The Truants Part 21

"No, kind," said she.

She asked him to sit down.

"You look tired," she added. "How does your election work go on?"

Callon related the progress of his campaign, and with an air of making particular confidences. He could speak without any reserve to her, he said. He conveyed the impression that he was making headway against almost insuperable obstacles. He flattered her, moreover, by a suggestion that she herself was a great factor in his successes. The mere knowledge that she wished him well, that perhaps, once or twice in the day, she gave him a spare thought, helped him much more than she could imagine. Millie was induced to believe that, although she sat quietly in London, she was thus exercising power through Callon in his const.i.tuency.

"Of course, I am a poor man," said Callon. "Poverty hampers one."

"Oh, but you will win," cried Millie Stretton, with a delighted conviction; "yes, you will win."

She felt strong, confident--just, in a word, as she had felt when she had agreed with Tony that he must go away.

"With your help, yes," he answered; and the sound of his voice violated her like a caress. Millie rose from her chair.

At once Callon rose too, and altered his tone.

"You have heard from Sir Anthony Stretton?" he said. "Tell me of yourself."

"Yes, I have heard. He will not return yet."

There came a light into Callon's eyes. He raised his hand to his mouth to hide a smile.

"Few men," he said, with the utmost sympathy, "would have left you to bear these last weeks alone."

He was standing just behind her, speaking over her shoulder. He was very still, the house was very silent. Millie was suddenly aware of danger.

"You must not say that, Mr. Callon," she said rather sharply.

And immediately he answered, "I beg your pardon. I had no idea my sympathy would have seemed to you an insult."

He spoke with a sudden bitterness. Millicent turned round in surprise.

She saw that his face was stern and cold.

"An insult?" she said, and her voice was troubled. "No, you and I are friends."

But Callon would have none of these excuses. He had come to the house deliberately to quarrel. He had a great faith in the efficacy of quarrels, given the right type of woman. As Mudge had told Pamela, he knew the tactics of the particular kind of warfare which he waged. To cause a woman some pain, to make her think with regret that in him she had lost a friend; that would fix him in her thoughts. So Callon quarrelled. Millie Stretton could not say a word but he misinterpreted it. Every sentence he cleverly twisted into an offence.

"I will say good-bye," he said, at length, as though he had reached the limits of endurance.

Millie Stretton looked at him with troubled eyes.

"I am so sorry it should end like this," she said piteously. "I don't know why it has."

Callon went out of the room, and closed the door behind him. Then he let himself into the street. Millie Stretton would miss him, he felt sure. Her looks, her last words a.s.sured him of that. He would wait now without a movement towards a reconciliation. That must come from her, it would give him in her eyes a reputation for strength. He knew the value of that reputation. He had no doubt, besides, that she would suggest a reconciliation. Other women might not, but Millie--yes. On the whole, Mr. Callon was very well content with his night's work. He had taken, in his way of thinking, a long step. The square was empty, except for the carriages outside Lady Millingham's door. Lionel Callon walked briskly home.

CHAPTER XV

MR. MUDGE COMES TO THE RESCUE

Lionel Callon's visit to Millie Stretton bore, however, consequences which had not at all entered into his calculations. He was unaware of the watchers at Lady Millingham's window; he had no knowledge of Pamela's promise to Tony Stretton; no suspicion, therefore, that she was now pa.s.sionately resolved to keep it in the spirit and the letter.

He was even without a thought that his advances towards Millie had at all been remarked upon or their motive discovered. Ignorance lulled him into security. But within a short while a counter-plot was set in train.

The occasion was the first summer meeting on Newmarket Heath. Pamela Mardale seldom missed a race meeting at Newmarket dining the spring and summer. There were the horses, in the first place; she met her friends besides; the heath itself, with its broad expanse and its downs, had for her eyes a beauty of its own; and in addition the private enclosure was separated by the width of the course from the crowd and clamour of the ring. She attended this particular meeting, and after the second race was over she happened to be standing amidst a group of friends within the grove of trees at the back of the paddock. Outside, upon the heath, the air was clear and bright; a light wind blew pleasantly. Here the trees were in bud, and the sunlight, split by the boughs, dappled with light and shadow the glossy coats of the horses as they were led in and out amongst the boles. A mare was led past Pamela, and one of her friends said--

"Semiramis. I think she will win this race."

Pamela looked towards the mare, and saw, just beyond her, Mr. Mudge.

He was alone, as he usually was; and though he stopped in his walk, now here, now there, to exchange a word with some acquaintance, he moved on again, invariably alone. Gradually he drew nearer to the group in which Pamela was standing, and his face brightened. He quickened his step; Pamela, on her side, advanced rather quickly towards him.

"You are here?" she said, with a smile. "I am glad, though I did not think to meet you."

Mr. Mudge, to tell the truth, though he carried a race-card in his hand, and gla.s.ses slung across his shoulder, had the disconsolate air of a man conscious that he was out of place. He answered Pamela, indeed, almost apologetically.

"It is better after all to be here than in London on a day of summer,"

he said, and he added, with a shrewd glance at her, "You have something to say to me--a question to ask."

Pamela looked up at him in surprise.

"Yes, I have. Let us go out."

They walked into the paddock, and thence through the gate into the enclosure. The enclosure was at this moment rather empty. Pamela led the way to the rails alongside the course, and chose a place where they were out of the hearing of any bystander.

"You remember the evening at Frances Millingham's?" she asked. She had not seen Mr. Mudge since that date.

Mr. Mudge replied immediately.

"Yes; Sir Anthony Stretton"--and the name struck so oddly upon Pamela's ears that, serious as at this moment she was, she laughed.

"Sir Anthony Stretton turned away from the steps of his house. You were distressed, Miss Mardale: I, on the contrary, said that nothing better could have happened. You wish to ask me why I said that?"

"Yes," said Pamela; "I am very anxious to know. Millie is my friend. I am, in a sort of way, too, responsible for her;" and as Mr. Mudge looked surprised, she repeated the word--"Yes, responsible. And I am rather troubled." She spoke with a little hesitation. There was a frown upon her forehead, a look of perplexity in her dark eyes. She was reluctant to admit that her friend was in any danger or needed any protection from her own weakness. The freemasonry of her s.e.x impelled her to silence. On the other hand, she was at her wits' end what to do. And she had confidence in her companion's discretion; she determined to speak frankly.

"It is not only your remark which troubles me," she said, "but I called on Millie the next afternoon."

"Oh, you did?" exclaimed Mr. Mudge.

"Yes; I asked after Tony. Millie had not seen him, and did not expect him. She showed me letters from his solicitors empowering her to do what she liked with the house and income, and a short letter from Tony himself, written on the _Perseverance_, to the same effect."

She did not explain to Mr. Mudge what the _Perseverance_ was, and he asked no questions.

"I told Millie," she continued, "that Tony had returned, but she refused to believe it. I told her when and where I had seen him."

"You did that?" said Mr. Mudge. "Wait a moment." He saw and understood Pamela's reluctance to speak. He determined to help her out. "Let me describe to you what followed. She stared blankly at you and asked you to repeat what you had said?"

"Yes," replied Pamela, in surprise; "that is just what she did."