CHAPTER XXIV.
IN THE HOUR OF NEED.
It need scarcely be remarked that it is not usual for young ladies unattended to pay gentlemen visits at their chambers. Scandal is only too ready to seize upon the slightest excuse for the exercise of its malignity, and the fact, if it were known, that Lady Grace Peyton had been seen in Cecil Neville’s rooms would be quite sufficient to set evil tongues wagging.
All this flashed across Cecil Neville’s mind as she stood in the doorway, a picture of queenly beauty which seemed to light up the room, and made the sheriff’s officer stare with all his eyes.
Lord Cecil went forward, a slight flush on his face denoting his embarrassment.
“Lady Grace!” he said.
Then he stopped suddenly, remembering that it would be well not to mention her name before the man.
She bit her lip and looked from one to the other as she gave him her hand.
“I—I thought you were alone!” she said, in a low voice full of confusion and anxiety.
The officer rose and made a slight bow.
“I’ll step outside, my lord,” he said, respectfully, and he did so.
“I—I did not know,” faltered Lady Grace, looking after him. “Have I done anything very wrong in coming? I did not stop to think. I was so anxious that I thought I would come up to town——”
“Will you not sit down?” he said, gravely, and he placed a chair for her.
She sank into it, and looked up at him.
“What news is there? Have you heard of her? I can’t tell you how anxious I am! Ah! I see by your face that something has happened! What is it?”
“Yes; I have had news,” he said, in a low voice. “My uncle was right, and you and I were wrong, Lady Grace. Miss Marlowe”—his voice grew grim—“has sailed for Australia.”
“Oh, no, no! But alone?” she breathed.
“No, not alone. She went with this Mr. Garland,” he said, sternly.
She held out her hand to him.
“Oh, I am so sorry! What can I say, dear Lord Neville, to comfort you?”
He smiled wearily.
“Nothing, I am afraid. There is nothing to be said—or done; I have got to bear it, that is all! I am not the only man who has been—jilted.” The cruel word left his lips like a note of steel. “Probably my lot is all too common. Yes, I have got to bear it!”
“There—there is no doubt about it?” she asked.
“None, whatever,” he replied. “I have been down to the office and seen the list of passengers, and her name is among them, together with this man’s.”
“How bad, how heartless, she must be!” she murmured, indignantly.
He winced and looked aside; even in this, the first hour of his trouble, he could scarcely endure to hear Doris thus spoken of.
“I don’t know,” he said. “I can scarcely believe that she has done what she has; it seems more like a dream than sober reality. But I suppose every man in my case feels like that.”
“If I could only do something for you!” she murmured,leaning forward, and looking up into his face with the sympathy which, coming from a woman, is so precious to a man, especially when the woman is young and beautiful.
“Thanks, awfully,” he said, trying to speak in a conventional tone to hide the acuteness of his suffering, “but, as I said, no one can do anything, except it is our old friend, Time. I shall ‘get over it,’” and he smiled, as the Spartan may have smiled while the fox was gnawing at his bosom.
“You look very tired,” she said, after a moment’s pause. “What will you do with yourself to-day? Will you—don’t think me obtrusive!—but will you come and drive with me—come, and do something? I am so afraid that you will sit here and mope.” She glanced round, then started and looked up at him, as if with a sudden remembrance of the situation. “But I am forgetting! I—I ought not to be here, ought I? Lord Neville, you don’t think ill of me for coming?” and the color rose to her face, and she dropped her eloquent eyes as if with a sudden shame.
“Think ill of you, Lady Grace!” he echoed, impetuously. “What, for coming to try and help a poor fellow with your sympathy? I can’t tell you how grateful I am! It was a kind action, which not one woman out of a thousand would have done!”
“Ah!” she said, in a low voice; “that is it! One woman in a thousand! Tell me, Lord Cecil, and tell me the truth! I have been foolish and—and forward in coming here to you like this?”
If he had told to her the truth, Lord Cecil would certainly have been obliged to admit that she had been foolish; but what man in his position ever does make such an admission?
“I think you have done a very kind action, Lady Grace,” he said, gravely. “And—shame to him who thinks ill of it! Besides——” He hesitated.
She looked at him with an intelligent flash of her eyes.
“You were going to say that no one need know. You forget the cabman and the man outside.”
Lord Cecil bit his lip.
“At any rate, no one else need know,” he said. “The cabman does not know who you are——”
“I engaged him from just outside our own house,” she said, in a voice of concern.
“Cabmen are discreet,” he said, to reassure her.
“But the man—who is he, Lord Neville?”
He wiped his moustache, and made a great business of it.
“Oh! a man I do business with,” he said; “nobody of any consequence. He does not know you, I’ll answer for it.”
She drew a long breath.
“Not until this moment have I realized what I have done,” she said, and he saw her lips tremble.
“Don’t be uneasy, Lady Grace,” he said, soothingly. “Let me discharge this cabman and call another——”
“Very well,” she said; then she added, tremulously; “but will you not come back with me?”
“Of course I will!” he assented, promptly, and he seized his hat. “I will come and see Lord Peyton——”
“My father is away, yachting,” she said; “but come as far as the house, if you will.”
“Yes!” Then he stopped and turned crimson, and stared at her, the picture of a man embarrassed beyond measure.
“Oh, what is it now?” she exclaimed, almost clasping her hands.
“Nothing, nothing,” he hastened to reassure her, though his voice was anything but reassuring; “only that I have just remembered that I cannot leave the—the house just at present. The fact is, I have important business with this man, and—and—oh, Lady Grace, I am so sorry! Don’t misunderstand! I’d give all I’m worth”—he laughed bitterly, and corrected himself—“ten years of my life, to come with you, but——”
He turned away, and set down his hat almost savagely.
“I don’t understand,” she murmured, anxiously, and there seemed to him a touch of reproach in her voice, which maddened him. “But I will not ask you to explain. Good-by,” and she turned away without offering her hand.
He sprang forward; then pulled up, and with something between a groan and an oath, sank into a chair.
She passed out, closing the door after her. On the bottom of the stairs she found the man sitting with his hands in his pockets, his hat on the back of his head; but he sprang up and removed his hat as she appeared. She made a slight gesture with her hand, and he followed her to the door; there she turned and, looking at him, calmly said:
“You are a sheriff’s officer?”
He looked rather surprised.
“Yes, I am, my lady,” he admitted. “I suppose his lordship told you?”
“No matter,” she said. “Do you know who I am?”
His eyes dropped before her steady gaze, and he looked rather uncertain how to answer.
“I see you do!” she said.
“Well, yes, my lady. You see, I get about a good deal,” he added, apologetically, “and anybody who is accustomed to seeing much of the upper ten, knows Lady Grace Peyton.”
She looked round as he spoke her name, and bit her lip.
“Yes, I am Lady Grace Peyton,” she said; “and I have come to see Lord Cecil Neville because he is in trouble. I am a very great friend of his.”
The man nodded appreciatively. He took her words as meaning that she was engaged to Lord Cecil.
“He is in great trouble, is he not?”
“Well, yes, he is,” he replied. “That is, he is in just a bit of a hole at present! It’s not much of a hole, but he seems as if he couldn’t get out of it.”
“You have arrested him for debt, have you not?”
“Well, yes I have,” he admitted, almost reluctantly. “I suppose he has told you, and it’s no use my denying it, my lady, especially if—begging your pardon for the liberty—you are going to help him; and I suppose you are?”
“Yes,” she said, quietly. “What is the amount?”
He handed her the paper.
“Is that all?”
“All I’m concerned with,” he replied, significantly.
“I will pay it,” she said, after a moment’s reflection. “Will you come with me to the bank?”
He hesitated a moment, then put on his hat with a certain amount of emphasis.
“Yes, I will! It’s not usual, but I’d trust your ladyship to the utmost.”
“Walk down the street and beckon the cab to follow, please,” she said. “I do not wish Lord Neville to see us together. I do not wish him to know anything of what I have done. Can I trust you?”
“You can, my lady,” he said.
They drove in silence to the West End branch of the bank, which was only half-a-mile off, and Lady Grace drew a check for the amount and handed it to the officer, who took it with unfeigned pleasure.
“I can’t tell you now how glad I am you came, Lady Grace,” he said. “If ever I’ve had a disagreeable job, this one of Lord Neville’s was one. Most of ’em treat one like dirt, and give a lot of trouble into the bargain. I’ve met with rough usage sometimes, my lady; but Lord Neville, though he’s young and full of go, so to speak, has behaved like a gentleman, and treated me as if I had the feelings of a man. Yes, he’s a nobleman, every inch of him, and—I hope you won’t laugh, my lady!—but, I declare, if I’d had the money, I’d have lent it him myself rather than taken him off. There’s the receipt.”
She thought a moment, holding the paper in her hand; then she said:
“Take it to Lord Neville, and put an end to his anxiety; but, remember your promise, and do not tell him from whom you got the money.”
Then she lowered her veil, and left him.
He walked back to Clarges street—almost ran, indeed—and, opening the door in response to Lord Cecil’s gloomy “Come in,” entered, and pantingly surveyed him with a smile.
“Well?” said Lord Cecil, grimly. “You are agreeably surprised at finding me here still! Most jailbirds would have taken advantage of your absence and flown, would they not?”
“Yes, they would,” assented the man, emphatically. “But I spoke the truth when I said you were a realnobleman. And I didn’t hurry back because I was afraid. No!—I knew you’d wait! You are the right sort, you are, my lord!”
“Thanks,” said Lord Cecil, curtly; “and where have you been?”
“Begging your pardon, my lord, that’s a secret; but I’ve been on business, and there it is!” and he laid the discharge on the table.
Lord Cecil took it up indifferently; then, when he had realized its purport, he started and flushed.
“Why!—what does this mean?” he demanded.
“It means that the claim is settled, and that you are a free man, my lord,” said the officer, warmly; “and if you’ll allow me to offer my respectful congratulations and a word of warning——”
“A word of warning?” said Lord Cecil, confusedly.
“Yes, my lord. This business—though it’s all right in a legal way—has had a curious feature or two about it. I mean that there’s been some underhand work going on: Jews, I expect. You see, though the amounts were owing to several persons originally, they’ve been bought up by some one—some one who’s got a grudge against you! Can you guess who it is?”
Lord Cecil shook his head.
“I know no one who has any grudge against me,” he said, still bewildered.
“Very well, my lord, all the more reason that you should keep your eyes open. At any rate, you’re clear of ’em now, and I wish you good-day. You won’t be sorry to see the back of me, I daresay.”
“Stop!” exclaimed Lord Cecil; and the man turned, with his hand on the door. “Some one has paid this money. Who was it?”
The man shook his head.
“A friend who wishes to remain unknown, my lord,” he said.
Lord Cecil stared at him.
“A friend who—nonsense, man! I must know! Who was it? The marquis?”
The man shook his head again.
“I’m pledged, my lord,” he said. “But it wasn’t the marquis—confound him!” he added, under his breath.
“Not the marquis? I know of no one else—stop!” His face went crimson. “The lady who was here”—he sprang forward and seized the man’s arm in a grip like that of a vice—“was it she?”
“I’m pledged, my lord. I’ve given my word. I have, indeed!”
Lord Cecil dropped his arm.
“You have answered,” he said, in a low voice, and the officer, after a moment’s hesitation, nodded ruefully and went out.
Lord Cecil paced up and down the room with the discharge in his hand. The excitement of the last twenty-four hours, the suspense respecting Doris, the arrest, and now this sudden release, added to his physical exhaustion, told upon him fearfully.
That he owed his escape from the disgrace of imprisonment to Lady Grace he could not doubt. Doris, on whose truth he would have staked his life, had jilted him; his uncle, the marquis, had, in his hour of trouble, disdainfully deserted him and cast him aside and this woman, whom he had regarded as a perfect type of worldliness, had come to his aid and freed him.
She had done more than that, for she had risked her reputation in her desire to show him her sympathy with him. She had done that which only one woman in a thousand would have dared to do: come to his room alone and unprotected.
A man is never so tender as regards his heart as in the moment when he has been betrayed by one woman and succored by another; and Lord Cecil’s heart throbbed with a painful sense of admiration and gratitude toward this woman of the world, the girl whom he had always regarded as just a society beauty, who had, at such fearful risks to her own name, come to his side in his dark hour.
“May Heaven forget me if ever I forget it!” he said to himself, not once nor twice only. “What shall I say to her? What am I to do to show her how I feel about it? And where shall I get the money to repay her? I can’t let her be the loser; I must pay her; but how—but how?”
Meanwhile, Lady Grace had reached her house inGrosvenor Square, and, going to the drawing-room, found Mr. Spenser Churchill seated in an easy-chair, reading the last annual report of the Sweeps’ Orphan Home.
“Well?” he said, looking up with a bland smile.
She sank into a chair, and began pulling off her gloves, her eyes downcast, her face pale and thoughtful.
“It is done,” she said.
“Ah!” he said, with a nod of satisfaction. “You have seen him, then?”
“Yes, I have seen him,” she said, in a low voice. “I was only just in time.”
He smiled with an air of complacency.
“Oh, I think I timed it carefully,” he said. “I knew he would be at the office the moment they opened it; I calculated that he would be arrested shortly after, and that he would go to his rooms and telegraph to the marquis, allowing a little over an hour—say two—for the answer, a refusal, as the dear marquis and I arranged; and there you are, you see!” and he laughed, softly.
“Yes,” she said; “you arranged it very well.”
“Ye—s! And the news at the office. Is he satisfied?”
“Yes, he is satisfied. He saw her name. It did not occur to him to ascertain if she had really sailed; if it had——” She paused, significantly.
The philanthropist laughed with unctuous enjoyment.
“But he didn’t, you see, my dear young lady. That is just the little risk one has to run; but, after all, it isn’t much risk. Why should he suspect that any one should go to the trouble and expense of booking a passage for Miss Marlowe? And you found him in bonds—just starting for prison?” And he rubbed his hands together with renewed enjoyment. “Poor Cecil! Really, it is very sad that one should be compelled to take such strong measures. And yet, after all, will not the lesson be a salutary one? Pride must have a fall, dear lady; pride must have a fall! And our dear Cecil”—his small eyes glinted maliciously for a moment—“was very, very proud! And you paid the money?”
She looked up with a little start.
“Yes, I paid the money. In fact, I have carried out your instructions to the letter.”
“Yes, yes; you are a courageous girl, dear lady. It is not every one so well known as you who would so far brave the consequences as to go to a gentleman’s rooms——”
She looked at him, with a flash in her eyes and with a tight compression of the lips, but he pretended not to notice the warning signs.
“Our dear Cecil ought to be very grateful to you; very! And, if I know his generous nature—and I fancy I do—I think he must be. Oh, yes, he will never forget it—never! Why, bless me, if it were known—if, for instance, any acquaintance had seen you going or departing—what would not be said?” And he held up his fat hands.
She sprang to her feet, and stood with her hand pressed against the chair, her bosom heaving, her magnificent eyes fixed upon him with suppressed fury.
“A word, a hint, just a whisper, is enough nowadays for the scandal-loving world; and I can just fancy how delighted the society papers would be with such a dainty morsel as the incident of a visit to Lord C——l N——l from Lady G——e P——n. They never print the name in full; oh, no; but everybody understands——”
“Take care!” she breathed. “Do not drive me too far!”
“Oh, yes, yes; we must take care!” he assented, feigning to misunderstand her. “We must not breathe a word of it, of course; must flatly contradict it, if we hear a hint dropped. But there, dear Cecil would rather die than admit it!”
“Yes,” she said, between her teeth; “yes, you speak the truth there; he would rather die than harm should come to me—to any one—for his sake!”
“Y-e-s, he is so high-minded, isn’t he? And how does the dear fellow bear this blow? It isn’t pleasant to be jilted, is it? Is he resigned? I am curious now to hear how he takes it!”
“Go to him and ask him!” she said, with fine scorn. “Take care, Spenser Churchill! Up to the present your schemes have succeeded. You know best how far theywill carry you. To me it seems that you—and I are walking on a volcano. What if he should find this—this girl?”
“Miss Marlowe, do you mean?” he said. “My dear lady, you forget; she is in Australia!” he said.
“Is she in London?” she asked, in a lower voice, and looking away from him. “If so, and he finds her——” She stopped, significantly.
He smiled blandly.
“Let me beg of you not to be uneasy, dear lady,” he said, seriously. “The young lady in question left England nearly a week ago, and there is no chance of our friend Cecil meeting her until it is too late.”
“Too late?” she echoed, raising her eyes to his face.
“Yes,” he smiled. “Until he is married.”
She let her hand fall from the mantel shelf, and a warm crimson flooded her face, and he chuckled, unctuously.
“I am quite sure it is time dear Cecil ‘ranged himself,’ as the French say; it really is time he was married and settled down. Don’t you agree with me? Ah, I see it is too delicate a subject. Well, good-morning, dear lady. Accept my profound homage and admiration for your courage and generosity in our dear young friend’s behalf,” and with another chuckle he smiled himself out of the room.