The Master Mummer Part 28

"I know very well indeed," I answered.

Just then Mabane broke loose from the man with whom he had been struggling, and rushed to Arthur's a.s.sistance. The Baron raised his hand and shouted something in German. Instantly our a.s.sailants seemed to melt away. The Baron stepped on to the strip of lawn and raised his hand.

"I call a truce, Mr. Greatson," he said. "I desire to speak with you."

I released my hold upon Isobel and turned to Mabane. Arthur too, breathless but unhurt, had struggled to his feet.

"Take her into the house," I said quickly. But her grasp only tightened upon my arm.

"I will not leave you, Arnold," she said. "I shall stay here. They will not dare to touch me."

I tried to disengage her arm, but she was persistent. She took no notice of Allan, who tried to lead her away. I stole a glance at her through the darkness. Her face was white, but there were no signs of fear there, nor were there any signs of childishness in her manner or bearing. She carried herself like an angry young princess, and her eyes seemed lit with smouldering fire, as clinging to my arm she leaned a little forwards toward the Baron.

"Why am I spoken of," she cried pa.s.sionately, "as though I were a baby, a thing of no account, to be carried away to your mistress or disposed of according to your liking? Do you think that I would come, Baron von Leibingen----"

She broke off suddenly. She leaned a little further forward. Her lips were parted. The fire in her eyes had given way to a great wonder, and the breathlessness of her silence was like a thing to be felt. It held us all dumb. We waited--we scarcely knew for what. Only we knew that she had something more to say, and we were impelled to wait for her words.

"I have seen you before," she cried, with a strange note of wonder in her tone. "Your face comes back to me--only it was a long time ago--a long, long time! Where was it, Baron von Leibingen?"

I heard his smothered exclamation. He drew quickly a step backwards as though he sought to evade her searching gaze.

"You are mistaken, young lady," he said. "I know nothing of you beyond the fact that the lady whom I have the honour to serve desires to be your friend."

"It is not true," she answered. "I remember you--a long way back--and the memory comes to me like an evil thought. I will not come to you. You may kill me, but I will not come alive."

"Indeed you are mistaken," he persisted, though he sought still the shadow of a rhododendron bush, and his voice quivered with nervous anxiety. "You have never seen me before. Surely the Archd.u.c.h.ess, the daughter of a King, is not one whose proffered kindness it is well to slight? Think again, young lady. Her Highness will make your future her special charge!"

"If your visit to-night, sir," she answered, "is a mark of the Archd.u.c.h.ess's good-will to me, I can well dispense with it. I have given you my answer."

"You will remember, Baron," I said, speaking at random, but gravely, and as though some special meaning lurked in my words, "that this young lady comes of a race who do not readily change. She has made her choice, and her answer to you is my answer. She will remain with us!"

The Baron stepped out again into the rich-scented twilight.

"You hold strong cards, Mr. Arnold Greatson," he said, "but I see their backs only. How do I know that you speak the truth? From whom have you learnt the story of this young lady's antecedents?"

"From Mr. Grooten," I answered boldly.

"I do not know the name," the Baron protested.

"He is the man," I said, "who set Isobel free!"

The Baron said something to himself in German, which I did not understand.

"You mean the man who shot Major Delahaye?" he asked.

"I do!"

"Then I would to Heaven I knew whose ident.i.ty that name conceals," he cried fiercely.

"You would not dare to publish it," I answered, "for to do so would be to give Isobel's story to the world."

"And why should I shrink from that?" he asked.

I laughed.

"Ask your august mistress," I declared. "It seems to me that we know more than you think."

The Baron looked over his shoulder and spoke to his companions. From that moment I knew that we had conquered. One of them left and went outside to where the motor-car, with its great flaring lights, still stood. Then the Baron faced me once more.

"Mr. Greatson," he said, "you are playing a game of your own, and for the moment I must admit that you hold the tricks against me. But it is well that I should give you once more this warning. If you should decide upon taking one false step--you perhaps know very well what I mean--things will go ill with you--very ill indeed."

Then he turned away, and our little garden was freed from the presence of all of them. We heard the starting of the car. Presently it glided away. We listened to its throbbing growing fainter and fainter in the distance. Then there was silence. A faint breeze had sprung up, and was rustling in the shrubs. From somewhere across the moor we heard the melancholy cry of the corncrakes. A great sob of relief broke from Isobel's throat--then suddenly her arm grew heavy upon mine. We hurried her into the house.

CHAPTER VIII

The perfume from a drooping lilac-bush a few feet away from the open cas.e.m.e.nt was mingled with the fainter odour of jessamine and homely stocks. In the soft morning sunshine the terrors of last night seemed a thing far removed from us. We sat at breakfast in our little sitting-room, and as though by common though unspoken consent we treated the whole affair as a gigantic joke. We ignored its darker aspect. We spoke of it as an "opera-bouffe" attempt never likely to be repeated--the hare-brained scheme of a mad foreigner, over anxious to earn the favour of his mistress. But beneath all our light talk was an undernote of seriousness. I think that Mabane and I, at any rate, realized perhaps for the first time that the situation, so far as Isobel was concerned, was fast becoming an impossible one.

After breakfast we all strolled out into the garden. Isobel, with her hands full of flowers, flitted in and out amongst the rose-bushes, laughing and talking with all the invincible gaiety of light-hearted youth, and Arthur hung all the while about her, his eyes following her every movement, telling her all the while by every action and look--if indeed the time had come for her to discern such things--all that our compact forbade him to utter. Presently I slipped away, and shutting myself up in the tiny room where I worked, drew out my papers. In a few minutes I had made a start. I pa.s.sed with a little unconscious sigh of relief into the detachment which was fast becoming the one luxury of my life.

An hour may have pa.s.sed, perhaps more, when I was interrupted. I heard the door softly opened, and light footsteps crossed the room to my side.

Isobel's hand rested on my shoulder, and she looked down at my work.

"Arnold," she exclaimed, "how dare you! You promised to read your story when you had finished six chapters, and you are working on chapter twenty now!"

Her long white forefinger pointed accusingly to the heading of my last page. Then I realized with a sudden flash of apprehension why I had not kept my promise--why I could never keep it. The story which flowed so smoothly from my pen was a record of my own emotions, my own sufferings.

Even her name had usurped the name of my heroine, and stared up at me from the half-finished page. It was my own story which was written there, my own unhappiness which throbbed through every word and sentence. With a little nervous gesture I covered over the open sheets.

I rose hastily to my feet, and I drew her away from the table.

"Another time, Isobel," I said. "It is too glorious a day to spend indoors, and Arthur has taken holiday too. Tell me, what shall we do?"

She looked at me a little doubtfully. I had grown into the habit of consulting her about my work, of reading most of it to her. Sometimes, too, she acted as my secretary. Perhaps she saw something of the trouble in my face, for she answered me very softly.

"I should like," she said, "to sit there before the open window on a cushion, and to have you sit down in that easy-chair and read to me.

That is how I choose to spend the morning!"

I shook my head.

"How about the others?" I asked.

"Oh, Arthur and Allan can go for a walk!" she declared.

"What selfishness," I answered, as lightly as I could. "Arthur must go back to town to-night, he says. I think that we ought all to spend the day together, don't you? I rather thought that you young people would have been off somewhere directly after breakfast."

She looked at me earnestly.