The Wages of Virtue Part 38

He coughed and swallowed, his mouth and chin twitched and worked, and tears trickled down his face.

"Can't do much harm," said Rupert, and took the bottle from the American's shaking hand.

The brandy revived the mortally wounded man.

"Good-bye, Rupert," he said. "I advise you to go straight down to Les Imberts station ... and take the next train.... There will be a patrol ... after this patrol ... before long. You can't lie up here for long now.... Buck might take a horse and gallop for it.... Lie up somewhere else.... And ride to Oran to-night.... 'Erb should go as Rupert's servant ... or by a different train.... Remember Mendoza's tips."

The stertorous, wheezy breathing was painfully interrupted by a paroxysm of coughing.

"Much pain, old chap?" asked the white-faced Rupert, as he wiped the blood from his friend's lips.

"No," whispered Sir Montague Merline. "I am dead ... up to ... the heart.... Expanding bullet.... Lungs ... and spine ... I ... ex- ...

pect. Shan't be ... long."

"Anything I can do--any message or anything?" asked Rupert.

The dying man closed his eyes.

The Bucking Bronco was frankly blubbering. Turning to the dead "Goum"

who had shot his friend, he swore horribly, and deplored that the man was dead and beyond the reach of his further vengeance. He fell instantly silent as his stricken friend spoke again.

"If you ... get ... to Eng ... land, Rupert ... will ... you go ... to ... my wife? She's Lady..." he whispered.

"Yes--Lady ... _who_?" asked Rupert eagerly.

"NO," continued the dying man, in a stronger voice, as he opened his eyes. "I never ... had ... a ... wife."

Silence again.

"Why _Marguerite_ ... My ... darling ... girl. _Darling_ ... at ...

last. _Marguerite_."

Sir Montague Merline's problem was solved, and the last of his wages paid....

--6

The Honourable Reginald Rupert Huntingten never forgot the hour that followed. The three broken-hearted men buried their friend in a shallow, sandy grave and piled a cairn of rocks and stones above the spot. It gave them a feeling akin to pleasure to realise that every minute devoted to this labour of love, lessened their chance of escape.

Their task accomplished, they shook hands and parted--the Bucking Bronco incapable of speech. Before he rode away, Huntingten thrust a piece of paper into his hand, upon which he had scribbled: "_R. R. Huntingten, Elham Old Hall, Elham, Kent,_" and said, "Wire me there. Or--better still, come--and we'll arrange about Carmelita."

The Bucking Bronco rode away in the cool of the morning.

Having settled by the toss of a coin whether he or 'Erb should attempt the next train, he gave that grief-stricken warrior the same address and invitation.

With a crushing hand-clasp they parted, and Huntingten, with a light and jaunty step, and a sore and heavy heart, set forth for the station of Les Imberts to put his nerve and fortune to the test.

EPILOGUE

"Well, good night, my own darling Boy," said the beautiful Lady Huntingten, as she lit her candle from that of her son, by the table in the hall. "Don't keep Father up all night, if he and General Strong come to your bedroom."

"Good night, dearest," replied he, kissing her fondly.

Setting down her candlestick, she took him by the lapels of his coat as though loth to let him out of her sight and part with him, even for the night.

"Oh, but it is good to have you again, darling," she murmured, gazing long at his bronzed and weather-beaten face. "You won't go off again for a long, long time, will you? And we must keep your promise to that wholly delightful 'Erb, if it's humanly possible. But I really cannot picture him as a discreet and silent-footed valet.... I simply loved him and the Bucking Bronco. I don't know which is the more precious and priceless.... I do so wonder whether he'll be happy with his Carmelita.... I shall love seeing her."

"Yes, 'Erb and Buck are great birds," replied her son, "but poor old John Bull was the chap."

"Poor man, how awful--with freedom in sight.... You knew nothing of his story?" she asked.

"Absolutely nothing, dearest. All I know about him is that he was one of the very best. Funny thing, y' know, Mother--I simply lived with that chap, night and day, for a year, and know no more about him than just that. That, and his marks--and by Jove, he'd got some.... Simply a ma.s.s of scars, beginning with the crown of his head, where was a hole you could have laid your thumb in. Been about a bit, too; fought in China, Madagascar, West Africa, the Sahara and Morocco, in the Legion.

Certainly been in the British Army--in Africa, too. I fancy he'd been a sailor as well--anyhow he'd been in j.a.pan and got the loveliest bit of tattooing I ever set eyes on. Wonderful colours--snake winding round his wrist and up his forearm. Thing looked alive though it had been done for over thirty years. Nagasaki, I think he said...." He yawned hugely. "But here I am rambling on about a person you never saw, and keeping you up," he added. He bent to kiss his mother again.

"Mother!--_darling_! Don't you feel well? Here, I'll get you a little brandy."

Lady Huntingten was clutching at the edge of the table, and staring at her son, white-lipped. Her face looked drawn and suddenly old.

"No, no," she said. "Come back. I--sometimes--a little..." and she sat down on the oak settle beside the table.

"The heat ..." she continued incoherently. "There, I'm all right now.

Tell me some more about this--John Bull.... He _is_ dead? ... You buried him yourself, you said."

"Yes, poor old chap, it was awful."

"And he gave you no messages for his people? He did not tell you his real name?"

"No. Nothing. He's taken his story with him. The last words he said were 'Will you go and tell my wife, Lady...' and there he pulled himself up, and said he never had a wife. But he had, I'm sure--and he called to her by her Christian name. As he died, he cried out, '_At last--my darling--_'"

"_Marguerite_," whispered Lady Huntingten.