Delilah of the Snows Part 6

Leger did so concisely, and Hetty clenched the chair-arm hard as she listened to him. Still, young as she was, she held herself in hand, and sat very still, with the colour ebbing from her face.

"What shall we do?" she said.

"Ingleby has asked us to go out to Canada with him. He offers to lend us the money."

The girl's face flushed suddenly, and she glanced at Ingleby, who appeared embarra.s.sed.

"How much will you have left if you do that?" she asked.

"I don't know yet. Anyway, it doesn't matter. If you make any silly objections, Hetty, Tom will go to jail."

The girl turned to her brother, with the crimson still in her cheek and her lips quivering, and it suddenly struck Ingleby that she was really remarkably pretty, though that appeared of no great moment just then.

"That would happen, Tom?" she said.

"Yes," said Leger quietly; "I believe it would."

Hetty turned again, and looked at Ingleby with a curious intentness.

"You are quite sure you want us?"

Ingleby, moved by an impulse he did not understand, caught and held fast one of her hands. "Hetty," he said, "aren't we old friends? There is n.o.body I would sooner take with me, but we shall certainly quarrel if you ask me a question of that kind again."

The girl's expression perplexed him, and with a sudden movement she drew her hand away. "Well," she said, "we will come. I would stay--only I know Tom would not go without me; but whatever happens we will pay you back the money."

"I don't think you want to be unpleasant, Hetty," said Ingleby. "Anyway, you have only about an hour in which to get ready, because if we're not off by the next train it's quite likely that we shall not have the opportunity for going at all. Get what you want together, and meet us behind the booking office on the main line platform. Tom and I will take the back way to the station."

Hetty turned and went out without a word, and Leger looked at his companion.

"I don't think she meant to hurt you, but what she did mean exactly is a good deal more than I understand," he said.

Ingleby made a little impatient gesture. "I don't suppose it matters.

Girls seem to have curious fancies. In the meanwhile it might be as well if we made a start. I'll lend you a decent jacket, and, as you had a cap on, it would be advisable to take my straw hat. To carry out the same notion I'll slip on my one dark suit. They usually make a point of mentioning one's clothes."

They were ready in about ten minutes, but when they had descended the long stairway Ingleby stopped in the dingy hall, and stood still a moment irresolute.

"If it wasn't for the harpy downstairs we might get clear away before anybody was aware that we had gone," he said. "I can't leave her what I owe her either, for one never does seem to have change when he wants it.

How much have you got on you?"

"A handful of copper," said Leger, with a little grim smile.

Ingleby appeared to reflect. "I could send her the few shillings from wherever we stop."

"The Post Office people obligingly stamp every envelope with the name of the place it comes from. I don't think we want to leave a trail behind us."

Ingleby stood still a moment longer with a flush in his face. "Nothing would stop that woman's talking--not even a gag. It's horribly unfortunate."

"It usually is," and Leger looked at him with a curious little smile.

"The worst of having a propaganda is that the people who haven't any get indignant when one doesn't live up to it. They naturally lay part of the blame on the fallacies he believes in."

Ingleby swung round. "I'd sooner face a battery--but I'm going down."

He disappeared down the bas.e.m.e.nt steps, and in another minute a harsh voice apparently vituperating him rose up, and when he rejoined his comrade his face was redder than ever.

"Now," he said, "we'll go; the sooner the better. Everybody in the neighbourhood will know what she thinks of me inside of ten minutes."

They slipped out into the street, and Ingleby stopped a moment at the end of it and looked back with a curious expression in his face. The sunlight that lay bright upon one side of it emphasized its unattractiveness. Tall houses, grim in their squalid ugliness, shut it in, and the hot air that scarcely stirred between them was heavy with the sour odours from a neighbouring tanyard. A hoa.r.s.e clamour and a woman's voice, high-pitched and shrill with fear or anger, came out of a shadowy alley where unkempt children played in the gutter. The uproar did not concern them. They were apparently used to it.

"I've lived five years in the midst of--this--and now I'm almost sorry to leave it," he said. "There's no reason in us."

Then he turned again with a little resolute shake of his shoulders.

"Well, we have done with it at last, and if half what one hears is true there is a chance for such as us in the country we are going to."

Leger said nothing, and it was silently they threaded their way deviously in and out of alleys and archways towards the station. Their life had been a hard one in that squalid town, but the place had, after all, been home, and they could not tell what awaited them in the unknown. They had in them the steadfastness which is born of struggle, but the unthinking courage of youth that has felt no care is quite a different thing.

However, n.o.body appeared desirous of preventing their departure, and they eventually got away by a steamer for which they had to wait several days in Liverpool.

In the meanwhile Geoffrey Esmond lay one evening propped up amidst the pillows in a darkened room at Holtcar Grange. He was blanched in face, and his eyes were heavy, while a big wet bandage was still rolled about his head. Major Coulthurst was by his bedside, and a burly sergeant of police sat on the very edge of a sofa with a notebook in his hand. The window was open behind the blind, and a little cool air that brought the fragrance of flowers with it crept into the room.

"Major Coulthurst fancied he could recognize the man who a.s.saulted you, Mr. Esmond, and I have no doubt we will lay hands on him in a day or two," said the officer. "If you could identify him, too, it would make the thing more certain, and I would like to read you the description furnished me before we go any farther."

"If that is the usual course I don't see why I should object," said Esmond drily. "Still, isn't it a trifle suggestive?"

The sergeant did not appear to notice the irony of the inquiry, and launched out into what was, in the circ.u.mstances, a tolerably accurate description of Leger. Esmond listened quietly, with a little smile in his half-closed eyes.

"Major Coulthurst," he said, "is evidently astonishingly quick-sighted if he saw all that."

"I'm not sure I understand you, Esmond," and Coulthurst looked up sharply.

"Well," said the younger man reflectively, "I always fancied you were a sportsman, and we had our fun. Of course, while it lasted I would cheerfully have broken the Socialist fellow's head if I could have managed it, but just now the odds seem a trifle heavy against him."

Coulthurst laughed a little, but the sergeant shook his head. "That's not at all the way to look at it, sir," he said. "In a case of this kind one has, if I may point it out, a duty to society."

"And the police?" said Esmond, who made a little gesture. "I really do not think I should ask the opinion of the latter as to what is inc.u.mbent on me. Still, that is scarcely the point. You want me to identify the man--and I can't do it."

"You must have seen him close to, sir."

Esmond laughed. "Have you ever had incipient concussion of the brain?

You probably haven't. I believe they line your headgear with cork or cane. Well, in one respect, it's a little unfortunate, since it would have helped you to understand my position. Now, the major says the man's hair was light brown, but so far as I can remember it was red. Are you quite sure it wasn't, Coulthurst?"

Coulthurst appeared reflective. "He certainly had his hat on."

"A cap, sir," said the sergeant.

Esmond glanced at the major reproachfully. "You will notice, sergeant, how reliable he is."

"The fact mentioned wouldn't prevent your seeing what kind of man he was," said the sergeant, tartly. "He is described as little and pale, and of a delicate appearance."

"Then if the blow on my head is anything to go by, I really think my friend was mistaken," said Esmond. "It's my firm opinion the man was distinctly muscular."