Suddenly she caught a sound of hoofs. Was this Diana? She sped to the other window, the one that stood open, and now she heard the crunch of gravel and the champ of bits and the sound of more than two pairs of hoofs. She caught a glimpse of Mr. Wilding and Mr. Trenchard.
She felt the colour flying from her cheeks; again her heart fluttered in her throat, and it was in vain that with her hand she sought to repress the heaving of her breast. She was afraid; her every instinct bade her slip through the window at which she stood and run from Zoyland Chase. And then she thought of Richard and his danger, and she seemed to gather courage from the reflection of her purpose in this house.
Men's voices reached her — a laugh, the harsh cawing of Nick Trenchard.
"A lady!" she heard him cry. "'Od's heart, Tony! Is this a time for trafficking with doxies?" She crimsoned an instant at the coarse word and set her teeth, only to pale again the next. The voices were lowered so that she heard not what was said; one sharp exclamation she recognized to be in Wilding's voice, but caught not the word he uttered. There followed a pause, and she stirred uneasily, waiting. Then came swift steps and jangling spurs across the hall, the door opened suddenly, and Mr. Wilding, in a scarlet riding-coat, his boots white with dust, stood bowing to her from the threshold.
"Your servant, Mistress Westmacott," she heard him murmur. "My house is deeply honoured."
She dropped him a half-curtsy, pale and tongue-tied. He turned to deliver hat and whip and gloves to Walters, who had followed him, then closed the door and came forward into the room.
"You will forgive that I present myself thus before you," he said, in apology for his dusty raiment. "But I bethought me you might be in haste, and Walters tells me that already have you waited nigh upon an hour. Will you not sit, madam?" And he advanced a chair. His long white face was set like a mask; but his dark, slanting eyes devoured her. He guessed the reason of her visit. She who had humbled him, who had driven him to the very borders of despair, was now to be humbled and to despair before him. Under the impassive face his soul exulted fiercely.
She disregarded the chair he proffered. "My visit . . . has no doubt surprised you," she began, tremulous and hesitating.
"I' faith, no," he answered quietly. "The cause, after all, is not very far to seek. You are come on Richard's behalf."
"Not on Richard's," she answered. "On my own." And now that the ice was broken, the suspense of waiting over, she found the tide of her courage flowing fast. "This encounter must not take place, Mr. Wilding," she informed him.
He raised his eyebrows — fine and level as her own — his thin lips smiled never so faintly. "It is, I think," said he, "for Richard to prevent it. The chance was his last night. It shall be his again when we meet. If he will express regret . . ." He left his sentence there. In truth he mocked her, though she guessed it not.
"You mean," said she, "that if he makes apology . . .?"
"What else? What other way remains?"
She shook her head, and, if pale, her face was resolute, her glance steady.
"That is impossible," she told him. "Last night — as I have the story — he might have done it without shame. Today it is too late. To tender his apology on the ground would be to proclaim himself a coward."
Mr. Wilding pursed his lips and shifted his position. "It is difficult, perhaps," said he, "but not impossible."
"It is impossible," she insisted firmly.
"I'll not quarrel with you for a word," he answered, mighty agreeable. "Call it impossible, if you will. Admit, however, that it is all I can suggest. You will do me the justice, I am sure, to see that in expressing my willingness to accept your brother's expressions of regret I am proving myself once more your very obedient servant. But that it is you who ask it — and whose desires are my commands — I should let no man go unpunished for an insult such as your brother put upon me."
She winced at his words, at the bow with which he had professed himself once more her servant.
"It is no clemency that you offer him," she said. "You leave him a choice between death and dishonour."
"He has," Wilding reminded her, "the chance of combat."
She flung back her head impatiently. "I think you mock me," said she.
He looked at her keenly. "Will you tell me plainly, madam," he begged, "what you would have me do?"
She flushed under his gaze, and the flush told him what he sought to learn. There was, of course, another way, and she had thought of it; but she lacked — as well she might, all things considered — the courage to propose it. She had come to Mr. Wilding in the vague hope that he himself would choose the heroic part. And he, to punish for her scorn of him this woman whom he loved to hating-point, was resolved that she herself must beg it of him. Whether, having so far compelled her, he would grant her prayer or not was something he could not just then himself have told you. She bowed her head in silence, and Wilding, that faint smile, half friendliness, half mockery, hovering ever on his lips, turned aside and moved softly towards the window. Her eyes, veiled behind the long lashes of their drooping lids, followed him furtively. She felt that she hated him in very truth. She marked the upright elegance of his figure, the easy grace of his movements, the fine aristocratic mould of the aquiline face, which she beheld in profile; and she hated him the more for these outward favours that must commend him to no lack of women. He was too masterful. He made her realize too keenly her own weakness and that of Richard. She felt that just now he controlled the vice that held her fast — her affection for her brother. And because of that she hated him the more.
"You see, Mistress Westmacott," said he, his shoulder to her, his tone sweet to the point of sadness, "that there is nothing else."
She stood, her eyes following the pattern of the parquetry, her foot unconsciously tracing it; her courage ebbed, and she had no answer for him. After a pause he spoke again, still without turning.
"If that was not enough to suit your ends" — and though he spoke in a tone of ever-increasing sadness, there glinted through it the faintest ray of mockery — "I marvel you should have come to Zoyland — to compromise yourself to so little purpose."
She raised a startled face. "Com . . . compromise myself?" she echoed. "Oh!" It was a cry of indignation.
"What else?" quoth he, and turned abruptly to confront her.
"Mistress Horton was . . . was with me," she panted, her voice quivering as on the brink of tears.
"'Tis unfortunate you should have separated," he condoled.
"But . . . but, Mr. Wilding, I . . . I trusted to your honour. I accounted you a gentleman. Surely . . . surely, sir, you will not let it be known that . . . I came to you? You will keep my secret?"
"Secret!" said he, his eyebrows raised. "'Tis already the talk of the servants' hall. By tomorrow 'twill be the gossip of Bridgwater."
Air failed her. Her blue eyes fixed him in horror out of her stricken face. Not a word had she wherewith to answer him.
The sight of her, thus, affected him oddly. His passion for her surged up, aroused by pity for her plight, and awakened in him a sense of his brutality. A faint flush stirred in his cheeks. He stepped quickly to her, and caught her hand. She let it lie, cold and inert, within his nervous grasp.
"Ruth, Ruth!" he cried, and his voice was for once unsteady. "Give it no thought! I love you, Ruth. If you'll but heed that, no breath of scandal can hurt you."
She swallowed hard. "As how?" she asked mechanically.
He bowed low over her hand — so low that his face was hidden from her.
"If you will do me the honour to become my wife . . ." he began, but got no further, for she snatched away her hand, her cheeks crimsoning, her eyes aflame with indignation. He stepped back, crimsoning too. She had dashed the gentleness from his mood. He was angered now and tigerish.
"Oh!" she panted. "It is to affront me! Is this the time or place . . .?"
He cropped her flow of indignant speech ere it was well begun. He caught her in his arms, an
d held her tight, and so sudden was the act, so firm his grip that she had not the thought or force to struggle.
"All time is love's time, all places are love's place," he told her, his face close to her own. "And of all time and places the present ever preferable to the wise — for life is uncertain and short at best. I bring you worship, and you answer me with scorn. But I shall prevail, and you shall come to love me in very spite of your own self."
She threw back her head, away from his as far as the bonds he had cast about her would allow. "Air! Air!" she panted feebly.
"Oh, you shall have air enough anon," he answered with a half-strangled laugh, his passion mounting ever. "Hark you, now — hark you, for Richard's sake, since you'll not listen for my own nor yours. There is another course by which I can save both Richard's life and honour. You know it, and you counted upon my generosity to suggest it. But you overlooked the thing on which you should have counted. You overlooked my love. Count upon that, my Ruth, and Richard shall have naught to fear. Count upon that, and when we meet this evening, Richard and I, it is I who will tender the apology, I who will admit that I was wrong to introduce your name into that company last night, and that what Richard did was a just and well-deserved punishment upon me. This will I do if you'll but count upon my love."
She looked up at him fearfully, yet with flutterings of hope. "What is't you mean?" she asked him faintly.
"That if you'll promise to be my wife . . ."
"Your wife!" she interrupted him. She struggled to free herself, released one arm and struck him in the face. "Let me go, you coward!"
He was answered. His arms melted from her. He fell back a pace, very white and even trembling, the fire all gone from his eye, which was now turned dull and deadly.
"So be it," he said, and strode to the bell-rope. "I'll not offend again. I had not offended now" — he continued, in the voice of one offering an explanation cold and formal — "but that when first I came into your life you seemed to bid me welcome." His fingers closed upon the crimson bell-cord. She guessed his purpose.
"Wait!" she gasped, and put forth her hand. He paused, the rope in his, his eye kindling anew. "You . . . you mean to kill Richard now?" she asked him.
A swift lifting of his brows was his only answer. He tugged the cord. From the distance the peal of the bell reached them faintly.
"Oh, wait, wait!" she begged, her hands pressed against her cheeks. He stood impassible — hatefully impassible. "If . . . if I were to consent to . . . this . . . how . . . how soon . . .?" He understood the unfinished question. Interest warmed his face again. He took a step towards her, but by a gesture she seemed to beg him come no nearer.
"If you will promise to marry me within the week, Richard shall have no cause to fear either for his life or his honour at my hands."
She seemed now to be recovering her calm. "Very well," she said, her voice singularly steady. "Let that be a bargain between us. Spare Richard's life and honour — both, remember! — and on Sunday next . . ." For all her courage her voice quavered and faltered. She dared add no more, lest it should break altogether.
Mr. Wilding drew a deep breath. Again he would have advanced. "Ruth!" he cried, and some repentance smote him, some shame shook him in his purpose. At that moment it was in his mind to capitulate unconditionally; to tell her that Richard should have naught to fear from him, and yet that she should go free as the winds. Her gesture checked him. It was so eloquent of aversion. He paused in his advance, stifled his better feelings, and turned once more, relentless. The door opened and old Walters stood awaiting his commands.
"Mistress Westmacott is leaving," he informed his servant, and bowed low and formally in farewell before her. She passed out without another word, the old butler following, and presently through the door that remained open came Trenchard, in quest of Mr. Wilding who stood bemused.
Nick sauntered in, his left eye almost hidden by the rakish cock of his hat, one hand tucked away under the skirts of his plum-coloured coat, the other supporting the stem of a long clay pipe, at which he was pulling thoughtfully. The pipe and he were all but inseparable; indeed, the year before in London he had given appalling scandal by appearing with it in the Mall, and had there remained him any character to lose, he must assuredly have lost it then.
He observed his friend through narrowing eyes — he had small eyes, very blue and very bright, in which there usually abode a roguish gleam.
"My sight, Anthony," said he, "reminds me that I am growing old. I wonder did it mislead me on the score of your visitor?"
"The lady who left," said Wilding with a touch of severity, "will be Mistress Wilding by this day se'night."
Trenchard took the pipe from his lips, audibly blew out a cloud of smoke and stared at his friend. "Body o' me!" quoth he. "Is this a time for marrying? — with these rumours of Monmouth's coming over."
Wilding made an impatient gesture. "I thought to have convinced you they are idle," said he, and flung himself into a chair at his writing-table.
Nick came over and perched himself upon the table's edge, one leg swinging in the air. "And what of this matter of the intercepted letter from London to our Taunton friends?"
"I can't tell you. But of this I am sure, His Grace is incapable of anything so rash. Certain is it that he'll not stir until Battiscomb returns to Holland, and Battiscomb is still in Cheshire sounding the Duke's friends."
"Yet were I you, I should not marry just at present."
Wilding smiled. "If you were me, you'd never marry at all."
"Faith, no!" said Trenchard. "I'd as soon play at 'hot-cockles' or 'Parson-has-lost-his-cloak.' 'Tis a mort more amusing and the sooner done with."
CHAPTER V
THE ENCOUNTER
RUTH WESTMACOTT rode back like one in a dream, with vague and hazy notions of what she saw or did. So overwrought was she by the interview from which she came, her mind so obsessed by it, that never a thought had she for Diana and her indisposition until she arrived home to find her cousin there before her. Diana was in tears, called up by the reproaches of her mother, Lady Horton — the relict of that fine soldier Sir Cholmondeley Horton, of Taunton.
The girl had arrived at Lupton House a half-hour ahead of Miss Westmacott, and upon her arrival she had expressed surprise, either feigned or real, at finding Ruth still absent. Detecting the alarm that Diana was careful to throw into her voice and manner, her mother questioned her, and elicited the story of her faintness and of Ruth's having ridden on alone to Mr. Wilding's. So outraged was Lady Horton that for once in a way this woman, usually so meek and ease-loving, was roused to an energy and anger with her daughter and her niece that threatened to remove Diana at once from the pernicious atmosphere of Lupton House and carry her home to Taunton. Ruth found her still at her remonstrances, arrived, indeed, in time for her share of them.
"I have been sore mistaken in you, Ruth!" the dame reproached her. "I can scarce believe it of you. I have held you up as an example to Diana, for the discretion and wisdom of your conduct, and you do this! You go alone to Mr. Wilding's house — to Mr. Wilding's, of all men!"
"It was no time for ordinary measures," said Ruth, but she spoke without any of the heat of one who defends her conduct. She was, the slyly watchful Diana observed, very white and tired. "It was no time to think of nice conduct. There was Richard to be saved."
"And was it worth ruining yourself to do that?" quoth Lady Horton, her colour high.
"Ruining myself?" echoed Ruth, and she smiled never so weary a smile. "I have, indeed, done that, though not in the way you mean."
Mother and daughter eyed her, mystified. "Your good name is blasted," said her aunt, "unless so be that Mr. Wilding is proposing to make you his wife." It was a sneer the good woman could not, in her indignation, repress.
"That is what Mr. Wilding has done me the honour to propose," Ruth answered bitterly, and left them gaping. "We are to be married this day se'night."
A dead silence followed the calm announc
ement. Then Diana rose. At the misery, the anguish that could impress so strange and white a look on Ruth's winsome face, she was smitten with remorse, her incipient satisfaction dashed. This was her work; the fruit of her scheming. But it had gone further than she had foreseen; and for all that no result could better harmonize with her own ambitions and desires, for the moment — under the first shock of that announcement — she felt guilty and grew afraid.
"Ruth!" she cried, her voice a whisper of stupefaction. "Oh, I wish I had come with you!"
"But you couldn't; you were faint." And then — recalling what had passed — her mind was filled with sudden concern for Diana, even amid her own sore troubles. "Are you quite yourself again, Diana?" she inquired.
Diana answered almost fiercely, "I am quite well." And then, with a change to wistfulness, she added, "Oh, I would I had come with you!"
"Matters had been no different," Ruth assured her. "It was a bargain Mr. Wilding drove. It was the price I had to pay for Richard's life and honour." She swallowed hard, and let her hands fall limply to her sides. "Where is Richard?" she inquired.
It was her aunt who answered her. "He went forth half an hour agone with Mr. Vallancey and Sir Rowland."
"Sir Rowland had returned, then?" She looked up quickly.
"Yes," answered Diana. "But he had achieved nothing by his visit to Lord Gervase. His lordship would not intervene; he swore he hoped the cub would be flayed alive by Wilding. Those were his lordship's words, as Sir Rowland repeated them. Sir Rowland is in sore distress for Richard. He has gone with them to the meeting."
"At least, he has no longer cause for his distress," said Miss Westmacott with her bitter smile, and sank as one exhausted to a chair. Lady Horton moved to comfort her, her motherliness all aroused for this motherless girl, usually so wise and strong, and seemingly wiser and stronger than ever in this thing that Lady Horton had deemed a weakness and a folly.