The God in the Car Part 46

"I have done," said he, and, laying his thin yellow hand in hers, he went on, "If you meet him again--and I think you will--tell him that I longed to see him, as a man who is dying longs for his son. He would be a breath of life to me in this room, where everything seems dead. He is full of life--full as a tiger. And you can tell him----" He stopped a moment and smiled. "You can tell him why I was a buyer of Omof.a.gas. What will he say?"

"What will he say?" she echoed, with wide-opened eyes, that watched the old man's slow-moving lips.

"Will he weep?" asked the Baron.

"In G.o.d's name, don't!" she stammered.

"He will say, 'Behold, the Baron von Geltschmidt was a good man--he was of use in the world--may he sleep in peace!' And now--how goes the railway?"

The old man lay silent, with a grim smile on his face. The woman sat by, with lips set tight in an agony of repression. At last she spoke.

"If I'd known you were going to tell me this, I wouldn't have come."

"It's hard, hard, hard, but----"

"Oh, not that. But--I knew it."

She rose to her feet.

"Good-bye," said the Baron. "I shan't see you again. G.o.d make it light for you, my dear."

She would not seem to hear him. She smoothed his pillows and his scanty straggling hair; then she kissed his forehead.

"Good-bye," she said. "I will tell Willie when I see him. I shall see him soon."

The old man moaned softly and miserably.

"It would be better if you lay here," he said.

"Yes, I suppose so," she answered, almost listlessly. "Good-bye."

Suddenly he detained her, catching her hand.

"Do you believe in people meeting again anywhere?" he asked.

"Oh, I suppose so. No, I don't know, I'm sure."

"They've been telling me to have a priest. I call myself a Catholic, you know. What can I say to a priest? I have done nothing but make money. If that is a sin, it's too simple to need confession, and I've done too much of it for absolution. How can I talk to a priest? I shall have no priest."

She did not speak, but let him hold her hand.

"If," he went on, with a little smile, "I'm asked anywhere what I've done, I must say, 'I've made money.' That's all I shall have to say."

She stooped low over him and whispered,

"You can say one more thing, Baron--one little thing. You once tried to save a woman," and she kissed him again and was gone.

Outside the house, she found Semingham waiting for her.

"Oh, I say, Mrs. Dennison," he cried, "Harry's come. He got away a day earlier than he expected. I met him driving up towards your house."

For just a moment she stood aghast. It came upon her with a shock; between a respite of a day and the actual terrible now, there had seemed a gulf.

"Is he there--at the house--now?" she asked.

Semingham nodded.

"Will you walk up with me?" she asked eagerly. "I must go directly, you know. He'll be so sorry not to find me there. Do you mind coming? I'm tired."

He offered his arm, and she almost clutched at it, but she walked with nervous quickness.

"He's looking very well," said Semingham. "A bit f.a.gged, and so on, you know, of course, but he'll soon get all right here."

"Yes, yes, very soon," she replied absently, quickening her pace till he had to force his to match it. But, half-way up the hill, she stopped suddenly, breathing rapidly.

"Yes, take a rest, we've been bucketing," said he.

"Did he ask after me?"

"Yes; directly."

"And you said----?"

"Oh, that you were all right, Mrs. Dennison."

"Thanks. Has he seen Mr. Loring?"

"No; but he knew he had come here. He told me so."

"Well, I needn't take you right up, need I?"

Semingham thought of some jest about not intruding on the sacred scene, but the jest did not come. Somehow he shrank from it. Mrs. Dennison did not.

"We shall want to fall on one another's necks," said she, smiling. "And you'd feel in the way. You hate honest emotions, you know."

He nodded, lifted his hat, and turned. On his way down alone, he stopped once for a moment and exclaimed,

"Good heavens! And I believe she'd rather meet the devil himself. She is a woman!"

Mrs. Dennison pursued her way at a gentler pace. Before she came in sight, she heard her children's delighted chatterings, and, a moment later, Harry's hearty tones. His voice brought to her, in fullest force, the thing that was always with her--with her as the cloak that a man hath upon him, and as the girdle that he is always girded withal.

When the children saw her, they ran to her, seizing her hands and dragging her towards Harry. A little way off stood Marjory Valentine, with a nervous smile on her lips. Harry himself stood waiting, and Mrs.

Dennison walked up to him and kissed him. Not till that was done did she speak or look him in the face. He returned her kiss, and then, talking rapidly, she made him sit down, and sat herself, and took her little boy on her knee. And she called Marjory, telling her jokingly that she was one of the family.

Harry began to talk of his journey, and they all joined in. Then he grew silent, and the children chattered more about the delights of Dieppe, and how all would be perfect now that father was come. And, under cover of their chatter, Maggie Dennison stole a long covert glance at her husband.

"And Tom's here, father," cried the little boy on her lap exultingly.

"Yes," chimed in Madge, "and Mr. Ruston's gone."