The Dust of Conflict Part 52

The man went away, and in another moment or two the frail hull quivered until the deck beams rattled above them. Then while the splash of flung- off water swelled into a deep pulsating sound it seemed to leap onward under them, and the commander sat down again, looking at Appleby with a curious little smile in his eyes.

"I haven't asked your name yet, and scarcely think it's necessary," he said. "So far as my duty permits, you can count upon my doing everything I can to meet your wishes, Mr. Appleby."

Appleby stared at him. "I appreciate your offer, though I don't quite understand it yet," he said.

"Well," said the commander with a pleasant laugh, "my name is Julian Savine, and I have been hoping that I should come across you for a long while. It is quite likely you have heard Miss Harding mention me."

Appleby felt the blood creep into his face, and recognized that this was the last thing he could have wished for, but he met Savine's gaze steadily.

"I have," he said slowly. "I fancy Miss Harding has shown herself a good friend to me."

Savine stretched out a brown hand. "Well," he said, "I hope you will also count me in. And now, if you will excuse me, I have something to tell my lieutenant. In the meanwhile I'll send the steward along."

He went out, and Harper grinned at Appleby. "That," he said reflectively, "is the kind of man we raise in my country. He has heard about the night you took her in. The question is how much did Miss Harding know or think fit to tell him?"

"Yes," said Appleby grimly, "it is just that point which is worrying me."

The steward brought them in a meal, but it was a little while before Savine appeared again. He opened a box of cigars, and though he said nothing that seemed to indicate that Harper's company was not altogether necessary the latter rose.

"I guess I'll go out and see how she's getting along," he said.

Then there was a little silence, until Appleby glanced at the commander.

"I have been thinking hard during the last half-hour, and I am now going to tell you exactly what happened on the night I met Miss Harding in Santa Marta," he said. "I scarcely think you have heard it in quite the same shape before, and I was not sure that it would have been altogether advisable a little while ago."

"I don't know that it is necessary. Still, you might go on."

Appleby told his story with almost brutal frankness, and then looked the commander in the eyes.

"If you have the slightest doubt on any point you may never have such an opportunity of getting rid of it again," he said.

Savine smiled a little, though there was the faintest tinge of darker color in his bronzed cheek.

"I never had any, and now there is nothing I could do which would quite wipe out the obligation I feel I am under to you," he said.

He stopped with a curious little gleam in his eyes, and Appleby felt that he had made another friend who would not fail him. Then he turned the conversation, and Savine told him that he was engaged on special service on the Cuban coast when he saw the boat and decided to intercept her in the hope of acquiring information. Hostilities were certain, but he hoped to put his guests on board a steamer he expected to fall in with on the morrow.

x.x.xIII - VIOLET REGAINS HER LIBERTY

THE light was fading when Violet Wayne lay in a low chair by the fire in Hester Earle's drawing-room. A bitter wind wailed dolefully outside among the swaying trees, and the room was growing dusky, but now and then a flickering blaze from the hearth forced up the girl's face out of the shadow. It was, so Hester who sat opposite her fancied, curiously weary, and there was a suggestive listlessness in her att.i.tude. She had, though few of those who met her would have suspected it, been living under a constant strain during the last two or three months, and it was a relief to feel that for the time at least she could relax her efforts to preserve her customary serenity. Hester evidently understood this, for she was a young woman of discernment, and the two were close friends.

"I am glad you have asked the Cochrane girls to stay with you, Violet,"

she said. "I think you need stirring up, and though there is not a great deal in Lily Cochrane or her sister, n.o.body could accuse them of undue quietness. They are coming?"

"I believe so, but Lily seemed uncertain whether she could get away, and was to telegraph us to-night. Still, I almost fancy I would rather be without them. There are times when one scarcely feels equal to entertaining anybody."

Hester nodded sympathetically. "Of course, but it is in just such cases the effort is most likely to prove beneficial," she said. "Have you had any word from Tony since he left?"

"Two or three lines written in pencil from Havana. He was going into the country to find Mr. Appleby."

Hester gazed thoughtfully at the fire for awhile, and then suddenly fixed her eyes upon her companion's face.

"We have been friends since the time we wore short frocks, and that implies a good deal," she said. "Now, it is a little more difficult to deceive me than the rest-and I have been concerned about you lately. I wonder if I dare ask you if you have quite forgiven Tony?"

"I don't know"; and Violet's voice was a trifle strained. "I feel that I should-but it is difficult, and I can't convince myself. It may be a little easier by and by."

Hester made a little sympathetic gesture, though she was almost astonished, for it was seldom that Violet Wayne revealed her feelings.

"Still, we understood that you would marry him when he came back," she said.

Her companion sat still for almost a minute, while the flickering firelight showed the pain in her face. Ever since the shock of Nettie Harding's disclosure had pa.s.sed she had grappled with the question Hester had suggested, and striven to reconcile herself to the answer.

Tony had been suddenly revealed to her as he was, and the love she had once cherished had not survived her belief in him, but there was in her a depth of almost maternal tenderness and compa.s.sion which few suspected, and the man's feebleness appealed to it. She knew how he clung to her, and that if she cast him off he would inevitably sink.

There was a trace of contempt in her compa.s.sion as she realized it, and yet she had been fond of him, and he had many lovable qualities. She had also made him a promise, and his ring was still upon her hand, while she reflected with a tinge of bitterness that it is not wise to expect too much, and that men of stainless character were doubtless singularly scarce. The joy of life had vanished, but she felt that Tony's fate was in her hands, and the duty, at least, remained.

"Yes," she said very slowly. "If he still wishes it when he comes back."

Hester nodded gravely. "I think you are right," she said. "Tony will wipe the blunder out when he has you to prompt him, but I think he would go to pieces if you sent him away. Of course, it is not everybody who would feel it-but it is-a responsibility. You can, you see, make whatever you wish of him."

"One would esteem a man with the qualities which make that easy?" said Violet, with a little weary smile.

"They might occasionally prove convenient in one's husband," said Hester, with a faint twinkle in her eyes.

Her companion seemed to s.h.i.+ver. "I wonder what Tony is doing now," she said. "It is, at least, hot and bright in Cuba, and if I had only known when he was coming back we would have gone away to the Riviera." Then she straightened herself a little. "Isn't it time your father arrived?"

Hester smiled, and wondered if Violet was already sorry that she had unbent so far.

"He should be here at any minute unless the train is late," she said, and, feeling that her companion would prefer it, plunged into a discussion of Northrop affairs.

While she made the most of each triviality there was a rattle of wheels outside, and Mr. Earle came in. He shook hands with Violet, and stood a moment or two by the fire.

"I had expected to find your mother here," he said.

"It was a bitter afternoon, and I persuaded her to stay at home."

The man took a pink envelope out of his pocket, and handed it her.

"I pa.s.sed the post-office lad walking his bicycle over a very soft piece of road, and pulled up to ask if he had anything for me," he said. "When I found he had only a telegram for your mother I offered to bring it on, and he seemed quite willing to let me. The vicar hasn't turned up yet, Hester?"

"No," said Hester. "I am expecting him."

Earle went out, and Hester proceeded with the account of a recent dance which she had been engaged in when he came in, while Violet turned over the telegram.

"It will be from Lily Cochrane to tell us she is coming, and I think I'll open it," she said.

Hester nodded. "Ada Whittingham in green-there are people who really have no sense of fitness," she said. "The effect was positively startling."