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diff --git a/old/hilda10.txt b/old/hilda10.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..8eb7ec4 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/hilda10.txt @@ -0,0 +1,10615 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Hilda Wade, by Grant Allen +(#5 in our series by Grant Allen) + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the +copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing +this or any other Project Gutenberg eBook. + +This header should be the first thing seen when viewing this Project +Gutenberg file. Please do not remove it. Do not change or edit the +header without written permission. + +Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the +eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is +important information about your specific rights and restrictions in +how the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!***** + + +Title: Hilda Wade + +Author: Grant Allen + +Release Date: January, 2004 [EBook #4903] +[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] +[This file was first posted on March 23, 2002] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, HILDA WADE *** + + + + +This eBook was produced by Don Lainson. + + + +HILDA WADE + +A WOMAN WITH TENACITY OF PURPOSE + + +by + + +Grant Allen + + +1899 + + + +PUBLISHERS' NOTE + + +In putting before the public the last work by Mr. Grant Allen, the +publishers desire to express their deep regret at the author's +unexpected and lamented death--a regret in which they are sure to +be joined by the many thousand readers whom he did so much to +entertain. A man of curiously varied and comprehensive knowledge, +and with the most charming personality; a writer who, treating of a +wide variety of subjects, touched nothing which he did not make +distinctive, he filled a place which no man living can exactly +occupy. The last chapter of this volume had been roughly sketched +by Mr. Allen before his final illness, and his anxiety, when +debarred from work, to see it finished, was relieved by the +considerate kindness of his friend and neighbour, Dr. Conan Doyle, +who, hearing of his trouble, talked it over with him, gathered his +ideas, and finally wrote it out for him in the form in which it now +appears--a beautiful and pathetic act of friendship which it is a +pleasure to record. + + + + +HILDA WADE + + + +CHAPTER I + +THE EPISODE OF THE PATIENT WHO DISAPPOINTED HER DOCTOR + + +Hilda Wade's gift was so unique, so extraordinary, that I must +illustrate it, I think, before I attempt to describe it. But first +let me say a word of explanation about the Master. + +I have never met anyone who impressed me so much with a sense of +GREATNESS as Professor Sebastian. And this was not due to his +scientific eminence alone: the man's strength and keenness struck +me quite as forcibly as his vast attainments. When he first came +to St. Nathaniel's Hospital, an eager, fiery-eyed physiologist, +well past the prime of life, and began to preach with all the +electric force of his vivid personality that the one thing on earth +worth a young man's doing was to work in his laboratory, attend his +lectures, study disease, and be a scientific doctor, dozens of us +were infected by his contagious enthusiasm. He proclaimed the +gospel of germs; and the germ of his own zeal flew abroad in the +hospital: it ran through the wards as if it were typhoid fever. +Within a few months, half the students were converted from lukewarm +observers of medical routine into flaming apostles of the new +methods. + +The greatest authority in Europe on comparative anatomy, now that +Huxley was taken from us, he had devoted his later days to the +pursuit of medicine proper, to which he brought a mind stored with +luminous analogies from the lower animals. His very appearance +held one. Tall, thin, erect, with an ascetic profile not unlike +Cardinal Manning's, he represented that abstract form of asceticism +which consists in absolute self-sacrifice to a mental ideas, not +that which consists in religious abnegation. Three years of travel +in Africa had tanned his skin for life. His long white hair, +straight and silvery as it fell, just curled in one wave-like +inward sweep where it turned and rested on the stooping shoulders. +His pale face was clean-shaven, save for a thin and wiry grizzled +moustache, which cast into stronger relief the deep-set, hawk-like +eyes and the acute, intense, intellectual features. In some +respects, his countenance reminded me often of Dr. Martineau's: in +others it recalled the knife-like edge, unturnable, of his great +predecessor, Professor Owen. Wherever he went, men turned to stare +at him. In Paris, they took him for the head of the English +Socialists; in Russia, they declared he was a Nihilist emissary. +And they were not far wrong--in essence; for Sebastian's stern, +sharp face was above all things the face of a man absorbed and +engrossed by one overpowering pursuit in life--the sacred thirst of +knowledge, which had swallowed up his entire nature. + +He WAS what he looked--the most single-minded person I have ever +come across. And when I say single-minded, I mean just that, and +no more. He had an End to attain--the advancement of science, and +he went straight towards the End, looking neither to the right nor +to the left for anyone. An American millionaire once remarked to +him of some ingenious appliance he was describing: "Why, if you +were to perfect that apparatus, Professor, and take out a patent +for it, I reckon you'd make as much money as I have made." +Sebastian withered him with a glance. "I have no time to waste," +he replied, "on making money!" + +So, when Hilda Wade told me, on the first day I met her, that she +wished to become a nurse at Nathaniel's, "to be near Sebastian," I +was not at all astonished. I took her at her word. Everybody who +meant business in any branch of the medical art, however humble, +desired to be close to our rare teacher--to drink in his large +thought, to profit by his clear insight, his wide experience. The +man of Nathaniel's was revolutionising practice; and those who +wished to feel themselves abreast of the modern movement were +naturally anxious to cast in their lot with him. I did not wonder, +therefore, that Hilda Wade, who herself possessed in so large a +measure the deepest feminine gift--intuition--should seek a place +under the famous professor who represented the other side of the +same endowment in its masculine embodiment--instinct of diagnosis. + +Hilda Wade herself I will not formally introduce to you: you will +learn to know her as I proceed with my story. + +I was Sebastian's assistant, and my recommendation soon procured +Hilda Wade the post she so strangely coveted. Before she had been +long at Nathaniel's, however, it began to dawn upon me that her +reasons for desiring to attend upon our revered Master were not +wholly and solely scientific. Sebastian, it is true, recognised +her value as a nurse from the first; he not only allowed that she +was a good assistant, but he also admitted that her subtle +knowledge of temperament sometimes enabled her closely to approach +his own reasoned scientific analysis of a case and its probable +development. "Most women," he said to me once, "are quick at +reading THE PASSING EMOTION. They can judge with astounding +correctness from a shadow on one's face, a catch in one's breath, a +movement of one's hands, how their words or deeds are affecting us. +We cannot conceal our feelings from them. But underlying character +they do not judge so well as fleeting expression. Not what Mrs. +Jones IS in herself, but what Mrs. Jones is now thinking and +feeling--there lies their great success as psychologists. Most +men, on the contrary, guide their life by definite FACTS--by signs, +by symptoms, by observed data. Medicine itself is built upon a +collection of such reasoned facts. But this woman, Nurse Wade, to +a certain extent, stands intermediate mentally between the two +sexes. She recognises TEMPERAMENT--the fixed form of character, +and what it is likely to do--in a degree which I have never seen +equalled elsewhere. To that extent, and within proper limits of +supervision, I acknowledge her faculty as a valuable adjunct to a +scientific practitioner." + +Still, though Sebastian started with a predisposition in favour of +Hilda Wade--a pretty girl appeals to most of us--I could see from +the beginning that Hilda Wade was by no means enthusiastic for +Sebastian, like the rest of the hospital: + +"He is extraordinarily able," she would say, when I gushed to her +about our Master; but that was the most I could ever extort from +her in the way of praise. Though she admitted intellectually +Sebastian's gigantic mind, she would never commit herself to +anything that sounded like personal admiration. To call him "the +prince of physiologists" did not satisfy me on that head. I wanted +her to exclaim, "I adore him! I worship him! He is glorious, +wonderful!" + +I was also aware from an early date that, in an unobtrusive way, +Hilda Wade was watching Sebastian, watching him quietly, with those +wistful, earnest eyes, as a cat watches a mouse-hole; watching him +with mute inquiry, as if she expected each moment to see him do +something different from what the rest of us expected of him. +Slowly I gathered that Hilda Wade, in the most literal sense, had +come to Nathaniel's, as she herself expressed it, "to be near +Sebastian." + +Gentle and lovable as she was in every other aspect, towards +Sebastian she seemed like a lynx-eyed detective. She had some +object in view, I thought, almost as abstract as his own--some +object to which, as I judged, she was devoting her life quite as +single-mindedly as Sebastian himself had devoted his to the +advancement of science. + +"Why did she become a nurse at all?" I asked once of her friend, +Mrs. Mallet. "She has plenty of money, and seems well enough off +to live without working." + +"Oh, dear, yes," Mrs. Mallet answered. "She is independent, quite; +has a tidy little income of her own--six or seven hundred a year-- +and she could choose her own society. But she went in for this +mission fad early; she didn't intend to marry, she said; so she +would like to have some work to do in life. Girls suffer like +that, nowadays. In her case, the malady took the form of nursing." + +"As a rule," I ventured to interpose, "when a pretty girl says she +doesn't intend to marry, her remark is premature. It only means--" + +"Oh, yes, I know. Every girl says it; 'tis a stock property in the +popular masque of Maiden Modesty. But with Hilda it is different. +And the difference is--that Hilda means it!" + +"You are right," I answered. "I believe she means it. Yet I know +one man at least--" for I admired her immensely. + +Mrs. Mallet shook her head and smiled. "It is no use, Dr. +Cumberledge," she answered. "Hilda will never marry. Never, that +is to say, till she has attained some mysterious object she seems +to have in view, about which she never speaks to anyone--not even +to me. But I have somehow guessed it!" + +"And it is?" + +"Oh, I have not guessed what it IS: I am no Oedipus. I have merely +guessed that it exists. But whatever it may be, Hilda's life is +bounded by it. She became a nurse to carry it out, I feel +confident. From the very beginning, I gather, a part of her scheme +was to go to St. Nathaniel's. She was always bothering us to give +her introductions to Dr. Sebastian; and when she met you at my +brother Hugo's, it was a preconcerted arrangement; she asked to sit +next you, and meant to induce you to use your influence on her +behalf with the Professor. She was dying to get there." + +"It is very odd," I mused. "But there!--women are inexplicable!" + +"And Hilda is in that matter the very quintessence of woman. Even +I, who have known her for years, don't pretend to understand her." + +A few months later, Sebastian began his great researches on his new +anaesthetic. It was a wonderful set of researches. It promised so +well. All Nat's (as we familiarly and affectionately styled St. +Nathaniel's) was in a fever of excitement over the drug for a +twelvemonth. + +The Professor obtained his first hint of the new body by a mere +accident. His friend, the Deputy Prosector of the Zoological +Society, had mixed a draught for a sick raccoon at the Gardens, +and, by some mistake in a bottle, had mixed it wrongly. (I +purposely refrain from mentioning the ingredients, as they are +drugs which can be easily obtained in isolation at any chemist's, +though when compounded they form one of the most dangerous and +difficult to detect of organic poisons. I do not desire to play +into the hands of would-be criminals.) The compound on which the +Deputy Prosector had thus accidentally lighted sent the raccoon to +sleep in the most extraordinary manner. Indeed, the raccoon slept +for thirty-six hours on end, all attempts to awake him, by pulling +his tail or tweaking his hair being quite unavailing. This was a +novelty in narcotics; so Sebastian was asked to come and look at +the slumbering brute. He suggested the attempt to perform an +operation on the somnolent raccoon by removing, under the influence +of the drug, an internal growth, which was considered the probable +cause of his illness. A surgeon was called in, the growth was +found and removed, and the raccoon, to everybody's surprise, +continued to slumber peacefully on his straw for five hours +afterwards. At the end of that time he awoke, and stretched +himself as if nothing had happened; and though he was, of course, +very weak from loss of blood, he immediately displayed a most royal +hunger. He ate up all the maize that was offered him for +breakfast, and proceeded to manifest a desire for more by most +unequivocal symptoms. + +Sebastian was overjoyed. He now felt sure he had discovered a drug +which would supersede chloroform--a drug more lasting in its +immediate effects, and yet far less harmful in its ultimate results +on the balance of the system. A name being wanted for it, he +christened it "lethodyne." It was the best pain-luller yet +invented. + +For the next few weeks, at Nat's, we heard of nothing but lethodyne. +Patients recovered and patients died; but their deaths or recoveries +were as dross to lethodyne, an anaesthetic that might revolutionise +surgery, and even medicine! A royal road through disease, with no +trouble to the doctor and no pain to the patient! Lethodyne held +the field. We were all of us, for the moment, intoxicated with +lethodyne. + +Sebastian's observations on the new agent occupied several months. +He had begun with the raccoon; he went on, of course, with those +poor scapegoats of physiology, domestic rabbits. Not that in this +particular case any painful experiments were in contemplation. The +Professor tried the drug on a dozen or more quite healthy young +animals--with the strange result that they dozed off quietly, and +never woke up again. This nonplussed Sebastian. He experimented +once more on another raccoon, with a smaller dose; the raccoon fell +asleep, and slept like a top for fifteen hours, at the end of which +time he woke up as if nothing out of the common had happened. +Sebastian fell back upon rabbits again, with smaller and smaller +doses. It was no good; the rabbits all died with great unanimity, +until the dose was so diminished that it did not send them off to +sleep at all. There was no middle course, apparently, to the +rabbit kind, lethodyne was either fatal or else inoperative. So it +proved to sheep. The new drug killed, or did nothing. + +I will not trouble you with all the details of Sebastian's further +researches; the curious will find them discussed at length in +Volume 237 of the Philosophical Transactions. (See also Comptes +Rendus de l'Academie de Medecine: tome 49, pp. 72 and sequel.) I +will restrict myself here to that part of the inquiry which +immediately refers to Hilda Wade's history. + +"If I were you," she said to the Professor one morning, when he was +most astonished at his contradictory results, "I would test it on a +hawk. If I dare venture on a suggestion, I believe you will find +that hawks recover." + +"The deuce they do!" Sebastian cried. However, he had such +confidence in Nurse Wade's judgment that he bought a couple of hawks +and tried the treatment on them. Both birds took considerable +doses, and, after a period of insensibility extending to several +hours, woke up in the end quite bright and lively. + +"I see your principle," the Professor broke out. "It depends upon +diet. Carnivores and birds of prey can take lethodyne with +impunity; herbivores and fruit-eaters cannot recover, and die of +it. Man, therefore, being partly carnivorous, will doubtless be +able more or less to stand it." + +Hilda Wade smiled her sphinx-like smile. "Not quite that, I +fancy," she answered. "It will kill cats, I feel sure; at least, +most domesticated ones. But it will NOT kill weasels. Yet both +are carnivores." + +"That young woman knows too much!" Sebastian muttered to me, +looking after her as she glided noiselessly with her gentle tread +down the long white corridor. "We shall have to suppress her, +Cumberledge. . . . But I'll wager my life she's right, for all +that. I wonder, now, how the dickens she guessed it!" + +"Intuition," I answered. + +He pouted his under lip above the upper one, with a dubious +acquiescence. "Inference, I call it," he retorted. "All woman's +so-called intuition is, in fact, just rapid and half-unconscious +inference." + +He was so full of the subject, however, and so utterly carried away +by his scientific ardour, that I regret to say he gave a strong +dose of lethodyne at once to each of the matron's petted and +pampered Persian cats, which lounged about her room and were the +delight of the convalescents. They were two peculiarly lazy +sultanas of cats--mere jewels of the harem--Oriental beauties that +loved to bask in the sun or curl themselves up on the rug before +the fire and dawdle away their lives in congenial idleness. +Strange to say, Hilda's prophecy came true. Zuleika settled +herself down comfortably in the Professor's easy chair and fell +into a sound sleep from which there was no awaking; while Roxana +met fate on the tiger-skin she loved, coiled up in a circle, and +passed from this life of dreams, without knowing it, into one where +dreaming is not. Sebastian noted the facts with a quiet gleam of +satisfaction in his watchful eye, and explained afterwards, with +curt glibness to the angry matron, that her favourites had been +"canonised in the roll of science, as painless martyrs to the +advancement of physiology." + +The weasels, on the other hand, with an equal dose, woke up after +six hours as lively as crickets. It was clear that carnivorous +tastes were not the whole solution, for Roxana was famed as a +notable mouser. + +"Your principle?" Sebastian asked our sibyl, in his brief, quick +way. + +Hilda's cheek wore a glow of pardonable triumph. The great teacher +had deigned to ask her assistance. "I judged by the analogy of +Indian hemp," she answered. "This is clearly a similar, but much +stronger, narcotic. Now, whenever I have given Indian hemp by your +direction to people of sluggish, or even of merely bustling +temperament, I have noticed that small doses produce serious +effects, and that the after-results are most undesirable. But when +you have prescribed the hemp for nervous, overstrung, imaginative +people, I have observed that they can stand large amounts of the +tincture without evil results, and that the after-effects pass off +rapidly. I who am mercurial in temperament, for example, can take +any amount of Indian hemp without being made ill by it; while ten +drops will send some slow and torpid rustics mad drunk with +excitement--drive them into homicidal mania." + +Sebastian nodded his head. He needed no more explanation. "You +have hit it," he said. "I see it at a glance. The old antithesis! +All men and all animals fall, roughly speaking, into two great +divisions of type: the impassioned and the unimpassioned; the vivid +and the phlegmatic. I catch your drift now. Lethodyne is poison +to phlegmatic patients, who have not active power enough to wake up +from it unhurt; it is relatively harmless to the vivid and +impassioned, who can be put asleep by it, indeed, for a few hours +more or less, but are alive enough to live on through the coma and +reassert their vitality after it." + +I recognised as he spoke that this explanation was correct. The +dull rabbits, the sleepy Persian cats, and the silly sheep had died +outright of lethodyne; the cunning, inquisitive raccoon, the quick +hawk, and the active, intense-natured weasels, all most eager, +wary, and alert animals, full of keenness and passion, had +recovered quickly. + +"Dare we try it on a human subject?" I asked, tentatively. + +Hilda Wade answered at once, with that unerring rapidity of hers: +"Yes, certainly; on a few--the right persons. _I_, for one, am not +afraid to try it." + +"You?" I cried, feeling suddenly aware how much I thought of her. +"Oh, not YOU, please, Nurse Wade. Some other life, less valuable!" + +Sebastian stared at me coldly. "Nurse Wade volunteers," he said. +"It is in the cause of science. Who dares dissuade her? That +tooth of yours? Ah, yes. Quite sufficient excuse. You wanted it +out, Nurse Wade. Wells-Dinton shall operate." + +Without a moment's hesitation, Hilda Wade sat down in an easy chair +and took a measured dose of the new anaesthetic, proportioned to +the average difference in weight between raccoons and humanity. My +face displayed my anxiety, I suppose, for she turned to me, smiling +with quiet confidence. "I know my own constitution," she said, +with a reassuring glance that went straight to my heart. "I do not +in the least fear." + +As for Sebastian, he administered the drug to her as unconcernedly +as if she were a rabbit. Sebastian's scientific coolness and +calmness have long been the admiration of younger practitioners. + +Wells-Dinton gave one wrench. The tooth came out as though the +patient were a block of marble. There was not a cry or a movement, +such as one notes when nitrous oxide is administered. Hilda Wade +was to all appearance a mass of lifeless flesh. We stood round and +watched. I was trembling with terror. Even on Sebastian's pale +face, usually so unmoved, save by the watchful eagerness of +scientific curiosity, I saw signs of anxiety. + +After four hours of profound slumber--breath hovering, as it +seemed, between life and death--she began to come to again. In +half an hour more she was wide awake; she opened her eyes and asked +for a glass of hock, with beef essence or oysters. + +That evening, by six o'clock, she was quite well and able to go +about her duties as usual. + +"Sebastian is a wonderful man," I said to her, as I entered her +ward on my rounds at night. "His coolness astonishes me. Do you +know, he watched you all the time you were lying asleep there as if +nothing were the matter." + +"Coolness?" she inquired, in a quiet voice. "Or cruelty?" + +"Cruelty?" I echoed, aghast. "Sebastian cruel! Oh, Nurse Wade, +what an idea! Why, he has spent his whole life in striving against +all odds to alleviate pain. He is the apostle of philanthropy!" + +"Of philanthropy, or of science? To alleviate pain, or to learn +the whole truth about the human body?" + +"Come, come, now," I cried. "You analyse too far. I will not let +even YOU put me out of conceit with Sebastian." (Her face flushed +at that "even you"; I almost fancied she began to like me.) "He is +the enthusiasm of my life; just consider how much he has done for +humanity!" + +She looked me through searchingly. "I will not destroy your +illusion," she answered, after a pause. "It is a noble and +generous one. But is it not largely based on an ascetic face, long +white hair, and a moustache that hides the cruel corners of the +mouth? For the corners ARE cruel. Some day, I will show you +them. Cut off the long hair, shave the grizzled moustache--and +what then will remain?" She drew a profile hastily. "Just that," +and she showed it me. 'Twas a face like Robespierre's, grown +harder and older and lined with observation. I recognised that it +was in fact the essence of Sebastian. + +Next day, as it turned out, the Professor himself insisted upon +testing lethodyne in his own person. All Nat's strove to dissuade +him. "Your life is so precious, sir--the advancement of science!" +But the Professor was adamantine. + +"Science can only be advanced if men of science will take their +lives in their hands," he answered, sternly. "Besides, Nurse Wade +has tried. Am I to lag behind a woman in my devotion to the cause +of physiological knowledge?" + +"Let him try," Hilda Wade murmured to me. "He is quite right. It +will not hurt him. I have told him already he has just the proper +temperament to stand the drug. Such people are rare: HE is one of +them." + +We administered the dose, trembling. Sebastian took it like a man, +and dropped off instantly, for lethodyne is at least as instantaneous +in its operation as nitrous oxide. + +He lay long asleep. Hilda and I watched him. + +After he had lain for some minutes senseless, like a log, on the +couch where we had placed him, Hilda stooped over him quietly and +lifted up the ends of the grizzled moustache. Then she pointed one +accusing finger at his lips. "I told you so," she murmured, with a +note of demonstration. + +"There is certainly something rather stern, or even ruthless, about +the set of the face and the firm ending of the lips," I admitted, +reluctantly. + +"That is why God gave men moustaches," she mused, in a low voice; +"to hide the cruel corners of their mouths." + +"Not ALWAYS cruel," I cried. + +"Sometimes cruel, sometimes cunning, sometimes sensuous; but nine +times out of ten best masked by moustaches." + +"You have a bad opinion of our sex!" I exclaimed. + +"Providence knew best," she answered. "IT gave you moustaches. +That was in order that we women might be spared from always seeing +you as you are. Besides, I said 'Nine times out of ten.' There +are exceptions--SUCH exceptions!" + +On second thought, I did not feel sure that I could quarrel with +her estimate. + +The experiment was that time once more successful. Sebastian woke +up from the comatose state after eight hours, not quite as fresh as +Hilda Wade, perhaps, but still tolerably alive; less alert, +however, and complaining of dull headache. He was not hungry. +Hilda Wade shook her head at that. "It will be of use only in a +very few cases," she said to me, regretfully; "and those few will +need to be carefully picked by an acute observer. I see resistance +to the coma is, even more than I thought, a matter of temperament. +Why, so impassioned a man as the Professor himself cannot entirely +recover. With more sluggish temperaments, we shall have deeper +difficulty." + +"Would you call him impassioned?" I asked. "Most people think him +so cold and stern." + +She shook her head. "He is a snow-capped volcano!" she answered. +"The fires of his life burn bright below. The exterior alone is +cold and placid." + +However, starting from that time, Sebastian began a course of +experiments on patients, giving infinitesimal doses at first, and +venturing slowly on somewhat larger quantities. But only in his +own case and Hilda's could the result be called quite satisfactory. +One dull and heavy, drink-sodden navvy, to whom he administered no +more than one-tenth of a grain, was drowsy for a week, and listless +long after; while a fat washerwoman from West Ham, who took only +two-tenths, fell so fast asleep, and snored so stertorously, that +we feared she was going to doze off into eternity, after the +fashion of the rabbits. Mothers of large families, we noted, stood +the drug very ill; on pale young girls of the consumptive tendency +its effect was not marked; but only a patient here and there, of +exceptionally imaginative and vivid temperament, seemed able to +endure it. Sebastian was discouraged. He saw the anaesthetic was +not destined to fulfil his first enthusiastic humanitarian +expectations. One day, while the investigation was just at this +stage, a case was admitted into the observation-cots in which Hilda +Wade took a particular interest. The patient was a young girl +named Isabel Huntley--tall, dark, and slender, a markedly quick and +imaginative type, with large black eyes which clearly bespoke a +passionate nature. Though distinctly hysterical, she was pretty +and pleasing. Her rich dark hair was as copious as it was +beautiful. She held herself erect and had a finely poised head. +From the first moment she arrived, I could see nurse Wade was +strongly drawn towards her. Their souls sympathised. Number +Fourteen--that is our impersonal way of describing CASES--was +constantly on Hilda's lips. "I like the girl," she said once. +"She is a lady in fibre." + +"And a tobacco-trimmer by trade," Sebastian added, sarcastically. + +As usual, Hilda's was the truer description. It went deeper. + +Number Fourteen's ailment was a rare and peculiar one, into which I +need not enter here with professional precision. (I have described +the case fully for my brother practitioners in my paper in the +fourth volume of Sebastian's Medical Miscellanies.) It will be +enough for my present purpose to say, in brief, that the lesion +consisted of an internal growth which is always dangerous and most +often fatal, but which nevertheless is of such a character that, if +it be once happily eradicated by supremely good surgery, it never +tends to recur, and leaves the patient as strong and well as ever. +Sebastian was, of course, delighted with the splendid opportunity +thus afforded him. "It is a beautiful case!" he cried, with +professional enthusiasm. "Beautiful! Beautiful! I never saw one +so deadly or so malignant before. We are indeed in luck's way. +Only a miracle can save her life. Cumberledge, we must proceed to +perform the miracle." + +Sebastian loved such cases. They formed his ideal. He did not +greatly admire the artificial prolongation of diseased and +unwholesome lives, which could never be of much use to their owners +or anyone else; but when a chance occurred for restoring to perfect +health a valuable existence which might otherwise, be extinguished +before its time, he positively revelled in his beneficent calling. +"What nobler object can a man propose to himself," he used to say, +"than to raise good men and true from the dead, as it were, and +return them whole and sound to the family that depends upon them? +Why, I had fifty times rather cure an honest coal-heaver of a wound +in his leg than give ten years more lease of life to a gouty lord, +diseased from top to toe, who expects to find a month of Carlsbad +or Homburg once every year make up for eleven months of over- +eating, over-drinking, vulgar debauchery, and under-thinking." He +had no sympathy with men who lived the lives of swine: his heart +was with the workers. + +Of course, Hilda Wade soon suggested that, as an operation was +absolutely necessary, Number Fourteen would be a splendid subject +on whom to test once more the effects of lethodyne. Sebastian, +with his head on one side, surveying the patient, promptly +coincided. "Nervous diathesis," he observed. "Very vivid fancy. +Twitches her hands the right way. Quick pulse, rapid perceptions, +no meaningless unrest, but deep vitality. I don't doubt she'll +stand it." + +We explained to Number Fourteen the gravity of the case, and also +the tentative character of the operation under lethodyne. At +first, she shrank from taking it. "No, no!" she said; "let me die +quietly." But Hilda, like the Angel of Mercy that she was, +whispered in the girl's ear: "IF it succeeds, you will get quite +well, and--you can marry Arthur." + +The patient's dark face flushed crimson. + +"Ah! Arthur," she cried. "Dear Arthur! I can bear anything you +choose to do to me--for Arthur!" + +"How soon you find these things out!" I cried to Hilda, a few +minutes later. "A mere man would never have thought of that. And +who is Arthur?" + +"A sailor--on a ship that trades with the South Seas. I hope he is +worthy of her. Fretting over Arthur's absence has aggravated the +case. He is homeward-bound now. She is worrying herself to death +for fear she should not live to say good-bye to him." + +"She WILL live to marry him," I answered, with confidence like her +own, "if YOU say she can stand it." + +"The lethodyne--oh, yes; THAT'S all right. But the operation +itself is so extremely dangerous; though Dr. Sebastian says he has +called in the best surgeon in London for all such cases. They are +rare, he tells me--and Nielsen has performed on six, three of them +successfully." + +We gave the girl the drug. She took it, trembling, and went off at +once, holding Hilda's hand, with a pale smile on her face, which +persisted there somewhat weirdly all through the operation. The +work of removing the growth was long and ghastly, even for us who +were well seasoned to such sights; but at the end Nielsen expressed +himself as perfectly satisfied. "A very neat piece of work!" +Sebastian exclaimed, looking on. "I congratulate you, Nielsen. I +never saw anything done cleaner or better." + +"A successful operation, certainly!" the great surgeon admitted, +with just pride in the Master's commendation. + +"AND the patient?" Hilda asked, wavering. + +"Oh, the patient? The patient will die," Nielsen replied, in an +unconcerned voice, wiping his spotless instruments. + +"That is not MY idea of the medical art," I cried, shocked at his +callousness. "An operation is only successful if--" + +He regarded me with lofty scorn. "A certain percentage of losses," +he interrupted, calmly, "is inevitable, of course, in all surgical +operations. We are obliged to average it. How could I preserve my +precision and accuracy of hand if I were always bothered by +sentimental considerations of the patient's safety?" + +Hilda Wade looked up at me with a sympathetic glance. "We will +pull her through yet," she murmured, in her soft voice, "if care +and skill can do it,--MY care and YOUR skill. This is now OUR +patient, Dr. Cumberledge." + +It needed care and skill. We watched her for hours, and she showed +no sign or gleam of recovery. Her sleep was deeper than either +Sebastian's or Hilda's had been. She had taken a big dose, so as +to secure immobility. The question now was, would she recover at +all from it? Hour after hour we waited and watched; and not a +sign of movement! Only the same deep, slow, hampered breathing, +the same feeble, jerky pulse, the same deathly pallor on the dark +cheeks, the same corpse-like rigidity of limb and muscle. + +At last our patient stirred faintly, as in a dream; her breath +faltered. We bent over her. Was it death, or was she beginning to +recover? + +Very slowly, a faint trace of colour came back to her cheeks. Her +heavy eyes half opened. They stared first with a white stare. +Her arms dropped by her side. Her mouth relaxed its ghastly +smile. . . . We held our breath. . . . She was coming to again! + +But her coming to was slow--very, very slow. Her pulse was still +weak. Her heart pumped feebly. We feared she might sink from +inanition at any moment. Hilda Wade knelt on the floor by the +girl's side and held a spoonful of beef essence coaxingly to her +lips. Number Fourteen gasped, drew a long, slow breath, then +gulped and swallowed it. After that she lay back with her mouth +open, looking like a corpse. Hilda pressed another spoonful of the +soft jelly upon her; but the girl waved it away with one trembling +hand. "Let me die," she cried. "Let me die! I feel dead +already." + +Hilda held her face close. "Isabel," she whispered--and I +recognised in her tone the vast moral difference between "Isabel" +and "Number Fourteen,"--"Is-a-bel, you must take it. For Arthur's +sake, I say, you MUST take it." + +The girl's hand quivered as it lay on the white coverlet. "For +Arthur's sake!" she murmured, lifting her eyelids dreamily. "For +Arthur's sake! Yes, nurse, dear!" + +"Call me Hilda, please! Hilda!" + +The girl's face lighted up again. "Yes, Hilda, dear," she +answered, in an unearthly voice, like one raised from the dead. "I +will call you what you will. Angel of light, you have been so good +to me." + +She opened her lips with an effort and slowly swallowed another +spoonful. Then she fell back, exhausted. But her pulse improved +within twenty minutes. I mentioned the matter, with enthusiasm, +to Sebastian later. "It is very nice in its way," he answered; +"but . . . it is not nursing." + +I thought to myself that that was just what it WAS; but I did not +say so. Sebastian was a man who thought meanly of women. "A +doctor, like a priest," he used to declare, "should keep himself +unmarried. His bride is medicine." And he disliked to see what he +called PHILANDERING going on in his hospital. It may have been on +that account that I avoided speaking much of Hilda Wade thenceforth +before him. + +He looked in casually next day to see the patient. "She will die," +he said, with perfect assurance, as we passed down the ward +together. "Operation has taken too much out of her." + +"Still, she has great recuperative powers," Hilda answered. "They +all have in her family, Professor. You may, perhaps, remember +Joseph Huntley, who occupied Number Sixty-seven in the Accident +Ward, some nine months since--compound fracture of the arm--a dark, +nervous engineer's assistant--very hard to restrain--well, HE was +her brother; he caught typhoid fever in the hospital, and you +commented at the time on his strange vitality. Then there was her +cousin, again, Ellen Stubbs. We had HER for stubborn chronic +laryngitis--a very bad case--anyone else would have died--yielded +at once to your treatment; and made, I recollect, a splendid +convalescence." + +"What a memory you have!" Sebastian cried, admiring against his +will. "It is simply marvellous! I never saw anyone like you in my +life . . . except once. HE was a man, a doctor, a colleague of +mine--dead long ago. . . . Why--" he mused, and gazed hard at her. +Hilda shrank before his gaze. "This is curious," he went on +slowly, at last; "very curious. You--why, you resemble him!" + +"Do I?" Hilda replied, with forced calm, raising her eyes to his. +Their glances met. That moment, I saw each had recognised +something; and from that day forth I was instinctively aware that a +duel was being waged between Sebastian and Hilda,--a duel between +the two ablest and most singular personalities I had ever met; a +duel of life and death--though I did not fully understand its +purport till much, much later. + +Every day after that, the poor, wasted girl in Number Fourteen grew +feebler and fainter. Her temperature rose; her heart throbbed +weakly. She seemed to be fading away. Sebastian shook his head. +"Lethodyne is a failure," he said, with a mournful regret. "One +cannot trust it. The case might have recovered from the operation, +or recovered from the drug; but she could not recover from both +together. Yet the operation would have been impossible without the +drug, and the drug is useless except for the operation." + +It was a great disappointment to him. He hid himself in his room, +as was his wont when disappointed, and went on with his old work at +his beloved microbes. + +"I have one hope still," Hilda murmured to me by the bedside, when +our patient was at her worst. "If one contingency occurs, I +believe we may save her." + +"What is that?" I asked. + +She shook her head waywardly. "You must wait and see," she +answered. "If it comes off, I will tell you. If not, let it swell +the limbo of lost inspirations." + +Next morning early, however, she came up to me with a radiant face, +holding a newspaper in her hand. "Well, it HAS happened!" she +cried, rejoicing. "We shall save poor Isabel Number Fourteen, I +mean; our way is clear, Dr. Cumberledge." + +I followed her blindly to the bedside, little guessing what she +could mean. She knelt down at the head of the cot. The girl's +eyes were closed. I touched her cheek; she was in a high fever. +"Temperature?" I asked. + +"A hundred and three." + +I shook my head. Every symptom of fatal relapse. I could not +imagine what card Hilda held in reserve. But I stood there, +waiting. + +She whispered in the girl's ear: "Arthur's ship is sighted off the +Lizard." + +The patient opened her eyes slowly, and rolled them for a moment as +if she did not understand. + +"Too late!" I cried. "Too late! She is delirious--insensible!" + +Hilda repeated the words slowly, but very distinctly. "Do you +hear, dear? Arthur's ship . . . it is sighted. . . . Arthur's +ship . . . at the Lizard." + +The girl's lips moved. "Arthur! Arthur! . . . Arthur's ship!" A +deep sigh. She clenched her hands. "He is coming?" Hilda nodded +and smiled, holding her breath with suspense. + +"Up the Channel now. He will be at Southampton tonight. Arthur +. . . at Southampton. It is here, in the papers; I have telegraphed +to him to hurry on at once to see you." + +She struggled up for a second. A smile flitted across the worn +face. Then she fell back wearily. + +I thought all was over. Her eyes stared white. But ten minutes +later she opened her lids again. "Arthur is coming," she murmured. +"Arthur . . . coming." + +"Yes, dear. Now sleep. He is coming." + +All through that day and the next night she was restless and +agitated; but still her pulse improved a little. Next morning she +was again a trifle better. Temperature falling--a hundred and one, +point three. At ten o'clock Hilda came in to her, radiant. + +"Well, Isabel, dear," she cried, bending down and touching her +cheek (kissing is forbidden by the rules of the house), "Arthur has +come. He is here . . . down below . . . I have seen him." + +"Seen him!" the girl gasped. + +"Yes, seen him. Talked with him. Such a nice, manly fellow; and +such an honest, good face! He is longing for you to get well. He +says he has come home this time to marry you." + +The wan lips quivered. "He will NEVER marry me!" + +"Yes, yes, he WILL--if you will take this jelly. Look here--he +wrote these words to you before my very eyes: 'Dear love to my +Isa!' . . . If you are good, and will sleep, he may see you-- +to-morrow." + +The girl opened her lips and ate the jelly greedily. She ate as +much as she was desired. In three minutes more her head had fallen +like a child's upon her pillow and she was sleeping peacefully. + + + +I went up to Sebastian's room, quite excited with the news. He was +busy among his bacilli. They were his hobby, his pets. "Well, +what do you think, Professor?" I cried. "That patient of Nurse +Wade's--" + +He gazed up at me abstractedly, his brow contracting. "Yes, yes; I +know," he interrupted. "The girl in Fourteen. I have discounted +her case long ago. She has ceased to interest me. . . . Dead, of +course! Nothing else was possible." + +I laughed a quick little laugh of triumph. "No, sir; NOT dead. +Recovering! She has fallen just now into a normal sleep; her +breathing is natural." + +He wheeled his revolving chair away from the germs and fixed me +with his keen eyes. "Recovering?" he echoed. "Impossible! +Rallying, you mean. A mere flicker. I know my trade. She MUST +die this evening." + +"Forgive my persistence," I replied; "but--her temperature has gone +down to ninety-nine and a trifle." + +He pushed away the bacilli in the nearest watch-glass quite +angrily. "To ninety-nine!" he exclaimed, knitting his brows. +"Cumberledge, this is disgraceful! A most disappointing case! A +most provoking patient!" + +"But surely, sir--" I cried. + +"Don't talk to ME, boy! Don't attempt to apologise for her. Such +conduct is unpardonable. She OUGHT to have died. It was her clear +duty. I SAID she would die, and she should have known better than +to fly in the face of the faculty. Her recovery is an insult to +medical science. What is the staff about? Nurse Wade should have +prevented it." + +"Still, sir," I exclaimed, trying to touch him on a tender spot, +"the anaesthetic, you know! Such a triumph for lethodyne! This +case shows clearly that on certain constitutions it may be used +with advantage under certain conditions." + +He snapped his fingers. "Lethodyne! pooh! I have lost interest in +it. Impracticable! It is not fitted for the human species." + +"Why so? Number Fourteen proves--" + +He interrupted me with an impatient wave of his hand; then he rose +and paced up and down the room testily. After a pause, he spoke +again. "The weak point of lethodyne is this: nobody can be trusted +to say WHEN it may be used--except Nurse Wade,--which is NOT +science." + +For the first time in my life, I had a glimmering idea that I +distrusted Sebastian. Hilda Wade was right--the man was cruel. +But I had never observed his cruelty before--because his devotion +to science had blinded me to it. + + + +CHAPTER II + +THE EPISODE OF THE GENTLEMAN WHO HAD FAILED FOR EVERYTHING + + +One day, about those times, I went round to call on my aunt, Lady +Tepping. And lest you accuse me of the vulgar desire to flaunt my +fine relations in your face, I hasten to add that my poor dear old +aunt is a very ordinary specimen of the common Army widow. Her +husband, Sir Malcolm, a crusty old gentleman of the ancient school, +was knighted in Burma, or thereabouts, for a successful raid upon +naked natives, on something that is called the Shan frontier. When +he had grown grey in the service of his Queen and country, besides +earning himself incidentally a very decent pension, he acquired +gout and went to his long rest in Kensal Green Cemetery. He left +his wife with one daughter, and the only pretence to a title in our +otherwise blameless family. + +My cousin Daphne is a very pretty girl, with those quiet, sedate +manners which often develop later in life into genuine self-respect +and real depth of character. Fools do not admire her; they accuse +her of being "heavy." But she can do without fools; she has a +fine, strongly built figure, an upright carriage, a large and broad +forehead, a firm chin, and features which, though well-marked and +well-moulded, are yet delicate in outline and sensitive in +expression. Very young men seldom take to Daphne: she lacks the +desired inanity. But she has mind, repose, and womanly tenderness. +Indeed, if she had not been my cousin, I almost think I might once +have been tempted to fall in love with her. + +When I reached Gloucester Terrace, on this particular afternoon, I +found Hilda Wade there before me. She had lunched at my aunt's, in +fact. It was her "day out" at St. Nathaniel's, and she had come +round to spend it with Daphne Tepping. I had introduced her to the +house some time before, and she and my cousin had struck up a close +acquaintance immediately. Their temperaments were sympathetic; +Daphne admired Hilda's depth and reserve, while Hilda admired +Daphne's grave grace and self-control, her perfect freedom from +current affectations. She neither giggled nor aped Ibsenism. + +A third person stood back in the room when I entered--a tall and +somewhat jerry-built young man, with a rather long and solemn face, +like an early stage in the evolution of a Don Quixote. I took a +good look at him. There was something about his air that impressed +me as both lugubrious and humorous; and in this I was right, for I +learned later that he was one of those rare people who can sing a +comic song with immense success while preserving a sour countenance, +like a Puritan preacher's. His eyes were a little sunken, his +fingers long and nervous; but I fancied he looked a good fellow at +heart, for all that, though foolishly impulsive. He was a +punctilious gentleman, I felt sure; his face and manner grew upon +one rapidly. + +Daphne rose as I entered, and waved the stranger forward with an +imperious little wave. I imagined, indeed, that I detected in the +gesture a faint touch of half-unconscious proprietorship. "Good- +morning, Hubert," she said, taking my hand, but turning towards the +tall young man. "I don't think you know Mr. Cecil Holsworthy." + +"I have heard you speak of him," I answered, drinking him in with +my glance. I added internally, "Not half good enough for you." + +Hilda's eyes met mine and read my thought. They flashed back word, +in the language of eyes, "I do not agree with you." + +Daphne, meanwhile, was watching me closely. I could see she was +anxious to discover what impression her friend Mr. Holsworthy was +making on me. Till then, I had no idea she was fond of anyone in +particular; but the way her glance wandered from him to me and from +me to Hilda showed clearly that she thought much of this gawky +visitor. + +We sat and talked together, we four, for some time. I found the +young man with the lugubrious countenance improved immensely on +closer acquaintance. His talk was clever. He turned out to be the +son of a politician high in office in the Canadian Government, and +he had been educated at Oxford. The father, I gathered, was rich, +but he himself was making an income of nothing a year just then as +a briefless barrister, and he was hesitating whether to accept a +post of secretary that had been offered him in the colony, or to +continue his negative career at the Inner Temple, for the honour +and glory of it. + +"Now, which would YOU advise me, Miss Tepping?" he inquired, after +we had discussed the matter some minutes. + +Daphne's face flushed up. "It is so hard to decide," she answered. +"To decide to YOUR best advantage, I mean, of course. For +naturally all your English friends would wish to keep you as long +as possible in England." + +"No, do you think so?" the gawky young man jerked out with evident +pleasure. "Now, that's awfully kind of you. Do you know, if YOU +tell me I ought to stay in England, I've half a mind . . . I'll +cable over this very day and refuse the appointment." + +Daphne flushed once more. "Oh, please don't!" she exclaimed, +looking frightened. "I shall be quite distressed if a stray word +of mine should debar you from accepting a good offer of a +secretaryship." + +"Why, your least wish--" the young man began--then checked himself +hastily--"must be always important," he went on, in a different +voice, "to everyone of your acquaintance." + +Daphne rose hurriedly. "Look here, Hilda," she said, a little +tremulously, biting her lip, "I have to go out into Westbourne +Grove to get those gloves for to-night, and a spray for my hair; +will you excuse me for half an hour?" + +Holsworthy rose too. "Mayn't I go with you?" he asked, eagerly. + +"Oh, if you like. How very kind of you!" Daphne answered, her +cheek a blush rose. "Hubert, will you come too? and you, Hilda?" + +It was one of those invitations which are given to be refused. I +did not need Hilda's warning glance to tell me that my company +would be quite superfluous. I felt those two were best left +together. + +"It's no use, though, Dr. Cumberledge!" Hilda put in, as soon as +they were gone. "He WON'T propose, though he has had every +encouragement. I don't know what's the matter; but I've been +watching them both for weeks, and somehow things seem never to get +any forwarder." + +"You think he's in love with her?" I asked. + +"In love with her! Well, you have eyes in your head, I know; where +could they have been looking? He's madly in love--a very good kind +of love, too. He genuinely admires and respects and appreciates +all Daphne's sweet and charming qualities." + +"Then what do you suppose is the matter?" + +"I have an inkling of the truth: I imagine Mr. Cecil must have let +himself in for a prior attachment." + +"If so, why does he hang about Daphne?" + +"Because--he can't help himself. He's a good fellow and a +chivalrous fellow. He admires your cousin; but he must have got +himself into some foolish entanglement elsewhere which he is too +honourable to break off; while at the same time he's far too much +impressed by Daphne's fine qualities to be able to keep away from +her. It's the ordinary case of love versus duty." + +"Is he well off? Could he afford to marry Daphne?" + +"Oh, his father's very rich: he has plenty of money; a Canadian +millionaire, they say. That makes it all the likelier that some +undesirable young woman somewhere may have managed to get hold of +him. Just the sort of romantic, impressionable hobbledehoy such +women angle for." + +I drummed my fingers on the table. Presently Hilda spoke again. +"Why don't you try to get to know him, and find out precisely +what's the matter?" + +"I KNOW what's the matter--now you've told me," I answered. "It's +as clear as day. Daphne is very much smitten with him, too. I'm +sorry for Daphne! Well, I'll take your advice; I'll try to have +some talk with him." + +"Do, please; I feel sure I have hit upon it. He has got himself +engaged in a hurry to some girl he doesn't really care about, and +he is far too much of a gentleman to break it off, though he's in +love quite another way with Daphne." + +Just at that moment the door opened and my aunt entered. + +"Why, where's Daphne?" she cried, looking about her and arranging +her black lace shawl. + +"She has just run out into Westbourne Grove to get some gloves and +a flower for the fete this evening," Hilda answered. Then she +added, significantly, "Mr. Holsworthy has gone with her." + +"What? That boy's been here again?" + +"Yes, Lady Tepping. He called to see Daphne." + +My aunt turned to me with an aggrieved tone. It is a peculiarity +of my aunt's--I have met it elsewhere--that if she is angry with +Jones, and Jones is not present, she assumes a tone of injured +asperity on his account towards Brown or Smith, or any other +innocent person whom she happens to be addressing. "Now, this is +really too bad, Hubert," she burst out, as if _I_ were the culprit. +"Disgraceful! Abominable! I'm sure I can't make out what the +young fellow means by it. Here he comes dangling after Daphne +every day and all day long--and never once says whether he means +anything by it or not. In MY young days, such conduct as that +would not have been considered respectable." + +I nodded and beamed benignly. + +"Well, why don't you answer me?" my aunt went on, warming up. "DO +you mean to tell me you think his behaviour respectful to a nice +girl in Daphne's position?" + +"My dear aunt," I answered. "you confound the persons. I am not +Mr. Holsworthy. I decline responsibility for him. I meet him +here, in YOUR house, for the first time this morning." + +"Then that shows how often you come to see your relations, Hubert!" +my aunt burst out, obliquely. "The man's been here, to my certain +knowledge, every day this six weeks." + +"Really, Aunt Fanny," I said; "you must recollect that a +professional man--" + +"Oh, yes. THAT'S the way! Lay it all down to your profession, do, +Hubert! Though I KNOW you were at the Thorntons' on Saturday--saw +it in the papers--the Morning Post--'among the guests were Sir +Edward and Lady Burnes, Professor Sebastian, Dr. Hubert Cumberledge,' +and so forth, and so forth. YOU think you can conceal these things; +but you can't. I get to know them!" + +"Conceal them! My dearest aunt! Why, I danced twice with Daphne." + +"Daphne! Yes, Daphne. They all run after Daphne," my aunt +exclaimed, altering the venue once more. "But there's no respect +for age left. _I_ expect to be neglected. However, that's neither +here nor there. The point is this: you're the one man now living +in the family. You ought to behave like a brother to Daphne. Why +don't you board this Holsworthy person and ask him his intentions?" + +"Goodness gracious!" I cried; "most excellent of aunts, that epoch +has gone past. The late lamented Queen Anne is now dead. It's no +use asking the young man of to-day to explain his intentions. He +will refer you to the works of the Scandinavian dramatists." + +My aunt was speechless. She could only gurgle out the words: +"Well, I can safely say that of all the monstrous behaviour--" then +language failed her and she relapsed into silence. + +However, when Daphne and young Holsworthy returned, I had as much +talk with him as I could, and when he left the house I left also. + +"Which way are you walking?" I asked, as we turned out into the +street. + +"Towards my rooms in the Temple." + +"Oh! I'm going back to St. Nathaniel's," I continued. If you'll +allow me, I'll walk part way with you." + +"How very kind of you!" + +We strode side by side a little distance in silence. Then a +thought seemed to strike the lugubrious young man. "What a +charming girl your cousin is!" he exclaimed, abruptly. + +"You seem to think so," I answered, smiling. + +He flushed a little; the lantern jaw grew longer. "I admire her, +of course," he answered. "Who doesn't? She is so extraordinarily +handsome." + +"Well, not exactly handsome," I replied, with more critical and +kinsman-like deliberation. "Pretty, if you will; and decidedly +pleasing and attractive in manner." + +He looked me up and down, as if he found me a person singularly +deficient in taste and appreciation. "Ah, but then, you are her +cousin," he said at last, with a compassionate tone. "That makes a +difference." + +"I quite see all Daphne's strong points," I answered, still +smiling, for I could perceive he was very far gone. "She is good- +looking, and she is clever." + +"Clever!" he echoed. "Profound! She has a most unusual intellect. +She stands alone." + +"Like her mother's silk dresses," I murmured, half under my breath. + +He took no notice of my flippant remark, but went on with his +rhapsody. "Such depth; such penetration! And then, how +sympathetic! Why, even to a mere casual acquaintance like myself, +she is so kind, so discerning!" + +"ARE you such a casual acquaintance?" I inquired, with a smile. +(It might have shocked Aunt Fanny to hear me; but THAT is the way +we ask a young man his intentions nowadays.) + +He stopped short and hesitated. "Oh, quite casual," he replied, +almost stammering. "Most casual, I assure you. . . . I have never +ventured to do myself the honour of supposing that . . . that Miss +Tepping could possibly care for me." + +"There is such a thing as being TOO modest and unassuming," I +answered. "It sometimes leads to unintentional cruelty." + +"No, do you think so?" he cried, his face falling all at once. "I +should blame myself bitterly if that were so. Dr. Cumberledge, you +are her cousin. DO you gather that I have acted in such a way as +to--to lead Miss Tepping to suppose I felt any affection for her?" + +I laughed in his face. "My dear boy," I answered, laying one hand +on his shoulder, "may I say the plain truth? A blind bat could see +you are madly in love with her." + +His mouth twitched. "That's very serious!" he answered, gravely; +"very serious." + +"It is," I responded, with my best paternal manner, gazing blankly +in front of me. + +He stopped short again. "Look here," he said, facing me. "Are you +busy? No? Then come back with me to my rooms; and--I'll make a +clean breast of it." + +"By all means," I assented. "When one is young--and foolish--I +have often noticed, as a medical man, that a drachm of clean breast +is a magnificent prescription." + +He walked back by my side, talking all the way of Daphne's many +adorable qualities. He exhausted the dictionary for laudatory +adjectives. By the time I reached his door it was not HIS fault if +I had not learned that the angelic hierarchy were not in the +running with my pretty cousin for graces and virtues. I felt that +Faith, Hope, and Charity ought to resign at once in favour of Miss +Daphne Tepping, promoted. + +He took me into his comfortably furnished rooms--the luxurious +rooms of a rich young bachelor, with taste as well as money--and +offered me a partaga. Now, I have long observed, in the course of +my practice, that a choice cigar assists a man in taking a +philosophic outlook on the question under discussion; so I accepted +the partaga. He sat down opposite me and pointed to a photograph +in the centre of his mantlepiece. "I am engaged to that lady," he +put in, shortly. + +"So I anticipated," I answered, lighting up. + +He started and looked surprised. "Why, what made you guess it?" he +inquired. + +I smiled the calm smile of superior age--I was some eight years or +so his senior. "My dear fellow," I murmured, "what else could +prevent you from proposing to Daphne--when you are so undeniably in +love with her?" + +"A great deal," he answered. "For example, the sense of my own +utter unworthiness." + +"One's own unworthiness," I replied, "though doubtless real--p'f, +p'f--is a barrier that most of us can readily get over when our +admiration for a particular lady waxes strong enough. So THIS is +the prior attachment!" I took the portrait down and scanned it. + +"Unfortunately, yes. What do you think of her?" + +I scrutinised the features. "Seems a nice enough little thing," I +answered. It was an innocent face, I admit; very frank and +girlish. + +He leaned forward eagerly. "That's just it. A nice enough little +thing! Nothing in the world to be said against her. While Daphne-- +Miss Tepping, I mean--" His silence was ecstatic. + +I examined the photograph still more closely. It displayed a lady +of twenty or thereabouts, with a weak face, small, vacant features, +a feeble chin, a good-humoured, simple mouth, and a wealth of +golden hair that seemed to strike a keynote. + +"In the theatrical profession?" I inquired at last, looking up. + +He hesitated. "Well, not exactly," he answered. + +I pursed my lips and blew a ring. "Music-hall stage?" I went on, +dubiously. + +He nodded. "But a girl is not necessarily any the less a lady +because she sings at a music-hall," he added, with warmth, +displaying an evident desire to be just to his betrothed, however +much he admired Daphne. + +"Certainly not," I admitted. "A lady is a lady; no occupation can +in itself unladify her. . . . But on the music-hall stage, the +odds, one must admit, are on the whole against her." + +"Now, THERE you show prejudice!" + +"One may be quite unprejudiced," I answered, "and yet allow that +connection with the music-halls does not, as such, afford clear +proof that a girl is a compound of all the virtues." + +"I think she's a good girl," he retorted, slowly. + +"Then why do you want to throw her over?" I inquired. + +"I don't. That's just it. On the contrary, I mean to keep my word +and marry her." + +"IN ORDER to keep your word?" I suggested. + +He nodded. "Precisely. It is a point of honour." + +"That's a poor ground of marriage," I went on. "Mind, I don't want +for a moment to influence you, as Daphne's cousin. I want to get +at the truth of the situation. I don't even know what Daphne +thinks of you. But you promised me a clean breast. Be a man and +bare it." + +He bared it instantly. "I thought I was in love with this girl, +you see," he went on, "till I saw Miss Tepping." + +"That makes a difference," I admitted. + +"And I couldn't bear to break her heart." + +"Heaven forbid!" I cried. "It is the one unpardonable sin. Better +anything than that." Then I grew practical. "Father's consent?" + +"MY father's? IS it likely? He expects me to marry into some +distinguished English family." + +I hummed a moment. "Well, out with it!" I exclaimed, pointing my +cigar at him. + +He leaned back in his chair and told me the whole story. A pretty +girl; golden hair; introduced to her by a friend; nice, simple +little thing; mind and heart above the irregular stage on to which +she had been driven by poverty alone; father dead; mother in +reduced circumstances. "To keep the home together, poor Sissie +decided--" + +"Precisely so," I murmured, knocking off my ash. "The usual self- +sacrifice! Case quite normal! Everything en regle!" + +"You don't mean to say you doubt it?" he cried, flushing up, and +evidently regarding me as a hopeless cynic. "I do assure you, Dr. +Cumberledge, the poor child--though miles, of course, below Miss +Tepping's level--is as innocent, and as good--" + +"As a flower in May. Oh, yes; I don't doubt it. How did you come +to propose to her, though?" + +He reddened a little. "Well, it was almost accidental," he said, +sheepishly. "I called there one evening, and her mother had a +headache and went up to bed. And when we two were left alone, +Sissie talked a great deal about her future and how hard her life +was. And after a while she broke down and began to cry. And then--" + +I cut him short with a wave of my hand. "You need say no more," I +put in, with a sympathetic face. "We have all been there." + +We paused a moment, while I puffed smoke at the photograph again. +"Well," I said at last, "her face looks to me really simple and +nice. It is a good face. Do you see her often?" + +"Oh, no; she's on tour." + +"In the provinces?" + +"M'yes; just at present, at Scarborough." + +"But she writes to you?" + +"Every day." + +"Would you think it an unpardonable impertinence if I made bold to +ask whether it would be possible for you to show me a specimen of +her letters?" + +He unlocked a drawer and took out three or four. Then he read one +through, carefully. "I don't think," he said, in a deliberative +voice, "it would be a serious breach of confidence in me to let you +look through this one. There's really nothing in it, you know-- +just the ordinary average every-day love-letter." + +I glanced through the little note. He was right. The conventional +hearts and darts epistle. It sounded nice enough: "Longing to see +you again; so lonely in this place; your dear sweet letter; looking +forward to the time; your ever-devoted Sissie." + +"That seems straight," I answered. "However, I am not quite sure. +Will you allow me to take it away, with the photograph? I know I +am asking much. I want to show it to a lady in whose tact and +discrimination I have the greatest confidence." + +"What, Daphne?" + +I smiled. "No, not Daphne," I answered. "Our friend, Miss Wade. +She has extraordinary insight." + +"I could trust anything to Miss Wade. She is true as steel." + +"You are right," I answered. "That shows that you, too, are a +judge of character." + +He hesitated. "I feel a brute," he cried, "to go on writing every +day to Sissie Montague--and yet calling every day to see Miss +Tepping. But still--I do it." + +I grasped his hand. "My dear fellow," I said, "nearly ninety per +cent. of men, after all--are human!" + +I took both letter and photograph back with me to Nathaniel's. +When I had gone my rounds that night, I carried them into Hilda +Wade's room and told her the story. Her face grew grave. "We must +be just," she said at last. "Daphne is deeply in love with him; +but even for Daphne's sake, we must not take anything for granted +against the other lady." + +I produced the photograph. "What do you make of that?" I asked. +"_I_ think it an honest face, myself, I may tell you." + +She scrutinised it long and closely with a magnifier. Then she put +her head on one side and mused very deliberately. "Madeline Shaw +gave me her photograph the other day, and said to me, as she gave +it, 'I do so like these modern portraits; they show one WHAT MIGHT +HAVE BEEN.'" + +"You mean they are so much touched up!" + +"Exactly. That, as it stands, is a sweet, innocent face--an honest +girl's face--almost babyish in its transparency but . . . the +innocence has all been put into it by the photographer." + +"You think so?" + +"I know it. Look here at those lines just visible on the cheek. +They disappear, nowhere, at impossible angles. AND the corners of +that mouth. They couldn't go so, with that nose and those puckers. +The thing is not real. It has been atrociously edited. Part is +nature's; part, the photographer's; part, even possibly paint and +powder." + +"But the underlying face?" + +"Is a minx's." + +I handed her the letter. "This next?" I asked, fixing my eyes on +her as she looked. + +She read it through. For a minute or two she examined it. "The +letter is right enough," she answered, after a second reading, +"though its guileless simplicity is, perhaps, under the +circumstances, just a leetle overdone; but the handwriting--the +handwriting is duplicity itself: a cunning, serpentine hand, no +openness or honesty in it. Depend upon it, that girl is playing a +double game." + +"You believe, then, there is character in handwriting?" + +"Undoubtedly; when we know the character, we can see it in the +writing. The difficulty is, to see it and read it BEFORE we know +it; and I have practised a little at that. There is character in +all we do, of course--our walk, our cough, the very wave of our +hands; the only secret is, not all of us have always skill to see +it. Here, however, I feel pretty sure. The curls of the g's and +the tails of the y's--how full they are of wile, of low, underhand +trickery!" + +I looked at them as she pointed. "That is true!" I exclaimed. "I +see it when you show it. Lines meant for effect. No straightness +or directness in them!" + +Hilda reflected a moment. "Poor Daphne!" she murmured. "I would +do anything to help her. . . . I'll tell what might be a good +plan." Her face brightened. "My holiday comes next week. I'll +run down to Scarborough--it's as nice a place for a holiday as any-- +and I'll observe this young lady. It can do no harm--and good may +come of it." + +"How kind of you!" I cried. "But you are always all kindness." + +Hilda went to Scarborough, and came back again for a week before +going on to Bruges, where she proposed to spend the greater part of +her holidays. She stopped a night or two in town to report +progress, and, finding another nurse ill, promised to fill her +place till a substitute was forthcoming. + +"Well, Dr. Cumberledge," she said, when she saw me alone, "I was +right! I have found out a fact or two about Daphne's rival!" + +"You have seen her?" I asked. + +"Seen her? I have stopped for a week in the same house. A very +nice lodging-house on the Spa front, too. The girl's well enough +off. The poverty plea fails. She goes about in good rooms and +carries a mother with her." + +"That's well," I answered. "That looks all right." + +"Oh, yes, she's quite presentable: has the manners of a lady +whenever she chooses. But the chief point is this: she laid her +letters every day on the table in the passage outside her door for +post--laid them all in a row, so that when one claimed one's own +one couldn't help seeing them." + +"Well, that was open and aboveboard," I continued, beginning to +fear we had hastily misjudged Miss Sissie Montague. + +"Very open--too much so, in fact; for I was obliged to note the +fact that she wrote two letters regularly every day of her life-- +'to my two mashes,' she explained one afternoon to a young man who +was with her as she laid them on the table. One of them was always +addressed to Cecil Holsworthy, Esq." + +"And the other?" + +"Wasn't." + +"Did you note the name?" I asked, interested. + +"Yes; here it is." She handed me a slip of paper. + +I read it: "Reginald Nettlecraft, Esq., 427, Staples Inn, London." + +"What, Reggie Nettlecraft!" I cried, amused. "Why, he was a very +little boy at Charterhouse when I was a big one; he afterwards went +to Oxford, and got sent down from Christ Church for the part he +took in burning a Greek bust in Tom Quad--an antique Greek bust-- +after a bump supper." + +"Just the sort of man I should have expected," Hilda answered, with +a suppressed smile. "I have a sort of inkling that Miss Montague +likes HIM best; he is nearer her type; but she thinks Cecil +Holsworthy the better match. Has Mr. Nettlecraft money?" + +"Not a penny, I should say. An allowance from his father, perhaps, +who is a Lincolnshire parson; but otherwise, nothing." + +"Then, in my opinion, the young lady is playing for Mr. Holsworthy's +money; failing which, she will decline upon Mr. Nettlecraft's +heart." + +We talked it all over. In the end I said abruptly: "Nurse Wade, +you have seen Miss Montague, or whatever she calls herself. I have +not. I won't condemn her unheard. I have half a mind to run down +one day next week to Scarborough and have a look at her." + +"Do. That will suffice. You can judge then for yourself whether +or not I am mistaken." + +I went; and what is more, I heard Miss Sissie sing at her hall--a +pretty domestic song, most childish and charming. She impressed me +not unfavourably, in spite of what Hilda said. Her peach-blossom +cheek might have been art, but looked like nature. She had an open +face, a baby smile and there was a frank girlishness about her +dress and manner that took my fancy. "After all," I thought to +myself, "even Hilda Wade is fallible." + +So that evening, when her "turn" was over, I made up my mind to go +round and call upon her. I had told Cecil Holsworthy my intentions +beforehand, and it rather shocked him. He was too much of a +gentleman to wish to spy upon the girl he had promised to marry. +However, in my case, there need be no such scruples. I found the +house and asked for Miss Montague. As I mounted the stairs to the +drawing-room floor, I heard a sound of voices--the murmur of +laughter; idiotic guffaws, suppressed giggles, the masculine and +feminine varieties of tomfoolery. + +"YOU'D make a splendid woman of business, YOU would!" a young man +was saying. I gathered from his drawl that he belonged to that +sub-species of the human race which is known as the Chappie. + +"Wouldn't I just?" a girl's voice answered, tittering. I +recognised it as Sissie's. "You ought to see me at it! Why, my +brother set up a place once for mending bicycles; and I used to +stand about at the door, as if I had just returned from a ride; and +when fellows came in, with a nut loose or something, I'd begin +talking with them while Bertie tightened it. Then, when THEY +weren't looking, I'd dab the business end of a darning-needle, so, +just plump into their tires; and of course, as soon as they went +off, they were back again in a minute to get a puncture mended! I +call THAT business." + +A roar of laughter greeted the recital of this brilliant incident +in a commercial career. As it subsided, I entered. There were two +men in the room, besides Miss Montague and her mother, and a second +young lady. + +"Excuse this late call," I said, quietly, bowing. "But I have only +one night in Scarborough, Miss Montague, and I wanted to see you. +I'm a friend of Mr. Holsworthy's. I told him I'd look you up, and +this is my sole opportunity." + +I FELT rather than saw that Miss Montague darted a quick glance of +hidden meaning at her friends the chappies; their faces, in +response, ceased to snigger and grew instantly sober. + +She took my card; then, in her alternative manner as the perfect +lady, she presented me to her mother. "Dr. Cumberledge, mamma," +she said, in a faintly warning voice. "A friend of Mr. +Holsworthy's." + +The old lady half rose. "Let me see," she said, staring at me. +"WHICH is Mr. Holsworthy, Siss?--is it Cecil or Reggie?" + +One of the chappies burst into a fatuous laugh once more at this +remark. "Now, you're giving away the whole show, Mrs. Montague!" +he exclaimed, with a chuckle. A look from Miss Sissie immediately +checked him. + +I am bound to admit, however, that after these untoward incidents +of the first minute, Miss Montague and her friends behaved +throughout with distinguished propriety. Her manners were perfect-- +I may even say demure. She asked about "Cecil" with charming +naivete. She was frank and girlish. Lots of innocent fun in her, +no doubt--she sang us a comic song in excellent taste, which is a +severe test--but not a suspicion of double-dealing. If I had not +overheard those few words as I came up the stairs, I think I should +have gone away believing the poor girl an injured child of nature. + +As it was, I went back to London the very next day, determined to +renew my slight acquaintance with Reggie Nettlecraft. + +Fortunately, I had a good excuse for going to visit him. I had +been asked to collect among old Carthusians for one of those +endless "testimonials" which pursue one through life, and are, +perhaps, the worst Nemesis which follows the crime of having wasted +one's youth at a public school: a testimonial for a retiring +master, or professional cricketer, or washerwoman, or something; +and in the course of my duties as collector it was quite natural +that I should call upon all my fellow-victims. So I went to his +rooms in Staples Inn and reintroduced myself. + +Reggie Nettlecraft had grown up into an unwholesome, spotty, +indeterminate young man, with a speckled necktie, and cuffs of which +he was inordinately proud, and which he insisted on "flashing" every +second minute. He was also evidently self-satisfied; which was +odd, for I have seldom seen anyone who afforded less cause for +rational satisfaction. "Hullo," he said, when I told him my name. +"So it's you, is it, Cumberledge?" He glanced at my card. "St. +Nathaniel's Hospital! What rot! Why, blow me tight if you haven't +turned sawbones!" + +"That is my profession," I answered, unashamed. "And you?" + +"Oh, I don't have any luck, you know, old man. They turned me out +of Oxford because I had too much sense of humour for the +authorities there--beastly set of old fogeys! Objected to my +'chucking' oyster shells at the tutors' windows--good old English +custom, fast becoming obsolete. Then I crammed for the Army. But, +bless your heart, a GENTLEMAN has no chance for the Army nowadays; +a pack of blooming cads, with what they call 'intellect,' read up +for the exams, and don't give US a look-in; I call it sheer piffle. +Then the Guv'nor set me on electrical engineering--electrical +engineering's played out. I put no stock in it; besides, it's +such beastly fag; and then, you get your hands dirty. So now I'm +reading for the Bar; and if only my coach can put me up to tips +enough to dodge the examiners, I expect to be called some time next +summer." + +"And when you have failed for everything?" I inquired, just to test +his sense of humour. + +He swallowed it like a roach. "Oh, when I've failed for everything, +I shall stick up to the Guv'nor. Hang it all, a GENTLEMAN can't be +expected to earn his own livelihood. England's going to the dogs, +that's where it is; no snug little sinecures left for chaps like you +and me; all this beastly competition. And no respect for the +feelings of gentlemen, either! Why, would you believe it, +Cumberground--we used to call you Cumberground at Charterhouse, I +remember, or was it Fig Tree?--I happened to get a bit lively in the +Haymarket last week, after a rattling good supper, and the chap at +the police court--old cove with a squint--positively proposed to +send me to prison, WITHOUT THE OPTION OF A FINE!--I'll trouble you +for that--send ME to prison just--for knocking down a common brute +of a bobby. There's no mistake about it; England's NOT a country +now for a gentleman to live in." + +"Then why not mark your sense of the fact by leaving it?" I +inquired, with a smile. + +He shook his head. "What? Emigrate? No, thank you! I'm not +taking any. None of your colonies for ME, IF you please. I shall +stick to the old ship. I'm too much attached to the Empire." + +"And yet imperialists," I said, "generally gush over the colonies-- +the Empire on which the sun never sets." + +"The Empire in Leicester Squire!" he responded, gazing at me with +unspoken contempt. "Have a whisky-and-soda, old chap? What, no? +'Never drink between meals?' Well, you DO surprise me! I suppose +that comes of being a sawbones, don't it?" + +"Possibly," I answered. "We respect our livers." Then I went on +to the ostensible reason of my visit--the Charterhouse testimonial. +He slapped his thighs metaphorically, by way of suggesting the +depleted condition of his pockets. "Stony broke, Cumberledge," he +murmured; "stony broke! Honour bright! Unless Bluebird pulls off +the Prince of Wales's Stakes, I really don't know how I'm to pay +the Benchers." + +"It's quite unimportant," I answered. "I was asked to ask you, and +I HAVE asked you." + +"So I twig, my dear fellow. Sorry to have to say NO. But I'll +tell you what I can do for you; I can put you upon a straight +thing--" + +I glanced at the mantelpiece. "I see you have a photograph of Miss +Sissie Montague," I broke in casually, taking it down and examining +it. "WITH an autograph, too. 'Reggie, from Sissie.' You are a +friend of hers?" + +"A friend of hers? I'll trouble you. She IS a clinker, Sissie is! +You should see that girl smoke. I give you my word of honour, +Cumberledge, she can consume cigarettes against any fellow I know +in London. Hang it all, a girl like that, you know--well, one +can't help admiring her! Ever seen her?" + +"Oh, yes; I know her. I called on her, in fact, night before last, +at Scarborough." + +He whistled a moment, then broke into an imbecile laugh. "My gum," +he cried; "this IS a start, this is! You don't mean to tell me YOU +are the other Johnnie." + +"What other Johnnie?" I asked, feeling we were getting near it. + +He leaned back and laughed again. "Well, you know that girl +Sissie, she's a clever one, she is," he went on after a minute, +staring at me. "She's a regular clinker! Got two strings to her +bow; that's where the trouble comes in. Me and another fellow. +She likes me for love and the other fellow for money. Now, don't +you come and tell me that YOU are the other fellow." + +"I have certainly never aspired to the young lady's hand," I +answered, cautiously. "But don't you know your rival's name, +then?" + +"That's Sissie's blooming cleverness. She's a caulker, Sissie is; +you don't take a rise out of Sissie in a hurry. She knows that if +I knew who the other bloke was, I'd blow upon her little game to +him and put him off her. And I WOULD, s'ep me taters; for I'm nuts +on that girl. I tell you, Cumberledge, she IS a clinker!" + +"You seem to me admirably adapted for one another," I answered, +truthfully. I had not the slightest compunction in handing Reggie +Nettlecraft over to Sissie, nor in handing Sissie over to Reggie +Nettlecraft. + +"Adapted for one another? That's just it. There, you hit the +right nail plump on the cocoanut, Cumberground! But Sissie's an +artful one, she is. She's playing for the other Johnnie. He's got +the dibs, you know; and Sissie wants the dibs even more than she +wants yours truly." + +"Got what?" I inquired, not quite catching the phrase. + +"The dibs, old man; the chink; the oof; the ready rhino. He rolls +in it, she says. I can't find out the chap's name, but I know his +Guv'nor's something or other in the millionaire trade somewhere +across in America." + +"She writes to you, I think?" + +"That's so; every blooming day; but how the dummy did you come to +know it?" + +"She lays letters addressed to you on the hall table at her +lodgings in Scarborough." + +"The dickens she does! Careless little beggar! Yes, she writes to +me--pages. She's awfully gone on me, really. She'd marry me if it +wasn't for the Johnnie with the dibs. She doesn't care for HIM: +she wants his money. He dresses badly, don't you see; and, after +all, the clothes make the man! I'D like to get at him. I'D spoil +his pretty face for him." And he assumed a playfully pugilistic +attitude. + +"You really want to get rid of this other fellow?" I asked, seeing +my chance. + +"Get rid of him? Why, of course! Chuck him into the river some +nice dark night if I could once get a look at him!" + +"As a preliminary step, would you mind letting me see one of Miss +Montague's letters?" I inquired. + +He drew a long breath. "They're a bit affectionate, you know," he +murmured, stroking his beardless chin in hesitation. "She's a hot +'un, Sissie is. She pitches it pretty warm on the affection-stop, +I can tell you. But if you really think you can give the other +Johnnie a cut on the head with her letters--well, in the interests +of true love, which never DOES run smooth, I don't mind letting you +have a squint, as my friend, at one of her charming billy-doos." + +He took a bundle from a drawer, ran his eye over one or two with a +maudlin air, and then selected a specimen not wholly unsuitable for +publication. "THERE'S one in the eye for C.," he said, chuckling. +"What would C. say to that, I wonder? She always calls him C., you +know; it's so jolly non-committing. She says, 'I only wish that +beastly old bore C. were at Halifax--which is where he comes from +and then I would fly at once to my own dear Reggie! But, hang it +all, Reggie boy, what's the good of true love if you haven't got +the dibs? I MUST have my comforts. Love in a cottage is all very +well in its way; but who's to pay for the fizz, Reggie?' That's +her refinement, don't you see? Sissie's awfully refined. She was +brought up with the tastes and habits of a lady." + +"Clearly so," I answered. "Both her literary style and her liking +for champagne abundantly demonstrate it!" His acute sense of +humour did not enable him to detect the irony of my observation. I +doubt if it extended much beyond oyster shells. He handed me the +letter. I read it through with equal amusement and gratification. +If Miss Sissie had written it on purpose in order to open Cecil +Holsworthy's eyes, she couldn't have managed the matter better or +more effectually. It breathed ardent love, tempered by a +determination to sell her charms in the best and highest +matrimonial market. + +"Now, I know this man, C.," I said when I had finished. And I want +to ask whether you will let me show him Miss Montague's letter. It +would set him against the girl, who, as a matter of fact, is wholly +unwor--I mean totally unfitted for him." + +"Let you show it to him? Like a bird! Why, Sissie promised me +herself that if she couldn't bring 'that solemn ass, C.,' up to the +scratch by Christmas, she'd chuck him and marry me. It's here, in +writing." And he handed me another gem of epistolary literature. + +"You have no compunctions?" I asked again, after reading it. + +Not a blessed compunction to my name." + +"Then neither have I," I answered. + +I felt they both deserved it. Sissie was a minx, as Hilda rightly +judged; while as for Nettlecraft--well, if a public school and an +English university leave a man a cad, a cad he will be, and there +is nothing more to be said about it. + +I went straight off with the letters to Cecil Holsworthy. He read +them through, half incredulously at first; he was too honest- +natured himself to believe in the possibility of such double- +dealing--that one could have innocent eyes and golden hair and yet +be a trickster. He read them twice; then he compared them word for +word with the simple affection and childlike tone of his own last +letter received from the same lady. Her versatility of style would +have done honour to a practised literary craftsman. At last he +handed them back to me. "Do you think," he said, "on the evidence +of these, I should be doing wrong in breaking with her?" + +"Wrong in breaking with her!" I exclaimed. "You would be doing +wrong if you didn't,--wrong to yourself; wrong to your family; +wrong, if I may venture to say so, to Daphne; wrong even in the +long run to the girl herself; for she is not fitted for you, and +she IS fitted for Reggie Nettlecraft. Now, do as I bid you. Sit +down at once and write her a letter from my dictation." + +He sat down and wrote, much relieved that I took the responsibility +off his shoulders. + + +"DEAR MISS MONTAGUE," I began, "the inclosed letters have come into +my hands without my seeking it. After reading them, I feel that I +have absolutely no right to stand between you and the man of your +real choice. It would not be kind or wise of me to do so. I +release you at once, and consider myself released. You may +therefore regard our engagement as irrevocably cancelled. + +"Faithfully yours, + +"CECIL HOLSWORTHY." + + +"Nothing more than that?" he asked, looking up and biting his pen. +"Not a word of regret or apology?" + +"Not a word," I answered. "You are really too lenient." + +I made him take it out and post it before he could invent +conscientious scruples. Then he turned to me irresolutely. "What +shall I do next?" he asked, with a comical air of doubt. + +I smiled. "My dear fellow, that is a matter for your own +consideration." + +"But--do you think she will laugh at me?" + +"Miss Montague?" + +"No! Daphne." + +"I am not in not in Daphne's confidence," I answered. "I don't +know how she feels. But, on the face of it, I think I can venture +to assure you that at least she won't laugh at you." + +He grasped my hand hard. "You don't mean to say so!" he cried. +"Well, that's really very, kind of her! A girl of Daphne's high +type! And I, who feel myself so utterly unworthy of her!" + +"We are all unworthy of a good woman's love," I answered. "But, +thank Heaven, the good women don't seem to realise it." + +That evening, about ten, my new friend came back in a hurry to my +rooms at St. Nathaniel's. Nurse Wade was standing there, giving +her report for the night when he entered. His face looked some +inches shorter and broader than usual. His eyes beamed. His mouth +was radiant. + +"Well, you won't believe it, Dr. Cumberledge," he began; "but--" + +"Yes, I DO believe it," I answered. "I know it. I have read it +already." + +"Read it!" he cried. "Where?" + +I waved my hand towards his face. "In a special edition of the +evening papers," I answered, smiling. "Daphne has accepted you!" + +He sank into an easy chair, beside himself with rapture. "Yes, +yes; that angel! Thanks to YOU, she has accepted me!" + +"Thanks to Miss Wade," I said, correcting him. "It is really all +HER doing. If SHE had not seen through the photograph to the face, +and through the face to the woman and the base little heart of her, +we might never have found her out." + +He turned to Hilda with eyes all gratitude. "You have given me the +dearest and best girl on earth," he cried, seizing both her hands. + +"And I have given Daphne a husband who will love and appreciate +her," Hilda answered, flushing. + +"You see," I said, maliciously; "I told you they never find us out, +Holsworthy!" + +As for Reggie Nettlecraft and his wife, I should like to add that +they are getting on quite as well as could be expected. Reggie has +joined his Sissie on the music-hall stage; and all those who have +witnessed his immensely popular performance of the Drunken +Gentleman before the Bow Street Police Court acknowledge without +reserve that, after "failing for everything," he has dropped at +last into his true vocation. His impersonation of the part is said +to be "nature itself." I see no reason to doubt it. + + + +CHAPTER III + +THE EPISODE OF THE WIFE WHO DID HER DUTY + + +To make you understand my next yarn, I must go back to the date of +my introduction to Hilda. + +"It is witchcraft!" I said the first time I saw her, at Le Geyt's +luncheon-party. + +She smiled a smile which was bewitching, indeed, but by no means +witch-like,--a frank, open smile with just a touch of natural +feminine triumph in it. "No, not witchcraft," she answered, +helping herself with her dainty fingers to a burnt almond from the +Venetian glass dish,--"not witchcraft,--memory; aided, perhaps, by +some native quickness of perception. Though I say it myself, I +never met anyone, I think, whose memory goes quite as far as mine +does." + +"You don't mean quite as far BACK," I cried, jesting; for she +looked about twenty-four, and had cheeks like a ripe nectarine, +just as pink and just as softly downy. + +She smiled again, showing a row of semi-transparent teeth, with a +gleam in the depths of them. She was certainly most attractive. +She had that indefinable, incommunicable, unanalysable personal +quality which we know as CHARM. "No, not as far BACK," she +repeated. "Though, indeed, I often seem to remember things that +happened before I was born (like Queen Elizabeth's visit to +Kenilworth): I recollect so vividly all that I have heard or read +about them. But as far IN EXTENT, I mean. I never let anything +drop out of my memory. As this case shows you, I can recall even +quite unimportant and casual bits of knowledge when any chance clue +happens to bring them back to me." + +She had certainly astonished me. The occasion for my astonishment +was the fact that when I handed her my card, "Dr. Hubert Ford +Cumberledge, St. Nathaniel's Hospital," she had glanced at it for a +second and exclaimed, without sensible pause or break, "Oh, then, +of course, you're half Welsh, as I am." + +The instantaneous and apparent inconsecutiveness of her inference +took me aback. "Well, m'yes: I AM half Welsh," I replied. "My +mother came from Carnarvonshire. But, why THEN, and OF COURSE? I +fail to perceive your train of reasoning." + +She laughed a sunny little laugh, like one well accustomed to +receive such inquiries. "Fancy asking A WOMAN to give you 'the +train of reasoning' for her intuitions!" she cried, merrily. "That +shows, Dr. Cumberledge, that you are a mere man--a man of science, +perhaps, but NOT a psychologist. It also suggests that you are a +confirmed bachelor. A married man accepts intuitions, without +expecting them to be based on reasoning. . . . Well, just this +once, I will stretch a point to enlighten you. If I recollect +right, your mother died about three years ago?" + +"You are quite correct. Then you knew my mother?" + +"Oh, dear me, no! I never even met her. Why THEN?" + +Her look was mischievous. "But, unless I mistake, I think she came +from Hendre Coed, near Bangor." + +"Wales is a village!" I exclaimed, catching my breath. "Every Welsh +person seems to know all about every other." + +My new acquaintance smiled again. When she smiled she was +irresistible: a laughing face protruding from a cloud of diaphanous +drapery. "Now, shall I tell you how I came to know that?" she +asked, poising a glace cherry on her dessert fork in front of her. +"Shall I explain my trick, like the conjurers?" + +"Conjurers never explain anything," I answered. "They say: 'So, +you see, THAT'S how it's done!'--with a swift whisk of the hand-- +and leave you as much in the dark as ever. Don't explain like the +conjurers, but tell me how you guessed it." + +She shut her eyes and seemed to turn her glance inward. + +"About three years ago," she began slowly, like one who reconstructs +with an effort a half-forgotten scene, "I saw a notice in the +Times--Births, Deaths, and Marriages--'On the 27th of October'--was +it the 27th?" The keen brown eyes opened again for a second and +flashed inquiry into mine. + +"Quite right," I answered, nodding. + +"I thought so. 'On the 27th of October, at Brynmor, Bournemouth, +Emily Olwen Josephine, widow of the late Thomas Cumberledge, +sometime colonel of the 7th Bengal Regiment of Foot, and daughter +of Iolo Gwyn Ford, Esq., J.P., of Hendre Coed, near Bangor. Am I +correct?" She lifted her dark eyelashes once more and flooded me. + +"You are quite correct," I answered, surprised. "And that is +really all that you knew of my mother?" + +"Absolutely all. The moment I saw your card, I thought to myself, +in a breath: 'Ford, Cumberledge; what do I know of those two +names? I have some link between them. Ah, yes; found Mrs. +Cumberledge, wife of Colonel Thomas Cumberledge, of the 7th +Bengals, was a Miss Ford, daughter of a Mr. Ford, of Bangor.' That +came to me like a lightning-gleam. Then I said to myself again, +'Dr. Hubert Ford Cumberledge must be their son.' So there you have +'the train of reasoning.' Women CAN reason--sometimes. I had to +think twice, though, before I could recall the exact words of the +Times notice." + +"And can you do the same with everyone?" + +"Everyone! Oh, come, now: that is expecting too much! I have not +read, marked, learned, and inwardly digested everyone's family +announcements. I don't pretend to be the Peerage, the Clergy List, +and the London Directory rolled into one. I remembered YOUR family +all the more vividly, no doubt, because of the pretty and unusual +old Welsh names, 'Olwen' and 'Iolo Gwyn Ford,' which fixed +themselves on my memory by their mere beauty. Everything about +Wales always attracts me; my Welsh side is uppermost. But I have +hundreds--oh, thousands--of such facts stored and pigeon-holed in +my memory. If anybody else cares to try me," she glanced round the +table, "perhaps we may be able to test my power that way." + +Two or three of the company accepted her challenge, giving the full +names of their sisters or brothers; and, in three cases out of +five, my witch was able to supply either the notice of their +marriage or some other like published circumstance. In the +instance of Charlie Vere, it is true, she went wrong, just at +first, though only in a single small particular; it was not Charlie +himself who was gazetted to a sub-lieutenancy in the Warwickshire +Regiment, but his brother Walter. However, the moment she was told +of this slip, she corrected herself at once, and added, like +lightning, "Ah, yes: how stupid of me! I have mixed up the names. +Charles Cassilis Vere got an appointment on the same day in the +Rhodesian Mounted Police, didn't he?" Which was in point of fact +quite accurate. + +But I am forgetting that all this time I have not even now +introduced my witch to you. + +Hilda Wade, when I first saw her, was one of the prettiest, +cheeriest, and most graceful girls I have ever met--a dusky blonde, +brown-eyed, brown-haired, with a creamy, waxen whiteness of skin +that was yet warm and peach-downy. And I wish to insist from the +outset upon the plain fact that there was nothing uncanny about +her. In spite of her singular faculty of insight, which sometimes +seemed to illogical people almost weird or eerie, she was in the +main a bright, well-educated, sensible, winsome, lawn-tennis- +playing English girl. Her vivacious spirits rose superior to her +surroundings, which were often sad enough. But she was above all +things wholesome, unaffected, and sparkling--a gleam of sunshine. +She laid no claim to supernatural powers; she held no dealings with +familiar spirits; she was simply a girl of strong personal charm, +endowed with an astounding memory and a rare measure of feminine +intuition. Her memory, she told me, she shared with her father and +all her father's family; they were famous for their prodigious +faculty in that respect. Her impulsive temperament and quick +instincts, on the other hand, descended to her, she thought, from +her mother and her Welsh ancestry. + +Externally, she seemed thus at first sight little more than the +ordinary pretty, light-hearted English girl, with a taste for field +sports (especially riding), and a native love of the country. But +at times one caught in the brightened colour of her lustrous brown +eyes certain curious undercurrents of depth, of reserve, and of a +questioning wistfulness which made you suspect the presence of +profounder elements in her nature. From the earliest moment of our +acquaintance, indeed, I can say with truth that Hilda Wade +interested me immensely. I felt drawn. Her face had that strange +quality of compelling attention for which we have as yet no English +name, but which everybody recognises. You could not ignore her. +She stood out. She was the sort of girl one was constrained to +notice. + +It was Le Geyts first luncheon-party since his second marriage. +Big-bearded, genial, he beamed round on us jubilant. He was proud +of his wife and proud of his recent Q.C.-ship. The new Mrs. Le +Geyt sat at the head of the table, handsome, capable, self- +possessed; a vivid, vigorous woman and a model hostess. Though +still quite young, she was large and commanding. Everybody was +impressed by her. "Such a good mother to those poor motherless +children!" all the ladies declared in a chorus of applause. And, +indeed, she had the face of a splendid manager. + +I said as much in an undertone over the ices to Miss Wade, who sat +beside me--though I ought not to have discussed them at their own +table. "Hugo Le Geyt seems to have made an excellent choice," I +murmured. "Maisie and Ettie will be lucky, indeed, to be taken +care of by such a competent stepmother. Don't you think so?" + +My witch glanced up at her hostess with a piercing dart of the keen +brown eyes, held her wine-glass half raised, and then electrified +me by uttering, in the same low voice, audible to me alone, but +quite clearly and unhesitatingly, these astounding words: + +"I think, before twelve mouths are out, MR. LE GEYT WILL HAVE +MURDERED HER!" + +For a minute I could not answer, so startling was the effect of +this confident prediction. One does not expect to be told such +things at lunch, over the port and peaches, about one's dearest +friends, beside their own mahogany. And the assured air of +unfaltering conviction with which Hilda Wade said it to a complete +stranger took my breath away. WHY did she think so at all? And IF +she thought so why choose ME as the recipient of her singular +confidences? + +I gasped and wondered. + +"What makes you fancy anything so unlikely?" I asked aside at last, +behind the babel of voices. "You quite alarm me." + +She rolled a mouthful of apricot ice reflectively on her tongue, +and then murmured, in a similar aside, "Don't ask me now. Some +other time will, do. But I mean what I say. Believe me; I do not +speak at random." + +She was quite right, of course. To continue would have been +equally rude and foolish. I had perforce to bottle up my curiosity +for the moment and wait till my sibyl was in the mood for +interpreting. + +After lunch we adjourned to the drawing-room. Almost at once, +Hilda Wade flitted up with her brisk step to the corner where I was +sitting. "Oh, Dr. Cumberledge," she began, as if nothing odd had +occurred before, "I WAS so glad to meet you and have a chance of +talking to you, because I DO so want to get a nurse's place at St. +Nathaniel's." + +"A nurse's place!" I exclaimed, a little surprised, surveying her +dress of palest and softest Indian muslin; for she looked to me far +too much of a butterfly for such serious work. "Do you really mean +it; or are you one of the ten thousand modern young ladies who are +in quest of a Mission, without understanding that Missions are +unpleasant? Nursing, I can tell you, is not all crimped cap and +becoming uniform." + +"I know that," she answered, growing grave. "I ought to know it. +I am a nurse already at St. George's Hospital." + +"You are a nurse! And at St. George's! Yet you want to change to +Nathaniel's? Why? St. George's is in a much nicer part of London, +and the patients there come on an average from a much better class +than ours in Smithfield." + +"I know that too; but . . . Sebastian is at St. Nathaniel's--and I +want to be near Sebastian." + +"Professor Sebastian!" I cried, my face lighting up with a gleam of +enthusiasm at our great teacher's name. "Ah, if it is to be under +Sebastian that you, desire, I can see you mean business. I know +now you are in earnest." + +"In earnest?" she echoed, that strange deeper shade coming over her +face as she spoke, while her tone altered. "Yes, I think I am in +earnest! It is my object in life to be near Sebastian--to watch +him and observe him. I mean to succeed. . . . But I have given +you my confidence, perhaps too hastily, and I must implore you not +to mention my wish to him." + +"You may trust me implicitly," I answered. + +"Oh, yes; I saw that," she put in, with a quick gesture. "Of +course, I saw by your face you were a man of honour--a man one +could trust or I would not have spoken to you. But--you promise +me?" + +"I promise you," I replied, naturally flattered. She was +delicately pretty, and her quaint, oracular air, so incongruous +with the dainty face and the fluffy brown hair, piqued me not a +little. That special mysterious commodity of CHARM seemed to +pervade all she did and said. So I added: "And I will mention to +Sebastian that you wish for a nurse's place at Nathaniel's. As you +have had experience, and can be recommended, I suppose, by Le +Geyt's sister," with whom she had come, "no doubt you can secure an +early vacancy." + +"Thanks so much," she answered, with that delicious smile. It had +an infantile simplicity about it which contrasted most piquantly +with her prophetic manner. + +"Only," I went on, assuming a confidential tone, "you really MUST +tell me why you said that just now about Hugo Le Geyt. Recollect, +your Delphian utterances have gravely astonished and disquieted me. +Hugo is one of my oldest and dearest friends; and I want to know +why you have formed this sudden bad opinion of him." + +"Not of HIM, but of HER," she answered, to my surprise, taking a +small Norwegian dagger from the what-not and playing with it to +distract attention. + +"Come, come, now," I cried, drawing back. "You are trying to +mystify me. This is deliberate seer-mongery. You are presuming on +your powers. But I am not the sort of man to be caught by +horoscopes. I decline to believe it." + +She turned on me with a meaning glance. Those truthful eyes fixed +me. "I am going from here straight to my hospital," she murmured, +with a quiet air of knowledge--talking, I mean to say, like one who +really knows. "This room is not the place to discuss this matter, +is it? If you will walk back to St. George's with me, I think I +can make you see and feel that I am speaking, not at haphazard, but +from observation and experience." + +Her confidence roused my most vivid curiosity. When she left I +left with her. The Le Geyts lived in one of those new streets of +large houses on Campden Hill, so that our way eastward lay +naturally through Kensington Gardens. + +It was a sunny June day, when light pierced even through the smoke +of London, and the shrubberies breathed the breath of white lilacs. +"Now, what did you mean by that enigmatical saying?" I asked my new +Cassandra, as we strolled down the scent-laden path. "Woman's +intuition is all very well in its way; but a mere man may be +excused if he asks for evidence." + +She stopped short as I spoke, and gazed full into my eyes. Her +hand fingered her parasol handle. "I meant what I said," she +answered, with emphasis. "Within one year, Mr. Le Geyt will have +murdered his wife. You may take my word, for it." + +"Le Geyt!" I cried. "Never! I know the man so well! A big, good- +natured, kindly schoolboy! He is the gentlest and best of mortals. +Le Geyt a murderer! Im--possible!" + +Her eyes were far away. "Has it never occurred to you," she asked, +slowly, with her pythoness air, "that there are murders and +murders?--murders which depend in the main upon the murderer . . . +and also murders which depend in the main upon the victim?" + +"The victim? What do you mean?" + +"Well, there are brutal men who commit murder out of sheer +brutality--the ruffians of the slums; and there are sordid men who +commit murder for sordid money--the insurers who want to forestall +their policies, the poisoners who want to inherit property; but +have you ever realised that there are also murderers who become so +by accident, through their victims' idiosyncrasy? I thought all +the time while I was watching Mrs. Le Geyt, 'That woman is of the +sort predestined to be murdered.' . . . And when you asked me, I +told you so. I may have been imprudent; still, I saw it, and I +said it." + +"But this is second sight!" I cried, drawing away. "Do you pretend +to prevision?" + +"No, not second sight; nothing uncanny, nothing supernatural. But +prevision, yes; prevision based, not on omens or auguries, but on +solid fact--on what I have seen and noticed." + +"Explain yourself, oh, prophetess!" + +She let the point of her parasol make a curved trail on the gravel, +and followed its serpentine wavings with her eyes. "You know our +house surgeon?" she asked at last, looking up of a sudden. + +"What, Travers? Oh, intimately." + +"Then come to my ward and see. After you have seen, you will +perhaps believe me." + +Nothing that I could say would get any further explanation out of +her just then. "You would laugh at me if I told you," she +persisted; "you won't laugh when you have seen it." + +We walked on in silence as far as Hyde Park Corner. There my +Sphinx tripped lightly up the steps of St. George's Hospital. "Get +Mr. Travers's leave," she said, with a nod, and a bright smile, "to +visit Nurse Wade's ward. Then come up to me there in five +minutes." + +I explained to my friend the house surgeon that I wished to see +certain cases in the accident ward of which I had heard; he smiled +a restrained smile--"Nurse Wade, no doubt!" but, of course, gave me +permission to go up and look at them. "Stop a minute," he added, +"and I'll come with you." When we got there, my witch had already +changed her dress, and was waiting for us demurely in the neat +dove-coloured gown and smooth white apron of the hospital nurses. +She looked even prettier and more meaningful so than in her +ethereal outside summer-cloud muslin. + +"Come over to this bed," she said at once to Travers and myself, +without the least air of mystery. "I will show you what I mean by +it." + +"Nurse Wade has remarkable insight," Travers whispered to me as we +went. + +"I can believe it," I answered. + +"Look at this woman," she went on, aside, in a low voice--"no, NOT +the first bed; the one beyond it; Number 60. I don't want the +patient to know you are watching her. Do you observe anything odd +about her appearance?" + +"She is somewhat the same type," I began, "as Mrs.--" + +Before I could get out the words "Le Geyt," her warning eye and +puckering forehead had stopped me. "As the lady we were +discussing," she interposed, with a quiet wave of one hand. "Yes, +in some points very much so. You notice in particular her scanty +hair--so thin and poor--though she is young and good-looking?" + +"It is certainly rather a feeble crop for a woman of her age," I +admitted. "And pale at that, and washy." + +"Precisely. It's done up behind about as big as a nutmeg. . . . +Now, observe the contour of her back as she sits up there; it is +curiously curved, isn't it?" + +"Very," I replied. "Not exactly a stoop, nor yet quite a hunch, +but certainly an odd spinal configuration." + +"Like our friend's, once more?" + +"Like our friend's, exactly!" + +Hilda Wade looked away, lest she should attract the patient's +attention. "Well, that woman was brought in here, half-dead, +assaulted by her husband," she went on, with a note of unobtrusive +demonstration. + +"We get a great many such cases," Travers put in, with true medical +unconcern, "very interesting cases; and Nurse Wade has pointed out +to me the singular fact that in almost all instances the patients +resemble one another physically." + +"Incredible!" I cried. "I can understand that there might well be +a type of men who assault their wives, but not, surely, a type of +women who get assaulted." + +"That is because you know less about it than Nurse Wade," Travers +answered, with an annoying smile of superior knowledge. + +Our instructress moved on to another bed, laying one gentle hand as +she passed on a patient's forehead. The patient glanced gratitude. +"That one again," she said once more, half indicating a cot at a +little distance: "Number 74. She has much the same thin hair-- +sparse, weak, and colourless. She has much the same curved back, +and much the same aggressive, self-assertive features. Looks +capable, doesn't she? A born housewife! . . . Well, she, too, was +knocked down and kicked half-dead the other night by her husband." + +"It is certainly odd," I answered, "how very much they both recall--" + +"Our friend at lunch! Yes, extraordinary. See here"; she pulled +out a pencil and drew the quick outline of a face in her note-book. +"THAT is what is central and essential to the type. They have THIS +sort of profile. Women with faces like that ALWAYS get assaulted." + +Travers glanced over her shoulder. "Quite true," he assented, with +his bourgeois nod. "Nurse Wade in her time has shown me dozens of +them. Round dozens: bakers' dozens! They all belong to that +species. In fact, when a woman of this type is brought in to us +wounded now, I ask at once, 'Husband?' and the invariable answer +comes pat: 'Well, yes, sir; we had some words together.' The +effect of words, my dear fellow, is something truly surprising." + +"They can pierce like a dagger," I mused. + +"And leave an open wound behind that requires dressing," Travers +added, unsuspecting. Practical man, Travers! + +"But WHY do they get assaulted--the women of this type?" I asked, +still bewildered. + +"Number 87 has her mother just come to see her," my sorceress +interposed. "SHE'S an assault case; brought in last night; badly +kicked and bruised about the head and shoulders. Speak to the +mother. She'll explain it all to you." + +Travers and I moved over to the cot her hand scarcely indicated. +"Well, your daughter looks pretty comfortable this afternoon, in +spite of the little fuss," Travers began, tentatively. + +"Yus, she's a bit tidy, thanky," the mother answered, smoothing her +soiled black gown, grown green with long service. "She'll git on +naow, please Gord. But Joe most did for 'er." + +"How did it all happen?" Travers asked, in a jaunty tone, to draw +her out. + +"Well, it was like this, sir, yer see. My daughter, she's a lidy +as keeps 'erself TO 'erself, as the sayin' is, an' 'olds 'er 'ead +up. She keeps up a proper pride, an' minds 'er 'ouse an' 'er +little uns. She ain't no gadabaht. But she 'AVE a tongue, she +'ave"; the mother lowered her voice cautiously, lest the "lidy" +should hear. "I don't deny it that she 'AVE a tongue, at times, +through myself 'avin' suffered from it. And when she DO go on, +Lord bless you, why, there ain't no stoppin' of 'er." + +"Oh, she has a tongue, has she?" Travers replied, surveying the +"case" critically. "Well, you know, she looks like it." + +"So she do, sir; so she do. An' Joe, 'e's a man as wouldn't 'urt a +biby--not when 'e's sober, Joe wouldn't. But 'e'd bin aht; that's +where it is; an' 'e cum 'ome lite, a bit fresh, through 'avin' bin +at the friendly lead; an' my daughter, yer see, she up an' give it +to 'im. My word, she DID give it to 'im! An' Joe, 'e's a +peaceable man when 'e ain't a bit fresh; 'e's more like a friend to +'er than an 'usband, Joe is; but 'e lost 'is temper that time, as +yer may say, by reason o' bein' fresh, an' 'e knocked 'er abaht a +little, an' knocked 'er teeth aht. So we brought 'er to the +orspital." + +The injured woman raised herself up in bed with a vindictive scowl, +displaying as she did so the same whale-like curved back as in the +other "cases." "But we've sent 'im to the lockup," she continued, +the scowl giving way fast to a radiant joy of victory as she +contemplated her triumph "an' wot's more, I 'ad the last word of +'im. 'An 'e'll git six month for this, the neighbours says; an' +when he comes aht again, my Gord, won't 'e ketch it!" + +"You look capable of punishing him for it," I answered, and as I +spoke, I shuddered; for I saw her expression was precisely the +expression Mrs. Le Geyt's face had worn for a passing second when +her husband accidentally trod on her dress as we left the dining- +room. + +My witch moved away. We followed. "Well, what do you say to it +now?" she asked, gliding among the beds with noiseless feet and +ministering fingers. + +"Say to it?" I answered. "That it is wonderful, wonderful. You +have quite convinced me." + +"You would think so," Travers put in, "if you had been in this ward +as often as I have, and observed their faces. It's a dead +certainty. Sooner or later, that type of woman is cock-sure to be +assaulted." + +"In a certain rank of life, perhaps," I answered, still loth to +believe it; "but not surely in ours. Gentlemen do not knock down +their wives and kick their teeth out." + +My Sibyl smiled. "No; there class tells," she admitted. "They +take longer about it, and suffer more provocation. They curb their +tempers. But in the end, one day, they are goaded beyond +endurance; and then--a convenient knife--a rusty old sword--a pair +of scissors--anything that comes handy, like that dagger this +morning. One wild blow--half unpremeditated--and . . . the thing +is done! Twelve good men and true will find it wilful murder." + +I felt really perturbed. "But can we do nothing," I cried, "to +warn poor Hugo?" + +"Nothing, I fear," she answered. "After all, character must work +itself out in its interactions with character. He has married that +woman, and he must take the consequences. Does not each of us in +life suffer perforce the Nemesis of his own temperament?" + +"Then is there not also a type of men who assault their wives?" + +"That is the odd part of it--no. All kinds, good and bad, quick +and slow, can be driven to it at last. The quick-tempered stab or +kick; the slow devise some deliberate means of ridding themselves +of their burden." + +"But surely we might caution Le Geyt of his danger!" + +"It is useless. He would not believe us. We cannot be at his +elbow to hold back his hand when the bad moment comes. Nobody will +be there, as a matter of fact; for women of this temperament--born +naggers, in short, since that's what it comes to--when they are +also ladies, graceful and gracious as she is; never nag at all +before outsiders. To the world, they are bland; everybody says, +'What charming talkers!' They are 'angels abroad, devils at home,' +as the proverb puts it. Some night she will provoke him when they +are alone, till she has reached his utmost limit of endurance--and +then," she drew one hand across her dove-like throat, "it will be +all finished." + +"You think so?" + +"I am sure of it. We human beings go straight like sheep to our +natural destiny." + +"But--that is fatalism." + +"No, not fatalism: insight into temperament. Fatalists believe +that your life is arranged for you beforehand from without; willy- +nilly, you MUST act so. I only believe that in this jostling world +your life is mostly determined by your own character, in its +interaction with the characters of those who surround you. +Temperament works itself out. It is your own acts and deeds that +make up Fate for you." + + + +For some months after this meeting neither Hilda Wade nor I saw +anything more of the Le Geyts. They left town for Scotland at the +end of the season; and when all the grouse had been duly slaughtered +and all the salmon duly hooked, they went on to Leicestershire for +the opening of fox-hunting; so it was not till after Christmas that +they returned to Campden Hill. Meanwhile, I had spoken to Dr. +Sebastian about Miss Wade, and on my recommendation he had found her +a vacancy at our hospital. "A most intelligent girl, Cumberledge," +he remarked to me with a rare burst of approval--for the Professor +was always critical--after she had been at work for some weeks at +St. Nathaniel's. "I am glad you introduced her here. A nurse with +brains is such a valuable accessory--unless, of course, she takes to +THINKING. But Nurse Wade never THINKS; she is a useful instrument-- +does what she's told, and carries out one's orders implicitly." + +"She knows enough to know when she doesn't know," I answered, +"which is really the rarest kind of knowledge." + +"Unrecorded among young doctors!" the Professor retorted, with his +sardonic smile. "They think they understand the human body from +top to toe, when, in reality--well, they might do the measles!" + +Early in January, I was invited again to lunch with the Le Geyts. +Hilda Wade was invited, too. The moment we entered the house, we +were both of us aware that some grim change had come over it. Le +Geyt met us in the hall, in his old genial style, it is true; but +still with a certain reserve, a curious veiled timidity which we +had not known in him. Big and good-humoured as he was, with kindly +eyes beneath the shaggy eyebrows, he seemed strangely subdued now; +the boyish buoyancy had gone out of him. He spoke rather lower +than was his natural key, and welcomed us warmly, though less +effusively than of old. An irreproachable housemaid, in a spotless +cap, ushered us into the transfigured drawing-room. Mrs. Le Geyt, +in a pretty cloth dress, neatly tailor-made, rose to meet us, +beaming the vapid smile of the perfect hostess--that impartial +smile which falls, like the rain from Heaven, on good and bad +indifferently. "SO charmed to see you again, Dr. Cumberledge!" she +bubbled out, with a cheerful air--she was always cheerful, +mechanically cheerful, from a sense of duty. "It IS such a +pleasure to meet dear Hugo's old friends! AND Miss Wade, too; how +delightful! You look so well, Miss Wade! Oh, you're both at St. +Nathaniel's now, aren't you? So you can come together. What a +privilege for you, Dr. Cumberledge, to have such a clever +assistant--or, rather, fellow-worker. It must be a great life, +yours, Miss Wade; such a sphere of usefulness! If we can only feel +we are DOING GOOD--that is the main matter. For my own part, I +like to be mixed up with every good work that's going on in my +neighbourhood. I'm the soup-kitchen, you know, and I'm visitor at +the workhouse; and I'm the Dorcas Society, and the Mutual +Improvement Class; and the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals and to +Children, and I'm sure I don't know how much else; so that, what +with all that, and what with dear Hugo and the darling children"-- +she glanced affectionately at Maisie and Ettie, who sat bolt +upright, very mute and still, in their best and stiffest frocks, on +two stools in the corner--"I can hardly find time for my social +duties." + +"Oh, dear Mrs. Le Geyt," one of her visitors said with effusion, +from beneath a nodding bonnet--she was the wife of a rural dean +from Staffordshire--"EVERYBODY is agreed that YOUR social duties +are performed to a marvel. They are the envy of Kensington. We +all of us wonder, indeed, how one woman can find time for all of +it!" + +Our hostess looked pleased. "Well, yes," she answered, gazing down +at her fawn-coloured dress with a half-suppressed smile of self- +satisfaction, "I flatter myself I CAN get through about as much +work in a day as anybody!" Her eye wandered round her rooms with a +modest air of placid self-approval which was almost comic. +Everything in them was as well-kept and as well-polished as good +servants, thoroughly drilled, could make it. Not a stain or a +speck anywhere. A miracle of neatness. Indeed, when I carelessly +drew the Norwegian dagger from its scabbard, as we waited for +lunch, and found that it stuck in the sheath, I almost started to +discover that rust could intrude into that orderly household. + +I recollected then how Hilda Wade had pointed out to me during +those six months at St. Nathaniel's that the women whose husbands +assaulted them were almost always "notable housewives," as they say +in America--good souls who prided themselves not a little on their +skill in management. They were capable, practical mothers of +families, with a boundless belief in themselves, a sincere desire +to do their duty, as far as they understood it, and a habit of +impressing their virtues upon others which was quite beyond all +human endurance. Placidity was their note; provoking placidity. I +felt sure it must have been of a woman of this type that the famous +phrase was coined--"Elle a toutes les vertus--et elle est +insupportable." + +"Clara, dear," the husband said, "shall we go in to lunch?" + +"You dear, stupid boy! Are we not all waiting for YOU to give your +arm to Lady Maitland?" + +The lunch was perfect, and it was perfectly served. The silver +glowed; the linen was marked with H. C. Le G. in a most artistic +monogram. I noticed that the table decorations were extremely +pretty. Somebody complimented our hostess upon them. Mrs. Le Geyt +nodded and smiled--"_I_ arranged them. Dear Hugo, in his +blundering way--the big darling--forgot to get me the orchids I had +ordered. So I had to make shift with what few things our own wee +conservatory afforded. Still, with a little taste and a little +ingenuity--" She surveyed her handiwork with just pride, and left +the rest to our imaginations. + +"Only you ought to explain, Clara--" Le Geyt began, in a deprecatory +tone. + +"Now, you darling old bear, we won't harp on that twice-told tale +again," Clara interrupted, with a knowing smile. "Point da +rechauffes! Let us leave one another's misdeeds and one another's +explanations for their proper sphere--the family circle. The +orchids did NOT turn up, that is the point; and I managed to make +shift with the plumbago and the geraniums. Maisie, my sweet, NOT +that pudding, IF you please; too rich for you, darling. I know +your digestive capacities better than you do. I have told you +fifty times it doesn't agree with you. A small slice of the other +one!" + +"Yes, mamma," Maisie answered, with a cowed and cowering air. I +felt sure she would have murmured, "Yes, mamma," in the selfsame +tone if the second Mrs. Le Geyt had ordered her to hang herself. + +"I saw you out in the park, yesterday, on your bicycle, Ettie," Le +Geyt's sister, Mrs. Mallet, put in. "But do you know, dear, I +didn't think your jacket was half warm enough." + +"Mamma doesn't like me to wear a warmer one," the child answered, +with a visible shudder of recollection, "though I should love to, +Aunt Lina." + +"My precious Ettie, what nonsense--for a violent exercise like +bicycling! Where one gets so hot! So unbecomingly hot! You'd be +simply stifled, darling." I caught a darted glance which +accompanied the words and which made Ettie recoil into the recesses +of her pudding. + +"But yesterday was so cold, Clara," Mrs. Mallet went on, actually +venturing to oppose the infallible authority. "A nipping morning. +And such a flimsy coat! Might not the dear child be allowed to +judge for herself in a matter purely of her own feelings?" + +Mrs. Le Geyt, with just the shadow of a shrug, was all sweet +reasonableness. She smiled more suavely than ever. "Surely, +Lina," she remonstrated, in her frankest and most convincing tone, +"_I_ must know best what is good for dear Ettie, when I have been +watching her daily for more than six months past, and taking the +greatest pains to understand both her constitution and her +disposition. She needs hardening, Ettie does. Hardening. Don't +you agree with me, Hugo?" + +Le Geyt shuffled uneasily in his chair. Big man as he was, with +his great black beard and manly bearing, I could see he was afraid +to differ from her overtly. "Well,--m--perhaps, Clara," he began, +peering from under the shaggy eyebrows, "it would be best for a +delicate child like Ettie--" + +Mrs. Le Geyt smiled a compassionate smile. "Ah, I forgot," she +cooed, sweetly. "Dear Hugo never CAN understand the upbringing of +children. It is a sense denied him. We women know"--with a sage +nod. "They were wild little savages when I took them in hand +first--weren't you, Maisie? Do you remember, dear, how you broke +the looking-glass in the boudoir, like an untamed young monkey? +Talking of monkeys, Mr. Cotswould, HAVE you seen those delightful, +clever, amusing French pictures at that place in Suffolk Street? +There's a man there--a Parisian--I forget his honoured name-- +Leblanc, or Lenoir, or Lebrun, or something--but he's a most +humorous artist, and he paints monkeys and storks and all sorts of +queer beasties ALMOST as quaintly and expressively as you do. +Mind, I say ALMOST, for I never will allow that any Frenchman could +do anything QUITE so good, quite so funnily mock-human, as your +marabouts and professors." + +"What a charming hostess Mrs. Le Geyt makes," the painter observed +to me, after lunch. "Such tact! Such discrimination! . . . AND, +what a devoted stepmother!" + +"She is one of the local secretaries of the Society for the +Prevention of Cruelty to Children," I said, drily. + +"And charity begins at home," Hilda Wade added, in a significant +aside. + +We walked home together as far as Stanhope Gate. Our sense of doom +oppressed us. "And yet," I said, turning to her, as we left the +doorstep, "I don't doubt Mrs. Le Geyt really believes she IS a +model stepmother!" + +"Of course she believes it," my witch answered. "She has no more +doubt about that than about anything else. Doubts are not in her +line. She does everything exactly as it ought to be done--who +should know, if not she?--and therefore she is never afraid of +criticism. Hardening, indeed! that poor slender, tender, shrinking +little Ettie! A frail exotic. She would harden her into a +skeleton if she had her way. Nothing's much harder than a +skeleton, I suppose, except Mrs. Le Geyt's manner of training one." + +"I should be sorry to think," I broke in, "that that sweet little +floating thistle-down of a child I once knew was to be done to +death by her." + +"Oh, as for that, she will NOT be done to death," Hilda answered, +in her confident way. "Mrs. Le Geyt won't live long enough." + +I started. "You think not?" + +"I don't think, I am sure of it. We are at the fifth act now. I +watched Mr. Le Geyt closely all through lunch, and I'm more +confident than ever that the end is coming. He is temporarily +crushed; but he is like steam in a boiler, seething, seething, +seething. One day she will sit on the safety-valve, and the +explosion will come. When it comes"--she raised aloft one quick +hand in the air as if striking a dagger home--"good-bye to her!" + +For the next few months I saw much of Le Geyt; and the more I saw +of him, the more I saw that my witch's prognosis was essentially +correct. They never quarrelled; but Mrs. Le Geyt, in her +unobtrusive way, held a quiet hand over her husband which became +increasingly apparent. In the midst of her fancy-work (those busy +fingers were never idle) she kept her eyes well fixed on him. Now +and again I saw him glance at his motherless girls with what looked +like a tender, protecting regret; especially when "Clara" had been +most openly drilling them; but he dared not interfere. She was +crushing their spirit, as she was crushing their father's--and all, +bear in mind, for the best of motives! She had their interest at +heart; she wanted to do what was right for them. Her manner to him +and to them was always honey-sweet--in all externals; yet one could +somehow feel it was the velvet glove that masked the iron hand; not +cruel, not harsh even, but severely, irresistibly, unflinchingly +crushing. "Ettie, my dear, get your brown hat at once. What's +that? Going to rain? I did not ask you, my child, for YOUR +opinion on the weather. My own suffices. A headache? Oh, +nonsense! Headaches are caused by want of exercise. Nothing so +good for a touch of headache as a nice brisk walk in Kensington +Gardens. Maisie, don't hold your sister's hand like that; it is +imitation sympathy! You are aiding and abetting her in setting my +wishes at naught. Now, no long faces! What _I_ require is +CHEERFUL obedience." + +A bland, autocratic martinet: smiling, inexorable! Poor, pale +Ettie grew thinner and wanner under her law daily, while Maisie's +temper, naturally docile, was being spoiled before one's eyes by +persistent, needless thwarting. + +As spring came on, however, I began to hope that things were really +mending. Le Geyt looked brighter; some of his own careless, happy- +go-lucky self came back again at intervals. He told me once, with +a wistful sigh, that he thought of sending the children to school +in the country--it would be better for them, he said, and would +take a little work off dear Clara's shoulders; for never even to me +was he disloyal to Clara. I encouraged him in the idea. He went +on to say that the great difficulty in the way was . . . Clara. +She was SO conscientious; she thought it her duty to look after the +children herself, and couldn't bear to delegate any part of that +duty to others. Besides, she had such an excellent opinion of the +Kensington High School! + +When I told Hilda Wade of this, she set her teeth together and +answered at once: "That settles it! The end is very near. HE +will insist upon their going, to save them from that woman's +ruthless kindness; and SHE will refuse to give up any part of what +she calls her duty. HE will reason with her; he will plead for his +children; SHE will be adamant. Not angry--it is never the way of +that temperament to get angry--just calmly, sedately, and +insupportably provoking. When she goes too far, he will flare up +at last; some taunt will rouse him; the explosion will come; +and . . . the children will go to their Aunt Lina, whom they dote +upon. When all is said and done, it is the poor man I pity!" + +"You said within twelve months." + +"That was a bow drawn at a venture. It may be a little sooner; it +may be a little later. But--next week or next month--it is coming: +it is coming!" + + + +June smiled upon us once more; and on the afternoon of the 13th, +the anniversary of our first lunch together at the Le Geyts, I was +up at my work in the accident ward at St. Nathaniel's. "Well, the +ides of June have come, Sister Wade!" I said, when I met her, +parodying Caesar. + +"But not yet gone," she answered; and a profound sense of +foreboding spread over her speaking face as she uttered the words. + +Her oracle disquieted me. "Why, I dined there last night," I +cried; "and all seemed exceptionally well." + +"The calm before the storm, perhaps," she murmured. + +Just at that moment I heard a boy crying in the street: "Pall mall +Gazette; 'ere y'are; speshul edishun! Shocking tragedy at the +West-end! Orful murder! 'Ere y'are! Spechul Globe! Pall Mall, +extry speshul!" + +A weird tremor broke over me. I walked down into the street and +bought a paper. There it stared me in the face on the middle page: +"Tragedy at Campden Hill: Well-known Barrister Murders his Wife. +Sensational Details." + +I looked closer and read. It was as I feared. The Le Geyts! +After I left their house, the night before, husband and wife must +have quarrelled, no doubt over the question of the children's +schooling; and at some provoking word, as it seemed, Hugo must have +snatched up a knife--"a little ornamental Norwegian dagger," the +report said, "which happened to lie close by on the cabinet in the +drawing-room," and plunged it into his wife's heart. "The unhappy +lady died instantaneously, by all appearances, and the dastardly +crime was not discovered by the servants till eight o'clock this +morning. Mr. Le Geyt is missing." + +I rushed up with the news to Nurse Wade, who was at work in the +accident ward. She turned pale, but bent over her patient and said +nothing. + +"It is fearful to think!" I groaned out at last; "for us who know +all--that poor Le Geyt will be hanged for it! Hanged for +attempting to protect his children!" + +"He will NOT be hanged," my witch answered, with the same +unquestioning confidence as ever. + +"Why not?" I asked, astonished once more at this bold prediction. + +She went on bandaging the arm of the patient whom she was attending. +"Because . . . he will commit suicide," she replied, without moving +a muscle. + +"How do you know that?" + +She stuck a steel safety-pin with deft fingers into the roll of +lint. "When I have finished my day's work," she answered slowly, +still continuing the bandage, "I may perhaps find time to tell +you." + + + +CHAPTER IV + +THE EPISODE OF THE MAN WHO WOULD NOT COMMIT SUICIDE + + +After my poor friend Le Geyt had murdered his wife, in a sudden +access of uncontrollable anger, under the deepest provocation, the +police naturally began to inquire for him. It is a way they have; +the police are no respecters of persons; neither do they pry into +the question of motives. They are but poor casuists. A murder is +for them a murder, and a murderer a murderer; it is not their habit +to divide and distinguish between case and case with Hilda Wade's +analytical accuracy. + +As soon as my duties at St. Nathaniel's permitted me, on the +evening of the discovery, I rushed round to Mrs. Mallet's, Le +Geyt's sister. I had been detained at the hospital for some hours, +however, watching a critical case; and by the time I reached Great +Stanhope Street I found Hilda Wade, in her nurse's dress, there +before me. Sebastian, it seemed, had given her leave out for the +evening. She was a supernumerary nurse, attached to his own +observation-cots as special attendant for scientific purposes, and +she could generally get an hour or so whenever she required it. + +Mrs. Mallet had been in the breakfast-room with Hilda before I +arrived; but as I reached the house she rushed upstairs to wash her +red eyes and compose herself a little before the strain of meeting +me; so I had the opportunity for a few words alone first with my +prophetic companion. + +"You said just now at Nathaniel's," I burst out, "that Le Geyt +would not be hanged: he would commit suicide. What did you mean by +that? What reason had you for thinking so?" + +Hilda sank into a chair by the open window, pulled a flower +abstractedly from the vase at her side, and began picking it to +pieces, floret after floret, with twitching fingers. She was +deeply moved. "Well, consider his family history," she burst out +at last, looking up at me with her large brown eyes as she reached +the last petal. "Heredity counts. . . . And after such a +disaster!" + +She said "disaster," not "crime"; I noted mentally the reservation +implied in the word. + +"Heredity counts," I answered. "Oh, yes. It counts much. But +what about Le Geyt's family history?" I could not recall any +instance of suicide among his forbears. + +"Well--his mother's father was General Faskally, you know," she +replied, after a pause, in her strange, oblique manner. "Mr. Le +Geyt is General Faskally's eldest grandson." + +"Exactly," I broke in, with a man's desire for solid fact in place +of vague intuition. "But I fail to see quite what that has to do +with it." + +"The General was killed in India during the Mutiny." + +"I remember, of course--killed, bravely fighting." + +"Yes; but it was on a forlorn hope, for which he volunteered, and +in the course of which he is said to have walked straight into an +almost obvious ambuscade of the enemy's." + +"Now, my dear Miss Wade"--I always dropped the title of "Nurse," by +request, when once we were well clear of Nathaniel's,--"I have +every confidence, you are aware, in your memory and your insight; +but I do confess I fail to see what bearing this incident can have +on poor Hugo's chances of being hanged or committing suicide." + +She picked a second flower, and once more pulled out petal after +petal. As she reached the last again, she answered, slowly: "You +must have forgotten the circumstances. It was no mere accident. +General Faskally had made a serious strategical blunder at Jhansi. +He had sacrificed the lives of his subordinates needlessly. He +could not bear to face the survivors. In the course of the +retreat, he volunteered to go on this forlorn hope, which might +equally well have been led by an officer of lower rank; and he was +permitted to do so by Sir Colin in command, as a means of +retrieving his lost military character. He carried his point, but +he carried it recklessly, taking care to be shot through the heart +himself in the first onslaught. That was virtual suicide-- +honourable suicide to avoid disgrace, at a moment of supreme +remorse and horror." + +"You are right," I admitted, after a minute's consideration. "I +see it now--though I should never have thought of it." + +"That is the use of being a woman," she answered. + +I waited a second once more, and mused. "Still, that is only one +doubtful case," I objected. + +"There was another, you must remember: his uncle Alfred." + +"Alfred Le Geyt?" + +"No; HE died in his bed, quietly. Alfred Faskally." + +"What a memory you have!" I cried, astonished. "Why, that was +before our time--in the days of the Chartist riots!" + +She smiled a certain curious sibylline smile of hers. Her earnest +face looked prettier than ever. "I told you I could remember many +things that happened before I was born," she answered. "THIS is +one of them." + +"You remember it directly?" + +"How impossible! Have I not often explained to you that I am no +diviner? I read no book of fate; I call no spirits from the vasty +deep. I simply remember with exceptional clearness what I read and +hear. And I have many times heard the story about Alfred +Faskally." + +"So have I--but I forget it." + +"Unfortunately, I CAN'T forget. That is a sort of disease with +me. . . . He was a special constable in the Chartist riots; and +being a very strong and powerful man, like his nephew Hugo, he used +his truncheon--his special constable's baton, or whatever you call +it--with excessive force upon a starveling London tailor in the mob +near Charing Cross. The man was hit on the forehead--badly hit, so +that he died almost immediately of concussion of the brain. A woman +rushed out of the crowd at once, seized the dying man, laid his head +on her lap, and shrieked out in a wildly despairing voice that he +was her husband, and the father of thirteen children. Alfred +Faskally, who never meant to kill the man, or even to hurt him, but +who was laying about him roundly, without realising the terrific +force of his blows, was so horrified at what he had done when he +heard the woman's cry, that he rushed off straight to Waterloo +Bridge in an agony of remorse and--flung himself over. He was +drowned instantly." + +"I recall the story now," I answered; "but, do you know, as it was +told me, I think they said the mob THREW Faskally over in their +desire for vengeance." + +"That is the official account, as told by the Le Geyts and the +Faskallys; they like to have it believed their kinsman was +murdered, not that he committed suicide. But my grandfather"--I +started; during the twelve months that I had been brought into +daily relations with Hilda Wade, that was the first time I had +heard her mention any member of her own family, except once her +mother--"my grandfather, who knew him well, and who was present in +the crowd at the time, assured me many times that Alfred Faskally +really jumped over of his own accord, NOT pursued by the mob, and +that his last horrified words as he leaped were, 'I never meant it! +I never meant it!' However, the family have always had luck in +their suicides. The jury believed the throwing-over story, and +found a verdict of 'wilful murder' against some person or persons +unknown." + +"Luck in their suicides! What a curious phrase! And you say, +ALWAYS. Were there other cases, then?" + +"Constructively, yes; one of the Le Geyts, you must recollect, went +down with his ship (just like his uncle, the General, in India) +when he might have quitted her. It is believed he had given a +mistaken order. You remember, of course; he was navigating +lieutenant. Another, Marcus, was SAID to have shot himself by +accident while cleaning his gun--after a quarrel with his wife. +But you have heard all about it. 'The wrong was on my side,' he +moaned, you know, when they picked him up, dying, in the gun-room. +And one of the Faskally girls, his cousin, of whom his wife was +jealous--that beautiful Linda--became a Catholic, and went into a +convent at once on Marcus's death; which, after all, in such cases, +is merely a religious and moral way of committing suicide--I mean, +for a woman who takes the veil just to cut herself off from the +world, and who has no vocation, as I hear she had not." + +She filled me with amazement. "That is true," I exclaimed, "when +one comes to think of it. It shows the same temperament in +fibre. . . . But I should never have thought of it." + +"No? Well, I believe it is true, for all that. In every case, one +sees they choose much the same way of meeting a reverse, a blunder, +an unpremeditated crime. The brave way is to go through with it, +and face the music, letting what will come; the cowardly way is to +hide one's head incontinently in a river, a noose, or a convent +cell." + +"Le Geyt is not a coward," I interposed, with warmth. + +"No, not, a coward--a manly spirited, great-hearted gentleman--but +still, not quite of the bravest type. He lacks one element. The +Le Geyts have physical courage--enough and to spare--but their +moral courage fails them at a pinch. They rush into suicide or its +equivalent at critical moments, out of pure boyish impulsiveness." + +A few minutes later, Mrs. Mallet came in. She was not broken down-- +on the contrary, she was calm--stoically, tragically, pitiably +calm; with that ghastly calmness which is more terrible by far than +the most demonstrative grief. Her face, though deadly white, did +not move a muscle. Not a tear was in her eyes. Even her bloodless +hands hardly twitched at the folds of her hastily assumed black +gown. She clenched them after a minute when she had grasped mine +silently; I could see that the nails dug deep into the palms in her +painful resolve to keep herself from collapsing. + +Hilda Wade, with infinite sisterly tenderness, led her over to a +chair by the window in the summer twilight, and took one quivering +hand in hers. "I have been telling Dr. Cumberledge, Lina, about +what I most fear for your dear brother, darling; and . . . I think +. . . he agrees with me." + +Mrs. Mallet turned to me, with hollow eyes, still preserving her +tragic calm. "I am afraid of it, too," she said, her drawn lips +tremulous. "Dr. Cumberledge, we must get him back! We must induce +him to face it!" + +"And yet," I answered, slowly, turning it over in my own mind; "he +has run away at first. Why should he do that if he means--to +commit suicide?" I hated to utter the words before that broken +soul; but there was no way out of it. + +Hilda interrupted me with a quiet suggestion. "How do you know he +has run away?" she asked. "Are you not taking it for granted that, +if he meant suicide, he would blow his brains out in his own house? +But surely that would not be the Le Geyt way. They are gentle- +natured folk; they would never blow their brains out or cut their +throats. For all we know, he may have made straight for Waterloo +Bridge,"--she framed her lips to the unspoken words, unseen by Mrs. +Mallet,--"like his uncle Alfred." + +"That is true," I answered, lip-reading. "I never thought of that +either." + +"Still, I do not attach importance to this idea," she went on. "I +have some reason for thinking he has run away . . . elsewhere; and +if so, our first task must be to entice him back again." + +"What are your reasons?" I asked, humbly. Whatever they might be, +I knew enough of Hilda Wade by this time to know that she had +probably good grounds for accepting them. + +"Oh, they may wait for the present," she answered. "Other things +are more pressing. First, let Lina tell us what she thinks of most +moment." + +Mrs. Mallet braced herself up visibly to a distressing effort. +"You have seen the body, Dr. Cumberledge?" she faltered. + +"No, dear Mrs. Mallet, I have not. I came straight from Nathaniel's. +I have had no time to see it." + +"Dr. Sebastian has viewed it by my wish--he has been so kind--and +he will be present as representing the family at the post-mortem. +He notes that the wound was inflicted with a dagger--a small +ornamental Norwegian dagger, which always lay, as I know, on the +little what-not by the blue sofa." + +I nodded assent. "Exactly; I have seen it there." + +"It was blunt and rusty--a mere toy knife--not at all the sort of +weapon a man would make use of who designed to commit a deliberate +murder. The crime, if there WAS a crime (which we do not admit), +must therefore have been wholly unpremeditated." + +I bowed my head. "For us who knew Hugo that goes without saying." + +She leaned forward eagerly. "Dr. Sebastian has pointed out to me a +line of defence which would probably succeed--if we could only +induce poor Hugo to adopt it. He has examined the blade and +scabbard, and finds that the dagger fits its sheath very tight, so +that it can only be withdrawn with considerable violence. The +blade sticks." (I nodded again.) "It needs a hard pull to wrench +it out. . . . He has also inspected the wound, and assures me its +character is such that it MIGHT have been self-inflicted." She +paused now and again, and brought out her words with difficulty. +"Self-inflicted, he suggests; therefore, that THIS may have +happened. It is admitted--WILL be admitted--the servants overheard +it--we can make no reservation there--a difference of opinion, an +altercation, even, took place between Hugo and Clara that evening"-- +she started suddenly--"why, it was only last night--it seems like +ages--an altercation about the children's schooling. Clara held +strong views on the subject of the children"--her eyes blinked +hard--"which Hugo did not share. We throw out the hint, then, that +Clara, during the course of the dispute--we must call it a dispute-- +accidentally took up this dagger and toyed with it. You know her +habit of toying, when she had no knitting or needlework. In the +course of playing with it (we suggest) she tried to pull the knife +out of its sheath; failed; held it up, so, point upward; pulled +again; pulled harder--with a jerk, at last the sheath came off; the +dagger sprang up; it wounded Clara fatally. Hugo, knowing that +they had disagreed, knowing that the servants had heard, and seeing +her fall suddenly dead before him, was seized with horror--the Le +Geyt impulsiveness!--lost his head; rushed out; fancied the +accident would be mistaken for murder. But why? A Q.C., don't +you know! Recently married! Most attached to his wife. It is +plausible, isn't it?" + +"So plausible," I answered, looking it straight in the face, +"that . . . it has but one weak point. We might make a coroner's +jury or even a common jury accept it, on Sebastian's expert +evidence. Sebastian can work wonders; but we could never make--" + +Hilda Wade finished the sentence for me as I paused: "Hugo Le Geyt +consent to advance it." + +I lowered my head. "You have said it," I answered. + +"Not for the children's sake?" Mrs. Mallet cried, with clasped +hands. + +"Not for the children's sake, even," I answered. "Consider for a +moment, Mrs. Mallet: IS it true? Do you yourself BELIEVE it?" + +She threw herself back in her chair with a dejected face. "Oh, as +for that," she cried, wearily, crossing her hands, "before you and +Hilda, who know all, what need to prevaricate? How CAN I believe +it? We understand how it came about. That woman! That woman!" + +"The real wonder is," Hilda murmured, soothing her white hand, +"that he contained himself so long!" + +"Well, we all know Hugo," I went on, as quietly as I was able; +"and, knowing Hugo, we know that he might be urged to commit this +wild act in a fierce moment of indignation--righteous indignation +on behalf of his motherless girls, under tremendous provocation. +But we also know that, having once committed it, he would never +stoop to disown it by a subterfuge." + +The heart-broken sister let her head drop faintly. "So Hilda told +me," she murmured; "and what Hilda says in these matters is almost +always final." + +We debated the question for some minutes more. Then Mrs. Mallet +cried at last: "At any rate, he has fled for the moment, and his +flight alone brings the worst suspicion upon him. That is our +chief point. We must find out where he is; and if he has gone +right away, we must bring him back to London." + +"Where do you think he has taken refuge?" + +"The police, Dr. Sebastian has ascertained, are watching the +railway stations, and the ports for the Continent." + +"Very like the police!" Hilda exclaimed, with more than a touch of +contempt in her voice. "As if a clever man-of-the-world like Hugo +Le Geyt would run away by rail, or start off to the Continent! +Every Englishman is noticeable on the Continent. It would be sheer +madness!" + +"You think he has not gone there, then?" I cried, deeply +interested. + +"Of course not. That is the point I hinted at just now. He has +defended many persons accused of murder, and he often spoke to me +of their incredible folly, when trying to escape, in going by rail, +or in setting out from England for Paris. An Englishman, he used +to say, is least observed in his own country. In this case, I +think I KNOW where he has gone, how he went there." + +"Where, then?" + +"WHERE comes last; HOW first. It is a question of inference." + +"Explain. We know your powers." + +"Well, I take it for granted that he killed her--we must not mince +matters--about twelve o'clock; for after that hour, the servants +told Lina, there was quiet in the drawing-room. Next, I conjecture, +he went upstairs to change his clothes: he could not go forth on the +world in an evening suit; and the housemaid says his black coat and +trousers were lying as usual on a chair in his dressing-room--which +shows at least that he was not unduly flurried. After that, he put +on another suit, no doubt--WHAT suit I hope the police will not +discover too soon; for I suppose you must just accept the situation +that we are conspiring to defeat the ends of justice." + +"No, no!" Mrs. Mallet cried. "To bring him back voluntarily, that +he may face his trial like a man!" + +"Yes, dear. That is quite right. However, the next thing, of +course, would be that he would shave in whole or in part. His big +black beard was so very conspicuous; he would certainly get rid of +that before attempting to escape. The servants being in bed, he +was not pressed for time; he had the whole night before him. So, +of course, he shaved. On the other hand, the police, you may be +sure, will circulate his photograph--we must not shirk these +points"--for Mrs. Mallet winced again--"will circulate his +photograph, BEARD AND ALL; and that will really be one of our great +safeguards; for the bushy beard so masks the face that, without it, +Hugo would be scarcely recognisable. I conclude, therefore, that +he must have shorn himself BEFORE leaving home; though naturally I +did not make the police a present of the hint by getting Lina to +ask any questions in that direction of the housemaid." + +"You are probably right," I answered. "But would he have a razor?" + +"I was coming to that. No; certainly he would not. He had not +shaved for years. And they kept no men-servants; which makes it +difficult for him to borrow one from a sleeping man. So what he +would do would doubtless be to cut off his beard, or part of it, +quite close, with a pair of scissors, and then get himself properly +shaved next morning in the first country town he came to." + +"The first country town?" + +"Certainly. That leads up to the next point. We must try to be +cool and collected." She was quivering with suppressed emotion +herself, as she said it, but her soothing hand still lay on Mrs. +Mallet's. "The next thing is--he would leave London." + +"But not by rail, you say?" + +"He is an intelligent man, and in the course of defending others +has thought about this matter. Why expose himself to the needless +risk and observation of a railway station? No; I saw at once what +he would do. Beyond doubt, he would cycle. He always wondered it +was not done oftener, under similar circumstances." + +"But has his bicycle gone?" + +"Lina looked. It has not. I should have expected as much. I told +her to note that point very unobtrusively, so as to avoid giving +the police the clue. She saw the machine in the outer hall as +usual." + +"He is too good a criminal lawyer to have dreamt of taking his +own," Mrs. Mallet interposed, with another effort. + +"But where could he have hired or bought one at that time of +night?" I exclaimed. + +"Nowhere--without exciting the gravest suspicion. Therefore, I +conclude, he stopped in London for the night, sleeping at an hotel, +without luggage, and paying for his room in advance. It is +frequently done, and if he arrived late, very little notice would +be taken of him. Big hotels about the Strand, I am told, have +always a dozen such casual bachelor guests every evening." + +"And then?" + +"And then, this morning, he would buy a new bicycle--a different +make from his own, at the nearest shop; would rig himself out, at +some ready-made tailor's, with a fresh tourist suit--probably an +ostentatiously tweedy bicycling suit; and, with that in his +luggage-carrier, would make straight on his machine for the +country. He could change in some copse, and bury his own clothes, +avoiding the blunders he has seen in others. Perhaps he might ride +for the first twenty or thirty miles out of London to some minor +side-station, and then go on by train towards his destination, +quitting the rail again at some unimportant point where the main +west road crosses the Great Western or the South-Western line." + +"Great Western or South-Western? Why those two in particular? +Then, you have settled in your own mind which direction he has +taken?" + +"Pretty well. I judge by analogy. Lina, your brother was brought +up in the West Country, was he not?" + +Mrs. Mallet gave a weary nod. "In North Devon," she answered; "on +the wild stretch of moor about Hartland and Clovelly." + +Hilda Wade seemed to collect herself. "Now, Mr. Le Geyt is +essentially a Celt--a Celt in temperament," she went on; "he comes +by origin and ancestry from a rough, heather-clad country; he +belongs to the moorland. In other words, his type is the +mountaineer's. But a mountaineer's instinct in similar +circumstances is--what? Why, to fly straight to his native +mountains. In an agony of terror, in an access of despair, when +all else fails, he strikes a bee-line for the hills he loves; +rationally or irrationally, he seems to think he can hide there. +Hugo Le Geyt, with his frank boyish nature, his great Devonian +frame, is sure to have done so. I know his mood. He has made for +the West Country!" + +"You are, right, Hilda," Mrs. Mallet exclaimed, with conviction. +"I'm quite sure, from what I know of Hugo, that to go to the West +would be his first impulse." + +"And the Le Geyts are always governed by first impulses," my +character-reader added. + +She was quite correct. From the time we two were at Oxford +together--I as an undergraduate, he as a don--I had always noticed +that marked trait in my dear old friend's temperament. + +After a short pause, Hilda broke the silence again. "The sea +again; the sea! The Le Geyts love the water. Was there any place +on the sea where he went much as a boy--any lonely place, I mean, +in that North Devon district?" + +Mrs. Mallet reflected a moment. "Yes, there was a little bay--a +mere gap in high cliffs, with some fishermen's huts and a few yards +of beach--where he used to spend much of his holidays. It was a +weird-looking break in a grim sea-wall of dark-red rocks, where the +tide rose high, rolling in from the Atlantic." + +"The very thing! Has he visited it since he grew up?" + +"To my knowledge, never." + +Hilda's voice had a ring of certainty. "Then THAT is where we +shall find him, dear! We must look there first. He is sure to +revisit just such a solitary spot by the sea when trouble overtakes +him." + +Later in the evening, as we were walking home towards Nathaniel's +together, I asked Hilda why she had spoken throughout with such +unwavering confidence. "Oh, it was simple enough," she answered. +"There were two things that helped me through, which I didn't like +to mention in detail before Lina. One was this: the Le Geyts have +all of them an instinctive horror of the sight of blood; therefore, +they almost never commit suicide by shooting themselves or cutting +their throats. Marcus, who shot himself in the gun-room, was an +exception to both rules; he never minded blood; he could cut up a +deer. But Hugo refused to be a doctor, because he could not stand +the sight of an operation; and even as a sportsman he never liked +to pick up or handle the game he had shot himself; he said it +sickened him. He rushed from that room last night, I feel sure, in +a physical horror at the deed he had done; and by now he is as far +as he can get from London. The sight of his act drove him away; +not craven fear of an arrest. If the Le Geyts kill themselves--a +seafaring race on the whole--their impulse is to trust to water." + +"And the other thing?" + +"Well, that was about the mountaineer's homing instinct. I have +often noticed it. I could give you fifty instances, only I didn't +like to speak of them before Lina. There was Williams, for +example, the Dolgelly man who killed a game-keeper at Petworth in a +poaching affray; he was taken on Cader Idris, skulking among rocks, +a week later. Then there was that unhappy young fellow, Mackinnon, +who shot his sweetheart at Leicester; he made, straight as the crow +flies, for his home in the Isle of Skye, and there drowned himself +in familiar waters. Lindner, the Tyrolese, again, who stabbed the +American swindler at Monte Carlo, was tracked after a few days to +his native place, St. Valentin, in the Zillerthal. It is always +so. Mountaineers in distress fly to their mountains. It is a part +of their nostalgia. I know it from within, too: if _I_ were in +poor Hugo LeGeyt's place, what do you think I would do? Why, hide +myself at once in the greenest recesses of our Carnarvonshire +mountains." + +"What an extraordinary insight into character you have!" I cried. +"You seem to divine what everybody's action will be under given +circumstances." + +She paused, and held her parasol half poised in her hand. +"Character determines action," she said, slowly, at last. "That is +the secret of the great novelists. They put themselves behind and +within their characters, and so make us feel that every act of +their personages is not only natural but even--given the conditions-- +inevitable. We recognise that their story is the sole logical +outcome of the interaction of their dramatis personae. Now, _I_ am +not a great novelist; I cannot create and imagine characters and +situations. But I have something of the novelist's gift; I apply +the same method to the real life of the people around me. I try to +throw myself into the person of others, and to feel how their +character will compel them to act in each set of circumstances to +which they may expose themselves." + +"In one word," I said, "you are a psychologist." + +"A psychologist," she assented; "I suppose so; and the police-- +well, the police are not; they are at best but bungling materialists. +They require a CLUE. What need of a CLUE if you can interpret +character?" + +So certain was Hilda Wade of her conclusions, indeed, that Mrs. +Mallet begged me next day to take my holiday at once--which I could +easily do--and go down to the little bay in the Hartland district +of which she had spoken, in search of Hugo. I consented. She +herself proposed to set out quietly for Bideford, where she could +be within easy reach of me, in order to hear of my success or +failure; while Hilda Wade, whose summer vacation was to have begun +in two days' time, offered to ask for an extra day's leave so as to +accompany her. The broken-hearted sister accepted the offer; and, +secrecy being above all things necessary, we set off by different +routes: the two women by Waterloo, myself by Paddington. + +We stopped that night at different hotels in Bideford; but next +morning, Hilda rode out on her bicycle, and accompanied me on mine +for a mile or two along the tortuous way towards Hartland. "Take +nothing for granted," she said, as we parted; "and be prepared to +find poor Hugo Le Geyt's appearance greatly changed. He has eluded +the police and their 'clues' so far; therefore, I imagine he must +have largely altered his dress and exterior." + +"I will find him," I answered, "if he is anywhere within twenty +miles of Hartland." + +She waved her hand to me in farewell. I rode on after she left me +towards the high promontory in front, the wildest and least-visited +part of North Devon. Torrents of rain had fallen during the night; +the slimy cart-ruts and cattle-tracks on the moor were brimming +with water. It was a lowering day. The clouds drifted low. Black +peat-bogs filled the hollows; grey stone homesteads, lonely and +forbidding, stood out here and there against the curved sky-line. +Even the high road was uneven and in places flooded. For an hour I +passed hardly a soul. At last, near a crossroad with a defaced +finger-post, I descended from my machine, and consulted my ordnance +map, on which Mrs. Mallet had marked ominously, with a cross of red +rink, the exact position of the little fishing hamlet where Hugo +used to spend his holidays. I took the turning which seemed to me +most likely to lead to it; but the tracks were so confused, and the +run of the lanes so uncertain--let alone the map being some years +out of date--that I soon felt I had lost my bearings. By a little +wayside inn, half hidden in a deep combe, with bog on every side, I +descended and asked for a bottle of ginger-beer; for the day was +hot and close, in spite of the packed clouds. As they were opening +the bottle, I inquired casually the way to the Red Gap bathing- +place. + +The landlord gave me directions which confused me worse than ever, +ending at last with the concise remark: "An' then, zur, two or +dree more turns to the right an' to the left 'ull bring 'ee right +up alongzide o' ut." + +I despaired of finding the way by these unintelligible sailing- +orders; but just at that moment, as luck would have it, another +cyclist flew past--the first soul I had seen on the road that +morning. He was a man with the loose-knit air of a shop assistant, +badly got up in a rather loud and obtrusive tourist suit of brown +homespun, with baggy knickerbockers and thin thread stockings. I +judged him a gentleman on the cheap at sight. "Very Stylish; this +Suit Complete, only thirty-seven and sixpence!" The landlady +glanced out at him with a friendly nod. He turned and smiled at +her, but did not see me; for I stood in the shade behind the half- +open door. He had a short black moustache and a not unpleasing, +careless face. His features, I thought, were better than his +garments. + +However, the stranger did not interest me just then I was far too +full of more important matters. "Why don't 'ee taake an' vollow +thik ther gen'leman, zur?" the landlady said, pointing one large +red hand after him. "Ur do go down to Urd Gap to zwim every +marnin'. Mr. Jan Smith, o' Oxford, they do call un. 'Ee can't go +wrong if 'ee do vollow un to the Gap. Ur's lodgin' up to wold +Varmer Moore's, an' ur's that vond o' the zay, the vishermen do +tell me, as wasn't never any gen'leman like un." + +I tossed off my ginger-beer, jumped on to my machine, and followed +the retreating brown back of Mr. John Smith, of Oxford--surely a +most non-committing name--round sharp corners and over rutty lanes, +tire-deep in mud, across the rusty-red moor, till, all at once, at +a turn, a gap of stormy sea appeared wedge-shape between two +shelving rock-walls. + +It was a lonely spot. Rocks hemmed it in; big breakers walled it. +The sou'-wester roared through the gap. I rode down among loose +stones and water-worn channels in the solid grit very carefully. +But the man in brown had torn over the wild path with reckless +haste, zigzagging madly, and was now on the little three-cornered +patch of beach, undressing himself with a sort of careless glee, +and flinging his clothes down anyhow on the shingle beside him. +Something about the, action caught my eye. That movement of the +arm! It was not--it could not be--no, no, not Hugo! + +A very ordinary person; and Le Geyt bore the stamp of a born +gentleman. + +He stood up bare at last. He flung out his arms, as if to welcome +the boisterous wind to his naked bosom. Then, with a sudden burst +of recognition, the man stood revealed. We had bathed together a +hundred times in London and elsewhere. The face, the clad figure, +the dress, all were different. But the body--the actual frame and +make of the man--the well-knit limbs, the splendid trunk--no +disguise could alter. It was Le Geyt himself--big, powerful, +vigorous. + +That ill-made suit, those baggy knickerbockers, the slouched cap, +the thin thread stockings, had only distorted and hidden his +figure. Now that I saw him as he was, he came out the same bold +and manly form as ever. + +He did not notice me. He rushed down with a certain wild joy into +the turbulent water, and, plunging in with a loud cry, buffeted the +huge waves with those strong curving arms of his. The sou'-wester +was rising. Each breaker as it reared caught him on its crest and +tumbled him over like a cork, but like a cork he rose again. He +was swimming now, arm over arm, straight out seaward. I saw the +lifted hands between the crest and the trough. For a moment I +hesitated whether I ought to strip and follow him. Was he doing as +so many others of his house had done--courting death from the +water? + +But some strange hand restrained me. Who was I that I should stand +between Hugo Le Geyt and the ways of Providence? + +The Le Geyts loved ever the ordeal by water. + +Presently, he turned again. Before he turned, I had taken the +opportunity to look hastily at his clothes. Hilda Wade had +surmised aright once more. The outer suit was a cheap affair from +a big ready-made tailor's in St. Martin's Lane--turned out by the +thousand; the underclothing, on the other hand, was new and +unmarked, but fine in quality--bought, no doubt, at Bideford. An +eerie sense of doom stole over me. I felt the end was near. I +withdrew behind a big rock, and waited there unseen till Hugo had +landed. He began to dress again, without troubling to dry himself. +I drew a deep breath of relief. Then this was not suicide! + +By the time he had pulled on his vest and drawers, I came out +suddenly from my ambush and faced him. A fresh shock awaited me. +I could hardly believe my eyes. It was NOT Le Geyt--no, nor +anything like him! + +Nevertheless, the man rose with a little cry and advanced, half +crouching, towards me. "YOU are not hunting me down--with the +police?" he exclaimed, his neck held low and his forehead +wrinkling. + +The voice--the voice was Le Geyt's. It was an unspeakable mystery. +"Hugo," I cried, "dear Hugo--hunting you down?--COULD you imagine +it?" + +He raised his head, strode forward, and grasped my hand. "Forgive +me, Cumberledge," he cried. "But a proscribed and hounded man! If +you knew what a relief it is to me to get out on the water!" + +"You forget all there?" + +"I forget IT--the red horror!" + +"You meant just now to drown yourself?" + +"No! If I had meant it I would have done it. . . . Hubert, for my +children's sake, I WILL not commit suicide!" + +"Then listen!" I cried. I told him in a few words of his sister's +scheme--Sebastian's defence--the plausibility of the explanation-- +the whole long story. He gazed at me moodily. Yet it was not +Hugo! + +"No, no," he said, shortly; and as he spoke it was HE. "I have +done it; I have killed her; I will not owe my life to a falsehood." + +"Not for the children's sake?" + +He dashed his hand down impatiently. "I have a better way for the +children. I will save them still. . . . Hubert, you are not +afraid to speak to a murderer?" + +"Dear Hugo--I know all; and to know all is to forgive all." + +He grasped my hand once more. "Know ALL!" he cried, with a +despairing gesture. "Oh, no; no one knows ALL but myself; not even +the children. But the children know much; THEY will forgive me. +Lina knows something; SHE will forgive me. You know a little; YOU +forgive me. The world can never know. It will brand my darlings +as a murderer's children." + +"It was the act of a minute," I interposed. "And--though she is +dead, poor lady, and one must speak no ill of her--we can at least +gather dimly, for your children's sake, how deep was the +provocation." + +He gazed at me fixedly. His voice was like lead. "For the +children's sake--yes," he answered, as in a dream. "It was all for +the children! I have killed her--murdered her--she has paid her +penalty; and, poor dead soul, I will utter no word against her--the +woman I have murdered! But one thing I will say: If omniscient +justice sends me for this to eternal punishment, I can endure it +gladly, like a man, knowing that so I have redeemed my Marian's +motherless girls from a deadly tyranny." + +It was the only sentence in which he ever alluded to her. + +I sat down by his side and watched him closely. Mechanically, +methodically, he went on with his dressing. The more he dressed, +the less could I believe it was Hugo. I had expected to find him +close-shaven; so did the police, by their printed notices. Instead +of that, he had shaved his beard and whiskers, but only trimmed his +moustache; trimmed it quite short, so as to reveal the boyish +corners of the mouth--a trick which entirely altered his rugged +expression. But that was not all; what puzzled me most was the +eyes--they were not Hugo's. At first I could not imagine why. By +degrees the truth dawned upon me. His eyebrows were naturally +thick and shaggy--great overhanging growth, interspersed with many +of those stiff long hairs to which Darwin called attention in +certain men as surviving traits from a monkey-like ancestor. In +order to disguise himself, Hugo had pulled out all these coarser +hairs, leaving nothing on his brows but the soft and closely +pressed coat of down which underlies the longer bristles in all +such cases. This had wholly altered the expression of the eyes, +which no longer looked out keenly from their cavernous penthouse; +but being deprived of their relief, had acquired a much more +ordinary and less individual aspect. From a good-natured but +shaggy giant, my old friend was transformed by his shaving and his +costume into a well-fed and well-grown, but not very colossal, +commercial gentleman. Hugo was scarcely six feet high, indeed, +though by his broad shoulders and bushy beard he had always +impressed one with such a sense of size; and now that the +hirsuteness had been got rid of, and the dress altered, he hardly +struck one as taller or bigger than the average of his fellows. + +We sat for some minutes and talked. Le Geyt would not speak of +Clara; and when I asked him his intentions, he shook his head +moodily. "I shall act for the best," he said--"what of best is +left--to guard the dear children. It was a terrible price to pay +for their redemption; but it was the only one possible, and, in a +moment of wrath, I paid it. Now, I have to pay, in turn, myself. +I do not shirk it." + +"You will come back to London, then, and stand your trial?" I +asked, eagerly. + +"Come back TO LONDON?" he cried, with a face of white panic. +Hitherto he had seemed to me rather relieved in expression than +otherwise; his countenance had lost its worn and anxious look; he +was no longer watching each moment over his children's safety. +"Come back . . . TO LONDON . . . and face my trial! Why, did you +think, Hubert, 'twas the court or the hanging I was shirking? No, +no; not that; but IT--the red horror! I must get away from IT to +the sea--to the water--to wash away the stain--as far from IT--that +red pool--as possible!" + +I answered nothing. I left him to face his own remorse in silence. + +At last he rose to go, and held one foot undecided on his bicycle. + +"I leave myself in Heaven's hands," he said, as he lingered. "IT +will requite. . . . The ordeal is by water." + +"So I judged," I answered. + +"Tell Lina this from me," he went on, still loitering: "that if she +will trust me, I will strive to do the best that remains for my +darlings. I will do it, Heaven helping. She will know WHAT, +to-morrow." + +He mounted his machine and sailed off. My eyes followed him up the +path with sad forebodings. + +All day long I loitered about the Gap. It consisted of two bays-- +the one I had already seen, and another, divided from it by a saw- +edge of rock. In the further cove crouched a few low stone +cottages. A broad-bottomed sailing boat lay there, pulled up high +on the beach. About three o'clock, as I sat and watched, two men +began to launch it. The sea ran high; tide coming in; the sou'- +wester still increasing in force to a gale; at the signal-staff on +the cliff, the danger-cone was hoisted. White spray danced in air. +Big black clouds rolled up seething from windward; low thunder +rumbling; a storm threatened. + +One of the men was Le Geyt, the other a fisherman. + +He jumped in, and put off through the surf with an air of triumph. +He was a splendid sailor. His boat leapt through the breakers and +flew before the wind with a mere rag of canvas. "Dangerous weather +to be out!" I exclaimed to the fisherman, who stood with hands +buried in his pockets, watching him. + +"Ay that ur be, zur!" the man answered. "Doan't like the look o' +ut. But thik there gen'leman, 'ee's one o' Oxford, 'ee do tell me; +and they'm a main venturesome lot, they college volk. 'Ee's off by +'isself droo the starm, all so var as Lundy!" + +"Will he reach it?" I asked, anxiously, having my own idea on the +subject. + +"Doan't seem like ut, zur, do ut? Ur must, an' ur mustn't, an' yit +again ur must. Powerful 'ard place ur be to maake in a starm, to +be zure, Lundy. Zaid the Lord 'ould dezide. But ur 'ouldn't be +warned, ur 'ouldn't; an' voolhardy volk, as the zayin' is, must go +their own voolhardy waay to perdition!" + +It was the last I saw of Le Geyt alive. Next morning the lifeless +body of "the man who was wanted for the Campden Hill mystery" was +cast up by the waves on the shore of Lundy. The Lord had decided. + +Hugo had not miscalculated. "Luck in their suicides," Hilda Wade +said; and, strange to say, the luck of the Le Geyts stood him in +good stead still. By a miracle of fate, his children were not +branded as a murderer's daughters. Sebastian gave evidence at the +inquest on the wife's body: "Self-inflicted--a recoil--accidental-- +I am SURE of it." His specialist knowledge--his assertive +certainty, combined with that arrogant, masterful manner of his, +and his keen, eagle eye, overbore the jury. Awed by the great +man's look, they brought in a submissive verdict of "Death by +misadventure." The coroner thought it a most proper finding. Mrs. +Mallet had made the most of the innate Le Geyt horror of blood. +The newspapers charitably surmised that the unhappy husband, crazed +by the instantaneous unexpectedness of his loss, had wandered away +like a madman to the scenes of his childhood, and had there been +drowned by accident while trying to cross a stormy sea to Lundy, +under some wild impression that he would find his dead wife alive +on the island. Nobody whispered MURDER. Everybody dwelt on the +utter absence of motive--a model husband!--such a charming young +wife, and such a devoted stepmother. We three alone knew--we +three, and the children. + +On the day when the jury brought in their verdict at the adjourned +inquest on Mrs. Le Geyt, Hilda Wade stood in the room, trembling +and white-faced, awaiting their decision. When the foreman uttered +the words, "Death by misadventure," she burst into tears of relief. +"He did well!" she cried to me, passionately. "He did well, that +poor father! He placed his life in the hands of his Maker, asking +only for mercy to his innocent children. And mercy has been shown +to him and to them. He was taken gently in the way he wished. It +would have broken my heart for those two poor girls if the verdict +had gone otherwise. He knew how terrible a lot it is to be called +a murderer's daughter." + +I did not realise at the time with what profound depth of personal +feeling she said it. + + + +CHAPTER V + +THE EPISODE OF THE NEEDLE THAT DID NOT MATCH + + +"Sebastian is a great man," I said to Hilda Wade, as I sat one +afternoon over a cup of tea she had brewed for me in her own little +sitting-room. It is one of the alleviations of an hospital +doctor's lot that he may drink tea now and again with the Sister of +his ward. "Whatever else you choose to think of him, you must +admit he is a very great man." + +I admired our famous Professor, and I admired Hilda Wade: 'twas a +matter of regret to me that my two admirations did not seem in +return sufficiently to admire one another. "Oh, yes," Hilda +answered, pouring out my second cup; "he is a very great man. I +never denied that. The greatest man, on the whole, I think, that I +have ever come across." + +"And he has done splendid work for humanity," I went on, growing +enthusiastic. + +"Splendid work! Yes, splendid! (Two lumps, I believe?) He has +done more, I admit, for medical science than any other man I ever +met." + +I gazed at her with a curious glance. "Then why, dear lady, do you +keep telling me he is cruel?" I inquired, toasting my feet on the +fender. "It seems contradictory." + +She passed me the muffins, and smiled her restrained smile. + +"Does the desire to do good to humanity in itself imply a +benevolent disposition?" she answered, obliquely. + +"Now you are talking in paradox. Surely, if a man works all his +life long for the good of mankind, that shows he is devoured by +sympathy for his species." + +"And when your friend Mr. Bates works all his life long at +observing, and classifying lady-birds, I suppose that shows he is +devoured by sympathy for the race of beetles!" + +I laughed at her comical face, she looked at me so quizzically. +"But then," I objected, "the cases are not parallel. Bates kills +and collects his lady-birds; Sebastian cures and benefits +humanity." + +Hilda smiled her wise smile once more, and fingered her apron. +"Are the cases so different as you suppose?" she went on, with her +quick glance. "Is it not partly accident? A man of science, you +see, early in life, takes up, half by chance, this, that, or the +other particular form of study. But what the study is in itself, I +fancy, does not greatly matter; do not mere circumstances as often +as not determine it? Surely it is the temperament, on the whole, +that tells: the temperament that is or is not scientific." + +"How do you mean? You ARE so enigmatic!" + +"Well, in a family of the scientific temperament, it seems to me, +one brother may happen to go in for butterflies--may he not?--and +another for geology, or for submarine telegraphs. Now, the man who +happens to take up butterflies does not make a fortune out of his +hobby--there is no money in butterflies; so we say, accordingly, he +is an unpractical person, who cares nothing for business, and who +is only happy when he is out in the fields with a net, chasing +emperors and tortoise-shells. But the man who happens to fancy +submarine telegraphy most likely invents a lot of new improvements, +takes out dozens of patents, finds money flow in upon him as he +sits in his study, and becomes at last a peer and a millionaire; so +then we say, What a splendid business head he has got, to be sure, +and how immensely he differs from his poor wool-gathering brother, +the entomologist, who can only invent new ways of hatching out +wire-worms! Yet all may really depend on the first chance +direction which led one brother as a boy to buy a butterfly net, +and sent the other into the school laboratory to dabble with an +electric wheel and a cheap battery." + +"Then you mean to say it is chance that has made Sebastian?" + +Hilda shook her pretty head. "By no means. Don't be so stupid. +We both know Sebastian has a wonderful brain. Whatever was the +work he undertook with that brain in science, he would carry it out +consummately. He is a born thinker. It is like this, don't you +know." She tried to arrange her thoughts. "The particular branch +of science to which Mr. Hiram Maxim's mind happens to have been +directed was the making of machine-guns--and he slays his +thousands. The particular branch to which Sebastian's mind happens +to have been directed was medicine--and he cures as many as Mr. +Maxim kills. It is a turn of the hand that makes all the +difference." + +"I see," I said. "The aim of medicine happens to be a benevolent +one." + +"Quite so; that's just what I mean. The aim is benevolent; and +Sebastian pursues that aim with the single-minded energy of a +lofty, gifted, and devoted nature--but not a good one!' + +"Not good?" + +"Oh, no. To be quite frank, he seems to me to pursue it ruthlessly, +cruelly, unscrupulously. He is a man of high ideals, but without +principle. In that respect he reminds one of the great spirits of +the Italian Renaissance--Benvenuto Cellini and so forth--men who +could pore for hours with conscientious artistic care over the +detail of a hem in a sculptured robe, yet could steal out in the +midst of their disinterested toil to plunge a knife in the back of a +rival." + +"Sebastian would not do that," I cried. "He is wholly free from +the mean spirit of jealousy." + +"No, Sebastian would not do that. You are quite right there; there +is no tinge of meanness in the man's nature. He likes to be first +in the field; but he would acclaim with delight another man's +scientific triumph--if another anticipated him; for would it not +mean a triumph for universal science?--and is not the advancement +of science Sebastian's religion? But . . . he would do almost as +much, or more. He would stab a man without remorse, if he thought +that by stabbing him he could advance knowledge." + +I recognised at once the truth of her diagnosis. "Nurse Wade," I +cried, "you are a wonderful woman! I believe you are right; but-- +how did you come to think of it?" + +A cloud passed over her brow. "I have reason to know it," she +answered, slowly. Then her voice changed. "Take another muffin." + +I helped myself and paused. I laid down my cup, and gazed at her. +What a beautiful, tender, sympathetic face! And yet, how able! +She stirred the fire uneasily. I looked and hesitated. I had +often wondered why I never dared ask Hilda Wade one question that +was nearest my heart. I think it must have been because I +respected her so profoundly. The deeper your admiration and +respect for a woman, the harder you find it in the end to ask her. +At last I ALMOST made up my mind. "I cannot think," I began, "what +can have induced a girl like you, with means and friends, with +brains and"--I drew back, then I plumped it out--"beauty, to take +to such a life as this--a life which seems, in many ways, so +unworthy of you!" + +She stirred the fire more pensively than ever, and rearranged the +muffin-dish on the little wrought-iron stand in font of the grate. +"And yet," she murmured, looking down, "what life can be better +than the service of one's kind? You think it a great life for +Sebastian!" + +"Sebastian! He is a man. That is different; quite different. +But a woman! Especially YOU, dear lady, for whom one feels that +nothing is quite high enough, quite pure enough, quite good enough. +I cannot imagine how--" + +She checked me with one wave of her gracious hand. Her movements +were always slow and dignified. "I have a Plan in my life," she +answered earnestly, her eyes meeting mine with a sincere, frank +gaze; "a Plan to which I have resolved to sacrifice everything. It +absorbs my being. Till that Plan is fulfilled--" I saw the tears +were gathering fast on her lashes. She suppressed them with an +effort. "Say no more," she added, faltering. "Infirm of purpose! +I WILL not listen." + +I leant forward eagerly, pressing my advantage. The air was +electric. Waves of emotion passed to and fro. "But surely," I +cried, "you do not mean to say--" + +She waved me aside once more. "I will not put my hand to the +plough, and then look back," she answered, firmly. "Dr. Cumberledge, +spare me. I came to Nathaniel's for a purpose. I told you at the +time what that purpose was--in part: to be near Sebastian. I want +to be near him . . . for an object I have at heart. Do not ask me +to reveal it; do not ask me to forego it. I am a woman, therefore +weak. But I need your aid. Help me, instead of hindering me." + +"Hilda," I cried, leaning forward, with quiverings of my heart, "I +will help you in whatever way you will allow me. But let me at any +rate help you with the feeling that I am helping one who means in +time--" + +At that moment, as unkindly fate would have it, the door opened, +and Sebastian entered. + +"Nurse Wade," he began, in his iron voice, glancing about him with +stern eyes, "where are those needles I ordered for that operation? +We must be ready in time before Nielsen comes. . . . Cumberledge, +I shall want you." + +The golden opportunity had come and gone. It was long before I +found a similar occasion for speaking to Hilda. + +Every day after that the feeling deepened upon me that Hilda was +there to watch Sebastian. WHY, I did not know; but it was growing +certain that a life-long duel was in progress between these two--a +duel of some strange and mysterious import. + +The first approach to a solution of the problem which I obtained +came a week or two later. Sebastian was engaged in observing a +case where certain unusual symptoms had suddenly supervened. It +was a case of some obscure affection of the heart. I will not +trouble you here with the particular details. We all suspected a +tendency to aneurism. Hilda Wade was in attendance, as she always +was on Sebastian's observation cases. We crowded round, watching. +The Professor himself leaned over the cot with some medicine for +external application in a basin. He gave it to Hilda to hold. I +noticed that as she held it her fingers trembled, and that her eyes +were fixed harder than ever upon Sebastian. He turned round to his +students. "Now this," he began, in a very unconcerned voice, as if +the patient were a toad, "is a most unwonted turn for the disease +to take. It occurs very seldom. In point of fact, I have only +observed the symptom once before; and then it was fatal. The +patient in that instance"--he paused dramatically--"was the +notorious poisoner, Dr. Yorke-Bannerman." + +As he uttered the words, Hilda Wade's hands trembled more than +ever, and with a little scream she let the basin fall, breaking it +into fragments. + +Sebastian's keen eyes had transfixed her in a second. "How did you +manage to do that?" he asked, with quiet sarcasm, but in a tone +full of meaning. + +"The basin was heavy," Hilda faltered. "My hands were trembling-- +and it somehow slipped through them. I am not . . . quite +myself . . . not quite well this afternoon. I ought not to have +attempted it." + +The Professor's deep-set eyes peered out like gleaming lights from +beneath their overhanging brows. "No; you ought not to have +attempted it," he answered, withering her with a glance. "You +might have let the thing fall on the patient and killed him. As it +is, can't you see you have agitated him with the flurry? Don't +stand there holding your breath, woman: repair your mischief. Get +a cloth and wipe it up, and give ME the bottle." + +With skilful haste he administered a little sal volatile and nux +vomica to the swooning patient; while Hilda set about remedying the +damage. "That's better," Sebastian said, in a mollified tone, when +she had brought another basin. There was a singular note of +cloaked triumph in his voice. "Now, we'll begin again. . . . I +was just saying, gentlemen, before this accident, that I had seen +only ONE case of this peculiar form of the tendency before; and +that case was the notorious"--he kept his glittering eyes fixed +harder on Hilda than ever--"the notorious Dr. Yorke-Bannerman." + +_I_ was watching Hilda, too. At the words, she trembled violently +all over once more, but with an effort restrained herself. Their +looks met in a searching glance. Hilda's air was proud and +fearless: in Sebastian's, I fancied I detected, after a second, +just a tinge of wavering. + +"You remember Yorke-Bannerman's case," he went on. "He committed a +murder--" + +"Let ME take the basin!" I cried, for I saw Hilda's hands giving +way a second time, and I was anxious to spare her. + +"No, thank you," she answered low, but in a voice that was full of +suppressed defiance. "I will wait and hear this out. I PREFER to +stop here." + +As for Sebastian, he seemed now not to notice her, though I was +aware all the time of a sidelong glance of his eye, parrot-wise, in +her direction. "He committed a murder," he went on, "by means of +aconitine--then an almost unknown poison; and, after committing it, +his heart being already weak, he was taken himself with symptoms of +aneurism in a curious form, essentially similar to these; so that +he died before the trial--a lucky escape for him." + +He paused rhetorically once more; then he added in the same tone: +"Mental agitation and the terror of detection no doubt accelerated +the fatal result in that instance. He died at once from the shock +of the arrest. It was a natural conclusion. Here we may hope for +a more successful issue." + +He spoke to the students, of course, but I could see for all that +that he was keeping his falcon eye fixed hard on Hilda's face. I +glanced aside at her. She never flinched for a second. Neither +said anything directly to the other; still, by their eyes and +mouths, I knew some strange passage of arms had taken place between +them. Sebastian's tone was one of provocation, of defiance, I +might almost say of challenge. Hilda's air I took rather for the +air of calm and resolute, but assured, resistance. He expected her +to answer; she said nothing. Instead of that, she went on holding +the basin now with fingers that WOULD not tremble. Every muscle +was strained. Every tendon was strung. I could see she held +herself in with a will of iron. + +The rest of the episode passed off quietly. Sebastian, having +delivered his bolt, began to think less of Hilda and more of the +patient. He went on with his demonstration. As for Hilda, she +gradually relaxed her muscles, and, with a deep-drawn breath, +resumed her natural attitude. The tension was over. They had had +their little skirmish, whatever it might mean, and had it out; now, +they called a truce over the patient's body. + +When the case had been disposed of, and the students dismissed, I +went straight into the laboratory to get a few surgical instruments +I had chanced to leave there. For a minute or two, I mislaid my +clinical thermometer, and began hunting for it behind a wooden +partition in the corner of the room by the place for washing test- +tubes. As I stooped down, turning over the various objects about +the tap in my search, Sebastian's voice came to me. He had paused +outside the door, and was speaking in his calm, clear tone, very +low, to Hilda. "So NOW we understand one another, Nurse Wade," he +said, with a significant sneer. "I know whom I have to deal with!" + +"And _I_ know, too," Hilda answered, in a voice of placid +confidence. + +"Yet you are not afraid?" + +"It is not _I_ who have cause for fear. The accused may tremble, +not the prosecutor." + +"What! You threaten?" + +"No; I do not threaten. Not in words, I mean. My presence here +is in itself a threat, but I make no other. You know now, +unfortunately, WHY I have come. That makes my task harder. But +I will NOT give it up. I will wait and conquer." + +Sebastian answered nothing. He strode into the laboratory alone, +tall, grim, unbending, and let himself sink into his easy chair, +looking up with a singular and somewhat sinister smile at his +bottles of microbes. After a minute he stirred the fire, and bent +his head forward, brooding. He held it between his hands, with his +elbows on his knees, and gazed moodily straight before him into the +glowing caves of white-hot coal in the, fireplace. That sinister +smile still played lambent around the corners of his grizzled +moustaches. + +I moved noiselessly towards the door, trying to pass behind him +unnoticed. But, alert as ever, his quick ears detected me. With a +sudden start, he raised his head and glanced round. "What! you +here?" he cried, taken aback. For a second he appeared almost to +lose his self-possession. + +"I came for my clinical," I answered, with an unconcerned air. "I +have somehow managed to mislay it in the laboratory." + +My carefully casual tone seemed to reassure him. He peered about +him with knit brows. "Cumberledge," he asked at last, in a +suspicious voice, "did you hear that woman?" + +"The woman in 93? Delirious?" + +"No, no. Nurse Wade?" + +"Hear her?" I echoed, I must candidly admit with intent to deceive. +"When she broke the basin?" + +His forehead relaxed. "Oh! it is nothing," he muttered, hastily. +"A mere point of discipline. She spoke to me just now, and I +thought her tone unbecoming in a subordinate. . . . Like Korah and +his crew, she takes too much upon her. . . . We must get rid of +her, Cumberledge; we must get rid of her. She is a dangerous +woman!" + +"She is the most intelligent nurse we have ever had in the place, +sir," I objected, stoutly. + +He nodded his head twice. "Intelligent--je vous l'accorde; but +dangerous--dangerous!" + +Then he turned to his papers, sorting them out one by one with a +preoccupied face and twitching fingers. I recognised that he +desired to be left alone, so I quitted the laboratory. + +I cannot quite say WHY, but ever since Hilda Wade first came to +Nathaniel's my enthusiasm for Sebastian had been cooling +continuously. Admiring his greatness still, I had doubts as to his +goodness. That day I felt I positively mistrusted him. I wondered +what his passage of arms with Hilda might mean. Yet, somehow, I +was shy of alluding to it before her. + +One thing, however, was clear to me now--this great campaign that +was being waged between the nurse and the Professor had reference +to the case of Dr. Yorke-Bannerman. + +For a time, nothing came of it; the routine of the hospital went on +as usual. The patient with the suspected predisposition to +aneurism kept fairly well for a week or two, and then took a sudden +turn for the worse, presenting at times most unwonted symptoms. He +died unexpectedly. Sebastian, who had watched him every hour, +regarded the matter as of prime importance. "I'm glad it happened +here," he said, rubbing his hands. "A grand opportunity. I wanted +to catch an instance like this before that fellow in Paris had time +to anticipate me. They're all on the lookout. Von Strahlendorff, +of Vienna, has been waiting for just such a patient for years. So +have I. Now fortune has favoured me. Lucky for us he died! We +shall find out everything." + +We held a post-mortem, of course, the condition of the blood being +what we most wished to observe; and the autopsy revealed some +unexpected details. One remarkable feature consisted in a certain +undescribed and impoverished state of the contained bodies which +Sebastian, with his eager zeal for science, desired his students to +see and identify. He said it was likely to throw much light on +other ill-understood conditions of the brain and nervous system, as +well as on the peculiar faint odour of the insane, now so well +recognised in all large asylums. In order to compare this abnormal +state with the aspect of the healthy circulating medium, he +proposed to examine a little good living blood side by side with +the morbid specimen under the microscope. Nurse Wade was in +attendance in the laboratory, as usual. The Professor, standing by +the instrument, with one hand on the brass screw, had got the +diseased drop ready arranged for our inspection beforehand, and was +gloating over it himself with scientific enthusiasm. "Grey +corpuscles, you will observe," he said, "almost entirely deficient. +Red, poor in number, and irregular in outline. Plasma, thin. +Nuclei, feeble. A state of body which tells severely against the +due rebuilding of the wasted tissues. Now compare with typical +normal specimen." He removed his eye from the microscope, and +wiped a glass slide with a clean cloth as he spoke. "Nurse Wade, +we know of old the purity and vigour of your circulating fluid. +You shall have the honour of advancing science once more. Hold up +your finger." + +Hilda held up her forefinger unhesitatingly. She was used to such +requests; and, indeed, Sebastian had acquired by long experience +the faculty of pinching the finger-tip so hard, and pressing the +point of a needle so dexterously into a minor vessel, that he could +draw at once a small drop of blood without the subject even feeling +it. + +The Professor nipped the last joint between his finger and thumb +for a moment till it was black at the end; then he turned to the +saucer at his side, which Hilda herself had placed there, and chose +from it, cat-like, with great deliberation and selective care, a +particular needle. Hilda's eyes followed his every movement as +closely and as fearlessly as ever. Sebastian's hand was raised, +and he was just about to pierce the delicate white skin, when, with +a sudden, quick scream of terror, she snatched her hand away +hastily. + +The Professor let the needle drop in his astonishment. "What did +you do that for?" he cried, with an angry dart of the keen eyes. +"This is not the first time I have drawn your blood. You KNEW I +would not hurt you." + +Hilda's face had grown strangely pale. But that was not all. I +believe I was the only person present who noticed one unobtrusive +piece of sleight-of-hand which she hurriedly and skilfully +executed. When the needle slipped from Sebastian's hand, she leant +forward even as she screamed, and caught it, unobserved, in the +folds of her apron. Then her nimble fingers closed over it as if +by magic, and conveyed it with a rapid movement at once to her +pocket. I do not think even Sebastian himself noticed the quick +forward jerk of her eager hands, which would have done honour to a +conjurer. He was too much taken aback by her unexpected behaviour +to observe the needle. + +Just as she caught it, Hilda answered his question in a somewhat +flurried voice. "I--I was afraid," she broke out, gasping. "One +gets these little accesses of terror now and again. I--I feel +rather weak. I don't think I will volunteer to supply any more +normal blood this morning." + +Sebastian's acute eyes read her through, as so often. With a +trenchant dart he glanced from her to me. I could see he began to +suspect a confederacy. "That will do," he went on, with slow +deliberateness. "Better so. Nurse Wade, I don't know what's +beginning to come over you. You are losing your nerve--which is +fatal in a nurse. Only the other day you let fall and broke a +basin at a most critical moment; and now, you scream aloud on a +trifling apprehension." He paused and glanced around him. "Mr. +Callaghan," he said, turning to our tall, red-haired Irish student, +"YOUR blood is good normal, and YOU are not hysterical." He +selected another needle with studious care. "Give me your finger." + +As he picked out the needle, I saw Hilda lean forward again, alert +and watchful, eyeing him with a piercing glance; but, after a +second's consideration, she seemed to satisfy herself, and fell +back without a word. I gathered that she was ready to interfere, +had occasion demanded. But occasion did not demand; and she held +her peace quietly. + +The rest of the examination proceeded without a hitch. For a +minute or two, it is true, I fancied that Sebastian betrayed a +certain suppressed agitation--a trifling lack of his accustomed +perspicuity and his luminous exposition. But, after meandering for +a while through a few vague sentences, he soon recovered his wonted +calm; and as he went on with his demonstration, throwing himself +eagerly into the case, his usual scientific enthusiasm came back to +him undiminished. He waxed eloquent (after his fashion) over the +"beautiful" contrast between Callaghan's wholesome blood, "rich in +the vivifying architectonic grey corpuscles which rebuild worn +tissues," and the effete, impoverished, unvitalised fluid which +stagnated in the sluggish veins of the dead patient. The carriers +of oxygen had neglected their proper task; the granules whose duty +it was to bring elaborated food-stuffs to supply the waste of brain +and nerve and muscle had forgotten their cunning. The bricklayers +of the bodily fabric had gone out on strike; the weary scavengers +had declined to remove the useless by-products. His vivid tongue, +his picturesque fancy, ran away with him. I had never heard him +talk better or more incisively before; one could feel sure, as he +spoke, that the arteries of his own acute and teeming brain at that +moment of exaltation were by no means deficient in those energetic +and highly vital globules on whose reparative worth he so +eloquently descanted. "Sure, the Professor makes annywan see right +inside wan's own vascular system," Callaghan whispered aside to me, +in unfeigned admiration. + +The demonstration ended in impressive silence. As we streamed out +of the laboratory, aglow with his electric fire, Sebastian held me +back with a bent motion of his shrivelled forefinger. I stayed +behind unwillingly. "Yes, sir?" I said, in an interrogative voice. + +The Professor's eyes were fixed intently on the ceiling. His look +was one of rapt inspiration. I stood and waited. "Cumberledge," +he said at last, coming back to earth with a start, "I see it more +plainly each day that goes. We must get rid of that woman." + +"Of Nurse Wade?" I asked, catching my breath. + +He roped the grizzled moustache, and blinked the sunken eyes. "She +has lost nerve," he went on, "lost nerve entirely. I shall suggest +that she be dismissed. Her sudden failures of stamina are most +embarrassing at critical junctures." + +"Very well, sir," I answered, swallowing a lump in my throat. To +say the truth, I was beginning to be afraid on Hilda's account. +That morning's events had thoroughly disquieted me. + +He seemed relieved at my unquestioning acquiescence. "She is a +dangerous edged-tool; that's the truth of it," he went on, still +twirling his moustache with a preoccupied air, and turning over his +stock of needles. "When she's clothed and in her right mind, she +is a valuable accessory--sharp and trenchant like a clean, bright +lancet; but when she allows one of these causeless hysterical fits +to override her tone, she plays one false at once--like a lancet +that slips, or grows dull and rusty." He polished one of the +needles on a soft square of new chamois-leather while he spoke, as +if to give point and illustration to his simile. + +I went out from him, much perturbed. The Sebastian I had once +admired and worshipped was beginning to pass from me; in his place +I found a very complex and inferior creation. My idol had feet of +clay. I was loth to acknowledge it. + +I stalked along the corridor moodily towards my own room. As I +passed Hilda Wade's door, I saw it half ajar. She stood a little +within, and beckoned me to enter. + +I passed in and closed the door behind me. Hilda looked at me with +trustful eyes. Resolute still, her face was yet that of a hunted +creature. "Thank Heaven, I have ONE friend here, at least!" she +said, slowly seating herself. "You saw me catch and conceal the +needle?" + +"Yes, I saw you." + +She drew it forth from her purse, carefully but loosely wrapped up +in a small tag of tissue-paper. "Here it is!" she said, displaying +it. "Now, I want you to test it." + +"In a culture?" I asked; for I guessed her meaning. + +She nodded. "Yes, to see what that man has done to it." + +"What do you suspect?" + +She shrugged her graceful shoulders half imperceptibly. + +"How should I know? Anything!" + +I gazed at the needle closely. "What made you distrust it?" I +inquired at last, still eyeing it. + +She opened a drawer, and took out several others. "See here," she +said, handing me one; "THESE are the needles I keep in antiseptic +wool--the needles with which I always supply the Professor. You +observe their shape--the common surgical patterns. Now, look at +THIS needle, with which the Professor was just going to prick my +finger! You can see for yourself at once it is of bluer steel and +of a different manufacture." + +"That is quite true," I answered, examining it with my pocket lens, +which I always carry. "I see the difference. But how did you +detect it?" + +"From his face, partly; but partly, too, from the needle itself. I +had my suspicions, and I was watching him closely. Just as he +raised the thing in his hand, half concealing it, so, and showing +only the point, I caught the blue gleam of the steel as the light +glanced off it. It was not the kind I knew. Then I withdrew my +hand at once, feeling sure he meant mischief." + +"That was wonderfully quick of you!" + +"Quick? Well, yes. Thank Heaven, my mind works fast; my perceptions +are rapid. Otherwise--" she looked grave. "One second more, and +it would have been too late. The man might have killed me." + +"You think it is poisoned, then?" + +Hilda shook her head with confident dissent. "Poisoned? Oh, no. +He is wiser now. Fifteen years ago, he used poison. But science +has made gigantic strides since then. He would not needlessly +expose himself to-day to the risks of the poisoner." + +"Fifteen years ago he used poison?" + +She nodded, with the air of one who knows. "I am not speaking at +random," she answered. "I say what I know. Some day I will +explain. For the present, it is enough to tell you I know it." + +"And what do you suspect now?" I asked, the weird sense of her +strange power deepening on me every second. + +She held up the incriminated needle again. + +"Do you see this groove?" she asked, pointing to it with the tip of +another. + +I examined it once more at the light with the lens. A longitudinal +groove, apparently ground into one side of the needle, lengthwise, +by means of a small grinding-stone and emery powder, ran for a +quarter of an inch above the point. This groove seemed to me to +have been produced by an amateur, though he must have been one +accustomed to delicate microscopic manipulation; for the edges +under the lens showed slightly rough, like the surface of a file on +a small scale: not smooth and polished, as a needle-maker would +have left them. I said so to Hilda. + +"You are quite right," she answered. "That is just what it shows. +I feel sure Sebastian made that groove himself. He could have +bought grooved needles, it is true, such as they sometimes use for +retaining small quantities of lymphs and medicines; but we had none +in stock, and to buy them would be to manufacture evidence against +himself, in case of detection. Besides, the rough, jagged edge +would hold the material he wished to inject all the better, while +its saw-like points would tear the flesh, imperceptibly, but +minutely, and so serve his purpose." + +"Which was?" + +"Try the needle, and judge for yourself. I prefer you should find +out. You can tell me to-morrow." + +"It was quick of you to detect it!" I cried, still turning the +suspicious object over. "The difference is so slight." + +"Yes; but you tell me my eyes are as sharp as the needle. Besides, +I had reason to doubt; and Sebastian himself gave me the clue by +selecting his instrument with too great deliberation. He had put +it there with the rest, but it lay a little apart; and as he picked +it up gingerly, I began to doubt. When I saw the blue gleam, my +doubt was at once converted into certainty. Then his eyes, too, +had the look which I know means victory. Benign or baleful, it +goes with his triumphs. I have seen that look before, and when +once it lurks scintillating in the luminous depths of his gleaming +eyeballs, I recognise at once that, whatever his aim, he has +succeeded in it." + +"Still, Hilda, I am loth--" + +She waved her hand impatiently. "Waste no time," she cried, in an +authoritative voice. "If you happen to let that needle rub +carelessly against the sleeve of your coat you may destroy the +evidence. Take it at once to your room, plunge it into a culture, +and lock it up safe at a proper temperature--where Sebastian cannot +get at it--till the consequences develop." + +I did as she bid me. By this time, I was not wholly unprepared for +the result she anticipated. My belief in Sebastian had sunk to +zero, and was rapidly reaching a negative quantity. + +At nine the next morning, I tested one drop of the culture under +the microscope. Clear and limpid to the naked eye, it was alive +with small objects of a most suspicious nature, when properly +magnified. I knew those hungry forms. Still, I would not decide +offhand on my own authority in a matter of such moment. Sebastian's +character was at stake--the character of the man who led the +profession. I called in Callaghan, who happened to be in the ward, +and asked him to put his eye to the instrument for a moment. He was +a splendid fellow for the use of high powers, and I had magnified +the culture 300 diameters. "What do you call those?" I asked, +breathless. + +He scanned them carefully with his experienced eye. "Is it the +microbes ye mean?" he answered. "An' what 'ud they be, then, if it +wasn't the bacillus of pyaemia?" + +"Blood-poisoning!" I ejaculated, horror-struck. + +"Aye; blood-poisoning: that's the English of it." + +I assumed an air of indifference. "I made them that myself," I +rejoined, as if they were mere ordinary experimental germs; "but I +wanted confirmation of my own opinion. You're sure of the +bacillus?" + +"An' haven't I been keeping swarms of those very same bacteria +under close observation for Sebastian for seven weeks past? Why, I +know them as well as I know me own mother." + +"Thank you," I said. "That will do." And I carried off the +microscope, bacilli and all, into Hilda Wade's sitting-room. "Look +yourself!" I cried to her. + +She stared at them through the instrument with an unmoved face. "I +thought so," she answered shortly. "The bacillus of pyaemia. A +most virulent type. Exactly what I expected." + +"You anticipated that result?" + +"Absolutely. You see, blood-poisoning matures quickly, and kills +almost to a certainty. Delirium supervenes so soon that the +patient has no chance of explaining suspicions. Besides, it would +all seem so very natural! Everybody would say: 'She got some +slight wound, which microbes from some case she was attending +contaminated.' You may be sure Sebastian thought out all that. He +plans with consummate skill. He had designed everything." + +I gazed at her, uncertain. "And what will you DO?" I asked. +"Expose him?" + +She opened both her palms with a blank gesture of helplessness. +"It is useless!" she answered. "Nobody would believe me. Consider +the situation. YOU know the needle I gave you was the one +Sebastian meant to use--the one he dropped and I caught--BECAUSE +you are a friend of mine, and because you have learned to trust me. +But who else would credit it? I have only my word against his--an +unknown nurse's against the great Professor's. Everybody would say +I was malicious or hysterical. Hysteria is always an easy stone to +fling at an injured woman who asks for justice. They would declare +I had trumped up the case to forestall my dismissal. They would +set it down to spite. We can do nothing against him. Remember, on +his part, the utter absence of overt motive." + +"And you mean to stop on here, in close attendance on a man who has +attempted your life?" I cried, really alarmed for her safety. + +"I am not sure about that," she answered. "I must take time to +think. My presence at Nathaniel's was necessary to my Plan. The +Plan fails for the present. I have now to look round and +reconsider my position." + +"But you are not safe here now," I urged, growing warm. "If +Sebastian really wishes to get rid of you, and is as unscrupulous +as you suppose, with his gigantic brain he can soon compass his +end. What he plans he executes. You ought not to remain within +the Professor's reach one hour longer." + +"I have thought of that, too," she replied, with an almost +unearthly calm. "But there are difficulties either way. At any +rate, I am glad he did not succeed this time. For, to have killed +me now, would have frustrated my Plan"--she clasped her hands--"my +Plan is ten thousand times dearer than life to me!" + +"Dear lady!" I cried, drawing a deep breath, "I implore you in this +strait, listen to what I urge. Why fight your battle alone? Why +refuse assistance? I have admired you so long--I am so eager to +help you. If only you will allow me to call you--" + +Her eyes brightened and softened. Her whole bosom heaved. I felt +in a flash she was not wholly indifferent to me. Strange tremors +in the air seemed to play about us. But she waved me aside once +more. "Don't press me," she said, in a very low voice. "Let me go +my own way. It is hard enough already, this task I have undertaken, +without YOUR making it harder. . . . Dear friend, dear friend, you +don't quite understand. There are TWO men at Nathaniel's whom I +desire to escape--because they both alike stand in the way of my +Purpose." She took my hands in hers. "Each in a different way," +she murmured once more. "But each I must avoid. One is Sebastian. +The other--" she let my hand drop again, and broke off suddenly. +"Dear Hubert," she cried, with a catch, "I cannot help it: forgive +me!" + +It was the first time she had ever called me by my Christian name. +The mere sound of the word made me unspeakably happy. + +Yet she waved me away. "Must I go?" I asked, quivering. + +"Yes, yes: you must go. I cannot stand it. I must think this +thing out, undisturbed. It is a very great crisis." + +That afternoon and evening, by some unhappy chance, I was fully +engaged in work at the hospital. Late at night a letter arrived +for me. I glanced at it in dismay. It bore the Basingstoke +postmark. But, to my alarm and surprise, it was in Hilda's hand. +What could this change portend? I opened it, all tremulous. + +"DEAR HUBERT,--" I gave a sigh of relief. It was no longer "Dear +Dr. Cumberledge" now, but "Hubert." That was something gained, at +any rate. I read on with a beating heart. What had Hilda to say +to me? + + +"DEAR HUBERT,--By the time this reaches you, I shall be far away, +irrevocably far, from London. With deep regret, with fierce +searchings of spirit, I have come to the conclusion that, for the +Purpose I have in view, it would be better for me at once to leave +Nathaniel's. Where I go, or what I mean to do, I do not wish to +tell you. Of your charity, I pray, refrain from asking me. I am +aware that your kindness and generosity deserve better recognition. +But, like Sebastian himself, I am the slave of my Purpose. I have +lived for it all these years, and it is still very dear to me. To +tell you my plans would interfere with that end. Do not, therefore, +suppose I am insensible to your goodness. . . . Dear Hubert, spare +me--I dare not say more, lest I say too much. I dare not trust +myself. But one thing I MUST say. I am flying from YOU quite as +much as from Sebastian. Flying from my own heart, quite as much as +from my enemy. Some day, perhaps, if I accomplish my object, I may +tell you all. Meanwhile, I can only beg of you of your kindness to +trust me. We shall not meet again, I fear, for years. But I shall +never forget you--you, the kind counsellor, who have half turned me +aside from my life's Purpose. One word more, and I should +falter.--In very great haste, and amid much disturbance, yours ever +affectionately and gratefully, + +"HILDA." + + +It was a hurried scrawl in pencil, as if written in a train. I +felt utterly dejected. Was Hilda, then, leaving England? + +Rousing myself after some minutes, I went straight to Sebastian's +rooms, and told him in brief terms that Nurse Wade had disappeared +at a moment's notice, and had sent a note to tell me so. + +He looked up from his work, and scanned me hard, as was his wont. +"That is well," he said at last, his eyes glowing deep; "she was +getting too great a hold on you, that young woman!" + +"She retains that hold upon me, sir," I answered curtly. + +"You are making a grave mistake in life, my dear Cumberledge," he +went on, in his old genial tone, which I had almost forgotten. +"Before you go further, and entangle yourself more deeply, I think +it is only right that I should undeceive you as to this girl's true +position. She is passing under a false name, and she comes of a +tainted stock. . . . Nurse Wade, as she chooses to call herself, +is a daughter of the notorious murderer, Yorke-Bannerman." + +My mind leapt back to the incident of the broken basin. Yorke- +Bannerman's name had profoundly moved her. Then I thought of +Hilda's face. Murderers, I said to myself, do not beget such +daughters as that. Not even accidental murderers, like my poor +friend Le Geyt. I saw at once the prima facie evidence was +strongly against her. But I had faith in her still. I drew myself +up firmly, and stared him back full in the face. "I do not believe +it," I answered, shortly. + +"You do not believe it? I tell you it is so. The girl herself as +good as acknowledged it to me." + +I spoke slowly and distinctly. "Dr. Sebastian," I said, confronting +him, "let us be quite clear with one another. I have found you out. +I know how you tried to poison that lady. To poison her with +bacilli which _I_ detected. I cannot trust your word; I cannot +trust your inferences. Either she is not Yorke-Bannerman's daughter +at all, or else . . . Yorke-Bannerman was NOT a murderer. . . ." I +watched his face closely. Conviction leaped upon me. "And someone +else was," I went on. "I might put a name to him." + +With a stern white face, he rose and opened the door. He pointed +to it slowly. "This hospital is not big enough for you and me +abreast," he said, with cold politeness. "One or other of us must +go. Which, I leave to your good sense to determine." + +Even at that moment of detection and disgrace, in one man's eyes, +at least, Sebastian retained his full measure of dignity. + + + +CHAPTER VI + +THE EPISODE OF THE LETTER WITH THE BASINGSTOKE POSTMARK + + +I have a vast respect for my grandfather. He was a man of +forethought. He left me a modest little income of seven hundred +a-year, well invested. Now, seven hundred a-year is not exactly +wealth; but it is an unobtrusive competence; it permits a bachelor +to move about the world and choose at will his own profession. +_I_ chose medicine; but I was not wholly dependent upon it. So I +honoured my grandfather's wise disposition of his worldly goods; +though, oddly enough, my cousin Tom (to whom he left his watch and +five hundred pounds) speaks MOST disrespectfully of his character +and intellect. + +Thanks to my grandfather's silken-sailed barque, therefore, when I +found myself practically dismissed from Nathaniel's I was not +thrown on my beam-ends, as most young men in my position would have +been; I had time and opportunity for the favourite pastime of +looking about me. Of course, had I chosen, I might have fought the +case to the bitter end against Sebastian; he could not dismiss me-- +that lay with the committee. But I hardly cared to fight. In the +first place, though I had found him out as a man, I still respected +him as a great teacher; and in the second place (which is always +more important), I wanted to find and follow Hilda. + +To be sure, Hilda, in that enigmatic letter of hers, had implored +me not to seek her out; but I think you will admit there is one +request which no man can grant to the girl he loves--and that is +the request to keep away from her. If Hilda did not want ME, I +wanted Hilda; and, being a man, I meant to find her. + +My chances of discovering her whereabouts, however, I had to +confess to myself (when it came to the point) were extremely +slender. She had vanished from my horizon, melted into space. My +sole hint of a clue consisted in the fact that the letter she sent +me had been posted at Basingstoke. Here, then, was my problem: +given an envelope with the Basingstoke postmark, to find in what +part of Europe, Asia, Africa, or America the writer of it might be +discovered. It opened up a fine field for speculation. + +When I set out to face this broad puzzle, my first idea was: "I +must ask Hilda." In all circumstances of difficulty, I had grown +accustomed to submitting my doubts and surmises to her acute +intelligence; and her instinct almost always supplied the right +solution. But now Hilda was gone; it was Hilda herself I wished to +track through the labyrinth of the world. I could expect no +assistance in tracking her from Hilda. + +"Let me think," I said to myself, over a reflective pipe, with feet +poised on the fender. "How would Hilda herself have approached +this problem? Imagine I'm Hilda. I must try to strike a trail by +applying her own methods to her own character. She would have +attacked the question, no doubt,"--here I eyed my pipe wisely,-- +"from the psychological side. She would have asked herself"--I +stroked my chin--"what such a temperament as hers was likely to do +under such-and-such circumstances. And she would have answered it +aright. But then"--I puffed away once or twice--"SHE is Hilda." + +When I came to reconnoitre the matter in this light, I became at +once aware how great a gulf separated the clumsy male intelligence +from the immediate and almost unerring intuitions of a clever +woman. I am considered no fool; in my own profession, I may +venture to say, I was Sebastian's favourite pupil. Yet, though I +asked myself over and over again where Hilda would be likely to go-- +Canada, China, Australia--as the outcome of her character, in +these given conditions, I got no answer. I stared at the fire and +reflected. I smoked two successive pipes, and shook out the ashes. +"Let me consider how Hilda's temperament would work," I said, +looking sagacious. I said it several times--but there I stuck. I +went no further. The solution would not come. I felt that in +order to play Hilda's part, it was necessary first to have Hilda's +head-piece. Not every man can bend the bow of Ulysses. + +As I turned the problem over in my mind, however, one phrase at +last came back to me--a phrase which Hilda herself had let fall +when we were debating a very similar point about poor Hugo Le Geyt: +"If I were in his place, what do you think I would do?--why, hide +myself at once in the greenest recesses of our Carnarvonshire +mountains." + +She must have gone to Wales, then. I had her own authority for +saying so. . . . And yet--Wales? Wales? I pulled myself up with +a jerk. In that case, how did she come to be passing by +Basingstoke? + +Was the postmark a blind? Had she hired someone to take the letter +somewhere for her, on purpose to put me off on a false track? I +could hardly think so. Besides, the time was against it. I saw +Hilda at Nathaniel's in the morning; the very same evening I +received the envelope with the Basingstoke postmark. + +"If I were in his place." Yes, true; but, now I come to think on +it, WERE the positions really parallel? Hilda was not flying for +her life from justice; she was only endeavouring to escape +Sebastian--and myself. The instances she had quoted of the +mountaineer's curious homing instinct--the wild yearning he feels +at moments of great straits to bury himself among the nooks of his +native hills--were they not all instances of murderers pursued by +the police? It was abject terror that drove these men to their +burrows. But Hilda was not a murderer; she was not dogged by +remorse, despair, or the myrmidons of the law; it was murder she +was avoiding, not the punishment of murder. That made, of course, +an obvious difference. "Irrevocably far from London," she said. +Wales is a suburb. I gave up the idea that it was likely to prove +her place of refuge from the two men she was bent on escaping. +Hong-Kong, after all, seemed more probable than Llanberis. + +That first failure gave me a clue, however, as to the best way of +applying Hilda's own methods. "What would such a person do under +the circumstances?" that was her way of putting the question. +Clearly, then, I must first decide what WERE the circumstances. +Was Sebastian speaking the truth? Was Hilda Wade, or was she not, +the daughter of the supposed murderer, Dr. Yorke-Bannerman? + +I looked up as much of the case as I could, in unobtrusive ways, +among the old law-reports, and found that the barrister who had had +charge of the defence was my father's old friend, Mr. Horace +Mayfield, a man of elegant tastes, and the means to gratify them. + +I went to call on him on Sunday evening at his artistically +luxurious house in Onslow Gardens. A sedate footman answered the +bell. Fortunately, Mr. Mayfield was at home, and, what is rarer, +disengaged. You do not always find a successful Q.C. at his ease +among his books, beneath the electric light, ready to give up a +vacant hour to friendly colloquy. + +"Remember Yorke-Bannerman's case?" he said, a huge smile breaking +slowly like a wave over his genial fat face--Horace Mayfield +resembles a great good-humoured toad, with bland manners and a +capacious double chin--"I should just say I DID! Bless my soul-- +why, yes," he beamed, "I was Yorke-Bannerman's counsel. Excellent +fellow, Yorke-Bannerman--most unfortunate end, though--precious +clever chap, too! Had an astounding memory. Recollected every +symptom of every patient he ever attended. And SUCH an eye! +Diagnosis? It was clairvoyance! A gift--no less. Knew what was +the matter with you the moment he looked at you." + +That sounded like Hilda. The same surprising power of recalling +facts; the same keen faculty for interpreting character or the +signs of feeling. "He poisoned somebody, I believe," I murmured, +casually. "An uncle of his, or something." + +Mayfield's great squat face wrinkled; the double chin, folding down +on the neck, became more ostentatiously double than ever. "Well, I +can't admit that," he said, in his suave voice, twirling the string +of his eye-glass. "I was Yorke-Bannerman's advocate, you see; and +therefore I was paid not to admit it. Besides, he was a friend of +mine, and I always liked him. But I WILL allow that the case DID +look a trifle black against him." + +"Ha? Looked black, did it?" I faltered. + +The judicious barrister shrugged his shoulders. A genial smile +spread oilily once more over his smooth face. "None of my business +to say so," he answered, puckering the corners of his eyes. +"Still, it was a long time ago; and the circumstances certainly +WERE suspicious. Perhaps, on the whole, Hubert, it was just as +well the poor fellow died before the trial came off; otherwise"--he +pouted his lips--"I might have had my work cut out to save him." +And he eyed the blue china gods on the mantelpiece affectionately. + +"I believe the Crown urged money as the motive?" I suggested. + +Mayfield glanced inquiry at me. "Now, why do you want to know all +this?" he asked, in a suspicious voice, coming back from his +dragons. "It is irregular, very, to worm information out of an +innocent barrister in his hours of ease about a former client. We +are a guileless race, we lawyers; don't abuse our confidence." + +He seemed an honest man, I thought, in spite of his mocking tone. +I trusted him, and made a clean breast of it. "I believe," I +answered, with an impressive little pause, "I want to marry Yorke- +Bannerman's daughter." + +He gave a quick start. "What, Maisie?" he exclaimed. + +I shook my head. "No, no; that is not the name," I replied. + +He hesitated a moment. "But there IS no other," he hazarded +cautiously at last. "I knew the family." + +"I am not sure of it," I went on. "I have merely my suspicions. I +am in love with a girl, and something about her makes me think she +is probably a Yorke-Bannerman." + +"But, my dear Hubert, if that is so," the great lawyer went on, +waving me off with one fat hand, "it must be at once apparent to +you that _I_ am the last person on earth to whom you ought to apply +for information. Remember my oath. The practice of our clan: the +seal of secrecy!" + +I was frank once more. "I do not know whether the lady I mean is +or is not Yorke-Bannerman's daughter," I persisted. "She may be, +and she may not. She gives another name--that's certain. But +whether she is or isn't, one thing I know--I mean to marry her. I +believe in her; I trust her. I only seek to gain this information +now because I don't know where she is--and I want to track her." + +He crossed his big hands with an air of Christian resignation, and +looked up at the panels of the coffered ceiling. "In that," he +answered, "I may honestly say, I can't help you. Humbug apart, I +have not known Mrs. Yorke-Bannerman's address--or Maisie's either-- +ever since my poor friend's death. Prudent woman, Mrs. Yorke- +Bannerman! She went away, I believe, to somewhere in North Wales, +and afterwards to Brittany. But she probably changed her name; +and--she did not confide in me." + +I went on to ask him a few questions about the case, premising that +I did so in the most friendly spirit. "Oh, I can only tell you +what is publicly known," he answered, beaming, with the usual +professional pretence of the most sphinx-like reticence. "But the +plain facts, as universally admitted, were these. I break no +confidence. Yorke-Bannerman had a rich uncle from whom he had +expectations--a certain Admiral Scott Prideaux. This uncle had +lately made a will in Yorke-Bannerman's favour; but he was a +cantankerous old chap--naval, you know--autocratic--crusty--given +to changing his mind with each change of the wind, and easily +offended by his relations--the sort of cheerful old party who makes +a new will once every month, disinheriting the nephew he last dined +with. Well, one day the Admiral was taken ill, at his own house, +and Yorke-Bannerman attended him. OUR contention was--I speak now +as my old friend's counsel--that Scott Prideaux, getting as tired +of life as we were all tired of him, and weary of this recurrent +worry of will-making, determined at last to clear out for good from +a world where he was so little appreciated, and, therefore, tried +to poison himself." + +"With aconitine?" I suggested, eagerly. + +"Unfortunately, yes; he made use of aconitine for that otherwise +laudable purpose. Now, as ill luck would have it"--Mayfield's +wrinkles deepened--"Yorke-Bannerman and Sebastian, then two rising +doctors engaged in physiological researches together, had just been +occupied in experimenting upon this very drug--testing the use of +aconitine. Indeed, you will no doubt remember"--he crossed his fat +hands again comfortably--"it was these precise researches on a then +little-known poison that first brought Sebastian prominently before +the public. What was the consequence?" His smooth, persuasive +voice flowed on as if I were a concentrated jury. "The Admiral +grew rapidly worse, and insisted upon calling in a second opinion. +No doubt he didn't like the aconitine when it came to the pinch-- +for it DOES pinch, I can tell you--and repented him of his evil. +Yorke-Bannerman suggested Sebastian as the second opinion; the +uncle acquiesced; Sebastian was called in, and, of course, being +fresh from his researches, immediately recognised the symptoms of +aconitine poisoning." + +"What! Sebastian found it out?" I cried, starting. + +"Oh, yes! Sebastian. He watched the case from that point to the +end; and the oddest part of it all was this--that though he +communicated with the police, and himself prepared every morsel of +food that the poor old Admiral took from that moment forth, the +symptoms continually increased in severity. The police contention +was that Yorke-Bannerman somehow managed to put the stuff into the +milk beforehand; my own theory was--as counsel for the accused"--he +blinked his fat eyes--"that old Prideaux had concealed a large +quantity of aconitine in the bed, before his illness, and went on +taking it from time to time--just to spite his nephew." + +"And you BELIEVE that, Mr. Mayfield?" + +The broad smile broke concentrically in ripples over the great +lawyer's face. His smile was Mayfield's main feature. He shrugged +his shoulders and expanded his big hands wide open before him. +"My dear Hubert," he said, with a most humorous expression of +countenance, "you are a professional man yourself; therefore you +know that every profession has its own little courtesies--its own +small fictions. I was Yorke-Bannerman's counsel, as well as his +friend. 'Tis a point of honour with us that no barrister will ever +admit a doubt as to a client's innocence--is he not paid to +maintain it?--and to my dying day I will constantly maintain that +old Prideaux poisoned himself. Maintain it with that dogged and +meaningless obstinacy with which we always cling to whatever is +least provable. . . . Oh, yes! He poisoned himself; and Yorke- +Bannerman was innocent. . . . But still, you know, it WAS the sort +of case where an acute lawyer, with a reputation to make, would +prefer to be for the Crown rather than for the prisoner." + +"But it was never tried," I ejaculated. + +"No, happily for us, it was never tried. Fortune favoured us. +Yorke-Bannerman had a weak heart, a conveniently weak heart, which +the inquest sorely affected; and besides, he was deeply angry at +what he persisted in calling Sebastian's defection. He evidently +thought Sebastian ought to have stood by him. His colleague +preferred the claims of public duty--as he understood them, I mean-- +to those of private friendship. It was a very sad case--for +Yorke-Bannerman was really a charming fellow. But I confess I WAS +relieved when he died unexpectedly on the morning of his arrest. +It took off my shoulders a most serious burden." + +"You think, then, the case would have gone against him?" + +"My dear Hubert," his whole face puckered with an indulgent smile, +"of course the case must have gone against us. Juries are fools; +but they are not such fools as to swallow everything--like +ostriches: to let me throw dust in their eyes about so plain an +issue. Consider the facts, consider them impartially. Yorke- +Bannerman had easy access to aconitine; had whole ounces of it in +his possession; he treated the uncle from whom he was to inherit; +he was in temporary embarrassments--that came out at the inquest; +it was known that the Admiral had just made a twenty-third will in +his favour, and that the Admiral's wills were liable to alteration +every time a nephew ventured upon an opinion in politics, religion, +science, navigation, or the right card at whist, differing by a +shade from that of the uncle. The Admiral died of aconitine +poisoning; and Sebastian observed and detailed the symptoms. Could +anything be plainer--I mean, could any combination of fortuitous +circumstances"--he blinked pleasantly again--"be more adverse to an +advocate sincerely convinced of his client's innocence--as a +professional duty?" And he gazed at me comically. + +The more he piled up the case against the man who I now felt sure +was Hilda's father, the less did I believe him. A dark conspiracy +seemed to loom up in the background. "Has it ever occurred to +you," I asked, at last, in a very tentative tone, "that perhaps--I +throw out the hint as the merest suggestion--perhaps it may have +been Sebastian who--" + +He smiled this time till I thought his smile would swallow him. + +"If Yorke-Bannerman had NOT been my client," he mused aloud, "I +might have been inclined to suspect rather that Sebastian aided him +to avoid justice by giving him something violent to take, if he +wished it: something which might accelerate the inevitable action +of the heart-disease from which he was suffering. Isn't THAT more +likely?" + +I saw there was nothing further to be got out of Mayfield. His +opinion was fixed; he was a placid ruminant. But he had given me +already much food for thought. I thanked him for his assistance, +and returned on foot to my rooms at the hospital. + +I was now, however, in a somewhat different position for tracking +Hilda from that which I occupied before my interview with the +famous counsel. I felt certain by this time that Hilda Wade and +Maisie Yorke-Bannerman were one and the same person. To be sure, +it gave me a twinge to think that Hilda should be masquerading +under an assumed name; but I waived that question for the moment, +and awaited her explanations. The great point now was to find +Hilda. She was flying from Sebastian to mature a new plan. But +whither? I proceeded to argue it out on her own principles; oh, +how lamely! The world is still so big! Mauritius, the Argentine, +British Columbia, New Zealand! + +The letter I had received bore the Basingstoke postmark. Now a +person may be passing Basingstoke on his way either to Southampton +or Plymouth, both of which are ports of embarcation for various +foreign countries. I attached importance to that clue. Something +about the tone of Hilda's letter made me realise that she intended +to put the sea between us. In concluding so much, I felt sure I +was not mistaken. Hilda had too big and too cosmopolitan a mind to +speak of being "irrevocably far from London," if she were only +going to some town in England, or even to Normandy, or the Channel +Islands. "Irrevocably far" pointed rather to a destination outside +Europe altogether--to India, Africa, America: not to Jersey, +Dieppe, or Saint-Malo. + +Was it Southampton or Plymouth to which she was first bound?--that +was the next question. I inclined to Southampton. For the +sprawling lines (so different from her usual neat hand) were +written hurriedly in a train, I could see; and, on consulting +Bradshaw, I found that the Plymouth expresses stop longest at +Salisbury, where Hilda would, therefore, have been likely to post +her note if she were going to the far west; while some of the +Southampton trains stop at Basingstoke, which is, indeed, the most +convenient point on that route for sending off a letter. This was +mere blind guesswork, to be sure, compared with Hilda's immediate +and unerring intuition; but it had some probability in its favour, +at any rate. Try both: of the two, she was likelier to be going to +Southampton. + +My next move was to consult the list of outgoing steamers. Hilda +had left London on a Saturday morning. Now, on alternate +Saturdays, the steamers of the Castle line sail from Southampton, +where they call to take up passengers and mails. Was this one of +those alternate Saturdays? I looked at the list of dates: it was. +That told further in favour of Southampton. But did any steamer of +any passenger line sail from Plymouth on the same day? None, that +I could find. Or from Southampton elsewhere? I looked them all +up. The Royal Mail Company's boats start on Wednesdays; the North +German Lloyd's on Wednesdays and Sundays. Those were the only +likely vessels I could discover. Either, then, I concluded, Hilda +meant to sail on Saturday by the Castle line for South Africa, or +else on Sunday by North German Lloyd for some part of America. + +How I longed for one hour of Hilda to help me out with her almost +infallible instinct. I realised how feeble and fallacious was my +own groping in the dark. Her knowledge of temperament would have +revealed to her at once what I was trying to discover, like the +police she despised, by the clumsy "clues" which so roused her +sarcasm. + +However, I went to bed and slept on it. Next morning I determined +to set out for Southampton on a tour of inquiry to all the +steamboat agencies. If that failed, I could go on to Plymouth. + +But, as chance would have it, the morning post brought me an +unexpected letter, which helped me not a little in unravelling the +problem. It was a crumpled letter, written on rather soiled paper, +in an uneducated hand, and it bore, like Hilda's, the Basingstoke +postmark. + + +"Charlotte Churtwood sends her duty to Dr. Cumberledge," it said, +with somewhat uncertain spelling, "and I am very sorry that I was +not able to Post the letter to you in London, as the lady ast me, +but after her train ad left has I was stepping into mine the Ingine +started and I was knocked down and badly hurt and the lady gave me +a half-sovering to Post it in London has soon as I got there but +bein unable to do so I now return it dear sir not knowing the +lady's name and adress she having trusted me through seeing me on +the platform, and perhaps you can send it back to her, and was very +sorry I could not Post it were she ast me, but time bein an objeck +put it in the box in Basingstoke station and now inclose post +office order for ten Shillings whitch dear sir kindly let the young +lady have from your obedient servant, + +"CHARLOTTE CHURTWOOD." + + +In the corner was the address: "11, Chubb's Cottages, Basingstoke." + +The happy accident of this letter advanced things for me greatly-- +though it also made me feel how dependent I was upon happy +accidents, where Hilda would have guessed right at once by mere +knowledge of character. Still, the letter explained many things +which had hitherto puzzled me. I had felt not a little surprise +that Hilda, wishing to withdraw from me and leave no traces, should +have sent off her farewell letter from Basingstoke--so as to let me +see at once in what direction she was travelling. Nay, I even +wondered at times whether she had really posted it herself at +Basingstoke, or given it to somebody who chanced to be going there +to post for her as a blind. But I did not think she would +deliberately deceive me; and, in my opinion, to get a letter posted +at Basingstoke would be deliberate deception, while to get it +posted in London was mere vague precaution. I understood now that +she had written it in the train, and then picked out a likely +person as she passed to take it to Waterloo for her. + +Of course, I went straight down to Basingstoke, and called at once +at Chubb's Cottages. It was a squalid little row on the outskirts +of the town. I found Charlotte Churtwood herself exactly such a +girl as Hilda, with her quick judgment of character, might have hit +upon for such a purpose. She was a conspicuously honest and +transparent country servant, of the lumpy type, on her way to +London to take a place as housemaid. Her injuries were severe, but +not dangerous. "The lady saw me on the platform," she said, "and +beckoned to me to come to her. She ast me where I was going, and I +says, 'To London, miss.' Says she, smiling kind-like, 'Could you +post a letter for me, certain sure?' Says I, 'You can depend upon +me.' An' then she give me the arf-sovering, an' says, says she, +'Mind, it's VERY par-tickler; if the gentleman don't get it, 'e'll +fret 'is 'eart out.' An' through 'aving a young man o' my own, as +is a groom at Andover, o' course I understood 'er, sir. An' then, +feeling all full of it, as yu may say, what with the arf-sovering, +and what with one thing and what with another, an' all of a fluster +with not being used to travelling, I run up, when the train for +London come in, an' tried to scramble into it, afore it 'ad quite +stopped moving. An' a guard, 'e rushes up, an' 'Stand back!' says +'e; 'wait till the train stops,' says 'e, an' waves his red flag at +me. But afore I could stand back, with one foot on the step, the +train sort of jumped away from me, and knocked me down like this; +and they say it'll be a week now afore I'm well enough to go on to +London. But I posted the letter all the same, at Basingstoke +station, as they was carrying me off; an' I took down the address, +so as to return the arf-sovering." Hilda was right, as always. +She had chosen instinctively the trustworthy person,--chosen her at +first sight, and hit the bull's-eye. + +"Do you know what train the lady was in?" I asked, as she paused. +"Where was it going, did you notice?" + +"It was the Southampton train, sir. I saw the board on the +carriage." + +That settled the question. "You are a good and an honest girl," I +said, pulling out my purse; "and you came to this misfortune +through trying--too eagerly--to help the young lady. A ten-pound +note is not overmuch as compensation for your accident. Take it, +and get well. I should be sorry to think you lost a good place +through your anxiety to help us." + +The rest of my way was plain sailing now. I hurried on straight to +Southampton. There my first visit was to the office of the Castle +line. I went to the point at once. Was there a Miss Wade among +the passengers by the Dunottar Castle? + +No; nobody of that name on the list. + +Had any lady taken a passage at the last moment? + +The clerk perpended. Yes; a lady had come by the mail train from +London, with no heavy baggage, and had gone on board direct, taking +what cabin she could get. A young lady in grey. Quite unprepared. +Gave no name. Called away in a hurry. + +What sort of lady? + +Youngish; good-looking; brown hair and eyes, the clerk thought; a +sort of creamy skin; and a--well, a mesmeric kind of glance that +seemed to go right through you. + +"That will do," I answered, sure now of my quarry. "To which port +did she book?" + +"To Cape Town." + +"Very well," I said, promptly. "You may reserve me a good berth in +the next outgoing steamer." + +It was just like Hilda's impulsive character to rush off in this +way at a moment's notice; and just like mine to follow her. But it +piqued me a little to think that, but for the accident of an +accident, I might never have tracked her down. If the letter had +been posted in London as she intended, and not at Basingstoke, I +might have sought in vain for her from then till Doomsday. + +Ten days later, I was afloat on the Channel, bound for South +Africa. + +I always admired Hilda's astonishing insight into character and +motive; but I never admired it quite so profoundly as on the +glorious day when we arrived at Cape Town. I was standing on deck, +looking out for the first time in my life on that tremendous view-- +the steep and massive bulk of Table Mountain,--a mere lump of rock, +dropped loose from the sky, with the long white town spread +gleaming at its base, and the silver-tree plantations that cling to +its lower slopes and merge by degrees into gardens and vineyards-- +when a messenger from the shore came up to me tentatively. + +"Dr. Cumberledge?" he said, in an inquiring tone. + +I nodded. "That is my name." + +"I have a letter for you, sir." + +I took it, in great surprise. Who on earth in Cape Town could have +known I was coming? I had not a friend to my knowledge in the +colony. I glanced at the envelope. My wonder deepened. That +prescient brain! It was Hilda's handwriting. + +I tore it open and read: + + +"MY DEAR HUBERT,--I KNOW you will come; I KNOW you will follow me. +So I am leaving this letter at Donald Currie & Co.'s office, giving +their agent instructions to hand it to you as soon as you reach +Cape Town. I am quite sure you will track me so far at least; I +understand your temperament. But I beg you, I implore you, to go +no further. You will ruin my plan if you do. And I still adhere +to it. It is good of you to come so far; I cannot blame you for +that. I know your motives. But do not try to find me out. I warn +you, beforehand, it will be quite useless. I have made up my mind. +I have an object in life, and, dear as you are to me--THAT I will +not pretend to deny--I can never allow even YOU to interfere with +it. So be warned in time. Go back quietly by the next steamer. + +"Your ever attached and grateful, + +"HILDA." + + +I read it twice through with a little thrill of joy. Did any man +ever court so strange a love? Her very strangeness drew me. But +go back by the next steamer! I felt sure of one thing: Hilda was +far too good a judge of character to believe that I was likely to +obey that mandate. + +I will not trouble you with the remaining stages of my quest. +Except for the slowness of South African mail coaches, they were +comparatively easy. It is not so hard to track strangers in Cape +Town as strangers in London. I followed Hilda to her hotel, and +from her hotel up country, stage after stage--jolted by rail, worse +jolted by mule-waggon--inquiring, inquiring, inquiring--till I +learned at last she was somewhere in Rhodesia. + +That is a big address; but it does not cover as many names as it +covers square miles. In time I found her. Still, it took time; +and before we met, Hilda had had leisure to settle down quietly to +her new existence. People in Rhodesia had noted her coming, as a +new portent, because of one strange peculiarity. She was the only +woman of means who had ever gone up of her own free will to +Rhodesia. Other women had gone there to accompany their husbands, +or to earn their livings; but that a lady should freely select that +half-baked land as a place of residence--a lady of position, with +all the world before her where to choose--that puzzled the +Rhodesians. So she was a marked person. Most people solved the +vexed problem, indeed, by suggesting that she had designs against +the stern celibacy of a leading South African politician. "Depend +upon it," they said, "it's Rhodes she's after." The moment I +arrived at Salisbury, and stated my object in coming, all the world +in the new town was ready to assist me. The lady was to be found +(vaguely speaking) on a young farm to the north--a budding farm, +whose general direction was expansively indicated to me by a wave +of the arm, with South African uncertainty. + +I bought a pony at Salisbury--a pretty little seasoned sorrel mare-- +and set out to find Hilda. My way lay over a brand-new road, or +what passes for a road in South Africa--very soft and lumpy, like +an English cart-track. I am a fair cross-country rider in our own +Midlands, but I never rode a more tedious journey than that one. I +had crawled several miles under a blazing sun along the shadeless +new track, on my African pony, when, to my surprise I saw, of all +sights in the world, a bicycle coming towards me. + +I could hardly believe my eyes. Civilisation indeed! A bicycle in +these remotest wilds of Africa! + +I had been picking my way for some hours through a desolate +plateau--the high veldt--about five thousand feet above the sea +level, and entirely treeless. In places, to be sure, a few low +bushes of prickly aspect rose in tangled clumps; but for the most +part the arid table-land was covered by a thick growth of short +brown grass, about nine inches high, burnt up in the sun, and most +wearisome to look at. The distressing nakedness of a new country +confronted me. Here and there a bald farm or two had been +literally pegged out--the pegs were almost all one saw of them as +yet; the fields were in the future. Here and there, again, a +scattered range of low granite hills, known locally as kopjes--red, +rocky prominences, flaunting in the sunshine--diversified the +distance. But the road itself, such as it was, lay all on the high +plain, looking down now and again into gorges or kloofs, wooded on +their slopes with scrubby trees, and comparatively well-watered. +In the midst of all this crude, unfinished land, the mere sight of +a bicycle, bumping over the rubbly road, was a sufficient surprise; +but my astonishment reached a climax when I saw, as it drew near, +that it was ridden by a woman! + +One moment later I had burst into a wild cry, and rode forward to +her hurriedly. "Hilda!" I shouted aloud, in my excitement: +"Hilda!" + +She stepped lightly from her pedals, as if it had been in the park: +head erect and proud; eyes liquid, lustrous. I dismounted, +trembling, and stood beside her. In the wild joy of the moment, +for the first time in my life, I kissed her fervently. Hilda took +the kiss, unreproving. She did not attempt to refuse me. + +"So you have come at last!" she murmured, with a glow on her face, +half nestling towards me, half withdrawing, as if two wills tore +her in different directions. "I have been expecting you for some +days; and, somehow, to-day, I was almost certain you were coming!" + +"Then you are not angry with me?" I cried. "You remember, you +forbade me!" + +"Angry with you? Dear Hubert, could I ever be angry with you, +especially for thus showing me your devotion and your trust? I am +never angry with you. When one knows, one understands. I have +thought of you so often; sometimes, alone here in this raw new +land, I have longed for you to come. It is inconsistent of me, of +course; but I am so solitary, so lonely!" + +"And yet you begged me not to follow you!" + +She looked up at me shyly--I was not accustomed to see Hilda shy. +Her eyes gazed deep into mine beneath the long, soft lashes. "I +begged you not to follow me," she repeated, a strange gladness in +her tone. "Yes, dear Hubert, I begged you--and I meant it. Cannot +you understand that sometimes one hopes a thing may never happen-- +and is supremely happy because it happens, in spite of one? I have +a purpose in life for which I live: I live for it still. For its +sake I told you you must not come to me. Yet you HAVE come, +against my orders; and--" she paused, and drew a deep sigh--"oh, +Hubert, I thank you for daring to disobey me!" + +I clasped her to my bosom. She allowed me, half resisting. "I am +too weak," she murmured. "Only this morning, I made up my mind +that when I saw you I would implore you to return at once. And now +that you are here--" she laid her little hand confidingly in mine-- +"see how foolish I am!--I cannot dismiss you." + +"Which means to say, Hilda, that, after all, you are still a +woman!" + +"A woman; oh, yes; very much a woman! Hubert, I love you; I half +wish I did not." + +"Why, darling?" I drew her to me. + +"Because--if I did not, I could send you away--so easily! As it +is--I cannot let you stop--and . . . I cannot dismiss you." + +"Then divide it," I cried gaily; "do neither; come away with me!" + +"No, no; nor that, either. I will not stultify my whole past life. +I will not dishonour my dear father's memory." + +I looked around for something to which to tether my horse. A +bridle is in one's way--when one has to discuss important business. +There was really nothing about that seemed fit for the purpose. +Hilda saw what I sought, and pointed mutely to a stunted bush +beside a big granite boulder which rose abruptly from the dead +level of the grass, affording a little shade from that sweltering +sunlight. I tied my mare to the gnarled root--it was the only part +big enough--and sat down by Hilda's side, under the shadow of a +great rock in a thirsty land. I realised at that moment the force +and appropriateness of the Psalmist's simile. The sun beat +fiercely on the seeding grasses. Away on the southern horizon we +could faintly perceive the floating yellow haze of the prairie +fires lit by the Mashonas. + +"Then you knew I would come?" I began, as she seated herself on the +burnt-up herbage, while my hand stole into hers, to nestle there +naturally. + +She pressed it in return. "Oh, yes; I knew you would come," she +answered, with that strange ring of confidence in her voice. "Of +course you got my letter at Cape Town?" + +"I did, Hilda--and I wondered at you more than ever as I read it. +But if you KNEW I would come, why write to prevent me?" + +Her eyes had their mysterious far-away air. She looked out upon +infinity. "Well, I wanted to do my best to turn you aside," she +said, slowly. "One must always do one's best, even when one feels +and believes it is useless. That surely is the first clause in a +doctor's or a nurse's rubric." + +"But WHY didn't you want me to come?" I persisted. "Why fight +against your own heart? Hilda, I am sure--I KNOW you love me." + +Her bosom rose and fell. Her eyes dilated. "Love you?" she cried, +looking away over the bushy ridges, as if afraid to trust herself. +"Oh, yes, Hubert, I love you! It is not for that that I wish to +avoid you. Or, rather, it is just because of that. I cannot +endure to spoil your life--by a fruitless affection." + +"Why fruitless?" I asked, leaning forward. + +She crossed her hands resignedly. "You know all by this time," she +answered. "Sebastian would tell you, of course, when you went to +announce that you were leaving Nathaniel's. He could not do +otherwise; it is the outcome of his temperament--an integral part +of his nature." + +"Hilda," I cried, "you are a witch! How COULD you know that? I +can't imagine." + +She smiled her restrained, Chaldean smile. "Because I KNOW +Sebastian," she answered, quietly. I can read that man to the +core. He is simple as a book. His composition is plain, +straightforward, quite natural, uniform. There are no twists and +turns in him. Once learn the key, and it discloses everything, +like an open sesame. He has a gigantic intellect, a burning thirst +for knowledge; one love, one hobby--science; and no moral +instincts. He goes straight for his ends; and whatever comes in +his way," she dug her little heel in the brown soil, "he tramples +on it as ruthlessly as a child will trample on a worm or a beetle." + +"And yet," I said, "he is so great." + +"Yes, great, I grant you; but the easiest character to unravel that +I have ever met. It is calm, austere, unbending, yet not in the +least degree complex. He has the impassioned temperament, pushed +to its highest pitch; the temperament that runs deep, with +irresistible force; but the passion that inspires him, that carries +him away headlong, as love carries some men, is a rare and abstract +one--the passion of science." + +I gazed at her as she spoke, with a feeling akin to awe. "It must +destroy the plot-interest of life for you, Hilda," I cried--out +there in the vast void of that wild African plateau--"to foresee so +well what each person will do--how each will act under such given +circumstances." + +She pulled a bent of grass and plucked off its dry spikelets one by +one. "Perhaps so," she answered, after a meditative pause; +"though, of course, all natures are not equally simple. Only with +great souls can you be sure beforehand like that, for good or for +evil. It is essential to anything worth calling character that one +should be able to predict in what way it will act under given +circumstances--to feel certain, 'This man will do nothing small or +mean,' 'That one could never act dishonestly, or speak deceitfully.' +But smaller natures are more complex. They defy analysis, because +their motives are not consistent." + +"Most people think to be complex is to be great," I objected. + +She shook her head. "That is quite a mistake," she answered. +"Great natures are simple, and relatively predictable, since their +motives balance one another justly. Small natures are complex, and +hard to predict, because small passions, small jealousies, small +discords and perturbations come in at all moments, and override for +a time the permanent underlying factors of character. Great +natures, good or bad, are equably poised; small natures let petty +motives intervene to upset their balance." + +"Then you knew I would come," I exclaimed, half pleased to find I +belonged inferentially to her higher category. + +Her eyes beamed on me with a beautiful light. "Knew you would +come? Oh, yes. I begged you not to come; but I felt sure you were +too deeply in earnest to obey me. I asked a friend in Cape Town to +telegraph your arrival; and almost ever since the telegram reached +me I have been expecting you and awaiting you." + +"So you believed in me?" + +"Implicitly--as you in me. That is the worst of it, Hubert. If +you did NOT believe in me, I could have told you all--and then, you +would have left me. But, as it is, you KNOW all--and yet, you want +to cling to me." + +"You know I know all--because Sebastian told me?" + +"Yes; and I think I even know how you answered him." + +"How?" + +She paused. The calm smile lighted up her face once more. Then +she drew out a pencil. "You think life must lack plot-interest for +me," she began, slowly, "because, with certain natures, I can +partially guess beforehand what is coming. But have you not +observed that, in reading a novel, part of the pleasure you feel +arises from your conscious anticipation of the end, and your +satisfaction in seeing that you anticipated correctly? Or part, +sometimes, from the occasional unexpectedness of the real +denouement? Well, life is like that. I enjoy observing my +successes, and, in a way, my failures. Let me show you what I +mean. I think I know what you said to Sebastian--not the words, of +course, but the purport; and I will write it down now for you. Set +down YOUR version, too. And then we will compare them." + +It was a crucial test. We both wrote for a minute or two. +Somehow, in Hilda's presence, I forgot at once the strangeness of +the scene, the weird oddity of the moment. That sombre plain +disappeared for me. I was only aware that I was with Hilda once +more--and therefore in Paradise. Pison and Gihon watered the +desolate land. Whatever she did seemed to me supremely right. If +she had proposed to me to begin a ponderous work on Medical +Jurisprudence, under the shadow of the big rock, I should have +begun it incontinently. + +She handed me her slip of paper; I took it and read: "Sebastian +told you I was Dr. Yorke-Bannerman's daughter. And you answered, +'If so, Yorke-Bannerman was innocent, and YOU are the poisoner.' +Is not that correct?" + +I handed her in answer my own paper. She read it with a faint +flush. When she came to the words: "Either she is not Yorke- +Bannerman's daughter; or else, Yorke-Bannerman was not a poisoner, +and someone else was--I might put a name to him," she rose to her +feet with a great rush of long-suppressed feeling, and clasped me +passionately. "My Hubert!" she cried, "I read you aright. I knew +it! I was sure of you!" + +I folded her in my arms, there, on the rusty-red South African +desert. "Then, Hilda dear," I murmured, "you will consent to marry +me?" + +The words brought her back to herself. She unfolded my arms with +slow reluctance. "No, dearest," she said, earnestly, with a face +where pride fought hard against love. "That is WHY, above all +things, I did not want you to follow me. I love you; I trust you: +you love me; you trust me. But I never will marry anyone till I +have succeeded in clearing my father's memory. I KNOW he did not +do it; I KNOW Sebastian did. But that is not enough. I must prove +it, I must prove it!" + +"I believe it already," I answered. "What need, then, to prove +it?" + +"To you, Hubert? Oh, no; not to you. There I am safe. But to the +world that condemned him--condemned him untried. I must vindicate +him; I must clear him!" + +I bent my face close to hers. "But may I not marry you first?" I +asked--"and after that, I can help you to clear him." + +She gazed at me fearlessly. "No, no!" she cried, clasping her +hands; "much as I love you, dear Hubert, I cannot consent to it. I +am too proud!--too proud! I will not allow the world to say--not +even to say falsely"--her face flushed crimson; her voice dropped +low--"I will not allow them to say those hateful words, 'He married +a murderer's daughter.'" + +I bowed my head. "As you will, my darling," I answered. "I am +content to wait. I trust you in this, too. Some day, we will +prove it." + +And all this time, preoccupied as I was with these deeper concerns, +I had not even asked where Hilda lived, or what she was doing! + + + +CHAPTER VII + +THE EPISODE OF THE STONE THAT LOOKED ABOUT IT + + +Hilda took me back with her to the embryo farm where she had +pitched her tent for the moment; a rough, wild place. It lay close +to the main road from Salisbury to Chimoio. + +Setting aside the inevitable rawness and newness of all things +Rhodesian, however, the situation itself was not wholly +unpicturesque. A ramping rock or tor of granite, which I should +judge at a rough guess to extend to an acre in size, sprang +abruptly from the brown grass of the upland plain. It rose like a +huge boulder. Its summit was crowned by the covered grave of some +old Kaffir chief--a rude cairn of big stones under a thatched +awning. At the foot of this jagged and cleft rock the farmhouse +nestled--four square walls of wattle-and-daub, sheltered by its +mass from the sweeping winds of the South African plateau. A +stream brought water from a spring close by: in front of the house-- +rare sight in that thirsty land--spread a garden of flowers. It +was an oasis in the desert. But the desert itself stretched grimly +all round. I could never quite decide how far the oasis was caused +by the water from the spring, and how far by Hilda's presence. + +"Then you live here?" I cried, gazing round--my voice, I suppose, +betraying my latent sense of the unworthiness of the position. + +"For the present," Hilda answered, smiling. "You know, Hubert, I +have no abiding city anywhere, till my Purpose is fulfilled. I +came here because Rhodesia seemed the farthest spot on earth where +a white woman just now could safely penetrate--in order to get away +from you and Sebastian." + +"That is an unkind conjunction!" I exclaimed, reddening. + +"But I mean it," she answered, with a wayward little nod. "I +wanted breathing-space to form fresh plans. I wanted to get clear +away for a time from all who knew me. And this promised best. . . . +But nowadays, really, one is never safe from intrusion anywhere." + +"You are cruel, Hilda!" + +"Oh, no. You deserve it. I asked you not to come--and you came in +spite of me. I have treated you very nicely under the circumstances, +I think. I have behaved like an angel. The question is now, what +ought I to do next? You have upset my plans so." + +"Upset your plans? How?" + +"Dear Hubert,"--she turned to me with an indulgent smile,--"for a +clever man, you are really TOO foolish! Can't you see that you +have betrayed my whereabouts to Sebastian? _I_ crept away +secretly, like a thief in the night, giving no name or place; and, +having the world to ransack, he might have found it hard to track +me; for HE had not YOUR clue of the Basingstoke letter--nor your +reason for seeking me. But now that YOU have followed me openly, +with your name blazoned forth in the company's passenger-lists, and +your traces left plain in hotels and stages across the map of South +Africa--why, the spoor is easy. If Sebastian cares to find us, he +can follow the scent all through without trouble." + +"I never thought of that!" I cried, aghast. + +She was forbearance itself. "No, I knew you would never think of +it. You are a man, you see. I counted that in. I was afraid from +the first you would wreck all by following me." + +I was mutely penitent. "And yet, you forgive me, Hilda?" + +Her eyes beamed tenderness. "To know all, is to forgive all," she +answered. "I have to remind you of that so often! How can I help +forgiving, when I know WHY you came--what spur it was that drove +you? But it is the future we have to think of now, not the past. +And I must wait and reflect. I have NO plan just at present." + +"What are you doing at this farm?" I gazed round at it, +dissatisfied. + +"I board here," Hilda answered, amused at my crestfallen face. +"But, of course, I cannot be idle; so I have found work to do. I +ride out on my bicycle to two or three isolated houses about, and +give lessons to children in this desolate place, who would +otherwise grow up ignorant. It fills my time, and supplies me with +something besides myself to think about." + +"And what am _I_ to do?" I cried, oppressed with a sudden sense of +helplessness. + +She laughed at me outright. "And is this the first moment that +that difficulty has occurred to you?" she asked, gaily. "You have +hurried all the way from London to Rhodesia without the slightest +idea of what you mean to do now you have got here?" + +I laughed at myself in turn. "Upon my word, Hilda," I cried, "I +set out to find you. Beyond the desire to find you, I had no plan +in my head. That was an end in itself. My thoughts went no +farther." + +She gazed at me half saucily. "Then don't you think, sir, the best +thing you can do, now you HAVE found me, is--to turn back and go +home again?" + +"I am a man," I said, promptly, taking a firm stand. "And you are +a judge of character. If you really mean to tell me you think THAT +likely--well, I shall have a lower opinion of your insight into men +than I have been accustomed to harbour." + +Her smile was not wholly without a touch of triumph. + +"In that case," she went on, "I suppose the only alternative is for +you to remain here." + +"That would appear to be logic," I replied. "But what can I do? +Set up in practice?" + +"I don't see much opening," she answered. "If you ask my advice, I +should say there is only one thing to be done in Rhodesia just now-- +turn farmer." + +"It IS done," I answered, with my usual impetuosity. "Since YOU +say the word, I am a farmer already. I feel an interest in oats +that is simply absorbing. What steps ought I to take first in my +present condition?" + +She looked at me, all brown with the dust of my long ride. "I +would suggest," she said slowly, "a good wash, and some dinner." + +"Hilda," I cried, surveying my boots, or what was visible of them, +"that is REALLY clever of you. A wash and some dinner! So +practical, so timely! The very thing! I will see to it." + +Before night fell, I had arranged everything. I was to buy the +next farm from the owner of the one where Hilda lodged; I was also +to learn the rudiments of South African agriculture from him for a +valuable consideration; and I was to lodge in his house while my +own was building. He gave me his views on the cultivation of oats. +He gave them at some length--more length than perspicuity. I knew +nothing about oats, save that they were employed in the manufacture +of porridge--which I detest; but I was to be near Hilda once more, +and I was prepared to undertake the superintendence of the oat from +its birth to its reaping if only I might be allowed to live so +close to Hilda. + +The farmer and his wife were Boers, but they spoke English. Mr. +Jan Willem Klaas himself was a fine specimen of the breed--tall, +erect, broad-shouldered, and genial. Mrs. Klaas, his wife, was +mainly suggestive, in mind and person, of suet-pudding. There was +one prattling little girl of three years old, by name Sannie, a +most engaging child; and also a chubby baby. + +"You are betrothed, of course?" Mrs. Klaas said to Hilda before me, +with the curious tactlessness of her race, when we made our first +arrangement. + +Hilda's face flushed. "No; we are nothing to one another," she +answered--which was only true formally. "Dr. Cumberledge had a +post at the same hospital in London where I was a nurse; and he +thought he would like to try Rhodesia. That is all." + +Mrs. Klaas gazed from one to other of us suspiciously. "You +English are strange!" she answered, with a complacent little shrug. +"But there--from Europe! Your ways, we know, are different." + +Hilda did not attempt to explain. It would have been impossible to +make the good soul understand. Her horizon was so simple. She was +a harmless housewife, given mostly to dyspepsia and the care of her +little ones. Hilda had won her heart by unfeigned admiration for +the chubby baby. To a mother, that covers a multitude of +eccentricities, such as one expects to find in incomprehensible +English. Mrs. Klaas put up with me because she liked Hilda. + +We spent some months together on Klaas's farm. It was a dreary +place, save for Hilda. The bare daub-and-wattle walls; the clumps +of misshapen and dusty prickly-pears that girt round the thatched +huts of the Kaffir workpeople; the stone-penned sheep-kraals, and +the corrugated iron roof of the bald stable for the waggon oxen-- +all was as crude and ugly as a new country can make things. It +seemed to me a desecration that Hilda should live in such an +unfinished land--Hilda, whom I imagined as moving by nature through +broad English parks, with Elizabethan cottages and immemorial oaks-- +Hilda, whose proper atmosphere seemed to be one of coffee-coloured +laces, ivy-clad abbeys, lichen-incrusted walls--all that is +beautiful and gracious in time-honoured civilisations. + +Nevertheless, we lived on there in a meaningless sort of way--I +hardly knew why. To me it was a puzzle. When I asked Hilda, she +shook her head with her sibylline air and answered, confidently: +"You do not understand Sebastian as well as I do. We have to wait +for HIM. The next move is his. Till he plays his piece, I cannot +tell how I may have to checkmate him." + +So we waited for Sebastian to advance a pawn. Meanwhile, I toyed +with South African farming--not very successfully, I must admit. +Nature did not design me for growing oats. I am no judge of oxen, +and my views on the feeding of Kaffir sheep raised broad smiles on +the black faces of my Mashona labourers. + +I still lodged at Tant Mettie's, as everybody called Mrs. Klaas; +she was courtesy aunt to the community at large, while Oom Jan +Willem was its courtesy uncle. They were simple, homely folk, who +lived up to their religious principles on an unvaried diet of +stewed ox-beef and bread; they suffered much from chronic +dyspepsia, due in part, at least, no doubt, to the monotony of +their food, their life, their interests. One could hardly believe +one was still in the nineteenth century; these people had the calm, +the local seclusion of the prehistoric epoch. For them, Europe did +not exist; they knew it merely as a place where settlers came from. +What the Czar intended, what the Kaiser designed, never disturbed +their rest. A sick ox, a rattling tile on the roof, meant more to +their lives than war in Europe. The one break in the sameness of +their daily routine was family prayers; the one weekly event, going +to church at Salisbury. Still, they had a single enthusiasm. Like +everybody else for fifty miles around, they believed profoundly in +the "future of Rhodesia." When I gazed about me at the raw new +land--the weary flat of red soil and brown grasses--I felt at least +that, with a present like that, it had need of a future. + +I am not by disposition a pioneer; I belong instinctively to the +old civilisations. In the midst of rudimentary towns and incipient +fields, I yearn for grey houses, a Norman church, an English +thatched cottage. + +However, for Hilda's sake, I braved it out, and continued to learn +the A B C of agriculture on an unmade farm with great assiduity +from Oom Jan Willem. + +We had been stopping some months at Klaas's together when business +compelled me one day to ride in to Salisbury. I had ordered some +goods for my farm from England which had at last arrived. I had +now to arrange for their conveyance from the town to my plot of +land--a portentous matter. Just as I was on the point of leaving +Klaas's, and was tightening the saddle-girth on my sturdy little +pony, Oom Jan Willem himself sidled up to me with a mysterious air, +his broad face all wrinkled with anticipatory pleasure. He placed +a sixpence in my palm, glancing about him on every side as he did +so, like a conspirator. + +"What am I to buy with it?" I asked, much puzzled, and suspecting +tobacco. Tant Mettie declared he smoked too much for a church +elder. + +He put his finger to his lips, nodded, and peered round. +"Lollipops for Sannie," he whispered low, at last, with a guilty +smile. "But"--he glanced about him again--"give them to me, +please, when Tant Mettie isn't looking." His nod was all mystery. + +"You may rely on my discretion," I replied, throwing the time- +honoured prejudices of the profession to the winds, and well +pleased to aid and abet the simple-minded soul in his nefarious +designs against little Sannie's digestive apparatus. He patted me +on the back. "PEPPERMINT lollipops, mind!" he went on, in the same +solemn undertone. "Sannie likes them best--peppermint." + +I put my foot in the stirrup, and vaulted into my saddle. "They +shall not be forgotten," I answered, with a quiet smile at this +pretty little evidence of fatherly feeling. I rode off. It was +early morning, before the heat of the day began. Hilda accompanied +me part of the way on her bicycle. She was going to the other +young farm, some eight miles off, across the red-brown plateau, +where she gave lessons daily to the ten-year old daughter of an +English settler. It was a labour of love; for settlers in Rhodesia +cannot afford to pay for what are beautifully described as +"finishing governesses"; but Hilda was of the sort who cannot eat +the bread of idleness. She had to justify herself to her kind by +finding some work to do which should vindicate her existence. + +I parted from her at a point on the monotonous plain where one +rubbly road branched off from another. Then I jogged on in the +full morning sun over that scorching plain of loose red sand all +the way to Salisbury. Not a green leaf or a fresh flower anywhere. +The eye ached at the hot glare of the reflected sunlight from the +sandy level. + +My business detained me several hours in the half-built town, with +its flaunting stores and its rough new offices; it was not till +towards afternoon that I could get away again on my sorrel, across +the blazing plain once more to Klaas's. + +I moved on over the plateau at an easy trot, full of thoughts of +Hilda. What could be the step she expected Sebastian to take next? +She did not know, herself, she had told me; there, her faculty +failed her. But SOME step he WOULD take; and till he took it she +must rest and be watchful. + +I passed the great tree that stands up like an obelisk in the midst +of the plain beyond the deserted Matabele village. I passed the +low clumps of dry karroo-bushes by the rocky kopje. I passed the +fork of the rubbly roads where I had parted from Hilda. At last, I +reached the long, rolling ridge which looks down upon Klaas's, and +could see in the slant sunlight the mud farmhouse and the +corrugated iron roof where the oxen were stabled. + +The place looked more deserted, more dead-alive than ever. Not a +black boy moved in it. Even the cattle and Kaffir sheep were +nowhere to be seen. . . . But then it was always quiet; and +perhaps I noticed the obtrusive air of solitude and sleepiness even +more than usual, because I had just returned from Salisbury. All +things are comparative. After the lost loneliness of Klaas's farm, +even brand-new Salisbury seemed busy and bustling. + +I hurried on, ill at ease. But Tant Mettie would, doubtless, have +a cup of tea ready for me as soon as I arrived, and Hilda would be +waiting at the gate to welcome me. + +I reached the stone enclosure, and passed up through the flower- +garden. To my great surprise, Hilda was not there. As a rule, she +came to meet me, with her sunny smile. But perhaps she was tired, +or the sun on the road might have given her a headache. I +dismounted from my mare, and called one of the Kaffir boys to take +her to the stable. Nobody answered. . . . I called again. Still +silence. . . . I tied her up to the post, and strode over to the +door, astonished at the solitude. I began to feel there was +something weird and uncanny about this home-coming. Never before +had I known Klaas's so entirely deserted. + +I lifted the latch and opened the door. It gave access at once to +the single plain living-room. There, all was huddled. For a +moment my eyes hardly took in the truth. There are sights so +sickening that the brain at the first shock wholly fails to realise +them. + +On the stone slab floor of the low living-room Tant Mettie lay +dead. Her body was pierced through by innumerable thrusts, which I +somehow instinctively recognised as assegai wounds. By her side +lay Sannie, the little prattling girl of three, my constant +playmate, whom I had instructed in cat's-cradle, and taught the +tales of Cinderella and Red Riding Hood. My hand grasped the +lollipops in my pocket convulsively. She would never need them. +Nobody else was about. What had become of Oom Jan Willem--and the +baby? + +I wandered out into the yard, sick with the sight I had already +seen. There Oom Jan Willem himself lay stretched at full length; a +bullet had pierced his left temple; his body was also riddled +through with assegai thrusts. + +I saw at once what this meant. A rising of the Matabele! + +I had come back from Salisbury, unknowing it, into the midst of a +revolt of bloodthirsty savages. + +Yet, even if I had known, I must still have hurried home with all +speed to Klaas's--to protect Hilda. + +Hilda? Where was Hilda? A breathless sinking crept over me. + +I staggered out into the open. It was impossible to say what +horror might not have happened. The Matabele might even now be +lurking about the kraal--for the bodies were hardly cold. But +Hilda? Hilda? Whatever came, I must find Hilda. + +Fortunately, I had my loaded revolver in my belt. Though we had +not in the least anticipated this sudden revolt--it broke like a +thunder-clap from a clear sky--the unsettled state of the country +made even women go armed about their daily avocations. + +I strode on, half maddened. Beside the great block of granite +which sheltered the farm there rose one of those rocky little +hillocks of loose boulders which are locally known in South Africa +by the Dutch name of kopjes. I looked out upon it drearily. Its +round brown ironstones lay piled irregularly together, almost as if +placed there in some earlier age by the mighty hands of prehistoric +giants. My gaze on it was blank. I was thinking, not of it, but +of Hilda, Hilda. + +I called the name aloud: "Hilda! Hilda! Hilda!" + +As I called, to my immense surprise, one of the smooth round +boulders on the hillside seemed slowly to uncurl, and to peer about +it cautiously. Then it raised itself in the slant sunlight, put a +hand to its eyes, and gazed out upon me with a human face for a +moment. After that it descended, step by step, among the other +stones, with a white object in its arms. As the boulder uncurled +and came to life, I was aware, by degrees . . . yes, yes, it was +Hilda, with Tant Mettie's baby! + +In the fierce joy of that discovery I rushed forward to her, +trembling, and clasped her in my arms. I could find no words but +"Hilda! Hilda!" + +"Are they gone?" she asked, staring about her with a terrified air, +though still strangely preserving her wonted composure of manner. + +"Who gone? The Matabele?" + +"Yes, yes!" + +"Did you see them, Hilda?" + +"For a moment--with black shields and assegais, all shouting madly. +You have been to the house, Hubert? You know what has happened?" + +"Yes, yes, I know--a rising. They have massacred the Klaases." + +She nodded. "I came back on my bicycle, and, when I opened the +door, found Tant Mettie and little Sannie dead. Poor, sweet little +Sannie! Oom Jan was lying shot in the yard outside. I saw the +cradle overturned, and looked under it for the baby. They did not +kill her--perhaps did not notice her. I caught her up in my arms, +and rushed out to my machine, thinking to make for Salisbury, and +give the alarm to the men there. One must try to save others--and +YOU were coming, Hubert! Then I heard horses' hoofs--the Matabele +returning. They dashed back, mounted,--stolen horses from other +farms,--they have taken poor Oom Jan's,--and they have gone on, +shouting, to murder elsewhere! I flung down my machine among the +bushes as they came,--I hope they have not seen it,--and I crouched +here between the boulders, with the baby in my arms, trusting for +protection to the colour of my dress, which is just like the +ironstone." + +"It is a perfect deception," I answered, admiring her instinctive +cleverness even then. "I never so much as noticed you." + +"No, nor the Matabele either, for all their sharp eyes. They +passed by without stopping. I clasped the baby hard, and tried to +keep it from crying--if it had cried, all would have been lost; but +they passed just below, and swept on toward Rozenboom's. I lay +still for a while, not daring to look out. Then I raised myself +warily, and tried to listen. Just at that moment, I heard a +horse's hoofs ring out once more. I couldn't tell, of course, +whether it was YOU returning, or one of the Matabele, left behind +by the others. So I crouched again. . . . Thank God, you are +safe, Hubert!" + +All this took a moment to say, or was less said than hinted. "Now, +what must we do?" I cried. "Bolt back again to Salisbury?" + +"It is the only thing possible--if my machine is unhurt. They may +have taken it . . . or ridden over and broken it." + +We went down to the spot, and picked it up where it lay, half- +concealed among the brittle, dry scrub of milk-bushes. I examined +the bearings carefully; though there were hoof-marks close by, it +had received no hurt. I blew up the tire, which was somewhat +flabby, and went on to untie my sturdy pony. The moment I looked +at her I saw the poor little brute was wearied out with her two +long rides in the sweltering sun. Her flanks quivered. "It is no +use," I cried, patting her, as she turned to me with appealing eyes +that asked for water. "She CAN'T go back as far as Salisbury; at +least, till she has had a feed of corn and a drink. Even then, it +will be rough on her." + +"Give her bread," Hilda suggested. "That will hearten her more +than corn. There is plenty in the house; Tant Mettie baked this +morning." + +I crept in reluctantly to fetch it. I also brought out from the +dresser a few raw eggs, to break into a tumbler and swallow whole; +for Hilda and I needed food almost as sorely as the poor beast +herself. There was something gruesome in thus rummaging about for +bread and meat in the dead woman's cupboard, while she herself lay +there on the floor; but one never realises how one will act in +these great emergencies until they come upon one. Hilda, still +calm with unearthly calmness, took a couple of loaves from my hand, +and began feeding the pony with them. "Go and draw water for her," +she said, simply, "while I give her the bread; that will save time. +Every minute is precious." + +I did as I was bid, not knowing each moment but that the insurgents +would return. When I came back from the spring with the bucket, +the mare had demolished the whole two loaves, and was going on upon +some grass which Hilda had plucked for her. + +"She hasn't had enough, poor dear," Hilda said, patting her neck. +"A couple of loaves are penny buns to her appetite. Let her drink +the water, while I go in and fetch out the rest of the baking." + +I hesitated. "You CAN'T go in there again, Hilda!" I cried. +"Wait, and let me do it." + +Her white face was resolute. "Yes, I CAN," she answered. "It is a +work of necessity; and in works of necessity a woman, I think, +should flinch at nothing. Have I not seen already every varied +aspect of death at Nathaniel's?" And in she went, undaunted, to +that chamber of horrors, still clasping the baby. + +The pony made short work of the remaining loaves, which she +devoured with great zest. As Hilda had predicted, they seemed to +hearten her. The food and drink, with a bucket of water dashed on +her hoofs, gave her new vigour like wine. We gulped down our eggs +in silence. Then I held Hilda's bicycle. She vaulted lightly on +to the seat, white and tired as she was, with the baby in her left +arm, and her right hand on the handle-bar. + +"I must take the baby," I said. + +She shook her head. + +"Oh, no. I will not trust her to you." + +"Hilda, I insist." + +"And I insist, too. It is my place to take her." + +"But can you ride so?" I asked, anxiously. + +She began to pedal. "Oh, dear, yes. It is quite, quite easy. I +shall get there all right--if the Matabele don't burst upon us." + +Tired as I was with my long day's work, I jumped into my saddle. I +saw I should only lose time if I disputed about the baby. My +little horse seemed to understand that something grave had +occurred; for, weary as she must have been, she set out with a will +once more over that great red level. Hilda pedalled bravely by my +side. The road was bumpy, but she was well accustomed to it. I +could have ridden faster than she went, for the baby weighted her. +Still, we rode for dear life. It was a grim experience. + +All round, by this time, the horizon was dim with clouds of black +smoke which went up from burning farms and plundered homesteads. +The smoke did not rise high; it hung sullenly over the hot plain in +long smouldering masses, like the smoke of steamers on foggy days +in England. The sun was nearing the horizon; his slant red rays +lighted up the red plain, the red sand, the brown-red grasses, with +a murky, spectral glow of crimson. After those red pools of blood, +this universal burst of redness appalled one. It seemed as though +all nature had conspired in one unholy league with the Matabele. +We rode on without a word. The red sky grew redder. + +"They may have sacked Salisbury!" I exclaimed at last, looking out +towards the brand-new town. + +"I doubt it," Hilda answered. Her very doubt reassured me. + +We began to mount a long slope. Hilda pedalled with difficulty. +Not a sound was heard save the light fall of my pony's feet on the +soft new road, and the shrill cry of the cicalas. Then, suddenly, +we started. What was that noise in our rear? Once, twice, it rang +out. The loud ping of a rifle! + +Looking behind us, we saw eight or ten mounted Matabele! Stalwart +warriors they were--half naked, and riding stolen horses. They +were coming our way! They had seen us! They were pursuing us! + +"Put on all speed!" I cried, in my agony. "Hilda, can you manage +it?" She pedalled with a will. But, as we mounted the slope, I +saw they were gaining upon us. A few hundred yards were all our +start. They had the descent of the opposite hill as yet in their +favour. + +One man, astride on a better horse than the rest, galloped on in +front and came within range of us. He had a rifle in his hand, he +pointed it twice, and covered us. But he did not shoot. Hilda +gave a cry of relief. "Don't you see?" she exclaimed. "It is Oom +Jan Willem's rifle! That was their last cartridge. They have no +more ammunition." + +I saw she was probably right; for Klaas was out of cartridges, and +was waiting for my new stock to arrive from England. If that were +correct, they must get near enough to attack us with assegais. +They are more dangerous so. I remembered what an old Boer had said +to me at Buluwayo: "The Zulu with his assegai is an enemy to be +feared; with a gun, he is a bungler." + +We pounded on up the hill. It was deadly work, with those brutes +at our heels. The child on Hilda's arm was visibly wearying her. +It kept on whining. "Hilda," I cried, "that baby will lose your +life! You CANNOT go on carrying it." + +She turned to me with a flash of her eyes. "What! You are a man," +she broke out, "and you ask a woman to save her life by abandoning +a baby! Hubert, you shame me!" + +I felt she was right. If she had been capable of giving it up, she +would not have been Hilda. There was but one other way left. + +"Then YOU must take the pony," I called out, "and let me have the +bicycle!" + +"You couldn't ride it," she called back. "It is a woman's machine, +remember." + +"Yes, I could," I replied, without slowing. "It is not much too +short; and I can bend my knees a bit. Quick, quick! No words! Do +as I tell you!" + +She hesitated a second. The child's weight distressed her. "We +should lose time in changing," she answered, at last, doubtful but +still pedalling, though my hand was on the rein, ready to pull up +the pony. + +"Not if we manage it right. Obey orders! The moment I say 'Halt,' +I shall slacken my mare's pace. When you see me leave the saddle, +jump off instantly, you, and mount her! I will catch the machine +before it falls. Are you ready? Halt, then!" + +She obeyed the word without one second's delay. I slipped off, +held the bridle, caught the bicycle, and led it instantaneously. +Then I ran beside the pony--bridle in one hand, machine in the +other--till Hilda had sprung with a light bound into the stirrup. +At that, a little leap, and I mounted the bicycle. It was all done +nimbly, in less time than the telling takes, for we are both of us +naturally quick in our movements. Hilda rode like a man, astride-- +her short, bicycling skirt, unobtrusively divided in front and at +the back, made this easily possible. Looking behind me with a +hasty glance, I could see that the savages, taken aback, had reined +in to deliberate at our unwonted evolution. I feel sure that the +novelty of the iron horse, with a woman riding it, played not a +little on their superstitious fears; they suspected, no doubt, this +was some ingenious new engine of war devised against them by the +unaccountable white man; it might go off unexpectedly in their +faces at any moment. Most of them, I observed, as they halted, +carried on their backs black ox-hide shields, interlaced with white +thongs; they were armed with two or three assegais apiece and a +knobkerry. + +Instead of losing time by the change, as it turned out, we had +actually gained it. Hilda was able to put on my sorrel to her full +pace, which I had not dared to do, for fear of outrunning my +companion; the wise little beast, for her part, seemed to rise to +the occasion, and to understand that we were pursued; for she +stepped out bravely. On the other hand, in spite of the low seat +and the short crank of a woman's machine, I could pedal up the +slope with more force than Hilda, for I am a practised hill- +climber; so that in both ways we gained, besides having momentarily +disconcerted and checked the enemy. Their ponies were tired, and +they rode them full tilt with savage recklessness, making them +canter up-hill, and so needlessly fatiguing them. The Matabele, +indeed, are unused to horses, and manage them but ill. It is as +foot soldiers, creeping stealthily through bush or long grass, that +they are really formidable. Only one of their mounts was tolerably +fresh, the one which had once already almost overtaken us. As we +neared the top of the slope, Hilda, glancing behind her, exclaimed, +with a sudden thrill, "He is spurting again, Hubert!" + +I drew my revolver and held it in my right hand, using my left for +steering. I did not look back; time was far too precious. I set +my teeth hard. "Tell me when he draws near enough for a shot," I +said, quietly. + +Hilda only nodded. Being mounted on the mare, she could see behind +her more steadily now than I could from the machine; and her eye +was trustworthy. As for the baby, rocked by the heave and fall of +the pony's withers, it had fallen asleep placidly in the very midst +of this terror! + +After a second, I asked once more, with bated breath, "Is he +gaining?" + +She looked back. "Yes; gaining." + +A pause. "And now?" + +"Still gaining. He is poising an assegai." + +Ten seconds more passed in breathless suspense. The thud of their +horses' hoofs alone told me their nearness. My finger was on the +trigger. I awaited the word. "Fire!" she said at last, in a calm, +unflinching voice. "He is well within distance." + +I turned half round and levelled as true as I could at the +advancing black man. He rode, nearly naked, showing all his teeth +and brandishing his assegai; the long white feathers stuck upright +in his hair gave him a wild and terrifying barbaric aspect. It was +difficult to preserve one's balance, keep the way on, and shoot, +all at the same time; but, spurred by necessity, I somehow did it. +I fired three shots in quick succession. My first bullet missed; +my second knocked the man over; my third grazed the horse. With a +ringing shriek, the Matabele fell in the road, a black writhing +mass; his horse, terrified, dashed back with maddened snorts into +the midst of the others. Its plunging disconcerted the whole party +for a minute. + +We did not wait to see the rest. Taking advantage of this +momentary diversion in our favour, we rode on at full speed to the +top of the slope--I never knew before how hard I could pedal--and +began to descend at a dash into the opposite hollow. + +The sun had set by this time. There is no twilight in those +latitudes. It grew dark at once. We could see now, in the plain +all round, where black clouds of smoke had rolled before, one lurid +red glare of burning houses, mixed with a sullen haze of tawny +light from the columns of prairie fire kindled by the insurgents. + +We made our way still onward across the open plain without one word +towards Salisbury. The mare was giving out. She strode with a +will; but her flanks were white with froth; her breath came short; +foam flew from her nostrils. + +As we mounted the next ridge, still distancing our pursuers, I saw +suddenly, on its crest, defined against the livid red sky like a +silhouette, two more mounted black men! + +"It's all up, Hilda!" I cried, losing heart at last. "They are on +both sides of us now! The mare is spent; we are surrounded!" + +She drew rein and gazed at them. For a moment suspense spoke in +all her attitude. Then she burst into a sudden deep sigh of +relief. "No, no," she cried; "these are friendlies!" + +"How do you know?" I gasped. But I believed her. + +"They are looking out this way, with hands shading their eyes +against the red glare. They are looking away from Salisbury, in +the direction of the attack. They are expecting the enemy. They +MUST be friendlies! See, see! they have caught sight of us!" + +As she spoke, one of the men lifted his rifle and half pointed it. +"Don't shoot! don't shoot!" I shrieked aloud. "We are English! +English!" + +The men let their rifles drop, and rode down towards us. "Who are +you?" I cried. + +They saluted us, military fashion. "Matabele police, sah," the +leader answered, recognising me. "You are flying from Klaas's?" + +"Yes," I answered. "They have murdered Klaas, with his wife and +child. Some of them are now following us." + +The spokesman was a well-educated Cape Town negro. "All right +sah," he answered. "I have forty men here right behind de kopje. +Let dem come! We can give a good account of dem. Ride on straight +wit de lady to Salisbury!" + +"The Salisbury people know of this rising, then?" I asked. + +"Yes, sah. Dem know since five o'clock. Kaffir boys from Klaas's +brought in de news; and a white man escaped from Rozenboom's +confirm it. We have pickets all round. You is safe now; you can +ride on into Salisbury witout fear of de Matabele." + +I rode on, relieved. Mechanically, my feet worked to and fro on +the pedals. It was a gentle down-gradient now towards the town. +I had no further need for special exertion. + +Suddenly, Hilda's voice came wafted to me, as through a mist. +"What are you doing, Hubert? You'll be off in a minute!" + +I started and recovered my balance with difficulty. Then I was +aware at once that one second before I had all but dropped asleep, +dog tired, on the bicycle. Worn out with my long day and with the +nervous strain, I began to doze off, with my feet still moving +round and round automatically, the moment the anxiety of the chase +was relieved, and an easy down-grade gave me a little respite. + +I kept myself awake even then with difficulty. Riding on through +the lurid gloom, we reached Salisbury at last, and found the town +already crowded with refugees from the plateau. However, we +succeeded in securing two rooms at a house in the long street, and +were soon sitting down to a much-needed supper. + +As we rested, an hour or two later, in the ill-furnished back room, +discussing this sudden turn of affairs with our host and some +neighbours--for, of course, all Salisbury was eager for news from +the scene of the massacres--I happened to raise my head, and saw, +to my great surprise . . . a haggard white face peering in at us +through the window. + +It peered round a corner, stealthily. It was an ascetic face, very +sharp and clear-cut. It had a stately profile. The long and wiry +grizzled moustache, the deep-set, hawk-like eyes, the acute, +intense, intellectual features, all were very familiar. So was the +outer setting of long, white hair, straight and silvery as it fell, +and just curled in one wave-like inward sweep where it turned and +rested on the stooping shoulders. But the expression on the face +was even stranger than the sudden apparition. It was an expression +of keen and poignant disappointment--as of a man whom fate has +baulked of some well-planned end, his due by right, which mere +chance has evaded. + +"They say there's a white man at the bottom of all this trouble," +our host had been remarking, one second earlier. "The niggers know +too much; and where did they get their rifles? People at +Rozenboom's believe some black-livered traitor has been stirring up +the Matabele for weeks and weeks. An enemy of Rhodes's, of course, +jealous of our advance; a French agent, perhaps; but more likely +one of these confounded Transvaal Dutchmen. Depend upon it, it's +Kruger's doing." + +As the words fell from his lips, I saw the face. I gave a quick +little start, then recovered my composure. + +But Hilda noted it. She looked up at me hastily. She was sitting +with her back to the window, and therefore, of course, could not +see the face itself, which indeed was withdrawn with a hurried +movement, yet with a certain strange dignity, almost before I could +feel sure of having seen it. Still, she caught my startled +expression, and the gleam of surprise and recognition in my eye. +She laid one hand upon my arm. "You have seen him?" she asked +quietly, almost below her breath. + +"Seen whom?" + +"Sebastian." + +It was useless denying it to HER. "Yes, I have seen him," I +answered, in a confidential aside. + +"Just now--this moment--at the back of the house--looking in at the +window upon us?" + +"You are right--as always." + +She drew a deep breath. "He has played his game," she said low to +me, in an awed undertone. "I felt sure it was he. I expected him +to play; though what piece, I knew not; and when I saw those poor +dead souls, I was certain he had done it--indirectly done it. The +Matabele are his pawns. He wanted to aim a blow at ME; and THIS +was the way he chose to aim it." + +"Do you think he is capable of that?" I cried. For, in spite of +all, I had still a sort of lingering respect for Sebastian. "It +seems so reckless--like the worst of anarchists--when he strikes at +one head, to involve so many irrelevant lives in one common +destruction." + +Hilda's face was like a drowned man's. + +"To Sebastian," she answered, shuddering, "the End is all; the +Means are unessential. Who wills the End, wills the Means; that is +the sum and substance of his philosophy of life. From first to +last, he has always acted up to it. Did I not tell you once he was +a snow-clad volcano?" + +"Still, I am loth to believe--" I cried. + +She interrupted me calmly. "I knew it," she said. "I expected it. +Beneath that cold exterior, the fires of his life burn fiercely +still. I told you we must wait for Sebastian's next move; though I +confess, even from HIM, I hardly dreamt of this one. But, from the +moment when I opened the door on poor Tant Mettie's body, lying +there in its red horror, I felt it must be he. And when you +started just now, I said to myself in a flash of intuition-- +'Sebastian has come! He has come to see how his devil's work has +prospered.' He sees it has gone wrong. So now he will try to +devise some other." + +I thought of the malign expression on that cruel white face as it +stared in at the window from the outer gloom, and I felt convinced +she was right. She had read her man once more. For it was the +desperate, contorted face of one appalled to discover that a great +crime attempted and successfully carried out has failed, by mere +accident, of its central intention. + + + +CHAPTER VIII + +THE EPISODE OF THE EUROPEAN WITH THE KAFFIR HEART + + +Unfashionable as it is to say so, I am a man of peace. I belong to +a profession whose province is to heal, not to destroy. Still +there ARE times which turn even the most peaceful of us perforce +into fighters--times when those we love, those we are bound to +protect, stand in danger of their lives; and at moments like that, +no man can doubt what is his plain duty. The Matabele revolt was +one such moment. In a conflict of race we MUST back our own +colour. I do not know whether the natives were justified in rising +or not; most likely, yes; for we had stolen their country; but when +once they rose, when the security of white women depended upon +repelling them, I felt I had no alternative. For Hilda's sake, for +the sake of every woman and child in Salisbury, and in all +Rhodesia, I was bound to bear my part in restoring order. + +For the immediate future, it is true, we were safe enough in the +little town; but we did not know how far the revolt might have +spread; we could not tell what had happened at Charter, at +Buluwayo, at the outlying stations. The Matabele, perhaps, had +risen in force over the whole vast area which was once Lo-Bengula's +country; if so, their first object would certainly be to cut us off +from communication with the main body of English settlers at +Buluwayo. + +"I trust to you, Hilda," I said, on the day after the massacre at +Klaas's, "to divine for us where these savages are next likely to +attack us." + +She cooed at the motherless baby, raising one bent finger, and then +turned to me with a white smile. "Then you ask too much of me," +she answered. "Just think what a correct answer would imply! +First, a knowledge of these savages' character; next, a knowledge +of their mode of fighting. Can't you see that only a person who +possessed my trick of intuition, and who had also spent years in +warfare among the Matabele, would be really able to answer your +question?" + +"And yet such questions have been answered before now by people far +less intuitive than you," I went on. "Why, I've read somewhere +how, when the war between Napoleon the First and the Prussians +broke out, in 1806, Jomini predicted that the decisive battle of +the campaign would be fought near Jena; and near Jena it was +fought. Are not YOU better than many Jominis?" + +Hilda tickled the baby's cheek. "Smile, then, baby, smile!" she +said, pouncing one soft finger on a gathering dimple. "And who WAS +your friend Jomini?" + +"The greatest military critic and tactician of his age," I +answered. "One of Napoleon's generals. I fancy he wrote a book, +don't you know--a book on war--Des Grandes Operations Militaires, +or something of that sort." + +"Well, there you are, then! That's just it! Your Jomini, or +Hominy, or whatever you call him, not only understood Napoleon's +temperament, but understood war and understood tactics. It was all +a question of the lie of the land, and strategy, and so forth. If +_I_ had been asked, I could never have answered a quarter as well +as Jomini Piccolomini--could I, baby? Jomini would have been worth +a good many me's. There, there, a dear, motherless darling! Why, +she crows just as if she hadn't lost all her family!" + +"But, Hilda, we must be serious. I count upon you to help us in +this matter. We are still in danger. Even now these Matabele may +attack and destroy us." + +She laid the child on her lap, and looked grave. "I know it, +Hubert; but I must leave it now to you men. I am no tactician. +Don't take ME for one of Napoleon's generals." + +"Still," I said, "we have not only the Matabele to reckon with, +recollect. There is Sebastian as well. And, whether you know your +Matabele or not, you at least know your Sebastian." + +She shuddered. "I know him; yes, I know him. . . . But this case +is so difficult. We have Sebastian--complicated by a rabble of +savages, whose habits and manners I do not understand. It is THAT +that makes the difficulty." + +"But Sebastian himself?" I urged. "Take him first, in isolation." + +She paused for a full minute, with her chin on her hand and her +elbow on the table. Her brow gathered. "Sebastian?" she repeated. +"Sebastian?--ah, there I might guess something. Well, of course, +having once begun this attempt, and being definitely committed, as +it were, to a policy of killing us, he will go through to the +bitter end, no matter how many other lives it may cost. That is +Sebastian's method." + +"You don't think, having once found out that I saw and recognised +him, he would consider the game lost, and slink away to the coast +again?" + +"Sebastian? Oh, no; that is the absolute antipodes of his type and +temperament." + +"He will never give up because of a temporary check, you think?" + +"No, never. The man has a will of sheer steel--it may break, but +it will not bend. Besides, consider: he is too deeply involved. +You have seen him; you know; and he knows you know. You may bring +this thing home to him. Then what is his plain policy? Why, to +egg on the natives whose confidence he has somehow gained into +making a further attack, and cutting off all Salisbury. If he had +succeeded in getting you and me massacred at Klaas's, as he hoped, +he would no doubt have slunk off to the coast at once, leaving his +black dupes to be shot down at leisure by Rhodes's soldiers." + +"I see; but having failed in that?" + +"Then he is bound to go through with it, and kill us if he can, +even if he has to kill all Salisbury with us. That, I feel sure, +is Sebastian's plan. Whether he can get the Matabele to back him +up in it or not is a different matter." + +"But taking Sebastian himself; alone?" + +"Oh, Sebastian himself alone would naturally say: 'Never mind +Buluwayo! Concentrate round Salisbury, and kill off all there +first; when that is done, then you can move on at your ease and cut +them to pieces in Charter and Buluwayo.' You see, he would have no +interest in the movement, himself, once he had fairly got rid of us +here. The Matabele are only the pieces in his game. It is ME he +wants, not Salisbury. He would clear out of Rhodesia as soon as he +had carried his point. But he would have to give some reasonable +ground to the Matabele for his first advice; and it seems a +reasonable ground to say, 'Don't leave Salisbury in your rear, so +as to put yourselves between two fires. Capture the outpost first; +that down, march on undistracted to the principal stronghold.'" + +"Who is no tactician?" I murmured, half aloud. + +She laughed. "That's not tactics, Hubert; that's plain common +sense--and knowledge of Sebastian. Still, it comes to nothing. +The question is not, 'What would Sebastian wish?' it is, 'Could +Sebastian persuade these angry black men to accept his guidance?'" + +"Sebastian!" I cried; "Sebastian could persuade the very devil! I +know the man's fiery enthusiasm, his contagious eloquence. He +thrilled me through, myself, with his electric personality, so that +it took me six years--and your aid--to find him out at last. His +very abstractness tells. Why, even in this war, you may be sure, +he will be making notes all the time on the healing of wounds in +tropical climates, contrasting the African with the European +constitution." + +"Oh, yes; of course. Whatever he does, he will never forget the +interests of science. He is true to his lady-love, to whomever +else he plays false. That is his saving virtue." + +"And he will talk down the Matabele," I went on, "even if he +doesn't know their language. But I suspect he does; for, you must +remember, he was three years in South Africa as a young man, on a +scientific expedition, collecting specimens. He can ride like a +trooper; and he knows the country. His masterful ways, his austere +face, will cow the natives. Then, again, he has the air of a +prophet; and prophets always stir the negro. I can imagine with +what air he will bid them drive out the intrusive white men who +have usurped their land, and draw them flattering pictures of a new +Matabele empire about to arise under a new chief, too strong for +these gold-grubbing, diamond-hunting mobs from over sea to meddle +with." + +She reflected once more. "Do you mean to say anything of our +suspicions in Salisbury, Hubert?" she asked at last. + +"It is useless," I answered. "The Salisbury folk believe there is +a white man at the bottom of this trouble already. They will try +to catch him; that's all that is necessary. If we said it was +Sebastian, people would only laugh at us. They must understand +Sebastian, as you and I understand him, before they would think +such a move credible. As a rule in life, if you know anything +which other people do not know, better keep it to yourself; you +will only get laughed at as a fool for telling it." + +"I think so, too. That is why I never say what I suspect or infer +from my knowledge of types--except to a few who can understand and +appreciate. Hubert, if they all arm for the defence of the town, +you will stop here, I suppose, to tend the wounded?" + +Her lips trembled as she spoke, and she gazed at me with a strange +wistfulness. "No, dearest," I answered at once, taking her face in +my hands. "I shall fight with the rest. Salisbury has more need +to-day of fighters than of healers." + +"I thought you would," she answered, slowly. "And I think you do +right." Her face was set white; she played nervously with the +baby. "I would not urge you; but I am glad you say so. I want you +to stop; yet I could not love you so much if I did not see you +ready to play the man at such a crisis." + +"I shall give in my name with the rest," I answered. + +"Hubert, it is hard to spare you--hard to send you to such danger. +But for one other thing, I am glad you are going. . . . They must +take Sebastian alive; they must NOT kill him." + +"They will shoot him red-handed if they catch him," I answered +confidently. "A white man who sides with the blacks in an +insurrection!" + +"Then YOU must see that they do not do it. They must bring him in +alive, and try him legally. For me--and therefore for you--that is +of the first importance." + +"Why so, Hilda?" + +"Hubert, you want to marry me." I nodded vehemently. "Well, you +know I can only marry you on one condition--that I have succeeded +first in clearing my father's memory. Now, the only man living who +can clear it is Sebastian. If Sebastian were to be shot, it could +NEVER be cleared--and then, law of Medes and Persians, I could +never marry you." + +"But how can you expect Sebastian, of all men, to clear it, Hilda?" +I cried. "He is ready to kill us both, merely to prevent your +attempting a revision; is it likely you can force him to confess +his crime, still less induce him to admit it voluntarily?" + +She placed her hands over her eyes and pressed them hard with a +strange, prophetic air she often had about her when she gazed into +the future. "I know my man," she answered, slowly, without +uncovering her eyes. "I know how I can do it--if the chance ever +comes to me. But the chance must come first. It is hard to find. +I lost it once at Nathaniel's. I must not lose it again. If +Sebastian is killed skulking here in Rhodesia, my life's purpose +will have failed; I shall not have vindicated my father's good +name; and then, we can never marry." + +"So I understand, Hilda, my orders are these: I am to go out and +fight for the women and children, if possible; that Sebastian shall +be made prisoner alive, and on no account to let him be killed in +the open!" + +"I give you no orders, Hubert. I tell you how it seems best to me. +But if Sebastian is shot dead--then you understand it must be all +over between us. I NEVER can marry you until, or unless, I have +cleared my father." + +"Sebastian shall not be shot dead," I cried, with my youthful +impetuosity. "He shall be brought in alive, though all Salisbury +as one man try its best to lynch him." + +I went out to report myself as a volunteer for service. Within the +next few hours the whole town had been put in a state of siege, and +all available men armed to oppose the insurgent Matabele. Hasty +preparations were made for defence. The ox-waggons of settlers +were drawn up outside in little circles here and there, so as to +form laagers, which acted practically as temporary forts for the +protection of the outskirts. In one of these I was posted. With +our company were two American scouts, named Colebrook and Doolittle, +irregular fighters whose value in South African campaigns had +already been tested in the old Matabele war against Lo-Bengula. +Colebrook, in particular, was an odd-looking creature--a tall, +spare man, bodied like a weasel. He was red-haired, ferret-eyed, +and an excellent scout, but scrappier and more inarticulate in his +manner of speech than any human being I had ever encountered. His +conversation was a series of rapid interjections, jerked out at +intervals, and made comprehensible by a running play of gesture and +attitude. + +"Well, yes," he said, when I tried to draw him out on the Matabele +mode of fighting. "Not on the open. Never! Grass, if you like. +Or bushes. The eyes of them! The eyes! . . ." He leaned eagerly +forward, as if looking for something. "See here, Doctor; I'm +telling you. Spots. Gleaming. Among the grass. Long grass. And +armed, too. A pair of 'em each. One to throw"--he raised his hand +as if lancing something--"the other for close fighting. Assegais, +you know. That's the name of it. Only the eyes. Creeping, +creeping, creeping. No noise. One raised. Waggons drawn up in +laager. Oxen out-spanned in the middle. Trekking all day. Tired +out; dog tired. Crawl, crawl, crawl! Hands and knees. Might be +snakes. A wriggle. Men sitting about the camp fire. Smoking. +Gleam of their eyes! Under the waggons. Nearer, nearer, nearer! +Then, the throwing ones in your midst. Shower of 'em. Right and +left. 'Halloa! stand by, boys!' Look up; see 'em swarming, black +like ants, over the waggons. Inside the laager. Snatch up rifles! +All up! Oxen stampeding, men running, blacks sticking 'em like +pigs in the back with their assegais. Bad job, the whole thing. +Don't care for it, myself. Very tough 'uns to fight. If they once +break laager." + +"Then you should never let them get to close quarters," I +suggested, catching the general drift of his inarticulate swift +pictures. + +"You're a square man, you are, Doctor! There you touch the spot. +Never let 'em get at close quarters. Sentries?--creep past 'em. +Outposts?--crawl between. Had Forbes and Wilson like that. Cut +'em off. Per-dition! . . . But Maxims will do it! Maxims! Never +let em get near. Sweep the ground all round. Durned hard, though, +to know just WHEN they're coming. A night; two nights; all clear; +only waste ammunition. Third, they swarm like bees; break laager; +all over!" + +This was not exactly an agreeable picture of what we had to expect-- +the more so as our particular laager happened to have no Maxims. +However, we kept a sharp lookout for those gleaming eyes in the +long grass of which Colebrook warned us; their flashing light was +the one thing to be seen, at night above all, when the black bodies +could crawl unperceived through the tall dry herbage. On our first +night out we had no adventures. We watched by turns outside, +relieving sentry from time to time, while those of us who slept +within the laager slept on the bare ground with our arms beside us. +Nobody spoke much. The tension was too great. Every moment we +expected an attack of the enemy. + +Next day news reached us by scouts from all the other laagers. +None of them had been attacked; but in all there was a deep, half- +instinctive belief that the Matabele in force were drawing step by +step closer and closer around us. Lo-Bengula's old impis, or +native regiments, had gathered together once more under their own +indunas--men trained and drilled in all the arts and ruses of +savage warfare. On their own ground, and among their native scrub, +those rude strategists are formidable. They know the country, and +how to fight in it. We had nothing to oppose to them but a handful +of the new Matabeleland police, an old regular soldier or two, and +a raw crowd of volunteers, most of whom, like myself, had never +before really handled a rifle. + +That afternoon, the Major in command decided to send out the two +American scouts to scour the grass and discover, if possible, how +near our lines the Matabele had penetrated. I begged hard to be +permitted to accompany them. I wanted, if I could, to get evidence +against Sebastian; or, at least, to learn whether he was still +directing and assisting the enemy. At first, the scouts laughed at +my request; but when I told them privately that I believed I had a +clue against the white traitor who had caused the revolt, and that +I wished to identify him, they changed their tone, and began to +think there might be something in it. + +"Experience?" Colebrook asked in his brief shorthand of speech, +running his ferret eyes over me. + +"None," I answered; "but a noiseless tread and a capacity for +crawling through holes in hedges which may perhaps be useful." + +He glanced inquiry at Doolittle, who was a shorter and stouter man, +with a knack of getting over obstacles by sheer forcefulness. + +"Hands and knees!" he said, abruptly, in the imperative mood, +pointing to a clump of dry grass with thorny bushes ringed about +it. + +I went down on my hands and knees, and threaded my way through the +long grasses and matted boughs as noiselessly as I could. The two +old hands watched me. When I emerged several yards off, much to +their surprise, Colebrook turned to Doolittle. "Might answer," he +said curtly. "Major says, 'Choose your own men.' Anyhow, if they +catch him, nobody's fault but his. Wants to go. Will do it." + +We set out through the long grass together, walking erect at first, +till we had got some distance from the laager, and then, creeping +as the Matabele themselves creep, without displacing the grass- +flowers, for a mere wave on top would have betrayed us at once to +the quick eyes of those observant savages. We crept on for a mile +or so. At last, Colebrook turned to me, one finger on his lips. +His ferret eyes gleamed. We were approaching a wooded hill, all +interspersed with boulders. "Kaffirs here!" he whispered low, as +if he knew by instinct. HOW he knew, I cannot tell; he seemed +almost to scent them. + +We stole on farther, going more furtively than ever now. I could +notice by this time that there were waggons in front, and could +hear men speaking in them. I wanted to proceed, but Colebrook held +up one warning hand. "Won't do," he said, shortly, in a low tone. +"Only myself. Danger ahead! Stop here and wait for me." + +Doolittle and myself waited. Colebrook kept on cautiously, +squirming his long body in sinuous waves like a lizard's through +the grass, and was soon lost to us. No snake could have been +lither. We waited, with ears intent. One minute, two minutes, +many minutes passed. We could catch the voices of the Kaffirs in +the bush all round. They were speaking freely, but what they said +I did not know, as I had picked up only a very few words of the +Matabele language. + +It seemed hours while we waited, still as mice in our ambush, and +alert. I began to think Colebrook must have been lost or killed-- +so long was he gone--and that we must return without him. At last-- +we leaned forward--a muffled movement in the grass ahead! A +slight wave at the base! Then it divided below, bit by bit, while +the tops remained stationary. A weasel-like body slank noiselessly +through. Finger on lips once more, Colebrook glided beside us. We +turned and crawled back, stifling our very pulses. For many +minutes none of us spoke. But we heard in our rear a loud cry and +a shaking of assegais; the Kaffirs behind us were yelling +frightfully. They must have suspected something--seen some +movement in the tufted heads of grass, for they spread abroad, +shouting. We halted, holding our breath. After a time, however; +the noise died down. They were moving another way. We crept on +again, stealthily. + +When, at last, after many minutes, we found ourselves beyond a +sheltering belt of brushwood, we ventured to rise and speak. +"Well?" I asked of Colebrook. "Did you discover anything?" + +He nodded assent. "Couldn't see him," he said shortly. "But he's +there, right enough. White man. Heard 'em talk of him." + +"What did they say?" I asked, eagerly. + +"Said he had a white skin, but his heart was a Kaffir's. Great +induna; leader of many impis. Prophet, wise weather doctor! +Friend of old Moselekatse's. Destroy the white men from over the +big water; restore the land to the Matabele. Kill all in +Salisbury, especially the white women. Witches--all witches. They +give charms to the men; cook lions' hearts for them; make them +brave with love-drinks." + +"They said that?" I exclaimed, taken aback. "Kill all the white +women!" + +"Yes. Kill all. White witches, every one. The young ones worst. +Word of the great induna." + +"And you could not see him?" + +"Crept near waggons, close. Fellow himself inside. Heard his +voice; spoke English, with a little Matabele. Kaffir boy who was +servant at the mission interpreted." + +"What sort of voice? Like this?" And I imitated Sebastian's cold, +clear-cut tone as well as I was able. + +"The man! That's him, Doctor. You've got him down to the ground. +The very voice. Heard him giving orders." + +That settled the question. I was certain of it now. Sebastian was +with the insurgents. + +We made our way back to our laager, flung ourselves down, and slept +a little on the ground before taking our turn in the fatigues of +the night watch. Our horses were loosely tied, ready for any +sudden alarm. About midnight, we three were sitting with others +about the fire, talking low to one another. All at once Doolittle +sprang up, alert and eager. "Look out, boys!" he cried, pointing +his hands under the waggons. "What's wriggling in the grass +there?" + +I looked, and saw nothing. Our sentries were posted outside, about +a hundred yards apart, walking up and down till they met, and +exchanging "All's well" aloud at each meeting. + +"They should have been stationary!" one of our scouts exclaimed, +looking out at them. "It's easier for the Matabele to see them so, +when they walk up and down, moving against the sky. The Major +ought to have posted them where it wouldn't have been so simple for +a Kaffir to see them and creep in between them!" + +"Too late now, boys!" Colebrook burst out, with a rare effort of +articulateness. "Call back the sentries, Major! The blacks have +broken line! Hold there! They're in upon us!" + +Even as he spoke, I followed his eager pointing hand with my eyes, +and just descried among the grass two gleaming objects, seen under +the hollow of one of the waggons. Two: then two; then two again; +and behind, whole pairs of them. They looked like twin stars; but +they were eyes, black eyes, reflecting the starlight and the red +glare of the camp-fire. They crept on tortuously in serpentine +curves through the long, dry grasses. I could feel, rather than +see, that they were Matabele, crawling prone on their bellies, and +trailing their snake-like way between the dark jungle. Quick as +thought, I raised my rifle and blazed away at the foremost. So did +several others. But the Major shouted, angrily: "Who fired? +Don't shoot, boys, till you hear the word of command! Back, +sentries, to laager! Not a shot till they're safe inside! You'll +hit your own people!" + +Almost before he said it, the sentries darted back. The Matabele, +crouching on hands and knees in the long grass, had passed between +them unseen. A wild moment followed. I can hardly describe it; +the whole thing was so new to me, and took place so quickly. +Hordes of black human ants seemed to surge up all at once over and +under the waggons. Assegais whizzed through the air, or gleamed +brandished around one. Our men fell back to the centre of the +laager, and formed themselves hastily under the Major's orders. +Then a pause; a deadly fire. Once, twice, thrice we volleyed. The +Matabele fell by dozens--but they came on by hundreds. As fast as +we fired and mowed down one swarm, fresh swarms seemed to spring +from the earth and stream over the waggons. Others appeared to +grow up almost beneath our feet as they wormed their way on their +faces along the ground between the wheels, squirmed into the +circle, and then rose suddenly, erect and naked, in front of us. +Meanwhile, they yelled and shouted, clashing their spears and +shields. The oxen bellowed. The rifles volleyed. It was a +pandemonium of sound in an orgy of gloom. Darkness, lurid flame, +blood, wounds, death, horror! + +Yet, in the midst of all this hubbub, I could not help admiring the +cool military calm and self-control of our Major. His voice rose +clear above the confused tumult. "Steady, boys, steady! Don't +fire at random. Pick each your likeliest man, and aim at him +deliberately. That's right; easy--easy! Shoot at leisure, and +don't waste ammunition!" + +He stood as if he were on parade, in the midst of this palpitating +turmoil of savages. Some of us, encouraged by his example, mounted +the waggons, and shot from the tops at our approaching assailants. + +How long the hurly-burly went on, I cannot say. We fired, fired, +fired, and Kaffirs fell like sheep; yet more Kaffirs rose fresh +from the long grass to replace them. They swarmed with greater +ease now over the covered waggons, across the mangled and writhing +bodies of their fellows; for the dead outside made an inclined +plane for the living to mount by. But the enemy were getting less +numerous, I thought, and less anxious to fight. The steady fire +told on them. By-and-by, with a little halt, for the first time +they wavered. All our men now mounted the waggons, and began to +fire on them in regular volleys as they came up. The evil effects +of the surprise were gone by this time; we were acting with +coolness and obeying orders. But several of our people dropped +close beside me, pierced through with assegais. + +All at once, as if a panic had burst over them, the Matabele, with +one mind, stopped dead short in their advance and ceased fighting. +Till that moment, no number of deaths seemed to make any difference +to them. Men fell, disabled; others sprang up from the ground by +magic. But now, of a sudden, their courage flagged--they faltered, +gave way, broke, and shambled in a body. At last, as one man, they +turned and fled. Many of them leapt up with a loud cry from the +long grass where they were skulking, flung away their big shields +with the white thongs interlaced, and ran for dear life, black, +crouching figures, through the dense, dry jungle. They held their +assegais still, but did not dare to use them. It was a flight, +pell-mell--and the devil take the hindmost. + +Not until then had I leisure to THINK, and to realise my position. +This was the first and only time I had ever seen a battle. I am a +bit of a coward, I believe--like most other men--though I have +courage enough to confess it; and I expected to find myself +terribly afraid when it came to fighting. Instead of that, to my +immense surprise, once the Matabele had swarmed over the laager, +and were upon us in their thousands, I had no time to be +frightened. The absolute necessity for keeping cool, for loading +and reloading, for aiming and firing, for beating them off at close +quarters--all this so occupied one's mind, and still more one's +hands, that one couldn't find room for any personal terrors. "They +are breaking over there!" "They will overpower us yonder!" "They +are faltering now!" Those thoughts were so uppermost in one's +head, and one's arms were so alert, that only after the enemy gave +way, and began to run at full pelt, could a man find breathing- +space to think of his own safety. Then the thought occurred to me, +"I have been through my first fight, and come out of it alive; +after all, I was a deal less afraid than I expected!" + +That took but a second, however. Next instant, awaking to the +altered circumstances, we were after them at full speed; +accompanying them on their way back to their kraals in the uplands +with a running fire as a farewell attention. + +As we broke laager in pursuit of them, by the uncertain starlight +we saw a sight which made us boil with indignation. A mounted man +turned and fled before them. He seemed their leader, unseen till +then. He was dressed like a European--tall, thin, unbending, in a +greyish-white suit. He rode a good horse, and sat it well; his air +was commanding, even as he turned and fled in the general rout from +that lost battle. + +I seized Colebrook's arm, almost speechless with anger. "The white +man!" I cried. "The traitor!" + +He did not answer a word, but with a set face of white rage loosed +his horse from where it was tethered among the waggons. At the +same moment, I loosed mine. So did Doolittle. Quick as thought, +but silently, we led them out all three where the laager was +broken. I clutched my mare's mane, and sprang to the stirrup to +pursue our enemy. My sorrel bounded off like a bird. The fugitive +had a good two minutes start of us; but our horses were fresh, +while his had probably been ridden all day. I patted my pony's +neck; she responded with a ringing neigh of joy. We tore after the +outlaw, all three of us abreast. I felt a sort of fierce delight +in the reaction after the fighting. Our ponies galloped wildly +over the plain; we burst out into the night, never heeding the +Matabele whom we passed on the open in panic-stricken retreat. I +noticed that many of them in their terror had even flung away their +shields and their assegais. + +It was a mad chase across the dark veldt--we three, neck to neck, +against that one desperate runaway. We rode all we knew. I dug my +heels into my sorrel's flanks, and she responded bravely. The +tables were turned now on our traitor since the afternoon of the +massacre. HE was the pursued, and WE were the pursuers. We felt +we must run him down, and punish him for his treachery. + +At a breakneck pace, we stumbled over low bushes; we grazed big +boulders; we rolled down the sides of steep ravines; but we kept +him in sight all the time, dim and black against the starry sky; +slowly, slowly--yes, yes!--we gained upon him. My pony led now. +The mysterious white man rode and rode--head bent, neck forward-- +but never looked behind him. Bit by bit we lessened the distance +between us. As we drew near him at last, Doolittle called out to +me, in a warning voice: "Take care, Doctor! Have your revolvers +ready! He's driven to bay now! As we approach, he'll fire at us!" + +Then it came home to me in a flash. I felt the truth of it. "He +DARE not fire!" I cried. "He dare not turn towards us. He cannot +show his face! If he did, we might recognise him!" + +On we rode, still gaining. "Now, now," I cried, "we shall catch +him!" + +Even as I leaned forward to seize his rein, the fugitive, without +checking his horse, without turning his head, drew his revolver +from his belt, and, raising his hand, fired behind him at random. +He fired towards us, on the chance. The bullet whizzed past my +ear, not hitting anyone. We scattered, right and left, still +galloping free and strong. We did not return his fire, as I had +told the others of my desire to take him alive. We might have shot +his horse; but the risk of hitting the rider, coupled with the +confidence we felt of eventually hunting him to earth, restrained +us. It was the great mistake we made. + +He had gained a little by his shots, but we soon caught it up. +Once more I said, "We are on him!" + +A minute later, we were pulled up short before an impenetrable +thicket of prickly shrubs, through which I saw at once it would +have been quite impossible to urge our staggering horses. + +The other man, of course, reached it before us, with his mare's +last breath. He must have been making for it, indeed, of set +purpose; for the second he arrived at the edge of the thicket he +slipped off his tired pony, and seemed to dive into the bush as a +swimmer dives off a rock into the water. + +"We have him now!" I cried, in a voice of triumph. And Colebrook +echoed, "We have him!" + +We sprang down quickly. "Take him alive, if you can!" I exclaimed, +remembering Hilda's advice. "Let us find out who he is, and have +him properly tried and hanged at Buluwayo! Don't give him a +soldier's death! All he deserves is a murderer's!" + +"You stop here," Colebrook said, briefly, flinging his bridle to +Doolittle to hold. "Doctor and I follow him. Thick bush. Knows +the ways of it. Revolvers ready!" + +I handed my sorrel to Doolittle. He stopped behind, holding the +three foam-bespattered and panting horses, while Colebrook and I +dived after our fugitive into the matted bushes. + +The thicket, as I have said, was impenetrable above; but it was +burrowed at its base by over-ground runs of some wild animal--not, +I think, a very large one; they were just like the runs which +rabbits make among gorse and heather, only on a bigger scale-- +bigger, even, than a fox's or badger's. By crouching and bending +our backs, we could crawl through them with difficulty into the +scrubby tangle. It was hard work creeping. The runs divided soon. +Colebrook felt with his hands on the ground: "I can make out the +spoor!" he muttered, after a minute. "He has gone on this way!" + +We tracked him a little distance in, crawling at times, and rising +now and again where the runs opened out on to the air for a moment. +The spoor was doubtful and the tunnels tortuous. I felt the ground +from time to time, but could not be sure of the tracks with my +fingers; I was not a trained scout, like Colebrook or Doolittle. +We wriggled deeper into the tangle. Something stirred once or +twice. It was not far from me. I was uncertain whether it was +HIM--Sebastian--or a Kaffir earth-hog, the animal which seemed +likeliest to have made the burrows. Was he going to elude us, even +now? Would he turn upon us with a knife? If so, could we hold +him? + +At last, when we had pushed our way some distance in, we heard a +wild cry from outside. It was Doolittle's voice. "Quick! quick! +out again! The man will escape! He has come back on his tracks, +and rounded!" + +I saw our mistake at once. We had left our companion out there +alone, rendered helpless by the care of all three horses. + +Colebrook said never a word. He was a man of action. He turned +with instinctive haste, and followed our own spoor back again with +his hands and knees to the opening in the thicket by which we had +first entered. + +Before we could reach it, however, two shots rang out clear in the +direction where we had left poor Doolittle and the horses. Then a +sharp cry broke the stillness--the cry of a wounded man. We +redoubled our pace. We knew we were outwitted. + +When we reached the open, we saw at once by the uncertain light +what had happened. The fugitive was riding away on my own little +sorrel,--riding for dear life; not back the way we came from +Salisbury, but sideways across the veldt towards Chimoio and the +Portuguese seaports. The other two horses, riderless and +terrified, were scampering with loose heels over the dark plain. +Doolittle was not to be seen; he lay, a black lump, among the black +bushes about him. + +We looked around for him, and found him. He was severely, I may +even say dangerously, wounded. The bullet had lodged in his right +side. We had to catch our two horses, and ride them back with our +wounded man, leading the fugitive's mare in tow, all blown and +breathless. I stuck to the fugitive's mare; it was the one clue we +had now against him. But Sebastian, if it WAS Sebastian, had +ridden off scot-free. I understood his game at a glance. He had +got the better of us once more. He would make for the coast by the +nearest road, give himself out as a settler escaped from the +massacre, and catch the next ship for England or the Cape, now this +coup had failed him. + +Doolittle had not seen the traitor's face. The man rose from the +bush, he said, shot him, seized the pony, and rode off in a second +with ruthless haste. He was tall and thin, but erect--that was all +the wounded scout could tell us about his assailant. And THAT was +not enough to identify Sebastian. + +All danger was over. We rode back to Salisbury. The first words +Hilda said when she saw me were: "Well, he has got away from you!" + +"Yes; how did you know?" + +"I read it in your step. But I guessed as much before. He is so +very keen; and you started too confident." + + + +CHAPTER IX + +THE EPISODE OF THE LADY WHO WAS VERY EXCLUSIVE + + +The Matabele revolt gave Hilda a prejudice against Rhodesia. I +will confess that I shared it. I may be hard to please; but it +somehow sets one against a country when one comes home from a ride +to find all the other occupants of the house one lives in +massacred. So Hilda decided to leave South Africa. By an odd +coincidence, I also decided on the same day to change my residence. +Hilda's movements and mine, indeed, coincided curiously. The +moment I learned she was going anywhere, I discovered in a flash +that I happened to be going there too. I commend this strange case +of parallel thought and action to the consideration of the Society +for Psychical Research. + +So I sold my farm, and had done with Rhodesia. A country with a +future is very well in its way; but I am quite Ibsenish in my +preference for a country with a past. Oddly enough, I had no +difficulty in getting rid of my white elephant of a farm. People +seemed to believe in Rhodesia none the less firmly because of this +slight disturbance. They treated massacres as necessary incidents +in the early history of a colony with a future. And I do not deny +that native risings add picturesqueness. But I prefer to take them +in a literary form. + +"You will go home, of course?" I said to Hilda, when we came to +talk it all over. + +She shook her head. "To England? Oh, no. I must pursue my Plan. +Sebastian will have gone home; he expects me to follow." + +"And why don't you?" + +"Because--he expects it. You see, he is a good judge of character; +he will naturally infer, from what he knows of my temperament, that +after this experience I shall want to get back to England and +safety. So I should--if it were not that I know he will expect it. +As it is, I must go elsewhere; I must draw him after me." + +"Where?" + +"Why do you ask, Hubert?" + +"Because--I want to know where I am going myself. Wherever you go, +I have reason to believe, I shall find that I happen to be going +also." + +She rested her little chin on her hand and reflected a minute. +"Does it occur to you," she asked at last, "that people have +tongues? If you go on following me like this, they will really +begin to talk about us." + +"Now, upon my word, Hilda," I cried, "that is the very first time I +have ever known you show a woman's want of logic! I do not propose +to follow you; I propose to happen to be travelling by the same +steamer. I ask you to marry me; you won't; you admit you are fond +of me; yet you tell me not to come with you. It is _I_ who suggest +a course which would prevent people from chattering--by the simple +device of a wedding. It is YOU who refuse. And then you turn upon +me like this! Admit that you are unreasonable." + +"My dear Hubert, have I ever denied that I was a woman?" + +"Besides," I went on, ignoring her delicious smile, "I don't intend +to FOLLOW you. I expect, on the contrary, to find myself beside +you. When I know where you are going, I shall accidentally turn up +on the same steamer. Accidents WILL happen. Nobody can prevent +coincidences from occurring. You may marry me, or you may not; but +if you don't marry me, you can't expect to curtail my liberty of +action, can you? You had better know the worst at once; if you +won't take me, you must count upon finding me at your elbow all the +world over--till the moment comes when you choose to accept me." + +"Dear Hubert, I am ruining your life!" + +"An excellent reason, then, for taking my advice, and marrying me +instantly! But you wander from the question. Where are you going? +That is the issue now before the house. You persist in evading +it." + +She smiled, and came back to earth. "Oh, if you MUST know, to +India, by the east coast, changing steamers at Aden." + +"Extraordinary!" I cried. "Do you know, Hilda, as luck will have +it, _I_ also shall be on my way to Bombay by the very same +steamer!" + +"But you don't know what steamer it is?" + +"No matter. That only makes the coincidence all the odder. +Whatever the name of the ship may be, when you get on board, I have +a presentiment that you will be surprised to find me there." + +She looked up at me with a gathering film in her eyes. "Hubert, +you are irrepressible!" + +"I am, my dear child; so you may as well spare yourself the +needless trouble of trying to repress me." + +If you rub a piece of iron on a loadstone, it becomes magnetic. +So, I think, I must have begun to acquire some part of Hilda's own +prophetic strain; for, sure enough, a few weeks later, we both of +us found ourselves on the German East African steamer Kaiser +Wilhelm, on our way to Aden--exactly as I had predicted. Which +goes to prove that there is really something after all in +presentiments! + +"Since you persist in accompanying me," Hilda said to me, as we sat +in our chairs on deck the first evening out, "I see what I must do. +I must invent some plausible and ostensible reason for our +travelling together." + +"We are not travelling together," I answered. "We are travelling +by the same steamer; that is all--exactly like the rest of our +fellow-passengers. I decline to be dragged into this imaginary +partnership." + +"Now do be serious, Hubert! I am going to invent an object in life +for us." + +"What object?" + +"How can I tell yet? I must wait and see what turns up. When we +tranship at Aden, and find out what people are going on to Bombay +with us, I shall probably discover some nice married lady to whom I +can attach myself." + +"And am I to attach myself to her, too?" + +"My dear boy, I never asked you to come. You came unbidden. You +must manage for yourself as best you may. But I leave much to the +chapter of accidents. We never know what will turn up, till it +turns up in the end. Everything comes at last, you know, to him +that waits." + +"And yet," I put in, with a meditative air, "I have never observed +that waiters are so much better off than the rest of the community. +They seem to me--" + +"Don't talk nonsense. It is YOU who are wandering from the +question now. Please return to it." + +I returned at once. "So I am to depend on what turns up?" + +"Yes. Leave that to me. When we see our fellow-passengers on the +Bombay steamer, I shall soon discover some ostensible reason why we +two should be travelling through India with one of them." + +"Well, you are a witch, Hilda," I answered. "I found that out long +ago; but if you succeed between here and Bombay in inventing a +Mission, I shall begin to believe you are even more of a witch than +I ever thought you." + +At Aden we changed into a P. and O. steamer. Our first evening out +on our second cruise was a beautiful one; the bland Indian Ocean +wore its sweetest smile for us. We sat on deck after dinner. A +lady with a husband came up from the cabin while we sat and gazed +at the placid sea. I was smoking a quiet digestive cigar. Hilda +was seated in her deck chair next to me. + +The lady with the husband looked about her for a vacant space on +which to place the chair a steward was carrying for her. There was +plenty of room on the quarter-deck. I could not imagine why she +gazed about her with such obtrusive caution. She inspected the +occupants of the various chairs around with deliberate scrutiny +through a long-handled tortoise-shell optical abomination. None of +them seemed to satisfy her. After a minute's effort, during which +she also muttered a few words very low to her husband, she selected +an empty spot midway between our group and the most distant group +on the other side of us. In other words, she sat as far away from +everybody present as the necessarily restricted area of the +quarter-deck permitted. + +Hilda glanced at me and smiled. I snatched a quick look at the +lady again. She was dressed with an amount of care and a smartness +of detail that seemed somewhat uncalled for on the Indian Ocean. A +cruise on a P. and O. steamer is not a garden party. Her chair was +most luxurious, and had her name painted on it, back and front, in +very large letters, with undue obtrusiveness. I read it from where +I sat, "Lady Meadowcroft." + +The owner of the chair was tolerably young, not bad looking, and +most expensively attired. Her face had a certain vacant, languid, +half ennuyee air which I have learned to associate with women of +the nouveau-riche type--women with small brains and restless minds, +habitually plunged in a vortex of gaiety, and miserable when left +for a passing moment to their own resources. + +Hilda rose from her chair, and walked quietly forward towards the +bow of the steamer. I rose, too, and accompanied her. "Well?" she +said, with a faint touch of triumph in her voice when we had got +out of earshot. + +"Well, what?" I answered, unsuspecting. + +"I told you everything turned up at the end!" she said, confidently. +"Look at the lady's nose!" + +"It does turn up at the end--certainly," I answered, glancing back +at her. "But I hardly see--" + +"Hubert, you are growing dull! You were not so at Nathaniel's. . . . +It is the lady herself who has turned up, not her nose--though I +grant you THAT turns up too--the lady I require for our tour in +India; the not impossible chaperon." + +"Her nose tells you that?" + +"Her nose, in part; but her face as a whole, too, her dress, her +chair, her mental attitude to things in general." + +"My dear Hilda, you can't mean to tell me you have divined her +whole nature at a glance, by magic!" + +"Not wholly at a glance. I saw her come on board, you know--she +transhipped from some other line at Aden as we did, and I have been +watching her ever since. Yes, I think I have unravelled her." + +"You have been astonishingly quick!" I cried. + +"Perhaps--but then, you see, there is so little to unravel! Some +books, we all know, you must 'chew and digest'; they can only be +read slowly; but some you can glance at, skim, and skip; the mere +turning of the pages tells you what little worth knowing there is +in them." + +"She doesn't LOOK profound," I admitted, casting an eye at her +meaningless small features as we paced up and down. "I incline to +agree you might easily skim her." + +"Skim her--and learn all. The table of contents is SO short. . . . +You see, in the first place, she is extremely 'exclusive'; she +prides herself on her 'exclusiveness': it, and her shoddy title, +are probably all she has to pride herself upon, and she works them +both hard. She is a sham great lady." + +As Hilda spoke, Lady Meadowcroft raised a feebly querulous voice. +"Steward! this won't do! I can smell the engine here. Move my +chair. I must go on further." + +"If you go on further that way, my lady," the steward answered, +good-humouredly, but with a man-servant's deference for any sort of +title, "you'll smell the galley, where they're cooking the dinner. +I don't know which your ladyship would like best--the engine or the +galley." + +The languid figure leaned back in the chair with an air of +resignation. "I'm sure I don't know why they cook the dinners up +so high," she murmured, pettishly, to her husband. "Why can't they +stick the kitchens underground--in the hold, I mean--instead of +bothering us up here on deck with them?" + +The husband was a big, burly, rough-and-ready Yorkshireman--stout, +somewhat pompous, about forty, with hair wearing bald on the +forehead: the personification of the successful business man. "My +dear Emmie," he said, in a loud voice, with a North Country accent, +"the cooks have got to live. They've got to live like the rest of +us. I can never persuade you that the hands must always be +humoured. If you don't humour 'em, they won't work for you. It's +a poor tale when the hands won't work. Even with galleys on deck, +the life of a sea-cook is not generally thowt an enviable position. +Is not a happy one--not a happy one, as the fellah says in the +opera. You must humour your cooks. If you stuck 'em in the hold, +you'd get no dinner at all--that's the long and the short of it." + +The languid lady turned away with a sickly, disappointed air. +"Then they ought to have a conscription, or something," she said, +pouting her lips. "The Government ought to take it in hand and +manage it somehow. It's bad enough having to go by these beastly +steamers to India at all, without having one's breath poisoned by--" +the rest of the sentence died away inaudibly in a general murmur +of ineffective grumbling. + +"Why do you think she is EXCLUSIVE?" I asked Hilda as we strolled +on towards the stern, out of the spoilt child's hearing. + +"Why, didn't you notice?--she looked about her when she came on +deck to see whether there was anybody who WAS anybody sitting +there, whom she might put her chair near. But the Governor of +Madras hadn't come up from his cabin yet; and the wife of the chief +Commissioner of Oude had three civilians hanging about her seat; +and the daughters of the Commander-in-Chief drew their skirts away +as she passed. So she did the next best thing--sat as far apart as +she could from the common herd: meaning all the rest of us. If you +can't mingle at once with the Best People, you can at least assert +your exclusiveness negatively, by declining to associate with the +mere multitude." + +"Now, Hilda, that is the first time I have ever known you to show +any feminine ill-nature!" + +"Ill-nature! Not at all. I am merely trying to arrive at the +lady's character for my own guidance. I rather like her, poor +little thing. Don't I tell you she will do? So far from objecting +to her, I mean to go the round of India with her." + +"You have decided quickly." + +"Well, you see, if you insist upon accompanying me, I MUST have a +chaperon; and Lady Meadowcroft will do as well as anybody else. In +fact, being be-ladied, she will do a little better, from the point +of view of Society, though THAT is a detail. The great matter is +to fix upon a possible chaperon at once, and get her well in hand +before we arrive at Bombay." + +"But she seems so complaining!" I interposed. "I'm afraid, if you +take her on, you'll get terribly bored with her." + +"If SHE takes ME on, you mean. She's not a lady's-maid, though I +intend to go with her; and she may as well give in first as last, +for I'm going. Now see how nice I am to you, sir! I've provided +you, too, with a post in her suite, as you WILL come with me. No, +never mind asking me what it is just yet; all things come to him +who waits; and if you will only accept the post of waiter, I mean +all things to come to you." + +"All things, Hilda?" I asked, meaningly, with a little tremor of +delight. + +She looked at me with a sudden passing tenderness in her eyes. +"Yes, all things, Hubert. All things. But we mustn't talk of +that--though I begin to see my way clearer now. You shall be +rewarded for your constancy at last, dear knight-errant. As to my +chaperon, I'm not afraid of her boring me; she bores herself, poor +lady; one can see that, just to look at her; but she will be much +less bored if she has us two to travel with. What she needs is +constant companionship, bright talk, excitement. She has come away +from London, where she swims with the crowd; she has no resources +of her own, no work, no head, no interests. Accustomed to a whirl +of foolish gaieties, she wearies her small brain; thrown back upon +herself, she bores herself at once, because she has nothing +interesting to tell herself. She absolutely requires somebody else +to interest her. She can't even amuse herself with a book for +three minutes together. See, she has a yellow-backed French novel +now, and she is only able to read five lines at a time; then she +gets tired and glances about her listlessly. What she wants is +someone gay, laid on, to divert her all the time from her own +inanity." + +"Hilda, how wonderfully quick you are at reading these things! I +see you are right; but I could never have guessed so much myself +from such small premises." + +"Well, what can you expect, my dear boy? A girl like this, brought +up in a country rectory, a girl of no intellect, busy at home with +the fowls, and the pastry, and the mothers' meetings--suddenly +married offhand to a wealthy man, and deprived of the occupations +which were her salvation in life, to be plunged into the whirl of a +London season, and stranded at its end for want of the diversions +which, by dint of use, have become necessaries of life to her!" + +"Now, Hilda, you are practising upon my credulity. You can't +possibly tell from her look that she was brought up in a country +rectory." + +"Of course not. You forget. There my memory comes in. I simply +remember it." + +"You remember it? How?" + +"Why, just in the same way as I remembered your name and your +mother's when I was first introduced to you. I saw a notice once +in the births, deaths, and marriages--'At St. Alphege's, +Millington, by the Rev. Hugh Clitheroe, M.A., father of the bride, +Peter Gubbins, Esq., of The Laurels, Middleston, to Emilia Frances, +third daughter of the Rev. Hugh Clitheroe, rector of Millington.'" + +"Clitheroe--Gubbins; what on earth has that to do with it? That +would be Mrs. Gubbins: this is Lady Meadowcroft." + +"The same article, as the shopmen say--only under a different name. +A year or two later I read a notice in the Times that 'I, Ivor de +Courcy Meadowcroft, of The Laurels, Middleston, Mayor-elect of the +Borough of Middleston, hereby give notice, that I have this day +discontinued the use of the name Peter Gubbins, by which I was +formerly known, and have assumed in lieu thereof the style and +title of Ivor de Courcy Meadowcroft, by which I desire in future to +be known.' + +"A month or two later, again I happened to light upon a notice in +the Telegraph that the Prince of Wales had opened a new hospital +for incurables at Middleston, and that the Mayor, Mr. Ivor +Meadowcroft, had received an intimation of Her Majesty's intention +of conferring upon him the honour of knighthood. Now what do you +make of it?" + +"Putting two and two together," I answered, with my eye on our +subject, "and taking into consideration the lady's face and manner, +I should incline to suspect that she was the daughter of a poor +parson, with the usual large family in inverse proportion to his +means. That she unexpectedly made a good match with a very wealthy +manufacturer who had raised himself; and that she was puffed up +accordingly with a sense of self-importance." + +"Exactly. He is a millionaire, or something very like it; and, +being an ambitious girl, as she understands ambition, she got him +to stand for the mayoralty, I don't doubt, in the year when the +Prince of Wales was going to open the Royal Incurables, on purpose +to secure him the chance of a knighthood. Then she said, very +reasonably, 'I WON'T be Lady Gubbins--Sir Peter Gubbins!' There's +an aristocratic name for you!--and, by a stroke of his pen, he +straightway dis-Gubbinised himself, and emerged as Sir Ivor de +Courcy Meadowcroft." + +"Really, Hilda, you know everything about everybody! And what do +you suppose they're going to India for?" + +"Now, you've asked me a hard one. I haven't the faintest +notion. . . . And yet . . . let me think. How is this for a +conjecture? Sir Ivor is interested in steel rails, I believe, and +in railway plant generally. I'm almost sure I've seen his name in +connection with steel rails in reports of public meetings. There's +a new Government railway now being built on the Nepaul frontier--one +of these strategic railways, I think they call them--it's mentioned +in the papers we got at Aden. He MIGHT be going out for that. We +can watch his conversation, and see what part of India he talks +about." + +"They don't seem inclined to give us much chance of talking," I +objected. + +"No; they are VERY exclusive. But I'm very exclusive, too. And I +mean to give them a touch of my exclusiveness. I venture to +predict that, before we reach Bombay, they'll be going down on +their knees and imploring us to travel with them." + +At table, as it happened, from next morning's breakfast the +Meadowcrofts sat next to us. Hilda was on one side of me; Lady +Meadowcroft on the other; and beyond her again, bluff Yorkshire Sir +Ivor, with his cold, hard, honest blue North Country eyes, and his +dignified, pompous English, breaking down at times into a North +Country colloquialism. They talked chiefly to each other. Acting +on Hilda's instructions, I took care not to engage in conversation +with our "exclusive" neighbour, except so far as the absolute +necessities of the table compelled me. I "troubled her for the +salt" in the most frigid voice. "May I pass you the potato salad?" +became on my lips a barrier of separation. Lady Meadowcroft marked +and wondered. People of her sort are so anxious to ingratiate +themselves with "all the Best People" that if they find you are +wholly unconcerned about the privilege of conversation with a +"titled person," they instantly judge you to be a distinguished +character. As the days rolled on, Lady Meadowcroft's voice began +to melt by degrees. Once, she asked me, quite civilly, to send +round the ice; she even saluted me on the third day out with a +polite "Good-morning, doctor." + +Still, I maintained (by Hilda's advice) my dignified reserve, and +took my seat severely with a cold "Good-morning." I behaved like a +high-class consultant, who expects to be made Physician in Ordinary +to Her Majesty. + +At lunch that day, Hilda played her first card with delicious +unconsciousness--apparent unconsciousness; for, when she chose, she +was a consummate actress. She played it at a moment when Lady +Meadowcroft, who by this time was burning with curiosity on our +account, had paused from her talk with her husband to listen to us. +I happened to say something about some Oriental curios belonging to +an aunt of mine in London. Hilda seized the opportunity. "What +did you say was her name?" she asked, blandly. + +"Why, Lady Tepping," I answered, in perfect innocence. "She has a +fancy for these things, you know. She brought a lot of them home +with her from Burma." + +As a matter of fact, as I have already explained, my poor dear aunt +is an extremely commonplace old Army widow, whose husband happened +to get knighted among the New Year's honours for some brush with +the natives on the Shan frontier. But Lady Meadowcroft was at the +stage where a title is a title; and the discovery that I was the +nephew of a "titled person" evidently interested her. I could feel +rather than see that she glanced significantly aside at Sir Ivor, +and that Sir Ivor in return made a little movement of his shoulders +equivalent to "I told you so." + +Now Hilda knew perfectly well that the aunt of whom I spoke WAS +Lady Tepping; so I felt sure that she had played this card of +malice prepense, to pique Lady Meadowcroft. + +But Lady Meadowcroft herself seized the occasion with inartistic +avidity. She had hardly addressed us as yet. At the sound of the +magic passport, she pricked up her ears, and turned to me suddenly. +"Burma?" she said, as if to conceal the true reason for her change +of front. "Burma? I had a cousin there once. He was in the +Gloucestershire Regiment." + +"Indeed?" I answered. My tone was one of utter unconcern in her +cousin's history. "Miss Wade, will you take Bombay ducks with your +curry?" In public, I thought it wise under the circumstances to +abstain from calling her Hilda. It might lead to misconceptions; +people might suppose we were more than fellow-travellers. + +"You have had relations in Burma?" Lady Meadowcroft persisted. + +I manifested a desire to discontinue the conversation. "Yes," I +answered, coldly, "my uncle commanded there." + +"Commanded there! Really! Ivor, do you hear? Dr. Cumberledge's +uncle commanded in Burma." A faint intonation on the word +commanded drew unobtrusive attention to its social importance. +"May I ask what was his name?--my cousin was there, you see." An +insipid smile. "We may have friends in common." + +"He was a certain Sir Malcolm Tepping," I blurted out, staring hard +at my plate. + +"Tepping! I think I have heard Dick speak of him, Ivor." + +"Your cousin," Sir Ivor answered, with emphatic dignity, "is +certain to have mixed with nobbut the highest officials in Burma." + +"Yes, I'm sure Dick used to speak of a certain Sir Malcolm. My +cousin's name, Dr. Cumberledge, was Maltby--Captain Richard +Maltby." + +"Indeed," I answered, with an icy stare. "I cannot pretend to the +pleasure of having met him." + +Be exclusive to the exclusive, and they burn to know you. From +that moment forth Lady Meadowcroft pestered us with her endeavours +to scrape acquaintance. Instead of trying how far she could place +her chair from us, she set it down as near us as politeness +permitted. She entered into conversation whenever an opening +afforded itself, and we two stood off haughtily. She even ventured +to question me about our relation to one another: "Miss Wade is +your cousin, I suppose?" she suggested. + +"Oh, dear, no," I answered, with a glassy smile. "We are not +connected in any way." + +"But you are travelling together!" + +"Merely as you and I are travelling together--fellow-passengers on +the same steamer." + +"Still, you have met before." + +"Yes, certainly. Miss Wade was a nurse at St. Nathaniel's, in +London, where I was one of the house doctors. When I came on board +at Cape Town, after some months in South Africa, I found she was +going by the same steamer to India." Which was literally true. To +have explained the rest would have been impossible, at least to +anyone who did not know the whole of Hilda's history. + +"And what are you both going to do when you get to India?" + +"Really, Lady Meadowcroft," I said, severely, "I have not asked +Miss Wade what she is going to do. If you inquire of her point- +blank, as you have inquired of me, I dare say she will tell you. +For myself, I am just a globe-trotter, amusing myself. I only want +to have a look round at India." + +"Then you are not going out to take an appointment?" + +"By George, Emmie," the burly Yorkshireman put in, with an air of +annoyance, "you are cross-questioning Dr. Cumberledge; nowt less +than cross-questioning him!" + +I waited a second. "No," I answered, slowly. "I have not been +practising of late. I am looking about me. I travel for +enjoyment." + +That made her think better of me. She was of the kind, indeed, who +think better of a man if they believe him to be idle. + +She dawdled about all day on deck chairs, herself seldom even +reading; and she was eager now to drag Hilda into conversation. +Hilda resisted; she had found a volume in the library which +immensely interested her. + +"What ARE you reading, Miss Wade?" Lady Meadowcroft cried at last, +quite savagely. It made her angry to see anybody else pleased and +occupied when she herself was listless. + +"A delightful book!" Hilda answered. "The Buddhist Praying Wheel, +by William Simpson." + +Lady Meadowcroft took it from her and turned the pages over with a +languid air. "Looks awfully dull!" she observed, with a faint +smile, at last, returning it. + +"It's charming," Hilda retorted, glancing at one of the +illustrations. "It explains so much. It shows one why one turns +round one's chair at cards for luck; and why, when a church is +consecrated, the bishop walks three times about it sunwise." + +"Our Bishop is a dreadfully prosy old gentleman," Lady Meadowcroft +answered, gliding off at a tangent on a personality, as is the wont +of her kind; "he had, oh, such a dreadful quarrel with my father +over the rules of the St. Alphege Schools at Millington." + +"Indeed," Hilda answered, turning once more to her book. Lady +Meadowcroft looked annoyed. It would never have occurred to her +that within a few weeks she was to owe her life to that very +abstruse work, and what Hilda had read in it. + +That afternoon, as we watched the flying fish from the ship's side, +Hilda said to me abruptly, "My chaperon is an extremely nervous +woman." + +"Nervous about what?" + +"About disease, chiefly. She has the temperament that dreads +infection--and therefore catches it." + +"Why do you think so?" + +"Haven't you noticed that she often doubles her thumb under her +fingers--folds her fist across it--so--especially when anybody +talks about anything alarming? If the conversation happens to turn +on jungle fever, or any subject like that, down goes her thumb +instantly, and she clasps her fist over it with a convulsive +squeeze. At the same time, too, her face twitches. I know what +that trick means. She's horribly afraid of tropical diseases, +though she never says so." + +"And you attach importance to her fear?" + +"Of course. I count upon it as probably our chief means of +catching and fixing her." + +"As how?" + +She shook her head and quizzed me. "Wait and see. You are a +doctor; I, a trained nurse. Before twenty-four hours, I foresee +she will ask us. She is sure to ask us, now she has learned that +you are Lady Tepping's nephew, and that I am acquainted with +several of the Best People." + +That evening, about ten o'clock, Sir Ivor strolled up to me in the +smoking-room with affected unconcern. He laid his hand on my arm +and drew me aside mysteriously. The ship's doctor was there, +playing a quiet game of poker with a few of the passengers. "I beg +your pardon, Dr. Cumberledge," he began, in an undertone, "could +you come outside with me a minute? Lady Meadowcroft has sent me up +to you with a message." + +I followed him on to the open deck. "It is quite impossible, my +dear sir," I said, shaking my head austerely, for I divined his +errand. "I can't go and see Lady Meadowcroft. Medical etiquette, +you know; the constant and salutary rule of the profession!" + +"Why not?" he asked, astonished. + +"The ship carries a surgeon," I replied, in my most precise tone. +"He is a duly qualified gentleman, very able in his profession, and +he ought to inspire your wife with confidence. I regard this +vessel as Dr. Boyell's practice, and all on board it as virtually +his patients." + +Sir Ivor's face fell. "But Lady Meadowcroft is not at all well," +he answered, looking piteous; "and--she can't endure the ship's +doctor. Such a common man, you know! His loud voice disturbs her. +You MUST have noticed that my wife is a lady of exceptionally +delicate nervous organisation." He hesitated, beamed on me, and +played his trump card. "She dislikes being attended by owt but a +GENTLEMAN." + +"If a gentleman is also a medical man," I answered, "his sense of +duty towards his brother practitioners would, of course, prevent +him from interfering in their proper sphere, or putting upon them +the unmerited slight of letting them see him preferred before +them." + +"Then you positively refuse?" he asked, wistfully, drawing back. +I could see he stood in a certain dread of that imperious little +woman. + +I conceded a point. "I will go down in twenty minutes," I admitted, +looking grave,--"not just now, lest I annoy my colleague,--and I +will glance at Lady Meadowcroft in an unprofessional way. If I +think her case demands treatment, I will tell Dr. Boyell." And I +returned to the smoking-room and took up a novel. + +Twenty minutes later I knocked at the door of the lady's private +cabin, with my best bedside manner in full play. As I suspected, +she was nervous--nothing more--my mere smile reassured her. I +observed that she held her thumb fast, doubled under in her fist, +all the time I was questioning her, as Hilda had said; and I also +noticed that the fingers closed about it convulsively at first, but +gradually relaxed as my voice restored confidence. She thanked me +profusely, and was really grateful. + +On deck next day she was very communicative. They were going to +make the regular tour first, she said, but were to go on to the +Tibetan frontier at the end, where Sir Ivor had a contract to +construct a railway, in a very wild region. Tigers? Natives? Oh, +she didn't mind either of THEM; but she was told that that +district--what did they call it? the Terai, or something--was +terribly unwholesome. Fever was what-you-may-call-it there--yes, +"endemic"--that was the word; "oh, thank you, Dr. Cumberledge." +She hated the very name of fever. "Now you, Miss Wade, I suppose," +with an awestruck smile, "are not in the least afraid of it?" + +Hilda looked up at her calmly. "Not in the least," she answered. +"I have nursed hundreds of cases." + +"Oh, my, how dreadful! And never caught it?" + +"Never. I am not afraid, you see." + +"I wish _I_ wasn't! Hundreds of cases! It makes one ill to think +of it! . . . And all successfully?" + +"Almost all of them." + +"You don't tell your patients stories when they're ill about your +other cases who died, do you?" Lady Meadowcroft went on, with a +quick little shudder. + +Hilda's face by this time was genuinely sympathetic. "Oh, never!" +she answered, with truth. "That would be very bad nursing! One's +object in treating a case is to make one's patient well; so one +naturally avoids any sort of subject that might be distressing or +alarming." + +"You really mean it?" Her face was pleading. + +"Why, of course. I try to make my patients my friends; I talk to +them cheerfully; I amuse them and distract them; I get them away, +as far as I can, from themselves and their symptoms." + +"Oh, what a lovely person to have about one when one's ill!" the +languid lady exclaimed, ecstatically. "I SHOULD like to send for +you if I wanted nursing! But there--it's always so, of course, +with a real lady; common nurses frighten one so. I wish I could +always have a lady to nurse me!" + +"A person who sympathises--that is the really important thing," +Hilda answered, in her quiet voice. "One must find out first one's +patient's temperament. YOU are nervous, I can see." She laid one +hand on her new friend's arm. "You need to be kept amused and +engaged when you are ill; what YOU require most is--insight--and +sympathy." + +The little fist doubled up again; the vacant face grew positively +sweet. "That's just it! You have hit it! How clever you are! I +want all that. I suppose, Miss Wade, YOU never go out for private +nursing?" + +"Never," Hilda answered. "You see, Lady Meadowcroft, I don't nurse +for a livelihood. I have means of my own; I took up this work as +an occupation and a sphere in life. I haven't done anything yet +but hospital nursing." + +Lady Meadowcroft drew a slight sigh. "What a pity!" she murmured, +slowly. "It does seem hard that your sympathies should all be +thrown away, so to speak, on a horrid lot of wretched poor people, +instead of being spent on your own equals--who would so greatly +appreciate them." + +"I think I can venture to say the poor appreciate them, too," Hilda +answered, bridling up a little--for there was nothing she hated so +much as class-prejudices. "Besides, they need sympathy more; they +have fewer comforts. I should not care to give up attending my +poor people for the sake of the idle rich." + +The set phraseology of the country rectory recurred to Lady +Meadowcroft--"our poorer brethren," and so forth. "Oh, of course," +she answered, with the mechanical acquiescence such women always +give to moral platitudes. "One must do one's best for the poor, I +know--for conscience' sake and all that; it's our duty, and we all +try hard to do it. But they're so terribly ungrateful! Don't you +think so? Do you know, Miss Wade, in my father's parish--" + +Hilda cut her short with a sunny smile--half contemptuous +toleration, half genuine pity. "We are all ungrateful," she said; +"but the poor, I think, the least so. I'm sure the gratitude I've +often had from my poor women at St. Nathaniel's has made me +sometimes feel really ashamed of myself. I had done so little--and +they thanked me so much for it." + +"Which only shows," Lady Meadowcroft broke in, "that one ought +always to have a LADY to nurse one." + +"Ca marche!" Hilda said to me, with a quiet smile, a few minutes +after, when her ladyship had disappeared in her fluffy robe down +the companion-ladder. + +"Yes, ca marche," I answered. "In an hour or two you will have +succeeded in landing your chaperon. And what is most amusing, +landed her, too, Hilda, just by being yourself--letting her see +frankly the actual truth of what you think and feel about her and +about everyone!" + +"I could not do otherwise," Hilda answered, growing grave. "I must +be myself, or die for it. My method of angling consists in showing +myself just as I am. You call me an actress, but I am not really +one; I am only a woman who can use her personality for her own +purposes. If I go with Lady Meadowcroft, it will be a mutual +advantage. I shall really sympathise with her for I can see the +poor thing is devoured with nervousness." + +"But do you think you will be able to stand her?" I asked. + +"Oh, dear, yes. She's not a bad little thing, au fond, when you +get to know her. It is society that has spoilt her. She would +have made a nice, helpful, motherly body if she'd married the +curate." + +As we neared Bombay, conversation grew gradually more and more +Indian; it always does under similar circumstances. A sea voyage +is half retrospect, half prospect; it has no personal identity. +You leave Liverpool for New York at the English standpoint, and are +full of what you did in London or Manchester; half-way over, you +begin to discuss American custom-houses and New York hotels; by the +time you reach Sandy Hook, the talk is all of quick trains west and +the shortest route from Philadelphia to New Orleans. You grow by +slow stages into the new attitude; at Malta you are still +regretting Europe; after Aden, your mind dwells most on the hire of +punkah-wallahs and the proverbial toughness of the dak-bungalow +chicken. + +"How's the plague at Bombay now?" an inquisitive passenger inquired +of the Captain at dinner our last night out. "Getting any better?" + +Lady Meadowcroft's thumb dived between her fingers again. "What! +is there plague in Bombay?" she asked, innocently, in her nervous +fashion. + +"Plague in Bombay!" the Captain burst out, his burly voice +resounding down the saloon. "Why, bless your soul, ma'am, where +else would you expect it? Plague in Bombay! It's been there these +five years. Better? Not quite. Going ahead like mad. They're +dying by thousands." + +"A microbe, I believe, Dr. Boyell," the inquisitive passenger +observed deferentially, with due respect for medical science. + +"Yes," the ship's doctor answered, helping himself to an olive. +"Forty million microbes to each square inch of the Bombay +atmosphere." + +"And we are going to Bombay!" Lady Meadowcroft exclaimed, aghast. + +"You must have known there was plague there, my dear," Sir Ivor put +in, soothingly, with a deprecating glance. "It's been in all the +papers. But only the natives get it." + +The thumb uncovered itself a little. "Oh, only the natives!" Lady +Meadowcroft echoed, relieved; as if a few thousand Hindus more or +less would hardly be missed among the blessings of British rule in +India. "You know, Ivor, I never read those DREADFUL things in the +papers. _I_ read the Society news, and Our Social Diary, and +columns that are headed 'Mainly About People.' I don't care for +anything but the Morning Post and the World and Truth. I hate +horrors. . . . But it's a blessing to think it's only the +natives." + +"Plenty of Europeans, too, bless your heart," the Captain thundered +out unfeelingly. "Why, last time I was in port, a nurse died at +the hospital." + +"Oh, only a nurse--" Lady Meadowcroft began, and then coloured up +deeply, with a side glance at Hilda. + +"And lots besides nurses," the Captain continued, positively +delighted at the terror he was inspiring. "Pucka Englishmen and +Englishwomen. Bad business this plague, Dr. Cumberledge! Catches +particularly those who are most afraid of it." + +"But it's only in Bombay?" Lady Meadowcroft cried, clutching at the +last straw. I could see she was registering a mental determination +to go straight up-country the moment she landed. + +"Not a bit of it!" the Captain answered, with provoking +cheerfulness. "Rampaging about like a roaring lion all over +India!" + +Lady Meadowcroft's thumb must have suffered severely. The nails +dug into it as if it were someone else's. + +Half an hour later, as we were on deck in the cool of the evening, +the thing was settled. "My wife," Sir Ivor said, coming up to us +with a serious face, "has delivered her ultimatum. Positively her +ultimatum. I've had a mort o' trouble with her, and now she's +settled. EITHER, she goes back from Bombay by the return steamer; +OR ELSE--you and Miss Wade must name your own terms to accompany us +on our tour, in case of emergencies." He glanced wistfully at +Hilda. "DO you think you can help us?" + +Hilda made no hypocritical pretence of hanging back. Her nature +was transparent. "If you wish it, yes," she answered, shaking +hands upon the bargain. "I only want to go about and see India; I +can see it quite as well with Lady Meadowcroft as without her--and +even better. It is unpleasant for a woman to travel unattached. I +require a chaperon, and am glad to find one. I will join your +party, paying my own hotel and travelling expenses, and considering +myself as engaged in case your wife should need my services. For +that, you can pay me, if you like, some nominal retaining fee--five +pounds or anything. The money is immaterial to me. I like to be +useful, and I sympathise with nerves; but it may make your wife +feel she is really keeping a hold over me if we put the arrangement +on a business basis. As a matter of fact, whatever sum she chooses +to pay, I shall hand it over at once to the Bombay Plague +Hospital." + +Sir Ivor looked relieved. "Thank you ever so much!" he said, +wringing her hand warmly. "I thowt you were a brick, and now I +know it. My wife says your face inspires confidence, and your +voice sympathy. She MUST have you with her. And you, Dr. +Cumberledge?" + +"I follow Miss Wade's lead," I answered, in my most solemn tone, +with an impressive bow. "I, too, am travelling for instruction and +amusement only; and if it would give Lady Meadowcroft a greater +sense of security to have a duly qualified practitioner in her +suite, I shall be glad on the same terms to swell your party. I +will pay my own way; and I will allow you to name any nominal sum +you please for your claim on my medical attendance, if necessary. +I hope and believe, however, that our presence will so far reassure +our prospective patient as to make our post in both cases a +sinecure." + +Three minutes later Lady Meadowcroft rushed on deck and flung her +arms impulsively round Hilda. "You dear, good girl!" she cried; +"how sweet and kind of you! I really COULDN'T have landed if you +hadn't promised to come with us. And Dr. Cumberledge, too! So +nice and friendly of you both. But there, it IS so much pleasanter +to deal with ladies and gentlemen!" + +So Hilda won her point; and what was best, won it fairly. + + + +CHAPTER X + +THE EPISODE OF THE GUIDE WHO KNEW THE COUNTRY + + +We toured all round India with the Meadowcrofts; and really the +lady who was "so very exclusive" turned out not a bad little thing, +when once one had succeeded in breaking through the ring-fence with +which she surrounded herself. She had an endless, quenchless +restlessness, it is true; her eyes wandered aimlessly; she never +was happy for two minutes together, unless she was surrounded by +friends, and was seeing something. What she saw did not interest +her much; certainly her tastes were on the level with those of a +very young child. An odd-looking house, a queerly dressed man, a +tree cut into shape to look like a peacock, delighted her far more +than the most glorious view of the quaintest old temple. Still, +she must be seeing. She could no more sit still than a fidgety +child or a monkey at the Zoo. To be up and doing was her nature-- +doing nothing, to be sure; but still, doing it strenuously. + +So we went the regulation round of Delhi and Agra, the Taj Mahal, +and the Ghats at Benares, at railroad speed, fulfilling the whole +duty of the modern globe-trotter. Lady Meadowcroft looked at +everything--for ten minutes at a stretch; then she wanted to be +off, to visit the next thing set down for her in her guide-book. +As we left each town she murmured mechanically: "Well, we've seen +THAT, thank Heaven!" and straightway went on, with equal eagerness, +and equal boredom, to see the one after it. + +The only thing that did NOT bore her, indeed, was Hilda's bright +talk. + +"Oh, Miss Wade," she would say, clasping her hands, and looking +up into Hilda's eyes with her own empty blue ones, "you ARE so +funny! So original, don't you know! You never talk or think of +anything like other people. I can't imagine how such ideas come up +in your mind. If _I_ were to try all day, I'm sure I should never +hit upon them!" Which was so perfectly true as to be a trifle +obvious. + +Sir Ivor, not being interested in temples, but in steel rails, had +gone on at once to his concession, or contract, or whatever else it +was, on the north-east frontier, leaving his wife to follow and +rejoin him in the Himalayas as soon as she had exhausted the sights +of India. So, after a few dusty weeks of wear and tear on the +Indian railways, we met him once more in the recesses of Nepaul, +where he was busy constructing a light local line for the reigning +Maharajah. + +If Lady Meadowcroft had been bored at Allahabad and Ajmere, she was +immensely more bored in a rough bungalow among the trackless depths +of the Himalayan valleys. To anybody with eyes in his head, +indeed, Toloo, where Sir Ivor had pitched his headquarters, was +lovely enough to keep one interested for a twelvemonth. Snow-clad +needles of rock hemmed it in on either side; great deodars rose +like huge tapers on the hillsides; the plants and flowers were a +joy to look at. But Lady Meadowcroft did not care for flowers +which one could not wear in one's hair; and what was the good of +dressing here, with no one but Ivor and Dr. Cumberledge to see one? +She yawned till she was tired; then she began to grow peevish. + +"Why Ivor should want to build a railway at all in this stupid, +silly place," she said, as we sat in the veranda in the cool of +evening, "I'm sure _I_ can't imagine. We MUST go somewhere. This +is maddening, maddening! Miss Wade--Dr. Cumberledge--I count upon +you to discover SOMETHING for me to do. If I vegetate like this, +seeing nothing all day long but those eternal hills"--she clenched +her little fist--"I shall go MAD with ennui." + +Hilda had a happy thought. "I have a fancy to see some of these +Buddhist monasteries," she said, smiling as one smiles at a +tiresome child whom one likes in spite of everything. "You +remember, I was reading that book of Mr. Simpson's on the steamer-- +coming out--a curious book about the Buddhist Praying Wheels; and +it made me want to see one of their temples immensely. What do you +say to camping out? A few weeks in the hills? It would be an +adventure, at any rate." + +"Camping out?" Lady Meadowcroft exclaimed, half roused from her +languor by the idea of a change. "Oh, do you think that would be +fun? Should we sleep on the ground? But, wouldn't it be +dreadfully, horribly uncomfortable?" + +"Not half so uncomfortable as you'll find yourself here at Toloo in +a few days, Emmie," her husband put in, grimly. "The rains will +soon be on, lass; and when the rains are on, by all accounts, +they're precious heavy hereabouts--rare fine rains, so that a man's +half-flooded out of his bed o' nights--which won't suit YOU, my +lady." + +The poor little woman clasped her twitching hands in feeble agony. +"Oh, Ivor, how dreadful! Is it what they call the mongoose, or +monsoon, or something? But if they're so bad here, surely they'll +be worse in the hills--and camping out, too--won't they?" + +"Not if you go the right way to work. Ah'm told it never rains +t'other side o' the hills. The mountains stop the clouds, and once +you're over, you're safe enough. Only, you must take care to keep +well in the Maharajah's territory. Cross the frontier t'other +side into Tibet, an' they'll skin thee alive as soon as look at +thee. They don't like strangers in Tibet; prejudiced against them, +somehow; they pretty well skinned that young chap Landor who tried +to go there a year ago." + +"But, Ivor, I don't want to be skinned alive! I'm not an eel, +please!" + +"That's all right, lass. Leave that to me. I can get thee a +guide, a man that's very well acquainted with the mountains. I was +talking to a scientific explorer here t'other day, and he knows of +a good guide who can take you anywhere. He'll get you the chance +of seeing the inside of a Buddhist monastery, if you like, Miss +Wade. He's hand in glove with all the religion they've got in this +part o' the country. They've got noan much, but at what there is, +he's a rare devout one." + +We discussed the matter fully for two or three days before we made +up our minds. Lady Meadowcroft was undecided between her hatred of +dulness and her haunting fear that scorpions and snakes would +intrude upon our tents and beds while we were camping. In the end, +however, the desire for change carried the day. She decided to +dodge the rainy season by getting behind the Himalayan-passes, in +the dry region to the north of the great range, where rain seldom +falls, the country being watered only by the melting of the snows +on the high summits. + +This decision delighted Hilda, who, since she came to India, had +fallen a prey to the fashionable vice of amateur photography. She +took to it enthusiastically. She had bought herself a first-rate +camera of the latest scientific pattern at Bombay, and ever since +had spent all her time and spoiled her pretty hands in "developing." +She was also seized with a craze for Buddhism. The objects that +everywhere particularly attracted her were the old Buddhist temples +and tombs and sculptures with which India is studded. Of these she +had taken some hundreds of views, all printed by herself with the +greatest care and precision. But in India, after all, Buddhism is +a dead creed. Its monuments alone remain; she was anxious to see +the Buddhist religion in its living state; and that she could only +do in these remote outlying Himalayan valleys. + +Our outfit, therefore, included a dark tent for Hilda's photographic +apparatus; a couple of roomy tents to live and sleep in; a small +cooking-stove; a cook to look after it; half-a-dozen bearers; and +the highly recommended guide who knew his way about the country. +In three days we were ready, to Sir Ivor's great delight. He was +fond of his pretty wife, and proud of her, I believe; but when once +she was away from the whirl and bustle of the London that she loved, +it was a relief to him, I fancy, to pursue his work alone, +unhampered by her restless and querulous childishness. + +On the morning when we were to make our start, the guide who was +"well acquainted with the mountains" turned up--as villainous- +looking a person as I have ever set eyes on. He was sullen and +furtive. I judged him at sight to be half Hindu, half Tibetan. He +had a dark complexion, between brown and tawny; narrow slant eyes, +very small and beady-black, with a cunning leer in their oblique +corners; a flat nose much broadened at the wings; a cruel, thick, +sensuous mouth, and high cheek-bones; the whole surmounted by a +comprehensive scowl and an abundant crop of lank black hair, tied +up in a knot at the nape of the neck with a yellow ribbon. His +face was shifty; his short, stout form looked well adapted to +mountain climbing, and also to wriggling. A deep scar on his left +cheek did not help to inspire confidence. But he was polite and +civil-spoken. Altogether a clever, unscrupulous, wide-awake soul, +who would serve you well if he thought he could make by it, and +would betray you at a pinch to the highest bidder. + +We set out, in merry mood, prepared to solve all the abstruse +problems of the Buddhist religion. Our spoilt child stood the +camping out better than I expected. She was fretful, of course, +and worried about trifles; she missed her maid and her accustomed +comforts; but she minded the roughing it less, on the whole, than +she had minded the boredom of inaction in the bungalow; and, being +cast on Hilda and myself for resources, she suddenly evolved an +unexpected taste for producing, developing, and printing +photographs. We took dozens, as we went along, of little villages +on our route, wood-built villages with quaint houses and turrets; +and as Hilda had brought her collection of prints with her, for +comparison of the Indian and Nepaulese monuments, we spent the +evenings after our short day's march each day in arranging and +collating them. We had planned to be away six weeks, at least. +In that time the monsoon would have burst and passed. Our guide +thought we might see all that was worth seeing of the Buddhist +monasteries, and Sir Ivor thought we should have fairly escaped the +dreaded wet season. + +"What do you make of our guide?" I asked of Hilda on our fourth day +out. I began somehow to distrust him. + +"Oh, he seems all right," Hilda answered, carelessly--and her voice +reassured me. "He's a rogue, of course; all guides and interpreters, +and dragomans and the like, in out-of-the-way places, always ARE +rogues. If they were honest men, they would share the ordinary +prejudices of their countrymen, and would have nothing to do with +the hated stranger. But in this case our friend, Ram Das, has no +end to gain by getting us into mischief. If he had, he wouldn't +scruple for a second to cut our throats; but then, there are too +many of us. He will probably try to cheat us by making preposterous +charges when he gets us back to Toloo; but that's Lady Meadowcroft's +business. I don't doubt Sir Ivor will be more than a match for him +there. I'll back one shrewd Yorkshireman against any three Tibetan +half-castes, any day." + +"You're right that he would cut our throats if it served his +purpose," I answered. "He's servile, and servility goes hand in +hand with treachery. The more I watch him, the more I see +'scoundrel' written in large type on every bend of the fellow's +oily shoulders." + +"Oh, yes, he's a bad lot, I know. The cook, who can speak a little +English and a little Tibetan, as well as Hindustani, tells me Ram +Das has the worst reputation of any man in the mountains. But he +says he's a very good guide to the passes, for all that, and if +he's well paid will do what he's paid for." + +Next day but one we approached at last, after several short +marches, the neighbourhood of what our guide assured us was a +Buddhist monastery. I was glad when he told us of it, giving the +place the name of a well-known Nepaulese village; for, to say the +truth, I was beginning to get frightened. Judging by the sun, for +I had brought no compass, it struck me that we seemed to have been +marching almost due north ever since we left Toloo; and I fancied +such a line of march must have brought us by this time suspiciously +near the Tibetan frontier. Now, I had no desire to be "skinned +alive," as Sir Ivor put it. I did not wish to emulate St. +Bartholomew and others of the early Christian martyrs; so I was +pleased to learn that we were really drawing near to Kulak, the +first of the Nepaulese Buddhist monasteries to which our well- +informed guide, himself a Buddhist, had promised to introduce us. + +We were tramping up a beautiful high mountain valley, closed round +on every side by snowy peaks. A brawling river ran over a rocky +bed in cataracts down its midst. Crags rose abruptly a little in +front of us. Half-way up the slope to the left, on a ledge of +rock, rose a long, low building with curious, pyramid-like roofs, +crowned at either end by a sort of minaret, which resembled more +than anything else a huge earthenware oil-jar. This was the +monastery or lamasery we had come so far to see. Honestly, at +first sight, I did not feel sure it was worth the trouble. + +Our guide called a halt, and turned to us with a sudden peremptory +air. His servility had vanished. "You stoppee here," he said, +slowly, in broken English, "while me-a go on to see whether Lama- +sahibs ready to take you. Must ask leave from Lama-sahibs to visit +village; if no ask leave"--he drew his hand across his throat with +a significant gesture--"Lama-sahibs cuttee head off Eulopean." + +"Goodness gracious!" Lady Meadowcroft cried, clinging tight to +Hilda. "Miss Wade, this is dreadful! Where on earth have you +brought us to?" + +"Oh, that's all right," Hilda answered, trying to soothe her, +though she herself began to look a trifle anxious. "That's only +Ram Das's graphic way of putting things." + +We sat down on a bank of trailing club-moss by the side of the +rough track, for it was nothing more, and let our guide go on to +negotiate with the Lamas. "Well, to-night, anyhow," I exclaimed, +looking up, "we shall sleep on our own mattresses with a roof over +our heads. These monks will find us quarters. That's always +something." + +We got out our basket and made tea. In all moments of doubt, your +Englishwoman makes tea. As Hilda said, she will boil her Etna on +Vesuvius. We waited and drank our tea; we drank our tea and +waited. A full hour passed away. Ram Das never came back. +I began to get frightened. + +At last something stirred. A group of excited men in yellow robes +issued forth from the monastery, wound their way down the hill, and +approached us, shouting. They gesticulated as they came. I could +see they looked angry. All at once Hilda clutched my arm: +"Hubert," she cried, in an undertone, "we are betrayed! I see it +all now. These are Tibetans, not Nepaulese." She paused a second, +then went on: "I see it all--all, all. Our guide--Ram Das--he HAD +a reason, after all, for getting us into mischief. Sebastian must +have tracked us; he was bribed by Sebastian! It was HE who +recommended Ram Das to Sir Ivor!" + +"Why do you think so?" I asked, low. + +"Because--look for yourself; these men who come are dressed in +yellow. That means Tibetans. Red is the colour of the Lamas in +Nepaul; yellow in Tibet and all other Buddhist countries. I read +it in the book--The Buddhist Praying Wheel, you know. These are +Tibetan fanatics, and, as Ram Das said, they will probably cut our +throats for us." + +I was thankful that Hilda's marvellous memory gave us even that +moment for preparation and facing the difficulty. I saw in a flash +that she was quite right: we had been inveigled across the +frontier. These moutis were Tibetans--Buddhist inquisitors-- +enemies. Tibet is the most jealous country on earth; it allows no +stranger to intrude upon its borders. I had to meet the worst. I +stood there, a single white man, armed only with one revolver, +answerable for the lives of two English ladies, and accompanied by +a cringing out-caste Ghoorka cook and half-a-dozen doubtful +Nepaulese bearers. To fly was impossible. We were fairly trapped. +There was nothing for it but to wait and put a bold face on our +utter helplessness. + +I turned to our spoilt child. "Lady Meadowcroft," I said, very +seriously, "this is danger; real danger. Now, listen to me. You +must do as you are bid. No crying; no cowardice. Your life and +ours depend upon it. We must none of us give way. We must pretend +to be brave. Show one sign of fear, and these people will probably +cut our throats on the spot here." + +To my immense surprise, Lady Meadowcroft rose to the height of the +situation. "Oh, as long as it isn't disease," she answered, +resignedly; "I'm not much afraid of anything. I should mind the +plague a great deal more than I mind a set of howling savages." + +By that time the men in yellow robes had almost come up to us. It +was clear they were boiling over with indignation; but they still +did everything decently and in order. One, who was dressed in +finer vestments than the rest--a portly person, with the fat, +greasy cheeks and drooping flesh of a celibate church dignitary, +whom I therefore judged to be the abbot, or chief Lama of the +monastery--gave orders to his subordinates in a language which we +did not understand. His men obeyed him. In a second they had +closed us round, as in a ring or cordon. + +Then the chief Lama stepped forward, with an authoritative air, +like Pooh-Bah in the play, and said something in the same tongue to +the cook, who spoke a little Tibetan. It was obvious from his +manner that Ram Das had told them all about us; for the Lama +selected the cook as interpreter at once, without taking any notice +of myself, the ostensible head of the petty expedition. + +"What does he, say?" I asked, as soon as he had finished speaking. + +The cook, who had been salaaming all the time, at the risk of a +broken back, in his most utterly abject and grovelling attitude, +made answer tremulously in his broken English: "This is priest- +sahib of the temple. He very angry, because why? Eulopean-sahib +and mem-sahibs come into Tibet-land. No Eulopean, no Hindu, must +come into Tibet-land. Priest-sahib say, cut all Eulopean throats. +Let Nepaul man go back like him come, to him own country." + +I looked as if the message were purely indifferent to me. "Tell +him," I said, smiling--though at some little effort--"we were not +trying to enter Tibet. Our rascally guide misled us. We were +going to Kulak, in the Maharajah's territory. We will turn back +quietly to the Maharajah's land if the priest-sahib will allow us +to camp out for the night here." + +I glanced at Hilda and Lady Meadowcroft. I must say their bearing +under these trying circumstances was thoroughly worthy of two +English ladies. They stood erect, looking as though all Tibet +might come, and they would smile at it scornfully. + +The cook interpreted my remarks as well as he was able--his Tibetan +being probably about equal in quality to his English. But the +chief Lama made a reply which I could see for myself was by no +means friendly. + +"What is his answer?" I asked the cook, in my haughtiest voice. I +am haughty with difficulty. + +Our interpreter salaamed once more, shaking in his shoes, if he +wore any. "Priest-sahib say, that all lies. That all dam-lies. +You is Eulopean missionary, very bad man; you want to go to Lhasa. +But no white sahib must go to Lhasa. Holy city, Lhasa; for +Buddhists only. This is not the way to Kulak; this not Maharajah's +land. This place belong-a Dalai-Lama, head of all Lamas; have +house at Lhasa. But priest-sahib know you Eulopean missionary, +want to go Lhasa, convert Buddhists, because . . . Ram Das tell him +so." + +"Ram Das!" I exclaimed, thoroughly angry by this time. "The rogue! +The scoundrel! He has not only deserted us, but betrayed us as +well. He has told this lie on purpose to set the Tibetans against +us. We must face the worst now. Our one chance is, to cajole +these people." + +The fat priest spoke again. "What does he say this time?" I +asked. + +"He say, Ram Das tell him all this because Ram Das good man--very +good man: Ram Das converted Buddhist. You pay Ram Das to guidee +you to Lhasa. But Ram Das good man, not want to let Eulopean see +holy city; bring you here instead; then tell priest-sahib about +it." And he chuckled inwardly. + +"What will they do to us?" Lady Meadowcroft asked, her face very +white, though her manner was more courageous than I could easily +have believed of her. + +"I don't know," I answered, biting my lip. "But we must not give +way. We must put a bold face upon it. Their bark, after all, may +be worse than their bite. We may still persuade them to let us go +back again." + +The men in yellow robes motioned us to move on towards the village +and monastery. We were their prisoners, and it was useless to +resist. So I ordered the bearers to take up the tents and baggage. +Lady Meadowcroft resigned herself to the inevitable. We mounted +the path in a long line, the Lamas in yellow closely guarding our +draggled little procession. I tried my best to preserve my +composure, and above all else not to look dejected. + +As we approached the village, with its squalid and fetid huts, we +caught the sound of bells, innumerable bells, tinkling at regular +intervals. Many people trooped out from their houses to look at +us, all flat-faced, all with oblique eyes, all stolidly, sullenly, +stupidly passive. They seemed curious as to our dress and +appearance, but not apparently hostile. We walked on to the low +line of the monastery with its pyramidal roof and its queer, +flower-vase minarets. After a moment's discussion they ushered us +into the temple or chapel, which was evidently also their communal +council-room and place of deliberation. We entered, trembling. We +had no great certainty that we would ever get out of it alive +again. + +The temple was a large, oblong hall, with a great figure of Buddha, +cross-legged, imperturbable, enthroned in a niche at its further +end, like the apse or recess in a church in Italy. Before it stood +an altar. The Buddha sat and smiled on us with his eternal smile. +A complacent deity, carved out of white stone, and gaudily painted; +a yellow robe, like the Lamas', dangled across his shoulders. The +air seemed close with incense and also with bad ventilation. The +centre of the nave, if I may so call it, was occupied by a huge +wooden cylinder, a sort of overgrown drum, painted in bright +colours, with ornamental designs and Tibetan letters. It was much +taller than a man, some nine feet high, I should say, and it +revolved above and below on an iron spindle. Looking closer, I saw +it had a crank attached to it, with a string tied to the crank. A +solitary monk, absorbed in his devotions, was pulling this string +as we entered, and making the cylinder revolve with a jerk as he +pulled it. At each revolution, a bell above rang once. The monk +seemed as if his whole soul was bound up in the huge revolving drum +and the bell worked by it. + +We took this all in at a glance, somewhat vaguely at first, for +our lives were at stake, and we were scarcely in a mood for +ethnological observations. But the moment Hilda saw the cylinder +her eye lighted up. I could see at once an idea had struck her. +"This is a praying-wheel!" she cried, in quite a delighted voice. +"I know where I am now, Hubert--Lady Meadowcroft--I see a way out +of this! Do exactly as you see me do, and all may yet go well. +Don't show surprise at anything. I think we can work upon these +people's religious feelings." + +Without a moment's hesitation she prostrated herself thrice on the +ground before the figure of Buddha, knocking her head ostentatiously +in the dust as she did so. We followed suit instantly. Then Hilda +rose and began walking slowly round the big drum in the nave, saying +aloud at each step, in a sort of monotonous chant, like a priest +intoning, the four mystic words, "Aum, mani, padme, hum," "Aum, +mani, padme, hum," many times over. We repeated the sacred formula +after her, as if we had always been brought up to it. I noticed +that Hilda walked the way of the sun. It is an important point in +all these mysterious, half-magical ceremonies. + +At last, after about ten or twelve such rounds, she paused, with an +absorbed air of devotion, and knocked her head three times on the +ground once more, doing poojah, before the ever-smiling Buddha. + +By this time, however, the lessons of St. Alphege's rectory began +to recur to Lady Meadowcroft's mind. "Oh, Miss Wade," she murmured +in an awestruck voice, "OUGHT we to do like this? Isn't it clear +idolatry?" + +Hilda's common sense waved her aside at once. "Idolatry or not, it +is the only way to save our lives," she answered, in her firmest +voice. + +"But--OUGHT we to save our lives? Oughtn't we to be . . . well, +Christian martyrs?" + +Hilda was patience itself. "I think not, dear," she replied, +gently but decisively. "You are not called upon to be a martyr. +The danger of idolatry is scarcely so great among Europeans of our +time that we need feel it a duty to protest with our lives against +it. I have better uses to which to put my life myself. I don't +mind being a martyr--where a sufficient cause demands it. But I +don't think such a sacrifice is required of us now in a Tibetan +monastery. Life was not given us to waste on gratuitous +martyrdoms." + +"But . . . really . . . I'm afraid . . ." + +"Don't be afraid of anything, dear, or you will risk all. Follow +my lead; _I_ will answer for your conduct. Surely, if Naaman, in +the midst of idolaters, was permitted to bow down in the house of +Rimmon, to save his place at court, you may blamelessly bow down to +save your life in a Buddhist temple. Now, no more casuistry, but +do as I tell you! 'Aum, mani, padme, hum,' again! Once more round +the drum there!" + +We followed her a second time, Lady Meadowcroft giving in after a +feeble protest. The priests in yellow looked on, profoundly +impressed by our circumnavigation. It was clear they began to +reconsider the question of our nefarious designs on their holy +city. + +After we had finished our second tour round the drum, with the +utmost solemnity, one of the monks approached Hilda, whom he seemed +to take now for an important priestess. He said something to her +in Tibetan, which, of course, we did not understand; but, as he +pointed at the same time to the brother on the floor who was +turning the wheel, Hilda nodded acquiescence. "If you wish it," +she said in English--and he appeared to comprehend. "He wants to +know whether I would like to take a turn at the cylinder." + +She knelt down in front of it, before the little stool where the +brother in yellow had been kneeling till that moment, and took the +string in her hand, as if she were well accustomed to it. I could +see that the abbot gave the cylinder a surreptitious push with his +left hand, before she began, so as to make it revolve in the +opposite direction from that in which the monk had just been moving +it. This was obviously to try her. But Hilda let the string drop, +with a little cry of horror. That was the wrong way round--the +unlucky, uncanonical direction; the evil way, widdershins, the +opposite of sunwise. With an awed air she stopped short, repeated +once more the four mystic words, or mantra, and bowed thrice with +well-assumed reverence to the Buddha. Then she set the cylinder +turning of her own accord, with her right hand, in the propitious +direction, and sent it round seven times with the utmost gravity. + +At this point, encouraged by Hilda's example, I too became +possessed of a brilliant inspiration. I opened my purse and took +out of it four brand-new silver rupees of the Indian coinage. They +were very handsome and shiny coins, each impressed with an +excellent design of the head of the Queen as Empress of India. +Holding them up before me, I approached the Buddha, and laid the +four in a row submissively at his feet, uttering at the same time +an appropriate formula. But as I did not know the proper mantra +for use upon such an occasion, I supplied one from memory, saying, +in a hushed voice, "Hokey--pokey--winky--wum," as I laid each one +before the benignly-smiling statue. I have no doubt from their +faces the priests imagined I was uttering a most powerful spell or +prayer in my own language. + +As soon as I retreated, with my face towards the image, the chief +Lama glided up and examined the coins carefully. It was clear he +had never seen anything of the sort before, for he gazed at them +for some minutes, and then showed them round to his monks with an +air of deep reverence. I do not doubt he took the image of her +gracious Majesty for a very mighty and potent goddess. As soon as +all had inspected them, with many cries of admiration, he opened a +little secret drawer or relic-holder in the pedestal of the statue, +and deposited them in it with a muttered prayer, as precious +offerings from a European Buddhist. + +By this time, we could easily see we were beginning to produce a +most favourable impression. Hilda's study of Buddhism had stood us +in good stead. The chief Lama or abbot motioned to us to be +seated, in a much politer mood; after which he and his principal +monks held a long and animated conversation together. I gathered +from their looks and gestures that the head Lama inclined to regard +us as orthodox Buddhists, but that some of his followers had grave +doubts of their own as to the depth and reality of our religious +convictions. + +While they debated and hesitated, Hilda had another splendid idea. +She undid her portfolio, and took out of it the photographs of +ancient Buddhist topes and temples which she had taken in India. +These she produced triumphantly. At once the priests and monks +crowded round us to look at them. In a moment, when they +recognised the meaning of the pictures, their excitement grew quite +intense. The photographs were passed round from hand to hand, amid +loud exclamations of joy and surprise. One brother would point out +with astonishment to another some familiar symbol or some ancient +text; two or three of them, in their devout enthusiasm, fell down +on their knees and kissed the pictures. + +We had played a trump card! The monks could see for themselves by +this time that we were deeply interested in Buddhism. Now, minds +of that calibre never understand a disinterested interest; the +moment they saw we were collectors of Buddhist pictures, they +jumped at once to the conclusion that we must also, of course, be +devout believers. So far did they carry their sense of fraternity, +indeed, that they insisted upon embracing us. That was a hard +trial to Lady Meadowcroft, for the brethren were not conspicuous +for personal cleanliness. She suspected germs, and she dreaded +typhoid far more than she dreaded the Tibetan cutthroat. + +The brethren asked, through the medium of our interpreter, the +cook, where these pictures had been made. We explained as well as +we could by means of the same mouthpiece, a very earthen vessel, +that they came from ancient Buddhist buildings in India. This +delighted them still more, though I know not in what form our +Ghoorka retainer may have conveyed the information. At any rate, +they insisted on embracing us again; after which the chief Lama +said something very solemnly to our amateur interpreter. + +The cook interpreted. "Priest-sahib say, he too got very sacred +thing, come from India. Sacred Buddhist poojah-thing. Go to show +it to you." + +We waited, breathless. The chief Lama approached the altar before +the recess, in front of the great cross-legged, vapidly smiling +Buddha. He bowed himself to the ground three times over, as well +as his portly frame would permit him, knocking his forehead against +the floor, just as Hilda had done; then he proceeded, almost +awestruck, to take from the altar an object wrapped round with gold +brocade, and very carefully guarded. Two acolytes accompanied him. +In the most reverent way, he slowly unwound the folds of gold +cloth, and released from its hiding-place the highly sacred +deposit. He held it up before our eyes with an air of triumph. It +was an English bottle! + +The label on it shone with gold and bright colours. I could see it +was figured. The figure represented a cat, squatting on its +haunches. The sacred inscription ran, in our own tongue, "Old Tom +Gin, Unsweetened." + +The monks bowed their heads in profound silence as the sacred thing +was produced. I caught Hilda's eye. "For Heaven's sake," I +murmured low, "don't either of you laugh! If you do, it's all up +with us." + +They kept their countenances with admirable decorum. + +Another idea struck me. "Tell them," I said to the cook, "that we, +too, have a similar and very powerful god, but much more lively." +He interpreted my words to them. + +Then I opened our stores, and drew out with a flourish--our last +remaining bottle of Simla soda-water. + +Very solemnly and seriously I unwired the cork, as if performing an +almost sacrosanct ceremony. The monks crowded round, with the +deepest curiosity. I held the cork down for a second with my +thumb, while I uttered once more, in my most awesome tone, the +mystic words: "Hokey--pokey--winky--wum!" then I let it fly +suddenly. The soda-water was well up. The cork bounded to the +ceiling; the contents of the bottle spurted out over the place in +the most impressive fashion. + +For a minute the Lamas drew back alarmed. The thing seemed almost +devilish. Then slowly, reassured by our composure, they crept back +and looked. With a glance of inquiry at the abbot, I took out my +pocket corkscrew, and drew the cork of the gin-bottle, which had +never been opened. I signed for a cup. They brought me one, +reverently. I poured out a little gin, to which I added some soda- +water, and drank first of it myself, to show them it was not +poison. After that, I handed it to the chief Lama, who sipped at +it, sipped again, and emptied the cup at the third trial. +Evidently the sacred drink was very much to his taste, for he +smacked his lips after it, and turned with exclamations of +surprised delight to his inquisitive companions. + +The rest of the soda-water, duly mixed with gin, soon went the +round of the expectant monks. It was greatly approved of. +Unhappily, there was not quite enough soda water to supply a drink +for all of them; but those who tasted it were deeply impressed. I +could see that they took the bite of carbonic-acid gas for evidence +of a most powerful and present deity. + +That settled our position. We were instantly regarded, not only as +Buddhists, but as mighty magicians from a far country. The monks +made haste to show us rooms destined for our use in the monastery. +They were not unbearably filthy, and we had our own bedding. We +had to spend the night there, that was certain. We had, at least, +escaped the worst and most pressing danger. I may add that I +believe our cook to have been a most arrant liar--which was a lucky +circumstance. Once the wretched creature saw the tide turn, I have +reason to infer that he supported our cause by telling the chief +Lama the most incredible stories about our holiness and power. At +any rate, it is certain that we were regarded with the utmost +respect, and treated thenceforth with the affectionate deference +due to acknowledged and certified sainthood. + +It began to strike us now, however, that we had almost overshot the +mark in this matter of sanctity. We had made ourselves quite too +holy. The monks, who were eager at first to cut our throats, +thought so much of us now that we grew a little anxious as to +whether they would not wish to keep such devout souls in their +midst for ever. As a matter of fact, we spent a whole week against +our wills in the monastery, being very well fed and treated +meanwhile, yet virtually captives. It was the camera that did it. +The Lamas had never seen any photographs before. They asked how +these miraculous pictures were produced; and Hilda, to keep up the +good impression, showed them how she operated. When a full-length +portrait of the chief Lama, in his sacrificial robes, was actually +printed off and exhibited before their eyes, their delight knew no +bounds. The picture was handed about among the astonished +brethren, and received with loud shouts of joy and wonder. Nothing +would satisfy them then but that we must photograph every +individual monk in the place. Even the Buddha himself, cross- +legged and imperturbable, had to sit for his portrait. As he was +used to sitting--never, indeed, having done anything else--he came +out admirably. + +Day after day passed; suns rose and suns set; and it was clear that +the monks did not mean to let us leave their precincts in a hurry. +Lady Meadowcroft, having recovered by this time from her first +fright, began to grow bored. The Buddhists' ritual ceased to +interest her. To vary the monotony, I hit upon an expedient for +killing time till our too pressing hosts saw fit to let us depart. +They were fond of religious processions of the most protracted +sort--dances before the altar, with animal masks or heads, and +other weird ceremonial orgies. Hilda, who had read herself up in +Buddhist ideas, assured me that all these things were done in order +to heap up Karma. + +"What is Karma?" I asked, listlessly. + +"Karma is good works, or merit. The more praying-wheels you turn, +the more bells you ring, the greater the merit. One of the monks +is always at work turning the big wheel that moves the bell, so as +to heap up merit night and day for the monastery." + +This set me thinking. I soon discovered that, no matter how the +wheel is turned, the Karma or merit is equal. It is the turning it +that counts, not the personal exertion. There were wheels and +bells in convenient situations all over the village, and whoever +passed one gave it a twist as he went by, thus piling up Karma for +all the inhabitants. Reflecting upon these facts, I was seized +with an idea. I got Hilda to take instantaneous photographs of all +the monks during a sacred procession, at rapid intervals. In that +sunny climate we had no difficulty at all in printing off from the +plates as soon as developed. Then I took a small wheel, about the +size of an oyster-barrel--the monks had dozens of them--and pasted +the photographs inside in successive order, like what is called a +zoetrope, or wheel of life. By cutting holes in the side, and +arranging a mirror from Lady Meadowcroft's dressing-bag, I +completed my machine, so that, when it was turned round rapidly, +one saw the procession actually taking place as if the figures were +moving. The thing, in short, made a living picture like a +cinematograph. A mountain stream ran past the monastery, and +supplied it with water. I had a second inspiration. I was always +mechanical. I fixed a water-wheel in the stream, where it made a +petty cataract, and connected it by means of a small crank with the +barrel of photographs. My zoetrope thus worked off itself, and +piled up Karma for all the village whether anyone happened to be +looking at it or not. + +The monks, who were really excellent fellows when not engaged in +cutting throats in the interest of the faith, regarded this device +as a great and glorious religious invention. They went down on +their knees to it, and were profoundly respectful. They also bowed +to me so deeply, when I first exhibited it, that I began to be +puffed up with spiritual pride. Lady Meadowcroft recalled me to my +better self by murmuring, with a sigh: "I suppose we really can't +draw a line now; but it DOES seem to me like encouraging idolatry!" + +"Purely mechanical encouragement," I answered, gazing at my +handicraft with an inventor's pardonable pride. "You see, it is +the turning itself that does good, not any prayers attached to it. +I divert the idolatry from human worshippers to an unconscious +stream--which must surely be meritorious." Then I thought of the +mystic sentence, "Aum, mani, padme, hum." "What a pity it is," I +cried, "I couldn't make them a phonograph to repeat their mantra! +If I could, they might fulfil all their religious duties together +by machinery!" + +Hilda reflected a second. "There is a great future," she said at +last, "for the man who first introduces smoke-jacks into Tibet! +Every household will buy one, as an automatic means of acquiring +Karma." + +"Don't publish that idea in England!" I exclaimed, hastily--"if +ever we get there. As sure as you do, somebody will see in it an +opening for British trade; and we shall spend twenty millions on +conquering Tibet, in the interests of civilisation and a smoke-jack +syndicate." + +How long we might have stopped at the monastery I cannot say, had +it not been for the intervention of an unexpected episode which +occurred just a week after our first arrival. We were comfortable +enough in a rough way, with our Ghoorka cook to prepare our food +for us, and our bearers to wait; but to the end I never felt quite +sure of our hosts, who, after all, were entertaining us under false +pretences. We had told them, truly enough, that Buddhist +missionaries had now penetrated to England; and though they had not +the slightest conception where England might be, and knew not the +name of Madame Blavatsky, this news interested them. Regarding us +as promising neophytes, they were anxious now that we should go on +to Lhasa, in order to receive full instruction in the faith from +the chief fountainhead, the Grand Lama in person. To this we +demurred. Mr. Landor's experiences did not encourage us to follow +his lead. The monks, for their part, could not understand our +reluctance. They thought that every well-intentioned convert must +wish to make the pilgrimage to Lhasa, the Mecca of their creed. +Our hesitation threw some doubt on the reality of our conversion. +A proselyte, above all men, should never be lukewarm. They +expected us to embrace the opportunity with fervour. We might be +massacred on the way, to be sure; but what did that matter? We +should be dying for the faith, and ought to be charmed at so +splendid a prospect. + +On the day-week after our arrival time chief Lama came to me at +nightfall. His face was serious. He spoke to me through our +accredited interpreter, the cook. "Priest-sahib say, very +important; the sahib and mem-sahibs must go away from here before +sun get up to-morrow morning." + +"Why so?" I asked, as astonished as I was pleased. + +"Priest-sahib say, he like you very much; oh, very, very much; no +want to see village people kill you." + +"Kill us! But I thought they believed we were saints!" + +"Priest say, that just it; too much saint altogether. People +hereabout all telling that the sahib and the mem-sahibs very great +saints; much holy, like Buddha. Make picture; work miracles. +People think, if them kill you, and have your tomb here, very holy +place; very great Karma; very good for trade; plenty Tibetan man +hear you holy men, come here on pilgrimage. Pilgrimage make fair, +make market, very good for village. So people want to kill you, +build shrine over your body." + +This was a view of the advantages of sanctity which had never +before struck me. Now, I had not been eager even for the +distinction of being a Christian martyr; as to being a Buddhist +martyr, that was quite out of the question. "Then what does the +Lama advise us to do?" I asked. + +"Priest-sahib say he love you; no want to see village people kill +you. He give you guide--very good guide--know mountains well; take +you back straight to Maharajah's country." + +"Not Ram Das?" I asked, suspiciously. + +"No, not Ram Das. Very good man--Tibetan." + +I saw at once this was a genuine crisis. All was hastily arranged. +I went in and told Hilda and Lady Meadowcroft. Our spoilt child +cried a little, of course, at the idea of being enshrined; but on +the whole behaved admirably. At early dawn next morning, before +the village was awake, we crept with stealthy steps out of the +monastery, whose inmates were friendly. Our new guide accompanied +us. We avoided the village, on whose outskirts the lamasery lay, +and made straight for the valley. By six o'clock, we were well out +of sight of the clustered houses and the pyramidal spires. But I +did not breathe freely till late in the afternoon, when we found +ourselves once more under British protection in the first hamlet of +the Maharajah's territory. + +As for that scoundrel, Ram Das, we heard nothing more of him. He +disappeared into space from the moment he deserted us at the door +of the trap into which he had led us. The chief Lama told me he +had gone back at once by another route to his own country. + + + +CHAPTER XI + +THE EPISODE OF THE OFFICER WHO UNDERSTOOD PERFECTLY + + +After our fortunate escape from the clutches of our too-admiring +Tibetan hosts, we wound our way slowly back through the Maharajah's +territory towards Sir Ivor's headquarters. On the third day out +from the lamasery we camped in a romantic Himalayan valley--a +narrow, green glen, with a brawling stream running in white +cataracts and rapids down its midst. We were able to breathe +freely now; we could enjoy the great tapering deodars that rose in +ranks on the hillsides, the snow-clad needles of ramping rock that +bounded the view to north and south, the feathery bamboo-jungle +that fringed and half-obscured the mountain torrent, whose cool +music--alas, fallaciously cool--was borne to us through the dense +screen of waving foliage. Lady Meadowcroft was so delighted at +having got clear away from those murderous and saintly Tibetans +that for a while she almost forgot to grumble. She even +condescended to admire the deep-cleft ravine in which we bivouacked +for the night, and to admit that the orchids which hung from the +tall trees were as fine as any at her florist's in Piccadilly. +"Though how they can have got them out here already, in this +outlandish place--the most fashionable kinds--when we in England +have to grow them with such care in expensive hot-houses," she +said, "really passes my comprehension." + +She seemed to think that orchids originated in Covent Garden. + +Early next morning I was engaged with one of my native men in +lighting the fire to boil our kettle--for in spite of all +misfortunes we still made tea with creditable punctuality--when a +tall and good-looking Nepaulese approached us from the hills, with +cat-like tread, and stood before me in an attitude of profound +supplication. He was a well-dressed young man, like a superior +native servant; his face was broad and flat, but kindly and good- +humoured. He salaamed many times, but still said nothing. + +"Ask him what he wants," I cried, turning to our fair-weather +friend, the cook. + +The deferential Nepaulese did not wait to be asked. "Salaam, +sahib," he said, bowing again very low till his forehead almost +touched the ground. "You are Eulopean doctor, sahib?" + +"I am," I answered, taken aback at being thus recognised in the +forests of Nepaul. "But how in wonder did you come to know it?" + +"You camp near here when you pass dis way before, and you doctor +little native girl, who got sore eyes. All de country here tell +you is very great physician. So I come and to see if you will turn +aside to my village to help us." + +"Where did you learn English?" I exclaimed, more and more +astonished. + +"I is servant one time at British Lesident's at de Maharajah's +city. Pick up English dere. Also pick up plenty lupee. Velly +good business at British Lesident's. Now gone back home to my own +village, letired gentleman." And he drew himself up with conscious +dignity. + +I surveyed the retired gentleman from head to foot. He had an air +of distinction, which not even his bare toes could altogether mar. +He was evidently a person of local importance. "And what did you +want me to visit your village for?" I inquired, dubiously. + +"White traveller sahib ill dere, sir. Vely ill; got plague. Great +first-class sahib, all same like Governor. Ill, fit to die; send +me out all times to try find Eulopean doctor." + +"Plague?" I repeated, startled. He nodded. + +"Yes, plague; all same like dem hab him so bad down Bombay way." + +"Do you know his name?" I asked; for though one does not like to +desert a fellow-creature in distress, I did not care to turn aside +from my road on such an errand, with Hilda and Lady Meadowcroft, +unless for some amply sufficient reason. + +The retired gentleman shook his head in the most emphatic fashion. +"How me know?" he answered, opening the palms of his hands as if to +show he had nothing concealed in them. "Forget Eulopean name all +times so easily. And traveller sahib name very hard to lemember. +Not got English name. Him Eulopean foleigner." + +"A European foreigner!" I repeated. "And you say he is seriously +ill? Plague is no trifle. Well, wait a minute; I'll see what the +ladies say about it. How far off is your village?" + +He pointed with his hand, somewhat vaguely, to the hillside. "Two +hours' walk," he answered, with the mountaineer's habit of reckoning +distance by time, which extends, under the like circumstances, the +whole world over. + +I went back to the tents, and consulted Hilda and Lady Meadowcroft. +Our spoilt child pouted, and was utterly averse to any detour of +any sort. "Let's get back straight to Ivor," she said, petulantly. +I've had enough of camping out. It's all very well in its way for a +week but when they begin to talk about cutting your throat and all +that, it ceases to be a joke and becomes a wee bit uncomfortable. +I want my feather bed. I object to their villages." + +"But consider, dear," Hilda said, gently. "This traveller is ill, +all alone in a strange land. How can Hubert desert him? It is a +doctor's duty to do what he can to alleviate pain and to cure the +sick. What would we have thought ourselves, when we were at the +lamasery, if a body of European travellers had known we were there, +imprisoned and in danger of our lives, and had passed by on the +other side without attempting to rescue us?" + +Lady Meadowcroft knit her forehead. "That was us," she said, with +an impatient nod, after a pause--"and this is another person. You +can't turn aside for everybody who's ill in all Nepaul. And +plague, too!--so horrid! Besides, how do we know this isn't +another plan of these hateful people to lead us into danger?" + +"Lady Meadowcroft is quite right," I said, hastily. "I never +thought about that. There may be no plague, no patient at all. I +will go up with this man alone, Hilda, and find out the truth. It +will only take me five hours at most. By noon I shall be back with +you." + +"What? And leave us here unprotected among the wild beasts and the +savages?" Lady Meadowcroft cried, horrified. "In the midst of the +forest! Dr. Cumberledge, how can you?" + +"You are NOT unprotected," I answered, soothing her. "You have +Hilda with you. She is worth ten men. And besides, our Nepaulese +are fairly trustworthy." + +Hilda bore me out in my resolve. She was too much of a nurse, and +had imbibed too much of the true medical sentiment, to let me +desert a man in peril of his life in a tropical jungle. So, in +spite of Lady Meadowcroft, I was soon winding my way up a steep +mountain track, overgrown with creeping Indian weeds, on my road to +the still problematical village graced by the residence of the +retired gentleman. + +After two hours' hard climbing we reached it at last. The retired +gentleman led the way to a house in a street of the little wooden +hamlet. The door was low; I had to stoop to enter it. I saw in a +moment this was indeed no trick. On a native bed, in a corner of +the one room, a man lay desperately ill; a European, with white +hair and with a skin well bronzed by exposure to the tropics. +Ominous dark spots beneath the epidermis showed the nature of the +disease. He tossed restlessly as he lay, but did not raise his +fevered head or look at my conductor. "Well, any news of Ram Das?" +he asked at last, in a parched and feeble voice. Parched and +feeble as it was, I recognised it instantly. The man on the bed +was Sebastian--no other! + +"No news of Lam Das," the retired gentleman replied, with an +unexpected display of womanly tenderness. "Lam Das clean gone; +not come any more. But I bling you back Eulopean doctor, sahib." + +Sebastian did not look up from his bed even then. I could see he +was more anxious about a message from his scout than about his own +condition. "The rascal!" he moaned, with his eyes closed tight. +"The rascal! he has betrayed me." And he tossed uneasily. + +I looked at him and said nothing. Then I seated myself on a low +stool by the bedside and took his hand in mine to feel his pulse. +The wrist was thin and wasted. The face, too, I noticed, had +fallen away greatly. It was clear that the malignant fever which +accompanies the disease had wreaked its worst on him. So weak and +ill was he, indeed, that he let me hold his hand, with my fingers +on his pulse, for half a minute or more without ever opening his +eyes or displaying the slightest curiosity at my presence. One +might have thought that European doctors abounded in Nepaul, and +that I had been attending him for a week, with "the mixture as +before" at every visit. + +"Your pulse is weak and very rapid," I said slowly, in a +professional tone. "You seem to me to have fallen into a perilous +condition." + +At the sound of my voice, he gave a sudden start. Yet even so, +for a second, he did not open his eyes. The revelation of +my presence seemed to come upon him as in a dream. "Like +Cumberledge's," he muttered to himself, gasping. "Exactly like +Cumberledge's. . . . But Cumberledge is dead . . . I must be +delirious. . . . If I didn't KNOW to the contrary, I could have +sworn it was Cumberledge's!" + +I spoke again, bending over him. "How long have the glandular +swellings been present, Professor?" I asked, with quiet +deliberativeness. + +This time he opened his eyes sharply, and looked up in my face. He +swallowed a great gulp of surprise. His breath came and went. He +raised himself on his elbows and stared at me with a fixed stare. +"Cumberledge!" he cried; "Cumberledge! Come back to life, then! +They told me you were dead! And here you are, Cumberledge!" + +"WHO told you I was dead?" I asked, sternly. + +He stared at me, still in a dazed way. He was more than half +comatose. "Your guide, Ram Das," he answered at last, half +incoherently. "He came back by himself. Came back without you. +He swore to me he had seen all your throats cut in Tibet. He alone +had escaped. The Buddhists had massacred you." + +"He told you a lie," I said, shortly. + +"I thought so. I thought so. And I sent him back for confirmatory +evidence. But the rogue has never brought it." He let his head +drop on his rude pillow heavily. "Never, never brought it!" + +I gazed at him, full of horror. The man was too ill to hear me, +too ill to reason, too ill to recognise the meaning of his own +words, almost. Otherwise, perhaps, he would hardly have expressed +himself quite so frankly. Though to be sure he had said nothing to +criminate himself in any way; his action might have been due to +anxiety for our safety. + +I fixed my glance on him long and dubiously. What ought I to do +next? As for Sebastian, he lay with his eyes closed, half +oblivious of my presence. The fever had gripped him hard. He +shivered, and looked helpless as a child. In such circumstances, +the instincts of my profession rose imperative within me. I could +not nurse a case properly in this wretched hut. The one thing to +be done was to carry the patient down to our camp in the valley. +There, at least, we had air and pure running water. + +I asked a few questions from the retired gentleman as to the +possibility of obtaining sufficient bearers in the village. As I +supposed, any number were forthcoming immediately. Your Nepaulese +is by nature a beast of burden; he can carry anything up and down +the mountains, and spends his life in the act of carrying. + +I pulled out my pencil, tore a leaf from my note-book, and +scribbled a hasty note to Hilda: "The invalid is--whom do you +think?--Sebastian! He is dangerously ill with some malignant +fever. I am bringing him down into camp to nurse. Get everything +ready for him." Then I handed it over to a messenger, found for me +by the retired gentleman, to carry to Hilda. My host himself I +could not spare, as he was my only interpreter. + +In a couple of hours we had improvised a rough, woven-grass hammock +as an ambulance couch, had engaged our bearers, and had got +Sebastian under way for the camp by the river. + +When I arrived at our tents, I found Hilda had prepared everything +for our patient with her usual cleverness. Not only had she got a +bed ready for Sebastian, who was now almost insensible, but she had +even cooked some arrowroot from our stores beforehand, so that he +might have a little food, with a dash of brandy in it, to recover +him after the fatigue of the journey down the mountain. By the +time we had laid him out on a mattress in a cool tent, with the +fresh air blowing about him, and had made him eat the meal prepared +for him, he really began to look comparatively comfortable. + +Lady Meadowcroft was now our chief trouble. We did not dare to +tell her it was really plague; but she had got near enough back to +civilisation to have recovered her faculty for profuse grumbling; +and the idea of the delay that Sebastian would cause us drove her +wild with annoyance. "Only two days off from Ivor," she cried, +"and that comfortable bungalow! And now to think we must stop here +in the woods a week or ten days for this horrid old Professor! Why +can't he get worse at once and die like a gentleman? But, there! +with YOU to nurse him, Hilda, he'll never get worse. He couldn't +die if he tried. He'll linger on and on for weeks and weeks +through a beastly convalescence!" + +"Hubert," Hilda said to me, when we were alone once more; "we +mustn't keep her here. She will be a hindrance, not a help. One +way or another we must manage to get rid of her." + +"How can we?" I asked. "We can't turn her loose upon the mountain +roads with a Nepaulese escort. She isn't fit for it. She would be +frantic with terror." + +"I've thought of that, and I see only one thing possible. I must +go on with her myself as fast as we can push to Sir Ivor's place, +and then return to help you nurse the Professor." + +I saw she was right. It was the sole plan open to us. And I had +no fear of letting Hilda go off alone with Lady Meadowcroft and the +bearers. She was a host in herself, and could manage a party of +native servants at least as well as I could. + +So Hilda went, and came back again. Meanwhile, I took charge of +the nursing of Sebastian. Fortunately, I had brought with me a +good stock of jungle-medicines in my little travelling-case, +including plenty of quinine; and under my careful treatment the +Professor passed the crisis and began to mend slowly. The first +question he asked me when he felt himself able to talk once more +was, "Nurse Wade--what has become of her?"--for he had not yet +seen her. I feared the shock for him. + +"She is here with me," I answered, in a very measured voice. "She +is waiting to be allowed to come and help me in taking care of +you." + +He shuddered and turned away. His face buried itself in the +pillow. I could see some twinge of remorse had seized upon him. +At last he spoke. "Cumberledge," he said, in a very low and almost +frightened tone, "don't let her come near me! I can't bear it. I +can't bear it." + +Ill as he was, I did not mean to let him think I was ignorant of +his motive. "You can't bear a woman whose life you have attempted," +I said, in my coldest and most deliberate way, "to have a hand in +nursing you! You can't bear to let her heap coals of fire on your +head! In that you are right. But, remember, you have attempted MY +life too; you have twice done your best to get me murdered." + +He did not pretend to deny it. He was too weak for subterfuges. +He only writhed as he lay. "You are a man," he said, shortly, "and +she is a woman. That is all the difference." Then he paused for a +minute or two. "Don't let her come near me," he moaned once more, +in a piteous voice. "Don't let her come near me!" + +"I will not," I answered. "She shall not come near you. I spare +you that. But you will have to eat the food she prepares; and you +know SHE will not poison you. You will have to be tended by the +servants she chooses; and you know THEY will not murder you. She +can heap coals of fire on your head without coming into your tent. +Consider that you sought to take her life--and she seeks to save +yours! She is as anxious to keep you alive as you are anxious to +kill her." + +He lay as in a reverie. His long white hair made his clear-cut, +thin face look more unearthly than ever, with the hectic flush of +fever upon it. At last he turned to me. "We each work for our own +ends," he said, in a weary way. "We pursue our own objects. It +suits ME to get rid of HER: it suits HER to keep ME alive. I am no +good to her dead; living, she expects to wring a confession out of +me. But she shall not have it. Tenacity of purpose is the one +thing I admire in life. She has the tenacity of purpose--and so +have I. Cumberledge, don't you see it is a mere duel of endurance +between us?" + +"And may the just side win," I answered, solemnly. + +It was several days later before he spoke to me of it again. Hilda +had brought some food to the door of the tent and passed it in to +me for our patient. "How is he now?" she whispered. + +Sebastian overheard her voice, and, cowering within himself, still +managed to answer: "Better, getting better. I shall soon be well +now. You have carried your point. You have cured your enemy." + +"Thank God for that!" Hilda said, and glided away silently. + +Sebastian ate his cup of arrowroot in silence; then he looked at me +with wistful, musing eyes. "Cumberledge," he murmured at last; +"after all, I can't help admiring that woman. She is the only +person who has ever checkmated me. She checkmates me every time. +Steadfastness is what I love. Her steadfastness of purpose and her +determination move me." + +"I wish they would move you to tell the truth," I answered. + +He mused again. "To tell the truth!" he muttered, moving his head +up and down. "I have lived for science. Shall I wreck all now? +There are truths which it is better to hide than to proclaim. +Uncomfortable truths--truths that never should have been--truths +which help to make greater truths incredible. But, all the same, +I cannot help admiring that woman. She has Yorke-Bannerman's +intellect, with a great deal more than Yorke-Bannerman's force of +will. Such firmness! such energy! such resolute patience! She is +a wonderful creature. I can't help admiring her!" + +I said no more to him just then. I thought it better to let +nascent remorse and nascent admiration work out their own natural +effects unimpeded. For I could see our enemy was beginning to feel +some sting of remorse. Some men are below it. Sebastian thought +himself above it. I felt sure he was mistaken. + +Yet even in the midst of these personal preoccupations, I saw that +our great teacher was still, as ever, the pure man of science. +He noted every symptom and every change of the disease with +professional accuracy. He observed his own case, whenever his mind +was clear enough, as impartially as he would have observed any +outside patient's. "This is a rare chance, Cumberledge," he +whispered to me once, in an interval of delirium. "So few +Europeans have ever had the complaint, and probably none who were +competent to describe the specific subjective and psychological +symptoms. The delusions one gets as one sinks into the coma, for +example, are of quite a peculiar type--delusions of wealth and of +absolute power, most exhilarating and magnificent. I think myself +a millionaire or a Prime Minister. Be sure you make a note of +that--in case I die. If I recover, of course I can write an +exhaustive monograph on the whole history of the disease in the +British Medical Journal. But if I die, the task of chronicling +these interesting observations will devolve upon you. A most +exceptional chance! You are much to be congratulated." + +"You MUST not die, Professor," I cried, thinking more, I will +confess, of Hilda Wade than of himself. "You must live . . . to +report this case for science." I used what I thought the strongest +lever I knew for him. + +He closed his eyes dreamily. "For science! Yes, for science! +There you strike the right chord! What have I not dared and done +for science? But, in case I die, Cumberledge, be sure you collect +the notes I took as I was sickening--they are most important for +the history and etiology of the disease. I made them hourly. And +don't forget the main points to be observed as I am dying. You +know what they are. This is a rare, rare chance! I congratulate +you on being the man who has the first opportunity ever afforded us +of questioning an intelligent European case, a case where the +patient is fully capable of describing with accuracy his symptoms +and his sensations in medical phraseology." + +He did not die, however. In about another week he was well enough +to move. We carried him down to Mozufferpoor, the first large town +in the plains thereabouts, and handed him over for the stage of +convalescence to the care of the able and efficient station doctor, +to whom my thanks are due for much courteous assistance. + +"And now, what do you mean to do?" I asked Hilda, when our patient +was placed in other hands, and all was over. + +She answered me without one second's hesitation: "Go straight to +Bombay, and wait there till Sebastian takes passage for England." + +"He will go home, you think, as soon as he is well enough?" + +"Undoubtedly. He has now nothing more to stop in India for." + +"Why not as much as ever?" + +She looked at me curiously. "It is so hard to explain," she +replied, after a moment's pause, during which she had been drumming +her little forefinger on the table. "I feel it rather than reason +it. But don't you see that a certain change has lately come over +Sebastian's attitude? He no longer desires to follow me; he wants +to avoid me. That is why I wish more than ever to dog his steps. +I feel the beginning of the end has come. I am gaining my point. +Sebastian is wavering." + +"Then when he engages a berth, you propose to go by the same +steamer?" + +"Yes. It makes all the difference. When he tries to follow we, he +is dangerous; when he tries to avoid me, it becomes my work in life +to follow him. I must keep him in sight every minute now. I must +quicken his conscience. I must make him FEEL his own desperate +wickedness. He is afraid to face me: that means remorse. The more +I compel him to face me, the more the remorse is sure to deepen." + +I saw she was right. We took the train to Bombay. I found rooms +at the hospitable club, by a member's invitation, while Hilda went +to stop with some friends of Lady Meadowcroft's on the Malabar +Hill. We waited for Sebastian to come down from the interior and +take his passage. Hilda, with her intuitive certainty, felt sure +he would come. + +A steamer, two steamers, three steamers, sailed, and still no +Sebastian. I began to think he must have made up his mind to go +back some other way. But Hilda was confident, so I waited +patiently. At last one morning I dropped in, as I had often done +before, at the office of one of the chief steamship companies. It +was the very morning when a packet was to sail. "Can I see the +list of passengers on the Vindhya?" I asked of the clerk, a sandy- +haired Englishman, tall, thin, and sallow. + +The clerk produced it. + +I scanned it in haste. To my surprise and delight, a pencilled +entry half-way down the list gave the name, "Professor Sebastian." + +"Oh, Sebastian is going by this steamer?" I murmured, looking up. + +The sandy-haired clerk hummed and hesitated. "Well, I believe he's +going, sir," he answered at last; "but it's a bit uncertain. He's +a fidgety man, the Professor. He came down here this morning and +asked to see the list, the same as you have done. Then he engaged +a berth provisionally--'mind, provisionally,' he said--that's why +his name is only put in on the list in pencil. I take it he's +waiting to know whether a party of friends he wishes to meet are +going also." + +"Or wishes to avoid," I thought to myself, inwardly; but I did not +say so. I asked instead, "Is he coming again?" + +"Yes, I think so: at 5.30." + +"And she sails at seven?" + +"At seven, punctually. Passengers must be aboard by half-past six +at latest." + +"Very good," I answered, making up my mind promptly. "I only +called to know the Professor's movements. Don't mention to him +that I came. I may look in again myself an hour or two later." + +"You don't want a passage, sir? You may be the friend he's +expecting." + +"No, I don't want a passage--not at present certainly." Then I +ventured on a bold stroke. "Look here," I said, leaning across +towards him, and assuming a confidential tone: "I am a private +detective"--which was perfectly true in essence--"and I'm dogging +the Professor, who, for all his eminence, is gravely suspected of a +great crime. If you will help me, I will make it worth your while. +Let us understand one another. I offer you a five-pound note to +say nothing of all this to him." + +The sallow clerk's fishy eye glistened. "You can depend upon me," +he answered, with an acquiescent nod. I judged that he did not +often get the chance of earning some eighty rupees so easily. + +I scribbled a hasty note and sent it round to Hilda: "Pack your +boxes at once, and hold yourself in readiness to embark on the +Vindhya at six o'clock precisely." Then I put my own things +straight; and waited at the club till a quarter to six. At that +time I strolled on unconcernedly into the office. A cab outside +held Hilda and our luggage. I had arranged it all meanwhile by +letter. + +"Professor Sebastian been here again?" I asked. + +"Yes, sir; he's been here; and he looked over the list again; and +he's taken his passage. But he muttered something about +eavesdroppers, and said that if he wasn't satisfied when he got on +board, he would return at once and ask for a cabin in exchange by +the next steamer." + +"That will do," I answered, slipping the promised five-pound note +into the clerk's open palm, which closed over it convulsively. +"Talked about eavesdroppers, did he? Then he knows he's been +shadowed. It may console you to learn that you are instrumental in +furthering the aims of justice and unmasking a cruel and wicked +conspiracy. Now, the next thing is this: I want two berths at +once by this very steamer--one for myself--name of Cumberledge; one +for a lady--name of Wade; and look sharp about it." + +The sandy-haired man did look sharp; and within three minutes we +were driving off with our tickets to Prince's Dock landing-stage. + +We slipped on board unobtrusively, and instantly took refuge in our +respective staterooms till the steamer was well under way, and +fairly out of sight of Kolaba Island. Only after all chance of +Sebastian's avoiding us was gone for ever did we venture up on +deck, on purpose to confront him. + +It was one of those delicious balmy evenings which one gets only at +sea and in the warmer latitudes. The sky was alive with myriads of +twinkling and palpitating stars, which seemed to come and go, like +sparks on a fire-back, as one gazed upward into the vast depths and +tried to place them. They played hide-and-seek with one another +and with the innumerable meteors which shot recklessly every now +and again across the field of the firmament, leaving momentary +furrows of light behind them. Beneath, the sea sparkled almost +like the sky, for every turn of the screw churned up the +scintillating phosphorescence in the water, so that countless +little jets of living fire seemed to flash and die away at the +summit of every wavelet. A tall, spare man in a picturesque cloak, +and with long, lank, white hair, leant over the taffrail, gazing at +the numberless flashing lights of the surface. As he gazed, he +talked on in his clear, rapt voice to a stranger by his side. The +voice and the ring of enthusiasm were unmistakable. "Oh, no," he +was saying, as we stole up behind him, "that hypothesis, I venture +to assert, is no longer tenable by the light of recent researches. +Death and decay have nothing to do directly with the phosphorescence +of the sea, though they have a little indirectly. The light is due +in the main to numerous minute living organisms, most of them +bacilli, on which I once made several close observations and crucial +experiments. They possess organs which may be regarded as miniature +bull's-eye lanterns. And these organs--" + +"What a lovely evening, Hubert!" Hilda said to me, in an apparently +unconcerned voice, as the Professor reached this point in his +exposition. + +Sebastian's voice quavered and stammered for a moment. He tried +just at first to continue and complete his sentence: "And these +organs," he went on, aimlessly, "these bull's-eyes that I spoke +about, are so arranged--so arranged--I was speaking on the subject +of crustaceans, I think--crustaceans so arranged--" then he broke +down utterly and turned sharply round to me. He did not look at +Hilda--I think he did not dare; but he faced me with his head down +and his long, thin neck protruded, eyeing me from under those +overhanging, penthouse brows of his. "You sneak!" he cried, +passionately. "You sneak! You have dogged me by false pretences. +You have lied to bring this about! You have come aboard under a +false name--you and your accomplice!" + +I faced him in turn, erect and unflinching. "Professor Sebastian," +I answered, in my coldest and calmest tone, "you say what is not +true. If you consult the list of passengers by the Vindhya, now +posted near the companion-ladder, you will find the names of Hilda +Wade and Hubert Cumberledge duly entered. We took our passage +AFTER you inspected the list at the office to see whether our names +were there--in order to avoid us. But you cannot avoid us. We do +not mean that you shall avoid us. We will dog you now through +life--not by lies or subterfuges, as you say, but openly and +honestly. It is YOU who need to slink and cower, not we. The +prosecutor need not descend to the sordid shifts of the criminal." + +The other passenger had sidled away quietly the moment he saw our +conversation was likely to be private; and I spoke in a low voice, +though clearly and impressively, because I did not wish for a +scene. I was only endeavouring to keep alive the slow, smouldering +fire of remorse in the man's bosom. And I saw I had touched him on +a spot that hurt. Sebastian drew himself up and answered nothing. +For a minute or two he stood erect, with folded arms, gazing +moodily before him. Then he said, as if to himself: "I owe the +man my life. He nursed me through the plague. If it had not been +for that--if he had not tended me so carefully in that valley in +Nepaul--I would throw him overboard now--catch him in my arms and +throw him overboard! I would--and be hanged for it!" + +He walked past us as if he saw us not, silent, erect, moody. Hilda +stepped aside and let him pass. He never even looked at her. I +knew why; he dared not. Every day now, remorse for the evil part +he had played in her life, respect for the woman who had unmasked +and outwitted him, made it more and more impossible for Sebastian +to face her. During the whole of that voyage, though he dined in +the same saloon and paced the same deck, he never spoke to her, he +never so much as looked at her. Once or twice their eyes met by +accident, and Hilda stared him down; Sebastian's eyelids dropped, +and he stole away uneasily. In public, we gave no overt sign of +our differences; but it was understood on board that relations were +strained: that Professor Sebastian and Dr. Cumberledge had been +working at the same hospital in London together; and that owing to +some disagreement between them Dr. Cumberledge had resigned--which +made it most awkward for them to be travelling together by the same +steamer. + +We passed through the Suez Canal and down the Mediterranean. All +the time, Sebastian never again spoke to us. The passengers, +indeed, held aloof from the solitary, gloomy old man, who strode +along the quarter-deck with his long, slow stride, absorbed in his +own thoughts, and intent only on avoiding Hilda and myself. His +mood was unsociable. As for Hilda, her helpful, winning ways made +her a favourite with all the women, as her pretty face did with all +the men. For the first time in his life, Sebastian seemed to be +aware that he was shunned. He retired more and more within himself +for company; his keen eye began to lose in some degree its +extraordinary fire, his expression to forget its magnetic +attractiveness. Indeed, it was only young men of scientific tastes +that Sebastian could ever attract. Among them, his eager zeal, his +single-minded devotion to the cause of science, awoke always a +responsive chord which vibrated powerfully. + +Day after day passed, and we steamed through the Straits and neared +the Channel. Our thoughts began to assume a home complexion. +Everybody was full of schemes as to what he would do when he +reached England. Old Bradshaws were overhauled and trains looked +out, on the supposition that we would get in by such an hour on +Tuesday. We were steaming along the French coast, off the western +promontory of Brittany. The evening was fine, and though, of +course, less warm than we had experienced of late, yet pleasant and +summer-like. We watched the distant cliffs of the Finistere +mainland and the numerous little islands that lie off the shore, +all basking in the unreal glow of a deep red sunset. The first +officer was in charge, a very cock-sure and careless young man, +handsome and dark-haired; the sort of young man who thought more of +creating an impression upon the minds of the lady passengers than +of the duties of his position. + +"Aren't you going down to your berth?" I asked of Hilda, about +half-past ten that night; "the air is so much colder here than you +have been feeling it of late, that I'm afraid of your chilling +yourself." + +She looked up at me with a smile, and drew her little fluffy, white +woollen wrap closer about her shoulders. "Am I so very valuable to +you, then?" she asked--for I suppose my glance had been a trifle +too tender for a mere acquaintance's. "No, thank you, Hubert; I +don't think I'll go down, and, if you're wise, you won't go down +either. I distrust this first officer. He's a careless navigator, +and to-night his head's too full of that pretty Mrs. Ogilvy. He +has been flirting with her desperately ever since we left Bombay, +and to-morrow he knows he will lose her for ever. His mind isn't +occupied with the navigation at all; what HE is thinking of is how +soon his watch will be over, so that he may come down off the +bridge on to the quarter-deck to talk to her. Don't you see she's +lurking over yonder, looking up at the stars and waiting for him by +the compass? Poor child! she has a bad husband, and now she has +let herself get too much entangled with this empty young fellow. I +shall be glad for her sake to see her safely landed and out of the +man's clutches." + +As she spoke, the first officer glanced down towards Mrs. Ogilvy, +and held out his chronometer with an encouraging smile which seemed +to say, "Only an hour and a half more now! At twelve, I shall be +with you!" + +"Perhaps you're right, Hilda," I answered, taking a seat beside her +and throwing away my cigar. "This is one of the worst bits on the +French coast that we're approaching. We're not far off Ushant. I +wish the captain were on the bridge instead of this helter-skelter, +self-conceited young fellow. He's too cock-sure. He knows so much +about seamanship that he could take a ship through any rocks on his +course, blindfold--in his own opinion. I always doubt a man who is +so much at home in his subject that he never has to think about it. +Most things in this world are done by thinking." + +"We can't see the Ushant light," Hilda remarked, looking ahead. + +"No; there's a little haze about on the horizon, I fancy. See, the +stars are fading away. It begins to feel damp. Sea mist in the +Channel." + +Hilda sat uneasily in her deck-chair. "That's bad," she answered; +"for the first officer is taking no more heed of Ushant than of his +latter end. He has forgotten the existence of the Breton coast. +His head is just stuffed with Mrs. Ogilvy's eyelashes. Very +pretty, long eyelashes, too; I don't deny it; but they won't help +him to get through the narrow channel. They say it's dangerous." + +"Dangerous!" I answered. "Not a bit of it--with reasonable care. +Nothing at sea is dangerous--except the inexplicable recklessness +of navigators. There's always plenty of sea-room--if they care to +take it. Collisions and icebergs, to be sure, are dangers that +can't be avoided at times, especially if there's fog about. But +I've been enough at sea in my time to know this much at least--that +no coast in the world is dangerous except by dint of reckless +corner-cutting. Captains of great ships behave exactly like two +hansom-drivers in the streets of London; they think they can just +shave past without grazing; and they DO shave past nine times out +of ten. The tenth time they run on the rocks through sheer +recklessness, and lose their vessel; and then, the newspapers +always ask the same solemn question--in childish good faith--how +did so experienced and able a navigator come to make such a mistake +in his reckoning? He made NO mistake; he simply tried to cut it +fine, and cut it too fine for once, with the result that he usually +loses his own life and his passengers. That's all. We who have +been at sea understand that perfectly." + +Just at that moment another passenger strolled up and joined us--a +Bengal Civil servant. He drew his chair over by Hilda's, and began +discussing Mrs. Ogilvy's eyes and the first officer's flirtations. +Hilda hated gossip, and took refuge in generalities. In three +minutes the talk had wandered off to Ibsen's influence on the +English drama, and we had forgotten the very existence of the Isle +of Ushant. + +"The English public will never understand Ibsen," the newcomer +said, reflectively, with the omniscient air of the Indian civilian. +"He is too purely Scandinavian. He represents that part of the +Continental mind which is farthest removed from the English +temperament. To him, respectability--our god--is not only no +fetish, it is the unspeakable thing, the Moabitish abomination. +He will not bow down to the golden image which our British +Nebuchadnezzar, King Demos, has made, and which he asks us to +worship. And the British Nebuchadnezzar will never get beyond the +worship of his Vishnu, respectability, the deity of the pure and +blameless ratepayer. So Ibsen must always remain a sealed book to +the vast majority of the English people." + +"That is true," Hilda answered, "as to his direct influence; but +don't you think, indirectly, he is leavening England? A man so +wholly out of tune with the prevailing note of English life could +only affect it, of course, by means of disciples and popularisers-- +often even popularisers who but dimly and distantly apprehend his +meaning. He must be interpreted to the English by English +intermediaries, half Philistine themselves, who speak his language +ill, and who miss the greater part of his message. Yet only by +such half-hints-- Why, what was that? I think I saw something!" + +Even as she uttered the words, a terrible jar ran fiercely through +the ship from stem to stern--a jar that made one clench one's teeth +and hold one's jaws tight--the jar of a prow that shattered against +a rock. I took it all in at a glance. We had forgotten Ushant, +but Ushant had not forgotten us. It had revenged itself upon us by +revealing its existence. + +In a moment all was turmoil and confusion on deck. I cannot +describe the scene that followed. Sailors rushed to and fro, +unfastening ropes and lowering boats, with admirable discipline. +Women shrieked and cried aloud in helpless terror. The voice of +the first officer could be heard above the din, endeavouring to +atone by courage and coolness in the actual disaster for his +recklessness in causing it. Passengers rushed on deck half clad, +and waited for their turn to take places in the boats. It was a +time of terror, turmoil, and hubbub. But, in the midst of it all, +Hilda turned to me with infinite calm in her voice. "Where is +Sebastian?" she asked, in a perfectly collected tone. "Whatever +happens, we must not lose sight of him." + +"I am here," another voice, equally calm, responded beside her. +"You are a brave woman. Whether I sink or swim, I admire your +courage, your steadfastness of purpose." It was the only time he +had addressed a word to her during the entire voyage. + +They put the women and children into the first boats lowered. +Mothers and little ones went first; single women and widows after. +"Now, Miss Wade," the first officer said, taking her gently by the +shoulders when her turn arrived. "Make haste; don't keep us +waiting!" + +But Hilda held back. "No, no," she said, firmly. "I won't go yet. +I am waiting for the men's boat. I must not leave Professor +Sebastian." + +The first officer shrugged his shoulders. There was no time for +protest. "Next, then," he said, quickly. "Miss Martin--Miss +Weatherly!" + +Sebastian took her hand and tried to force her in. "You MUST go," +he said, in a low, persuasive tone. "You must not wait for me!" + +He hated to see her, I knew. But I imagined in his voice--for I +noted it even then--there rang some undertone of genuine desire to +save her. + +Hilda loosened his grasp resolutely. "No, no," she answered, "I +cannot fly. I shall never leave you." + +"Not even if I promise--" + +She shook her head and closed her lips hard. "Certainly not," she +said again, after a pause. "I cannot trust you. Besides, I must +stop by your side and do my best to save you. Your life is all in +all to me. I dare not risk it." + +His gaze was now pure admiration. "As you will," he answered. +"For he that loseth his life shall gain it." + +"If ever we land alive," Hilda answered, glowing red in spite of +the danger, "I shall remind you of that word. I shall call upon +you to fulfil it." + +The boat was lowered, and still Hilda stood by my side. One second +later, another shock shook us. The Vindhya parted amidships, and +we found ourselves struggling and choking in the cold sea water. + +It was a miracle that every soul of us was not drowned that moment, +as many of us were. The swirling eddy which followed as the +Vindhya sank swamped two of the boats, and carried down not a few +of those who were standing on the deck with us. The last I saw of +the first officer was a writhing form whirled about in the water; +before he sank, he shouted aloud, with a seaman's frank courage, +"Say it was all my fault; I accept the responsibility. I ran her +too close. I am the only one to blame for it." Then he +disappeared in the whirlpool caused by the sinking ship, and we +were left still struggling. + +One of the life-rafts, hastily rigged by the sailors, floated our +way. Hilda struck out a stroke or two and caught it. She dragged +herself on to it, and beckoned me to follow. I could see she was +holding on to something tightly. I struck out in turn and reached +the raft, which was composed of two seats, fastened together in +haste at the first note of danger. I hauled myself up by Hilda's +side. "Help me to pull him aboard!" she cried, in an agonised +voice. "I am afraid he has lost consciousness!" Then I looked at +the object she was clutching in her hands. It was Sebastian's +white head, apparently quite lifeless. + +I pulled him up with her and laid him out on the raft. A very +faint breeze from the south-west had sprung up; that and a strong +seaward current that sets round the rocks were carrying us straight +out from the Breton coast and all chance of rescue, towards the +open channel. + +But Hilda thought nothing of such physical danger. "We have saved +him, Hubert!" she cried, clasping her hands. "We have saved him! +But do you think he is alive? For unless he is, MY chance, OUR +chance, is gone forever!" + +I bent over and felt his pulse. As far as I could make out, it +still beat feebly. + + + +CHAPTER XII + +THE EPISODE OF THE DEAD MAN WHO SPOKE + + + +I will not trouble you with details of those three terrible days +and nights when we drifted helplessly about at the mercy of the +currents on our improvised life-raft up and down the English +Channel. The first night was the worst. Slowly after that we grew +used to the danger, the cold, the hunger, and the thirst. Our +senses were numbed; we passed whole hours together in a sort of +torpor, just vaguely wondering whether a ship would come in sight +to save us, obeying the merciful law that those who are utterly +exhausted are incapable of acute fear, and acquiescing in the +probability of our own extinction. But however slender the chance-- +and as the hours stole on it seemed slender enough--Hilda still +kept her hopes fixed mainly on Sebastian. No daughter could have +watched the father she loved more eagerly and closely than Hilda +watched her life-long enemy--the man who had wrought such evil upon +her and hers. To save our own lives without him would be useless. +At all hazards, she must keep him alive, on the bare chance of a +rescue. If he died, there died with him the last hope of justice +and redress. + +As for Sebastian, after the first half-hour, during which he lay +white and unconscious, he opened his eyes faintly, as we could see +by the moonlight, and gazed around him with a strange, puzzled +state of inquiry. Then his senses returned to him by degrees. +"What! you, Cumberledge?" he murmured, measuring me with his eye; +"and you, Nurse Wade? Well, I thought you would manage it." There +was a tone almost of amusement in his voice, a half-ironical tone +which had been familiar to us in the old hospital days. He raised +himself on one arm and gazed at the water all round. Then he was +silent for some minutes. At last he spoke again. "Do you know +what I ought to do if I were consistent?" he asked, with a tinge of +pathos in his words. "Jump off this raft, and deprive you of your +last chance of triumph--the triumph which you have worked for so +hard. You want to save my life for your own ends, not for mine. +Why should I help you to my own undoing?" + +Hilda's voice was tenderer and softer than usual as she answered: +"No, not for my own ends alone, and not for your undoing, but to +give you one last chance of unburdening your conscience. Some men +are too small to be capable of remorse; their little souls have no +room for such a feeling. You are great enough to feel it and to +try to crush it down. But you CANNOT crush it down; it crops up in +spite of you. You have tried to bury it in your soul, and you have +failed. It is your remorse that has driven you to make so many +attempts against the only living souls who knew and understood. +If ever we get safely to land once more--and God knows it is not +likely--I give you still the chance of repairing the mischief you +have done, and of clearing my father's memory from the cruel stain +which you and only you can wipe away." + +Sebastian lay long, silent once more, gazing up at her fixedly, +with the foggy, white moonlight shining upon his bright, inscrutable +eyes. "You are a brave woman, Maisie Yorke-Bannerman," he said, at +last, slowly; "a very brave woman. I will try to live--I too--for +a purpose of my own. I say it again: he that loseth his life shall +gain it." + +Incredible as it may sound, in half an hour more he was lying fast +asleep on that wave-tossed raft, and Hilda and I were watching him +tenderly. And it seemed to us as we watched him that a change had +come over those stern and impassive features. They had softened +and melted until his face was that of a gentler and better type. +It was as if some inward change of soul was moulding the fierce old +Professor into a nobler and more venerable man. + +Day after day we drifted on, without food or water. The agony was +terrible; I will not attempt to describe it, for to do so is to +bring it back too clearly to my memory. Hilda and I, being younger +and stronger, bore up against it well; but Sebastian, old and worn, +and still weak from the plague, grew daily weaker. His pulse just +beat, and sometimes I could hardly feel it thrill under my finger. +He became delirious, and murmured much about Yorke-Bannerman's +daughter. Sometimes he forgot all, and spoke to me in the friendly +terms of our old acquaintance at Nathaniel's, giving me directions +and advice about imaginary operations. Hour after hour we watched +for a sail, and no sail appeared. One could hardly believe we +could toss about so long in the main highway of traffic without +seeing a ship or spying more than the smoke-trail of some passing +steamer. + +As far as I could judge, during those days and nights, the wind +veered from south-west to south-east, and carried us steadily and +surely towards the open Atlantic. On the third evening out, about +five o'clock, I saw a dark object on the horizon. Was it moving +towards us? We strained our eyes in breathless suspense. A minute +passed, and then another. Yes, there could be no doubt. It grew +larger and larger. It was a ship--a steamer. We made all the +signs of distress we could manage. I stood up and waved Hilda's +white shawl frantically in the air. There was half an hour of +suspense, and our hearts sank as we thought that they were about to +pass us. Then the steamer hove to a little and seemed to notice +us. Next instant we dropped upon our knees, for we saw they were +lowering a boat. They were coming to our aid. They would be in +time to save us. + +Hilda watched our rescuers with parted lips and agonised eyes. +Then she felt Sebastian's pulse. "Thank Heaven," she cried, "he +still lives! They will be here before he is quite past confession." + +Sebastian opened his eyes dreamily. "A boat?" he asked. + +"Yes, a boat!" + +"Then you have gained your point, child. I am able to collect +myself. Give me a few hours' more life, and what I can do to make +amends to you shall be done." + +I don't know why, but it seemed longer between the time when the +boat was lowered and the moment when it reached us than it had +seemed during the three days and nights we lay tossing about +helplessly on the open Atlantic. There were times when we could +hardly believe it was really moving. At last, however, it reached +us, and we saw the kindly faces and outstretched hands of our +rescuers. Hilda clung to Sebastian with a wild clasp as the men +reached out for her. + +"No, take HIM first!" she cried, when the sailors, after the custom +of men, tried to help her into the gig before attempting to save +us; "his life is worth more to me than my own. Take him--and for +God's sake lift him gently, for he is nearly gone!" + +They took him aboard and laid him down in the stern. Then, and +then only, Hilda stepped into the boat, and I staggered after her. +The officer in charge, a kind young Irishman, had had the foresight +to bring brandy and a little beef essence. We ate and drank what +we dared as they rowed us back to the steamer. Sebastian lay back, +with his white eyelashes closed over the lids, and the livid hue of +death upon his emaciated cheeks; but he drank a teaspoonful or two +of brandy, and swallowed the beef essence with which Hilda fed him. + +"Your father is the most exhausted of the party," the officer said, +in a low undertone. "Poor fellow, he is too old for such +adventures. He seems to have hardly a spark of life left in him." + +Hilda shuddered with evident horror. "He is not my father--thank +Heaven!" she cried, leaning over him and supporting his drooping +head, in spite of her own fatigue and the cold that chilled our +very bones. "But I think he will live. I mean him to live. He is +my best friend now--and my bitterest enemy!" + +The officer looked at her in surprise, and then touched his +forehead, inquiringly, with a quick glance at me. He evidently +thought cold and hunger had affected her reason. I shook my head. +"It is a peculiar case," I whispered. "What the lady says is +right. Everything depends for us upon our keeping him alive till +we reach England." + +They rowed us to the boat, and we were handed tenderly up the side. +There, the ship's surgeon and everybody else on board did their +best to restore us after our terrible experience. The ship was the +Don, of the Royal Mail Steamship Company's West Indian line; and +nothing could exceed the kindness with which we were treated by +every soul on board, from the captain to the stewardess and the +junior cabin-boy. Sebastian's great name carried weight even here. +As soon as it was generally understood on board that we had brought +with us the famous physiologist and pathologist, the man whose name +was famous throughout Europe, we might have asked for anything that +the ship contained without fear of a refusal. But, indeed, Hilda's +sweet face was enough in itself to win the interest and sympathy of +all who saw it. + +By eleven next morning we were off Plymouth Sound; and by midday we +had landed at the Mill Bay Docks, and were on our way to a +comfortable hotel in the neighbourhood. + +Hilda was too good a nurse to bother Sebastian at once about his +implied promise. She had him put to bed, and kept him there +carefully. + +"What do you think of his condition?" she asked me, after the +second day was over. I could see by her own grave face that she +had already formed her own conclusions. + +"He cannot recover," I answered. "His constitution, shattered by +the plague and by his incessant exertions, has received too severe +a shock in this shipwreck. He is doomed." + +"So I think. The change is but temporary. He will not last out +three days more, I fancy." + +"He has rallied wonderfully to-day," I said; "but 'tis a passing +rally; a flicker--no more. If you wish to do anything, now is the +moment. If you delay, you will be too late." + +"I will go in and see him," Hilda answered. "I have said nothing +more to him, but I think he is moved. I think he means to keep his +promise. He has shown a strange tenderness to me these last few +days. I almost believe he is at last remorseful, and ready to undo +the evil which he has done." + +She stole softly into the sick room. I followed her on tip-toe, +and stood near the door behind the screen which shut off the +draught from the patient. Sebastian stretched his arms out to her. +"Ah, Maisie, my child," he cried, addressing her by the name she +had borne in her childhood--both were her own--"don't leave me any +more! Stay with me always, Maisie! I can't get on without you." + +"But you hated once to see me!" + +"Because I have so wronged you." + +"And now? Will you do nothing to repair the wrong?" + +"My child, I can never undo that wrong. It is irreparable, for the +past can never be recalled; but I will try my best to minimise it. +Call Cumberledge in. I am quite sensible now, quite conscious. +You will be my witness, Cumberledge, that my pulse is normal and +that my brain is clear. I will confess it all. Maisie, your +constancy and your firmness have conquered me. And your devotion +to your father. If only I had had a daughter like you, my girl, +one whom I could have loved and trusted, I might have been a better +man. I might even have done better work for science--though on +that side, at least, I have little with which to reproach myself." + +Hilda bent over him. "Hubert and I are here," she said, slowly, in +a strangely calm voice; "but that is not enough. I want a public, +an attested, confession. It must be given before witnesses, and +signed and sworn to. Somebody might throw doubt upon my word and +Hubert's." + +Sebastian shrank back. "Given before witnesses, and signed and +sworn to! Maisie, is this humiliation necessary; do you exact it?" + +Hilda was inexorable. "You know yourself how you are situated. +You have only a day or two to live," she said, in an impressive +voice. "You must do it at once, or never. You have postponed it +all your life. Now, at this last moment, you must make up for it. +Will you die with an act of injustice unconfessed on your +conscience?" + +He paused and struggled. "I could--if it were not for you," he +answered. + +"Then do it for me," Hilda cried. "Do it for me! I ask it of you +not as a favour, but as a right. I DEMAND it!" She stood, white, +stern, inexorable, by his couch, and laid her hand upon his +shoulder. + +He paused once more. Then he murmured feebly, in a querulous tone, +"What witnesses? Whom do you wish to be present?" + +Hilda spoke clearly and distinctly. She had thought it all out +with herself beforehand. "Such witnesses as will carry absolute +conviction to the mind of all the world; irreproachable, +disinterested witnesses; official witnesses. In the first place, a +commissioner of oaths. Then a Plymouth doctor, to show that you +are in a fit state of mind to make a confession. Next, Mr. Horace +Mayfield, who defended my father. Lastly, Dr. Blake Crawford, who +watched the case on your behalf at the trial." + +"But, Hilda," I interposed, "we may possibly find that they cannot +come away from London just now. They are busy men, and likely to +be engaged." + +"They will come if I pay their fees. I do not mind how much this +costs me. What is money compared to this one great object of my +life?" + +"And then--the delay! Suppose that we are too late?" + +"He will live some days yet. I can telegraph up at once. I want +no hole-and-corner confession, which may afterwards be useless, but +an open avowal before the most approved witnesses. If he will make +it, well and good; if not, my life-work will have failed. But I +had rather it failed than draw back one inch from the course which +I have laid down for myself." + +I looked at the worn face of Sebastian. He nodded his head slowly. +"She has conquered," he answered, turning upon the pillow. "Let +her have her own way. I hid it for years, for science' sake. That +was my motive, Cumberledge, and I am too near death to lie. +Science has now nothing more to gain or lose by me. I have served +her well, but I am worn out in her service. Maisie may do as she +will. I accept her ultimatum." + +We telegraphed up, at once. Fortunately, both men were disengaged, +and both keenly interested in the case. By that evening, Horace +Mayfield was talking it all over with me in the hotel at +Southampton. "Well, Hubert, my boy," he said, "a woman, we know, +can do a great deal"; he smiled his familiar smile, like a genial +fat toad; "but if your Yorke-Bannerman succeeds in getting a +confession out of Sebastian, she'll extort my admiration." He +paused a moment, then he added, in an afterthought: "I say that +she'll extort my admiration; but, mind you, I don't know that I +shall feel inclined to believe it. The facts have always appeared +to me--strictly between ourselves, you know--to admit of only one +explanation." + +"Wait and see," I answered. "You think it more likely that Miss +Wade will have persuaded Sebastian to confess to things that never +happened than that he will convince you of Yorke-Bannerman's +innocence?" + +The great Q.C. fingered his cigarette-holder affectionately. + +"You hit it first time," he answered. "That is precisely my +attitude. The evidence against our poor friend was so peculiarly +black. It would take a great deal to make me disbelieve it." + +"But surely a confession--" + +"Ah, well, let me hear the confession, and then I shall be better +able to judge." + +Even as he spoke Hilda had entered the room. + +"There will be no difficulty about that, Mr. Mayfield. You shall +hear it, and I trust that it will make you repent for taking so +black a view of the case of your own client." + +"Without prejudice, Miss Bannerman, without prejudice," said the +lawyer, with some confusion. "Our conversation is entirely between +ourselves, and to the world I have always upheld that your father +was an innocent man." + +But such distinctions are too subtle for a loving woman. + +"He WAS an innocent man," said she, angrily. "It was your business +not only to believe it, but to prove it. You have neither believed +it nor proved it; but if you will come upstairs with me, I will +show you that I have done both." + +Mayfield glanced at me and shrugged his fat shoulders. Hilda had +led the way, and we both followed her. In the room of the sick man +our other witnesses were waiting: a tall, dark, austere man who was +introduced to me as Dr. Blake Crawford, whose name I had heard as +having watched the case for Sebastian at the time of the +investigation. There were present also a commissioner of oaths, +and Dr. Mayby, a small local practitioner, whose attitude towards +the great scientist was almost absurdly reverential. The three men +were grouped at the foot of the bed, and Mayfield and I joined +them. Hilda stood beside the dying man, and rearranged the pillow +against which he was propped. Then she held some brandy to his +lips. "Now!" said she. + +The stimulant brought a shade of colour into his ghastly cheeks, +and the old quick, intelligent gleam came back into his deep sunk +eyes. + +"A remarkable woman, gentlemen," said he, "a very noteworthy woman. +I had prided myself that my willpower was the most powerful in the +country--I had never met any to match it--but I do not mind +admitting that, for firmness and tenacity, this lady is my equal. +She was anxious that I should adopt one course of action. I was +determined to adopt another. Your presence here is a proof that +she has prevailed." + +He paused for breath, and she gave him another small sip of the +brandy. + +"I execute her will ungrudgingly and with the conviction that it is +the right and proper course for me to take," he continued. "You +will forgive me some of the ill which I have done you, Maisie, when +I tell you that I really died this morning--all unknown to +Cumberledge and you--and that nothing but my will force has +sufficed to keep spirit and body together until I should carry out +your will in the manner which you suggested. I shall be glad when +I have finished, for the effort is a painful one, and I long for +the peace of dissolution. It is now a quarter to seven. I have +every hope that I may be able to leave before eight." + +It was strange to hear the perfect coolness with which he discussed +his own approaching dissolution. Calm, pale, and impassive, his +manner was that of a professor addressing his class. I had seen +him speak so to a ring of dressers in the old days at Nathaniel's. + +"The circumstances which led up to the death of Admiral Scott +Prideaux, and the suspicions which caused the arrest of Doctor +Yorke-Bannerman, have never yet been fully explained, although they +were by no means so profound that they might not have been +unravelled at the time had a man of intellect concentrated his +attention upon them. The police, however, were incompetent and the +legal advisers of Dr. Bannerman hardly less so, and a woman only +has had the wit to see that a gross injustice has been done. The +true facts I will now lay before you." + +Mayfield's broad face had reddened with indignation; but now his +curiosity drove out every other emotion, and he leaned forward with +the rest of us to hear the old man's story. + +"In the first place, I must tell you that both Dr. Bannerman and +myself were engaged at the time in an investigation upon the nature +and properties of the vegetable alkaloids, and especially of +aconitine. We hoped for the very greatest results from this drug, +and we were both equally enthusiastic in our research. Especially, +we had reason to believe that it might have a most successful +action in the case of a certain rare but deadly disease, into the +nature of which I need not enter. Reasoning by analogy, we were +convinced that we had a certain cure for this particular ailment. + +"Our investigation, however, was somewhat hampered by the fact that +the condition in question is rare out of tropical countries, and +that in our hospital wards we had not, at that time, any example of +it. So serious was this obstacle, that it seemed that we must +leave other men more favourably situated to reap the benefit of our +work and enjoy the credit of our discovery, but a curious chance +gave us exactly what we were in search of, at the instant when we +were about to despair. It was Yorke-Bannerman who came to me in my +laboratory one day to tell me that he had in his private practice +the very condition of which we were in search. + +"'The patient,' said he, 'is my uncle, Admiral Scott Prideaux.' + +"'Your uncle!' I cried, in amazement. 'But how came he to develop +such a condition?' + +"'His last commission in the Navy was spent upon the Malabar Coast, +where the disease is endemic. There can be do doubt that it has +been latent in his system ever since, and that the irritability of +temper and indecision of character, of which his family have so +often had to complain, were really among the symptoms of his +complaint.' + +"I examined the Admiral in consultation with my colleague, and I +confirmed his diagnosis. But, to my surprise, Yorke-Bannerman +showed the most invincible and reprehensible objection to +experiment upon his relative. In vain I assured him that he must +place his duty to science high above all other considerations. It +was only after great pressure that I could persuade him to add an +infinitesimal portion of aconitine to his prescriptions. The drug +was a deadly one, he said, and the toxic dose was still to be +determined. He could not push it in the case of a relative who +trusted himself to his care. I tried to shake him in what I +regarded as his absurd squeamishness--but in vain. + +"But I had another resource. Bannerman's prescriptions were made +up by a fellow named Barclay, who had been dispenser at Nathaniel's +and afterwards set up as a chemist in Sackville Street. This man +was absolutely in my power. I had discovered him at Nathaniel's in +dishonest practices, and I held evidence which would have sent him +to gaol. I held this over him now, and I made him, unknown to +Bannerman, increase the doses of aconitine in the medicine until +they were sufficient for my experimental purposes. I will not +enter into figures, but suffice it that Bannerman was giving more +than ten times what he imagined. + +"You know the sequel. I was called in, and suddenly found that I +had Bannerman in my power. There had been a very keen rivalry +between us in science. He was the only man in England whose career +might impinge upon mine. I had this supreme chance of putting him +out of my way. He could not deny that he had been giving his uncle +aconitine. I could prove that his uncle had died of aconitine. He +could not himself account for the facts--he was absolutely in my +power. I did not wish him to be condemned, Maisie. I only hoped +that he would leave the court discredited and ruined. I give you +my word that my evidence would have saved him from the scaffold." + +Hilda was listening, with a set, white face. + +"Proceed!" said she, and held out the brandy once more. + +"I did not give the Admiral any more aconitine after I had taken +over the case. But what was already in his system was enough. It +was evident that we had seriously under-estimated the lethal dose. +As to your father, Maisie, you have done me an injustice. You have +always thought that I killed him." + +"Proceed!" said she. + +"I speak now from the brink of the grave, and I tell you that I did +not. His heart was always weak, and it broke down under the +strain. Indirectly I was the cause--I do not seek to excuse +anything; but it was the sorrow and the shame that killed him. As +to Barclay, the chemist, that is another matter. I will not deny +that I was concerned in that mysterious disappearance, which was a +seven days' wonder in the Press. I could not permit my scientific +calm to be interrupted by the blackmailing visits of so insignificant +a person. And then after many years you came, Maisie. You also got +between me and that work which was life to me. You also showed that +you would rake up this old matter and bring dishonour upon a name +which has stood for something in science. You also--but you will +forgive me. I have held on to life for your sake as an atonement +for my sins. Now, I go! Cumberledge--your notebook. Subjective +sensations, swimming in the head, light flashes before the eyes, +soothing torpor, some touch of coldness, constriction of the +temples, humming in the ears, a sense of sinking--sinking--sinking!" + +It was an hour later, and Hilda and I were alone in the chamber of +death. As Sebastian lay there, a marble figure, with his keen eyes +closed and his pinched, thin face whiter and serener than ever, I +could not help gazing at him with some pangs of recollection. I +could not avoid recalling the time when his very name was to me a +word of power, and when the thought of him roused on my cheek a red +flush of enthusiasm. As I looked I murmured two lines from +Browning's Grammarian's Funeral: + + + This is our Master, famous, calm, and dead, + Borne on our shoulders. + + +Hilda Wade, standing beside me, with an awestruck air, added a +stanza from the same great poem: + + + Lofty designs must close in like effects: + Loftily lying, + Leave him--still loftier than the world suspects, + Living and dying. + + +I gazed at her with admiration. "And it is YOU, Hilda, who pay him +this generous tribute!" I cried, "YOU, of all women!" + +"Yes, it is I," she answered. "He was a great man, after all, +Hubert. Not good, but great. And greatness by itself extorts our +unwilling homage." + +"Hilda," I cried, "you are a great woman; and a good woman, too. +It makes me proud to think you will soon be my wife. For there is +now no longer any just cause or impediment." + +Beside the dead master, she laid her hand solemnly and calmly in +mine. "No impediment," she answered. "I have vindicated and +cleared my father's memory. And now, I can live. 'Actual life +comes next.' We have much to do, Hubert." + + + + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, HILDA WADE *** + +This file should be named hilda10.txt or hilda10.zip +Corrected EDITIONS of our eBooks get a new NUMBER, hilda11.txt +VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, hilda10a.txt + +Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US +unless a copyright notice is included. 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