A Court of Inquiry Part 17

The Skeptic turned in his chair and looked at me. "Well done!" he cried.

"Couldn't have said it better myself. We must tell Philo that speech.

He'll be deeply gratified. He has every confidence in your taste."

"The dinner was perfect," I went on. "I never imagined one so cleverly planned. And everybody seemed in great spirits--there wasn't a dull moment."

"You dear thing!" said Hepatica, and came and dropped a kiss upon my hair. "It's fun to do things for you, you're so appreciative. Didn't you enjoy your Mining Engineer?"

"He was so entertaining," said I, "that if it had been any other dinner than that one I shouldn't have known what I was eating."

"Hear, hear!" applauded the Skeptic. "Bouquets for us all! Didn't I make an ideal host?"

"Your geniality was rivalled only by your tact," I declared.

They laughed together. Then the Skeptic sat up. He got up and strode over to the window and peered down. "Philo is taking a disgracefully long time to see the lady into her carriage," he observed. "I supposed he'd be back, to talk it over, as usual. The best of entertaining is the talking your guests over after they've gone--eh, Patty, girl? I don't seem to see the carriage. Perhaps he's gone home with her."

I laid my hand upon the door of my room. "I don't know why I am so sleepy," I apologized. "It only came over me since the door closed. But you must both be tired, too--and we have to be up in the morning at the usual hour."

Hepatica looked regretful, but she did not urge me to remain. I felt guilty at leaving a wide-awake host and hostess who wanted to talk things over, but really I--the perfume from my violets had been stealing away my nerves all the evening. I felt that I must take them off or grow faint at their odour, which seemed stronger as they drooped. I opened my door, turned to smile back at the pair, and shut it upon the inside. A moment later I was standing by my window which I had thrown wide, and the winter wind was lifting the violets which I had already forgotten to take off.

I heard the murmur of voices in the room outside, but it soon ceased.

With no third person to praise the feast it was probably dull work congratulating each other on its success. By and by--I don't know when it happened--I heard the electric entrance-bell whirr in the tiny hall, and the Skeptic go to answer it. Then I heard voices again--men's voices. There was an interval. Then came a small knock at my door. I opened it to Hepatica.

"The Philosopher has come back," she whispered. I had not lit my light--I had closed my window and had been sitting by it, my elbows on the sill. Hepatica put out her hand and felt of me. "Oh, you haven't undressed," she said. "Then won't you go out and see him? He seemed so disappointed when Don said you had gone. It seems he's called out of town quite suddenly--he's afraid he may not be back before you go--he says he didn't have a chance to tell you about it this evening."

There was no help for it--I had no excuse. I did not dare to snap on my light and look at myself. I put my hands to my hair to feel if it was still snug; then I went.

Hepatica had mercifully turned off all the lights but the rose-shaded drop-light on the reading-table and two of the electric candles in the dining-room. It was a relief to feel the glare gone. The air from the window had freshened me. The Philosopher stood by the reading-table, upon which he had laid his hat. His overcoat was on a chair. Evidently he was not waiting merely to say good-bye and go.

The Skeptic, upon my entrance, immediately crossed the room to the door of the hall, upon which his own room opened. "You people will excuse me," he said. "I don't know _why_ I am so sleepy." His tone was peculiar, and I recognized that he was quoting my words of a half-hour before. "It only came over me since the door closed on our guests. And I have to be up in the morning at the usual hour. But don't let that hurry you, Philo, old man." And he vanished.

The Philosopher looked as if he did not mean to let it hurry him. He drew his chair near mine, facing me, after a fas.h.i.+on he has, and looked at me in silence for a minute.

"You are tired," he said.

"A little. The rooms were very warm."

"They were. They made the violets droop, I see."

I put up my hand. "Yes. I meant to take them off."

"Perhaps you don't like violets. If I could have found a bunch of sweet-williams to send you instead, like those in your own garden, I should have preferred it. I know what you like among summer flowers, but with these florist's offerings I'm not so familiar. I'm afraid I'm not much versed in the sending of flowers."

"Did you send these?" I put my hand up to them again. They certainly were drooping sadly. Perhaps if they had known who sent them----

"To be sure I did."

"There was no card. I thought it was Don--and forgot to thank him--luckily. Let me thank you now. They have been so sweet all the evening."

"Too sweet, haven't they? You looked a bit pale to-night, I thought."

"It was my frock. Gray always makes people look pale."

"Does it? I've liked that frock so much--and I had an idea gray and purple went together."

"They do--beautifully. And to-morrow, after the violets have been in water, they'll be quite fresh--and so shall I. To tell the honest truth, so many dinners--well, I'm not used to them. I'm just a little bit glad to remember that spring is coming on soon, and I can get out in my old garden and dig and rake, and watch the things come out."

"Yes--you're one of the outdoor creatures," said the Philosopher, leaning back in his chair in the old way--he had been sitting up quite straight. "I understand it--I like gardens myself. And your garden most of all. Do you realize, between your absences and my long stay in Germany, it's three summers since I've strolled about your garden?"

"So long? Yes, it must be."

"But I mean to be at home this summer. Do you?"

[Ill.u.s.tration: "And so we renewed the old vow"]

"I? Yes, I think so. After so long a winter outing--or inning--I couldn't bear to miss the garden this year. And Lad will be home--his first vacation. He is fond of the old garden, too."

"May I come?" asked the Philosopher rather abruptly.

"To stroll about the garden? Haven't you always been welcome?"

"I want a special welcome--from you--from my friend. When a man has only one friend, that one's welcome means a good deal to him."

"Only one! You have so many."

"Have I? Yes, so I have, and pleasant friends they are, too. But friends.h.i.+p--with only one. Come, Rhexia--you understand that as well as I. Why pretend you don't? That's not like you."

He was looking at me very steadily. He leaned forward, stretching out his hand. I laid mine in it. And so we renewed the old vow.

PART III

I

SIXTEEN MILES TO BOSWELL'S

"One pa.s.senger off the five-thirty, coming up the hill," announced Sue Boswell, peering eagerly out of the Inn's office window. "That makes nine for supper. I'll run and tell mother."

"Nine--poor child," murmured Tom Boswell, behind the desk. "That's certainly a great showing for a summer hotel, on the fifteenth day of July. If we don't do better in August--the game's up."

He stared out of the window at the approaching guest, who, escorted by Tom's brother Tim, was climbing the road toward Boswell's Inn at a pace which indicated no pressing anxiety to arrive. As the pair drew nearer, Tom could see that the stranger was a rather peculiar-looking person. Of medium height, as thin as a lath, with a nearly colourless face in which was set a pair of black eyes with dark circles round them, the man had somewhat the appearance of an invalid; yet an air of subdued nervous energy about him in a measure offset the suggestion of ill-health. He was surveying Boswell's Inn as he approached it in a comprehensive way which seemed to take in every feature of its appearance.

Across the desk in the small lobby the newcomer spoke curtly. "Good room and a bath? I want an absolutely quiet room where I get no kitchen noises or ballroom dancing. Windows with a breeze--if you've got such a thing."