The History of Sir Richard Calmady Part 85

"Undoubtedly."

"Then go to Cairo for the winter with Evelyn Tobermory. You must take no low gowns--ah! poor little soul, it is pathetic, though--she's forbidden to wear them. And--let me stay here!" Honoria said.

Ludovic gazed at his hands as they clasped his knee, then he looked sideways at his companion.

"Here, meaning--meaning Brockhurst, dear Miss St. Quentin?" he asked very sweetly.

"Meaning England," she declared.

"England?--ah! really. That pleases me better. Patriotism is an excellent virtue. The remark is not a wholly original one, but it comes in handy just now, all the same."

The young lady's head went up. Her face straightened. She was displeased. Turning sideways, she leaned both hands on the stonework and stared down into the water. But speedily she repented.

"See how the fish rise," she said. "It really is a pity one hasn't a fly-rod."

"I was under the impression you once told me that you objected to taking life, except in self-defense or for purposes of commissariat.

The trout would almost certainly be muddy. And I am quite unconscious of being exposed to any danger--at least from the trout."

Miss St. Quentin kept her eyes fixed upon the water.

"I told you my temper was out of sorts," she said.

"Is that a warning?" Ludovic inquired, with the utmost mildness.

Honoria was busy feeling in her jacket pockets. At the bottom of them a few crumbs remained. She emptied these on to the surface of the water, by the simple expedient of turning the pockets inside out.

"I know nothing about warnings," she said. "I state a plain fact. You can make of it what you please."

The young man rose leisurely from his place, sauntered across the roadway, and stood with his back to her, looking down the valley. The harvesters, their meal finished, moved away towards the further side of the great corn-field. The women followed them slowly, gleaning as they went. It was very quiet. And again there came to Honoria that ache of longing for the but-half-disclosed glory and fulness of life. It was there, an actuality--could she but find it, had she but the courage and the wit. Then, from the open moorland beyond the park palings, came the sound of horses trotting sharply. Ludovic Quayle turned and recrossed the road. He smiled, but his superfine manner, his effect of slight impertinence were, for the moment, in abeyance.

"Miss St. Quentin," he said, "what is the use of fencing any longer? I have done that which I engaged to do, namely, displayed the patience of innumerable a.s.ses. And--if I may be pardoned mentioning such a thing--the years pa.s.s. Really they do. And I seem to get no forwarder!

My position becomes slightly ludicrous."

"I know it, I know it!" Honoria cried penitently.

"That I am ludicrous?"

"No, no," she protested, "that I have been unreasonable and traded on your forbearance, that I have done wrong in allowing you to wait."

"That you could not very well help," he said, "since I chose to wait.

And, indeed, I greatly preferred waiting as long as there seemed to be a hope there was something--anything, in short--to wait for."

"Ah! but that is precisely what I have never been sure about myself--whether there really was anything to wait for or not."

She sat straight on the coping of the parapet again. Her face bore the most engaging expression. There was a certain softness in her aspect to-day. She was less of a youth, a comrade, so it seemed to Mr. Quayle, more distinctly, more consciously a woman. But now, to the sound of trotting horse-hoofs was added that of wheels. With a clang the park gates were thrown open.

"And are you still uncertain? In the back of your mind is there still a trifle of doubt?--If so, give me the benefit of it," the young man pleaded, half laughingly, half brokenly.

A carriage pa.s.sed under the gray archway of the red-brick and freestone lodges. Rapidly it came on down the wide, smooth, string-coloured road--a s.p.a.ce of neatly kept turf on either side--under the shade of the heavy-foliaged elm trees. Mr. Quayle glanced at it, and paused with raised eyebrows.

"I call you to witness that I do not swear, dear Miss St. Quentin, though men have been known to become blasphemous on slighter provocation than this," he said. "However, the rather violently-approaching interruption will be soon over, I hope and believe; since the driving is that of Richard Calmady of Brockhurst when his temper--like your own--being somewhat out of sorts, he, as Jehu the son of Nimshi of old--my father's morning ministrations to the maids again--driveth furiously."

Then, with an air of humorous resignation, his mouth working a little, his long neck directed forward as in mildly-surprised inquiry, he stood watching the approaching mail-phaeton. The wheels of it made a hollow rumbling, the tramp of the horses was impetuous, the pole-chains rattled, as it swung out on to the bridge and drew up. The grooms whipped down and ran round to the horses' heads. And these stood, a little extended, still and rigid as of bronze, the red of their open nostrils and the silver mounting of their harness very noticeable. Lady Calmady called to Mr. Quayle. The young man pa.s.sed round at the back of the carriage, and, standing on the far side of the roadway, talked with her.

Honoria St. Quentin remained sitting on the parapet of the bridge.

A singular disinclination to risk any movement had come upon her. Not the present situation in relation to Ludovic Quayle, but that other situation of the but-half-disclosed glory, the new and exquisite fulness of life oppressed her, penetrating her whole being to the point of physical weakness. Questioningly, yet with entire unself-consciousness, she looked up at Richard Calmady. And he, from the exalted height of the driving-seat, looked down at her. A dark, cloth rug was wrapped tight round him from the waist downward. It concealed the high driving-iron against which his feet rested. It concealed the strap which steadied him in his place. His person appeared finely proportioned.

His head and face were surprisingly handsome seen thus from below--though it must be conceded the expression of the latter was very far from angelic.

"You were well advised to stay at home, Honoria," he said. There was a grating tone in his voice.

"The function was even more distinguished for dulness than you expected?"

"On the contrary, it was not in the least dull. It was actively objectionable, ingeniously unpleasant. Whereas this----"

His face softened a little. He glanced at the golden water and cornland, the lush green of the paddock, the rich, ma.s.sive colouring of woodland and sky. Honoria glanced at it likewise, and, so doing, rose to her feet. That nostalgia of things new and glorious ached in her.

Yet the pain of it had a strange and intimate charm, making it unlike any pain she had ever yet felt. It hurt her very really, it made her weak, yet she would not have had it cease.

"Yes, it is all very lovely, isn't it?" she said.

She laid her hand on the folded leather of the carriage hood. Again she looked up.

"It is a good deal to have this--always--your own, to come back to, Richard."

She spoke sadly, almost unwillingly. d.i.c.kie did not answer, but he looked down, a certain violence and energy very evident in him, his blue eyes hard, and, in the depth of them, desolate as the sky of a winter night. Calmly, yet in a way desperately, as those who dare inquiry beyond the range of permitted human speech, the young man and woman looked at one another. Lady Calmady's sweet voice, meanwhile, went on in kindly question. Ludovic Quayle's in well-placed, slightly elaborate answer. The near horse threw back its head and the pole-chains rattled smartly.--Honoria's lips parted, but the words, if words indeed there were, died in her throat. She raised her hands, as though putting a tangible and actual presence away from her. She did not change colour, but for the moment her delicate features appeared thickened, as by a rush of blood. She was almost plain. Yet the effect was inexpressibly touching. It was as though she had received some mysterious injury which she was dumb, incapable to express. She let her hands drop at her sides, turned away and walked to the far end of the bridge.

Suddenly Richard's voice came to her, aggressive, curt.

"Look out, Ludovic--stand clear of the wheel."

The horses sprang forward, the grooms scrambled up at the back, and the carriage swung away from the brightness of the open to the gloom of the avenue and up the long hill to the house.

Mr. Quayle contemplated it for a minute or so and then, with an air of amused toleration, he followed Miss St. Quentin across the bridge.

"Poor, dear d.i.c.kie Calmady, poor, dear d.i.c.kie!" he said. "He attempts the impossible. Fails to attain it--as a matter of course, and, meanwhile, misses the possible--equally as a matter of course. It is all very magnificent, no doubt, but it is also not a little uncomfortable, at times, for other people.--However that trifle of criticism is, after all, beside the mark. Now that the whirlwind has ceased, Miss St. Quentin, may the still, small voice of my own affairs presume to make itself----"

But there he stopped abruptly.

"My dear friend," he asked in quick anxiety, "what is the matter?

Pardon me, but what on earth has happened to you?"

For Honoria leaned both elbows on the low, carved pillar terminating the masonry of the parapet. She covered her face with her hands. And, incontestably, she shuddered queerly from head to foot.

"Wait half a second," she said, in a stifled voice. "It's nothing--I'm all right."

Slowly she raised herself, and took a long breath. Then she turned to her faithful lover, showing him a brave, if somewhat drawn and tired countenance.

"Ludovic," she said gently, "don't, don't please let us talk any more about all that. And don't, I entreat you, wait any longer. If there was any uncertainty, if there was a doubt in the back of my mind, it's gone. Forgive me--this must sound brutal--but there is no more doubt. I can't marry you. I am sorry, horribly sorry--for you have been as charming to me as a man could be--but I shall never be able to marry you."