The Lion's Skin Part 23

There it was suddenly arrested, and for a long moment it was held there poised, death itself, menacing and imminent. And Lord Rotherby, not daring to move, rooted where he stood, looked with fascinated eyes along that shimmering blade into two gleaming eyes behind it that seemed to watch him with a solemnity that was grim to the point of mockery.

Time and the world stood still, or were annihilated in that moment for the man who waited.

High in the blue overhead a lark was pouring out its song; but his lordship heard it not. He heard nothing, he was conscious of nothing but that gleaming sword and those gleaming eyes behind it.

Then a voice--the voice of his antagonist--broke the silence. "Is more needed?" it asked, and without waiting for a reply, Mr. Caryll lowered his blade and drew himself upright. "Let this suffice," he said. "To take your life would be to deprive you of the means of profiting by this lesson."

It seemed to Rotherby as if he were awaking from a trance. The world resumed its way. He breathed again, and straightened himself, too, from the arrested att.i.tude of his last lunge. Rage welled up from his black soul; a crimson flood swept into his pallid cheeks; his eyes rolled and blazed with the fury of the mad.

Mr. Caryll moved away. In that quiet voice of his: "Take up your sword,"

he said to the vanquished, over his shoulder.

Wharton and Gascoigne moved towards him, without words to express the amazement that still held Rotherby glared an instant longer without moving. Then, doing as Mr. Caryll had bidden him, he stooped to recover his blade. A moment he held it, looking after his departing adversary; then with swift, silent stealth he sprang to follow. His fell intent was written on his face.

Falgate gasped--a helpless fool--while Mainwaring hurled himself forward to prevent the thing he saw impended. Too late. Even as he flung out his hands to grapple with his lordship, Rotherby's arm drove straight before him and sent his sword through the undefended back of Mr. Caryll.

All that Mr. Caryll realized at first was that he had been struck a blow between the shoulder blades; and then, ere he could turn to inquire into the cause, he was amazed to see some three inches of steel come through his shirt in front. The next instant an exquisite, burning, searing pain went through and through him as the blade was being withdrawn.

He coughed and swayed, then hurtled sideways into the arms of Major Gascoigne. His senses swam. The turf heaved and rolled as if an earthquake moved it; the houses fronting the square and the trees immediately before him leaped and danced as if suddenly launched into grotesque animation, while about him swirled a wild, incoherent noise of voices, rising and falling, now loud, now silent, and reaching him through a murmuring hum that surged about his ears until it shut out all else and consciousness deserted him.

Around him, meanwhile, a wild scene was toward.

His Grace of Wharton had wrenched away the sword from Rotherby, and mastered by an effort his own impulse to use it upon the murderer.

Captain Mainwaring--Rotherby's own second, a man of quick, fierce pa.s.sions--utterly unable to control himself, fell upon his lordship and beat him to the ground with his hands, cursing him and heaping abuse upon him with every blow; whilst delicate Mr. Falgate, in the background, sick to the point of faintness, stood dabbing his lips with his handkerchief and swearing that he would rot before he allowed himself again to be dragged into an affair of honor.

"Ye d.a.m.ned cutthroat!" swore the militia captain, standing over the man he had felled. "D'ye know what'll be the fruits of this? Ye'll swing at Tyburn like the dirty thief y' are. G.o.d help me! I'd give a hundred guineas sooner than be mixed in this filthy business."

"'Tis no matter for that now," said the duke, touching him on the shoulder and drawing him away from his lordship. "Get up, Rotherby."

Heavily, mechanically, Rotherby got to his feet. Now that the fit of rage was over, he was himself all stricken at the thing he had done. He looked at the limp figure on the turf, huddled against the knee of Major Gascoigne; looked at the white face, the closed eyes and the stain of blood oozing farther and farther across the Holland shirt, and, as white himself as the stricken man, he shuddered and his mouth was drawn wide with horror.

But pitiful though he looked, he inspired no pity in the Duke of Wharton, who considered him with an eye of unspeakable severity. "If Mr.

Caryll dies," said he coldly, "I shall see to it that you hang, my lord.

I'll not rest until I bring you to the gallows."

And then, before more could be said, there came a sound of running steps and labored breathing, and his grace swore softly to himself as he beheld no other than Lord Ostermore advancing rapidly, all out of breath and apoplectic of face, a couple of footmen pressing close upon his heels, and, behind these, a score of sightseers who had followed them.

"What's here?" cried the earl, without glancing at his son. "Is he dead?

Is he dead?"

Gascoigne, who was busily endeavoring to stanch the bleeding, answered without looking up: "It is in G.o.d's hands. I think he is very like to die."

Ostermore swung round upon Rotherby. He had paled suddenly, and his mouth trembled. He raised his clenched hand, and it seemed that he was about to strike his son; then he let it fall again. "You villain!" he panted, breathless from running and from rage. "I saw it! I saw it all.

It was murder, and, as G.o.d's my life, if Mr. Caryll dies, I shall see to it that you hang--I, your own father."

Thus a.s.sailed on every side, some of the cowering, shrinking manner left the viscount. His antagonism to his father spurred him to a prouder carriage. He shrugged indifferently. "So be it," he said. "I have been told that already. I don't greatly care."

Mainwaring, who had been stooping over Mr. Caryll, and who had perhaps more knowledge of wounds than any present, shook his head ominously.

"'Twould be dangerous to move him far," said he. "'Twill increase the hemorrhage."

"My men shall carry him across to Stretton House," said Lord Ostermore.

"Lend a hand here, you gaping oafs."

The footmen advanced. The crowd, which was growing rapidly and was watching almost in silence, awed, pressed as close as it dared upon these gentlemen. Mainwaring procured a couple of cloaks and improvised a stretcher with them. Of this he took one corner himself, Gascoigne another, and the footmen the remaining two. Thus, as gently as might be, they bore the wounded man from the enclosure, through the crowd that had by now a.s.sembled in the street, and over the threshold of Stretton House.

A groom had been dispatched for a doctor, and his Grace of Wharton had compelled Rotherby to accompany them into his father's house, sternly threatening to hand him over to a constable at once if he refused.

Within the cool hall of Stretton House they were met by her ladyship and Mistress Winthrop, both pale, but the eyes of each wearing a vastly different expression.

"What's this?" demanded her ladyship, as they trooped in. "Why do you bring him here?"

"Because, madam," answered Ostermore in a voice as hard as iron, "it imports to save his life; for if he dies, your son dies as surely--and on the scaffold."

Her ladyship staggered and flung a hand to her breast. But her recovery was almost immediate. "'Twas a duel--" she began stoutly.

"'Twas murder," his lordship corrected, interrupting--"murder, as any of these gentlemen can and will bear witness. Rotherby ran Mr. Caryll through the back after Mr. Caryll had spared his life."

"'Tis a lie!" screamed her ladyship, her lips ashen. She turned to Rotherby, who stood there in shirt and breeches and shoeless, as he had fought. "Why don't you say that it is a lie?" she demanded.

Rotherby endeavored to master himself. "Madam," he said, "here is no place for you."

"But is it true? Is it true what is being said?"

He half-turned from her, with a despairing movement, and caught the sharp hiss of her indrawn breath. Then she swept past him to the side of the wounded man, who had been laid on a settle. "What is his hurt?" she inquired wildly, looking about her. But no one spoke. Tragedy--more far than the tragedy of that man's possible death--was in the air, and struck them all silent. "Will no one answer me?" she insisted. "Is it mortal? Is it?"

His Grace of Wharton turned to her with an unusual gravity in his blue eyes. "We hope not, ma'am," he said. "But it is as G.o.d wills."

Her limbs seemed to fail her, and she sank down on her knees beside the settle. "We must save him," she muttered fearfully. "We must save his life. Where is the doctor? He won't die! Oh, he must not die!"

They stood grouped about, looking on in silence, Rotherby in the background. Behind him again, on the topmost of the three steps that led up into the inner hall, stood Mistress Winthrop, white of face, a wild horror in the eyes she riveted upon the wounded and unconscious man.

She realized that he was like to die. There was an infinite pity in her soul--and, maybe, something more. Her impulse was to go to him; her every instinct urged her. But her reason held her back.

Then, as she looked, she saw with a feeling almost of terror that his eyes were suddenly wide open.

"Wha--what?" came in feeble accents from his lips.

There was a stir about him.

"Never move, Justin," said Gascoigne, who stood by his head. "You are hurt. Lie still. The doctor has been summoned."

"Ah!" It was a sigh. The wounded man closed his eyes a moment, then re-opened them. "I remember. I remember," he said feebly. "It is--it is grave?" he inquired. "It went right through me. I remember!" He surveyed himself. "There's been a deal of blood lost. I am like to die, I take it."

"Nay, sir, we hope not--we hope not!" It was the countess who spoke.

A wry smile twisted his lips. "Your ladyship is very good," said he. "I had not thought you quite so much my well-wisher. I--I have done you a wrong, madam." He paused for breath, and it was not plain whether he spoke in sincerity or in sarcasm. Then with a startling suddenness he broke into a soft laugh and to those risen, who could not think what had occasioned it, it sounded more dreadful than any plaint he could have uttered.

He had bethought him that there was no longer the need for him to come to a decision in the matter that had brought him to England, and his laugh was almost of relief. The riddle he could never have solved for himself in a manner that had not shattered his future peace of mind, was solved and well solved if this were death.

"Where--where is Rotherby?" he inquired presently.