The Red Mouse Part 14

"I don't know," answered Miriam slowly, "whether he would or not."

"What!" gasped the girl.

"Don't misunderstand me," pleaded the woman. "There are two Lawrence Challoners--one is the man I love--that loves me; the other is the Lawrence Challoner who--well--I don't care," she added fiercely, "what he's done, I want him back." She sobbed for an instant. "You didn't know, Shirley, that we had a quarrel--I treated him badly, shamefully; he hasn't come back since."

"You quarrelled--you, Miriam!" The girl opened her eyes wide. "What about?"

"Money," admitted the conscience-stricken woman--"money. He wanted me to give him some--a perfectly natural request, wasn't it?--Men have got to have money," she went on, repeating his words, "and I wouldn't give him any. It was brutal in me--I can never forgive myself!"

A look of astonishment crossed Shirley's face.

"You wouldn't give him any money? And he didn't have any when he went away?"

Miriam wept. After a moment she answered:--

"No. My poor Laurie--think of him starving, freezing, perhaps dying!"

Shirley Bloodgood drew a long breath.

"And Colonel Hargraves was robbed," she murmured to herself.

"I don't think you understand," Miriam went on, breaking in upon her thoughts. "Of course I don't believe that Laurie is guilty of the things they charge him with; but he must come back and stand trial and be acquitted--and I must stand by his side through it all." She broke down completely.

"On the evidence they have," Shirley returned, trying to comfort her, "they'll----"

"What's that?" inquired Mrs. Challoner, starting up nervously, in alarm.

"It's that horrible bell ringing again," she went on breathlessly.

"Don't you hear voices below? Listen--I thought I heard...."

Shirley stole to the door and listened. Presently she called back:--

"Don't worry--whoever it is, Stevens is sending them away!"

"I hope so," sighed Miriam, "for I can't see any one--I won't see any one, unless--Oh, Laurie, Laurie," she cried out, "why don't you come home!"

Suddenly Shirley fell back from the door; it was being stealthily pushed open.

"Oh," she gasped, "it's only Stevens! How you frightened me!"

Stevens stood in the door at attention, looking neither to the right nor to the left, but straight over the heads of the women. He drew a long intake of breath, then he spoke the name:--

"_Mr. Challoner._"

And hardly were the words out of his mouth than he was thrust aside, and there stood in his place a spare, gaunt, tottering figure--a man dishevelled, soiled, exhausted--James Lawrence Challoner had come home!

At the sound of the name the young wife's face turned pale, and for a moment words failed her. Then all of a sudden she sprang to her feet and rushed to him, crying in an ecstasy of joy:--

"Laurie, Laurie, you've come home to me at last!" And throwing her arms around his neck, she kissed him many times, laughing hysterically and crying the while: "You've come back to me!" And once more the freshness of youth, joy and hope were in her voice.

But Challoner, still standing just within the entrance of the room, did not heed her; he cast her off with a frantic sweep of the arm.

"Keep away--keep away from me!" he cried. "I'm tired, dog-tired--I've got to sleep, sleep."

Painful as was the scene, Shirley was keenly alive to what his presence there might mean.

"Stevens," she called, pointing to a window, "pull that curtain down. I pulled it up after _they_ went; pull it down."

Challoner now turned upon her.

"Leave the curtain alone, I tell you," he said, "I don't care if it is up. I don't care about you either--nor you," looking at his wife. "I don't know you. I must have sleep--sleep--sleep."

Deep down in her soul Shirley knew that she should not hear all this, and she would have fled if she had not promised Miriam not to leave her.

Suddenly she wheeled upon Stevens as if she and not Miriam were the mistress of the house, exclaiming peremptorily:--

"Stevens, leave the room!"

Stevens obeyed her as he would his mistress, and left the room post haste.

Miriam now went over to the girl.

"You're not going to leave me!" she exclaimed, clinging to her. "You and Laurie are the only friends I have--you must stay here with Laurie and me."

Shirley saw the agony in her face and patted her affectionately as she promised:--

"There, there, Miriam, dear, of course I shall stay." And Miriam, at once rea.s.sured, darted back to her husband, and cried:--

"Laurie, dear," kissing him and pushing the hair back from his forehead, "so tired--so tired."

But Challoner, a wolf now and not a man, jerked away from her, and answered:--

"I came home, didn't I? Well, then, I must have sleep, sleep, I tell you, sleep." And tottering over to a dainty silken covered sofa, he threw himself upon it with a deep sigh, saying as though to himself: "Sleep--I must have sleep."

Spellbound, Miriam watched him for a moment, then following him to the sofa, she went down on her knees and drew him to her in a close embrace.

"Everything's all right now that you've come back," she told him in soothing tones. "And, dear, you'll forgive me for quarrelling with you--I'm so sorry, yes, I am, Laurie," kissing him on the lips, the face, the forehead. "Say you'll forgive me, Laurie, dear?"

His answer was a snore. Challoner lay supinely where he had thrown himself, sleeping as does the beast that has crept back to his lair after days of hunting by the man pack.

"Miriam," the whispered name came from Shirley, "you and I, dear, must now think of things. We must not forget that Murgatroyd and his men have only just left. We must not let him lie here; it was lucky they searched the house when they did...."

Miriam waved the other back.

"No," she objected strenuously, "he must sleep; we must let him alone."

"No, no, Miriam," persisted Shirley, putting great emphasis on the words, "we ought to tell him what kind of evidence is against him. He ought to know that. If we didn't warn him in time, he'd never forgive us--he'd never forgive you. He's a man...."

"Perhaps you're right, Shirley--you seem to be always right. Yes, I suppose he ought to know." Gently Miriam shook him, rocked him to and fro upon the sofa, as some fond mother might wake a drowsy, growing boy on a lazy summer morn.