Carleigh found himself presently crowded into the last seat of the last car, beside the Honorable Julian.
The occupants were men exclusively, and the subject of debate was the fire's origin. This was mingled with snatches of personal experiences.
"I fancy it started in the laundry drying-room," their host observed. "Overheated pipes or something."
"How about crossed wires?" some one asked. "The electricity in the east wing was out of commission from the start."
"But the flames showed first in the north extension," another man contributed. "I was lying wide-awake and saw the glare from my window."
"Yes. And if it hadn't been for your wakefulness, old chap, we might every one of us have been incinerated in our beds," Archdeacon observed gratefully. "As it was, the east wing was totally cut off before we could get to it."
He turned to Carleigh. "That's where you were, you know. We did our best to reach your room, but you were hemmed in. We tried shying stones at your windows, but it was too pitchy dark to locate them. Fancy what I went through before you dropped onto the dahlia bed!"
Sir Caryll appeared far less grateful for his deliverance than was to have been expected. He wasn't sure, indeed, that he was grateful at all. What with one romance ended and another budding one interrupted by death or disfigurement—life for him certainly was not worth the living.
"I suppose I did have a narrow squeak for it," he said.
Dawn had come, but it was a dark, indistinguishable dawn because of the heavy black clouds that shrouded it. The hall at Cross Saddle was brilliantly alight therefore when they arrived, and on the wide hearth blazed a roaring fire of great logs.
Many of the earlier arrivals had already been provided for, but there was still a waiting group, so smoke-stained and in such motley makeshift attire as to have titillated the risibilities of any but the most stolid British.
Sir Caryll's visage, black as a Senegambian's, was as long as the proverbial arm of coincidence. Directly he began making inquiry for the doctors in attendance on Nina, and learned with a mingling of encouragement and dismay that they had already done what they could and departed.
He ascertained also that Cecile Archdeacon was installed as nurse, assisted by Nina's own maid. But beyond these two facts he could gather nothing definite. Opinion at Cross Saddle appeared to be quite as divided as opinion at Carfen.
Sir Guy Waldron, who would be most likely to know the exact facts—if there were any exact facts to know—was already quartered, and anxious as Carleigh was he would not think of disturbing the man he had come to regard as a dangerous—and therefore hated—rival.
Lord Dalgries and his two sons were up and about, making arrangements for the refugees. Some of the guests at the hall had been awakened, too, and some not. Most of the men turned out and most of the women stayed in.
Young Nevill Dalgries, a chap about Carleigh's own age, who had been to school with him, had seen Mrs. Darling when she was carried in, and he didn't mind telling Caryll that at that moment he wouldn't have wagered tuppence on her life. But he had later been present when Dr. Dodson talked with his father about her, and—
"The M. D. seemed to think she'd pull through. He'll be over again in the forenoon. He said she was as comfortable as could be expected under the circumstances."
"They always say that," returned Carleigh, attempting to wipe out betraying signs of his emotion and leaving a gray-white streak across the black of either cheek. "They fill 'em with opium or something."
Nevertheless, he felt in a measure relieved. If it was as speculative as all the rest, it was, nevertheless, the speculation of authority and not the mere guesswork of indifferent optimistic or pessimistic lay minds.
Still he hung about, talking to whomsoever would talk of the one topic that engaged him until about all the rest had been led off to sleeping places.
Then finally, with Nevill Dalgries for guide, he followed to where a bed had been set up for him in one of the nurseries.
And there he lay awake, his brain teeming, until one of the footmen came to him at a little after eight. Then he raised himself on one elbow and asked whether the footman had heard how Mrs. Darling was.
"Mrs. Darling is very bad, sir," was the answer.
"But she was distinctly better when I turned in," Carleigh offered protest.
"Yes, sir; I dare say, sir. But she's very bad this morning, sir. Her maid was in the servants' hall not ten minutes ago, sir."
"And she said she was worse?"
"Oh, yes, sir. Very much worse, sir."
Sir Caryll let a long sigh escape him. He couldn't help it. The footman heard it and drew a conclusion or two.
"They're likely to be worse in the morning, you know, sir. I had an aunt once—begging your pardon, sir—that was burned most 'orribly. She was always worse in the morning, sir."
"And she recovered—in the end?" asked the baronet anxiously.
"No, sir. Not at all, sir. She died at last, sir. In the morning, just about this time, sir."
Carleigh dropped back on his pillow, and the footman, taking the action as a signal for silence, proceeded to light a fire, to fill the bath, and to lay out a very nice array of lent linen and morning garments for the guest to select from.
When he went away Carleigh got up with a curious new kind of pain about his heart and head which he was puzzled to account for.
Perhaps it was the smoke he had inhaled, or perhaps it was Mrs. Darling's condition. He wasn't sure which. At any rate, it was very real and very distressing.
He had bathed and scrubbed very carefully, as he thought, before lying down. But the morning light revealed stains and blotches invisible by candlelight—there was no electricity at Cross Saddle—and it took him some time to remove them.
As a consequence he found, when he went down to breakfast, that nearly every one was there before him. There was a general hubbub in the room that was nigh to deafening.
Questions were flying about like buzzing insects; and then, too, there was the more or less inevitable clatter of too hurried service.
He found a place at the table, and was just dropping a lump of sugar into his tea when a most extraordinary and upsetting thing happened.
The door opened again and admitted—of all persons in the world—Miss Rosamond Veynol.
Rosamond Veynol stopped short just inside the door and every vestige of color left her face.
Everybody remembered then, and everybody was scared. It was a tryingly dramatic moment.
Carleigh, astounded and greatly confused, half-rose in his place and bowed slightly and awkwardly. Miss Veynol bent her head without looking at him. The Countess of Cross Saddle pretended to know or notice nothing.
One man whistled under stress of the moment and then turned deeply crimson. The butler, who knew details of which all his superiors were naturally ignorant—he being a regular reader ofBritish Society—let fall a muffin cover.
And then, suddenly, everybody perceived that the only space left vacant at table was the space next to Carleigh, and saw with horror that one of the men who knew nothing had pushed a chair in there for the newcomer.
Miss Veynol looked waveringly about. The countess choked.
"Of course you two are old friends—" she began.
And then, her tongue cleaving to the roof of her mouth, she rose hastily, stammered something quite unintelligible about the injured woman upstairs, and precipitately fled.
"I had better go, too," Carleigh murmured, starting to rise. "I—I—" He would have sold his soul to be able to say, "am betrothed to Mrs. Darling." But he wasn't sure she was going to die, and so he didn't dare.
Nevill Dalgries, who had the place on the other side of him, and being a good friend, was awfully sorry, put out a strong hand and pulled him back into his seat again.
"You can't do anything, old man," he said with a roughness that was kindness. "Finish your tea."
And at that instant Rosamond sank into the proffered seat beside him. So there they sat, side by side, those two, one blazing red, one deathly white, silent and constrained.
And all the rest at the breakfast-table talked feverishly and painfully with a haste and loudness that appeared to them obligatory.
Those who watched say that Sir Caryll drank his tea and ate two slices of buttered toast, and that Miss Veynol spooned an egg without upsetting the cup; which may be perfectly true, though neither he nor she was aware of doing any such thing.
What they did they did subconsciously, their conscious minds being very much otherwise engaged. One thing is certain, however, and that is that neither of them spoke, until, happening to look up, Carleigh saw that everybody else had got up and got out and left them quite alone.
He felt then that he simply had to say something, and so he said, as so often happens, the one thing that he shouldn't have said. He asked: "Is your mother here?"
Miss Veynol looked down, shivered slightly, rose, and moved over to a window. Carleigh rose, too, and followed her.
"Mama is in Ireland," she answered at length, in a low, sweet voice. "She told me before she went—she—" Then she stopped.
He threw his gaze over her from head to feet. He felt bitter and scornful, and yet the memories crowded fast. After all, she was very lovely, and—odd how he had seen her face early this very morning when for all he knew he was dropping to his death!
"What do you think of me, anyway?" he asked at length. "What is your final opinion of us all three?"
She looked up at him. All her shyness seemed suddenly gone. Her eyes met his fearlessly. Yet her voice was very low as she said: "I think that you love mama."
Of course she would think that. If she had ever doubted it his question uttered a minute ago on their remeeting must have convinced her.
He took a backward step and drew in his breath. Upstairs Nina was dying perhaps. On every hand fortune seemed bent on breaking with him. He was lashed, stung, crumpled. He looked at her and truth cowered naked.
"Not at all," he said with biting emphasis. "Perhaps people talk that and you believe it. But I've never thought of such a thing. I have offered myself to Mrs. Darling, and I've given her your ring."
He paused, expectant; but Rosamond just stared at him.
Then he walked out of the room, hurt and—rather frightened.
It had been one of those fearfully ingenious tricks of Fate which she deals out in such a startlingly unexpected manner—this meeting with his whilom fiancée.
Chasing the woman who had the power to make him forget, only to be abruptly thrust, in the very midst of it, under the same roof with her he was striving never to remember, was malevolent cruelty. And it was very awful.
Yes, it would have been much better had he slept five minutes longer. Then there would have been no escape, and his troubles would have been over.
It was a very miserable morning for Carleigh. It was pretty miserable for every one, seeing that things were all at sixes and sevens, owing to the enforced mingling of two house parties; but the young baronet, with counter emotions tearing things apart deep down in the soul of him, found it especially so.
Out-of-doors was quite impossible. The heavy clouds were unloading their burden in a drenching downpour. Some brave one proposed a tramp to Carfen and a search of the cooling ruins, but found so few volunteers that the project was given over.
Bridge games were started in both the red and yellow drawing-rooms. Blissmore, the novelist, had induced Nevill Dalgries to oppose him at chess, and the pair sat in silent concentration over board and men in the library.
For a long while Sir Caryll hung about the hall in expectation of a word with Dr. Dodson on his morning visit; only to learn after something like two hours of waiting that the medical man had come and gone during that period of agony in the breakfast-room.
Nevertheless, there was some measure of relief for him in the tidings that Dodson had pronounced his patient improving steadily.
Julian Archdeacon had told him this, having had it direct from Cecile. "He doesn't say that Nina's out of danger; but he does say that with a continued absence of fresh symptoms she very soon will be."
Carleigh sighed and a faint color tinged his wan pallor. He had been pallid as a ghost ever since he told Miss Veynol about the ring. "If I could only see her," he muttered.
But Julian thought that quite impossible.
"It's mostly shock, don't you know," he said, "and everything depends on keeping her quiet."
The relief, small as it was, was not lasting. When he had flung that final ill-considered speech at Rosamond he had really believed Nina's case hopeless.
If she got well Rosamond would be sure to learn that what he said wasn't true, and she would probably hate him all the more for it. Therefore, it was actually imperative that he have a word with Mrs. Darling at the very earliest opportunity.
"I mean to ask Dr. Dodson, at all events," he said. "When will he be here again?"
The Honorable Julian didn't know. He might be over in the afternoon, and, then, just as likely, he might not be over until evening.
"Waldron is burned worse than was thought," he added. "He never gave a sign, and yet he must have been suffering torments. His self-command was nothing short of Spartan."
But at this Carleigh frowned.
"We have thought best to wire for his wife," Archdeacon added.
"His wife!" exclaimed Caryll.
"Yes. Good little woman. Does a lot of slum work in London, and all that sort of thing, you know. Time was too much taken up to come down with him."
So here was a measure of relief from another quarter.
"Did you wire for any of Mrs. Darling's people?"
"No. She didn't want any one. We suggested sending for the duke and duchess. But the idea only excited her. Then we thought of Kneedrock. He's a cousin, you know, and a sort of next-of-kin protector and adviser. But she wouldn't have him at any price. Gritty little woman, Nina."
Dr. Dodson came between tea and dinner, and it was more through good luck than good management that Carleigh saw him.
He had gone to his nursery bed-chamber, where he had been looking over the evening things laid out for him, only to discover that the pumps provided were fully two sizes too large.
Twice he had rung for valet or footman without response—his own man had been shipped up to town that morning—and was on his way to Nevill Dalgries's quarters when he encountered an elderly gentleman—bearded, carrying a small professional-looking hand-bag, and stepping with professional briskness—turning into the corridor from an intersecting passage.
He stopped him without the least hesitation. "I fancy you are Dr. Dodson?" he said.
The physician signified assent, and Carleigh introduced himself.
"I do so want to learn of poor Mrs. Darling," he went on. "I am very anxious."
"Mrs. Darling," Dodson replied, "is doing capitally. I have every reason to believe that she will make an amazingly quick recovery, Sir Caryll."
"That is good news indeed," Carleigh rejoined. "And now there is a favor I have to ask. I really think that I should be allowed to see her."
The doctor pursed his lips and his eyes shot a question through his glasses.
"I am deeply interested in her," the young man went on, "and I believe she would wish it, if you let her know."
His effort was to speak in exactly the right tone, all things considered. Yet he was wofully uncertain as to just what were the things he had to consider.
"I will ask her, of course," returned Dodson. "But I must warn you in advance, Sir Caryll, that Mrs. Darling does not care to see any one. Aside from the severe shock, she is at present, you know, so very badly disfigured."
Caryll experienced a deathlike sinking at his heart. Until this minute he had barely considered this matter of disfigurement. He just couldn't believe it—couldn't realize it as a possibility.
"How—" he began, and stopped short.
"One side of her face is very badly burned," said the doctor.
A man doesn't like to hear such things about a woman for whom he has just confessed an attachment. It took a brief moment for Carleigh to collect himself. Then: "Beg her to see me, please," he asked a little stiffly.
He saw the physician go, but he had very little hope. It was hardly possible that she would accede to his plea.
She didn't want "Doody" and "Pucketts." She didn't want even "Nibbetts," who, it was clear to him, was usually her help in time of trouble. What chance then was there that she would see him?
But to his surprise and that of the doctor as well, she did.
Her maid came back with Dodson and took him to the room. And there, in the half dark made by the drawn window-curtains he saw her lying in the wide, white bed, her beauty hidden—or was it her hideousness—by swathing white cloths.
She looked curiously Eastern and uncanny, and his thoughts crowded, and he was dumb.
But she held out her right hand to him and said: "So nice to see you! But—what is this I hear they are telling about us? Such astounding tales."
Then he knew that Rosamond had made no secret of his daring speech and that the doors and windows of gossip were all set open afresh.
He sat down in a chair close by her side and took the hand she offered, and held it close to his own.
"I have been telling the truth," he said, with that cool, odd courage which leaps like a well-trained servant to do the bidding of some men. "It is only a few days as time is counted, but clocks should be our slaves instead of our masters. To me it seems an eternity since you so gave me back to myself that I"—he faltered ever so slightly—"could love—yes, really and truly—love again. And I do. Oh, Nina, I do! Just you—only you."
Then, all at once, he remembered, and looked sharply about the room. He had forgotten the maid. He had not thought of Cecile Archdeacon. They might be there, somewhere, curtained by the gloom.
"Don't be alarmed," Nina said, amused. "There is no one but I to hear your confession. Cecile withdrew discreetly before you came, and my maid parted from you on the other side of the door."
"I love you," he repeated, reassured.
"But you have said openly here, in this house, that we are engaged—that I had your ring."
For a breath he hesitated. Then: "Let it stand," he pleaded, and bent toward her. "You are like me, you are sick of it all. The world has bruised us both—has tried to make outcasts of us both—has blackened us falsely.
"Let us go away together—to Yukon, to Ceylon, to where you will. Let us build for ourselves a free life—a new, clean life, out in those free, new clean surroundings."
He was actually surprised at his own eloquence and at how in earnest he felt; and how chivalrous. But he was still more surprised at how keen he was to prove to Rosamond that he had spoken truthfully.
"But I'm disfigured," said Nina behind her white windings. "Horridly disfigured."
"It will not matter," he declared.
"And I am old. I count for ten years beyond you."
"That is our own affair—our very own affair." He felt the hand within his quiver lightly and hope rose.
"I really am very fond of you," she whispered.
"Believe me, it is love," he whispered in return. "See how it snatched us both in the same instant."
Her fingers nestled sweetly in among his own.
"Did Kneedrock tell you more than you told me?" she asked.
"Yes," he answered frankly. "But it made no difference. I don't care what people say about you."
"But I have played with fire so often—once too often," she added with a laugh. "Fire came near ending me at last."
Abruptly his curiosity roused. "They say you were safely down stairs, and that then you turned and went back. Why did you go back?"
"I wanted something."
"What? What was worth the risk?"
For just a little she did not answer. Then, slowly, she reached out her other hand—her left hand. "For this," she said.
He looked and fancied he must be dreaming, for, lo, there on her engagement finger sparkled a ring—his ring. The ring that he believed lost; the ring that he believed no woman would ever wear again.
For a full minute he was too amazed, too stunned, to speak.
"You—you found it!" he stammered at last.
"I never threw it away at all," she confessed. "I only made the motion. Why should I throw away a perfectly good pearl and diamond ring when the mere motion of throwing answered every purpose?"
"Every purpose? What purpose?"
"My purpose," and she smiled.
"But I—I don't understand. What could have been your object?"
"I'll tell you," she replied. He could see her eyes quite clearly now. His own had grown accustomed to the gloom. He could see them so clearly as to read mischief in them. He wondered whether it was possible that she was suffering the least bit.
"I just wondered what you would say and do. I knew of no better way to test a man's whole character than by pretending to toss away as worthless something that he highly values."
"My whole character?" he echoed. "Did you have to test it?"
"I didn't have to. I wished to. One learns of the real man, then. And I am so interested in real men."
The thing rather hurt him, but he said: "I suppose you were satisfied."
"Myinterestwas," she answered, and he was clever enough to note the distinction she effected by the word and the emphasis.
"I'm glad if it amused you," he said, not at all pleased. "Are you going to tell me what you learned?"
"I'm going to let you draw your own conclusions," she answered. "I told a man once in India that there was a cobra in the corner of the room in which we were sitting, just to see what he would say."
"What did he say?"
"He didn't say anything. He acted."
"Was there a cobra there?"
"Of course. We could both see it."
"You were telling the truth then?"
"After my fashion, yes."
"And what did he do?"
"He shot."
"And—"
"The bullet knocked the cobra over. It was bronze."
Then, for the first time since he entered the room, he let go her hand. "And that satisfied your interest?"
"That satisfied me," she said, and he would have sworn she slightly emphasized the pronoun.
"There must have been a lot of shooting out there in India," he said significantly. Somehow he felt terribly vexed.
No, he didn't want to go into any wilds with this woman. He recalled that reincarnated tigress idea of Kneedrock's. No Yukon or Ceylon. No, surely not.
She seemed to read his thought. She drew back her right hand which he had dropped so coolly and, turning a little on her side, she reached out her left.
"There! Take off the ring and give it to Miss Veynol," she said cheerfully. "I really can't marry you. Indeed I can't. Don't press me. Don't even press my hand. It's absolutely no use. Go on, now, and leave me to sleep."
It was Caryll's mood of the moment to feel relieved. He took the ring from her finger, thrust it into his waistcoat pocket, and rose. Then he bowed a little stiffly. After which he left her to sleep.
All masculine and human as he was, Sir Caryll Carleigh emerged from that darkened room with a vivid vision still remaining of the white bandaged face and a keen awareness of the engagement ring once more in his possession, enormously eased.
If there was a sense of somewhat summary dismissal to annoy, it was more than offset by the knowledge that he was absolutely free. Yes, free even of the chain made by his own impulsive speech.
A thoroughly foolish man, embarrassed by the product of his various and gregarious emotions, may still have sense enough left to experience relief at being afforded a fresh chance.
Life, in spots, was very trying to the young baronet, but still it might have been far worse.
One may not enjoy being buffeted about by a woman one is almost sure one loves. Still it's a poor ball that isn't conscious of a thrill as it rises in the air of limitless freedom after a hard kick.
So Carleigh went lightly along the corridor and turned lightly at the angle. And as he turned he came face to face with Rosamond Veynol. And Rosamond, it so chanced, was looking beautiful as she had never looked beautiful before.
He stopped abruptly, and so did she. He gasped, and she likewise gasped. But, somehow, it was far less awful than before, because here there was no one present to witness their behavior.
He put out his hand and she put hers in it before she thought. It came to him just then, suddenly, that he had told her he had offered himself to Mrs. Darling and given her the ring. And now he had that very ring in his waistcoat pocket.
His breath came fast—so fast that it almost choked him.
"Rosamond!" he stammered. "Oh, Rosamond!"
She was dressed for traveling and was evidently just on her way down. In point of fact she was about quitting the house to save herself further embarrassment.
She wasn't expecting to meet Carleigh on that side of the house, and the encounter had startled her, as it did him, more than slightly.
She stood, actually panting. She strove to look at him, and failed utterly. Then she tried to free her hand and failed in that, too.
Had the place been less public he would surely have taken her in his arms. But dinner was barely an hour off, and guests were likely to be passing at any minute.
Moreover, being at the angle of the corridor, they were likely to come upon them without any warning whatever; just as they had come upon one another.
"Rosie," he said, without the slightest premeditation or consideration, "I've been very unhappy and very foolish, and Mrs. Darling has brought me to my senses. She doesn't want me and she doesn't want the ring. Will you take it back? Will you takemeback? She says that you are the one I love, and I think she knows."
All this at headlong speed, spoken as fast as he could form and utter the words. As he ended he opened the hand that had been fumbling at a pocket and showed her the ring—her engagement ring—lying in his palm.
She seemed to stumble and fall sideways against the wall, and his arm went out to steady her.
"Oh!" she gasped. "And mama? What of mama?"
"We'll run away and get married." His words were as wild as her own. "We'll tell no one. We'll fly. And afterward—afterward—" But there he stuck.
"And mama?" she said again. "And mama?"
He was sure now that for him she was the only woman in the world. "We will live abroad," he said heartily. "Ceylon, Yukon, or some place"—his imagination surely had limitations this evening—"and we will never come back."
Rosamond at length achieved control.
"Mama will never leave us in peace," she declared. "Mama will find us wherever we go. Believe me, mama is quite set against the marriage. She will not have it. And she says if it goes forwardever, she'll surely take you away from me. I can't tell you what awful things she's told me—things you've said to her. Terrible things."
At that he paled and loosed her hand. Certainly the corridor was far too public for this kind of conversation; and yet all he could sense was the odor of probable triumph—the exaltation, the exhilaration of winning out.
Never mind the mother; that selfish, narrow-viewed American grass-widow, who had her little way of having her little way on all occasions and under all circumstances.
He was determined that Rosamond Veynol must go off with him, so that Nina—and everybody else, of course, might hear of it. All other considerations were forgotten. He seized her hand again.
"Listen, my dear girl," he pleaded. "We do love one another. We've said so a thousand times. Your mama doesn't want the match, and we've tried to break it off. We can't break it off. It's too strong for us. We both have found that out.
"When I suddenly saw you this morning I knew it was too strong for me. Now you know it, too. But we can't put it through in the open. So let us put it through in the only other way. Let's run off. And at once."
She lifted her eyes to his and he felt that she would help him to manage it somehow. He didn't stop an instant to consider that perhaps she, too, had her triumph to secure. Rosamond was human too.
There was the world, and her mother, and—Mrs. Darling. Oh, especially there was Mrs. Darling. Carleigh didn't know, and Nina didn't know. Nobody knew, in fact, but Rosamond Veynol.
Caryll took her in his arms, unresisting, and hugged her very close. He had been warned about the corridor, but he didn't heed in time.
He was still holding her, and his lips were pressed tightly to hers, when Cecile turned the angle and uttered a little cry of astonishment.
Of course there was no escape.
"We—we're going to be married at once," Carleigh explained, stammeringly. And Rosamond, nodding, blushed as red as a peony.
"I am glad," Cecile congratulated.
"But—but—you see," the young baronet continued, one arm still held possessively about his fiancée's waist, "while we're delighted that you should know, we aren't quite ready to tell society in general."
"I understand perfectly. Rely on me to preserve your confidence. I think it is positively lovely."
"Yes, isn't it?" said Rosamond. "Caryll and I were made for one another. You do understand, don't you, dear Mrs. Archdeacon?"
"Perfectly," repeated Cecile. "By the bye, dear, the car has been waiting for you this half hour. If you've changed your mind—"
Rosamond shook her head vigorously. "Oh, but I haven't," she returned. Then she said to Caryll: "I'm going over to the Manse, at Ranleigh Copse, for a couple of days. If you'd care to ride over to-morrow—"
"Care to?" he murmured. "How can I wait until to-morrow? Suppose I run over with you now, just to see you safely there."
"Won't you be late getting back to dinner?" asked the chatelaine of Carfen House. "The countess might, you know, be annoyed."
Carleigh smiled. "As the earl has failed to fit me with pumps," he said, "I consider myself excusable. Would you mind explaining for me, my dear Cecile?"
Of course he drove over to the Manse with Rosamond. Nothing in the world could have held him back just then.
And on the way he told her of how nearly he had lost his life in the fire and of how her face had come before him in what he believed was his last moment.
"That should prove beyond everything how I love you, dearest," he murmured.
"I don't require any proof, Caryll, my own," she said. "I feel it so deep, deep down in the heart of me. Our brain knows other things, but it is with our heart that we know the things of love."
There was a great deal of this sort of thing on the way over, and if the chauffeur had sharp ears he must have been very much amused or—very much bored.
Love-making is always so infinitely entertaining to the lovers, with every burning word a fresh delight; and yet how tiresome, flat, trite, stale, and unprofitable to the disinterested yet enforced listener.
Carleigh got back to Cross Saddle Hall in ample time to dress for dinner, and found no less than a dozen pairs of pumps of varying sizes spread out on his floor for inspection and selection.
After dining he redressed and went up to town by a late train. The next day he returned his borrowed attire, and then he went down to Bellingdown once more for a long and important conference with his aunt.
It took place in Lady Bellingdown's boudoir, and this is the way he began it: "Rosamond and I are to be married within a week, and we'd like to be married here."
Lady Bellingdown's breath was quite taken away. She couldn't say a thing. So her nephew proceeded: "You see, we thought first of going to the registrar, saying nothing to any one, and just slipping off to some foreign paradise all by ourselves.
"But Rosamond says she never expects to be married but once, and that as she has her wedding-gown all ready and waiting she might as well wear it and show it."
"But I thought—" began his kinswoman, and got no farther.
"You thought I was in love with Mrs. Darling," he interrupted. "So I—No, I wasn't. I was fascinated, infatuated. But I—Of course you heard about the fire at Carfen?"
"We heard she was horribly burned. Do tell me the particulars."
"They say she's disfigured," he explained. "Her face is all swathed now."
"That will rob her of her power. And she was so beautiful."
"Yes, she was beautiful," agreed Carleigh. "And she did have power. She could make a man forget his eternal soul."
"Nina was wonderful at making men forget," said his Aunt Kitty. "She made you forget, didn't she?"
"For a little while. Then, by purest chance, I saw Rosamond again, and—well, I knew that she was the only woman I could ever really care for as one's wife should be cared for. She is an angel."
"But her mother?"
"Ah, her mother. We are going to keep clear of Mrs. Veynol."
"Can you?"
"Certainly. We must, you see. I don't know what it is, but she rouses all the devil there is in me. And then—" He paused.
"And then?" Lady Bellingdown asked.
"Then she tells Rosamond."
"Was that how she separated you before? I never exactly knew."
"That was at the bottom of it."
"And you mean to be married now—here—without letting her know?"
"Yes. Once we are married, what can she do? Rosie's of age, you know. She doesn't have to ask any one's consent. When she is Lady Carleigh we can defy the mater."
"But I thought you were going to keep out of the way."
"We are if—if we can. Absence is better than defiance, isn't it?"
"Absence may be defiance," said his aunt. "I didn't think of it that way."
"Yes," he agreed, but he evidently had some misgiving.
"But you're not so certain as you were a minute ago that you can keep the place of your absence a secret. Is that it?"
"Mrs. Veynol has an uncanny faculty of finding things out," he confided miserably.
"Now, there's where Nina has an advantage," Lady Bellingdown suggested. "She has no mother. You would have had no distressing mother-in-law."
Sir Caryll was thoughtful. Then: "But Mrs. Darling is too old for me. She said so herself."
"I suppose that's true. Nina seems fixed in her purpose never to marry. Fancy a woman saying she is too old for any man!"
"She counts by experience rather than years possibly. One would never think of age in her case if she didn't remind one."
"She's very lovely," said Kitty Bellingdown with something of finality. "Where will you and Rosamond spend your honeymoon?" she added.
"That's just it," Carleigh returned with knitted brow. "It's the one problem that troubles me. Honeymoon places are so devilishly well known. All Mrs. Veynol would have to do is to keep her eyes on the newspapers. She'd spot us within a week. And then—she'd follow."
"You might travelincognito."
"On one's wedding journey? Never! How can you think of it, Aunt Kitty? Don't you see—"
"Of course I see," she broke in. "Forgive me. It never once occurred to me."
Then they let that question drop, having been frightened away by thus straying on dangerous ground.
The arrangements for the nuptials were all completed in the next hour. They were not to be in any wise simple. They were to be very imposing, in fact, with a whole house full of guests, hurriedly brought together, yet every one under a strict bond of secrecy.
Rosamond was to stop on at the Manse until the second day before. Then she was to withdraw her trousseau from where it had been so hurriedly rushed into storage in London and appear at Bellingdown on the eve of her last day of maidenhood.
Lord Waltheof was deputed to look after minor details; but Lord Kneedrock, could his consent be obtained, was to be best man.
Carleigh saw personally to this, of course, and encountered no trouble. Kneedrock consented without demur and offered to see his grace, the Archbishop of Highshire, and arrange with him to perform the ceremony.
And, wonder of wonders, everything was carried out precisely as planned! The September day proved glorious. The sun shone on the bride in good omen, and the bride was a picture of loveliness.
Many of the presents, returned six weeks before, came back in the same wrappings, and most of the rest would probably come later when the givers learned what had happened and how.
But no one—not even Lady Bellingdown—was given a hint as to the honeymoon destination of bride and bridegroom.
They drove away toward London under a deluging shower of rice and old slippers, and with white ribbon—yards and yards of it—streaming from every attachable place on Sir Caryll's own motor-car.
After they had gone the guests continued very merry. A great quantity of champagne had been consumed in drinking the health and happiness of the launched voyagers on the matrimonial sea, and every one's spirits were keyed high.
Every one's, that is to say, except Kitty Bellingdown's and Kneedrock's.
"Poor dear Caryll!" sighed his aunt, who, like some others, always chose to weep over those that were given in matrimony. "Well, and so he's married at last!"
"And such a surprise!" exclaimed the duke. "I say, Doody, wasn't it a surprise?"
Doody didn't say anything. She was trying a new dance-step with Waltheof.
"And so now there's an end to the gossip," contributed Charlotte Grey.
Kneedrock, who had his back turned, wheeled around.
"Oh, is there?" he observed in his characteristic ringing undertone.
The duchess gave over trying the dance-step, and joined the group.
"His mother-in-law will be after them, of course," she said. "There'll be no keeping it from her. Such a dreadful person she is!"
"She rides races in boy's clothes," put in the duke. "She does—doesn't she, Doody?"
"And she bathes in one-piece, Continental bathing-suits," volunteered Waltheof. "I've seen her at Ostend. Ripping figure for the mother of such a big girl!"
"I wonder what will happen next?" mused Lady Bellingdown, who loved Carleigh like a son and was more than a little frightened.
"Nina will happen next," said Lord Kneedrock,sotto voce.
He was wondering why it was that the new Lady Carleigh reminded him so much of that Ramsay girl he had met through Nina at Simla.
The Carleighs went to Madeira for their honeymoon. It is a popular place for honeymoons; but not so popular as some others, because it's farther away.
No one knew but they, and they hoped that the mater wouldn't find out. They didn't in the least see how she was to find out.
Rosamond went so far as to write her a letter, omitting all mention of her wedding, of course, dating it from San Remo, and sending it there under cover to a confidential friend, to be mailed to "dear mama," who, it so happened, was still in Dublin.
Having thus taken every precaution to guard against pursuit, they threw care to the winds and reveled in their new and blissful companionship, amid tropical surroundings.
Everything amused them—the natives, the bullock-sledges, therêdes—hammocks swung on poles and carried by native bearers.
They explored the long ravine, visible from the windows of their rooms in the hotel at Funchal, riding on the backs of gaily-harnessed mules and sampling the wines of the vineyards along the way.
Of evenings there were always the botanical gardens, with their palms and rhododendrons, and the light-hearted Madeirans making afiestaof the hour.
There had been two weeks of it now—rapturous weeks—with Mrs. Veynol so far from their thoughts that even momentary memories had ceased to obtrude.
They sat in the half light of the gardens, a giant palm nodding above them, a soft breeze in their faces, lovers of another land—but still lovers like themselves—sauntering by, the men swinging malacca-sticks, the women's bright eyes shining beneath becomingly arranged mantillas, and believed paradise their very own.
And that was the moment that Fate chose for dropping a shadow. It descended while their heads were turned the other way, and their first warning was when a voice they both knew and recognized instantly fell like the knell of doom on their joy-attuned ears.
"Aren't you going to kiss mother, son?"
Carleigh seemed propelled to his feet. It appeared to him that he came up with a whirling motion. If he could only have gone on whirling and rising, like certain cardboard toys he remembered to have seen, it would have been such a satisfaction.
But, instead, he seemed to whirl straight into his mother-in-law's open arms, which closed affectionately—oh, so affectionately!—around him. And it wasn't at all a nice kiss she gave him or he gave her.
There was nothing maternal about it. It was so ardent that he felt ashamed, and when he was at length released and caught sight of Rosamond's eyes he was more ashamed than ever. He couldn't understand himself.
He didn't love Sibylla Veynol. He was sure he didn't. He would have been delighted never to see her again. And he did love her daughter. Yet this was the way it had been before.
Then their kisses had been in secret. Now that she had the right she chose to demand them openly. Heretofore she had told her daughter things. Now she meant to show her.
"I don't know whether to kiss you, Rosamond, or not," she said. "That letter you sent me from San Remo was a very low piece of work."
"But, mama—" began Lady Carleigh, and got no farther.
"What must the world think," her mother went on, "when it learns that you are married and that I was not bidden to your wedding?"
"Why, mama—" the bride attempted once more.
"I don't blame Caryll in the least," mama continued. "I am sure that he had nothing to do with it. He would have been only too glad to have me there. It was you, my ungrateful daughter—my own flesh and blood—who was at the bottom of it all."
"Oh, I say—" It was Carleigh who made the attempt this time.
"No, you needn't speak," Mrs. Veynol checked him. "You are a gentleman and wish to take the blame on your own shoulders; but, no matter what you said, I shouldn't believe you. Fortunately, I know my own daughter at last."
"It—it was the only way," Rosamond faltered.
"It was a very wicked way. Still, I don't see how I am to blame you. Caryll is so fascinating it is all I can do to resist him myself. But—oh, dear, I had quite forgotten!"
She turned abruptly to where a fair-haired young man, slightly round-shouldered, stood hat in hand behind her. "Let me present Mr. Miles O'Connor, Lady Carleigh—Sir Caryll Carleigh."
Rosamond inclined her head, and Carleigh bowed a little stiffly. Mr. Miles O'Connor withdrew a tentatively advanced hand.
"Mr. O'Connor," explained Mrs. Veynol, "is the sub-editor ofBritish Society. It was through him that I located you. How he managed it I don't know. I am curious myself; but he tells me it is an office secret, which is equivalent to a secret of the confessional."
Neither Sir Caryll nor his wife spoke. Both would have liked to cut out the tongue that had betrayed them.
"Mr. O'Connor came with me from London. He has been most kind and considerate. I can never hope to repay him."
"HasBritish Societyceased publication?" asked Carleigh bitingly.
"It's a little vacation I'm taking," ventured the sub-editor.
"Sorry you delayed it so long," rejoined the baronet, still more acidly.
"We were fortunate enough to secure rooms on the same corridor with you at your hotel," Mrs. Veynol disclosed.
"Mr. O'Connor again, I assume," said Carleigh. "As capable a courier as an editor—I mean as a sub-editor."
"Sir Caryll is pleased to be ironical," snapped the young Irishman, boiling.
"I'm not pleased at all," Sir Caryll replied equivocally. "Ordinarily I am most complacent, but I can't bear a sneaking, snooting busybody who's always attending to every one's business but his own."
O'Connor's fists doubled, but Mrs. Veynol laid a quieting hand on his curving shoulder.
"Caryll, dear," she soothed, "you are unjust. You are, really. Mr. O'Connor has served me at great personal sacrifice. I don't know what I should have done without him. When I learned that Rosamond was not at San Remo—had never been there—I was torn with anxiety. Fancy the feelings of a fond mother! I applied to Mr. O'Connor in my extremity, and he proved himself a friend in need."
Carleigh turned away, but no less vexed. In his wife's eyes he saw tears glistening. And they had been so inexpressibly happy.
He was tempted to allude toBritish Society'stheory of why his engagement had been broken—to inquire about the convict first husband—his Rosamond's own father—but he resisted the impulse, determining, nevertheless, to thresh out the matter with Mrs. Veynol privately at the first opportunity.
But there was no opportunity that evening. He managed it, however, the following morning. He was astir early, leaving Rosamond, who had been wakeful from nervousness, to get some compensating slumber.
And he met his mother-in-law, as if by prearrangement, in the hotel gardens while the dew was still on leaf and flower. To his delight she was unattended.
"You grow younger every time I see you," he said, kissing her hand in the Continental fashion he knew she liked. "You might be Rosa's sister."
It was odd how against his will such pretty speeches were wrung from him by this woman who in one way repelled him.
They strolled about for a while, and then sat down on a bench, which Carleigh did not observe was in full view from his wife's windows. But it was.
"Couldn't you have come here alone, mater?" he asked. It was the first time he had called her that, and it didn't please her. He saw it before she spoke.
"For Heaven's sake, Caryll dear, don't!" she begged. "You make me feel a hundred. If you can't find a pet name for me you may call me Sibylla, or Sibyl, or just Sib. But I'll hate you if you mater me. And I don't want to hate you. I don't really."
"No more than I wish to hate you," he laughed. "But I will unless you send that Irish bounder about his business. Fancy you fetching a cad like that, Sibyl—dear!"
"But I didn't," she protested. "It was he who fetched me. He would find Rosamond for me on no other terms. We came by train to Lisbon, you know. And he never mentioned Funchal until we were on the steamer."
"He's even more of a cad than I thought then."
"He's in love with me," Sibylla said.
"And you have encouraged him. Good Lord!"
"For a purpose. Purely for a purpose."
"And after what he did—after that vile screed he published."
She colored softly. "Then you saw it?" she asked.
"It was sent to me in Scotland. Of course I knew it wasn't true. I was tempted to horsewhip the beggar."
"But it was true," she declared boldly. "That was the worst of it."
And at that Carleigh sat suddenly upright, whereas he had been lounging. "I never knew it. I never threw Rosamond over for it. You know that."
"That was its only inaccuracy. The prison part was quite true. Your wife's father is still serving his sentence in the United States Federal Prison at Atlanta, Georgia."
"And you never told me! She never told me!" he cried reproachfully.
"It was a secret we thought buried. Why should we have dug it up?"
"Because I was marrying into the family. I was entitled to—"
"I had no intention of permitting you to marry into the family. You must grant I did all in my power to stop it. I even resorted to attracting you myself. I felt sure that my daughter would never marry a man who flirted with her mother. It was shameful perhaps, but I could not afford to be too discriminating."
"You had far better have told me," he protested.
"You mean that if you had known you would not have married?"
"No. I am not sure. But I should have had the chance to consider. Now it is too late."
Mrs. Veynol laughed ringingly.
"Not at all," she denied. "Marriage is the least irrevocable of steps. Give my daughter the grounds and I promise you she will divorce you."
"I have messed things up," mused Carleigh dismally.
"You see, I've lost neither time nor effort to let you know," said Mrs. Veynol. "As a gentleman, though, you will preserve my confidence. As a son-in-law I have told you what I could not even as afutur."
"But the whole world knows it," he retorted. "It has been published."
"And it has been denied—retracted with an apology—a very abject apology. Mr. O'Connor did it. He was most kind."
Carleigh fell to musing again. Finally he said: "What was your first husband's name?"
"The same as always," she answered, smiling at his past tense. "He hasn't changed it. It was only I that changed mine and Rosamond's. His name is Ramsay—J. Sprague Ramsay."
"You divorced him before or after he went to prison?" Caryll asked.
"I divorced himwhenhe went to prison," was her precise answer. "Then I took back my maiden name, called my daughter Rosamond instead of Jane—she had been christened Jane Rosamond—and deserted the world that knew us for Cape Town, where I met Mr. Veynol and married him."
"You are an ambitious woman, Sibyl," observed her son-in-law thoughtfully.
"Yes, I am," she admitted candidly. "And, you see, my ambition runs higher than a mere baronet. Let the girl divorce you, and I'll marry her to an earl."
"But I'm not going to let the girl divorce me." He had reached a decision. "I love her too much, and—" His eyes dwelt appraisingly for a moment on the woman beside him. In her dark, Spanish, almost gipsy way, she held a lure that for the susceptible Carleigh was well-nigh irresistible. "And," he added, "her mother is far too fascinating."
Mrs. Veynol laughed, but his flattery was not lost. "Kiss mother, son," she commanded and leaned toward him.
He glanced furtively from right to left. Not a soul was in sight. Then he took her in his arms and pressed her close, and the kiss was that of the night over again. If anything it was warmer.
The sub-editor left Madeira by the next calling steamer, liberally remunerated for his services.
Relieved of his presence, the Carleighs and Mrs. Veynol stayed on. They stayed for another fortnight. Then they traveled to Nice, arriving a little in advance of the season.
No one of them, however, was quite happy. The serpent had entered paradise, and its sweetest fruits had turned acrid.
In these days Sir Caryll talked more with his mother-in-law than he did with his wife. Her experience was wider, and she had more imagination.
Occasionally there were revelations that were like sudden drops into icy waters. For instance, one day when they had gone to Monte Carlo together, leaving Rosamond at Nice with a headache or some other ill, she surprised him by saying:
"It's odd Nina Darling never told you of us."
"You mean she knew?" he asked in astonishment.
"I'm not sure. We've never met—since. But we were great friends five years ago in Simla."
"It isn't possible she knows?" said Carleigh.
"I wouldn't be certain," said the whilom Mrs. Ramsay. "She can keep a secret. None better. You know, there's no doubt she shot poor Darling. They were alone in the gun-room together, and he couldn't have done it himself."
"I'll never believe that," he returned.
"Then you'll never believe the truth."
"But why? What was her object?"
"She wanted him out of the way to marry Lord Kneedrock, who was supposed to be dead, but was only buried for eight years in the South Seas."
"Nonsense!" said Carleigh. "She doesn't love Kneedrock. Never did. I've seen them together. I've heard them both talk, and I know."
"I told you she could keep a secret," said Sibylla Veynol.
They returned to Nice before dinner, and Carleigh found his wife reading.
"Feeling more fit?" he asked.
"I shall never feel more fit," she answered without looking up from her book.
"You don't mean it's incurable? Have you had in the physician?"
"Oh, it's not physical," she replied petulantly. "It's mental. It's the conditions. I'm sick of everything. You don't care in the least for me any more. You haven't since mama came back. You had an assignation with her in the gardens of the hotel at Funchal the very next morning, and you kissed her there under my window. I saw you."
The thing took him so by surprise that he couldn't muster a single word for defense.
"I do wish you'd leave me," she went on. "Why don't you ask mama to bolt with you? I'm sure she would, and then I'd be rid of you both."
He nearly reeled under the shock of that speech. It held him still mute. It was painfully plain that something was wrong in a social fabric which made it possible for a wife to say such a thing—a young and pretty wife, too. And to say it without seeming to find it very heinous.
He noticed that she yawned and went on reading her book.
When he fully sensed it all, hours later, alone on the promenade, he decided to go off. But not with "mama."
Just as soon as she could possibly manage it Nina left the Dalgries, and alone with her maid hied herself to that stupidest of all English resorts—Bath.
There she took a flat and secured two servants, and kept herself so secluded that the story went abroad that the blind beggar in the famous poem was a beauty beside her.
Some said that she was sightless and some that she had been scarred beyond all recognition; but nobody really knew because nobody had really seen her.
Nobody, that is to say, except her surgeon and his assistant, and Delphine, the French maid.
Nina chose Bath because of this wonderful surgeon, Dr. Pottow, who was connected with the chief hospital there, and knew more about the skin and cutaneous affections than any man in England.
He promised to restore her if restoration were possible, but he was very reticent about the method until his success was assured. Then he told her that it had been necessary to resort to the grafting of new and healthy skin to take the place of that which had been scorched practically to a cinder.
"But where did you get it?" Nina asked, deeply interested. She knew that it had not been taken from her and transplanted.
"I was fortunate enough to find a volunteer," answered the surgeon.
"I suppose she required some fabulous price," Nina rejoined. "But if it has given me back an unmarred countenance I shall be only too glad to pay."
"There is nothing to pay," Dr. Pottow told her. "He gave it gratuitously, and was glad to."
"Hegave it!" exclaimed the patient, starting up, impelled by flooding emotions.
"Yes, he."
"Shall I have to shave?" she asked, seriously startled by the dread possibility.
"No," came the answer with a smile. "The skin wasn't from his chin. There'll be no beard to bother you."
"I'd much rather had it from my own sex," she pouted.
"My sex is less selfish," said the surgeon. "Few women would sacrifice their cuticle that an afflicted sister might regain her beauty."
"Still I don't like the idea of being even that much man," she insisted. "I have always been so thoroughly—so entirely feminine."
"The cells are constantly renewing themselves." It was the scientist speaking. "You will wear these only temporarily."
Nina thought for a moment. Then she said: "Of course I shall pay him. I shall insist on it."
"I'm sure he won't accept. He regarded it a great privilege, he was delighted at the opportunity."
And at that she became really alarmed. It was some one she knew, of course. It was one or another, no doubt, of the army of lovers she had sent about their business when their ardor grew too oppressive.
But which one? Ah, that was the question—which one?
"But you've put me under a terrible obligation," she complained. "I think you should have consulted me, Dr. Pottow, before accepting such a sacrifice. I am very uncomfortable over it."
"You would have been more uncomfortable disfigured for life," he replied sagely.
Of course it wasn't Nibbetts. He would delight in seeing her hideous. The cabinet minister was out of the question, too. He'd be sure to get into the newspapers. Besides, he was very bitter.
The soldier of fortune was out of the country. And Carleigh was married and honeymooning. The American aviator had been killed volplaning.
"It might be the poet," she said aloud.
"I don't think he's ever been guilty of sonnets," observed Pottow. "Still we never know. He's most interested now in sheep-raising and in quarrying freestone."
"Good Heavens!" cried Mrs. Darling. "He isn't even a gentleman. How could you? Oh, how could you, Dr. Pottow?"
He smiled quizzically and excused himself with: "I hadn't any choice, you know. To tell the truth, I've done so much of this sort of thing that I've reduced the visible supply of skin, here in Bath, to the minimum."
"I don't see how he knew me," she went on, puzzled. "I'm very secluded here. I don't know a soul in the place, except you."
"You know him, or did. He says he owes you something, and—"
"What is his name?" she demanded, interrupting.
"I thought you'd ask that before. But you wished to place him for yourself, didn't you? And I'm afraid you'll have to. You see, when he volunteered it was on certain conditions; and that he was not to be known in the premises was one of them."
"But you've told me everything but his name."
"That was especially stipulated."
"And I am never to be any the wiser?" she inquired. "That seems hardly fair. Since I can't pay him I certainly should be permitted to thank him."
"I'll take your thanks to him."
"No. I wish to thank him myself, in person."
"You want him to come here?"
"I want him to come here—just as soon as I am fit to be seen."
"He'll come to-day, if you say so," he surprised her with.
"Oh, no, no, no. Not while I'm like this."
"But he's seen you worse than this, remember. He's been in this room a dozen—a score of times."
"Here!" she exclaimed, amazed.
"Of course. While your eyes were bandaged. While the transfer was made."
"Then he saw how awful I was?"
"I fancy he didn't regard you as awful. He seemed—"
But she wouldn't let him go on. "Send him this evening," she commanded, "and I'll have the lights arranged so that I can see him while I myself am veiled by the kindly shadow."
When the surgeon was gone Nina fell to wondering once more. There were flirtations she had totally forgotten; there was no question about that. But she had always been rather a stickler for caste, and she couldn't at all reconcile the sheep-raising and the stone-quarrying with any of her lightly amorous adventures.
Perhaps, after all, she had been on the wrong track. Certainly she had been on the wrong track. This man owed her something, the perplexing Pottow had said, meaning evidently a debt of gratitude.
Then it couldn't be one of those. They were the last persons to think themselves in arrears of that kind. It must be some one she had befriended. She supposed she had befriended poor men on occasions, but she couldn't recall individual cases.
Possibly it was a coachman or gardener, or one of the tenantry at some place she had been years agone.
Or—why, to be sure!—some private from the ranks, who had completed his service, fallen heir to a little farm and a little quarry here in Somersetshire, and settled down to the prosaic life of a plodding civilian.
The idea robbed the prospect of the meeting of most of its interest. And it was the only idea she could accept. She even forgot to tell Delphine that she was expecting a caller, and she forgot, too, to have the lights arranged as she had planned.
When, therefore, her maid came to her with the announcement that a gentleman was calling—a gentleman who wouldn't give his name, but said that he came at Dr. Pottow's suggestion—she was not in the least prepared.
"Does he seem a gentleman, Delphine?" she asked, interested afresh.
"Oh, oui, madame!A young gentleman, and good-looking."
"Have you ever seen him before?"
"Of a certainty, madame. Here, with Dr. Pottow."
"But you never heard his name?"
"Never, madame."
Then, hastily, she had her arrange the lights and give her a fan with which to mask the lower part of her features where the now healing burns were still more or less unsightly.
And then she waited—sure still that she was to be disappointed.
She heard the steps at length in the passage, and fixed her eyes upon the door. But the light was not very good there, either—she had had it concentrated as far as possible on the chair placed for the visitor at least four yards from her bedside, toward the foot and facing her.
He was in the room now, just over the threshold, bowing at what must have seemed to him just a black shadow, and save that he was tall, and that his figure was gracefully slender, what she saw meant nothing to her whatever. He hadn't even spoken, so there was no voice to recognize.
As he came forward, though, there was something in his walk and carriage that seemed familiar, though she couldn't place them for the life of her.