The Bars of Iron

  CHAPTER I

  THE VERDICT

  "It's much better than learning by heart," said Jeanie, with her tiredlittle smile. "Somehow, you know, I can't learn by heart--at least notlong things. Father says it is because my brain is deficient. But Mothersays hers is just the same, so I don't mind so much."

  "My dear, it will take you hours to read through all this," saidAvery, surveying with dismay the task which the Vicar had set hissmall daughter.

  "Yes," said Jeanie. "I am to devote three hours of every day to it. I hadto promise I would." She gave a short sigh. "It's very good for me, youknow," she said.

  "Is it?" said Avery. She smoothed back the brown hair lovingly. "Youmustn't overwork, Jeanie darling," she said.

  "I can't help it," said Jeanie quietly. "You see, I promised."

  That she would keep her promise, whatever the cost, was evidently aforegone conclusion; and Avery could say nothing against it.

  She left the child to work therefore, and wandered down herself tothe shore.

  It was June. A soft breeze came over the sea, salt and pure, with thelife-giving quality of the great spaces. She breathed it deeply,thankfully, conscious of returning strength.

  She and Jeanie had arrived only the week before, and she was sure theirvisit was going to do wonders for them both. Her own convalescence hadbeen a protracted one, but she told herself as she walked along the beachtowards the smiling, evening sea that she was already stronger than hercompanion. The old lassitude was evidently very heavy upon Jeanie. Thesmallest exertion seemed to tax her energies to the utmost. She had nevershaken off her cough, and it seemed to wear her out.

  Avery had spoken to Lennox Tudor about her more than once, but he neverdiscussed the subject willingly. He was never summoned to the Vicaragenow, and, when they chanced to meet, the Vicar invariably reserved forhim the iciest greeting that courtesy would permit. Tudor had defeatedhim once on his own ground, and he was not the man to forget it. Sopoor Jeanie's ailments were given none but home treatment to alleviatethem, and it seemed to Avery that her strength had dwindled almostperceptibly of late.

  She pondered the matter as she strolled along the shore, debating withherself if she would indeed take a step that she had been contemplatingfor some time, and, now that Jeanie was in her care, take her up to townand obtain Maxwell Wyndham's opinion with regard to her. It was a projectshe had mentioned to no one, and she hesitated a good deal over puttingit into practice. That Mrs. Lorimer would readily countenance such an actshe well knew, but she was also aware that it would be regarded as apiece of rank presumption by the child's father which might easily bepunished by the final withdrawal of Jeanie from her care. That was acontingency which she hardly desired to risk. Jeanie had become soinfinitely precious to her in those days.

  Unconsciously her feet had turned towards their old haunt. She foundherself halting by the low square rock on which Piers once had sat andcursed the sea-birds in bitterness of spirit. Often as she had visitedthe spot since, she had never done so without the memory of that springmorning flashing unbidden through her brain. It went through her now likea sharp dart of physical pain; the boyish figure, the ardent eyes, theblack hair plastered wet on the wide, patrician brow. Her heartcontracted. She seemed to hear again the eager, wooing words.

  He never wrote to her now. She believed he was in town, probably amusinghimself as he had amused himself at Monte Carlo, passing the time in around of gaieties, careless flirtations, possibly deeper intrigues.Crowther had probably kept him straight through the winter, but she didnot believe that Crowther's influence would be lasting. There was a stingin the very thought of Crowther. She was sure now that he had alwaysknown the bitter secret that Piers had kept from her. It had been thebond between them. Piers had obviously feared betrayal, but Crowther hadnot deemed it his business to betray him. He had suffered the deceptionto continue. She recognized that his position had been a difficult one;but it did not soften her heart towards him. Her heart had grown hardtowards all men of late. She sometimes thought that but for Jeanie itwould have atrophied altogether. There were so few things nowadays thatseemed to touch her. She could not even regret her lost baby. But yet thememory of Piers sitting on that rock at her feet pierced her oddly;Piers, the passionate, the adoring, the hot-blooded; Piers theinvincible; Piers the prince!

  She turned from the spot with a wrung feeling of heart-break. Shewished--how she wished--that she had died!

  In that moment she realized that she was no longer alone. A man's figure,thick-set and lounging, was sauntering towards her along the sand. Heseemed to move with extreme leisureliness, yet his approach was but amatter of seconds. His hands were in his pockets, his hat rammed downover his eyes.

  There seemed to her to be something vaguely familiar about him, thoughwherein it lay she could not have told. She stood and awaited him withthe certainty that he was coming with the express purpose of joining her.She knew him; she was sure she knew him, though who he was she had notthe faintest idea.

  He reached her, lifted his cap, and the sun glinted on a head of fieryred hair. "I thought I was not mistaken, Lady Evesham," he said.

  She recognized him with an odd leap of the pulses, and in a moment heldout her hand. "Dr. Wyndham!" she said. "How amazing!"

  "Why amazing?" said Wyndham. He held her hand for a second while hisgreen eyes scanned her face. When he dropped it she felt that he had madea full and exhaustive inspection, and she was strangely disconcerted, asif in some fashion he had gained an unfair advantage over her.

  "Amazing that you should be here," she explained, with a flush ofembarrassment.

  "Oh, not in the least, I assure you," he said. "I am staying at Brethavenfor a couple of days with my wife's people. It's only ten miles away, youknow. And I bicycled over here on the chance of seeing you."

  "But how did you know I was here?" she asked.

  "From your husband. I told him I was coming in this direction, and hesuggested that I should come over and look you up." Very casually he madereply, and he could not have been aware of the flood of colour his wordssent to her face, for he continued in the same cool fashion as hestrolled by her side. "I was afraid you might consider it an unpardonableliberty, but he assured me you wouldn't. So--" the green eyes smiled uponher imperturbably--"as I am naturally interested in your welfare, I tookmy courage in both hands and, at the risk of being consideredunprofessional,--I came."

  It was unexpected, but it was disarming. Avery found herself smilingin answer.

  "I am very pleased to see you," she said. "But your coming just at thistime is rather amazing all the same, for I was thinking of you, wishing Icould see you, only a few minutes ago."

  "What can I do for you?" said Maxwell Wyndham.

  She hesitated a little before the direct question; then as simply as hehad asked she answered, laying the matter before him without reservation.

  He listened in his shrewd, comprehending way, asking one or twoquestions, but making no comments.

  "There need be no difficulty about it," he said, when she ended. "You saythe child is tractable. Keep her in bed to-morrow, and say a medicalfriend of yours is coming over to see if he can do anything for hercough! Then if you'll ask me to lunch--I'll do the rest."

  He smiled as he ended, and thrust out his hand.

  "I'll be going now. I left my bicycle in the village and hope to find itstill there. Now remember, Lady Evesham, my visit to-morrow is to be of astrictly unprofessional character. You didn't send for me, so I shallassume the privilege of coming as a friend. Is that understood?"

  He spoke with smiling assurance, and seeing that he meant to gain hispoint she yielded it.

  Not till he was gone did she come to ponder the errand that had broughthim thither.

  She went back to Jeanie, and found her with aching eyes fixed resolutelyon her book. Yes, she was a little tired, but she would rather go on,thank you. Oh no, she did not mind staying in bed to-morrow to pleaseAvery, and she was sure she would like Avery's docto
r though she didn'texpect he would manage to stop the cough. She would have to do her taskthough all the same; dear Avery mustn't mind. You see, she had promised.But she would certainly stay in bed if Avery wished.

  And then came the tired sigh, and then that racking, cruel cough thatseemed to rend her whole frame. No, she would not finish for another houryet. Really she must go on.

  The brown head dropped on to the little bony hands, and Jeanie wasimmersed once more in her task.

  More than once in the night Avery awoke to hear that tearing, breathlesscough in the room next to hers. It was no new thing, but in view of thecoming ordeal it filled her with misgiving.

  When she rose herself in the morning she felt weighed down with anxiousforeboding.

  Yet, when Maxwell Wyndham arrived in his sauntering, informal fashion atabout noon, she was able to meet him with courage. There was somethingelectric about his personality that seemed almost unconsciously to impartstrength to the downhearted. He had drawn her back from the very Door ofDeath, and her confidence in him was absolute.

  They lunched alone together, and talked of many things. More than once,wholly incidentally, he mentioned her husband. She gathered that he didnot know of their bitter estrangement. He talked of the polo-craze, withwhich it seemed Piers was badly bitten, and commented on his splendidhorsemanship.

  "Yes, he is a wonderful athlete," Avery said.

  She wondered if he deemed her unresponsive, but decided that he set hercoldness down to anxiety; for he finished his luncheon without lingeringand declared himself ready for the business in hand.

  He became in fact strictly business-like from that moment, and throughoutthe examination that followed she had not the faintest notion as to whatwas passing in his mind. To Jeanie he was curtly kind, but to herself hewas as utterly uncommunicative as if he had been a total stranger.

  The examination was a protracted one, and more painful than Avery hadthought possible. It taxed poor Jeanie's powers of endurance to theuttermost, and long before it was finished she was weeping from sheerexhaustion. He was absolutely patient with her, but he insisted uponcarrying the matter through, remaining when it was at last over until shehad somewhat recovered from the ordeal.

  To Avery the suspense was well-nigh unbearable; but she dared not showthe impatience that consumed her. She had a feeling that in some fashionthe great doctor was depending upon her self-control, her strength ofmind; and she was determined that he should not find her wanting.

  Yet, when she at length preceded him downstairs and into the littlesitting-room she wondered if the hammering of her heart reached him, sotremendous were its strokes. They seemed to her to be beating out adeath-knell in her soul.

  "You will tell me the simple truth, I know," she said, and waited,straining to catch his words above the clamour.

  He answered her instantly with the utmost quietness, the utmost kindness.

  "Lady Evesham, your own heart has already told you the truth."

  She put out a quick hand, and he took it and held it firmly,sustainingly, while he went on.

  "There is nothing whatever to be done. Give her rest, that's all;absolute rest. She looks as if she has been worked beyond her strength.Is that so?"

  Avery nodded mutely.

  "It must stop," he said. "She is in a very precarious state, and anyexertion, mental or physical, is bound to hasten the end--which cannot,in any case, be very far off."

  He released Avery's hand and walked to the window, where he stood gazingout to sea with drawn brows.

  "The disease is of a good many months' standing," he said. "It has takenvery firm hold. Such a child as that should have been sheltered andcosseted, shielded from every hardship. Even then--very possibly--thiswould have developed. No one can say for certain."

  "Can you advise--nothing?" said Avery in a voice that sounded oddly dulland emotionless even to herself.

  "Nothing," said Maxwell Wyndham. "No medical science can help in a caselike this. Give her everything she wants, and give her rest! That is allyou can do for her now."

  Avery came and stood beside him. The blow had fallen, but she hadscarcely begun to feel its effects. There was so much to bethought of first.

  "Please be quite open with me!" she said. "Tell me how long you think shewill live!"

  He turned slightly and looked at her. "I can tell you what I think,Lady Evesham," he said. "But, remember, that does not bring the endany nearer."

  "I know," she said.

  She looked straight back at him with eyes unflinching, and after amoment's thought he spoke.

  "I think that--given every care--she may live through the summer, but Ido not consider it likely."

  Avery's face was very pale, but still she did not flinch. "Will shesuffer?" she asked.

  He raised his brows at the question. "My dear lady, she has sufferedalready far more than you have any idea of. One lung is practically gone,wholly useless. The other is rapidly going the same way. She has probablysuffered for a year or more, first lassitude, then shortness of breath,and pretty often actual pain. Hasn't she complained of these things?"

  "She is a child who never complains," Avery said. "But both her motherand I thought she was wasting."

  "She is mere skin and bone," he said. "Now--about her people, LadyEvesham; who is going to tell them? You or I?"

  She hesitated. "But I could hardly ask you to do that," she said.

  "You may command me in any way," he answered. "If I may presume toadvise, I should say that the best course would be for me to go toRodding, see the doctor there, and get him to take me to the Vicarage."

  "Oh, but they mustn't take her from me!" Avery said. "Let her mother comehere! She can't--she mustn't--go back home!"

  "Exactly what I was going to say," he returned, in his quiet practicalfashion. "To take her back there would be madness. But look here, LadyEvesham, you must have a nurse."

  "Oh, not yet!" said Avery. "I am quite strong now. I am used to nursing.I have--no other call upon me. Let me do this!"

  "None?" he said.

  His tone re-called her. She coloured burningly. "My husband--wouldunderstand," she said, with difficulty.

  He passed the matter by. "Will you promise to send me a message if youfind night-nursing a necessity?"

  She hesitated.

  He frowned. "Lady Evesham, you must promise me this in fairness to thechild as well as to yourself. Also, you will give me your word that youwill never under any circumstances sleep with her."

  She saw that he would have his way, and she yielded both points ratherthan fight a battle which instinct warned her she could not win.

  "Then I will be going," he said.

  He turned back into the room, and again she was aware of his green eyessurveying her closely, critically. But he made no reference whatever toher health, and inwardly she blessed him for his forbearance.

  She did not know that as he rode away, he grimly remarked to himself:"The best tonics generally taste the bitterest, and she'll drink this oneto the dregs, poor girl! But it'll help her in the end."