Rosa Mundi and Other Stories Part 57

"Go on to the steps!" murmured Toby behind her. "I shall keep watch."

She went on with gathering speed. At the head of the veranda-steps she dimly discerned a figure waiting for her, a figure clothed in some white, m.u.f.fling garment that seemed to cover the face. And yet she knew by all her bounding pulses whom she had found.

"Colonel Carlyon!" she said, and on the impulse of the moment she gave him both her hands.

His quiet voice answered her out of the strange folds. "Come into the garden a moment!" he said.

She went with him unquestioning, with the confidence of a child. He led her with silent, stealthy tread into the deepest gloom the compound afforded. Then he stopped and faced her with a question that sent a sudden tumult of doubt racing through her brain.

"Will you take a message to Fort Akbar for me, Averil?" he said. "A matter of life and death."

A message! Averil's heart stood suddenly-still. All the evil report that she had heard of this man raised its head like a serpent roused from slumber, a serpent that had hidden in her breast, and a terrible agony of fear took the place of her confidence.

Carlyon waited for her answer without a sign of impatience. Through her mind, as it were on wheels of fire, Steele's pa.s.sionate words were running: "He lives on treachery. He would betray any one or all of us to death if it were to the interest of the Empire that we should be sacrificed." And again: "I would sooner tread barefoot on a scorpion than get entangled in Carlyon's web."

All this she would once have dismissed as vilest calumny. But Carlyon's abandonment of Derrick, and his subsequent explanation thereof, were terribly overwhelming evidence against him. And now this man, this spy, wanted to use her as an instrument to accomplish some secret end of his.

A matter of life or death, he said. And for which of these did he purpose to use her efforts? Averil sickened at the possibilities the question raised in her mind. And still Carlyon waited for her answer.

"Why do you ask me?" she said at last, in a quivering whisper. "What is the message you want to send?"

"You delivered a message for me only yesterday without a single question," he said.

She wrung her hands together in the darkness. "I know. I know," she said; "but then I did not realize."

"You saved the camp from destruction," he went on. "Will you not do the same to-night?"

"How shall I know?" she sobbed in anguish.

"What have they been telling you?"

The quiet voice came in strange contrast to the agitated uncertainty of her tones. Carlyon laid steady hands on her shoulders. In the dim light his eyes had leapt to blue flame, sudden, intense. She hid her face from their searching; ashamed, horrified at her own doubts--yet still doubting.

"Your friendship has stood a heavier strain than this," Carlyon said, with grave reproach.

But she could not answer him. She dared scarcely face her own thoughts privately, much less utter them to him.

What if he were urging the tribes to rise to give the Government a pretext for war? She had heard him say that peace had come too soon, that war alone could remedy the evil of constantly recurring outrages along that troublous Frontier.

What if he counted the lives of a few women and their gallant protectors as but a little price to pay for the accomplishment of this end?

What if he purposed to make this awful sacrifice in the interests of the Empire, and only asked this thing of her because no other would undertake it?

She lifted her face. He was still looking at her with those strange, burning eyes that seemed to pierce her very soul.

"Averil," he said, "you may do a great thing for the Empire to-night--if you will."

The Empire! Ah, what fearful things would he not do behind that mask!

Yet she stood silent, bound by the spell of his presence.

Carlyon went on. "There is going to be a rising, but we shall hold our own, I hope without loss. You can ride a horse, and I can trust you.

This message must be delivered to-night. There is not an officer at liberty. I would not send one if there were. Every man will be wanted.

Averil, will you go for me?"

He was holding her very gently between his hands. He seemed to be pleading with her. Her resolution began to waver. They had shattered her idol, yet she clung fast to the crumbling shrine.

"You will not let them be killed?" she whispered piteously. "Oh, promise me!"

"No one belonging to this camp will be killed if I can help it," he said. "You will tell them at Fort Akbar that we are prepared here.

General Harford is marching to join them from Fort Wara. Whatever they may hear they must not dream of moving to join us till he reaches them.

They are not strong enough. They would be cut to pieces. That is the message you are going to take for me. Their garrison is too small to be split up, and Fort Akbar must be protected at all costs. It is a more important post than this even."

"But there are women here," Averil whispered.

"They are under my protection," said Carlyon quietly. "I want you to start at once--before we shut the gates."

"Have they taken you by surprise, then?" she asked, with a sharp, involuntary shiver.

"No," Carlyon said. "They have taken the Government by surprise. That's all." He spoke with strong bitterness. For he was the watchman who had awaked in vain.

A moment later he was drawing her with him along the shadowy path.

"You need have no fear," he whispered to her. "The road is open all the way. I have a horse waiting that will carry you safely. It is barely ten miles. You have done it before."

"Am I to go just as I am?" she asked him, carried away by his unfaltering resolution.

"Yes," said Carlyon, "except for this." He loosened the _chuddah_ from his own head and stooped to m.u.f.fle it about hers. "I have provided for your going," he said. "You will see no one. You know the way. Go hard!"

He moved on again. His arm was round her shoulders.

"And you?" she said, with sudden misgiving.

"I shall go back to the camp," he said, "when I have seen you go."

They went a little farther, ghostly, white figures gliding side by side. Wildly as her heart was beating, Averil felt that it was all strangely unreal, felt that the man beside her was a being unknown and mysterious, almost supernatural. And yet, strangely, she did not fear him. As she had once said to him, she believed he was a good man. She would always believe it. And yet was that awful doubt hammering through her brain.

They reached the bounds of the club compound and Carlyon stopped again.

From the building behind them there floated the notes of a waltz, weird, dream-like, sweet as the earth after rain in summer.

"I want to know," Carlyon said steadily, "if you trust me."

She stretched up her hands like a child and laid them against his breast. She answered him with piteous entreaty in which pa.s.sion strangely mingled.

"Colonel Carlyon," she whispered brokenly, "promise me that when this is over you will give it up! You were not made to spy and betray! You were made an honourable, true-hearted man--G.o.d's greatest and best creation.

You were never meant to be twisted and warped to an evil use. Ah, tell me you will give it up! How can I go away and leave you toiling in the dungeons?"

"Hush!" said Carlyon. "You do not understand."

Later, she remembered with what tenderness he gathered her hands again into his own, holding them reverently. At the time she realized nothing but the monstrous pity of his wasted life.