The Tigress Part 36

"Not until you have thought it over. It wouldn't be fair to any one of us three." And she disappeared through the maze of orange trees.

When Carleigh reached the luncheon table it was to find Nina in animated conversation with a tall, bald, red-mustached man who sat on her left.

Carleigh found his place opposite, but she barely noticed him, so thoroughly did she appear interested.

Her companion, who proved to be Sir Guy Waldron, the archaeologist, just back from an excavating expedition to Sardis, in Asia Minor, was telling her about the buried riches of Croesus, and his hope of digging them up.

The spectacle robbed Sir Caryll of his last vestige of appet.i.te, and Lady Mary Wycherley, who couldn't take her eyes off him--she did so love romance--whispered to Mrs. Blythe, the poetess, her nearest neighbor, that it was quite clear the poor boy was eating his heart out in melancholy over the inhuman treatment of "that shocking American girl."

"It's clear he must be eating something in private," returned the poetess, who could be very literal when her pen was idle, "for he hasn't put spoon to his soup, or fork to these delicious salmon cutlets."

In point of fact Carleigh was, for the moment at least, an impenetrable puzzle to every one present, save only Mrs. Darling and his host and hostess.

They couldn't at all understand how, with the scandal still fresh in society's mind, he could face a house full of persons, many of whom were comparative strangers and a few of whom he had never before met.

And the oddest part of it was that most of them never solved the riddle, owing to the manner in which fate chose to shape immediately succeeding events.

Directly after luncheon the entire party went motoring with Cragmoor Castle as the objective, and by prior arrangement Mrs. Darling occupied a seat next to Sir Guy, who drove his own car.

Carleigh, to his utter dismay, found himself with the poetess and four very young persons who did nothing but giggle.

They had tea at the castle, and Caryll strove valiantly to disentangle Nina from the party for a much-desired _tete-a-tete_; but with the poorest success.

In spite of every effort he was forced to share her with Captain Belden, a very loquacious young gentleman with an exaggerated idea of his own wit. And the fact that Nina laughed appreciatively at his dullest jokes plunged poor Caryll into deeper and deeper gloom.

On the way back to Carfen, Mrs. Blythe chose to dilate at considerable length upon Masefield and his new school, which she couldn't in the least understand, and denounced as lacking in every element of true poetic art.

Nor did Carleigh's monosyllabic comments and long silences in any wise discourage her. The young people giggled as persistently as the poetess talked, and altogether the journey was as nearly maddening as anything he had ever experienced.

Had it not been for the gladdening trust in a long evening with Nina under the stars his reason must have quite succ.u.mbed. As it was it merely tottered and threatened.

With the true Briton convention is a fetish. It ranks in his worshipful regard next to the throne--I was going to say above the throne.

Carleigh might kick over the traces of betrothal and marriage, incited by an unconventional matron from the States, but he couldn't think of defying the convention which forbids gentlemen to leave the dinner-table until the ladies have had a quarter of an hour, at the very least, to themselves in which to exchange confidences.

He didn't care in the least for the liqueurs and the cigars, nor for the gross stories which were not at all droll. There was only one thing he did care for.

He wanted to tell Nina he had thought it over very carefully, while Mrs.

Blythe talked of Masefield and the callow ones giggled, and that he was more than ever determined to accept her proposition with its accompanying condition in the utmost good faith.

But it never once entered his mind to desert his fellow men until they were of one mind and ready to rejoin the ladies.

He did manage, however, to change to a seat nearer the door so that he might be one of the first in the drawing-room and gain Nina's side before the coveted place was pre-empted.

"At last!" he breathed with a sigh as she drew her skirt aside for him.

Fashion having decreed scant skirts the action was more a habit than an actuality.

"You've missed me, then?" She spoke most casually.

"Have I? I've been absolutely wretched. I've been longing for you every second of the time. Do let us go out on the terrace or in the park--or somewhere that we can be quite alone together. I have so much to say to you."

His gaze was devouringly bent upon her eyes, and he was sure that he saw commiseration there. She did sympathize with him, then. She would go. In five minutes he would be holding her in his arms. But he misinterpreted.

"I'm so sorry, Caryll," she said, and it was like a dash of iced water.

"I'm so sorry. But I've promised to play bridge. See, they are bringing in the tables."

"You mustn't," he commanded. "I can't let you. I've been waiting hours--oh, so many, many, long, long hours. I can't--"

And then he was conscious that some one was standing at his elbow, speaking. It was Sir Guy Waldron--and he was saying:

"Now, Mrs. Darling, if you are quite ready."

CHAPTER XVII

The Intervention of the Unforeseen

Carleigh stalked off in a pet and smoked innumerable cigarettes, not under the stars, but under heavy low-sailing clouds which swept in from the Solway Firth. His mood was as sullen as the night.

He thought unutterable things, walking to the farthest limits of the park--and farther. It was near to midnight when he returned, his light top-coat dripping, for the wind and the clouds had brought with them a chill and drenching mist.

He paused in the hall. Voices penetrated from the drawing-room. The bridge game was still on. He climbed the broad staircase, gazed down upon by Archdeacons of past centuries in time-blackened frames. On the landings stands of armor, reflecting dim lights, appeared as sentinels.

He found his valet drowsing.

"Fetch me a brandy-and-soda at once," he ordered. "Better make it a decanter and two sodas," he added. "I'm chilled to the bone."

He might have added that his spirits were low, and required strenuous lifting measures. But he was not the sort that shares emotions with one's servants.

He drank the pegs when they came, dismissed the man, and was almost pleased to find himself drowsy. Had he been conscious, it would have surprised him to realize that he dropped into the deepest of deep slumbers directly his head rested on a pillow.

He slept soundly for four hours, and then awakened with a start and sat bolt upright in bed. He was choking. The room was full of smoke.

Coughing like an unm.u.f.fled gas engine, he got his feet to the floor, crept to where he imagined the light-switch was--found it by a miracle and turned it on.

But there was no answering illumination. Somewhere the rubber insulation had been burned away and the current short-circuited.

This fact of itself told him that the fire was no tiny matter. Carfen House was ablaze, and probably some of its inmates were still sleeping, unwarned, as he had been. Nina! She was his first thought. Was Nina in peril?

Every minute the smoke in the room grew more dense. It seemed to him that he would never be able to find his coat or a dressing-gown; and even seconds were perhaps precious.

Desperately, at length, he s.n.a.t.c.hed a blanket from the bed, drew it about him, and groped for the door. Half-blinded, his eyes smarting, he jerked it open and a scorching blast struck him in the face.

The smoke here was hot and lurid. And he dropped to his knees and crept.

One way he could see flashes of lambent flame. The other way was black as night itself. But he chose it, and half-crawled, half-leaped, questioning that he would ever be able to reach the open alive.