Winding Paths Part 79

"Dudley told me, dear. I have been thinking of you so much."

Then Dudley stepped up to them, and in his face, too, was this subdued gladness.

Hal looked from one to the other.

"Have you?..." she began, and paused uncertainly.

"Yes, dear"; and Ethel blushed charmingly. "I am going to be your sister, so I thought you would let me begin at once, and come to meet you, and try to comfort you a little."

"Oh," said Hal, drawing a deep breath; "and I thought I was never going to be glad about anything again."

CHAPTER XLVI

It is necessary to take but a cursory glance at the events that followed. Life flowed smoothly enough in its way, but it flowed towards higher and greater achievements for some, and that can only mean a story of obstacles, and drawbacks and difficulties st.u.r.dily overcome.

For the three inmates of the Cromwell Road flat it held many prizes.

Alymer Hermon's career continued to advance by leaps and bounds. The "taking up" by Sir Philip Hall became quickly an actual fact, and he was soon easily first among the juniors. What he lacked in years and experience his striking presence and personal charm supplied, and his calm gravity and self-possession went far to counteract his youthful appearance.

d.i.c.k Bruce finished his great novel, and though it was not quite the jumble about vegetables and babies he had prophesied, it was considered the most original book of the year, and brought him instantaneous recognition and fame.

Quin inherited some money, and built a wonderful East End Club House that is all his own, and is as the apple of his eye.

If the great solution of life is to find one's true environment, he has at any rate found his; and in finding it knows a happiness, even amid the squalid poverty of Sh.o.r.editch, such as is found by few.

In the meantime Hal continued to work and be independent. When Ethel and Dudley married, they tried hard to persuade her to live with them, but she had already bespoken a smaller sitting-room with her old landlady, Mrs. Carr, and made up her mind to live there.

Later, when Dudley began to add to his income, they begged her to give up her work, but she was obdurate, again expressing certain views on the boon of steady occupation they could not gainsay.

"It is so boring sometimes," Ethel remonstrated, and she answered:

"Not so boring as idleness in the long run, and having to make up your mind each day what you are going to do next. The girls who only enjoy themselves without work little know what they miss in never waking up in the morning to say, 'Hurray! this is a holiday.' No! give me my work and my play well balanced, and I'll turn them into happiness."

It was months before Alymer dared to speak to her of love. It had taken him long to win her to the old fooling again; and in a sudden gladness at some little remark or touch that seemed to show him he was truly forgiven for his own sake, he told her the story of his love, and his long waiting.

Hal was very taken aback, and a little unhappy, but when she had convinced him it was really quite hopeless, he forced himself back to the old comrades.h.i.+p, and took up his self-imposed burden of waiting once more.

Then followed a period of rapid successes, during which Hal told him seriously he must now make a choice among the bevy of beauty, wealth, and lineage at his disposal.

"You really ought, you know," she said, "out of consideration for all the poor things left hoping against hope, and the numbers that are yearly added to them!"

"I have made my choice," he answered; "it is not my fault about the vain hopes. It is the obstinacy of one woman, who is keeping the others in the unfortunate condition you describe."

But she only smiled lightly, and put him off again, concluding with:

"I should be frightened out of my life at possessing anything so beauteous and attractive in the way of a husband."

So Hermon worked on, and waited, believing in his star.

Yet there were times when the apparent hopelessness of it weighed heavily on his mind - times when the very l.u.s.tre of his success seemed only to mock him, because of that one thing he craved in vain.

It was so when the greatest achievement of his life came to his hands.

It was given him to plead for a woman's life against a charge of poisoning her husband, pitting his youth and slender experience against the greatest advocate of the Crown. The case caused a great stir, and with a growing wonderment and pride she hardly dared to account for.

Hal followed the newspaper reports day by day.

The evening before the speech for the defence he came to her. She greeted him as usual, saying little about his present notoriety, but she noticed that he looked careworn, as if the strain were becoming too much for him; and then suddenly he stated his errand.

"I want you to come to the court to-morrow, Hal. I - I - have a feeling I want you to be there when I am speaking. Will you come?"

She looked up doubtfully.

"Why do you want me?"

"I hardly know. I mean to save this woman if I can. She did not give the poison. I am quite certain of it; but we can't prove it absolutely. We can only appeal in such a way to the jury that they will feel the case is not merely not proven against her, but that she is innocent. I think it would inspire me more than anything if you were there." He paused, then added: "I love you so much, Hal, I feel as if I shall save her life if you are there."

Hal looked touched, and agreed to go if he would arrange everything, and telephone to her what time to arrive.

The next day she went to the court with the card he had given, and found herself received with the utmost deference, and ushered at once to a seat reserved for her.

A few minutes afterwards Alymer stood up to make his great speech, and then Hal heard a subdued murmur around her, and saw that the judge was watching him with some interest and expectancy.

It was the first time she had seen him in his wig and gown, in court, and her heart began to beat strangely. She felt suddenly and unaccountably incensed with the women all round, who whispered and gazed. "What was he to them anyway! How idiotic of them to murmur to each other how splendid he looked! What did he care for their approval?"

Her heart carried her a little farther. "What is he to you?..." it asked. She felt a sudden warm glow of pride, and her eyes grew very soft as she watched him.

Then he began to speak, and it seemed as if everything in heaven and earth has paused to listen. Surely there was no big thoroughfare with hurrying mult.i.tudes just outside, no continual stream of noisy, hurrying traffic; no busy newspaper offices awaiting each flying message - nothing anywhere but that crowded hall, that white-faced accused woman waiting for death or freedom, that man in his beauty of manhood and power straining every nerve to save her.

An hour pa.s.sed. No one spoke, no one moved. Sometimes a sob, hastily stifled, broke the oppresive hush, sometimes a stifled cough.

Alymer rarely raised his voice, for his was no impa.s.sioned, heated declaration. It was a magnificent piece of quiet oratory, which carried every one along by its earnestness and convincing calm, and was intensified by the look upon his n.o.ble, resolute face.

After a time every one knew instinctively that he had won. The tension grew less taut and more emotinal. Women began to weep softly and restrainedly. Men cleared their throats again and again. Some one sitting next to Hal apparently knew him, and knew her.

"My G.o.d," he breathed in her ear, "he's magnificent. He's saved her.

I wouldn't have missed this for anything. I'm proud to be his friend."

Hal's eyes suddenly filled with tears. She began to feel dazed and faint. It had been too much for her, and the relief was overwhelming.

She thought of Lorraine, and her heart swelled to think he had so gloriously fulfilled her vast hopes, and crowned all she had done for him. She longed that she might have been there, and then felt mysteriously that she not only was there, but was speaking to her. In a vague, unreal, mystical way, Lorraine was pleading with her to give him his happiness.

She looked again, confusedly, at the big, strong, calm man; and something that had been growing in her heart for months took shape and form.