Red Rowans Part 34

"Because you have not the making of an archangel in you; that is why.

Do you think you have, Paul?" She stood for a moment at the door to look up at him, as if she were making quite an ordinary remark. "But there is the earth in the middle between the heavens above and the waters beneath. Don't forget that, _my friend_."

When she had left him he lit another cigar out of sheer inability to think of doing anything more decided, anything which in any way affected his future, even to the extent of taking a night's repose; that feeling of uncertainty being largely a result of sheer surprise that he should have allowed Violet Vane's man[oe]uvring to pa.s.s unreproved. And this, in its turn, convinced him, as nothing else would have done, that she understood him as no one else could do.

And she? When he, coming up to his room, turned out the lamp on the stair, he left the house in darkness, save for the candle he carried.

Yet Mrs. Vane was not even undressed. She was face down on her bed trying to forget everything; above all, that old Peggy Duncan possessed a secret which might--which might----

For her own reference to the past had brought that other past back upon her, and, as she buried her hot face in the pillow, she told herself that she had not, after all, spoken the truth. She had said that his happiness was her motive, when it was her own. And wherefore not?

CHAPTER XVIII.

Marjory sate at the window pretending to be busy over laces and ribbons, but in reality watching Dr. Kennedy's deft hands lit up by the shaft of light from his microscope lamp, as, with the aid of a tiny pair of tweezers, and a watchmaker's gla.s.s fixed in one eye, he laid out the almost invisible film of some sea plant on a slide. For they, that is to say, Marjory, Will, and the doctor, had spent the day after the theatricals in dredging for oysters, as a relief to what the latter called fishing for men; and something interesting had come up in the dredger, which had to be set up despite the waning light. He looked more natural when so employed, and yet, despite the grizzling hair and the thin brown face, she seemed to trace in him as she had never done before a hint of that figure on last night's stage, which had opened her eyes to love in its pa.s.sion, its unreason. And with this fancy came the remembrance of Paul Macleod's swift resource, his kindness, his courage. And both memories confused her, making her feel as if the old landmarks had been removed, and she could not be certain even of those she knew intimately; as if a man's ideals might yield no clue to his actions. For Tom must surely have felt that storm and stress before he could portray it so vividly? And then, even if this were not so, his vast experience of things which she had been accustomed to despise remained inexplicable.

"I had no idea that you were so frivolous, Tom," she said suddenly, laying down even her pretence of work.

He wheeled round in his chair instantly, and let the gla.s.s fall from his eye. "Are you aware that that is a very odd remark to make to a man who believes he has found a new infusorian which may revolutionise all our theories, especially when it is made by a young lady who is busy, or ought to be busy, over her first ball-dress."

"Ought I?" She smiled back a little wearily. "I'm afraid I'm a bad pupil, Tom. I was just wishing Lady George could have postponed it till you had gone."

He gave a little grimace. "Thank you, my dear, I daresay it would be pleasanter,----"

"Don't tease, Tom. You know what I mean, perfectly; it interrupts the holiday."

"Which is perilously near its close, by the way. I have to go back next Thursday."

"Yes, I know. But don't talk of it; let us enjoy it while it lasts!"

He turned back to his work again hurriedly. "Now, that is what I should call truly frivolous. So be it. However, _Vogue la galere!_ It is a very easy philosophy, at any rate."

They were silent again for a s.p.a.ce, and then she began again. "What I meant was, that you must have seen so much of the world; and then you are so interested in it. Last night," she hesitated a little, "it struck me, Tom, that for all I knew, you might have--have seen something like it when you were through the Franco-Prussian war, for instance. You--you were quite a boy then, weren't you?"

"A baby, so to speak. I remember nearly fainting over the first wound I saw. Yes, Marjory, I've seen such romantic young fools many a time.

I see a good deal of that sort of thing necessarily in my profession.

It is human nature."

"I suppose so," she said curtly. "Well, I suppose I ought to go and dress. Oh, Tom! why couldn't Lady George have put it off, and why won't you let me stay at home?"

"Because, when, after infinite toil, you have caught a netful of mankind for theatricals, you naturally choose the next day for a dance. And because a girl ought to go to a ball. How can she tell her _metier_ if she only keeps to one? Besides, it is your holiday."

"I shan't like it a bit, and I shall feel dowdy in this thing."

She held up a white stuff gown, with the oddest mixture of self-complacency and disdain. "Of course, it will do quite well, and it would have been recklessly extravagant of me to get another, seeing that I shan't want evening dresses at a Board School; but I shall be a dowdy all the same."

"I doubt it," remarked her guardian, busy adjusting his screws. "Now, you really ought to go and dress, my dear. In my time girls----"

"In your time!" she flashed out. "Why? Why, you are quite up to date, Tom, and I--I am hopelessly _arrieree_, especially in my dress! Oh, dear f I suppose I must----"

A minute afterwards she came flying down the stairs, followed by Mrs.

Cameron, who had evidently been on the watch for the occasion in Marjory's room, and was determined not to lose the scene downstairs.

It was rather a pretty one, though the first words were distinctly sordid.

"Oh, Tom! what did it cost?"

"Now, that really is the rudest question! I'm surprised at you,"

returned Dr. Kennedy, trying to jest, though something in the girl's face told him she was not far from tears.

"But it is dreadful," she began.

"Naethin' o' the sort," broke in Mrs. Cameron, breathlessly. "Just don't belie the nature G.o.d gave to you. It's just beautiful, and the doctor and me has been agog these three days lest it should not come in time, for it is ill getting things to Gleneira from Paris."

"Paris!" echoed Marjory. "Yes, I thought it looked like Paris! How foolish of you, Tom!"

"And so that is all the thanks you're giving him. Wait, my la.s.s, till you're as auld as I am, with no a soul in the wide world caring a bawbee if you're clad in sackcloth and ashes, and then see if ye woudna like to be made a lily o' the field. Just arrayed in glory wi'out a toil or a spin."

"Quite right, Mrs. Cameron," put in Dr. Kennedy, with a laugh. "She will have plenty of toiling and spinning by and bye; why shouldn't she be a flower and do credit to us all for one evening?"

She looked at him from head to foot. "A flower for you to wear in your b.u.t.tonhole, apparently. Tom, are all men alike?"

"I am human, at any rate," he said quietly.

"Oh, come away, come away!" cried Mrs. Cameron, impatiently. "Come and put it on, like a good la.s.sie, and don't be chopping logic. It's time enough to be an angel when you've done being a girl, and you'll have more chance o' bein' one if ye make the best o' your gifts in this world, I can tell you. So come away, my dear, there may be a st.i.tch or two a-wantin', and the time is none too long."

But Marjory stood her ground even after the old lady had bustled upstairs again, and she looked so serious that Dr. Kennedy was driven into suggesting that if she preferred it, she might wear her old gown.

"It is not that," she said slowly. "It is beautiful. I could see that, at a glance; but--Tom, did Mrs. Vane choose it?"

His laugh had a certain content in it. "My dear child, I prefer people to be dressed as I like, and I am generally supposed to have good taste."

"Very, I should say," she remarked, with a curious accent of regret in her voice.

But the fact was indubitable. When she came down again in a shimmer of silver and white, set cunningly with frosted rowan berries showing a glint of scarlet here and there, she knew so well that her dress was perfect, that from a new bashfulness she turned the tables on him swiftly.

"Tom," she cried, "I declare you have waxed the ends of your moustache!"

"And if I had been in Italy, I should have curled my hair, too," he replied imperturbably. "It is not a crime."

"And that coat! It is not your ordinary one."

"It is not. The one I use here--since you are so particular--is a dress jacket; the correct thing, I a.s.sure you, for a shooting lodge.

But I have the misfortune to be honorary surgeon to a potentate somewhere, who insists on bra.s.s b.u.t.tons on state occasions, so I don't happen to have the intermediate affair. Besides, there are to be lord-lieutenants and generals hanging round this evening from the Oban gathering. If that is satisfactory to your highness, we should be going."

"And that red thing in your b.u.t.tonhole?" she persisted, going close up to him and touching the bit of ribbon with dainty curious finger. "It is the Legion of Honour, I suppose."

"It is called so; you look as if that were a crime also."

"I did not know you had it, that was all," she said. And then, Will, coming in full of fuss because his very occasional white tie had not been folded properly in the wash, changed the _venue_ by declaring that fine feathers make fine birds, and that he was half ashamed to belong to them.