Oh, I say, can't we see something of--"
"I am afraid not."
He kept pace with her through the hall.
"I suppose your father told you that I--I haven't altogether givenup hope of--you."
"He spoke of going to America with you, if that's what you mean,"she said coldly, and left him at the foot of the staircase.
Leslie's hand trembled as it went up to his moustache. "I can'tunderstand her beastly obstinacy," he said to himself.