The Highwayman Part 28

She was so surprised that his lips had almost time to reach her. "Lord, sir, are you mad?" she cried, as she thrust him off.

"Pretty creature," Sir George giggled, and clung to her.

"Your carriage is at the door, Sir George." Harry stood over them. His face was as much a mask as ever, his voice placid.

Alison started up and stood to face him with a lowering brow. He did not appear to see her. Sir George shook down his ruffles. "Carriage? What d'ye mean?" says he. "I ha' had no carriage this year. I came in a hackney coach."

Harry turned away from him and opened the door.

"Eh? Oh, stap me!" Sir George giggled and got on to his feet, "Madame, your eternally devoted." He went out with a strut, waving his scented handkerchief in the direction of Harry.

Then Alison spoke. Her eyes were furious. "You--oh, you boor! How dare you?"

"Egad, that's very good!" Harry laughed.

She beat her foot on the floor. "Oh, you are not to be borne! To make a noise of it! To make a scandal of me and that--that creature!"

"To be sure, I came untimely. Well, ma'am, if you wanted to be quiet about it, I had rather it made a noise."

"My G.o.d!" she was white. "You dare say that to me! Be careful, Harry."

"Pray, ma'am, no heroics."

"I warn you, there are things I'll not bear."

"Is it possible?" Harry sneered.

She swept past him and away.

CHAPTER XVII

RETURN OF MR. WAVERTON

It seems that, years afterwards, Harry and Alison were afflicted with a dreary and remorseful wonder at these wars. Both, as they grew older, had something of a turn for moralising, and in their copious letters to their several children is evidence of much penitence and puzzling over the disasters of their youth. Each plainly took all the blame. Each is eloquent about the sins of pride and hardness. Harry preaches the duty of trust; Alison the folly of easy intimacies. Both of them, in those latter days when they could calmly estimate what they had lost, still wondered with a gloomy scorn how they had come to let the ugly, ridiculous affair of Sir George set them against each other. You find them both trying to recall (or guess) what exactly it was that, in the time of crisis, they felt and believed.

When it was all part of their history, Harry could hardly persuade himself that ever he had fancied Alison untrue, even disloyal; or Alison believe that she had stormed against him for driving out of the house a man who had been impudent to her. Yet it is not to be doubted that Harry did let suspicions of her honesty poison him. He could not, at the worst of his anger, believe that she would play false with such a husk of a fop; but he told himself that she wanted to make the fellow into a waiting gentleman, a servant, and a toy at once--a thing more nauseous than a lover. And Alison, though at the back of her brain she was aware that Harry had excuse for what he had done, raged the more against him for the intolerable things he had said. His suspicions made her despise him. For his a.s.sumption of authority she hated him.

There were almost from the first the usual sage and kindly friends to tell them that it was all a misunderstanding, that they had only to be frank with each other and commonly reasonable and there would be no quarrel left. But it is doubtful whether this sagacious advice could have done them much good if they had taken it. "Talk things over like rational creatures," was (as usual) the prescription. But if they had really been rational, they would only have come to the conclusion that they ought not to be married. The force of their pa.s.sion, to be sure, was real enough and still moved in them. To hold them together they had nothing else. There was no consciousness of other need, no longing for a common life, no desire to help or give. If they had been most calmly wise and wisely calm in a dozen conversations, they would but have made this all the clearer.

Still it is true, as the sagacious friends guessed, that they did not try to compose the quarrel. Each was by far too proud. Harry was pleased to consider that he had done his duty by a flighty wife, and would take no more account of her unless she were penitent--or provoked him again. Alison, reckoning herself meanly insulted, was resolved that he could never again be more than an unwelcome guest in her house. They were, to be sure, ridiculous. In private they avoided each other. In public they continued to meet, for each was too proud to confess to the world the failure of their marriage. You imagine how poor Mrs. Weston enjoyed life in an icy atmosphere, the temperature of which she was not permitted to notice.

Such were their relations when the final blow fell upon them. They dined late in the Lincoln Inn Fields. It was as much as six o'clock and they were still at table--as jovial as usual. The butler came to Alison with an elaborate whispering. "Pray him come up," she said aloud, and looked defiance down the table at Harry. "It is Mr. Waverton."

"Lord, Lord, is he still alive?" Harry grinned. "That's heroic."

"Back from France? Is Colonel Boyce come back?" Mrs. Weston cried.

"I know nothing of Colonel Boyce," said Alison coldly.

"You couldn't please him better," Harry laughed. "Dear Geoffrey! I wonder if he knows anything? Well I It would be a new experience."

Mr. Waverton came. He was more stately than ever--browner also, but not changed otherwise. His large and handsome face affected all the old melancholy.

"Oh, Mr. Waverton!" Harry grinned. "You do honour me. Pray let me present you to my poor wife."

Geoffrey took no notice of him. "Madame, your obedient," he bowed to Alison. "I beg leave to have some speech with you."

"There's still some dinner. Draw up a chair," said Harry.

"I did not come to dine, sir."

"Oh, that's a sad stomach of yours. A gla.s.s of wine, then?"

"I do not take wine with you, Mr. Boyce."

"I wonder if you have made a mistake. For you have come into my house."

"I will answer for all my mistakes, sir, with hearty goodwill."

"Egad, you'll be busy."

"Oh, be silent!" Alison cried. "You are welcome, Mr. Waverton. How can I serve you?"

"I understand the gentleman's desire to hurry me into a quarrel, ma'am.

Be sure that I shall not permit it." Harry laughed disagreeably. "It's very well, sir. But I choose first that you should listen to what I have to say."

"Listen I Oh Lud, is it a poem?"

Mr. Waverton flushed. "You are impertinent, sir. It shall not serve you. I intend that madame shall know the truth of your father's treachery and yours."

Harry stood up. "Are we to stay for more of this, ma'am?"

"I shall stay," Alison said.

"You remark the gentleman's impatience to silence me, ma'am. I promise you that I shall tell you nothing which he or any man can deny."

"It's a dull tale, then," Harry muttered.

"I think it will excite you enough, ma'am. You are advised that I went to France with Colonel Boyce. The office which he offered me was to negotiate with Prince James. This I undertook readily, for to his party my family hath ever had an inclination, nay, an affection, and I saw in the affair duties of honour and moment."

"To the greater glory of Geoffrey, first Duke of Waverton, whom G.o.d preserve," quoth Harry.

"I did not, I will avow, foresee that the thing was but a trick to take me away from my house and out of the country. Though I may regret, ma'am"--he bowed magnificently to Alison--"I do not even now blame myself for my blindness, for I have ever accounted it unworthy of a man of honour to fear treachery in his servants"--he glared at Harry--"or weakness--ah--weakness in those to whom he gives his devotion"--he made melancholy eyes at Alison. "No more of that. In fine, I did not suspect that a fellow who was taking wages from my hand had plotted to rob me of what was my dearest hope, or that another--another--would surrender herself a prey to his crafty greed."