"Yes, I see. But what happened after that?"
"According to March, the orderly was back again in next to no time. March had stopped where he was, waiting for him, as he didn't want to give the snap away to me and the men till the last minute. And he was hoping against hope, till he got the return message. It was verbal again, in spite of his written request, and mighty peremptory, ordering him to obey without any more nonsense. That's March's story. Not seeing a way to get out of it, yet realizing the awful consequences should there be anything wrong, March was going to pass on the order to load and fire when he suddenly thought he'd compromise by firing blank only. You see he was in an awful fix anyway, had to make an instant decision, and did what he thought best at the moment, though in giving that order to fire blank he was already disobeying the orders of his superior officer. Vandyke's version is that he never sent any orders whatever. That his orderly was with him in his car, and had never left it for a minute. That March must have been deceived by some trick of resemblance—a sort of 'Captain of Kopenick' (if you know that story); getting off a hoax on him, a deadly hoax, meant to upset the whole situation between the United States and Mexico. He says March ought to have known better than to obey a verbal order when the thing was so serious, and that he was something worse than an ass to mistake a stranger for Johnson, the orderly, whose face March knew almost as well as his own. There's where Vandyke scores an extra point against March. It would be very unusual to send a verbal order."
"That's why Eagle doubted it," I argued breathlessly. "Couldhe have refused to obey the acting colonel, when the order was repeated?"
"That's the question. It's too big for me," Tony said with a sigh. "It's for the court-martial to settle. There are no witnesses who can be of much use on either side, so far as I can see. Johnson was wounded in the lungs last night, you know, crossing the bridge in Vandyke's car, and never so much as squeaked again. He's dead now, so Vandyke has to depend on his own word alone; but everybody who knows about the business seems to think that probabilities are with him. His story is that he knew nothing of what was going on till he heard the guns at work. Luckily he was near by in his car, as you've heard a dozen times, and dashed up to the rescue."
"What about the message Eagle wrote in his notebook?"
"There's only his own word to prove it was ever written. Naturally there's no trace of it."
"But you," I persisted, "you and your men who were in charge of the guns; can't any of you bear witness for Captain March—that you saw Major Vandyke's orderly?"
"Unfortunately for March, no, not a man Jack of us," said Tony. "If he'd been close to us at the time, we must have seen and recognized anybody who came and spoke to him. But I told you he'd strolled off. It wasn't our business to watch him, and nobody was watching. A man on foot wheeling a bicycle doesn't make much noise; and a khaki uniform is just about the colour of the ground, on that yellow hill. There was no moon, only stars, which means no black shadow. I shall be called on as a witness for the defence, of course, worse luck—but I'm afraid I can't say anything to help March. I wish to the Lord I could! I'm dashed if it isn't the other way round. If I'm not mighty careful, I may do him harm instead of good."
"You'dliketo do him good, wouldn't you?" I pleaded.
"You bet your life I would, Peggy. March is just about the finest chap I ever met, and most people think the same of him. But what can I do?"
"I can't see," I said, "but I may, when things grow clearer. Theymustgrow clearer! You for one believe Eagle's word, don't you, Tony? You believe it was Major Vandyke's orderly who came to him?"
As I asked this question, I stared through the twilight into Tony's face, trying to read it even as he tried not to let it be read. He looked wretchedly uneasy, and rather obstinate. "I can't say I'm sure of that," he replied. "I'm sure some one came to him, and I'm sure Marchthoughtit was Vandyke's orderly. That's as far as I can go."
"Even when I've told you that I know there's a motive for Major Vandyke's wanting to injure him, ruin him in his career if he can?"
"You seem to think Vandyke's a regular sort of villain out of melodrama," said Tony, with an uncomfortable laugh. "I guess you don't know men very well yet, Peggy—except in novels and plays—when it comes down to bedrock. They're not much like that in real life, as far as I've ever seen. They never go round plotting to ruin other chaps' careers, even when they don't happen to get along very well with 'em."
"You'renot so very old. You haven't had much more experience of life than I have," I taunted him.
Tony laughed. "Haven't I? That's all you know. You're a child, a little baby-child, compared to me. I may be young, but anyhow, I'm a man, and I've lived among men since I left West Point two years ago—even if you don't count cadets as men. Vandyke's no angel, and he and March have been doing a bit of the cat-and-dog act in a quiet way lately. But it's pretty far-fetched to accuse Vandyke of hatching up a plot to wipe March off the map, especially when it meant risking his own life and sacrificing his orderly, who was devoted to him—a fellow he valued a whole lot——"
"Ah!" I broke in. "So the orderly was 'devoted to him!' I wonder if the court-martial will remember that fact for what it's worth?"
"For what it's worth, yes. I guess it can be trusted to do just that. But what there is will be likely to tell in Vandyke's favour, I guess, not against him. Johnson had good reasons for being devoted to the major. The chap got consumption, and was in a bad way—would have had to say good-bye to an army life—if Vandyke hadn't paid for his cure in one of the best sanatoria in America, and used influence to keep his job open for him, too. Nothing very black in that record, eh?"
"Major Vandyke's the kind of person to pay high for anything he really wants himself," I said. "He must have badly wanted this Johnson man for something or other."
"Johnson was born a sort of gentleman, but hadn't the art of getting along in life, although he was pretty near being a genius at mathematics as well as mechanics, and could do stunts in several languages, like you. No shame to Vandyke to make use of the man's gifts. He must have been jolly useful—too useful to waste."
"It won't make me love you better, Tony," I remarked with deliberate injustice (for there are moods when any girl must feel a horrid satisfaction in being unjust), "if you go on praising Major Vandyke to the skies. Does it matter why the orderly was devoted to him, or he to the orderly? The thing of importance is the tie between them. The more devoted the man was, the more willing he would be to go to any lengths for Major Vandyke."
"Oh, if you want to put it that way," Tony hedged. "But it's a girl's notion, like the motive you attribute to Vandyke."
"How do you know what motive I mean?" I shot at him. "I haven't told you!"
"'I may be an ass, but I'm not asillyass,'" quoted Tony. "I've guessed."
"What have you guessed?"
"Oh, about Vandyke and March both being in love with Lady Diana. All the owliest owls are on to that. First time Vandyke was ever caught for keeps, the fellows say. But it would only do harm to March to bring anything of that sort up in this business, to say nothing of the bad taste, and how mad he'd be, and the unpleasantness for Lady Diana and—and all your family."
"It wouldn't be agreeable, I know," I admitted. "But anything to save Eagle, no matter how we sacrifice ourselves."
"I don't somehow hear Lady Di echoing that, though I agree with you. Only there's more in the thing than you seem to see, because you keep your eyes fixed on one spot. If Lady Diana's engaged to Major Vandyke, then he'd have no incentive to strike at another man who was gone on her. It would be the other way round. The chap who had lost her would be the one, if any, to be up to melodramatic stunts. It might be said about March that he risked trouble for himself, for the pleasure of having a smack at Vandyke; putting the blame on him for a mad order to fire off guns at the good little Mexicans, for instance, do you see?"
I did see, and seeing, suffered a sharp stab of disappointment. Tony had taken my one weapon out of my hands. He was right. I had been wrong, while thinking myself cleverer than he. "There must be some other way of clearing Eagle," I said desperately.
"I hope so, with my whole heart; although I've always had a sneaking admiration for Vandyke, too. He's such a dashed fine-looking chap, a credit to the army, and all that. To clear March—really clear him, without leaving a stain of carelessness even—means to ruin Vandyke. For March can't be made white as snow without Vandyke being proved a liar, and—by Jove, yes, a traitor to his country!"
"That's what he must be proved," I said.
"It'll be a tough proposition. As I see it, there's no proof."
"It must be found."
"That's easy to say. But if there's any, it ought to be found by the court."
"When will the trial come on?" I asked.
"In a few days. I don't know yet just when."
"In the meantime, Eagle is under arrest?"
"Yes. It's sickening."
"Aren't his friends—I mean among the officers—indignant?"
"They're mighty sorry, all broken up, and don't know what to think. But, of course, Major Vandyke's got a good many friends, too. As for the Fort Bliss officers, they're so wild about the whole business that I'm afraid they're a bit prejudiced against March—those of them who don't know him personally. You see, there was an awful row on the hill after the firing—but I didn't mean to tell you about that——"
"Why not, as I know the rest? I suppose some of them arrived——"
"I should say they did arrive! That's too slow a word. The noise shot 'em out of their blessed beds—those of 'em who had gone to bed—and brought the others out of any old place they happened to be in: club, hotel, friends' houses. The first thing we knew, we had the General Commanding on us. They knowsomelanguage, those grand old Johnnies! Poor March! He was up against it, I can tell you. His worst enemy would have been sorry for him."
"Fiends! What did they do?" I gasped.
"It wasn't so much what they did as what they said. But I shan't give you details, Peggy, so don't try and worm 'em out of me. It'll only waste our valuable time. March was under arrest—that's enough. I suppose he ought to be grateful that it's been 'judged expedient'—that's the phrase—never to let the story in its full enormity leak out. Vandyke was so smart at apologies and explanations in that Mexican dash of his last night, and the part he played appealed such a lot to the chaps over there, who're nothing if they're not sensational, that it's hoped the incident won't have any serious international results at all. The great thing is to keep the business forever from the public on both sides of the Rio Grande. Luckily most people had the willies so badly after the first shot that they couldn't swear what sort of noise theyhadheard. It's a hard job, too, for an amateur to tell what direction a sound comes from, when his eyes haven't helped his ears. If Vandyke hadn't put a stop to any danger of return shots, the fat would have been in the fire for us. Thanks to him, that story of an explosion among the ammunition could pass muster. As for March's alleged 'wound,' that tale's to get him out of his social engagements, without stirring up talk. But it won't be believed in for long. The court-martial findings can be kept secret, but not the fact of its taking place. It's to be put round that March was accused of gross carelessness, and causing the 'accident' that occurred. So now you see, Peggy, your keeping dark about what I've told you to-night is all for March's good. If he's found guilty——"
"What then?" I breathed. "What will be the sentence?"
"Why, as the affair has to be hushed up forever he can't be 'chucked.' He'll probably be 'given permission to resign.' And then he will resign. And nobody outside will ever know why. Those inside will think he's jolly well in luck to be let down so easy considering all ... what?"
"I didn't speak," I whispered.
"Why, Peggy, you're crying!"
I couldn't answer. I only bent down my head lest he should see my face.
"I felt from the first I oughtn't to have told you," growled Tony. "Now I'm sure. Don't take it so hard, dear. Something may turn up we can't think of, and March get off scot free. Who knows? Anyhow, he's nothing but your friend. And your sister isn't likely to marry him now. I shouldn't be surprised if she's engaged to Vandyke already."
"It wasn't settled between them," I said, swallowing my tears. "Only I thought she liked Eagle better, and that if he'd plenty of money—but it's all over. No hope since this thing has happened!"
"Would you like to have her marry March?" Tony wanted to know.
"I'm—not sure! But it will be too dreadful if she marries Major Vandyke after what he has done. Why do you say you 'shouldn't wonder' if they're engaged already? And a little while ago, too, you said 'if Lady Di is engaged to Vandyke.' Di can't have heard yet that there's any reason why—why the most disloyal coward should drop Eagle March."
"There are such things as telegrams. And the big California papers must have got hold of the story printed in El Paso this morning. They're sure to have correspondents here. I bet Lady Di had Vandyke as a hero served up to her with her coffee at breakfast to-day. Wouldn't she wire and congratulate him? Wouldn't he wire back to her, and strike while the iron was hot, to get her promise? That's what I'd do if I were in his place."
"I never thought——" I began; but no more words would come. I felt broken. It seemed to me that I could look ahead and see the whole future.
I let my hand lie in Tony's, and he stroked it gently, not speaking or trying to make me speak. Silence was the only balm just then, if balm there was, and a loud burst of music not far off struck on my brain like the blow of a hammer.
We had forgotten all about the torchlight procession which we had come out to see. But—by and by—Tony did not forget his kiss.
If I could, without betraying Tony, I should have written to Eagle that night, telling him just a hundredth part of what I thought and felt. But I was bound by my word to "keep dark" what I had heard, even from Eagle himself, unless some day Tony set me free to speak. I must seem to know and believe what the public knew and believed, no more. But I did write cautiously, saying how grieved I was if he suffered, how I should think of him every hour, and how I wished that some way might be arranged for me to see him by and by. Could it be managed? I asked. And I posted the letter before I went to bed, tired to the heart and more miserable than I had ever been in my life.
The next morning, before I was out of my room, a telegram was brought to the door. It was from Di, and said, "Am engaged to Major Vandyke. He will probably call and tell you the news himself, but thought I should like you to know first from me. Please be nice to him for my sake. I am very happy. What a hero he is! Write me all about what happened."
This was a long, expensive message to lavish on me; but Diana's days of economy were over, and this was the first sign of the change.
I boiled with anger against her, and should have liked to send some of my emotions over the telegraph wire, but that would have been a childish way to strike. Besides, I knew in my heart that I was a little unjust. Di had treated Eagle shamefully, there was no doubt of that. But there was one thing in her favour: she was not conscious of betraying Eagle March in the hour of danger, for she knew about him only what the papers said: that he had been wounded in an accident. It was Major Vandyke's great exploit which had weighed down the scales in his favour, or influenced Diana, anyhow, to throw Eagle over definitely, and announce her engagement to the "hero." I telegraphed back, "Don't make it public till you've heard from me. You may change your mind." I followed the wire with a letter, in which I assured Di that Major Vandyke had committed a crime against Eagle March. Perhaps it would be found out, and then she would be very sorry that she had promised to marry such a man. I dared not hope much from my protest, however; so, two days later, I wasn't surprised to hear that Di was disgusted as well as hurt by my "wicked prejudice against Sidney." "You never liked him," she said, "but I didn't think you would go so far as to accuse him of crimes. If it weren't so silly, it would be horrible. As it is, I can't help laughing; but all the same, be careful what you say to other people. If you speak against Sidney to strangers, you can't do him any harm, but you will do yourself a great deal, and Captain March, too. Sidney has written me a long letter telling me the whole history of that Thursday night. It has just come. Of course, I can repeat tonobodywhat he wrote. It was strictly confidential, though I suppose the truth is bound to leak out, more or less, in future. Judging from your hints, I suppose you, too, have heard something—probably from Tony Dalziel (whom I hope, by the way, you are treating better than you did, as you're never likely to get another such chance). Naturally you believe the other side. But after the court-martial there won't be any 'other side.'"
There was just one consolation in the next few days: a letter that came to me from Eagle. He said not a word that any one mightn't have read, and told me nothing about himself, except that he was "getting along very well" and I mustn't spend a sad minute over him. But he added: "Your thought of me, and your unfailing friendship, are more to me than I can express. I feel that nothing can rob me of them, and now and always they will be for me like a comforting fire, at which I can warm myself when days are cold and dark. I count on you, my little Peggy girl, and I know I shan't count in vain, even though I have to say that it's impossible for us to meet now, or for some time to come. Write to me when you feel like it. I shall be more than glad of your letters."
If I had written when I felt like it, I should seldom have had a pen out of my hand; yet it was hard to write. There was so little I dared, so much I wished, to say. And I couldn't mention Diana. I wondered whether she had broken to him in a letter the news of her engagement, or whether she had left it for him to discover by accident. I felt that he ought to be told, but I couldn't bear to be the one to deal the blow, so I hedged when I wrote to him next, asking, "Have you heard from D... lately?"
He answered the question briefly by the next post "Yes, I heard from her on Saturday." That was all. No comment, no word as to his feelings. But he had let me see how he loved her. He could not help knowing that I would understand what losing her meant to him—and losing her to Major Vandyke, at such a time and in such a way. Looking back at events, I calculated that the blow had fallen on Eagle before he answered my letter, and this gave a more pathetic meaning to the lines which I intended always to keep.
Except for the knowledge that, powerless as I was, he valued me, there was no brightness in my days. Major Vandyke did have the effrontery to come and see me, as Di had thought he would, and I had thought he wouldn't. He took me at a disadvantage by walking up to me in the hall of the hotel, where I stood reading a note from Tony. Warned by a flash of my eyes as I looked up at the sound of his voice, saying, "How do you do?" he went on hastily: "Don't let's have a scene, please, for Diana's sake, if not for your own. I know how you feel, so you needn't go to the length of telling me, or even cutting me, before people. If I hadn't been sure you were too much of a little lady to make yourself conspicuous in public, in spite of your feelings, I shouldn't have risked surprising you like this. I was pretty sure if I didn't catch you unawares you would refuse to see me. So I had to take some risk, for I particularly want to speak to you."
"I don't share your desire," I said stiffly. "You were perfectly right in thinking I shouldn't have seen you if you had given me the chance to refuse. It's like you, not to have given it. But you're right, too, when you take it for granted that I won't make a scene. If it could do the the slightest good, though, to any one concerned, I would!"
He smiled, a pale, unpleasant smile. "No doubt. You'd be capable of anything. Here's the situation: I'm going to marry your sister, and though you've tried your best to stop me, you can't."
"I wonder any man, even you, should want Diana after the way she's behaved," I said sullenly.
"Thanks for that expressive 'even.' Your weapons are pretty sharp, little lady! But you're a child, and you're Diana's sister, so I bear no malice. I'm the sort of man, it happens, who doesn't stop to bother much about the way a very beautiful girl 'behaves' to another fellow. I love Diana, and I'd take her across that other fellow's dead body if she'd just stabbed him."
"She has stabbed Captain March, though not mortally, I hope," said I. "But she has behaved as badly to you as to him, in a way."
"You mean the affair of the photograph, I suppose," Major Vandyke remarked calmly. "She has explained that. Not that I asked her to. All I did was to put into a letter the story of that little scene in which you were mixed up in March's tent. She answered voluntarily that March must have bribed the photographer to sell him a copy, though the man had been given strict instructions to print only one—for me. March had begged her for a picture, when he heard from Mrs. Main that she'd been sitting for that fellow, who's supposed to be a great artist; and Di put him off in some laughing way. I was pretty certain, when I noticed there was no signature on the portrait March had, that he'd not got the photograph from Diana herself. No doubt he thought all fair in love or war."
"You judge him by yourself," I said. "But never mind! I shan't ask you not to believe Di, but to believe your own common sense. Think—or pretend to think what you like."
"I shall," he assured me; "that's a great principle of mine! As a general rule it makes for happiness and success. But we're getting away from my object in speaking to you, when I know you're wishing me in kingdom come."
"Not there," said I. He laughed out aloud, and anybody looking at us might have imagined us the best of friends.
"What a little devil you are! Where did you inherit it from?"
"From French chocolate, perhaps," said I. "What is it you want with me, Major Vandyke? Tell me, and get it over."
"I want to know exactly what it is in me that you dislike so much?"
"Only everything."
"That's a large order, and not very explicit. Would you have disliked me if I hadn't interfered with—a—er—a person more to your taste; in other words, with Captain Eagleston March?"
"Oh, of course, if you hadn't been jealous of him, I might have thought better of yourcharacter. But then, you wouldn't have been you."
"D'you know," drawled Major Vandyke, "I've a sort of idea that it was Captain March who was jealous of me!"
"It isn'tinhim to be jealous, in the way you mean. But you've asked why I dislike you, and you interrupted me before I could finish. 'Dislike' is a very small word for what I feel. I loathe you, because you've done your best to ruin him. There are some things Iknow. Partly, I blame myself because of what I said to you about Di in camp. Perhaps—just perhaps—you mightn't have done what you have done if I'd held my tongue. That's why, if I've had a hand in pulling Eagle March down, I'd cut it off, and the other one, too, if I could have a hand in lifting him up."
"Sounds complicated—and Irish!" sneered Vandyke. "In your country a man is presumed to be innocent until he's proved guilty; yet you accuse me of guilt on no proof whatever. Evidently you've wormed things out of Tony Dalziel, and drawn your own conclusions to suit yourself. So like a woman! But my conscience is clear as crystal. Personal feeling has had nothing to do with my actions. Every man will give me credit for that. I'm sorry for March. He's either insane with jealousy, or he's allowed himself to be tricked. Privately, not publicly, of course, I'm inclined to believe in the former theory; and I think most people would agree with me if they knew all the circumstances——"
"As you put them!"
"Let's go back to my object in inflicting myself upon you to-night, Lady Peggy. Eagleston March is the god of your idolatry. Let's take that for granted. He's bound to suffer. He brought it on himself, whatever you—a child—may think to the contrary. Do you want to make him suffer more or less?"
"Is it necessary to answer?" I asked.
"Hardly. But I have to impress upon you that it's partly in those hands of yours, which you would 'cut off' for him. The full immensity of his guilt need never come out. It's not intended that it should come out. Still, if you are going to treat me like the dirt under your feet—the man who will soon be your sister's husband—and kick up a scandal, I shan't lie still. I'm not a saint. If you mean to fight against me with Diana, or anybody else, or even set people talking by your behaviour, by Jove! I'll hit back. I shan't take much trouble to do my part in keeping the secret."
"You're bound to keep it, aren't you?" I suggested. "Government doesn't want it to come out."
"That's the attitude at present. But when relations have been definitely and permanently smoothed over between the United States and Mexico, it won't so much matter except for March himself. In any case,Ishan't let the cat out of the bag. I'm not such a blunderer! But I tell you frankly, I can influence others to keep the secret after the time limit's up—or I can refrain from using influence. Which shall it be? Is it peace or war between us?"
I stopped to think for a moment, and then I answered, "It's an armed truce."
We have all heard quite a lot about the mouse who saved a lion. But it was only one mouse out of a world crammed full of mice. I never heard, in the whole history of mice, since those which Cain and Abel maybe had for pets, of another mouse capable of saving any animal whatever, even itself. Still, there remains that one heroic and intelligent mouse. When Sidney Vandyke had left me to "think things over," I envied it with passion, feeling that I was not even of the mouse tribe. I felt more like a fly, if you can imagine a fly cursed with a human heart, who loves an eagle that has been shot in the wing and caged, and the cage set down on the seashore when the night tide is coming in. What could such a fly do but cling sadly to the cage and buzz and let the great rush of water drown it with the eagle? Even that fly seemed more fortunate than I was, as I pictured it to myself. For it was privileged to rest on the eagle's cage. I could not be near my wounded eagle!
Five days after that awful Thursday night a letter from Di told me that her engagement had "changed all her plans." "Sidney" was very impatient, and wanted to be married soon. The moment his work was over at El Paso he would get long leave, and possibly he might make up his mind to resign from the army. That was what she wanted him to do; and when she had him with her, she knew that she could persuade him, for he wasn't really "very keen" on soldiering, and shemustlive in England, at least half the year round. This part was for the future to decide; but in any case there would be the long leave. It would give time for the wedding and the honeymoon. She had set her heart on being married at St. George's, for it was the "historic" thing to do. And there was the trousseau. Kitty Maininsistedon giving it to her for a wedding present; which was rather a weight off one's mind, as America had cost something in spite of everybody's being so hospitable and good. Kitty would go to Paris with her, and help to choose the things, which would be nicer than having just a sum down, and going alone. So they—Di and Kitty and Father—had all decided to cut out the rest of the visits arranged and "make for home." California had been great fun, and Di wished she might stop longer, but one couldn't have one's cake and eat it, too. Being married was her cake. This was her mistake. As I have said before, she had always had both.
Major Vandyke's "work in El Paso" was to bear witness against Eagle March in the court-martial which would come on almost at once. And I was to go away without hearing the verdict or seeing Eagle after all was over.
Di had written to Mrs. Dalziel, too, it appeared, and Milly was only too glad of an excuse to escape from the the place where Captain March's society had been the first and only attraction for her.
"Now that Tony's time is so dreadfully taken up," she said to her mother, "he can't give us any fun, or have any fun with us himself, so we might as well go away.Let's, dear! Let's clear out to-morrow, and take Peggy to meet Lady Di and the others at Albuquerque, where we can get into the 'Limited' and join them."
"I don't know what Tony will say!" wavered Mrs. Dalziel, who was finding El Paso rather hot in those days, for plump people. She looked at me. So did Milly. Then Milly laughed. "No good pretending we've got cotton wool over our eyes," she exclaimed. "Can't you make up your mind to take my poor, dear little brother, Peggy, and put him out of his misery?"
"Tony and I understand each other already," I said.
"Do you? Oh, I'msoglad, so pleased," they both cried together. And I had to explain in a violent hurry, before I had been caressed under false pretences, that there are understandingsandunderstandings. Tony's and mine was the kind of understanding which left us both perfectly free; the kind of understanding where you didn't make up your mind, but just waited to see whether it made itself up.
"Isn't there anything between you and the poor boy, then?" implored the boy's mother.
"Only—a kiss," I said. "One—on a cheek. My cheek."
"Well, that's something," she sighed. "At least, it was when I was a girl."
It was not much to me, though it might have been to a better regulated flapper. I couldn't dwell on such trifles as kisses. I thought only of the coming court-martial.
The "understanding" remainedin statu quo(whatever that means; the expression was his) between Tony and me, when Mrs. Dalziel and Milly and I turned our backs on El Paso. We had a night at Albuquerque, which made me homesick for past days, because the hotel where we stopped had the name of Alvarado. I hadn't known that I was happy at the Springs, but in looking back it seemed as though I must have been without a care.
Milly and her mother bought wonderful Indian curios and gorgeous Mexican opals and silver spoons set with turquoises at Albuquerque, and Milly was almost feverishly gay; but I guessed that at heart, if she had an organ worth the name, she was nearly as wretched as I. For she had failed; and she had let the venom of her spite poison her nature, trying to tell herself that she rejoiced because of Eagle's misfortunes, and that it was very good, as things turned out, to be free of him and his fate. No one can really be happy with such poison in the veins, and there can't possibly be deep-down, soul-satisfying enjoyment from revelling in another's misfortunes. Underneath my fury, when Milly said little veiled, spiteful things about Captain March, was pity for her, the kind of pity you have for an irritable invalid who snaps.
When Father and Mrs. Main and Diana (Di in great beauty) came to Albuquerque on the "Limited," and we three took up our quarters in staterooms on board, Milly Dalziel and Di struck up a great friendship, almost as if they were new acquaintances who had just been introduced and fallen in love with each other's unexpectedly charming qualities. This was quite funny, because Milly had found it hard work to be civil to Di at Alvarado Springs, and Di had been rather contemptuously amused at Milly's badly disguised jealousy. Now, with Eagle March eliminated from the scheme of life for both of them, each discovered that the other was a delightful creature.
Milly accounted to me for her change of mind by exclaiming: "I do think Lady Di has got heaps prettier since she went to California, don't you? And she's just as sweet as she's pretty. Perhaps it's being engaged to the man she loves that has made the difference. And no wonder, with such a gorgeous lover as Major Vandyke! He's something to be proud of—even for a beauty and a 'swell' like your sister."
Di accounted for the change inhermind by saying to me: "I don't know what you've done to that Dalziel girl, Peggy, but you seem to have made her all over. She used to be a thorough-paced cat. Now she's quite a darling, and if you're ever sensible enough to marry Tony, I shall love to have such a fascinating sister-in-law. I've asked her to be one of my bridesmaids."
I suppose changing your mind often is a good, clean thing for your soul, just as changing your clothes is for your body.
We had a few hours to flash round Chicago in a motor car, seeing pretty, young-looking parks, and a great lake like the sea with wonderful buildings along its shore, and a sky like a painting by Turner. I was bitterly disappointed not to get the telegram Tony had promised to send, addressed to the Blackstone Hotel, where it had been arranged beforehand that we should lunch and dine. The court-martial was to have been held on the eighth day after Eagle March's arrest, the day before our arrival in Chicago, and meanwhile I had lived only for the telegram. My impatience to know the worst—or best—had been like a flame in my blood and brain. When it was time to take the fast train to New York in the evening, and no telegram had come, it seemed as if that flame gave a devouring leap, and then went out, leaving my body a burnt-up shell.
The next morning we were in New York, where Mr. Dalziel met his wife and Milly. I hoped that he might have read some news of El Paso in the morning papers, and that he would spring it upon us in the railway station where we paused, being charming and affectionate to each other, and making plans to meet again before our party sailed. I couldn't have questioned him to save my life, any more than I could have cried out in fearful nightmares which I remembered, when the earth was about to swallow me up, or a mountain fall on to my head. Surely, I thought, if there were news about the court-martial it would be interesting enough to the Dalziel family for the man to mention it, if only because Tony was to be a witness in the case! But the affair might have been more remote from us all than a destructive tidal wave in China, judging by Mr. Dalziel's oblivion of it. He and Father talked about our luck in grabbing cabins at short notice on theMauretania; his wife and Mrs. Main discussed getting seats for that night at D'Annunzio's great moving-picture play, which had come on at a theatre in New York; his daughter and Diana chatted about the earliest date when Milly could persuade her mother to sail for England. I longed to scream at them, "Oh, you hard, unfeelingwretches!" But instead I stood outwardly patient, a good, well-behaved young girl with a little mincing smile on my face. Only the smile was frozen so hard you could have knocked it off with a hammer.
We were going to Kitty Main's flat, which she called her "apartment," and the Dalziels were going to their house, but it was not to be a regular parting. We were to dine with them (somehow the idea was borne in upon me that dear Mrs. Dalziel wanted naughty, shilly-shallying Peggy to see what lovely surroundings might be hers as Tony's wife); all of us were to lunch next day at Delmonico's, as Kitty's guests; the Dalziels were to motor us over to Long Island for a glimpse of their country place there; and they were to see us off on theMauretania. But that would not be until five days had passed. Meanwhile, there would be time for telegrams and even letters from El Paso.
At last, after all the noisy planning of things to do, the two parties contrived to tear themselves from one another, and we got away from the wonderful station in Mrs. Main's motor car, which had come to meet us—a most impressive motor car which needed only a coronet or at worst a crest, on its door. Perhaps, however, judging from present signs, that lack might be supplied later.
Her "apartment" was in a marvellously ornate sky-scraper; a huge brown block like a plum cake for a Titan tea party, which would have made Buckingham Palace or any other royal residence in Europe look a toy. It was in the highest story, according to Kitty the most desirable, because you had all the air there and none of the noise; just like living on a mountain, with a lift to the top. I wondered what she would think of poor old Ballyconal, when she came to see it!
The first thing I did was to wire my temporary address to Tony, and hate myself because I hadn't done it before. Until I met Father and Di I didn't know where we were to stay in New York, for everything had been settled through letters and telegrams, with as little useful information as possible. If I had remembered in Chicago that Tony had no idea where I would be in New York, there need have been no more delay in my getting the news. But something seemed to be strangely wrong at his end of the line, for even when there had been time for him to get my telegram and send another, no answer came. Nothing arrived for Di, either; but apparently she was expecting no wire. She must have had some human curiosity, if not anxiety, to know the fate of a man who had been as much to her as Eagle March had been; but she was thinking of his trial, I suppose, entirely from Sidney Vandyke's point of view, and she had no uneasiness as to the result for Sidney. As for the papers, though I quite cleverly managed to find other things than football news, I could discover nothing about the court-martial on Captain March. I had to tell myself that perhaps they didn't put such affairs in newspapers, for I was too ignorant to think of trying to hunt up the army and navy official journals.
We had been three days in New York in great heat, which Kitty took pains to tell us was most unseasonable, when one morning a thunderstorm accompanied by terrific wind came up, preventing us from going out as we had intended. Kitty's floor at the top of the building, with its steel supports, actually gave the effect of swaying in the blast like an overgrown spear of wheat, a phenomenon Kitty took as a matter of course. So we Britishers had to do the same, no matter how we felt, to show that we were as brave as Americans. In the midst of the storm the postman's ring sounded reassuringly, as if to say that we were not cut off from earth; and a calm maid, used to hanging on insectlike by her antennæ to the top grain on the wheat stalk, quietly presented a silver tray with letters to her mistress.
"One for dear Diana," Kitty announced, picking up a large purple-sealed and monogrammed envelope, such as Sidney Vandyke had made peculiarly his own. And I had only time for a heartbeat before she added, "Two for little Peggy!"
I never much relished being patronized as "little Peggy" by my would-be stepmother, but she might safely have called me anything from a pterodactyl to a hippopotamus just then. I had caught a glimpse of the uppermost envelope of the two as she doled the letters out. In a flash I knew that Eagle March had written to me.
Just to save the scarlet flag my cheeks flung out from Father's stare, I pretended great interest in the other envelope. It had been addressed to me by Tony.
"My letter is from Sidney. I thought I should have one from him to-day," said Di, with the brazen boldness of the legitimately engaged girl who has a right to expose her feelings. "Now he'll tell me, perhaps, when he will be able to get leave and follow us."
She proceeded to tear open the envelope in the ruthless violating way of which I could never be guilty except with a soulless circular. A letter from a lover, or a friend, full of thoughts and touched by a dear hand, is too sacred for such usage. Fearing from Di's expression that she would be capable of reading aloud choice selections from Major Vandyke's version of events, I simply couldn't stay to risk hearing them. I jumped up and fled with my two prizes.
Locked safely in my room, delicately I cut the edge of Eagle's envelope. I was on the point of drawing out the letter, which appeared to be meagrely thin, when something within me seemed to faint. Reading what he had to say, I should know in a very few words, I was sure, the fate to which he looked forward. There would be no working up, no preamble, to prepare my mind. I wasn't strong enough to bear it. I should have to take Tony's letter first, like a dose of sal volatile.
"Dear, dear Peggy," my benevolent Billiken addressed me, and as I read, the thunder rolled like the far-away drums of Fort Alvarado or El Paso. "This is my first real letter to you, for I don't count notes; and I wish it could be a better one. I'm afraid you must be pretty mad about not getting a telegram at Chicago, or anyhow at Mrs. Main's, when you'd taken all the trouble to wire me your address. But it was intimated to all of us concerned that we weren't to telegraph news aboutyou know whatto our families or friends, and that we were even to be discreet about our letters. I've been so indiscreet with you on that subject already, on a never-to-be-forgotten night, however, that the latter bit of fatherly instruction doesn't hold good in my case. Only, before telling you what I have to tell, I'll just take the liberty of reminding you once again of your promise to keep mum till Gabriel's trumpet sounds—or till I take off the embargo (is that the way to spell it, I wonder, and what exactly does it mean?). As matters look at present, one thing is liable to happen about the same time as the other. Well, now I'm going to tell you news of the court-martial as best I can. I'm no great shakes at telling things, you know. Vandyke was 'seedy' (as you say in your truly British fashion) the day appointed for the trial, and as he was the principal witness it had to be put off for twenty-four hours. You'd have thought it would be March, if anybody, who was on the sick list, wouldn't you? But he was all right in health. I don't know what was the matter with Vandyke, except that I happened to hear our old Doc say he had a temperature way up in C. Maybe it was stage fright. I felt like that myself—queer all over when the time came, as a fellow does when he's just going to be seasick.
"The court-martial was what you call a 'field-general court-martial,' which can be convened when forces are on active service, as of course we are now (though we've had nothing very active to do, except on a certain night none of us will forget, and on Army Day when we all marched and sweated to give the populace an impressive show). A field general court-martial can try cases just as grave as a general court-martial can, and its proceedings are conducted with more secrecy. It consists of not less than three officers, none of them under the rank of captain, but the president of the court may be a general officer, a colonel, or lieutenant-colonel. In this case, which was considered very important, both on account of March's fine record and the necessary secrecy that had to be maintained, we had the general commanding the Fort for president, and the other two officers of the court were a colonel and a major. I don't think you met either of them when you were here, so their names wouldn't interest you.
"The courtroom was just a plain ordinary room in the barracks at Fort Bliss; but there wasn't a map or copy of 'rules and regulations' hanging on the yellowish white walls that I can't see now, whenever I shut my eyes. I guess they were all photographed on my 'mental retina,' as the writing folks say. The three officers were in full uniform, to do honour to the case, and of course there wasn't a man present dressed in 'cits.' All were army chaps, even to the headquarters clerk who took notes of the proceedings, the orderly who kept the door, and the witnesses. There weren't many of those. I was one of the principal witnesses and you've heard from me before how little I had to say.
"March, who as prisoner had to be formally conducted in by an officer, had a seat on the left of the judges' table, and his friend, Major Dell, sat beside him. If you could have been a fly on that beastly wall, looking down at your hero, I guess you'd have been proud of the way he held himself. If he'd been brought there to receive a medal of honour instead of to be tried for a big, insane sort of offence calculated to bring about international complications he couldn't have had a prouder bearing. And he wasn't even pale. He looked just brown and calm and natural. I had to confess to when you asked me a point-blank question that night in the park, that I was all muddled up in my mind about his conduct in ordering the gunfire. I didn't know whether he'd gone off his chump, or been fooled, or what. But I can tell you one thing: I felt proud of him as a man and as my superior officer when I saw the way he bore himself for his trial. I don't know now the rights of the matter any more than I did then, in spite of the court's findings; but something tells me—as girls say—that Marchwasn't to blame. There's a black mystery in this, and I don't see how it's ever going to be cleared up, as things are. But to go back to the court-martial.
"March was accused by the prosecutor of having fired without orders three charges from field guns into a country living at peace with the United States, to the detriment of its inhabitants and property, and to the imminent peril of disturbing international relations. He could have objected legally to any of the judges and stated his objections. But he didn't object to them, nor to the shorthand-writer, whom he had a right to throw out if he could show reasons for thinking that the man was likely to be partial in his notes of the proceedings.
"Of course, I as a mere witness wasn't present all the time; but I know what took place, because I've heard some of it from different quarters. I know that when 'the court had been duly sworn, the accused was arraigned,' which means that the president read out the charges against March, and asked him whether he pleaded guilty or not guilty. Can't you just hear March answering steadily in that pleasant, quiet voice of his: 'Not guilty!' The next thing to follow was the prosecutor's address, outlining the case against the prisoner, and mentioning the witnesses he meant to summon. Then he called the evidence for the prosecution, and that's where, as I've heard from other witnesses, those present got their first big surprise.
"Naturally there'd been no end of whispering among those in the know before the court met; and it was discussed whether or not March would bring into his defence the state of feeling between Vandyke and himself. Some thought he would be justified in doing so, and quixotic not to, as the bad blood between them, and the cause of it (I hope you don't mind my saying this?) was already a sort of open secret. Others argued that if the ill-feeling were once lugged in, the name of the lady concerned and other details would certainly be dragged into the case through inquiries which would have to be made; and that March wasn't the man to run such a risk even if it were likely to do him any good. The surprise of the court came when Vandyke accused March of giving the order for firing the guns without authority, but deliberately putting the responsibility on him—Vandyke—with the object of ruining him. Did you ever know the like of that?
"From one way of looking at the thing, it was a jolly smart way for Vandyke to turn the tables, because it would take all the wind out of March's sails, in case he meant to accuse Vandyke of the same intention toward him. I don't suppose there ever was such a queer case between officers as this one; both men highly placed and popular in the service and society.
"I believe March brought out his notebook in evidence (the khaki-coloured one with his monogram on it in silver, which I'd often seen, and which you say you gave him) to show the newly torn-out leaf; and his friend, Major Dell, who was his classmate at West Point (you've seen him here; fine-looking cavalry chap), suggested that the page underneath should be examined with a magnifying glass for the impression of writing on the missing page with a blunt pencil which had borne heavily on the paper. No words could be definitely made out, even with the magnifier, and even if they could have been, I'm afraid that wouldn't have made much difference in the case. March had had the notebook in his possession after the gunfiring, you see, and could easily have written what he liked and then torn out the leaf.
"Vandyke's orderly being dead, there was no evidence as to the part he had played for either side; but I suppose he would have been a witness for the prosecution, so his disappearance off the scene was perhaps a good thing for March. I was called for the defence, but nothing I had to say was of any good. I felt that; and being keen to serve March's interest if I could with truth, put such a strain on me to be careful of each word that you could have knocked me down with a feather after I was released. When my evidence was read over (they always do that to every witness before he leaves the court) it seemed to me I'd given the most rotten answers every time; but I couldn't have made them any better if I'd tried to explain them away, or amend them as I should have had the right to do; so I let them go as they were.
"March cross-examined me himself, about the distance he was from the guns when the orderly was supposed to come up; and the darkness of the night; and the nature of the ground for muffling the sound of footsteps. He didn't seem a bit disgusted or hurt with me because I could not do better for his case. He had a real friendly look in his eyes whenever they met mine; and I tell you, Peggy, I could have blubbed like a kid when I thought of it later, after I knew what the verdict was.
"Once I saw him cross glances with Vandyke, and if you won't think I'm getting sentimental on top of all the rest, I'll tell you I thought March's look was like a sword. Vandyke was yellow and bloodshot as if he'd had a bilious attack, and perhaps bile had been the trouble when he went on sick report and the case had to be delayed for him.
"The findings were considered in closed court. And now you must take this one bit of comfort to yourself, Peggy, in your trouble about your friend Captain March: things might have gone a lot harder for him than they did in such a serious case. Vandyke's accusation against him was mighty bad, and there was some evidence to support it. March didn't seem to use such weapons as he had to hit back with, quite as smartly as he might have done, though that was, no doubt, in his determination to keep your sister's name from coming into the affair. He did defend himself to the extent of saying he'd tried to save the situation by firing blank instead of shell; but that didn't help him much, for the whole point of the accusation against him was that he had had no right to fire at all. None of his witnesses could help him any more than I could, whereas Vandyke had several who took their oath to seeing him in the auto with his orderly, leaving old Fort Bliss at much about the time when March said Johnson came to him with the second verbal order. March could have been sentenced to imprisonment or chucked out of the army if the court had believed in his giving the order to fire the guns on his own responsibility out of sheer madness, or spite against Vandyke. As it was, they accepted the theory that he had been hoaxed by some one unknown, purporting to be the orderly of Major Vandyke, then acting as colonel. Owing to the comparative darkness of the night (luckily there wasn't a moon, only stars) it would have been possible for a nervous, jumpy man to mistake the identity of a person masquerading as another person. Nowyouknow, andIknow, and everybody who knows him knows March is the last fellow in the world to get nerves or jumps in any circumstances whatever. All the same, giving him credit for them on a night when a Mexican raid on the town had been predicted offered the court an excuse to let the accused down lightly. He was sentenced merely to 'severe censure for rashness and carelessness,' etc., etc. In sequence to this our Old Man—the colonel, I mean—has had to advise March to resign. That's part of the programme. And equally it is part of the programme that March should take the advice.
"Now, dear, I've told you the story as well or as badly as I can. Anyhow, you know as much as I do, and that is a good deal more than you ought to know, or others are likely to know. If you hear anything further, it will be from March himself.
"When the Mexican bees have settled down in their hive again, and we're back at Fort Alvarado, I'm going to have a good try for a month's leave or longer, so as to cross the blue with the mater and sis. Of course, entirely with the object of looking after them, and perhaps getting an invitation to Lady Di's wedding, and not a bit for the sake of seeing you or jogging your memory about a certain decision! Yours till the end of beyond, Billiken."
For a while, after I had read this long letter through, to the accompaniment of thunder, lightning, and rain, I sat with the four closely written sheets of paper in my hand, not thinking, only feeling. I could not console myself with "the one bit of comfort" which Tony waved under my eyes. Eagle March was a born soldier. He cared more for his career than for his life, and it had been taken from him. Though the world was not to know what he was accused of doing, all the world would know that he had left the army because his country no longer needed his services. And he owed this to his love for my sister! This was what Diana and I had brought upon the bravest and best man we should ever meet.
"What will he do? What will become of him?" I asked myself miserably; and the rain beating on the window seemed to give a desolating answer. But there was still the letter I had waited to read until I learned the best or worst from Tony. Perhaps that would tell me what I wished to know!
Eagle March's letter was characteristic. Though he must have felt as if he stood alone, at the jumping-off place of the world, he had more to say about me than of himself.
He had read in the El Paso papers that I was going to sail for England, and all the first part of his letter was concerned with "bon voyage." It was only in the last paragraph that he mentioned his own affairs. "You'll have heard already," he said, "of what has happened to me. I've had a blow, but I'm not going to lie down under it. There must be work for me somewhere, and when I've found it you'll hear from me again. Not until then though, for I'm rather hard hit, and might be inclined to grumble. But I shall think of you constantly, and I don't believe if I wrote a volume I could make you understand how much the thought will help. I shall wear it like armour."
Not a word of Diana. But I read between the lines. He was "rather hard hit." Just when he was facing an attack from the front she had stabbed him in the back. In one way, the letter was a bitter disappointment, for I had longed to be told Eagle's plans; yet in the hint that I should hear again when he had "found work," there was a thrill like that which comes with martial music. I was far from guessing then what that work would be, and how quickly and surprisingly he would find it; but vaguely I felt that there was only one kind of work worth Eagle March's while: soldier work.
Because I mustn't expect to hear, that did not prevent my writing from the ship. "This isn't 'good-bye,'" I said. "Always I'll be looking forward to great things for you. And (you may laugh, but I'm in earnest) I shall live in the hope of 'righting' you in the world's eyes. The day may come. I believe it will—the best day of my life."
When theMauretaniapassed "Liberty" I sent back a last message by the statue to Eagle. "Till the day!" I said. But it was a pang to see the last of her. I went down to my stateroom and cried—oh! how I cried!
As if to flaunt the glorious difference between this summer and last, Father took a furnished house in Norfolk Street, Hyde Park, which was to let with the owner's servants. It was very rich looking, though the elaborate decorations reminded me of houses in moving-picture plays. Father was able to splurge, on Di's prospects; and probably Kitty Main contributed to the expense, for she and her maid came to stay with us. We began to be expensively gay; and I believe if any duke or earl who tangoed with Diana had offered himself for the dance of life, she would have thrown over Sidney Vandyke at the eleventh hour. But no one exciting showed signs of entangling himself permanently, and so, when Major Vandyke wired that the situation in Mexico permitted him to ask for leave, Di's engagement was announced in theMorning Post.
Soon after this, Sidney arrived with cartloads of luggage, which seemed to detach him from America forever. He had got long leave and intended to resign from the army at the end of it. He took up his quarters at the Savoy Hotel, but he was at our house morning, noon, and night; and though everybody who saw him for the first time said how handsome he was, it struck me from the minute we met that he had changed for the worse. He looked older and stouter, and black and white would no longer express him in a picture. A suffusion of red for the face, as well as for the lips under the black moustache, would have been needed. I wondered if he were drinking; and though, when he lunched or dined with us he was always careful (except with champagne, which he loved as a child loves sweets), he might be less cautious when out of Diana's sight.
At first I could hardly bear to sit down at the same table with Sidney Vandyke; but as time went on, I found an impish pleasure in watching him, in staring openly, as a baby stares. I had the satisfaction of feeling that he was disturbed by my gaze, and that he knew, even when not looking, that my eyes were on him. Sometimes in the midst of talk he would break down and forget what he had meant to say next. I affected him with a kind of aphasia, erasing the words he wanted from his brain. But otherwise my tactics were changed. I was no longer rude to my future brother-in-law. I wished to study him, and I didn't object to his knowing that I studied him.
A silent battle was being fought between us under a smooth surface of civility, and Sidney might easily have complained to Diana that my owl stare was "getting on his nerves," even though he could have brought no other complaint. If he had spoken to her she would have made some excuse to scratch me off her list of bridesmaids. I hoped she would, and save me trouble! But perhaps Sidney felt that I was yearning for him to "squeal," and resolved not to please me. In any case, nobody not in the secret of our hearts could have guessed that anything was wrong. And I had to play at spraining my ankle in order to escape being one of the eight.
It was well to be civil in word and deed, and "bide my time," but to be in at the death, and marry my sister to a man who'd stolen her from Eagle March and ruined him, was a different thing. I drew the line at that.
It's quite simple for a girl vowed to the conscientious life and no fibs to wrench her ankle, if she'll wear high heels. All she has to do when walking in the street is to look out for banana peel; or an apple paring may do at a pinch. She launches herself upon it, with a skating movement. Her foot turns, and the deed is done. She can in this way produce a "strain," if not a "sprain"; and only doctors know the difference. The difficult part comes in remembering to limp. I was so fearful of forgetting in some moment of excitement, that I took to wearing shoes which were not mates. They were actually incompatible. One had a Louis Quinze heel and the other had none at all; but my dresses by this time were so "grown up" and long that nobody noticed. Besides, though refusing to see a doctor, I stopped in bed for days, and hypnotically impressed the idea of a sprain on every one.
Those who didn't know why I wouldn't for the world be bridesmaid to Diana sat by my bedside and sympathized, among others Mrs. Dalziel and Milly, who had followed us in time to have all the season's fun in London before the wedding. Tony hoped to get leave and arrive for "the great day." Afterward he and his mother and sister planned a motor tour through Belgium, and Luxemburg, and France, before the time when Tony must rejoin his regiment. I had a sneaking idea that they meant me to go, too; but at that moment—before other things had happened—I told myself that I would do nothing of the kind. I was homesick for Ireland and Ballyconal.
The date of Di's wedding wasn't definitely settled until after Sidney came. Then it was fixed for the ninth of July, and the bride and bridegroom were to have four weeks' motoring in the north of England. When the honeymoon was officially over they were to make country-house visits in Scotland for the shooting season. Sidney Vandyke boasted of being a crack shot, and Diana hoped to be proud of her American husband among British sportsmen.
Meanwhile they had some time before the wedding in which to find a town house, and choose furniture and things so that they might be "at home" in the autumn. I think Di really loved Sidney the day he consented to buy a house—a very expensive though small house—in Park Lane. She had set her heart upon Park Lane; for, you see, there was always something rootedly Victorian about Di; such as being convinced that Park Lane was the Mount Olympus of London, and that you couldn't be properly married except at St. George's. She was, and is, up-to-date only on the surface, in such details as clothes and hats, and tango, and the latest slang. Probably Di had never been so happy as in gathering together materials for her future frame; and if Sidney was chagrined because Father didn't offer to lend for the honeymoon our ancestral castle (to which he and Di had frequently alluded in America) he kept his feelings to himself. He would have been twice as much chagrined by the castle could he have seen it before Kitty Main got in her deadly work. The Trowbridges of Chicago would have rejoiced to tell him what it was really like.
I don't quite know why it is the fashion for brides to shut themselves up and not "go out" for days before the wedding; but perhaps they are supposed to pass their close time in prayer and maiden meditation, thanking heaven for what it has provided, and dwelling on the responsibilities of the future. Di spent her days in being fitted for frocks (goodness knew who would pay for them, unless Sidney, on ceasing to be a bridegroom and turning into a husband), receiving wedding presents, having photographs taken, and giving discreet interviews to journalists. She told the male ones what a heroic person Major Vandyke was; and to the female ones she showed her dresses. There wasn't an illustrated daily or weekly paper in London that didn't produce a picture of Sidney in uniform, looking dashing, and Di looking down, all modesty and eyelashes.
The last night she went out to anything big before the wedding was to a dinner at the Russian embassy; and though nothing which seemed to us sensationally interesting happened that night, something was led up to later. It came through Milly Dalziel, for whom Father and Di had contrived to get an invitation. She met Captain Count Stefan Stefanovitch, the military attaché of the Russian Embassy.
There is something irresistible to some natures about a Russian count; and to Russian counts about American heiresses, particularly those with red hair. When the two had seen each other three times they were engaged, subject to the consent of the count's father. Everybody in that family was a count or countess, a delicious prospect for Milly when she wished to talk of her Russian relatives. Stefan was to stay and see Milly in her bridesmaid's dress; then he was going to make a dash for Petrograd (we called it St. Petersburg then!) armed with her photograph and substantial accounts of her father's bank balance, returning as soon as the consent was insured. There seemed to be something almost feudally old-fashioned about Russians, Milly thought, for a mere wire toherfather had been considered adequate. But then, Tony Senior wasn't a count or a "vitch," or anything exciting like that.
It was after this dinner that I began to prowl for banana peel. I hadn't wanted to be premature; still, it was necessary to give some other girl time to get a bridesmaid's dress. Just then the only thing in London that anybody cared about was the Russian opera and ballet, and it occurred to Di that it would be original to clothe her eight attendant maidens in Léon Bakst designs. Most of the girls were pale blondes, whom she had chosen because they would form an effective contrast to herself; but they were very brave about the Bakst effects. The measure of their fingers had been taken, and they were expecting presents of rings beautiful enough to console them for worse disasters. Besides, Sidney had brought over from America a Captain Beatty to be his best man. He was rather rich and very good-looking.
During all this time of our new popularity I had heard nothing of Eagle March, except that he had turned his back on his native land after resigning from the army, and that various "ugly stories" were in circulation. It was even said that he had been bribed by Mexico with immense sums of money to betray his country. It was Tony who wrote me this, in answer to a question. But he knew no more than this gossip, not even when he arrived in London the day before Diana's wedding.
"For all I can tell," he said, when he had congratulated me on my limp, "March may have offered himself and his aeroplane to the Viceroy of India or the Sultan of Turkey or even the Emperor of Japan. There's only one thing certain about him: he'll have to be a soldier somewhere—somehow!"
"Blessed is the bride the sun shines on," they say, but the sun did not shine on Diana. The ninth of July dawned gray and blustering, with a queer rasping chill in the air like an autumn day slipped back in the calendar. I hated the thought of seeing Di married to Sidney Vandyke. It seemed like aiding and abetting the enemy, but unless I had another accident at the last minute, such as falling downstairs, I could see no way of stopping at home without a row.
What would Eagle want me to do? I asked myself. It was almost as if I could hear his voice saying, "Don't hurt Diana on such a day by stopping away from her wedding."
I decided to be there; and it was arranged for me to sit with Kitty Main, Mrs. Dalziel, and Tony. I didn't mind this, because Tony couldn't very well propose in church with "The voice that breathed o'er Eden" resounding to the roof.
The wedding was fixed for two o'clock at St. George's, Hanover Square; and if any were left in London who didn't know the hour and all other details, it must have been because they didn't read the halfpenny papers. It had even been announced that one of the bridegroom's many magnificent presents to the bride would be a high-powered Grayles-Grice car, in which Lady Diana Vandyke would drive from the church with her husband to the house of her father, for the wedding reception, and go on for the honeymoon tour afterward. This paragraph was truer than some of the others, but the day before the wedding the car hadn't yet been delivered by the makers. A frantic telegram from Sidney brought the assurance that he might count without fail on its arriving by ten o'clock next day at latest. The firm regretted deeply the unforeseen delay which had occurred owing to a strike, but the automobile had been shipped. Still Sidney and Diana were anxious.
Kitty and Mrs. Dalziel and Tony and I started rather late, for Kitty had superintended the bride's dressing. The other two came for us in a motor car, but Mrs. Dalziel had to stop for a look at Di. As for me, I'm not sure how I felt about my sister. She was so lovely in her lace and silver brocade gown, and her cap-veil, that my eyes clung to her, yet it was hateful that her beauty should be for Sidney Vandyke. My thoughts flew to Eagle, wherever he might be—at the other end of the world, perhaps—and I wondered if he knew what was happening in London.
Our places at church were at the front, in one of the pews reserved for the bride's relatives and intimate friends, so our being late didn't matter. But already the back part of the church was full, and the air heavy with the perfumes women wore, and the fragrance of roses and lilies which made the decorations. As we went in, a sense of suffocation gripped me. I felt as if I could easily faint, and I realized that the long strain on my nerves had begun to tell. I had a queer impression that I was only a body, and that my soul was far away looking for some one it could not find. I was glad when we were settled in our seats, but still the odour of the flowers oppressed me. I fancied that the brooding gloom of the day would end in a thunderstorm.
People were whispering and rustling in their seats, wondering if it were not almost the time for the bride music to begin. I had a jumpy sensation that somebody behind me must be staring, and strongly willing me to look round. Always I have been sensitive to that kind of influence, and often, too, I've tried to make others feel it. I kept turning my head, but could see no one who seemed to be taking an undue interest in me. Presently, however, I caught Tony's eyes, which fixed themselves on mine in an owlish stare.
"What makes you keep on twisting round like that?" he inquired in a stage whisper. "Are you looking for any one in particular?"
"No—o," I said, "but I have a funny sort of feeling as if some one were looking for me!"
"By Jove!" exclaimed Tony, and repressed himself at a glare from his mother. "I wonder if it's possible——" He stopped, and began carefully to smooth his silk hat which was poised on his knee.
"If what's possible?" I wanted to know, bending my head near to his, regardless of somebody's plume which grazed my eye.
"Oh—er, nothing much. Only just a silly idea of mine."
"Tell me, and let me judge whether it's silly or not. You're rousing my curiosity." And all the while I tingled with that almost irresistible desire to turn my head again. It was as if I were missing something very important.
"I'd rather not now," said Tony. "I'll tell you afterward."
Before I had time to wheedle the mystery out of him (as I felt confident I could) the "Wedding March" from Lohengrin struck up. Of course, Dianawouldhave that! It went with St. George's and the rest of it: the "historic" thing.
She came up the aisle, her hand on Father's arm.
"Oh, doesn't he lookhandsome?" murmured Kitty Main.
"He?" I murmured back.
"Lord Ballyconal. But dear Diana is wonderful, of course."
Her wondrousness was largely a tribute to Kitty, who had given the bride everything she had on, everything that was packed away in her trunks at home, or laid out ready to go away in.
It all passed off exactly like any other wedding on a grand scale, except that Tony, sitting by my side, drew a long breath when the bishop who was marrying Diana to Sidney Vandyke finished the conventional pause following "or else forever after hold his peace." I flashed another glance at Tony but he was looking more like an imperturbable Billiken than he had ever looked.
And so Di was married, and people whispered what a beautiful bride, and how good-looking the American bridegroom was, while she and Sidney were in the vestry signing their names in the book. Then, down the aisle they came, Di radiant, Major Vandyke flushed and brilliant eyed. "He looks as if he had just fought a successful engagement," I heard an American man in the pew behind say to his wife. Well, that was exactly what he had done. But whether according to the rules of war or not was another question. We let the crowd pour out of the church before us, and followed at leisure, I feeling more depressed than I should at a funeral. Automobiles and carriages were dashing up to the pavement to take people away, and dashing off again after an instant's pause, while throngs of the uninvited and curious pressed close on either side of the red carpet. Rain was falling, but the lookers-on appeared to care little. The people seemed more excited than usual at a wedding, we thought, especially after the passing of the bride; and Tony and I looked at each other questioningly with raised eyebrows as we caught a word here and there.