The Kingdom Round the Corner Part 23

"Nevertheless, I should like to hear you put it into words."

Sir Tobias gave one of his remarkable exhibitions of youthfulness.

Flinging aside his decrepitude, as though it had been no more than an affectation, he shot bolt upright, gripping the arms of his chair. "Last night, within a handful of hours of my forbidding him the house, he had the impertinence to call here to inform me that he was in love with Terry. Not content with that, he added insult to his impertinence by telling me that he had been your valet. How is it, Taborley, that on that evening when you dined here as his fellow-guest, you never once hinted by look or word that he wasn't the part he was playing? I can't consider that very honorable of you. As an old friend, quite apart from any new relationship, I had the right to expect that my interests were nearer to your heart. It upsets me to find I was mistaken. Have you so little pride in the girl you propose to marry that it doesn't offend you to see her gadding about with ex-servants? You saw them get up and leave the table that night. You heard the front-door bang and knew that they'd gone out together--my daughter with the fellow who used to put the studs into your shirts! And there you sat with me, sipping your coffee and chatting as though it were all perfectly right and normal. Upon my soul, Taborley, you're beyond my comprehending. If I, her father, can feel this indignation, what ought not you to feel? You're supposed to be her lover and you're not jealous. So far as I can see, you're not even disturbed."

Tabs' face had gone suddenly white. He acknowledged to himself that, had he been Terry's father, he would have said no less. When he spoke it was with quiet intensity.

"I am annoyed, Sir Tobias--a good deal more annoyed than I care to own to myself; but I try not to let my annoyance obscure my sense of justice. It isn't fair to consider Braithwaite in the light of a servant. He isn't a servant; he's won his spurs. He arrived at the position he occupies to-day through original and unaided merit. That the man who was my servant, happens to be my rival, is bitterly galling. But I'm not going to let it blind me to the fact that he has qualities of greatness. He proved those qualities, even more than on the battlefield, when he came to you and pluckily told you the truth about himself. G.o.d knows what he thought to gain by it; but I'm hats off to him."

Sir Tobias threw out his hands in a disowning gesture. "I don't want to quarrel with you--that's the last thing I desire. But I must confess that I fail to sympathize with your att.i.tude of mind. Magnanimity is all very well, but it's easy to be magnanimous where your affections aren't too deeply concerned. A man in love has no right to be magnanimous--it isn't a healthy sign. Lady Beddow used those very words to me this morning. She feels as I do, that in your att.i.tude to Terry you lack something. You've let two days elapse since you asked my permission to approach her---- You're the same with this Maisie woman--inhumanly, unsatisfactorily magnanimous. You don't identify yourself with our antipathies--you almost side with the people who affront us. It's estranging and distressing. I like a man to be more emphatic in his loyalties and aversions. I like him to show more fire. In days that I can almost remember, Braithwaite's intrusion would have been an occasion for a duel. Terry's mother feels the same about you; it makes her unhappy. 'He lacks ardor'--that was how she expressed it. 'Perhaps, after all, he's too old for Terry,' she said. Personally I don't go as far as that."

Now that he had made an end, Sir Tobias attempted to beam on Tabs with his accustomed suavity. He was skillful in saying offensive things with an air of consideration. When he had said, "Personally I don't go as far as that," he had leant out and patted Tabs' hand with a senile display of affection.

_Too old for Terry!_ Tabs sat pondering the words. They voiced his own doubt--the doubt that had haunted him from the moment of his return. The antiquated version of Shakespeare sat watching him, plucking at his pointed beard and blinking his faded eyes shrewdly.

Suddenly with a cavalier smile of conquest, which was strangely unwarranted, Tabs swung himself to his feet. "Well, Sir Tobias, we've talked for more than our half hour. After all, it doesn't matter a continental what you, or I, or Lady Beddow feels. It's Terry's feelings that count. I shall know what she feels before the afternoon is ended."

He was holding out his hand to the surprised old gentleman, when the door opened just sufficiently to admit Terry's head.

"Come on, your Lordship!" she laughed mockingly, "you've kept me waiting long enough."

CHAPTER THE SIXTH

TRAMPLED ROSES

I

As Tabs emerged from his interview with Sir Tobias, he found Terry standing in the hall, doing up the last b.u.t.ton of her gloves. James, of the velvet-plush manners, lost no time in proffering him his hat and cane, and in flinging the front-door wide. He did it with the air of a sentimentalist who was aiding and abetting an elopement. Tabs had the feeling as he limped along the pavement with Terry tripping at his side, that the eyes of the house which they had left followed them--followed them jealously, romantically, expectantly. There was only one way in which they could give satisfaction and that was by returning to it engaged.

"He lacks ardor. Perhaps, after all, he's too old!" Lady Beddow's criticism drummed in his mind. Not very pleasant hearing!

Silence was maintained till they had rounded a corner and the tall buff house was left behind. Then Terry raised a shy, laughing face.

"Downcast, Tabs? You look as though you were bearing the sins of all the world."

"Not of all the world!" he corrected gravely. "Only of three people."

"Then I'm one of them. Who are the other two?"

"You know already--Mrs. Lockwood and Braithwaite. I saved all your necks, but I broke my own."

She brushed against him affectionately. "Tabs, you're a trump."

Her praise displeased him. "I didn't tell you for that."

"Then why?"

"Because I thought you ought to know." He slackened his pace. "I thought you ought to know that your father isn't as keen on me as he was, Terry."

"That's all right," she said cheerily; "I am. But what have you been doing to Daddy?"

"Describing Mrs. Lockwood as a lady above reproach and accusing him of uncharity towards Braithwaite."

She tossed her head and laughed outright. "You _have_ become converted!"

"Converted!" He pondered her a.s.sertion. "No. I'll acknowledge that I was inclined to be too harsh at first. I may have become more pitiful; but I've not become converted, if by that you mean that I condone what these two people have done. I still think that Mrs. Lockwood's conduct with Adair was inexcusable and that Braithwaite's holding back the truth from you was dishonorable. In talking with your father I gave Braithwaite all the credit for speaking out to him like a man, and I let him suppose that Mrs. Lockwood had given up Adair unconditionally. As you know, Braithwaite didn't come up to scratch till I'd handed him your ultimatum; and Mrs. Lockwood---- But you don't know about her yet. I haven't told you."

"I know," Terry smiled roguishly. "Maisie's a great abuser of the telephone. She called me up this morning to ask whether she might share you with me for a few weeks. When I asked her why, she said to help her to forget Adair. Of course I consented."

Tabs looked down at his companion to see whether her last remark had been sarcastic; to his discomfort he found that it hadn't. "I'm not sure that I like to be lent round like that," he objected. "I was sorry for her last night and promised to help her; but this phoning you up to ask your permission puts an entirely erroneous complexion on the affair."

"Not erroneous if I understand," she a.s.sured him, glancing up with tender frankness.

He smiled at the way she cozened him. Was she willing to lend him to another woman because she was so sure of him, or because she didn't care whether she lost him?

"Your father suspects me of being lukewarm about you," he said; "and I can't blame him. He knows nothing about our meeting yesterday. He doesn't know that you care for Braithwaite. All he knows is that I asked his permission to approach you and then let two days elapse. When I did come to his house again it was to defend the two people who have caused him most annoyance. My reason for defending them was that I might make things easier for you. But my position is false, Terry. Every day your parents are expecting that we'll become engaged; every day that we don't----"

They had come to the Marble Arch. "Shall we hop into a taxi?" he enquired.

She shook her head. "Let's walk a little farther--down to Hyde Park Corner. It's easier to say things."

When he had helped her through the traffic and they were sauntering through the Park, she took up the thread of their conversation. "I told you yesterday that I was willing to become engaged to you. I'm willing to-day."

"_Willing!_" he emphasized. "But you don't _want_. The man you love is Braithwaite. What difference has this confession of his made?"

She shrugged her shoulders and looked away, so that he should not see the quivering of her mouth. "It's made everything impossible. I admire him more than ever. I admire him for having told the truth and for having climbed so far up by his gallantry. But---- I'm no fool, Tabs. I know that I couldn't marry him without bringing ridicule upon all of us.

n.o.ble notions about human equality don't work in practice. He's what he is--fine of his kind. He's finer than you or I, Tabs, only he's not our sort. He couldn't ever become our sort. If I were as big as he is, I might not mind. But I'm little and mean; I care so much for caste. And yet, in spite of that, I want to marry him. I oughtn't to tell you, of all people. But I can't tell him and I can't tell any one--any one but you, Tabs. I want him so much that I'm ashamed sometimes. I wouldn't have my people know it, so you must stick by me. Do at least as much for me as you promised to do for Maisie--stay with me till I can forget him." And then she added ruefully, "It isn't much fun for you after all you'd expected."

He couldn't afford to let her become emotional. Riders and smart equipages were pa.s.sing. Several times already they had been recognized.

The introduction of Maisie's name supplied him with a loophole. "Mrs.

Lockwood rather adds to our complication. If I'm not engaged to you and I see something of her, your father will never understand. If I were your father, I wouldn't. To be perfectly frank, he thinks already that I'm lenient to Maisie only because she's good-looking----"

Terry didn't permit him to get further. "Daddy's probably right. Be honest, Tabs. Would you have stood up for her, if you'd found her fat and forty? Of course you wouldn't. Maisie's a dear, but she's dangerous.

She can't help being dangerous; it's half her attraction. By the way, we've been walking entirely in the wrong direction."

They had come out by Hyde Park Corner. "How do you make that out?" he asked. "I thought we would lunch at the Ritz."

She began to apologize. "Before I met you this morning, I'd arranged for us to lunch with her--I mean with Maisie. You don't mind, do you? I was speaking with her over the phone and she said we must come because she didn't feel safe."

"She said that to you, too! She said the same thing to me. But you and I, do we want her?"

Terry nodded, making her eyes wide. "We'll all make each other more safe. That's what friends are for. I told her we'd be at her house by one."

"If you told her that----" He was trying to discover whether he was relieved or disappointed. With an eagerness which it was hard to account for, he was wondering whether Lady Dawn would be there. He pulled out his watch. "Twelve-forty-five. We can just do it in a taxi. If you told her that, we'd better stick to your plans."

He hailed a driver who was pa.s.sing and helped her into the cab.