The Riddle of the Night Part 11

"I haven't the slightest intention of doing so, dear chap," replied Cleek, who, it must be confessed, was a little shaken by the discovery.

"Every man has a right to cut up a bit rough when he thinks some other fellow is going to pry into his secrets. And I reckon this is one of your pet mashes--eh, what?"

"Yes, something like that. The latest--and a ripper. French, you know.

That's what rattled me for the moment. The dad loathes French women. I'm extra careful to keep this one's picture out of sight. I say! Don't know what you'll think about my manners, but I forgot all about your asking to go down and get out into the air. Sorry, old chap! Come along! Take my arm, and I'll help you."

As the breaking of the tobacco jar had deprived Raynor of again making use of that as a means of hiding the little silver box and its contents, he had, while speaking, crammed the letters, the photograph, and the sc.r.a.p of pink gauze into an inside pocket of his coat, and now came forward and took Cleek's arm with the amiable intention of leading him from the room.

There was, of course, in the circ.u.mstances nothing for it but to go, much as Cleek would have preferred to stop and trace the connection between young Raynor and Margot; but he was far too careful in his methods to cast any doubt regarding the genuineness of that sudden attack of a moment before by pretending that it had begun to abate, and therefore yielded himself to the inevitable.

But he had this consolation in doing it: not only would he now be enabled to witness the meeting between Geoff Clavering and Lady Katharine Fordham after all, but as a man who is ill is always more or less an object of sympathy and attention upon the part of women, he foresaw that he might induce Lady Katharine to hover round him, and thus bring Geoff Clavering within close range for easy and careful studying.

Nor did he fear that he had lost all opportunity for pursuing the subject of Harry Raynor's acquaintance with Margot. The mere fact that that young man had the contents of the little silver box upon his person might easily cause an apprehensive inquiry regarding the risk of carrying them about where they might be dropped, and so brought to his father's attention; and from that inquiry it would be simple work getting back to the subject itself without exciting any suspicion regarding his keen interest in it. He therefore allowed young Raynor to lead him from the room.

"Fearfully groggy, old chap, fearfully," he said in answer to young Raynor's inquiry regarding how he felt as they went down the dim pa.s.sage toward the staircase; "head going round like a teetotum; hope I don't keel over and spoil the evening's sport by having to be put to bed like a kid. Don't want two sick men on one floor, do you, eh? Or is it on this floor that Lord St. Ulmer's room is situated?"

"Yes, that one over there--second door from the wing staircase. Speak low, old chap, or you may disturb him. Sleeps like a cat, they say--one eye and both ears always open. Doesn't do anything but sleep, I imagine, day and night, from the way he keeps to his room. Hullo! I say! What's it? Aren't going to crumple up, Barch, are you?"

This, because Cleek had suddenly lurched against the bannister at the head of the stairs, and swung clean round until his back was resting against it.

"No--that is, I hope not; but I do feel rotten, old chap," replied he.

"Just half a second, will you?"

He lolled back his head, gave a sort of groan, and rapidly and silently began to count the doors and to make sure of the location of Lord St.

Ulmer's room. "All right; only a pa.s.sing spasm, I reckon, old chap," he went on as soon as he had discovered that his lords.h.i.+p's door was the third from the end of the pa.s.sage, and that his window would, therefore, be the second from the angle of the wing in the outer wall of the house.

"Come on--let's go down." And leaning heavily upon young Raynor, he descended to the dining-room.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

THE CLOUDBURST

The delay, trifling though it was, occasioned by the smas.h.i.+ng of the tobacco jar and the discovery of the photograph, served to interfere with the smooth progress of events, as it fell out that Cleek did not, after all, rejoin the party below in time to witness the first meeting between Geoffrey Clavering and Lady Katharine Fordham, for the carriage had arrived at the entrance to the house before he put in an appearance, and the General and Mrs. Raynor, Ailsa and Lady Katharine, were out on the veranda talking excitedly with young Clavering when Harry and Cleek came upon the scene.

There is a subtle magic in love that dispels all other emotions, and despite the gravity of the situation, a look of happiness radiated from Lady Katharine's face, reflected, though in a far lesser degree, upon Geoffrey Clavering's; indeed it did not need an over-keen eye to detect that the young man was seriously ill at ease, and general conversation languished.

Cleek's entry, therefore, with young Raynor's announcement of his sudden attack of faintness, not only drew all attention, but, as he had foreseen, he became an object of extreme solicitude upon the part of the ladies.

"Crocked up, poor beggar, and came within an ace of bowling over,"

explained young Raynor as he led him to a seat in a big wicker chair.

"Sharp attack of indigestion, if I know the symptoms. Bet you a hat, mater, it was that beastly cheese souffle we had for lunch. Enough to kill a dog, that stuff. But you will give that silly a.s.s of a cook his head, and let him serve up anything he likes. How are you, Clavering?

Things look like going all right for you after all--eh, what? 'Tisn't every man who can have his rival's wind shut off to order."

The remark could not be said to be a happy one, despite the fact that the maker of it laughed as though he had just perpetrated a witticism; for even his doting mother could not but deplore it.

"Harry, darling, how can you?" she said reproachfully, as young Clavering coloured and the two girls looked distressed and indignant.

"Darling, you ought to think before you speak."

"Huh!" grunted the disgusted General. "If he did, he probably wouldn't speak at all. It seems to me, Harry, that you must lie awake at nights planning how you can arrange to say just the wrong thing upon all occasions--you do it so constantly."

"Oh, that's it--just lay everything on me!" responded his dutiful offspring sulkily. "I'm always doing the wrong thing--if you believe what other people say. Seems to me that the best thing I can do is to take myself off, and then everybody will be happy. I say, Barch, when you feel like yourself again you'll find me either at the stables or in the pater's blessed ruin taking lessons in etiquette from the family ghost--if the pater has been able to rake up one and coax him to reside there."

And with this ill-natured dig at his father's pet weakness this engaging young gentleman lurched down the steps of the veranda and walked surlily away round the angle of the house.

The place which he had spoken of as "the pater's ruin" was a little fad of the General's, whose love of antiquities and the like had tempted him to transform a bare and unattractive part of the Grange grounds into something at least picturesque if not in the very highest good taste.

Ancient ruins had always been a pa.s.sion with him, but as you can't have ancient ruins in modern Wimbledon, the General had had a ruin built for himself, modelling it after the crumbling remains of an old Scottish castle which had appealed to his artistic eye, planting it with ferns and enwrapping ivy and vines of Virginia creeper, and even supplying it with owls and bats to keep up the illusion. It was his one harmless weakness, his one foible--that ruin; and n.o.body but his son ever mocked him for it, though many laughed in their sleeves and secretly made game of his foolish whim.

Cleek had heard of the "ruin" at Wuthering Grange before he had ever set foot inside the gates of the place; and hearing of it again--now, like this--he felt that he would like to kick the young cub who could publicly mock his father's folly in this fas.h.i.+on. He saw the General's kindly old face flush with anger and mortification, and was not at all surprised when he presently made an excuse to get away and retired indoors.

Meantime, Cleek's plan of pretending illness had panned out precisely as he had imagined, and was productive of the results he desired.

Essentially feminine and of a highly sympathetic nature, Lady Katharine hovered near him, doing all in her power to ease the sufferings of one whom she shrewdly suspected of being very near to the heart of her dearest friend, and this naturally brought Geoffrey to the little group surrounding him, and enabled him to study his att.i.tude at close quarters.

The more he saw of Sir Philip Clavering's son and heir, the better he liked him; but although the young man occasionally turned an adoring look upon Lady Katharine, and appeared to be doing his best to share her evident high spirits, it was apparent to Cleek, after a moment's study, that his att.i.tude was for the most part a.s.sumed. He made no attempt to get away from the others and have the lady of his heart all to himself, and whenever he and she were for a moment separated from Mrs. Raynor and Ailsa Lorne, he was nervous, distressed, and acted with an air of restraint that was as puzzling as it was p.r.o.nounced.

A chance remark regarding the state of Lord St. Ulmer's health brought from Lord St. Ulmer's daughter the happy, excited remark:

"Oh, Geoff, dear, he's improving every hour, and he has been so wonderfully kind and tender to me this afternoon that I could kiss him.

Just think, he says that things can go on now just as they did before Count de Louvisan came; that there is nothing now to come between us, Geoff; nothing to keep us apart for another moment!"

"Really? That's ripping!" said young Clavering, and in his effort to appear delighted smiled the ghastliest parody of a smile possible to conceive. It was so p.r.o.nounced that even Lady Katharine herself noticed it and looked puzzled and distressed.

"You don't seem very glad," she said, a note of pain in her voice, a look of pain in her reproachful eyes. "_Aren't_ you glad, Geoff? And is that why you did not come over to see me before?"

"Don't be silly, Kathie. I couldn't come any earlier because--well, because I couldn't, that's all."

"A very lucid explanation, I must say. What is the matter with you, Geoff? You're not a bit like yourself to-day--is he, Ailsa?"

But Ailsa made no reply. There was none really needed. Geoffrey had taken hardly any notice, but as if struck with a sudden thought, whipped out a notebook and began shuffling the pages nervously through his fingers.

"I'd nearly forgotten, Kathie," he said apologetically; "my mother asked if you would lend her these books." He handed her the torn leaf with something scribbled upon it. "Any time will do, but she said you would have them."

Lady Katharine looked down at the writing, and a wave of colour surged over her face.

"But----" she commenced.

"I don't want them now; in fact, I can't stop even now, only I just wanted to know that you were all right."

There was no mistaking the look of adoration on the young man's face, but she looked at him reproachfully.

"Going back again, so soon!" she said softly, averting her head, while her lips trembled and her hand clutched painfully on the leaf of the notebook.

"I'm afraid I must, dear," responded Geoff. Then he turned swiftly to Cleek, who had been watching the little scene, the peculiar one-sided smile looping up the corners of his mouth.

"Good-bye, Mr. Barch; pleased to have met you," he said without, however, coming forward and offering his hand.

"Thanks! same to you; good-bye," replied Cleek, and that same smile was still on his face when a minute or two later, young Clavering having taken his departure, Cleek was rejoined by Ailsa Lorne.