The Outspan Part 14

I sat down in my little friend's seat and waited. I had not long to wait. Presently I heard behind me the awkward tiptoeing of a child trying to walk very silently. Like Brer Rabbit, I lay low. Then came the climbing on to the seat, and finally a pair of childish hands were clapped over my eyes to an accompaniment of half-suppressed squeals of laughter, broken by panting efforts to maintain the blind-folding hug.

I was busily keeping up the illusion by extravagantly bad guesses as to who it was, when I heard the rustle of a dress, and someone ran out, calling:

"Molly, Molly! how can you be so naughty, darling? Oh, do excuse her!"

I was released. My hat was in the dust and my hair rumpled. I saw Mrs Chauncey in the background in peals of laughter; Mrs Mallandane before me, looking most concerned, and holding the bewildered Molly by the hand; and Molly vindicating herself by saying with much dignity:

"Mother, it's only the gentimell that dooth my thumth an' kitheth me."

As a defence this was, of course, adequate--not to say excellent; but it was rather embarra.s.sing for me. It was so effective, however, that I was spared the necessity of saying anything myself Mrs Chauncey introduced me to her _protegee_ as she would have done to any of her lady friends, and the _protegee_ bowed, as it seemed to me, with a great deal more grace and quite as much easy composure as the best of them.

That was my first thought. The next was to take myself indignantly to task for inst.i.tuting a comparison.

As we resumed our walk I was wondering what could be the tie between this woman and Ca.s.sidy. There was no mistaking her cla.s.s. She was a gentlewoman to her finger-tips. I was roused from my rather discourteous distraction by Mrs Chauncey saying:

"You are not so surprised now, perhaps, that I lost my temper with Mr Carter the other evening. I am sorry I spoke as I did, but I felt it deeply--indeed I did."

"I can well understand it," I answered. "How do you like her?" she asked abruptly. "What! after on interview of two minutes--and such an interview?"

Mrs Chauncey smiled, and said: "Well, I only wanted to know your impression. And, after all, you have had time to form one, for you have been thinking of her all the time since we left the house!"

"Perfectly true--I have. And to speak candidly, I think I have seldom-- indeed, I think, never--seen a face that interested me more; partly, I suppose, because of what you told us. And I don't think I have ever seen anyone look so infinitely sad. It is a pitiful, haunting face."

"I feel that also. I have never been able to forget her look since she came to me a month ago for work--needlework or any work. I will never believe that she could be an impostor. No, no! Truth is stamped in her face--truth and sorrow."

I had always liked Mrs Chauncey. Just at that moment I was mentally patting her on the back and calling her "a little brick," for it was clear that she too had heard something--heard it and pa.s.sed it by. Good woman!

I was a bachelor, and not too old to feel; and, over and above my interest in Ca.s.sidy, this whole affair fascinated me considerably. From this time forward I never pa.s.sed the house without greeting mother or child with sincere warmth, or missing them with an equally genuine sense of disappointment. I never met Mrs Chauncey without inquiring with interest the latest news of her friend and all details of her affairs.

There was never much to tell. Now it was some commission for a dress, now the mending of children's clothes--another time the tr.i.m.m.i.n.g of hats or working a tennis-net, that helped to make ends meet without hurt to her pride. These were petty details which might pa.s.s in woman's chat, but should fail to interest a man, you would think. Nevertheless, they interested me. They did more. In the evenings, as I sat alone and smoked out in the starlight they helped me to conjure up pictures and to see her as she would at those very moments, perhaps, be employed.

I would have done anything to help her had I been able, but there was nothing I could do. I had even learned that I might not as much as evince sympathy or interest, except at the cost of insult to her. On one occasion when I happened to meet and walk with her in one of the main streets of the camp, I was frigidly cut by two ladies with whom I thought I was on quite friendly terms. This disturbed me considerably, not on my own account, but because of the insult and injustice to one who was powerless to resent it. It hurt me even more to realise that it would be wise to bow before this and prove greater friendship by showing less.

I was still smarting under this next morning when I was accosted by one of those puddle-headed, blundering idiots of whom there seem to be one or more in any community, no matter how small.

"I say, old chap," he began, "look here, ye know! You're not playin'

the game, ye know, old chap! The missis has been complainin' to me about you. You know what I mean."

I detest this "dontcherknow," "g"-dropping kind of animal at any time-- the thing that fondles you with "old chap" and "dear boy" and refers to its wife as "the missis." But apart from this, I was to-day especially unprepared to submit to further outrage. I was still smarting, as I said before.

"My good man," I said, "may I ask you to be more explicit?"

"Why, dash it all, old chap! you know what I mean--er. It's no affair of mine, of course, if you only keep it quiet, don't you know. But you don't give one a chance, don't you know; and, after all, you can't run with the hare and hunt with the hounds, and all that sort of thing, don't you know!"

I was trying to keep my temper, but with no very marked success, I fear; but I said as calmly as I could:

"That's a very original remark, my friend, and no doubt equally intelligent, but I shall be pleased if you will be good enough to apply it so that _I_ can understand it."

"Look here, old chap. If you will go and walk in broad daylight with a woman like that, you know--well, you can't expect--"

"Stop now!" I said. I had hardly breath enough to speak, and there must have been something unpleasant in my face, for he stepped back a pace or two. "So far you are only a babbling fool. If you go on now you will be an infernal cad and must take the consequences. You understand what I mean. And further, as you have been good enough to hint that I should choose my line, I may tell you--to adopt your happy ill.u.s.tration--that I elect to 'run with the hare.' You see! Perhaps _you_ understand what I mean!"

Now, before two minutes had pa.s.sed, I did not need anyone to tell me that I had done the worst and most unwise thing possible under the circ.u.mstances. Of course I knew well enough that when a woman is concerned two things are very essential--that the man shall keep his temper, and that he shall be judicious, even circ.u.mspect, in defending.

Having failed in the former, I necessarily failed in the latter, and I felt sick with impotent rage when I realised it.

I knew how the story would circulate, and I knew exactly how it would be touched up, amplified, and ill.u.s.trated with graphic gesticulations when it reached the club and Exchange and pa.s.sed through the hands of certain expert _raconteurs_; and to avoid the lamentable result of chaff and further provocation I got away for a couple of days to give myself--and the story--a chance.

Several weeks pa.s.sed after this incident, during which I saw but little of Mrs Mallandane, and heard not much more. Occasionally I heard of Ca.s.sidy from men coming up the line. In spite of his grumbling and seeming discontent with the nature of the country in his section n.o.body believed that Ca.s.sidy's Cutting was such a very unprofitable job as he gave out. Ca.s.sidy was too old a hand to be drawn into any admission which could be used against him for the purpose of cutting down prices in future contracts. Those best able to judge put him down to make close on 10,000 pounds out of that job. His section lay some sixty miles from Barberton, and, as far as I knew, he had been into camp only twice during the five months that had pa.s.sed since I had first met him.

One occasion was the night on which I had seen him; the other when he called at the office to see me. I was out of camp that day and missed him. I do not know how often he may have been in besides those two occasions.

Mrs Chauncey and I were real friends. Jack was one of my oldest chums, and when he married I found--what does not necessarily follow--that his wife was just one to strengthen the friendship and not weaken it. With regard to her, I felt that if an occasion should arise requiring that I should make a confidante of any woman Mrs Chauncey would be the one. I don't know that I ever realised this sufficiently forcibly to express it even to myself until after a remark which she made to me about this time.

She had been telling me some little thing about Mrs Mallandane, and I may have shown by my attention--perhaps even by questions--more interest than she expected or thought called for. There was quite a long silence, during which I felt that she was thinking of something concerning me. When she turned towards me her expression was one of almost tender consideration, and in the gentlest possible voice she said:

"It is good to be kind and generous, and to help those who need it; but when a man means to help a woman it should be clear to him from day to day, from hour to hour, not only how far _he_ means to go, but also what she will understand."

The words went home to me, and I suppose I showed it, for she added a little nervously:

"You must not mind that from me. 'Faithful are the wounds of a friend.'"

"Taken as meant, Mrs Chauncey; and--thank you!" I meant it.

I made a careful and impartial examination of conscience that night when I had the silence and darkness to favour me; and although I honestly acquitted myself, there was just the faintest suggestion of the finding of the Irish jury: "We find the prisoner not guilty; but he's not to do it again." I told myself again that Mrs Chauncey was a "little brick"

for her timely and well-judged warning; for I thought it was quite possible that I might have drifted on and "gone soft" before knowing it.

I am satisfied that there was no cause for alarm, as the resolution to "ease up" cost me neither effort nor pang.

I abided fairly by the spirit of my unspoken pact. I changed my daily route to one that did not lead past Mrs Mallandane's house. I ceased to talk of her; I even tried not to think of her. But just there I failed--for the effort to forget makes occasion to remember.

It was the tail end of summer. The heat was terrible, and in all the outlying parts--even in the lower portions of the camp--malarial fever was prevalent. The accounts from the line were particularly bad, nearly all the engineers, contractors, and sub-contractors being more or less laid up by attacks of the summer fiend. One of the engineers suffering from a mild attack was brought in, and, being at the hotel when he arrived, I heard accounts of what was going on. He told me that Ca.s.sidy had had attack after attack, but that he would neither lie up there nor come into hospital. It was work, work, work, with him, all day and night, except when he was looking after others--and, in truth, his camp was a kind of improvised hospital Ca.s.sidy, he said, with his superb strength and physique would not give in. He would not believe that fever could beat a man who was game, and he fought it.

There was no suitable conveyance to be got before night, so I arranged to start after dark, for I was determined to do something to repay the kindness I had had at Ca.s.sidy's hands. I took a serious view of his case, for I knew how these things usually ended, and he was not going to die without an effort on my part to save him.

I walked home that night worrying considerably about poor Ca.s.sidy and wishing to Heaven that the trap was ready to start at once. I had reached the crossing-stones in the little stream, where my old and new paths forked out. It was dusk, and I was not thinking of whom I might meet, so I started at the sight of Mrs Mallandane a few paces off coming towards me, evidently to meet me.

"Oh, I have waited for hours to meet you!" she began without any ceremony, and talking nervously and fast. "I thought you had gone already, and yet I feared to annoy you by going to your office. Look here--look! Tell me, is this true? Oh, you can't see--I forgot; it's too dark. Here in the paper they say you are going down the line to-night to bring in someone who is ill, very ill with fever. Tell me, is it true?"

"It is quite true. I leave to-night after nine," I answered--I hope without betraying surprise; but I could not help noticing that she did not mention Ca.s.sidy's name, and that she was painfully excited. I drew no conclusions--I had no time for thought; but these things left a weight on my heart for all that, and it was not lightened as she went on.

"I have come to ask you something. You will please bring him to my house. I must nurse him! He must come to me!" This was not a favour sought, it was rather a direction given, and there was only the slightest note of interrogation in her voice. I could only repeat in surprise: "To your house, Mrs Mallandane?"

"Yes--yes! You will do that for me, please?"

"I am sorry, but I do not think that would be right. His place is clearly in the hospital, and I have no right to take him elsewhere."

"You refuse? Oh, you cannot refuse me!"

"Mrs Mallandane, you put it very harshly. You must see that I cannot do otherwise. I know of nothing to justify me in not sending him to hospital. It will be better for him, and far better for you."