The Indifference of Juliet Part 30

XXVII.--LOCKWOOD PAYS A CALL

"Did you know Roger Barnes was back?" asked Wayne Carey of Anthony Robeson, on the evening of the twenty-fifth of June, as the two met on the street corner from which Anthony was to take his car. Electrics ran within a few rods of his home now, but they ran only at fifteen-minute intervals and were difficult to catch.

"No. To stay this time, I hope?"

"Off again to-morrow. Never saw such a fellow--restless as a fish. Been working all winter in Vienna--off to-morrow on the Overland Limited to sail Sat.u.r.day for Hongkong. Goes to do a special operation on the Emperor's brother or some swell of the sort. He's been doing some mighty slick operating, according to the medical review I ran across in a throat specialist's office."

"I must see him. Where is he?"

"At your house now, more than likely. Said he'd got to see you, and if you haven't seen him yet you're sure to before he goes to-morrow night. By the way, Anthony, do you know what we heard lately about Rachel Redding--Huntington? That she wasn't married to Huntington till the night he died, almost three years ago."

Anthony stared.

"Guess it's straight, too," pursued Carey. "Queer she should have kept it all this time. Didn't Juliet hear from her at all?"

"Only once or twice, I believe."

"Her father and mother both died last winter."

"Are you sure?"

"The man who told me was a traveller. Said she and Huntington's mother were coming back to live East again. He was an Eastern man himself--knew Huntington, and got interested when he heard the name out in Arizona.

'Alexander Huntington's' rather an uncommon name, you know. But what could have been her motive for keeping everything so still?"

"I've no idea," said Anthony, and let Carey talk on by himself till the car came. He was unwilling to discuss Rachel Redding's affairs on a street corner even with Wayne Carey, because she was Juliet's friend. But he had an idea as to why Rachel had been so reserved about herself. There were three men in the East whose interest in Huntington's life or death had not been an altogether unbiased one. He could understand that the girl would not be eager to declare herself free to them, though the fact of Huntington's death had reached them soon after its occurrence. But this other fact--that she had married him only at the last moment--it was obvious that the sort of girl Rachel Redding was would never make capital out of that strange occurrence, whatever its explanation might be. That Roger Barnes knew nothing of it he was quite certain.

He missed Juliet from the corner where she and the boy usually met him, and hurrying on to the house came upon his wife just as she was leaving.

"Oh, I didn't realise I was late, dear," she said, while Anthony swung his little son up to his shoulder, eliciting triumphant shouts as a reward.

"Tony, Rachel is here."

"_Rachel?_"

"Hush--yes; she's upstairs, and her window is open. Walk down the orchard with me and I'll tell you. Her coming, an hour ago, was what made me forget the time."

"Carey was talking about her this afternoon," said Anthony, strolling by her side and carrying on a frolic with the boy at the same time. "He'd just heard a singular thing--that she wasn't married to Huntington till the very night he died."

"She told me. She's going away to-night, she insists; but I shall not let her. No, Mr. Huntington wouldn't let her marry him. After they went away he said he wouldn't take her unless he got well. Tony, he was a fine character; in our sympathy for Roger Barnes we haven't appreciated him. It was only at the last that he let her do it. She found out how happy it would make him then, and she would have it so."

"I'm glad she did--poor fellow. Juliet, Roger Barnes is in town."

"Really?" Juliet stopped, her breath catching. "Oh, Tony----"

"Came day before yesterday--leaves to-morrow night for Hongkong."

"Tony!"

Anthony looked down at her, smiling. "There's a situation for you. Can you be expected to keep your friendly hands off that possibility?"

"He won't go away without coming to see us?"

"Most certainly not."

"Then he will naturally come to-night."

"It's more than probable."

"Tony, I won't be trying to manage fate--that's what the doctor calls it--if I keep Rachel here until after----"

"Until after the Overland Limited leaves for San Francisco? Well, fate needs a little a.s.sistance once in a while. I think you may legitimately persuade Rachel to stay, if you can. What is her hurry, anyway?"

"I can't find out, except that I imagine she's afraid of meeting one of the men she most a.s.suredly would meet if they knew she had come. She thinks Roger Barnes is in Vienna still."

"She does? Ye G.o.ds! I think my knees will begin to tremble if I see their meeting imminent. Come, son, let's try a race to the house. I'll give you to the big, crooked apple tree. One--two--three--go!"

Juliet followed more slowly, thinking busily. Rachel had been very decided about going back into the city that night. Mrs. Huntington, Senior, was with friends, who had begged her daughter's acceptance of their hospitality, and for the elder woman's sake she had acquiesced. Rachel was a keeper of promises, Juliet knew. And to tell her of the probability of the doctor's appearance would be a doubtful means of securing her detention. But if, for any reason, the doctor should fail to appear--Juliet made up her mind that she would give fate her chance until nine o'clock that night. If by that time Barnes had not come----

Juliet looked on eagerly while Anthony greeted Rachel. Her friend had never seemed to her so lovely as now, in her simple black gown, accentuating, as it did, the deep tone of her hair and eyes. Her face had gained in colour and contour in the Arizona climate--its tints were richer. The delicacy of her features was not changed, but their beauty was greater.

"You've lived much outdoors, I see," said Anthony, when dinner was over and the three had gone out upon the porch, "and it's been good for you."

"I've even slept outdoors," Rachel told them, "fully half the year; and ridden horseback every day. I can't quite think how the electrics are going to seem in place of my gallop on Scot. The people on the ranch where we were have simply made me do the things they did. The owner was a dear old gentleman; he gave me Scot. He wanted to send him after me; but nurses have small use for horses, I believe," she ended, smiling.

"That's the plan, is it?"

"Yes. It's what I can do best, I think. I am to enter the training-school the first of July, at the Larchmont Memorial Hospital."

"I'll wager tremendous odds you don't," thought Anthony, "in spite of that confident tone. If Roger Barnes looks in to-night it's all up with your plans--or make a bigger fight than even you can do. A man who can't stay in his own town because you are out of it----"

He was sitting--purposely--where he faced the road. He had considerately offered Rachel a chair with her back to the highway. Juliet was swinging lightly in the hammock behind the vines. Anthony, talking on about Arizona and the Larchmont Memorial, kept an eye on the approach to the house from the corner where visitors always left the car. His watch was rewarded at length by the sight of a figure rapidly turning the corner and making straight for the house.

"Now we're in for it," he thought. "From now on the question with Juliet and me will be how we can most gracefully efface ourselves without seeming to do it. If I remember this young person correctly she's a little difficult to leave unchaperoned against her will."

Out of the corner of his eye he kept track of the approaching figure. It was coming on at a great pace, and in the twilight could be seen looming taller and taller as it crossed the road and turned in across the lawn, making a short cut according to Barnes's own fashion, so that the coming footsteps were noiseless, even to the moment when the figure reached the porch itself.

"Now for it," thought Anthony, feeling as if the curtain were about to ascend on the fourth act of a play, when the third had ended amidst all possible excitement.

"I found the roses blooming just as they used to do, at the side of the house"--Rachel's warm, contralto voice was answering a question from Juliet--"only so untended. I think I shall have to come out again before I begin my work, to look after them."

Anthony did not turn as the step he had been watching for sounded upon the porch. To save his life he could not help keeping his eyes upon Rachel's face. Rachel herself looked up with the air of the visitor who does not know the guests of the house, and the expression Anthony saw upon her face showed only the slightest possible surprise--certainly no other feeling.

Juliet rose. "Ah, Mr. Lockwood," she said, with a cordiality, sincere little person though she was, Anthony knew for once she did not feel. "In the dusk I couldn't be quite sure."

Lockwood's eyes instantly turned to Rachel. That he had known in some way whom he was to see was evident from a most unusual agitation in his manner.