The Valiants of Virginia Part 16

He looked out across the distance; he could not trust his face.

"And--Valiant?"

"He went away the same day and never came back; he lived in New York till he died. He was the father of the Court's present owner. You never heard the story?"

"No," he admitted. "I--till quite recently I never heard of Damory Court."

"As a little girl," she went on, "I had a very vivid imagination, and when I came here to play I used to imagine I could see them, Valiant so handsome--his nickname was Beauty Valiant--and Sa.s.soon. How awful to come to such a lovely spot, just because of a young man's quarrel, and to--to kill one's friend! I used to wonder if the sky was blue that day and whether poor Sa.s.soon looked up at it when he took his place; and whom else he thought of that last moment."

"Had he parents?"

"No, neither of them had, I believe. But there might have been some one else,--some one he cared for and who cared for him. That was the last duel ever fought in Virginia. Dueling was a dreadful custom. I'm glad it's gone. Aren't you?"

"Yes," he said slowly, "it was a thing that cut two ways. Perhaps Valiant, if he could have had his choice afterward, would rather have been lying there that morning than Sa.s.soon."

"He must have suffered, too," she agreed, "or he wouldn't have exiled himself as he did. I used to wonder if it was a love-quarrel--whether they could have been in love with the same woman."

"But why should he go away?"

"I can't imagine, unless she had really loved the other man. If so, she couldn't have borne seeing Valiant afterward." She paused with a little laugh. "But then," she said, "it may have been nothing so romantic.

Perhaps they quarreled over cards or differed as to whose horse was the better jumper. Valiant's grandfather, who was known as Devil-John, is said to have called a man out because he rode past him on the wrong side. Our ancestors in Virginia, I'm afraid, didn't stand on ceremony when they felt uppish."

He did not smile. He was looking out once more over the luminous stretch of fields, his side-face toward her. Curious and painful questions were running through his brain. With an effort, he thrust these back and recalled his attention to what she was saying.

"You wonder, I suppose, that we feel as we do toward these old estates, and set store by them, and--yes, and brag of them insufferably as we do.

But it's in our blood. We love them as the English do their ancient manors. They have made our legends and our history. And the history of Virginia--"

She broke off with a shrug and, more himself now, he finished for her: "--isn't exactly a trifling part of the history of these United States.

You are right."

"You Northerners think we are desperately conceited," she smiled, "but it's true. We're still as proud of our land, and its old, old places, and love them as well as our ancestors ever did. We wouldn't change a line of their stately old pillars or a pebble of their darling homey gardens. Do you wonder we resent their pa.s.sing to people who don't care for them in the Southern way?"

"But suppose the newcomers _do_ care for them?"

Her lips curled. "A young millionaire who has lived all his life in New York, to care for Damory Court! A youth idiotically rich, brought up in a superheated atmosphere of noise and money!"

He started uncontrollably. So that was what she thought! He felt himself flus.h.i.+ng. He had wondered what would be his impression of the neighborhood and its people; their possible opinion of himself had never occurred to him.

"Why," she went on, "he's never cared enough about the place even to come and see it. For reasons of his own--good enough ones, perhaps, according to the papers,--he finds himself tired of the city. I can imagine him reflecting." With a mocking simulation of a brown-study, she put her hand to her brow, pus.h.i.+ng impatiently back the wayward l.u.s.ter: "'Let me see. Don't I own an estate somewhere in the South? Ah-ha! yes.

If I remember, it's in Virginia. I'll send down and fix up the old hovel.' Then he telephones for his architect to run down and see what 'improvements' it needs. And--here you are!"

He laughed shortly--a tribute to her mimicry--but it was a difficult laugh. The desperately ennuyee pose, the lax drawl, the unaccustomed mental effort and the sudden self-congratulatory "ah-ha!"--hitting off to a hair the lackadaisical boredom of the haplessly rich young boulevardier--this was the countryside's pen-picture of _him_!

"Don't you consider a longing for nature a wholesome sign?"

"Perhaps. The vagaries of the rich are always suggestive."

"You think there's no chance of his choosing to stay here because he actually likes it?"

"Not the slightest," she said indifferently.

"You are so certain of this without ever having seen him?"

She glanced at him covertly, annoyedly sensible of the impropriety of the discussion, since the man discussed was certainly his patron, maybe his friend. But his insistence had roused a certain balky wilfulness that would have its way. "It's true I've never seen him," she said, "but I've read about him a hundred times in the Sunday supplements. He's a regular feature of the high-roller section. His idea of a good time is a dog-banquet at Sherry's. Why, a girl told me once that there was a cigarette named after him--the Vanity Valiant!"

An angry glint slanted across his eyes. For some reason the silly story on her lips stung him deeply. "You find the Sunday newspapers always so dependable?"

"Well," she flashed, "you must know Mr. Valiant. _Is_ he a useful citizen? What has he ever done except play polo and furnish spicy paragraphs for the society columns?"

"Isn't that beside the point? Because he has been an idler, must he necessarily be a--vandal?"

She laughed again. "_He_ wouldn't call it vandalism. He'd think it decided improvement to make Damory Court as frantically different as possible. I suppose he'll erect a gla.s.s cupola and a porte-cochere, all up-to-date and varnishy, and put orchid hot-houses where the wilderness garden was, and a modern marble cupid instead of the summer-house, and lay out a kite-shaped track--"

Everything that was impulsive and explosive in John Valiant's nature came out with a bang. "No!" he cried, "whatever else he is, he's not such a preposterous a.s.s as that!"

She faced him squarely now. Her eyes were sparkling. "Since you know him so intimately and so highly approve of him--"

"No, no," he interrupted. "You mistake me. I shouldn't try to justify him." His flush had risen to the roots of his brown hair, but he did not lower his gaze. Now the red color slowly ebbed, leaving him pale. "He _has_ been an idler--that's true enough--and till a week ago he was 'idiotically rich.' But his idling is over now. At this moment, except for this one property, he is little better than a beggar."

She had taken a hasty step or two back from him, and her eyes were now fixed on his with a dawning half-fearful question in them.

"Till the failure of the Valiant Corporation, he had never heard of Damory Court, much less been aware that he owned it. It wasn't because he loved it that he came here--no! How could it be? He had never set foot in Virginia in his mortal life."

She put up her hands to her throat with a start. "Came?" she echoed.

"_Came!_"

"But if you think that even he could be so cra.s.sly stupid, so monumentally blind to all that is really fine and beautiful--"

"Oh!" she cried with flas.h.i.+ng comprehension. "Oh, how could you! You--"

He nodded curtly. "Yes," he said. "I am that haphazard harlequin, John Valiant, himself."

CHAPTER XX

ON THE EDGE OF THE WORLD

There was a pause not to be reckoned by minutes but suffocatingly long.

She had grown as pale as he.

"That was ungenerous of you," she said then with icy slowness. "Though no doubt you--found it entertaining. It must have still further amused you to be taken for an architect?"

"I am flattered," he replied, with a trace of bitterness, "to have suggested, even for a moment, so worthy a calling."

Though he spoke calmly enough, his thoughts were in ragged confusion. As her gaze dived into his, he was conscious of outre fancies. She seemed to him like some snow-cloud in woman's shape, edged with anger and swept by a wrathful wind into this summery afternoon. For her part she was telling herself with pa.s.sionate resentment that he had no right so to misrepresent himself--to lead her on to such a denouement. At his answer she put out her hand with a sudden gesture, as if bluntly thrusting the matter from her concern, and turning, went back along the tree-shadowed path.