Doctor Claudius, A True Story Part 33

"Thank you," said he. "I am a very good friend of his, and I thank you on his behalf, as I am sure he will himself. There's one of our Foreign Office clerks here for his holiday; I will get him to draw up the paper as he is an old friend of mine--in fact, some relation, I believe. By Jove! there goes Barker." The latter exclamation was caused by the sudden appearance of the man he named on the opposite side of the avenue, in conversation with the two young gentlemen whom the Duke had already noticed as preparing to mount their dogcart.

"Oh," said Margaret indifferently, in response to the exclamation.

"Yes," said the Duke, "it is he. I thought he was in New York."

"No," said the Countess, "he has just called. It was his card they brought me just as you came. He wants me to drive with him this afternoon."

"Indeed. Shall you go?"

"I think so--yes," said she.

"Very well. I will take my sister with me," said the Duke. "I have got something very decent to drive in." Margaret laughed at the implied invitation.

"How you take things for granted," said she. "Did you really think I would have gone with you?"

"Such things have happened," said the Duke good-humouredly, and went away. Not being in the least a ladies' man, he was very apt to make such speeches occasionally. He had a habit of taking it for granted that no one refused his invitations.

At four o'clock that afternoon Silas B. Barker junior drew up to the steps of the hotel in a very gorgeous conveyance, called in America a T-cart, and resembling a mail phaeton in build. From the high double box Mr. Barker commanded and guided a pair of showy brown horses, harnessed in the most approved philanthropic, or rather philozooic style; no check-rein, no breeching, no nothing apparently, except a pole and Mr.

Barker's crest. For Mr. Barker had a crest, since he came from Salem, Ma.s.sachusetts, and the bearings were a witch pendant, gules, on a gallows sinister, sable. Behind him sat the regulation clock-work groom, brought over at considerable expense from the establishment of Viscount Plungham, and who sprang to the ground and took his place at the horses'

heads as soon as Barker had brought them to a stand. Then Barker, arrayed in a new hat, patent-leather boots, a very long frock-coat, and a very expensive rose, descended lightly from his chariot and swiftly ascended the steps, seeming to tread half on air and half on egg-sh.e.l.ls.

And a few minutes later he again appeared, accompanied by the Countess Margaret, looking dark and pale and queenly. A proud man was dandy Silas as he helped her to her place, and going to the other side, got in and took the ribbands. Many were the glances that shot from the two edges of the road at the unknown beauty whom Silas drove by his side, and obsequious were the bows of Silas's friends as they pa.s.sed. Even the groggy old man who drives the water-cart on Bellevue Avenue could scarce forbear to cheer as she went by.

And so they drove away, side by side. Barker knew very well that Claudius had taken his leave the day before, and to tell the truth, he was a good deal surprised that Margaret should be willing to accept this invitation. He had called to ask her, because he was not the man to let the gra.s.s grow under his feet at any time, much less when he was laying siege to a woman. For with women time is sometimes everything. And being of a reasonable mind, when Mr. Barker observed that he was surprised, he concluded that there must be some good reason for his astonishment, and still more that there must be some very good reason why Margaret should accept his first invitation to a _tete-a-tete_ afternoon. From one reflection to another, he came at last to the conclusion that she must be anxious to learn some details concerning the Doctor's departure, from which again he argued that Claudius had not taken her into his confidence. The hypothesis that she might be willing to make an effort with him for Claudius's justification Mr. Barker dismissed as improbable. And he was right. He waited, therefore, for her to broach the subject, and confined himself, as they drove along, to remarks about the people they pa.s.sed, the doings of the Newport summer, concerning which he had heard all the gossip during the last few hours, the prospect of Madame Patti in opera during the coming season, horses, dogs, and mutual friends--all the motley array of subjects permissible, desultory, and amusing. Suddenly, as they bowled out on an open road by the sea, Margaret began.

"Why has Dr. Claudius gone abroad," she asked, glancing at Barker's face, which remained impenetrable as ever. Barker changed his hold on the reins, and stuck the whip into the bucket by his side before he answered.

"They say he has gone to get himself sworn to," he said rather slowly, and with a good show of indifference.

"I cannot see why that was necessary," answered Margaret calmly "It seems to me we all knew him very well."

"Oh, n.o.body can understand lawyers," said Barker, and was silent, knowing how strong a position silence was, for she could know nothing more about Claudius without committing herself to a direct question.

Barker was in a difficult position. He fully intended later to hint that Claudius might never return at all. But he knew too much to do anything of the kind at present, when the memory of the Doctor was fresh in the Countess's mind, and when, as he guessed, he himself was not too high in her favour. He therefore told a bit of the plain truth which could not be cast in his teeth afterwards, and was silent.

It was a good move, and Margaret was fain to take to some other subject of conversation, lest the pause should seem long. They had not gone far before the society kaleidoscope was once more in motion, and Barker was talking his best. They rolled along, pa.s.sing most things on the road, and when they came to a bit of hill, he walked his horses, on pretence of keeping them cool, but in reality to lengthen the drive and increase his advantage, if only by a minute and a hairbreadth. He could see he was amusing her, as he drew her away from the thing that made her heavy, and sketched, and crayoned, and photographed from memory all manner of harmless gossip--he took care that it should be harmless--and such book-talk as he could command, with such a general sprinkling of sentimentalism, ready made and easy to handle, as American young men affect in talking to women.

Making allowance for the customs of the country, they were pa.s.sing a very innocently diverting afternoon; and Margaret, though secretly annoyed at finding that Barker would not talk about Claudius, or add in any way to her information, was nevertheless congratulating herself upon the smooth termination of the interview. She had indeed only accepted the invitation in the hope of learning something more about Claudius and his "other reason." But she also recognised that, though Barker were unwilling to speak of the Doctor, he might have made himself very disagreeable by taking advantage of the confession of interest she had volunteered in asking so direct a question. But Barker had taken no such lead, and never referred to Claudius in all the ramblings of his polite conversation.

He was in the midst of a description of Mrs. Orlando Van Sueindell's last dinner-party, which he had unfortunately missed, when his browns, less peaceably disposed than most of the lazy bean-fed cattle one sees on the Newport avenue, took it into their heads that it would be a joyous thing to canter down a steep place into the sea. The road turned, with a sudden dip, across a little neck of land separating the bay from the harbour, and the descent was, for a few yards, very abrupt. At this point, then, the intelligent animals conceived the ingenious scheme of bolting, with that eccentricity of device which seems to characterise overfed carriage-horses. In an instant they were off, and it was clear there would be no stopping them--from a trot to a break, from a canter to a gallop, from a gallop to a tearing, breakneck, leave-your-bones-behind-you race, all in a moment, down to the sea.

Barker was not afraid, and he did what he could. He was not a strong man, and he knew himself no match for the two horses, but he hoped by a sudden effort, repeated once or twice, to scare the runaways into a standstill, as is sometimes possible. Acting immediately on his determination, as he always did, he wound one hand in each rein, and half rising from his high seat, jerked with all his might. Margaret held her breath.

But alas for the rarity of strength in saddlers' work! The off-rein snapped away like a thread just where the buckle leads half of it over to the near horse, and the strain on the right hand being thus suddenly removed, the horses' heads were jerked violently to the left, and they became wholly unmanageable. Barker was silent, and instantly dropped the unbroken rein. As for Margaret, she sat quite still, holding to the low rail-back of her seat, and preparing for a jump. They were by this time nearly at the bottom of the descent, and rapidly approaching a corner where a great heap of rocks made the prospect hideous. To haul the horses over to the left would have been destruction, as the ground fell away on that side to a considerable depth down to the rocks below. Then Barker did a brave thing.

"If I miss him, jump off to the right," he cried; and in a moment, before Margaret could answer or prevent him, he had got over the dashboard, and was in mid-air, a strange figure, in his long frock-coat and shiny hat. With a bold leap--and the Countess shivered as she saw him flying in front of her--he alighted on the back of the off horse, almost on his face, but well across the beast for all that. Light and wiry, a mere bundle of nerves dressed up, Mr. Barker was not to be shaken off, and, while the animal was still plunging, he had caught the flying bits of bridle, and was sawing away, right and left, with the energy of despair. Between its terror at being suddenly mounted by some one out of a clear sky, so to say, and the violent wrenching it was getting from Barker's bony little hands, the beast decided to stop at last, and its companion, who was coming in for some of the pulling too, stopped by sympathy, with a series of snorts and plunges. Barker still clung to the broken rein, leaning far over the horse's neck so as to wind it round his wrist; and he shouted to Margaret to get out, which she immediately did; but, instead of fainting away, she came to the horses' heads and stood before them, a commanding figure that even a dumb animal would not dare to slight--too much excited to speak yet, but ready to face anything.

A few moments later the groom, whose existence they had both forgotten, came running down to them, with a red face, and dusting his battered hat on his arm as he came. He had quietly slipped off behind, and had been rolled head over heels for his pains, but had suffered no injury. Then Barker got off. He was covered with dust, but his hat was still on his head, and he did not look as though he had been jumping for his life.

Margaret turned to him with genuine grat.i.tude and admiration, for he had borne himself as few men could or would have done.

"You have saved my life," she said, "and I am very grateful. It was very brave of you." And she held out her hand to meet his, now trembling violently from the fierce strain.

"Oh, not at all; it was really nothing," he said, bowing low. But the deep wrinkle that scored Barker's successes in life showed plainly round his mouth. He knew what his advantage was, and he had no thought of the danger when he reflected on what he had gained. Not he! His heart, or the organ which served him in place of one, was full of triumph. Had he planned the whole thing with the utmost skill and foresight he could not have succeeded better. Such a victory! and the very first day after Claudius's departure--Ye G.o.ds! what luck!

And so it came to pa.s.s that by the time the harness had been tied together and the conveyance got without accident as far as the first stable on the outskirts of the town, where it was left with the groom, Barker had received a goodly meed of thanks and praise. And when Margaret proposed that they should walk as far as the hotel, Barker tried a few steps and found he was too lame for such exercise, his left leg having been badly bruised by the pole of the carriage in his late exploit; which injury elicited a further show of sympathy from Margaret. And when at last he left her with a cab at the door of her hotel, he protested that he had enjoyed a very delightful drive, and went away in high spirits. Margaret, in her grat.i.tude for such an escape, and in unfeigned admiration of Barker's daring and coolness, was certainly inclined to think better of him than she had done for a long time. Or perhaps it would be truer to say that he was more in her thoughts than he had been; for, in the reign of Claudius, Barker had dwindled to a nearly insignificant speck in the landscape, dwarfed away to nothing by the larger mould and stronger character of the Swede.

Margaret saw the Duke in the evening. He gave her a doc.u.ment, unsealed, in a huge envelope, bidding her keep it in a safe place, for the use of their mutual friend, in case he should need it. She said she would give it to Claudius when he came back; and then she told the Duke about her drive with Barker and the accident. The Duke looked grave.

"Of course," he said, "I introduced Barker to you, and it would seem very odd if I were to warn you against him now. All the same, Countess, I have had the honour of being your friend for some time, and I must say I have sometimes regretted that I brought him to your house." He reddened a little after he had spoken, fearing she might have misunderstood him. "I wish," he added, to make things clearer, "that I could have brought you Claudius without Barker." Then he reddened still more, and wished he had said nothing. Margaret raised her eyebrows.

Perhaps she could have wished as much herself, but she dropped the subject.

"When are you coming back from the West, Duke," she asked, busying herself in arranging some books on her table. The hotel sitting-room was so deadly dreary to the eye that she was trying to make it look as if it had not been lately used as a place of burial.

"It may be two months before I am here again. A--about the time Claudius comes over, I should think."

"And when do you go?"

"Next week, I think."

"I wish you were going to stay," said Margaret simply, "or Lady Victoria. I shall be so lonely."

"You will have Miss Skeat," suggested his Grace.

"Oh, it's not that," said she. "I shall not be alone altogether, for there is poor Nicholas, you know. I must take care of him; and then I suppose some of these people will want to amuse me, or entertain me--not that they are very entertaining; but they mean well. Besides, my being mixed up in a Nihilist persecution adds to my social value." The Duke, however, was not listening, his mind being full of other things--what there was of it, and his heart had long determined to sympathise with Margaret in her troubles; so there was nothing more to be said.

"Dear me," thought Miss Skeat, "what a pity! They say she might have had the Duke when she was a mere child--and to think that she should have refused him! So admirably suited to each other!" But Miss Skeat, as she sat at the other end of the room trying to find "what it was that people saw so funny" in the _Tramp Abroad_, was mistaken about her patroness and the very high and mighty personage from the aristocracy. The Duke was much older than Margaret, and had been married before he had ever seen her. It was only because they were such good friends that the busybodies said they had just missed being man and wife.

But when the Duke was gone, Margaret and Miss Skeat were left alone, and they drew near each other and sat by the table, the elder lady reading aloud from a very modern novel. The Countess paid little attention to what she heard, for she was weary, and it seemed as though the evening would never end. Miss Skeat's even and somewhat monotonous voice produced no sensation of drowsiness to-night, as it often did, though Margaret's eyes were half-closed and her fingers idle. She needed rest, but it would not come, and still her brain went whirling through the scenes of the past twenty-four hours, again and again recurring to the question "Why is he gone?" unanswered and yet ever repeated, as the dreadful wake-song of the wild Irish, the "Why did he die?" that haunts the ear that has once heard it for weeks afterwards.

She tried to reason, but there was no reason. Why, why, why? He was gone with her kiss on his lips and her breath in his. She should have waited till he came back from over the sea before giving him what was so very precious. More than once, as she repeated the words he had spoken at parting, she asked herself whether she doubted him after all, and whether it would not be wiser to speak to the Duke. But then, the latter so evidently believed in Claudius that it comforted her to think of his honest faith, and she would dismiss every doubt again as vain and wearying. But still the eternal question rang loudly in her soul's ears, and the din of the inquisitive devil that would not be satisfied deafened her so that she could not hear Miss Skeat. Once or twice she moved her head nervously from side to side, as it rested on the back of the chair, and her face was drawn and pale, so that Miss Skeat anxiously asked whether she were in any pain, but Margaret merely motioned to her companion to continue reading, and was silent. But Miss Skeat grew uneasy, feeling sure that something was the matter.

"Dear Countess," she said, "will you not retire to rest? I fear that this horrid accident has shaken you. Do go to bed, and I will come and read you to sleep." Her voice sounded kindly, and Margaret's fingers stole out till they covered Miss Skeat's bony white ones, with the green veins and the yellowish lights between the knuckles.

Miss Skeat, at this unusual manifestation of feeling, laid down the book she held in her other hand, and settled her gold-rimmed gla.s.ses over her long nose. Then her eyes beamed across at Margaret, and a kindly, old-fashioned smile came into her face that was good to see, and as she pressed the hot young hand in hers there was a suspicion of motherliness in her expression that would have surprised a stranger. For Miss Skeat did not look motherly at ordinary times.

"Poor child!" said she softly. Margaret's other hand went to her eyes and hid them from sight, and her head sank forward until it touched her fingers, where they joined Miss Skeat's.

"I am so unhappy to-night," murmured Margaret, finding at last, in the evening hours, the sympathy she had longed for all day. Miss Skeat changed her own position a little so as to be nearer to her.

"Poor child!" repeated Miss Skeat almost in a whisper, as she bent down to the regal head that lay against her hand, smoothing the thick hair with her worn fingers. "Poor child, do you love him so very dearly?" She spoke almost inaudibly, and her wrinkled eyelids were wet. But low as was her voice, Margaret heard, and moved her head in a.s.sent, without lifting it from the table.

Ah yes--she loved him very, very much. But she could not bear to confess it, for all that, and a moment afterwards she was sitting upright again in her chair, feeling that she had weathered the first storm. Her companion, who was not ignorant of her ways, contented herself then with patting Margaret's hand caressingly during the instant it remained in her own, before it was drawn away. There was a world of kindness and of gentle humanity in the gaunt gentlewoman's manner, showing that the heart within was not withered yet. Then Miss Skeat flattened the book before her with the paper-cutter, and began to read. Reading aloud had become to her a second nature, and whether she had liked it or not at first, she had learned to do it with perfect ease and indifference, neither letting her voice drag languidly and hesitatingly when she was tired, nor falling into that nerve-rending fault of readers who vainly endeavour to personate the characters in dialogue, and to give impressiveness in the descriptive portions. She never made a remark, or asked her hearer's opinion. If the Countess was in the humour to sleep, the reading was soporific; if she desired to listen, she felt that her companion was not trying to bias her judgment by the introduction of dramatic intonation and effect. With an even, untiring correctness of utterance, Miss Skeat read one book just as she read another--M. Thiers or Mr. Henry James, Mark Twain or a Parliamentary Report--it was all one to her. Poor Miss Skeat!

But to Margaret the evening seemed long and the night longer, and many days and evenings and nights afterwards. Not that she doubted, but that she thought--well--perhaps she thought she ought to doubt. Some cunning reader of face and character, laughing and making love by turns, had once told her she had more heart than head. Every woman knows she ought to seem flattered at being considered a "person of heart," and yet every woman cordially hates to be told so. And, at last, Margaret began to wonder whether it were true. Should she have admitted she loved a man who left her a moment afterwards in order to make a voyage of two months for the mere furthering of his worldly interest? But then--he told her he was going before he kissed her. What could be the "other reason"?

CHAPTER XVII.