The Great Secret Part 19

I hesitated. Her fingers gripped my arm.

"I think that he is very ill," I answered.

"Dying?"

"I should not be surprised."

She looked back towards the terrace. Her eyes were full of tears.

"Do what you can for him," she said softly. "He was once a great friend of mine. He was different then! Will you go out to him now? I promised to send you."

Guest was sitting upon the terrace, exactly as I had left him. His eyes were fixed upon vacancy, his lips were slightly curled in a meditative smile. There was a distinct change in his appearance. His expression was more peaceful, the slight restlessness had disappeared from his manner.

But he had never looked to me more like a dying man.

"Lady Dennisford sent me out," I remarked, "She has ordered a pony-cart to take us home."

He nodded.

"I am quite ready," he said.

He tried to rise, but the effort seemed too much for him. I hastened to his aid, or I think that he would have fallen. He leaned on my arm heavily as we pa.s.sed on our way to the avenue, where a carriage was already awaiting us.

"I was once," he remarked, in an ordinary conversational tone, "engaged to be married to Lady Dennisford."

"There was no--disagreement between you?" I asked.

"None that has not been healed," he answered softly.

"You would consider her to-day as a friend--not a likely enemy?" I asked.

He looked at me curiously.

"She is my friend," he answered softly. "Of that there is no doubt at all. Why do you ask?"

"Because," I answered, "for your friend, she has a strange guest."

"Whom do you mean?" he asked.

"Mademoiselle, and her maid--and poodle," I answered. "They are all here!"

I felt him shiver, for he was leaning heavily upon me. Nevertheless, he answered me with confidence.

"It is the gathering of the jackals," he muttered--"the jackals who are going to be disappointed. But you may be sure of one thing, my friend.

The young lady is here as an ordinary guest! That was a matter very easy to arrange. There is a great social backing behind her. She can come and go where she pleases. But Lady Dennisford's knowledge of her is wholly innocent."

We drove back almost in silence. Rust was waiting for us when we arrived, and he eyed his patient curiously, and hurried him off to the house. They were alone together for some time, and when he came out his face was very grave. He came out into the garden in search of me!

"Courage," he said, "I wish to heavens I had never seen your guest!"

"What do you mean?" I asked. "Have you been quarrelling?"

"Quarrelling, no! One doesn't quarrel with a dying man," he answered.

"A dying man!" I repeated.

He nodded.

"He was on the verge of a collapse just now," he said. "I honestly fear that he will not live many more hours. Yet, though I could fill in his death certificate plausibly enough, if you were to ask me honestly to-day what was the matter with him, I could not tell you. Do you mind if I wire for a friend of mine to come down and see him?"

"By all means," I answered; "you mean a specialist, I suppose?"

"Yes!"

"On the heart?" I asked.

"No! a toxicologist!" Rust remarked dryly.

I glanced into his face. He was in deadly earnest.

"You believe--"

"What the devil is one to believe?" the doctor exclaimed irritably. "The man is sound, but he is dying. If I told you that I understood his symptoms, I should be a liar. I can think only of one thing. You yourself gave me the idea."

"Wire by all means," I said.

"I shall go to the village," Rust said, "and return immediately. Don't let him be left alone. He has a draught to take in case of necessity."

I turned back to the house with a sigh. I am afraid that I had as little faith in medicine as Guest himself.

CHAPTER XIV

GATHERING JACKALS

Guest for the remainder of the morning seemed to have fallen into a sort of stupor. He declined to sit in the garden or come down to lunch.

When I went up to his room, he was lying upon a couch, half undressed, and with a dressing-gown wrapped around him. He opened his eyes when I came in, but waved me away.

"I am thinking," he said. "Don't interrupt me; I want to be alone for an hour or so."

"But you must have something to eat," I insisted. "You will lose your strength if you don't."

"Quite right," he admitted. "Send me up some soup, and let me have pencil and paper."

He was supplied with both. When I went up an hour later, he was smoking a cigarette and writing.