The Star-Gazers Part 59

"Humph!" grumbled Sir John; "it does look as if he were having a run."

"Very much," said the major, "five hundred yards run along the carriage drive. What is he training for now?"

"Tchah!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Sir John; "don't ask me. Here, hi! Rob! Hang the fellow: is he deaf?"

Rolph seemed to be. He ran, growing more distant every moment, while, as Sir John trudged on, he was evidently fretting and fuming, the more, too, that the major seemed to be in a malicious spirit, and to enjoy worrying him about his choice.

"Poor fellow!" he said; "he is overdone with impatience to hear the result of your visit, and can only keep down his excitement by running hard."

"Look here, Jem, if you want to quarrel, say so, and I'll take another path to the house, for I'm not in the humour to have words."

"I am," said the major, "a good many. I feel as if there is nothing that would agree with me better than a deuced good quarrel with somebody."

"Then hang it, man, why didn't you quarrel with Alleyne--take your niece's part?"

"Alleyne is not a man I could quarrel with," said the major sharply.

"There, I'll go and have a few words with Rolph about the cool way in which he takes a quarrel that you look upon as almost vital."

"No, no, for goodness sake don't do anything of the kind," cried Sir John sharply, and he caught his brother by the shoulder. "My dear Jem, don't be absurd."

The major muttered something that was inaudible, and struck right across the park towards the house, by the lawn, while Sir John, feeling out of humour with his brother, with Rolph, and even with himself, went on along the carriage drive to encounter his prospective son-in-law after a few minutes, perspiring and panting after running fifteen hundred yards towards a mile.

"Hullo! back?" panted Rolph.

"Yes," said Sir John abruptly.

"Well, what did he say?"

"I'll tell you after dinner," replied Sir John sourly; "your training must be too important to be left."

"What did he mean?" said Rolph to himself as he stood watching Sir John's retreating form. "Why, the old boy looks as if he had been huffed. Bah! I wish he wouldn't come and stop me when I'm running; he has given me quite a chill."

Volume 3, Chapter II.

THE STARS AT THE NADIR.

"I will see him again, Mrs Alleyne, and try a little more persuasion; perhaps he will yield."

"But are you sure you are right, Mr Oldroyd? I know my son's const.i.tution so well. Would it be better to go to some specialist?"

"My dear madam, I would advise you directly to persuade him to go up to town and see any of our magnates, but it would be so much money wasted."

"But he seems so ill again!" sighed Mrs Alleyne.

"He does, indeed, but this illness is one of the simplest of ailments.

It needs no doctor to tell you what it is. Really, Mrs Alleyne, if you will set maternal anxiety aside for one moment, and look at your son as you would at a stranger, you will see directly what is wrong. It is only an aggravated form of the complaint for which you consulted me before."

"If I could only feel so," sighed Mrs Alleyne.

"Really, madam, you may," replied Oldroyd. "When you first called me in, you know what I prescribed, and how much better he grew. I prescribe the same again. If we set Nature and her simple laws at defiance, she will punish us."

"But he grows worse," sighed Mrs Alleyne. "He devotes himself more and more to his studies, and it is hard work to get him out of the observatory. He says he has some discovery on the way, and to make that he is turning himself into an old man. Will you go and see him now?"

Oldroyd bowed his acquiescence, and rose to go.

"You had better go alone," said Mrs Alleyne, "as if you had called in as a friend. He is very sensitive and strange at times, and I should not like him to think that I had sent for you."

"It would be as well not," said Oldroyd; and, taking the familiar way, he was crossing the hall, when he came suddenly upon Lucy, who stopped short, turned very red, turned hastily, and hurried through the next door, which closed after her with quite a bang.

Oldroyd's brow filled with lines, and he drew a long breath as he went on to the door of the observatory, knocked, and, receiving no answer, turned the handle gently and stepped in, closing the door behind him.

He stood for a few minutes in what seemed to be intense darkness; but as his eyes grew more accustomed to the great place, he could see that through the closed shutters a white stream of light came here and there, and on one side there was a very small, closely-shaded lamp, which threw a ring of softened yellow light down upon a sheet of paper covered with figures. Saving these faint traces of light all was gloom and obscurity, through which loomed out in a weirdly, grotesque fashion the great tubes and pedestals and wheels of the various instruments that stood in the place. On one side, too, a bright ray of light shone from a spot near the floor, and, after a moment or two, Oldroyd recalled that there stood the large trough of mercury, glittering like a mirror, and now reflecting a ray of light as if it were a star.

The silence was perfect, not a breath could be heard, and it was some few minutes before Oldroyd made out that his friend was seated on the other side of the table that bore the shaded lamp, his head resting upon his hand, perfectly motionless, but whether asleep or thinking it was impossible to say.

Oldroyd had not seen the astronomer for some weeks. There had been no falling off from the friendly feeling existing between them, but Alleyne had completely secluded himself since the encounter with Rolph in the fir wood, and, for reasons of his own, Oldroyd had refrained from calling, the princ.i.p.al cause being, as he told himself, a desire not to encounter Lucy.

He stood waiting for a short time watching the dimly-seen figure, and half-expecting that it would move and speak; but the minutes sped on, and the dead silence continued till Oldroyd, as he gave another look round the gloomy place, black as night in the early part of the afternoon of a sunny day, could not help saying to himself--"How can a man expect health when he shuts himself up in such a tomb?"

He crossed the place cautiously, and with outstretched hands, lest he should fall over a chair or philosophical instrument; but though he made some little noise, Alleyne did not stir, even when his visitor was close up to the table, looking down upon the head resting upon the dimly-seen hand.

"He must be asleep, worn out with watching," thought Oldroyd; and he remained silent again for a few minutes, waiting for his friend to move.

But Alleyne remained motionless; and now the visitor could see that his hair was rough and untended, and that he was in a loose kind of dressing-gown.

"Alleyne! Alleyne!" said Oldroyd at last, but there was no movement.

"Alleyne!" cried Oldroyd, louder now, but without result, and, feeling startled, he caught the shade from the lamp, so that the light might fall upon the heavily-bearded face.

As he did so, Alleyne moved, slowly raising his head, and letting his hand drop till he was gazing full at his visitor.

"Were you asleep?" said Oldroyd uneasily, "or are you ill?"

"Asleep?--ill?" replied Alleyne, in a low, dreamy voice, his eyes blinking uneasily in the light, as he displayed a white and ghastly face to his visitor, one that was startling in its aspect. "No, I am quite well. I was thinking."

Oldroyd was not ignorant of his friend's trouble, but he was surprised and shocked at the change that had taken place in so short a time; and laying his hand upon Alleyne's shoulder, and closely scanning the deeply-lined, ashy face, he said quietly,--

"May I open a shutter or two, and admit the light?"

"Light?--shutter?" said Alleyne dreamily; "is it morning?"

"Yes; glorious sunny morning, man. There, now we can see each other,"

cried Oldroyd cheerfully, as he threw back one or two shutters. "Why, Alleyne, how you do stick to the work."

"Yes--yes," in a low, dreamy voice. "There is so much to do, and one gets on so slowly."

"Big problem on, I suppose, as usual, eh?"

"Yes; a difficult problem," said Alleyne vacantly. "These things take time."