Count Bunker Part 42

"Is there any one about the house just now?"

"Oh yes; the keeper is stationed in the hall!"

"Miss Wallingford, if you would atone for a deep injury which you have inadvertently done an innocent man, bring me fifty feet of stout rope!

And, I say, see that the door of the bicycle house is left unlocked.

Will you do this?"

"I--I'll try."

A sound on the stairs alarmed her, and with a fleeting smile of sympathy she was gone and the door locked upon him again.

Again the time pa.s.sed slowly by, and he was left to ponder over the critical nature of the situation as revealed by the luckless Baron's intelligence. Clearly he must escape to-night, at all hazards.

"What's that? My rope?" he wondered.

But it was only the arrival of his dinner, brought as before upon a tray and set just within the door, as though they feared for the bearer's life should he venture within reach of this desperate adventurer from Uruguay.

"A very large dish for a very small appet.i.te," he thought, as he bore his meal over to the bed and drew his chair up before it.

It looked indeed as though a roasted goose must be beneath the cover.

He raised it, and there, behold! lay a large coil of excellent new rope.

The Count chuckled.

"Commend me to the heart and the wit of women! What man would ever have provided so dainty a dish as this? Unless, indeed" (he had the breadth of mind to add) "it happened to be a charming adventuress who was in trouble."

Drinking the half pint of moderate claret which they had allowed him to the happiness and prosperity of all true-hearted women, he could not help regretting that his imprisoned confederate should be so unlikely to enjoy similar good fortune.

"He went too far with those two dear girls. A woman deceived as he has deceived them will never forgive him. They'd stand sentry at his cell-door sooner than let the poor Baron escape," he reflected commiserately, and sighed to think of the disastrous effect this mishap might have both upon his friend's diplomatic career and domestic felicity.

While waiting for the dusk to deepen, and endeavoring to console himself for the lack of cigars with the poor remedy of cigarettes, he employed his time profitably in tying a series of double knots upon the line of rope. Then at last, when he could see the stars bright above the trees and hear no sound in the house, he pulled his bed softly to the open window, and to it fastened one end of his rope securely. The other he quietly let drop, and losing not an instant followed it hand under hand, murmuring anathemas on the rough wall that so sc.r.a.ped his evening trousers.

On tiptoe he stole to the door through which the bicycle had gone. It yielded to a push, and once inside he ventured to strike a match.

"By Gad! I've a choice of half a dozen," he exclaimed.

It need scarcely be said that he selected the best; and after slitting with his pocket-knife the tires of all the others, he mounted and pedalled quietly down the drive. The lodge gates stood open; the road, a trifle muddy but clear of all traffic, stretched visible for a long way in the starlight; the breeze blew fair behind him.

"May Providence guide me to the station," he prayed, and rode off into the night.

CHAPTER x.x.xIII

Suppose the clock be set back four-and-twenty hours, and behold now the Baron von Blitzenberg, the diplomatist and premier baron of Bavaria, engaged in unhappy argument with himself. Unhappy, because his reason, though so carefully trained from the kindergarten upward, proved unable to combat the dismal onsets of superst.i.tion.

"Pooh! who cares for an old picture?" Reason would reiterate.

"It is an omen," said Superst.i.tion simply; and Reason stood convicted as an empty braggart.

But if Time be the great healer, Dinner is at least a clever quack, and when he and old Mr. Rentoul had consumed well-nigh a bottle and a half of their host's port between them, the outlook became much less gloomy.

A particularly hilarious evening in the drawing-room completed the triumph of mind over what he was now able to term "jost nonsense,"

and he slept that night as soundly as the Count was simultaneously slumbering in Sir Justin's bed-room. And there was no unpleasant awakening in the Baron's case. On the contrary, all nature seemed in a conspiracy to make the last day of his adventure pleasant. The sun shone brightly, his razors had an excellent edge, sausages were served for breakfast, and when he joined the family afterwards he found them as affectionately kind as a circle of relations. In fact, the Baron had dropped more than one hint the night before of such a nature that they had some reason for supposing relations.h.i.+p imminent. It is true Eva was a little disappointed that the actual words were not yet said, and when he made an airy reference to paying a farewell call that morning upon their neighbors at Lincoln Lodge, she exhibited so much disapproval in her air that he said at once--

"Ach, vell, I shall jost go after lonch and be back in an hour and a half. I jost vish to say good-bye, zat is all."

Little guessing how much was to hang upon this postponement, he drove over after luncheon with a mind entirely rea.s.sured. With only an afternoon to be safely pa.s.sed, no mishap, he was sure, could possibly happen now. If indeed the Maddisons chose to be offended with him, why, then, his call would merely be the briefer and he would recommend Eva for the post of Lady Tulliwuddle without qualification. It was his critics who had reason to fear, not he.

Miss Maddison was at home, the staff of footmen a.s.sured him, and, holding his head as high as a chieftain should, he strode into her sanctuary.

"Do I disturb you?"

He asked this with a quicker beating heart. Not Eleanor alone, but her father and Ri confronted him, and it was very plain to see that a tempest was in the brewing. Her eyes were bright with tears and indignation; their brows heavy with formidable frowns. At the first moment of his entering, extreme astonishment at seeing him was clearly their dominant emotion, and as evidently it rapidly developed into a sentiment even less hospitable.

"Why, this beats the devil!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Mr. Maddison; and for a moment this was the sole response to his inquiry.

The next to speak was Ri--

"Show it him, Poppa! Confront him with the evidence!"

With ominous deliberation the millionaire picked up a newspaper from the floor, where apparently it had been crumpled and flung, smoothed out the creases, and approached the Baron till their noses were in danger of collision. While executing this manoeuvre the silence was only broken by the suppressed sobbing of his daughter. Then at last he spoke.

"Our mails, sir, have just arrived. This, sir, is 'The Times' newspaper, published in the city of London yesterday morning."

He shook it in the Baron's face with a sudden vehemence that caused that n.o.bleman to execute an abrupt movement backward.

"Take it," continued the millionaire--"take it, sir, and explain this if you can!"

So confused had the Baron's mind become already that it was with difficulty he could decipher the following petrifying announcement--

"Tulliwuddle--Herringay.--In London, privately, Lord Tulliwuddle to Constance, daughter of Robert Herringay."

The Baron's brain reeled.

"Here is another paragraph that may interest you," pursued Mr. Maddison, turning the paper outside in with an alarmingly vigorous movement, and presenting a short paragraph for the Baron's inspection. This ran--

"PEER AND ACTRESS.

"As announced in our marriage column, the wedding took place yesterday, privately, of Lord Tulliwuddle, kinsman and heir of the late peer of that name, so well known in London and Scottish society, and Miss Constance Herringay, better known as 'Connie Fitz Aubyn,' of the Gaiety Theatre. It is understood that the young couple have departed for the Mediterranean."

In a few seconds given him to prepare his mind, the Baron desperately endeavored to imagine what the resourceful Bunker would say or do under these awful circ.u.mstances.

"Well, sir?" said Mr. Maddison.

"It is a lie!"

"A lie?"

Ri laughed scornfully.