One Maid's Mischief Part 45

"Ah, here's Perowne," cried the doctor. "Good-night, old fellow. Thank you for a pleasant evening. We are just off. Where is Madam Helen?"

"Don't know; but don't wait for her," said Mr Perowne; and after a friendly leave-taking the party of three moved towards the gates, Mrs Doctor heaving a satisfied sigh as they went along.

They had to cross the lawn again, where a goodly group of guests yet remained; and as they pa.s.sed, the Inche Maida smiled and kissed her hand to Grey, while the Rajah rose to see them to the gates.

"Not gone yet, Rajah?" said the doctor. "I say, how are you going to get home?"

"My boat is waiting. We like the night for a journey, and my rowers will soon take me back."

"And the Inche Maida, will she go back home to-night?"

"No; I think she is to stay here. Shall I go and ask her?"

"Oh, no, no!" exclaimed Mrs Doctor, "he does not want to know.

Good-night, Rajah."

"Good-night--good-night."

They parted at the gate, and the Rajah returned to the lawn, staying with the remaining guests till they departed; he and the Inche Maida being about the last to leave--the latter being handed by Mr Perowne into her boat, for the Rajah was wrong--the Princess had not been invited to stay, and her strong crew of boatmen were very soon sending the long light naga swiftly up stream, the smoothly-flowing water breaking up into myriads of liquid stars, as it seemed to rush glittering along on either side while they progressed between the two black walls of foliage that ran up from the surface high in air, one ma.s.s of leaf.a.ge, from which the lowermost branches kissed the stream.

VOLUME TWO, CHAPTER TWO.

MISSING.

The hum of a mosquito was about the only sound to be heard in the Residency house, as, clad in silken pyjamas, Mr Harley lay sleeping easily upon his light bamboo bedstead, dimly seen through the thin gauzy curtains by the light of a well-subdued lamp.

The bedroom was furnished in the lightest and coolest way, with matting floor and sides, while jalousie shutters admitted the cool night air.

The Resident had been smoking, partly in obedience to a bad bachelor habit, partly to keep at bay that Macbeth of insects that haunts all eastern rooms, and tries so diligently to murder the sleep of the inoffensive and just.

The faint pungent odour of a good cigar still pervaded the room, and the extinct end was yet between Neil Harley's white teeth, as he lay there dreaming about Helen Perowne, seeing her admired and followed by all the single men at the station, while he was the only one who made no sign.

He sighed in his sleep, and then uttered a low moan, as if in spite of his placid face and show of indifference he suffered deeply on Helen's account; but a calm smile, well resembling indifference, rested upon his features, and seemed to say that, come what might, he was patiently waiting his time.

Then came a change, for the calmness seemed to be swept away by a gust of pa.s.sion, and the strong man's hands clenched, his brow grew rugged, and as if suffering from some acute agony, the white teeth of the sleeper closed tightly with a sharp click, and a portion of the bitten-through cigar rolled from his lips on to the floor.

Then all was very still. The heat seemed to grow more intense, and the faint ripple of the river, as it glided by the island, could be distinctly heard. Now and then from the distant jungle some wild, uneasy cry rose upon the still air, riding as it were across the river like a warning to tell the slumbering Europeans that the savagery of the primeval forest lay close beside their civilisation; while the wakeful might have pondered on the fact that their safety rested solely upon the British _prestige_, and that a spark might ignite a train that would result in a terrible conflagration sufficient to sweep them all away.

Some such thoughts crossed the sleeping brain of Neil Harley that night, and his sleep grew more and more troubled as he thought how love-blinded he had been, and the risks they had run from Helen's treatment of the young Rajah.

The trouble had pa.s.sed away now, but such another affair might result in ruin to them all; and yet he had allowed her to go on and trifle, looking on with a.s.sumed indifference, though his heart was stung the while.

Neil Harley's sleep again grew restful and calm; for in a pleasant dream he fancied that Helen, more beautiful than ever, had bidden him to her side, telling him that all her weak and wilful coquetry was but to try him. That she had loved him from the first, for he was the only man who had really touched her heart; and that, though she had fought against the restraint he had placed upon her, and told herself that she hated him and the way in which he had mocked at her trifling, she was his--his alone--that she resigned herself to his keeping--his keeping--that of the only man who could ever sway her heart.

The night grew hotter still, and the faint breath that was wafted between the open laths that covered the window seemed to have pa.s.sed from the mouth of some furnace. A harsh roar came from the jungle, and then a loud plash or two echoed over the surface of the stream, as some great reptile plunged in from the muddy bank.

Then all was very still once more for a time, till suddenly the faint plash-plash of oars was heard, seeming now to be coming nearer, now to be fading away, drowned by the shrill insect hum. Again it sounded nearer, and all doubt of its proceeding from a boat bound for the Residency island was ended by the loud challenge of the sentry at the landing-place.

Then came voices in reply, and once more the hum of the mosquitoes was all that could be heard: now low and deep, now shrill and angry.

The faint lapping of the river and the plash of oars had died away, and the silence and heat were painful enough to draw a low sigh from the sleeper, just as the bedroom door was softly opened, and a dark figure glided in, crept over the matting floor without making a sound, and bent over the bed.

For the moment it seemed as though he was there upon some errand of ill; and one who watched would have been ready to raise an alarm, the insecurity of the station life being sufficient to warrant such a supposition; but the idea of the dark figure being bent on an evil errand was at once destroyed, for after waiting for a moment, he cried, softly:

"Master--master!"

The Resident started lip with the sudden awakening of a man accustomed to suspect peril at every turn, and his hand darted beneath his pillow even as he raised himself, to be withdrawn grasping the b.u.t.t of a loaded revolver.

"Ah, you Ling," he said, with a sigh of relief, as he lowered his hand.

"What is it? Someone ill?"

"Mr Perowne has come across in his boat, sir."

"Mr Perowne? at this time! what does he want?"

"To see you, sir."

"Tell him I'll be there directly." The Chinese servant glided away as silently as he had come, and the Resident hastily dashed some water in his face to clear away the sleepy feeling.

"I hope nothing serious!" he muttered. "Has Helen been taken ill?"

A pang shot through him at the thought, and the reckless behaviour of the night, that had stung him again and again during the course of the evening, was forgiven.

"Poor child!" he muttered. "I believe she loves me, and bird-like, is fluttering and timorously striving to escape from the string that holds her." He glanced at his watch as it hung upon a stand. "Two o'clock.

I have not been in bed above an hour. What can be wrong?"

The next minute he was in the dining-room, where he found Mr Perowne agitatedly walking up and down; but as soon as the Resident entered he advanced and caught him fiercely by the arm. "Harley, do you know anything of this?" he cried.

"Of this? Of what?"

"Helen! Where is she?"

"Helen? In bed and asleep I hope. What do you mean?"

"I missed her somewhere about eleven. I have not seen her since."

The Resident looked curiously at Mr Perowne, whose flushed face and excited manner seemed to suggest that he had been playing the host too freely during the evening, and to his own deterioration in balance.

"Tired, and gone to bed. A bit peevish with weariness," suggested the Resident, who drove back a curious sense of uneasiness that troubled him.

"No," said Mr Perowne, hoa.r.s.ely; "she has not gone to bed, and the house and the gardens have been searched again and again. Do you know anything of this?"

"I? Absurd! I left in good time. I bade her good-night when she was talking to the chaplain; he was trying to persuade her to let him cover her shoulders with the shawl he carried."

The Resident ceased speaking to dwell for a moment upon the luminous look he had seen Helen bestow upon the chaplain--a look meant, he told himself, to annoy him, while he knew that it would give poor Rosebury food for sweet reflection during weeks to come.

"It is very strange," said Mr Perowne excitedly; and his haggard gaze was directed about the place, as if he half expected to find that Helen was there. "Where did you see her last, do you say?"