The Ordeal Part 3

"Did you really hear something?" he asked sceptically.

The light note of satire stung her pride. "Oh, I _saw_ them, and they saw me," she protested. "I saw three men, and they all ran as I came into the dining-room."

He broke into a short laugh. "Got them on the run, did you? Not very formidable they were, you must admit. Shadows, I fancy. There is a large mirror on the blank side of the dining-room opposite the door. Don't you suppose it possible that you saw only your own moving reflection?"

Her pride was roused. The pulse of anger began to tint her face with a dull crimson. "I should imagine I could distinguish my own reflection from three men--rough-looking men with slouched hats, all running and looking backward over their shoulders."

It had been a conscious effort to nerve herself for this protest in defence of her poise and capacity, but at the mere recollection of the scene she had conjured up anew she fell to trembling, looking very pale again and as if she might faint.

"Well, it is no great matter, as the intruders were bluffed off," he said suavely, putting the question aside. "I will send one of Briscoe's grooms to investigate the premises. But now, suppose we go to the piazza, and let you rest there and recover from the strain to your ankle." Once more he glanced down at the dainty shoe with its high French heel. "I don't wonder it turned. A proper shoe for mountaineering!" That rancor against a frivolity of feminine fas.h.i.+on that holds a menace to health or safety, so characteristic of the utilitarian masculine mind, was a touch of his old individuality, and it made him seem to her more like himself of yore.

The resemblance did not tend to confirm her composure, and she was almost piteous as she protested that she could not, she would not, go near the hotel again.

"Why, you need not, then," he rea.s.sured her abruptly, waiving the possibility of insistence, as much as to say it was no concern of his.

"I might walk to the observatory," she suggested, "and--and--I need not detain you then."

"In view of three bandits in slouched hats, although all on the back-track--and although I am convinced that it was but their astral apparitions with which you were favored--I will venture to intrude my society until I can see you to the Briscoe bungalow."

"Oh, there's no intrusion," she rejoined petulantly. "You must know I couldn't mean that!"

"I never know what you mean, I am sure!" he said with that tense note of satire. Then he paused with a vague wonder at himself thus to trench on the emotional phases between them that must be buried forever.

Remembering her own allusion that morning, her cry of regret and appeal, he was apprehensive of some renewal of the topic that he had thus invited, and he began to move hastily down the slope, supporting her with care, but with a certain urgency too. He was obviously eager to terminate the conversational opportunity, and when it was requisite to pause to rest he improved the respite by beckoning to one of the stablemen pa.s.sing near, bound toward a pasture in the rear of the hotel with a halter in his hand, and ordering him to investigate the building to discover any signs of intrusion.

The man hearkened in patent surprise, then asked if he might defer the commission till he had harnessed Fairy-foot, Mr. Briscoe having ordered out the dog-cart and his favorite mare.

"Plenty of time, plenty of time! We can't hope to overtake them, with the start they have already. Just see if there are any signs of intrusion into the place and report. And now, Mrs. Royston, shall we move on?"

The observatory was a structure strong but singularly light and airy of effect, poised on the brink of the mountain, above a slant so steep as to be precipitous indeed, terminating in a sheer vertical descent, after affording such foothold as the supporting timbers required. A great landscape it overlooked of wooded range and valley in autumnal tints and burnished sunset glow, but this made only scant impression on the minds of both, looking out with preoccupied, unseeing eyes. The bal.u.s.trade around the four sides formed the back of a bench, and on this seat Lillian sank down, still feeble and fluttering, painfully agitated, acutely aware that, as she had no obvious physical hurt, the nervous shock she had sustained might scarcely suffice to account for her persistent claim on his aid and attention. Certainly he was warranted in thinking anything, all he would, since her wild, impulsive appeal in the early morning. How had it chanced, that cry from her heart! It was a triumph in some sort for him, unsought, complete, yet so pitiable, so mean, that he did not even care for it. His face was not triumphant; rather, listless, anxious, careworn. He was gazing down toward the bungalow where Briscoe stood at the head of the flight of the veranda steps, drawing on his driving gloves, while Fairy-foot, the fine mare, now resplendent in the least restrictions of harness that might control her bounding spirits and splendid strength, stood between the shafts of the dog-cart on the drive, a groom at her head, holding the bit.

Mrs. Briscoe had approached, and they discerned from her husband's gestures that he was inviting her to accompany him. They could not hear the words at this distance, but presently Briscoe, the most transparently candid of men, suddenly whirled and glanced up toward the observatory across the ravine, showing plainly that the two had become the subject of conversation.

Lillian was all unstrung, her powers of self-control annulled. She broke out with as unreasoning a sense of injury as a sensitive child might have felt. "They are talking about us!" she wailed.

"They are not the first!" Bayne could not restrain his curt, bitter laugh, the unconscious humor of the suggestion was so patent, albeit the edge cut deep.

"And how do you suppose that fact makes _me_ feel?" she asked, looking up at him, her eyes full of tears, her heart swelling, her face scarlet.

Bayne would have given much to avoid this moment. But now that the discussion was upon him, he said to himself that he would not traffic with the insincerities, he would not be recreant to his own ident.i.ty. He would not fawn, and bow, and play the smug squire of dames, full of specious flatteries, and kiss the hand that smote him.

"And how do you suppose that _I_ should think you could feel at all?" he retorted sternly.

It was so unlike him, the rebuke--he had so ardently wors.h.i.+pped her, even her faults, which were like s.h.i.+ning endowments in his estimation--that for the first time she felt the full poignancy of his alienation. He was no longer hers, loving, regretting, always yearning after her, the unattainable! Had he not said only to-day that neither of them had aught to regret? Was this what he had really felt through the long years of their separation? Was it she who had forfeited him, rather than he who had lost her? She sat quite still, almost stunned by the realization, a vague sense of bereavement upon her. A woman's faith in the constancy of a lover is a robust endowment! It withstands change and time and many a coercive intimation.

"I suppose," she said at length, quite humbly, "it is natural that you should say that to me."

"You asked for it," he replied tersely.

Then they were both silent for a s.p.a.ce, looking down at the group on the veranda of the bungalow.

"May I have the honor and pleasure of your company, madam?" Briscoe had asked his wife with fantastic formality.

"You may _not_!" she rejoined with a gay laugh.

"And why not?"

"I declare, Ned, you live so much up here in the wilderness, with your bears and deer and catamounts and mountaineers, that you are likely to forget all the _bienseance_ you ever knew. Don't you perceive that my duties as chaperon to those lovers should lie nearest my heart?"

Then it was that he turned and cast that comprehending glance at the two in the distant observatory. Knowing how far from Bayne's mind was the emotion, the intention, she ascribed to him, that she would fain foster, his face grew rueful and overcast. He shook his head with disconsolate rebuke. "Oh, you woman, you!"

But the reproach did not strike home. Mrs. Briscoe was quite satisfied to be a woman, and was avowedly seeking to add to the normal subtleties of this state the special craft of a matchmaker.

Briscoe desired to avoid being drawn into any confession of his knowledge of Bayne's att.i.tude of mind, and, aware of his own lack of diplomacy, sheered off precipitately from the subject. He turned, beaming anew, to the little boy who was looking on, cherubically roseate, at the sleek mare and the smart groom at her bit.

"Then, Archibald Royston, Esquire, may I hope that _you_ will favor me?"

Archibald Royston, Esquire, suddenly apprehending in the midst of his absorption the nature of the invitation, gave two elastic bounces straight up and down expressive of supreme ecstasy; then, his arms outstretched, he began to run wildly up and down the veranda, looking in at the doors and windows as he pa.s.sed, seeking his mother and her permission.

"Oh!" cried Lillian, springing to her feet as she watched the dumb-show at the distance. "They want Archie to go to drive. Oh, how can I make them hear me? I am sure Ned will not take him without permission."

She waved her hand, but the distance was obviously too great for the signal to be understood, and Briscoe's att.i.tude was doubtful and perplexed. There was no time to be lost, for it was growing late, and a postponement, as far as Archie was concerned, seemed inevitable.

"Oh, the poor little fellow will be so disappointed! The mare will be off before I can make them understand."

"Wait," said Bayne authoritatively. He sprang upon the bench, and in this commanding position placed both hands megaphone-like to his lips, and as Archie came running along the veranda again, having descried his mother in the distance, and with outstretched arms bleating forth his eager, unheard appeal, Bayne shouted, his voice clear as a trumpet, "Yes, you _may go_!"

Not until he was once more on the floor of the observatory did he realize the form of the permission, and what relish its a.s.sumption of authority must give the matchmaking Mrs. Briscoe. Apparently, it did not impress Lillian as they stood together and she smilingly watched the group at the bungalow, when Archie was swung to a seat in the dog-cart beside his host. It seemed for a moment that they were off, but Mrs. Briscoe, with womanly precaution, bethought herself to throw a wrap into the vehicle.

Throughout the day the close curtaining mists had resisted all stir of air, and the temperature had been almost sultry. Since the lifting of the vapors, the currents of the atmosphere were flowing freely once more, and the crystal clarity that succeeded was pervaded by an increasing chilliness. Before nightfall it would be quite cold, and doubtless the smart little red coat, gay with its Persian embroideries, would be brought into requisition.

For many a month afterward, whenever Lillian closed her eyes, she saw that little red coat. Shutting out the light, the world, brought neither rest nor darkness; instead, the long flaring vistas of gold and russet foliage and gray crags and flaming sunset remained indelible, and amidst it all one vivid point of scarlet hue as the little red coat was tossed through the air like a red leaf flying in the wind.

Now, as all unprescient she watched the group, she thought again they were gone. But no! Fairy-foot was a handful, even for so capital a whip as Briscoe. He obviously considered that the boy would be more secure stowed on the floor of the vehicle, half under the soft rug, and braced by the firm foot planted on either side against the dash-board.

"How considerate!" the watching mother thought with a glow of grat.i.tude, noting the caution.

Suddenly the groom leaped aside; the splendid mare sprang forward; there was a whirl of wheels, a whorl of rays as the gleaming spokes caught the suns.h.i.+ne, and they were gone indeed!

"Oh!" cried Mrs. Royston, her eyes bright and soft with tenderness, "what a delight for Archie! He fairly adores to go with Ned. He owes it to you this time. You always took little things so much to heart."

"And great ones, too, to my sorrow," he said.

Her face changed. She was trembling once more on the brink of tears. She looked up at him with earnest appeal. "I wish, Julian, that we could forget the past."

"I do not," he returned, stern and grave, gazing far away over the landscape.

"No," she cried in a sudden transport of painful emotion; "you hold it against me like a grudge--a grudge that you despise too much to wreak vengeance for its sake. The past will always live in your memory--you hold it like a sword to my throat. You know that I shall always feel the torture of its edge, but in your magnanimity"--with sarcastic emphasis--"you forbear to thrust in the murderous blade."

"Good G.o.d, Lillian!" exclaimed Bayne, losing his balance altogether at the accusation. "How have I arrogated magnanimity, or anything else? I a.s.sume nothing! I have sought to efface myself while here, as far as might be. For the sake of all concerned--you, the Briscoes, _les convenances_, myself--I could not run away at the sight of you, like a whipped hound! But I perceive my error. I will get out of this forthwith.

Heaven knows it has been anything but a pleasure!"