CHAPTER VIA LESSON UPON SKISThe "ghost" had been seen by many of the guests in the Palace Hotel, but not by the "little widow," despite her wakefulness. For her the night was fruitful of other thoughts, and chiefly the thought of her own situation, of its difficulties and its dangers.They had christened her the "little widow" down at Sierre, and the embarrassing distinction of a pardonable error had followed her to Andana. So much she had achieved by her desire to obliterate the past and to recall, if it were possible, the innocence and the freedom of her girlhood. But she knew now that the attempt had failed, and that she stood upon the brink of a discovery which must be attended by shame. Luton Delayne would come to Andana sooner or later, and all would know the truth.It is true that she did not lack courage, and had the perception to see that worldly sympathy, so far as she cared to win it, must be upon her side; but the ordeal through which she must pass, in a sense the exposure, affrighted her and robbed her even of a desire to sleep. The morning of the day might bring the man to the hotel; the evening might send her upon her way again, a derelict upon a lonely sea which offered no safe harbourage.There had been no child of her marriage, and thus no chain upon her desire for freedom. Her father, Sir Frederick Kennaird, had married again at the age of fifty-seven; and while the gates of the old home were not shut against her, she shrank from the thought of such a shelter. Her only brother, Harold, was with his regiment in India, and had already condemned her conduct in strenuous letters full of childish complaints. "Would she drag her story into the papers? Wash their dirty linen in public?"—and all that sort of thing. To these she made answer that she would be the arbiter of her own fortune, and that if the family honour depended upon her tolerance of such a man as Luton Delayne, she would not lift a finger to save it.This was well enough as an expression of her promise, but more difficult as a practice. Enjoying an allowance of three thousand a year from her father, whose collieries brought him ten times that sum, she discovered presently that candour is a factor in the due enjoyment of life, and that the world has little love of anonymity. Go where she would, to remote cities of Europe, to the East, even to America, there were some who knew her story and would sell secrecy at a price. She made no friends, won no sure refuge, could find no sanctuary. Sometimes she regretted her determination to be known henceforth as Lily Kennaird, and wondered if her brother were not right when he described such a subterfuge as madness. Sacrifice carried her into a new world, and one with which she was unfamiliar. She missed the amenities of the state she had abandoned, its overt dignities, its influence and power. Mrs. Kennaird was merely the "little widow" to the multitude. It had been otherwise when she was Lady Delayne.All this troubled her during the night, and the new day found her afflicted by apprehensions to which she had long been a stranger. Twice in as many years she had seen her husband, Luton, and upon each occasion at a crisis of his life. A wanderer like herself, he lived chiefly upon the allowance of one thousand a year which she made him, and when that was exhausted, upon his wits, which were considerable. The latter occupation was not unattended by danger and the curiosity of the police. Lily wondered sometimes at her patience.And now he had followed her to Switzerland, and unquestionably would visit her at Andana. What shameful story lay behind the pursuit she could not imagine; but of the existence of such a story she was sure. Luton Delayne rarely troubled her unless his case were desperate—and desperate indeed it must be for him to abandon the purlieus of Monte Carlo at such a season. She resolved, upon her part, to refuse him audience if that were possible; and if it were not possible, then to summon all her courage and insist that this interview should be final. The day for compromise was past.It had been her promise to the parson, Harry Clavering, that she would submit to the ordeal of the skis on this morning; and when, with Kavanagh, she met him on the veranda of the hotel, he reminded her pleasantly of her obligations.Unwilling to disappoint, she professed her readiness to face the ordeal, and skis having been commanded from the hotel porter, the parson upon one side and Kavanagh upon the other set to work to imprison the smallest pair of feet in Andana and to tell the owner the news while they did so."You've heard that the ghost has been seen?" asked Clavering, a little excitedly. She shook her head incredulously."Oh, but it's quite true. Miss Nellie Rider saw it from her bedroom window and so did her sister. Sir Gordon Snagg is another. He declares it was a man in a flying machine. I shouldn't wonder if he were right."Kavanagh was of this opinion."There are fools in the world who will do anything," he said. "Some idiot out of Hanwell may have brought his aeroplane here to scare the natives; and jolly well he's succeeded. I hope he may break his neck, that's all. He deserves to, that's sure."He thought that the "little widow" would agree with him as a matter of course, and her answer rather astonished him."Then you think that pioneers are very wicked people?" she remarked; "you have no sympathy with them, Mr. Kavanagh?""Oh, I won't say that—good for science and all that sort of thing. What I mean is, let's keep the mountains anyway. We don't want ginger-beer bottles on our heads up here—do we now? I'm sure Mr. Clavering agrees to that."The parson dissented altogether."I think it would be a brave thing to fly here," he said quietly, "a very brave thing. And I hope the day when we cannot admire courage is distant. If there had been no pioneers in the world, I should not be travelling through the Simplon Tunnel to Bellagio in three weeks' time, and you would not be smoking that excellent tobacco. If there is an aeroplane at Andana, it must be owned by one of the men who is about to fly for the great prize offered by the English daily paper. I hope he will win it.""But you wouldn't go up in one yourself?" Kavanagh insisted."Not for a thousand sovereigns, poor as I am."Kavanagh laughed, but found no support from Lily Kennaird. She, grown a little less pale in the glorious freshness of the morning, was more concerned with the difficulties of the uncouth implements they had strapped to her boots than with any question of flight and its consequences. How awkward she felt! How impossible it seemed to do anything at all with those great wooden skates, so much taller than she was, and so exceedingly slippery."Now," said the parson, who had fixed his own skis and become a little more anxious when he had done so, "just shuffle along without lifting your feet, if you can; it's quite easy to walk up—-the coming down is the difficulty. We'll go to the slopes by the Park Hotel and find a very gentle one. I'm sure you'll like it when you become accustomed to the balance. The great thing is not to be afraid."Kavanagh seconded this, and was in the act of showing her exactly how to place her feet, when he sat down without warning, and having remained some moments in an attitude of despair, explained that he had done it to show the ease with which one can rise when the boots and straps are all right. This process he repeated at intervals on their way to the Park Hotel; indeed, he proved a paragon of good nature in the matter.The fine weather of the previous day favoured them again, and the famous slopes were merry with the gambols of the players. Here there is a great basin of the snow with a lake at its depths and the white mountains towering high above it. The banks themselves are often gentle and rarely difficult; and hither go the inexperienced to be tutored by kindly masters, who are themselves but children at the game. On every side you hear the injunction not to be afraid—so pompously uttered, so difficult to obey. Elderly gentlemen, who would be more at home upon a rocking-horse, glide down gentle declivities and are proud of the success which follows them to the bottom. Spinsters, of far from mature aspect, sit down upon less than no provocation at all, and declare it to be glorious. The great white kindergarten is the merriest place in all the world—and the world is far distant from it.Parson Clavering had an excellent eye for an easy slope, and he chose one just suited to his own capacities. It was about three hundred yards from the chalet which Benny had hired, and that excellent fellow, looking out of the window and blaming his hard luck, forgot the latter employment when he espied the "little widow." How he envied the cheery parson, who was holding her arm; how he detested that gilded popinjay (Benny had got the expression from a novel) who stood by her side and smoked a cigarette as though he had hired the parson to do the manual work of which he himself would reap the fruit. But Benny carried his arm in a sling to-day, and even his zeal prompted no thought of skis. He was lucky to be alive.Meanwhile he could watch the lesson—and instructive it was. First Clavering would show his pupil exactly how to stand, with one leg slightly before the other and the arms, which carried the trailing sticks, held well behind the body. Then the amiable little man would proceed to slide down the slope himself, perhaps sitting hurriedly at the foot of it, or arriving triumphantly at his goal as a man who has achieved greatness. When his pupil essayed to do the same and sank immediately into the soft snow, he assured her that such a proceeding was correct, and that by tribulation only would perfection be attained."They tell boys who hunt that they must fall forty times before they can ride—anyone who skis must fall four hundred times," he said reassuringly. "Now don't be afraid—we are all in the same boat, and we sink together. You are not hurt, I hope?"She told him that she was not hurt at all—though, as a fact, she had dashed a little wildly down the slope and fallen heavily upon her side at the bottom. A fine effort to save her upon Kavanagh's part resulted in that lordly person falling headlong and in such a position that his skis held him immobile, and he had to cry for help. When he was rescued and had brushed the snow from his immaculate collar, he asked her if she did not find it "rather rotten"; but being answered in the negative, he retired to the path again and watched her a little jealously. That "infernal parson" was having the time of his life—really it was too ridiculous.In plain truth, Lily had begun already to enjoy herself exceedingly. The keenness of the air, the glorious sunshine, the delight of this new exercise drove all other thoughts from her head; and for the time being she was a child again with all a child's ardour. This ski-ing must be the most fascinating thing on earth, she thought, while she watched those experts, Bob Otway and Keith Rivers, sailing down the mountain-side with a dexterity which amazed her. Patience would teach her to imitate them, and then the heights would be open to her. A vain desire whispered that the mountains might be her safe refuge after all, and that they would harbour her—an altitude of dreams upon which Bob Otway's hard voice intruded painfully: "I say, Kavanagh," he roared, "come up and jump. Miss Rivers wants to see you do it; you aren't going to disappoint her?"Kavanagh retorted by fixing his glass in his eye and turning upon that wild youth a glance which deserved the attribute "stony.""I am not an acrobat," he snapped severely. "If you will tell me how much you require to begin, I will put something into your hat."Bob Otway turned away with a laugh."By Jove, old chap, it would want a precious big hat to make you start," and with that for a shot he began to climb up the mountain-side toward the chalet where Nellie Rivers was waiting for him."Otway's a fine jumper," said the parson, "I believe he learned in Norway. It's quite impossible to do what he does unless you are caught young. Shall we watch him come down? It is really a fine thing to see."She assented willingly, and they watched the "happy pair," who were now far up the slope by the Park Hotel and preparing to take the jump which has been fashioned about half-way down the valley. This was nothing more nor less than a kind of diving board of snow, from which the runners would take off as they dashed down the steep. "A clever performer," said the parson, "would jump ninety or a hundred feet before his skis touched ground again"; but the proceeding was hazardous, and some wonderful falls resulted. However, he had no fears about Bob Otway, and when that young gentleman started with a flourish, he followed him with expectant eyes. Alas for his hopes! Master Bob flew high into the air, missed his footing as he landed, and rolled over and over as though he would never stop. Then he sat motionless for many minutes—the situation required some thinking about, and Bob was rapidly becoming a philosopher.Nellie Rivers was more successful. A graceful performer at Alpine games, there was no prettier figure upon skis then in the mountains. And her jumping was, as Bob would tell you, divine. Hardly seeming to leave the track, she shot through the air at a tremendous pace, and landed so evenly and with such perfect balance that the run was resumed as though it had never been interrupted. Then she skimmed by the parson, and raising one foot suddenly and bringing the other round, she "telemarked" most gracefully and stood laughingly before him."Bob always falls when I am coming down," she said, "I suppose it's to make a soft place for me. Mr. Kavanagh would not be so obliging—I can see it in his eye."Kavanagh said that he would prefer to dig a hole with a spade; but he admitted that Master Bob was an obliging fellow enough."If nobody cut capers, this would be a rotten place. It's a man's duty to do something of the sort," he said, "but, of course—um—er—mere youth has the responsibility!""And the glory," said Clavering, who thought that the lesson might well be resumed upon so inspiring an example and immediately turned a somersault to demonstrate his aptitude as a pupil. The little man was wonderfully active from this time forth, and when half-past twelve came and they heard the bell calling them back to the Palace for lunch, he resolutely refused to go indoors. Had he not brought baskets packed with chicken and the mysterious sausage in which "Chic," the cook, delighted? They would bivouac up there in the woods—perhaps that generous person, Mr. Benjamin Benson, would permit them to use the table in the garden of his chalet—a suggestion which annoyed Kavanagh, but made an instantaneous appeal to Madame Lily. Yes, she would like it, she said, and having said it, repented immediately of the admission. What right had she to think with pleasure of any friendship of the kind?Nevertheless, they went up to the chalet and received the warm welcome they expected. Benny himself, his arm in a sling and his sallow face paler than ordinary, busied about the place with amazing ardour directly he heard that Mrs. Kennaird was of the party. His brother, apologising for the black-handled knives and the forks which matched them, declared that the kitchen fire was at their service; but he did so rather knavishly and with a glance aside at the beautiful woman who had intruded upon their privacy. It remained for the Abbé Villari to join the party, and he cut the oddest figure of all, for his cassock was girdled high about his waist while the sleeves of it were tucked up to his elbow. Moreover, he was exceedingly black, and when Benny explained with a very red face that the abbé had a penchant for amateur mechanics, it was easy to believe him."The gospel of the hammer, I suppose," said Kavanagh, staring fixedly at them as he spoke.Benny replied that some heads were very thick and that a corkscrew was the only implement to let a joke into them—a correct rendering of the great doctor'sbon mot, which made but a poor appeal to his enemy. Then they all sat down to lunch, and a merrier meal was not known that day at Andana.Lily could hardly believe in this sense of contentment which now came upon her. The magic power of the mountains as an antidote to ill had never been wholly understood by her before; she realised it as she sat there in the glowing sunshine and looked up to a sky infinitely blue. The great fields of the dazzling snow, the beauty of the woods, the grandeur of the prospect spoke of peace and rest as no other scene she could remember. And with it there came the idea that one man's good will contributed not a little to this gift of self-deception, and that in the humanity and good nature of such a personality as Benny the true secret was to be found. Much had the great world of artificiality and of false ideals taught her in her youth, but here was something different, something to be learned with gratitude, and being learned, not to be forgotten.Benny, for his part, hovered about her as a shadow, and when she inquired with a woman's gentleness of his hurt, he blushed like any schoolgirl."It was nothing—nothing at all," he said—but his brother Jack muttered that it was everything—and as he said it, he glanced at the "little widow" and wondered what evil fortune had sent her to Andana.CHAPTER VIIAN ULTIMATUMIt had just grown dark when Lily returned to the Palace Hotel, and the hall was quite full of muffled folk, whose arguments upon the events of the day waxed hot and eloquent. Some of these turned their heads as the "pretty little woman" went by; but the many were too interested in their narration of particular exploits to notice her. Upstairs, she found her sitting-room in darkness, but she knew, even before she had switched on the electric light, that it was not untenanted, and presently she discovered her husband, Luton, sitting by the window and smiling a little sardonically while he waited for her to speak.Eight months had passed since they had met, and time had not been kind to him. He looked very old, she thought, and his red hair was sown with grey. A fine man physically, he had lost flesh, and his clothes bagged upon his arms and chest. One characteristic remained—the evil of a face which had expressed little but evil since his childhood."Well," he said—and he had never been famous for his eloquence—"well, Lil, you didn't expect to see me, I suppose. Rather an unpleasant surprise for you, isn't it?"She took off her furs and laid them upon a chair. The room had become insufferably hot, and she would have opened the window had he not barred the way. But all her instinct forbade her to approach him, and she had need of her courage that he might not see her trembling."What do you want of me?" she rejoined in a cold voice—and then: "Why do you come here?"He liked the idea of it, and leaning back in the chair, laughed as though it were the drollest of notions."A man comes to see his wife, and she doesn't offer him the tips of her beautiful fingers! 'Pon my word, Lil, you look splendid when you stand like that—and since you press me, I will take a whisky-and-soda and a cigar just for luck."She ignored the request and advancing a little nearer to him, repeated the question:"Why do you come to me? Was it not understood that you should not come; was not that part of the bargain?"He shrugged his shoulders, but his face flushed none the less."Bargain be d——d! I'm in a hole—nine thousand four hundred pounds with Bothand and Co.—you remember them? I bought your emeralds there. Well, they talk of fraud and all that sort of stuff. I'll have to pay them, Lil—it's jail if I don't."She knew that it would be some story of this kind, and was relieved, it may be, to find it no worse. His exaggerations had ceased to alarm her, and she believed little of what he told her."You have had five thousand pounds from me in two years," she said quietly. "I am now making you an allowance of a thousand a year. If there is a duty in the matter, God knows I have done it. More I will not, whatsoever the consequences—you know that I cannot; it is quite impossible."He nodded his head, and, failing the cigar, took a cigarette from his case and lighted it."Why don't you ask the old man?" he retorted. "I tell you, Lil, this is business, and if I don't pay in ten days' time, there'll be mischief. You don't mean to say you'd send me to prison for nine thousand pounds—your beautiful father wouldn't disgrace his daughter for a trifle like that? I've been pretty considerate, I must say. It's nearly a year since I came to you, and then for twopence-halfpenny which I had to beg on my knees. By ——, you're becoming a Jew, my dear, a devilish pretty little Jew—that's what it is."She turned from him with contempt."You have my answer," she said. "I will continue to pay you a thousand a year while you leave me as I am. But I will not pay more, whatever the consequences. That is final and irrevocable. If you come to me at this hotel again, you shall never receive another penny. The understanding was made, and I will have it kept. Have I not suffered enough at your hands; is there to be no end to a woman's patience? You have ceased to be anything to me but a name—take care that I do not forbid you even that right."He smiled provokingly."You dare not do it, my dear; the old man wouldn't have it. Devilish proud old boy, Sir Frederick Kennaird, eh? His hair would turn grey if you talked about the courts—he told me so himself. He'll have to pay Bothand and look pleased. I shall write to him myself if you don't; tell him you're sailing under false colours here, and the men dancing at your heels. Eh, what, wouldn't that be the truth? Why, I saw you on the snow with two of them this morning, and I laughed. This paragon of virtue nods sometimes, eh? Well, I don't complain; I'm meek as a lamb. And I'm going to have nine thousand four hundred inside ten days, or there'll be a story at the New Bailey and you'll figure in it, my dear—for, you see, I used your name and they're not the kind of people to forget it. No, by gad, we'll sink or swim together—so help me Heaven!"Her anger had been growing while he spoke and now quite mastered her. The gentle lady had become the proud woman, full of courage and resolution."You are one of the worst of men," she said in a low voice. "I thought and believed that you had gone from my life; I now see how much I was mistaken. But I shall live now for nothing else. If you come here again, I will appeal to the people of the hotel for protection. You tell me that you have been guilty of fraud, and I can quite believe it. But understand: I will write no letter to my father, take no steps whatever to save you, and if you are punished, I will be the first to rejoice. Go now, and let that be my answer."He was not at all alarmed."Oh," he said, rising jauntily, "I'm going all right; but I'm up at Vermala if you want me. Remember it's nine thousand four hundred, and the old man can pay Bothand and Co. direct if he likes. I pawned the stuff in your name, and they say it's fraud. Well, we shall have the 'tecs out here in a day or two and there'll be some fun. They can extradite the pair of us, and you'd have to go back with me. I say, Lil, that would make the old man sit up, wouldn't it? There'd be a harvest home at Kennaird Court, now wouldn't there? I'd write to him, if I were you—there's a day or two yet; but the game will be up if they get a warrant. Think it over, my sweet love, take the advice of the little bounder in black, who was holding you so tight this morning, if you like. He'll tell you what to do better than I can. A man will know that I wouldn't take it so lightly if the money were coming to me; no, by the Lord, I'd be singing another tune then, and one you'd understand. But these d——d jewellers must have their bit—there's no help for it."He laughed again at the idea; and repeating the intimation that he was staying at the hotel at Vermala under the name of Faikes, who had been an old valet of his, he held out his hand to her; and when she would not take it, he laughed loudly at the rebuff. But he did not remain with her, and when he had passed out of the hotel, he stood a little while looking up at her window, and his face became grave and wistful. What a beautiful woman she was, and what a mess he had made of his own life! Perchance his hatred against her welled up because of that great gulf between them; the gulf of a woman's will and character, of her pity and patience bestowed upon him once as a priceless gift, but now forever withdrawn. His own future lay in the chasms; he would tread the high paths no more.Lily, his wife, stood meanwhile just where he had left her. This new story of shame rang in her ears as a knell. No longer doubtful, she knew that it was true, and she believed him when he said that he would drag her also to the abyss. Her father remained their last hope; but what would Sir Frederick Kennaird say to such a letter as she must now write him? What would his answer be?Assuredly the old baronet would declare that the arrangement entered into with his daughter had been final and that Luton Delayne must answer for his own dishonesty. She believed it would be so; and it seemed to her, as her tears fell upon the page, that the sins of the man lay heavy upon her, and that she must make atonement.CHAPTER VIIIBENNY BECOMES AN OPTIMISTThere were two men who recognised Luton Delayne when he left the Palace Hotel, and one was that master of all the courtiers, Dr. Orange. The other was Benny, who met the baronet at the turn of the road and understood in a flash why he had come to Andana."Luton Delayne, by all that's unholy!" said he to himself, and turning, he watched the stooping figure of the man until the little wood of pines hid the apparition from his sight.Dr. Orange treated the matter a little more cavalierly. He had Bess Bethune by his side, and she had been in the act of giving him a definition of beauty—which he had just declared that even Aristotle could not define—when the baronet passed him in the hall, and he uttered a sharp exclamation."Do you know who that is?" he said to Bess. She replied that she neither knew nor cared."Oh, but we shall all care if he comes here," the doctor ran on; "that's the greatest scoundrel in Switzerland at the present moment, Luton Delayne, who used to live at Holmswell. Surely, the hotel people know—"Bess laughed."I wonder you didn't introduce me. My uncle says that the study of crime is necessary to virtue; but, of course, I know you, and that's something. Are you coming upstairs to play 'hearings,' or are you not? Really, Dr. Orange, you are getting very difficult."The doctor said that it must be old age; but he was contemplative, and his enthusiasm for a child's game had waned. Excusing himself to Bess, who promised him lasting displeasure, he went off to the little French secretary, Ardlot, to discover, if he could, what that worthy knew about it. Ardlot was as dumb as a drum with a hole in it, and fearing the consequences of a premature disclosure, the doctor retired to his own room to think of it. Of course, he knew the "little widow" now. She was Lady Delayne, and he could well understand that she was ashamed of her name. At the same time he foresaw how difficult her position in the hotel must become, and he wondered that she had sought the critical society of Andana when a city would have shielded her more successfully.Benny's problem was of a different kind altogether. He, too, knew the "little widow" now, and knowing her, a hundred castles came tumbling down with a crash and threatened to leave a brave heart sadly crushed beneath their ruins. Benny would have admitted nothing of the kind to himself; but such was the truth.Meanwhile, he could but stare after the retreating figure of the baronet, and when that had disappeared from his view, he trudged back heavily toward the chalet, quite forgetful that he carried in his hand a fur tippet which Madame Lily had left behind her that afternoon of blessed memory.Benny was a good philosopher and in part a historian, so that it was quite easy for him to sum up the events of the last few hours and to carry a clear impression of them in his mind. Yesterday he had seen a beautiful woman for the first time, and for the sake of her unforgettable eyes he had rolled over and over on the slopes of the Zaat last night, and had been dragged out headlong by a miracle of a priest, the Abbé Villari. Had not one of the patients at the Sanatorium providentially fallen ill during the small hours, the abbé would not have been on the mountain road at all, and he, Benny, would now be making the best he could of a new and unfamiliar world. But the priest had saved him—and, more wonderful to tell, had confessed, as they came down the mountain-side together, that he also had dabbled in this new and wonderful science of aviation, and often delighted the monastery with the model of a "Bleriot" which would fly. To all of which the wounded man had listened indifferently, for what was the meaning of all this eloquence to him, who had lost the whole world an hour ago on the slopes of the Zaat?The priest, however, persisted and, word by word, he dragged Benny's story from him. The Englishman, he said, would be competing for the great prize offered by the English editor. It was a fine ambition, and one to deserve a blessing. Let him not despair because the machine was broken. There were clever lads at the monastery, and he, Felix Villari, was no mean mechanic. He would guard the secrets as his own, and pledge his word that the machine should be ready. Grown almost angry at his optimism, and deriding his pretensions, Benny lifted his bruised arm and asked for what kind of a prize that would fly. It was idle to speak of flight to such a man at such a time.Here was the state of the game when Benny met Luton Delayne upon the mountain road, and stood gaping at "the ghost." His first idea was to get away from the place altogether, to cut Andana, and to forget both his disappointment and the source of it. Then a better spirit came to his aid, and he began to remember the many stories which Holmswell had told of the baronet, and to wonder how many of them were true. Lily Delayne was quite alone in this place; she herself had told him that she had no friends. He knew that his own good-will might be worth something to her; but for quite a long time he had no courage to pursue the idea. A sense of finality attended this amazing discovery as a sense of finality had been associated with his mishap in the earlier hours of the day.Had Benny's mind been absolutely commonplace, and had he been hide-bound by the conventions, perchance the matter would have ended there and then. An early train would have carried him from Sierre to London, and he might very well have lived out his life as a very ordinary mechanic in a very ordinary workshop. In this way has the story of hundreds of good fellows, blessed with no common measure of talent, been written; and this might have been his own fate but for a certain hardening of determination which failure provoked.The great prize was lost for a certainty, the new and dazzling hope which had come into his life yesterday had been shattered beyond all belief: and yet, when he had communed with himself for the best part of an hour on the narrow road which led up to the chalet, he took a sudden resolution and acted upon it without an instant's delay. He would see Lily Delayne immediately and hear from her own lips any story she might have to tell him. That she would have a story he firmly believed, and quickened by the pleasing idea of a friendship which must be beyond all question altruistic, he returned at once to the hotel and sent up a message to her. Five minutes later he was in her room, and he perceived at a glance that she had been weeping."I beg your pardon, Mrs. Kennaird," he said, "but I think you left this at the chalet?"Lily took the tippet without a word. Her heart was beating fast, and the colour had returned as upon a freshet of understanding to her cheeks. A woman's sure instinct told her why he had come to the room. He knew that she had lied to him, and he understood the reason.Benny handed over the fur, but showed no intention to go. She thought that he had changed very much since they had parted an hour ago, and he wore a certain dignity of manhood which was sure, but indefinable. When he spoke, the note of cringing banter had left him, and he had a man's tone, encouraging and not a little masterful."I thought I would bring the thing down," he said, with a kindly smile, "I shan't be in to dinner to-night, and you might want it. The doctor says I oughtn't to be out at all; but it doesn't do to listen overmuch to the medicine men. You see, I had a pretty bad spill, and the muscles of my arm are playing tricks. It wouldn't matter in an ordinary way, but just now—"She looked up quickly."You had a fall on skis, had you not?" she asked.Benny laughed."You can keep a secret, can't you, Mrs. Kennaird? Well, I'm going to tell you one; I fell out of an aeroplane—that's the truth!""You fell out of an aeroplane!—then you were the ghost, Mr. Benson?"He nodded his head."Yes, I'm the ghost, but I don't want anyone to know it just yet. There's a prize of ten thousand offered for a flight down the Simplon Valley and over the big mountains. My machine would have won it if I hadn't come down last night. There's where luck figures. I don't think I can be ready now, and I suppose Paulhan or Bleriot will get it. But I wanted an Englishman to win, and I believe I have the machine. It's not like anybody else's—something different altogether. They tell me I look just like a double-headed eagle when I'm up. That's true, I suppose, for my machine is a bit of a curiosity in its way. You wouldn't understand, perhaps, but if you will come to the chalet sometime, I'll show you. You ought to come just to see an extraordinary thing—and that's a priest with his cassock tucked up, working like one of the best. I left him there when I came along; and, just by the way, I met a man I knew outside the hotel door—Sir Luton Delayne, of Holmswell. We were talking about him last night, you'll remember?"She flushed scarlet."Yes," she said in a low voice, "he is my husband—he has been here to-night."Benny drew a little nearer still."You will forgive me for what I said last night, Lady Delayne. I ought to have known; my good sense should have told me. What I really came here for was not to excuse myself, but to ask your forgiveness. A man should never speak all that is in his mind to anybody except himself. When he begins to judge other people, he is putting a fool's cap on his head. I am old enough to have learned that lesson, and I think shame to have forgotten it. Will you let me say as much to-night?"She answered him with wondering eyes which declared her perplexity. There is an elementary simplicity of thought and character which women find irresistible, and Benny was the possessor of it. To such a man, women impart strange confidences. Lily needed all her self-control."There is no need to say anything," she rejoined with an effort, "men will be judged when they invite judgment. I am sure you meant no harm, and intention is all that matters."And then, with a shrug of her shoulders and a want of sequence entirely feminine, she exclaimed:"Women have few real friends, Mr. Benson; they make no mistake when they discover one.""Ah!" he said, "I was hoping you would know that. It's very true, Lady Delayne—perhaps the truest thing in life. Women make few friends—men forbid them to do so. But they need friends sometimes, need them very badly. Some day you might care to remember it. I would give a great deal to be at Andana should that day come—that is, if you are staying here?"She did not attempt to disguise the meaning of the question."I must stay some days yet; but not in this hotel, I think. It may be impossible for me to do so; in which case I must imitate you and take a chalet. Do you know if there is one to let?"He was delighted to become her confidant."There's the very place for you, just by the Park Hotel. I looked over it, but it was too dear for me. They've left the servants—you can have it to-morrow, if you like. I'm sure you'd be very comfortable there.""You are very good," she said. "We shall be meeting in the morning. May I tell you then?"Benny would have permitted her to tell him at any hour of the twenty-four, any season of the year, or any century which might find him alive. He left her room like a schoolboy who has dared an ordeal and returned triumphant. The stars had never shone so brightly over Andana as they shone that night; the moon had never looked down so gloriously upon the majesty of the mountains. He had become her confidant; he shared her secret; he was permitted to be her friend!And all this at the nadir of his fortunes—when the great machine had been wrecked utterly, and the master-key of his ambitions lost beyond hope. Yesternight, he believed that his name was about to go out to the world as one of its pioneers; the name of a man who had dared and had achieved. To-day, he doubted if such an hour would ever come. Others would win the great prize; he might preach to them the wonders of his own inventions, but few would listen. The gates of success lay far from him, and the lantern which burned above them had become but a star upon his horizon.And yet all sadness had left him. Jack stared open-eyed when Benny entered the chalet and began to caper about like a boy. The little abbé himself, understanding nothing, shook his head reproachfully, and complained of the delay."The hours are precious," he said; "we cannot work unless you direct us. What has kept you, monsieur?""A lady's tippet," retorted Benny, delighted at the childish sally—and then, as one inspired, he began to tell them what to do.There was just a chance by the Lord Harry! It came to Benny as he stood there that the thing might yet be done—the machine made good, the flight achieved. Long hours of unremitting toil would be necessary; but what of that? Ten thousand pounds would recreate the world for him, and change the course of his life as surely as though he were born again.And for that gentle lady also—But here Benny felt himself upon difficult ground and, turning aside, he contented himself with that wholly uplifting thought, that even now, at the eleventh hour, he might achieve the victory!CHAPTER IXIN WHICH WE BAG A BRACEThe weekly paper-chase upon skis took place upon the third day after Luton Delayne's visit to the Palace Hotel, and was not wanting in the customary excitements.Youths, garbed in heavy sweaters and the monstrous boots which are necessary to a delightful accomplishment, hailed each other uproariously from their bedroom windows about the hour of nine o'clock and declared emphatically that the outlook was "rotten." Young ladies of ages varying from eighteen to two-and-fifty, hobbled about the precincts crying for John, the porter, to "come and strap them on." The cooks in the kitchen, not less busy, carved sandwiches with amazing dexterity and packed mysterious lengths of sausage as though they were well hidden from the human eye. Few thought of anything but the weather, and all the talk turned upon that well-worn topic.The morning had broken with some promise, but the mists were heavy, and now the whole of the great valley of the Simplon was filled by cloud.Standing upon the plateau before the Palace Hotel, a stranger might have imagined himself upon the brink of an inland sea, whose feathery waves rolled noiselessly to his feet. Nothing could be seen of the panorama below, not a vineyard, nor a cottage; and while the Weisshorn reared itself majestically from the white fog, the lesser peaks were wreathed about as by trailing pillars of smoke.In one hour or in two, said the experts, this sea of mist would drift up and envelop the heights. It might also be relied upon to obscure the fleeting forms of "the hares," and to play subtle tricks with the panting hounds—a prospect which was full of terror to the majority, but of great interest: (1) to a certain Bob Otway, who had persuaded Nellie Rider to be his partner in the promise of the day; and (2) to his friend, Dick Fenton, who had promised to fly with her sister Marjory, if not to the ends of the earth, at least to the chalet where lunch would be found at one o'clock precisely.Fenton, as will be gathered from the foregoing, had been chosen for a hare, sharing the honour with Keith Rivers and that engaging performer, Miss Marjory Rider. Allowed five minutes' grace, these three, who wore fine scarlet sashes, set out at nine o'clock precisely, and quickly disappeared in the direction of the Park Hotel. Immediately they were gone, the concourse of indifferents, tempered by a few such experts as Bob Otway, lined up before the porch of the hotel, and prepared to carry itself with what grace it could. The light of it, conversationally considered, was Miss Bess Bethune, who, moving like a sprite amidst the company, assured each and all that something dreadful was about to happen at the Palace, and that the night would bear witness. When she had thus breakfasted upon horrors, she sought out Dr. Orange, and attached herself firmly to him, until she discovered that he preferred the seclusion of the skating rink, where he might hold out the tails of his threes to the delight of the elect. Bess hated him in the instant of that avowal; and, oh! the malignity of Fate, she was left to enjoy the society of Sir Gordon Snagg, who insisted upon treating her as a child, despite her thirteen years.Perhaps Bess would have captured Bob Otway, but for the expert tactics of hisvis-à-vis, Nellie Rider. Three seasons had Miss Nellie (and her sister) pirouetted vainly at Andana, and she was determined that the fourth should pay for all. The gossip of chosen friends, feeding upon the inflated estimates of rumour, declared that Master Bob had just come into a fortune of fifteen hundred a year—a tale, by the way, told also of his friend, Dick Fenton—and this sum being clearly in her mind and sweet romance, as it were, jangling the silver bells upon the neck of that good horse, Matrimony, she attached herself to Bob with the tenacious grip of an octopus (the words were Bess's), and so led him instanter to the heights, as to the place of execution duly appointed.To be sure, they cared little for the paper-chase. Both were experts, and the delight of climbing could not be marred by any thought of direction or rendezvous. Sufficient to know that they were mounting far above the mists, winning their way steadily to the entrancing slopes and the golden fields of unbroken sunshine. When, at last, Bob discovered that they were lost, he added the intimation that it was a good thing too!"We should have old Gordon Snagg on our backs if we'd stayed down there," he said. "I know the old bounder well—he always stops to tell you some yarn about his brother, the brewer, and falls down in the middle of it. He got me yesterday. That nut, Major Boodle, was with him and the lady, of course. Lady Coral-Smith's a pretty good weight when she's round your neck, but I'd sooner see her round the major's. Did you hear her trying to tell something about the 'little widow' this morning? Beastly shame, I call it—the little thing's all alone, and worth about two hundred of the rest of them. Now don't you think so yourself, Nellie?"He had not called her Nellie before, and she remarked the circumstance, and pronounced it to be of good omen. Fearing no possible rival in the "little widow," Nellie could afford to be generous."She is very pretty, and very nice," she said. "I am sorry for her, because she has lost her husband—at least I should be, if I knew what kind of a husband he was. It's all guess-work with widows; you never quite know whether to be sorry or glad."Bob laughed loudly."They're saying in the hotel that she hasn't lost him. Bess Bethune hints that he wouldn't be lost. That's a new sort of game, I suppose: trying to lose a husband and counting points against yourself when he turns up! Do you think you would like to play it when you are married?"She was horribly shocked. The word "husband" was sacrosanct, and such trifling seemed to her next door to a sacrilege."Oh, do let's talk of something sensible," she exclaimed petulantly. "Wherever there is a pretty woman, there will people tell untruths about her. What is it to us? We don't care, do we?"Bob shook his head; he liked to pose as a man of the world."I think we ought to stand by her," he said. "Suppose you had been in the case, Nellie; wouldn't you expect me to stand by you?""Of course I should—but you wouldn't do it; you would begin to talk about widows instead. I'm quite sorry I came with you—"He looked up appealingly."But we're having such a jolly time together. You don't mean to say you would sooner have been with old Gordon Snagg?""I would sooner be with somebody who talked about sensible things, so there! Are you going to stand here all day looking down at nothing? I didn't come out for that; I came to ski. Perhaps you would like to go back to the paper-chase?"Bob hastened to say that he hoped the paper-chase might be swallowed up by an avalanche before he overtook it. Having insisted upon the point, he seized her hand without so much as a by-your-leave or any other unnecessary absurdity, and began to run down the slope with her. Here was something to live for; they were as two who had conquered the world and returned its proud heights upon wings of azure.Down, down, the skis hissing in the splendid snow, the keen air bringing hot blood to their cheeks, the speed surpassing dreams of flight—so toward the woods which would hide them again, and permit them to forget that towns and hamlets, to say nothing of the inhabitants thereof, existed. Both were gasping for breath as they sailed down the last of the steeps and swung to the left at the bottom. Both were too sensible of the obvious fitness of things to utter one complaint when Miss Nellie tripped and fell right into Master Bob's arms upon the very verge of the wood. Is not the left an unlucky turn to make at any time? But who believes in luck when a pretty girl tumbles headlong into his arms and refuses to budge an inch?"I say, Nellie, I wish you'd do that every day. Now, don't get angry—you know you rather like it."She sat up and tried to push him from her."Whatever do you mean, Bob? It was your fault; you pushed me down.""Of course I did. Let's lie here a month, just as we are—only I should like your arms a little closer round my neck. Never mind about your skis—I'll take them off."He was as good as his word, unbuckling the straps and regretted that the monstrous boots forbade him to admire her pretty ankles. When he had removed his own impedimenta, he coolly put his arms about her waist, and lifted her from the deep snow."Let's sit down a bit and talk over things," he said. "There's a grand view from here, Nellie—I could see Brigue, if it wasn't for the cloud.""Do you want to see Brigue, Bob?""Do I want to see Brigue?—when I can look at you! I say, Nellie, how silky your hair is—and I do believe your lips are cold. Well, that ought to warm them anyway! Shall I do it again? I will if you like!"She shook her head; but her colour was high, and her heart beat fast."Why do you treat me like this, Bob?""Because I love you, Nellie.""Do you mean it—every word of it?""I'll swear a thousand oaths if you like.""And you'll never love anyone else?"She put both her hands upon his shoulders, and looked straight into his eyes.Bob admitted in confidence to his friend Dick, whom he met presently, that it was the look which did it."I'll never love anybody else, if I live to two hundred, Nellie. You'll just be my little girl, and when we're married—"He paused abruptly, wondering what he had said. Nellie, however, sealed the compact instantly. She gave him a smacking kiss on his lips, and held him so tightly that he could not utter a single word."I'll have to tell mother, Bob—I'll have to tell her when we get back. I'm sure she'll be kind about it. I know she likes you. Wasn't it lucky we came up here to-day? Wouldn't it have been dreadful to have gone with all those people? Oh, why didn't we bring our lunch—I'm sure I ought to have thought of it. Now, I suppose, we'll have to go down."Bob shook his head. It really was very nice to be kissed like that, and he didn't mind how long the process continued. The future became as misty as the wraith of cloud floating over Mont Blanc. After all, things might be fixed up somehow, and his two hundred a year would be all right if they didn't get married until he got something to do."Anyway," he said, upon reflection, "we needn't move just yet, Nellie—let's stop up here and talk. Perhaps we shall see the hares. I wonder what Marjory will say when we tell her. You know Dick Fenton's awfully gone on her. It would be a game if he had proposed, wouldn't it?"Nellie didn't like the flippant tone, and looked a little serious. Her keen eyes were roving the valley below; but not a sign either of hares or hounds did they detect. What she did see was a man walking to and fro upon the narrow bridle-track, near Vermala, and another man who dodged upon his heels, but took good care not to be discovered. The pantomime was so engaging that she pointed it out to Bob, despite her desire to pursue that singularly interesting subject, matrimony and its preliminaries."Look at that man," she exclaimed in her surprise. "He's being followed by the soldier. I'm quite sure of it. Bob, look at him!"Bob had no particular curiosity in the matter—so he put his arm about her waist, and peeped over the steep as she desired. Sure enough, the play was going on just as she had indicated. A man walked leisurely upon the path, while another dodged him in the security of the woods. Such a game of hide-and-seek carried its own explanations. There were two who played it, and one spied upon the other."Why, it's a gendarme from Sierre!" exclaimed Bob presently. "I should know the fellow anywhere. What's he up to, I wonder; and who's the man? It must be one of the Vermala people—and look, he's dropped to it now—he knows what's going on!"It really was vastly curious. The man who had been spied upon detected his enemy suddenly and stood quite still, as though meditating a plan. Presently he turned about, and began to climb the height in a direction which would have carried him to the very wood which now sheltered the lovers. This manoeuvre, closely observed by the gendarme, was not immediately answered by him; but presently he turned about and set off as though to return to the hotel at Vermala. So he became lost to view, and the wood hiding the other, the little comedy terminated abruptly."That's a queer game," Bob remarked presently.Nellie, upon her part, could make nothing of it, nor had she any desire to do so. Suddenly, as they stood there, the hounds burst into view, in more or less full cry, according to their agility. Gliding, shuffling, sprawling, the thin white line made what haste it could toward the village of Andana, where lunch was waiting. No one cared very much about the hares; elderly ladies, repenting of their rashness, would have paid precious gold to have been carried to any destination; the girls desired only that the men should admire their dexterity; the men, that their tricks should not go unobserved by the girls. Here and there, a fine performer rejoiced in the magic of the exercise and swooped down the mountain-side with the dash of an eagle upon its prey. But dash—except as an expression of the language employed—was in the main lacking to thecortège, which moved as though in lingering agony.Bob hazarded the opinion that they had better go down immediately to the "bun-scrap" in the village, and reluctantly, with a last prolonged embrace which threatened the stability of the feminine superstructure, they turned and began to ski gently down through the wood. Hardly, however, had they made a start, when there came, not from below but from above, a loud and prolonged cry, which echoed in the very heights of the Zaat, and brought them to a stand in an instant. Someone had fallen, up yonder, from one of the dangerous precipices—there could not be a doubt of it!"It must have been that fellow who dodged the gendarme," said Bob, after a little interval of waiting. Nellie did not know what to make of it. The cry was not repeated, and the pines hid the truth from their view. Nevertheless both were a little awed, and it was impossible not to believe that something untoward had happened."I wonder if we ought to go up?" Bob asked her. She replied, with a very white face, that it was not their business."There are always plenty of people at Vermala, and I know some of ours have gone up to the Zaat to-day. We could do no good, Bob—I'm sure I would go, if I thought that we could—but is it our business, when there are so many others about?""And the whole thing just spoof, perhaps. By George, though; if it were not!—if it were murder, Nellie?""Murder?—you make me shudder. How can you be so horrid, Bob?"Bob hastened to protest that horrors were what most girls doted on; but he was obviously ill at ease, and neither said much while they went down through the wood. A little further on they disturbed, maladroitly, a pair of lovers, who started up in guilty fashion to reveal the red face of a certain Mr. Richard Fenton, and the tousled hair of that amiable and athletic nymph, Miss Marjory Rider. It was the merriest meeting in all the world, and Nellie's "Oh!" when she espied her sister would have done credit to a lady of the theatre."Oh, Margy, how can you look me in the face—?""But we're engaged, Nell—I'm going to marry Dick."Dick looked under his eyes at Bob, but he seemed rather abashed, and by no means a lover who would have done credit to the heroics of the poets.Upon his part, Bob said never a word about his own predicament; but Nellie had it out in a twinkling, and there the four of them stood, giggling and laughing and blushing. It remained for Bob to set matters straight by a resounding cheer, which he did presently to the great scandal of hisfiancée, and the surprise of all in the vicinity of the wood. Then he discovered that he was hungry—a meagre lover sighing for baked meats."We shall miss the bun-scrap if we don't buck up," he said. "I'm sure old Gordon Snagg will eat all the sandwiches within half a mile of him. Let's make a dash for it, Nellie; these two will stop here spooning all day. It makes me sick to see them."He did not wait for his friend to put on his skis, but taking Nellie by the hand, sailed with her down the nearest slope, and presently came out just above Benny's cottage. Here a little Frenchman, standing on the path which debouches from the woods below Vermala, waved his hand to them in a frantic and demoralised appeal, and when they approached him, began to tell them an excited tale which even one of his own countrymen might not have followed. As for Bob, who had forgotten the only irregular verb he ever knew, and Nellie, whose French hardly represented the guinea expended upon it per quarter, they were at their wits' end, until Benson himself came to their assistance; as he did almost immediately, lurching down from the chalet and asking gruffly what was up. To him the Frenchman now addressed himself, while Benny listened with an amused smile. Then he interpreted the rigmarole to the others."He says a man's fallen down from the height up yonder. That's steep, anyway; a baby would walk the path. Do you know anything of it? Did you see anything, Mr. Otway?""We saw a man and another following him," Bob said in a halting way. "I think the little man was a gendarme, for he had something bright on his hat. They went off toward the Zaat, and then we heard one of them shout out. I shouldn't wonder if this gentleman were right"—pointing to the Frenchman—"it's very likely the pair may have had a row."To their great surprise and wonder, Benny turned as pale as a sheet. Muttering something about a silly tale, he, nevertheless, went about, and returned almost immediately to his chalet, leaving the young couple to appease the excited Frenchman as best they could. That worthy, perceiving their lack of understanding, renewed his appeals, this time to Dick Fenton and Marjory, who had just emerged from the wood."What does he say?" Dick asked his friend. Bob assumed an air of reproving superiority, and replied:"Oh, a man has fallen off the Zaat—!"Marjory said "Oh!" and turned very pale. Dick was not so sentimental."Well," he exclaimed rather pettishly, "why doesn't he go and pick him up? I expect it's all my eye; people don't fall off the Zaat, of all places. Why don't you tell him so, Bob?""He speakspatois—mine's no good to him. You have a shot, Dick, or perhaps Miss Marjory will?"They laughed at this, and the Frenchman turned away in despair. These English assuredly were mad and without pity. He had told his story to half a dozen of them already, and all the answer he got was the gibberish of a tongue spoken neither in heaven nor on earth. Obviously, he must find one of his own countrymen, and they must go together to the slopes above. Failing that, he would return, and telephone to the police; an alternative which so pleased him that he was already half-way down to the hotel, when Benny, who had appeared on the scene again, overtook him and entered immediately into an exciting argument. Benny spoke French like a true Parisian—the stranger had no difficulty in understanding him.The others, meanwhile, had gone down to the village of Andana. There in a little café, ordinarily shut during the winter, the hares and hounds browsed upon a common pasture. And curiously enough, while Bob and Dick ate with good appetite, their mood was hardly as joyous as it should have been; while those interesting young ladies, Miss Marjory and Miss Nellie Rider, wore already something of the staid demeanour of the married woman.It was not until after lunch and much good Malvoisie that the young men drew aside to debate the situation in anxious whispers. Assuredly, as Bob admitted, they had "done it," and time alone and that far from amiable old lady, Mrs. Rider, could show them the way out.In short, as Dick added savagely: "they were in a devil of a mess."
CHAPTER VI
A LESSON UPON SKIS
The "ghost" had been seen by many of the guests in the Palace Hotel, but not by the "little widow," despite her wakefulness. For her the night was fruitful of other thoughts, and chiefly the thought of her own situation, of its difficulties and its dangers.
They had christened her the "little widow" down at Sierre, and the embarrassing distinction of a pardonable error had followed her to Andana. So much she had achieved by her desire to obliterate the past and to recall, if it were possible, the innocence and the freedom of her girlhood. But she knew now that the attempt had failed, and that she stood upon the brink of a discovery which must be attended by shame. Luton Delayne would come to Andana sooner or later, and all would know the truth.
It is true that she did not lack courage, and had the perception to see that worldly sympathy, so far as she cared to win it, must be upon her side; but the ordeal through which she must pass, in a sense the exposure, affrighted her and robbed her even of a desire to sleep. The morning of the day might bring the man to the hotel; the evening might send her upon her way again, a derelict upon a lonely sea which offered no safe harbourage.
There had been no child of her marriage, and thus no chain upon her desire for freedom. Her father, Sir Frederick Kennaird, had married again at the age of fifty-seven; and while the gates of the old home were not shut against her, she shrank from the thought of such a shelter. Her only brother, Harold, was with his regiment in India, and had already condemned her conduct in strenuous letters full of childish complaints. "Would she drag her story into the papers? Wash their dirty linen in public?"—and all that sort of thing. To these she made answer that she would be the arbiter of her own fortune, and that if the family honour depended upon her tolerance of such a man as Luton Delayne, she would not lift a finger to save it.
This was well enough as an expression of her promise, but more difficult as a practice. Enjoying an allowance of three thousand a year from her father, whose collieries brought him ten times that sum, she discovered presently that candour is a factor in the due enjoyment of life, and that the world has little love of anonymity. Go where she would, to remote cities of Europe, to the East, even to America, there were some who knew her story and would sell secrecy at a price. She made no friends, won no sure refuge, could find no sanctuary. Sometimes she regretted her determination to be known henceforth as Lily Kennaird, and wondered if her brother were not right when he described such a subterfuge as madness. Sacrifice carried her into a new world, and one with which she was unfamiliar. She missed the amenities of the state she had abandoned, its overt dignities, its influence and power. Mrs. Kennaird was merely the "little widow" to the multitude. It had been otherwise when she was Lady Delayne.
All this troubled her during the night, and the new day found her afflicted by apprehensions to which she had long been a stranger. Twice in as many years she had seen her husband, Luton, and upon each occasion at a crisis of his life. A wanderer like herself, he lived chiefly upon the allowance of one thousand a year which she made him, and when that was exhausted, upon his wits, which were considerable. The latter occupation was not unattended by danger and the curiosity of the police. Lily wondered sometimes at her patience.
And now he had followed her to Switzerland, and unquestionably would visit her at Andana. What shameful story lay behind the pursuit she could not imagine; but of the existence of such a story she was sure. Luton Delayne rarely troubled her unless his case were desperate—and desperate indeed it must be for him to abandon the purlieus of Monte Carlo at such a season. She resolved, upon her part, to refuse him audience if that were possible; and if it were not possible, then to summon all her courage and insist that this interview should be final. The day for compromise was past.
It had been her promise to the parson, Harry Clavering, that she would submit to the ordeal of the skis on this morning; and when, with Kavanagh, she met him on the veranda of the hotel, he reminded her pleasantly of her obligations.
Unwilling to disappoint, she professed her readiness to face the ordeal, and skis having been commanded from the hotel porter, the parson upon one side and Kavanagh upon the other set to work to imprison the smallest pair of feet in Andana and to tell the owner the news while they did so.
"You've heard that the ghost has been seen?" asked Clavering, a little excitedly. She shook her head incredulously.
"Oh, but it's quite true. Miss Nellie Rider saw it from her bedroom window and so did her sister. Sir Gordon Snagg is another. He declares it was a man in a flying machine. I shouldn't wonder if he were right."
Kavanagh was of this opinion.
"There are fools in the world who will do anything," he said. "Some idiot out of Hanwell may have brought his aeroplane here to scare the natives; and jolly well he's succeeded. I hope he may break his neck, that's all. He deserves to, that's sure."
He thought that the "little widow" would agree with him as a matter of course, and her answer rather astonished him.
"Then you think that pioneers are very wicked people?" she remarked; "you have no sympathy with them, Mr. Kavanagh?"
"Oh, I won't say that—good for science and all that sort of thing. What I mean is, let's keep the mountains anyway. We don't want ginger-beer bottles on our heads up here—do we now? I'm sure Mr. Clavering agrees to that."
The parson dissented altogether.
"I think it would be a brave thing to fly here," he said quietly, "a very brave thing. And I hope the day when we cannot admire courage is distant. If there had been no pioneers in the world, I should not be travelling through the Simplon Tunnel to Bellagio in three weeks' time, and you would not be smoking that excellent tobacco. If there is an aeroplane at Andana, it must be owned by one of the men who is about to fly for the great prize offered by the English daily paper. I hope he will win it."
"But you wouldn't go up in one yourself?" Kavanagh insisted.
"Not for a thousand sovereigns, poor as I am."
Kavanagh laughed, but found no support from Lily Kennaird. She, grown a little less pale in the glorious freshness of the morning, was more concerned with the difficulties of the uncouth implements they had strapped to her boots than with any question of flight and its consequences. How awkward she felt! How impossible it seemed to do anything at all with those great wooden skates, so much taller than she was, and so exceedingly slippery.
"Now," said the parson, who had fixed his own skis and become a little more anxious when he had done so, "just shuffle along without lifting your feet, if you can; it's quite easy to walk up—-the coming down is the difficulty. We'll go to the slopes by the Park Hotel and find a very gentle one. I'm sure you'll like it when you become accustomed to the balance. The great thing is not to be afraid."
Kavanagh seconded this, and was in the act of showing her exactly how to place her feet, when he sat down without warning, and having remained some moments in an attitude of despair, explained that he had done it to show the ease with which one can rise when the boots and straps are all right. This process he repeated at intervals on their way to the Park Hotel; indeed, he proved a paragon of good nature in the matter.
The fine weather of the previous day favoured them again, and the famous slopes were merry with the gambols of the players. Here there is a great basin of the snow with a lake at its depths and the white mountains towering high above it. The banks themselves are often gentle and rarely difficult; and hither go the inexperienced to be tutored by kindly masters, who are themselves but children at the game. On every side you hear the injunction not to be afraid—so pompously uttered, so difficult to obey. Elderly gentlemen, who would be more at home upon a rocking-horse, glide down gentle declivities and are proud of the success which follows them to the bottom. Spinsters, of far from mature aspect, sit down upon less than no provocation at all, and declare it to be glorious. The great white kindergarten is the merriest place in all the world—and the world is far distant from it.
Parson Clavering had an excellent eye for an easy slope, and he chose one just suited to his own capacities. It was about three hundred yards from the chalet which Benny had hired, and that excellent fellow, looking out of the window and blaming his hard luck, forgot the latter employment when he espied the "little widow." How he envied the cheery parson, who was holding her arm; how he detested that gilded popinjay (Benny had got the expression from a novel) who stood by her side and smoked a cigarette as though he had hired the parson to do the manual work of which he himself would reap the fruit. But Benny carried his arm in a sling to-day, and even his zeal prompted no thought of skis. He was lucky to be alive.
Meanwhile he could watch the lesson—and instructive it was. First Clavering would show his pupil exactly how to stand, with one leg slightly before the other and the arms, which carried the trailing sticks, held well behind the body. Then the amiable little man would proceed to slide down the slope himself, perhaps sitting hurriedly at the foot of it, or arriving triumphantly at his goal as a man who has achieved greatness. When his pupil essayed to do the same and sank immediately into the soft snow, he assured her that such a proceeding was correct, and that by tribulation only would perfection be attained.
"They tell boys who hunt that they must fall forty times before they can ride—anyone who skis must fall four hundred times," he said reassuringly. "Now don't be afraid—we are all in the same boat, and we sink together. You are not hurt, I hope?"
She told him that she was not hurt at all—though, as a fact, she had dashed a little wildly down the slope and fallen heavily upon her side at the bottom. A fine effort to save her upon Kavanagh's part resulted in that lordly person falling headlong and in such a position that his skis held him immobile, and he had to cry for help. When he was rescued and had brushed the snow from his immaculate collar, he asked her if she did not find it "rather rotten"; but being answered in the negative, he retired to the path again and watched her a little jealously. That "infernal parson" was having the time of his life—really it was too ridiculous.
In plain truth, Lily had begun already to enjoy herself exceedingly. The keenness of the air, the glorious sunshine, the delight of this new exercise drove all other thoughts from her head; and for the time being she was a child again with all a child's ardour. This ski-ing must be the most fascinating thing on earth, she thought, while she watched those experts, Bob Otway and Keith Rivers, sailing down the mountain-side with a dexterity which amazed her. Patience would teach her to imitate them, and then the heights would be open to her. A vain desire whispered that the mountains might be her safe refuge after all, and that they would harbour her—an altitude of dreams upon which Bob Otway's hard voice intruded painfully: "I say, Kavanagh," he roared, "come up and jump. Miss Rivers wants to see you do it; you aren't going to disappoint her?"
Kavanagh retorted by fixing his glass in his eye and turning upon that wild youth a glance which deserved the attribute "stony."
"I am not an acrobat," he snapped severely. "If you will tell me how much you require to begin, I will put something into your hat."
Bob Otway turned away with a laugh.
"By Jove, old chap, it would want a precious big hat to make you start," and with that for a shot he began to climb up the mountain-side toward the chalet where Nellie Rivers was waiting for him.
"Otway's a fine jumper," said the parson, "I believe he learned in Norway. It's quite impossible to do what he does unless you are caught young. Shall we watch him come down? It is really a fine thing to see."
She assented willingly, and they watched the "happy pair," who were now far up the slope by the Park Hotel and preparing to take the jump which has been fashioned about half-way down the valley. This was nothing more nor less than a kind of diving board of snow, from which the runners would take off as they dashed down the steep. "A clever performer," said the parson, "would jump ninety or a hundred feet before his skis touched ground again"; but the proceeding was hazardous, and some wonderful falls resulted. However, he had no fears about Bob Otway, and when that young gentleman started with a flourish, he followed him with expectant eyes. Alas for his hopes! Master Bob flew high into the air, missed his footing as he landed, and rolled over and over as though he would never stop. Then he sat motionless for many minutes—the situation required some thinking about, and Bob was rapidly becoming a philosopher.
Nellie Rivers was more successful. A graceful performer at Alpine games, there was no prettier figure upon skis then in the mountains. And her jumping was, as Bob would tell you, divine. Hardly seeming to leave the track, she shot through the air at a tremendous pace, and landed so evenly and with such perfect balance that the run was resumed as though it had never been interrupted. Then she skimmed by the parson, and raising one foot suddenly and bringing the other round, she "telemarked" most gracefully and stood laughingly before him.
"Bob always falls when I am coming down," she said, "I suppose it's to make a soft place for me. Mr. Kavanagh would not be so obliging—I can see it in his eye."
Kavanagh said that he would prefer to dig a hole with a spade; but he admitted that Master Bob was an obliging fellow enough.
"If nobody cut capers, this would be a rotten place. It's a man's duty to do something of the sort," he said, "but, of course—um—er—mere youth has the responsibility!"
"And the glory," said Clavering, who thought that the lesson might well be resumed upon so inspiring an example and immediately turned a somersault to demonstrate his aptitude as a pupil. The little man was wonderfully active from this time forth, and when half-past twelve came and they heard the bell calling them back to the Palace for lunch, he resolutely refused to go indoors. Had he not brought baskets packed with chicken and the mysterious sausage in which "Chic," the cook, delighted? They would bivouac up there in the woods—perhaps that generous person, Mr. Benjamin Benson, would permit them to use the table in the garden of his chalet—a suggestion which annoyed Kavanagh, but made an instantaneous appeal to Madame Lily. Yes, she would like it, she said, and having said it, repented immediately of the admission. What right had she to think with pleasure of any friendship of the kind?
Nevertheless, they went up to the chalet and received the warm welcome they expected. Benny himself, his arm in a sling and his sallow face paler than ordinary, busied about the place with amazing ardour directly he heard that Mrs. Kennaird was of the party. His brother, apologising for the black-handled knives and the forks which matched them, declared that the kitchen fire was at their service; but he did so rather knavishly and with a glance aside at the beautiful woman who had intruded upon their privacy. It remained for the Abbé Villari to join the party, and he cut the oddest figure of all, for his cassock was girdled high about his waist while the sleeves of it were tucked up to his elbow. Moreover, he was exceedingly black, and when Benny explained with a very red face that the abbé had a penchant for amateur mechanics, it was easy to believe him.
"The gospel of the hammer, I suppose," said Kavanagh, staring fixedly at them as he spoke.
Benny replied that some heads were very thick and that a corkscrew was the only implement to let a joke into them—a correct rendering of the great doctor'sbon mot, which made but a poor appeal to his enemy. Then they all sat down to lunch, and a merrier meal was not known that day at Andana.
Lily could hardly believe in this sense of contentment which now came upon her. The magic power of the mountains as an antidote to ill had never been wholly understood by her before; she realised it as she sat there in the glowing sunshine and looked up to a sky infinitely blue. The great fields of the dazzling snow, the beauty of the woods, the grandeur of the prospect spoke of peace and rest as no other scene she could remember. And with it there came the idea that one man's good will contributed not a little to this gift of self-deception, and that in the humanity and good nature of such a personality as Benny the true secret was to be found. Much had the great world of artificiality and of false ideals taught her in her youth, but here was something different, something to be learned with gratitude, and being learned, not to be forgotten.
Benny, for his part, hovered about her as a shadow, and when she inquired with a woman's gentleness of his hurt, he blushed like any schoolgirl.
"It was nothing—nothing at all," he said—but his brother Jack muttered that it was everything—and as he said it, he glanced at the "little widow" and wondered what evil fortune had sent her to Andana.
CHAPTER VII
AN ULTIMATUM
It had just grown dark when Lily returned to the Palace Hotel, and the hall was quite full of muffled folk, whose arguments upon the events of the day waxed hot and eloquent. Some of these turned their heads as the "pretty little woman" went by; but the many were too interested in their narration of particular exploits to notice her. Upstairs, she found her sitting-room in darkness, but she knew, even before she had switched on the electric light, that it was not untenanted, and presently she discovered her husband, Luton, sitting by the window and smiling a little sardonically while he waited for her to speak.
Eight months had passed since they had met, and time had not been kind to him. He looked very old, she thought, and his red hair was sown with grey. A fine man physically, he had lost flesh, and his clothes bagged upon his arms and chest. One characteristic remained—the evil of a face which had expressed little but evil since his childhood.
"Well," he said—and he had never been famous for his eloquence—"well, Lil, you didn't expect to see me, I suppose. Rather an unpleasant surprise for you, isn't it?"
She took off her furs and laid them upon a chair. The room had become insufferably hot, and she would have opened the window had he not barred the way. But all her instinct forbade her to approach him, and she had need of her courage that he might not see her trembling.
"What do you want of me?" she rejoined in a cold voice—and then: "Why do you come here?"
He liked the idea of it, and leaning back in the chair, laughed as though it were the drollest of notions.
"A man comes to see his wife, and she doesn't offer him the tips of her beautiful fingers! 'Pon my word, Lil, you look splendid when you stand like that—and since you press me, I will take a whisky-and-soda and a cigar just for luck."
She ignored the request and advancing a little nearer to him, repeated the question:
"Why do you come to me? Was it not understood that you should not come; was not that part of the bargain?"
He shrugged his shoulders, but his face flushed none the less.
"Bargain be d——d! I'm in a hole—nine thousand four hundred pounds with Bothand and Co.—you remember them? I bought your emeralds there. Well, they talk of fraud and all that sort of stuff. I'll have to pay them, Lil—it's jail if I don't."
She knew that it would be some story of this kind, and was relieved, it may be, to find it no worse. His exaggerations had ceased to alarm her, and she believed little of what he told her.
"You have had five thousand pounds from me in two years," she said quietly. "I am now making you an allowance of a thousand a year. If there is a duty in the matter, God knows I have done it. More I will not, whatsoever the consequences—you know that I cannot; it is quite impossible."
He nodded his head, and, failing the cigar, took a cigarette from his case and lighted it.
"Why don't you ask the old man?" he retorted. "I tell you, Lil, this is business, and if I don't pay in ten days' time, there'll be mischief. You don't mean to say you'd send me to prison for nine thousand pounds—your beautiful father wouldn't disgrace his daughter for a trifle like that? I've been pretty considerate, I must say. It's nearly a year since I came to you, and then for twopence-halfpenny which I had to beg on my knees. By ——, you're becoming a Jew, my dear, a devilish pretty little Jew—that's what it is."
She turned from him with contempt.
"You have my answer," she said. "I will continue to pay you a thousand a year while you leave me as I am. But I will not pay more, whatever the consequences. That is final and irrevocable. If you come to me at this hotel again, you shall never receive another penny. The understanding was made, and I will have it kept. Have I not suffered enough at your hands; is there to be no end to a woman's patience? You have ceased to be anything to me but a name—take care that I do not forbid you even that right."
He smiled provokingly.
"You dare not do it, my dear; the old man wouldn't have it. Devilish proud old boy, Sir Frederick Kennaird, eh? His hair would turn grey if you talked about the courts—he told me so himself. He'll have to pay Bothand and look pleased. I shall write to him myself if you don't; tell him you're sailing under false colours here, and the men dancing at your heels. Eh, what, wouldn't that be the truth? Why, I saw you on the snow with two of them this morning, and I laughed. This paragon of virtue nods sometimes, eh? Well, I don't complain; I'm meek as a lamb. And I'm going to have nine thousand four hundred inside ten days, or there'll be a story at the New Bailey and you'll figure in it, my dear—for, you see, I used your name and they're not the kind of people to forget it. No, by gad, we'll sink or swim together—so help me Heaven!"
Her anger had been growing while he spoke and now quite mastered her. The gentle lady had become the proud woman, full of courage and resolution.
"You are one of the worst of men," she said in a low voice. "I thought and believed that you had gone from my life; I now see how much I was mistaken. But I shall live now for nothing else. If you come here again, I will appeal to the people of the hotel for protection. You tell me that you have been guilty of fraud, and I can quite believe it. But understand: I will write no letter to my father, take no steps whatever to save you, and if you are punished, I will be the first to rejoice. Go now, and let that be my answer."
He was not at all alarmed.
"Oh," he said, rising jauntily, "I'm going all right; but I'm up at Vermala if you want me. Remember it's nine thousand four hundred, and the old man can pay Bothand and Co. direct if he likes. I pawned the stuff in your name, and they say it's fraud. Well, we shall have the 'tecs out here in a day or two and there'll be some fun. They can extradite the pair of us, and you'd have to go back with me. I say, Lil, that would make the old man sit up, wouldn't it? There'd be a harvest home at Kennaird Court, now wouldn't there? I'd write to him, if I were you—there's a day or two yet; but the game will be up if they get a warrant. Think it over, my sweet love, take the advice of the little bounder in black, who was holding you so tight this morning, if you like. He'll tell you what to do better than I can. A man will know that I wouldn't take it so lightly if the money were coming to me; no, by the Lord, I'd be singing another tune then, and one you'd understand. But these d——d jewellers must have their bit—there's no help for it."
He laughed again at the idea; and repeating the intimation that he was staying at the hotel at Vermala under the name of Faikes, who had been an old valet of his, he held out his hand to her; and when she would not take it, he laughed loudly at the rebuff. But he did not remain with her, and when he had passed out of the hotel, he stood a little while looking up at her window, and his face became grave and wistful. What a beautiful woman she was, and what a mess he had made of his own life! Perchance his hatred against her welled up because of that great gulf between them; the gulf of a woman's will and character, of her pity and patience bestowed upon him once as a priceless gift, but now forever withdrawn. His own future lay in the chasms; he would tread the high paths no more.
Lily, his wife, stood meanwhile just where he had left her. This new story of shame rang in her ears as a knell. No longer doubtful, she knew that it was true, and she believed him when he said that he would drag her also to the abyss. Her father remained their last hope; but what would Sir Frederick Kennaird say to such a letter as she must now write him? What would his answer be?
Assuredly the old baronet would declare that the arrangement entered into with his daughter had been final and that Luton Delayne must answer for his own dishonesty. She believed it would be so; and it seemed to her, as her tears fell upon the page, that the sins of the man lay heavy upon her, and that she must make atonement.
CHAPTER VIII
BENNY BECOMES AN OPTIMIST
There were two men who recognised Luton Delayne when he left the Palace Hotel, and one was that master of all the courtiers, Dr. Orange. The other was Benny, who met the baronet at the turn of the road and understood in a flash why he had come to Andana.
"Luton Delayne, by all that's unholy!" said he to himself, and turning, he watched the stooping figure of the man until the little wood of pines hid the apparition from his sight.
Dr. Orange treated the matter a little more cavalierly. He had Bess Bethune by his side, and she had been in the act of giving him a definition of beauty—which he had just declared that even Aristotle could not define—when the baronet passed him in the hall, and he uttered a sharp exclamation.
"Do you know who that is?" he said to Bess. She replied that she neither knew nor cared.
"Oh, but we shall all care if he comes here," the doctor ran on; "that's the greatest scoundrel in Switzerland at the present moment, Luton Delayne, who used to live at Holmswell. Surely, the hotel people know—"
Bess laughed.
"I wonder you didn't introduce me. My uncle says that the study of crime is necessary to virtue; but, of course, I know you, and that's something. Are you coming upstairs to play 'hearings,' or are you not? Really, Dr. Orange, you are getting very difficult."
The doctor said that it must be old age; but he was contemplative, and his enthusiasm for a child's game had waned. Excusing himself to Bess, who promised him lasting displeasure, he went off to the little French secretary, Ardlot, to discover, if he could, what that worthy knew about it. Ardlot was as dumb as a drum with a hole in it, and fearing the consequences of a premature disclosure, the doctor retired to his own room to think of it. Of course, he knew the "little widow" now. She was Lady Delayne, and he could well understand that she was ashamed of her name. At the same time he foresaw how difficult her position in the hotel must become, and he wondered that she had sought the critical society of Andana when a city would have shielded her more successfully.
Benny's problem was of a different kind altogether. He, too, knew the "little widow" now, and knowing her, a hundred castles came tumbling down with a crash and threatened to leave a brave heart sadly crushed beneath their ruins. Benny would have admitted nothing of the kind to himself; but such was the truth.
Meanwhile, he could but stare after the retreating figure of the baronet, and when that had disappeared from his view, he trudged back heavily toward the chalet, quite forgetful that he carried in his hand a fur tippet which Madame Lily had left behind her that afternoon of blessed memory.
Benny was a good philosopher and in part a historian, so that it was quite easy for him to sum up the events of the last few hours and to carry a clear impression of them in his mind. Yesterday he had seen a beautiful woman for the first time, and for the sake of her unforgettable eyes he had rolled over and over on the slopes of the Zaat last night, and had been dragged out headlong by a miracle of a priest, the Abbé Villari. Had not one of the patients at the Sanatorium providentially fallen ill during the small hours, the abbé would not have been on the mountain road at all, and he, Benny, would now be making the best he could of a new and unfamiliar world. But the priest had saved him—and, more wonderful to tell, had confessed, as they came down the mountain-side together, that he also had dabbled in this new and wonderful science of aviation, and often delighted the monastery with the model of a "Bleriot" which would fly. To all of which the wounded man had listened indifferently, for what was the meaning of all this eloquence to him, who had lost the whole world an hour ago on the slopes of the Zaat?
The priest, however, persisted and, word by word, he dragged Benny's story from him. The Englishman, he said, would be competing for the great prize offered by the English editor. It was a fine ambition, and one to deserve a blessing. Let him not despair because the machine was broken. There were clever lads at the monastery, and he, Felix Villari, was no mean mechanic. He would guard the secrets as his own, and pledge his word that the machine should be ready. Grown almost angry at his optimism, and deriding his pretensions, Benny lifted his bruised arm and asked for what kind of a prize that would fly. It was idle to speak of flight to such a man at such a time.
Here was the state of the game when Benny met Luton Delayne upon the mountain road, and stood gaping at "the ghost." His first idea was to get away from the place altogether, to cut Andana, and to forget both his disappointment and the source of it. Then a better spirit came to his aid, and he began to remember the many stories which Holmswell had told of the baronet, and to wonder how many of them were true. Lily Delayne was quite alone in this place; she herself had told him that she had no friends. He knew that his own good-will might be worth something to her; but for quite a long time he had no courage to pursue the idea. A sense of finality attended this amazing discovery as a sense of finality had been associated with his mishap in the earlier hours of the day.
Had Benny's mind been absolutely commonplace, and had he been hide-bound by the conventions, perchance the matter would have ended there and then. An early train would have carried him from Sierre to London, and he might very well have lived out his life as a very ordinary mechanic in a very ordinary workshop. In this way has the story of hundreds of good fellows, blessed with no common measure of talent, been written; and this might have been his own fate but for a certain hardening of determination which failure provoked.
The great prize was lost for a certainty, the new and dazzling hope which had come into his life yesterday had been shattered beyond all belief: and yet, when he had communed with himself for the best part of an hour on the narrow road which led up to the chalet, he took a sudden resolution and acted upon it without an instant's delay. He would see Lily Delayne immediately and hear from her own lips any story she might have to tell him. That she would have a story he firmly believed, and quickened by the pleasing idea of a friendship which must be beyond all question altruistic, he returned at once to the hotel and sent up a message to her. Five minutes later he was in her room, and he perceived at a glance that she had been weeping.
"I beg your pardon, Mrs. Kennaird," he said, "but I think you left this at the chalet?"
Lily took the tippet without a word. Her heart was beating fast, and the colour had returned as upon a freshet of understanding to her cheeks. A woman's sure instinct told her why he had come to the room. He knew that she had lied to him, and he understood the reason.
Benny handed over the fur, but showed no intention to go. She thought that he had changed very much since they had parted an hour ago, and he wore a certain dignity of manhood which was sure, but indefinable. When he spoke, the note of cringing banter had left him, and he had a man's tone, encouraging and not a little masterful.
"I thought I would bring the thing down," he said, with a kindly smile, "I shan't be in to dinner to-night, and you might want it. The doctor says I oughtn't to be out at all; but it doesn't do to listen overmuch to the medicine men. You see, I had a pretty bad spill, and the muscles of my arm are playing tricks. It wouldn't matter in an ordinary way, but just now—"
She looked up quickly.
"You had a fall on skis, had you not?" she asked.
Benny laughed.
"You can keep a secret, can't you, Mrs. Kennaird? Well, I'm going to tell you one; I fell out of an aeroplane—that's the truth!"
"You fell out of an aeroplane!—then you were the ghost, Mr. Benson?"
He nodded his head.
"Yes, I'm the ghost, but I don't want anyone to know it just yet. There's a prize of ten thousand offered for a flight down the Simplon Valley and over the big mountains. My machine would have won it if I hadn't come down last night. There's where luck figures. I don't think I can be ready now, and I suppose Paulhan or Bleriot will get it. But I wanted an Englishman to win, and I believe I have the machine. It's not like anybody else's—something different altogether. They tell me I look just like a double-headed eagle when I'm up. That's true, I suppose, for my machine is a bit of a curiosity in its way. You wouldn't understand, perhaps, but if you will come to the chalet sometime, I'll show you. You ought to come just to see an extraordinary thing—and that's a priest with his cassock tucked up, working like one of the best. I left him there when I came along; and, just by the way, I met a man I knew outside the hotel door—Sir Luton Delayne, of Holmswell. We were talking about him last night, you'll remember?"
She flushed scarlet.
"Yes," she said in a low voice, "he is my husband—he has been here to-night."
Benny drew a little nearer still.
"You will forgive me for what I said last night, Lady Delayne. I ought to have known; my good sense should have told me. What I really came here for was not to excuse myself, but to ask your forgiveness. A man should never speak all that is in his mind to anybody except himself. When he begins to judge other people, he is putting a fool's cap on his head. I am old enough to have learned that lesson, and I think shame to have forgotten it. Will you let me say as much to-night?"
She answered him with wondering eyes which declared her perplexity. There is an elementary simplicity of thought and character which women find irresistible, and Benny was the possessor of it. To such a man, women impart strange confidences. Lily needed all her self-control.
"There is no need to say anything," she rejoined with an effort, "men will be judged when they invite judgment. I am sure you meant no harm, and intention is all that matters."
And then, with a shrug of her shoulders and a want of sequence entirely feminine, she exclaimed:
"Women have few real friends, Mr. Benson; they make no mistake when they discover one."
"Ah!" he said, "I was hoping you would know that. It's very true, Lady Delayne—perhaps the truest thing in life. Women make few friends—men forbid them to do so. But they need friends sometimes, need them very badly. Some day you might care to remember it. I would give a great deal to be at Andana should that day come—that is, if you are staying here?"
She did not attempt to disguise the meaning of the question.
"I must stay some days yet; but not in this hotel, I think. It may be impossible for me to do so; in which case I must imitate you and take a chalet. Do you know if there is one to let?"
He was delighted to become her confidant.
"There's the very place for you, just by the Park Hotel. I looked over it, but it was too dear for me. They've left the servants—you can have it to-morrow, if you like. I'm sure you'd be very comfortable there."
"You are very good," she said. "We shall be meeting in the morning. May I tell you then?"
Benny would have permitted her to tell him at any hour of the twenty-four, any season of the year, or any century which might find him alive. He left her room like a schoolboy who has dared an ordeal and returned triumphant. The stars had never shone so brightly over Andana as they shone that night; the moon had never looked down so gloriously upon the majesty of the mountains. He had become her confidant; he shared her secret; he was permitted to be her friend!
And all this at the nadir of his fortunes—when the great machine had been wrecked utterly, and the master-key of his ambitions lost beyond hope. Yesternight, he believed that his name was about to go out to the world as one of its pioneers; the name of a man who had dared and had achieved. To-day, he doubted if such an hour would ever come. Others would win the great prize; he might preach to them the wonders of his own inventions, but few would listen. The gates of success lay far from him, and the lantern which burned above them had become but a star upon his horizon.
And yet all sadness had left him. Jack stared open-eyed when Benny entered the chalet and began to caper about like a boy. The little abbé himself, understanding nothing, shook his head reproachfully, and complained of the delay.
"The hours are precious," he said; "we cannot work unless you direct us. What has kept you, monsieur?"
"A lady's tippet," retorted Benny, delighted at the childish sally—and then, as one inspired, he began to tell them what to do.
There was just a chance by the Lord Harry! It came to Benny as he stood there that the thing might yet be done—the machine made good, the flight achieved. Long hours of unremitting toil would be necessary; but what of that? Ten thousand pounds would recreate the world for him, and change the course of his life as surely as though he were born again.
And for that gentle lady also—
But here Benny felt himself upon difficult ground and, turning aside, he contented himself with that wholly uplifting thought, that even now, at the eleventh hour, he might achieve the victory!
CHAPTER IX
IN WHICH WE BAG A BRACE
The weekly paper-chase upon skis took place upon the third day after Luton Delayne's visit to the Palace Hotel, and was not wanting in the customary excitements.
Youths, garbed in heavy sweaters and the monstrous boots which are necessary to a delightful accomplishment, hailed each other uproariously from their bedroom windows about the hour of nine o'clock and declared emphatically that the outlook was "rotten." Young ladies of ages varying from eighteen to two-and-fifty, hobbled about the precincts crying for John, the porter, to "come and strap them on." The cooks in the kitchen, not less busy, carved sandwiches with amazing dexterity and packed mysterious lengths of sausage as though they were well hidden from the human eye. Few thought of anything but the weather, and all the talk turned upon that well-worn topic.
The morning had broken with some promise, but the mists were heavy, and now the whole of the great valley of the Simplon was filled by cloud.
Standing upon the plateau before the Palace Hotel, a stranger might have imagined himself upon the brink of an inland sea, whose feathery waves rolled noiselessly to his feet. Nothing could be seen of the panorama below, not a vineyard, nor a cottage; and while the Weisshorn reared itself majestically from the white fog, the lesser peaks were wreathed about as by trailing pillars of smoke.
In one hour or in two, said the experts, this sea of mist would drift up and envelop the heights. It might also be relied upon to obscure the fleeting forms of "the hares," and to play subtle tricks with the panting hounds—a prospect which was full of terror to the majority, but of great interest: (1) to a certain Bob Otway, who had persuaded Nellie Rider to be his partner in the promise of the day; and (2) to his friend, Dick Fenton, who had promised to fly with her sister Marjory, if not to the ends of the earth, at least to the chalet where lunch would be found at one o'clock precisely.
Fenton, as will be gathered from the foregoing, had been chosen for a hare, sharing the honour with Keith Rivers and that engaging performer, Miss Marjory Rider. Allowed five minutes' grace, these three, who wore fine scarlet sashes, set out at nine o'clock precisely, and quickly disappeared in the direction of the Park Hotel. Immediately they were gone, the concourse of indifferents, tempered by a few such experts as Bob Otway, lined up before the porch of the hotel, and prepared to carry itself with what grace it could. The light of it, conversationally considered, was Miss Bess Bethune, who, moving like a sprite amidst the company, assured each and all that something dreadful was about to happen at the Palace, and that the night would bear witness. When she had thus breakfasted upon horrors, she sought out Dr. Orange, and attached herself firmly to him, until she discovered that he preferred the seclusion of the skating rink, where he might hold out the tails of his threes to the delight of the elect. Bess hated him in the instant of that avowal; and, oh! the malignity of Fate, she was left to enjoy the society of Sir Gordon Snagg, who insisted upon treating her as a child, despite her thirteen years.
Perhaps Bess would have captured Bob Otway, but for the expert tactics of hisvis-à-vis, Nellie Rider. Three seasons had Miss Nellie (and her sister) pirouetted vainly at Andana, and she was determined that the fourth should pay for all. The gossip of chosen friends, feeding upon the inflated estimates of rumour, declared that Master Bob had just come into a fortune of fifteen hundred a year—a tale, by the way, told also of his friend, Dick Fenton—and this sum being clearly in her mind and sweet romance, as it were, jangling the silver bells upon the neck of that good horse, Matrimony, she attached herself to Bob with the tenacious grip of an octopus (the words were Bess's), and so led him instanter to the heights, as to the place of execution duly appointed.
To be sure, they cared little for the paper-chase. Both were experts, and the delight of climbing could not be marred by any thought of direction or rendezvous. Sufficient to know that they were mounting far above the mists, winning their way steadily to the entrancing slopes and the golden fields of unbroken sunshine. When, at last, Bob discovered that they were lost, he added the intimation that it was a good thing too!
"We should have old Gordon Snagg on our backs if we'd stayed down there," he said. "I know the old bounder well—he always stops to tell you some yarn about his brother, the brewer, and falls down in the middle of it. He got me yesterday. That nut, Major Boodle, was with him and the lady, of course. Lady Coral-Smith's a pretty good weight when she's round your neck, but I'd sooner see her round the major's. Did you hear her trying to tell something about the 'little widow' this morning? Beastly shame, I call it—the little thing's all alone, and worth about two hundred of the rest of them. Now don't you think so yourself, Nellie?"
He had not called her Nellie before, and she remarked the circumstance, and pronounced it to be of good omen. Fearing no possible rival in the "little widow," Nellie could afford to be generous.
"She is very pretty, and very nice," she said. "I am sorry for her, because she has lost her husband—at least I should be, if I knew what kind of a husband he was. It's all guess-work with widows; you never quite know whether to be sorry or glad."
Bob laughed loudly.
"They're saying in the hotel that she hasn't lost him. Bess Bethune hints that he wouldn't be lost. That's a new sort of game, I suppose: trying to lose a husband and counting points against yourself when he turns up! Do you think you would like to play it when you are married?"
She was horribly shocked. The word "husband" was sacrosanct, and such trifling seemed to her next door to a sacrilege.
"Oh, do let's talk of something sensible," she exclaimed petulantly. "Wherever there is a pretty woman, there will people tell untruths about her. What is it to us? We don't care, do we?"
Bob shook his head; he liked to pose as a man of the world.
"I think we ought to stand by her," he said. "Suppose you had been in the case, Nellie; wouldn't you expect me to stand by you?"
"Of course I should—but you wouldn't do it; you would begin to talk about widows instead. I'm quite sorry I came with you—"
He looked up appealingly.
"But we're having such a jolly time together. You don't mean to say you would sooner have been with old Gordon Snagg?"
"I would sooner be with somebody who talked about sensible things, so there! Are you going to stand here all day looking down at nothing? I didn't come out for that; I came to ski. Perhaps you would like to go back to the paper-chase?"
Bob hastened to say that he hoped the paper-chase might be swallowed up by an avalanche before he overtook it. Having insisted upon the point, he seized her hand without so much as a by-your-leave or any other unnecessary absurdity, and began to run down the slope with her. Here was something to live for; they were as two who had conquered the world and returned its proud heights upon wings of azure.
Down, down, the skis hissing in the splendid snow, the keen air bringing hot blood to their cheeks, the speed surpassing dreams of flight—so toward the woods which would hide them again, and permit them to forget that towns and hamlets, to say nothing of the inhabitants thereof, existed. Both were gasping for breath as they sailed down the last of the steeps and swung to the left at the bottom. Both were too sensible of the obvious fitness of things to utter one complaint when Miss Nellie tripped and fell right into Master Bob's arms upon the very verge of the wood. Is not the left an unlucky turn to make at any time? But who believes in luck when a pretty girl tumbles headlong into his arms and refuses to budge an inch?
"I say, Nellie, I wish you'd do that every day. Now, don't get angry—you know you rather like it."
She sat up and tried to push him from her.
"Whatever do you mean, Bob? It was your fault; you pushed me down."
"Of course I did. Let's lie here a month, just as we are—only I should like your arms a little closer round my neck. Never mind about your skis—I'll take them off."
He was as good as his word, unbuckling the straps and regretted that the monstrous boots forbade him to admire her pretty ankles. When he had removed his own impedimenta, he coolly put his arms about her waist, and lifted her from the deep snow.
"Let's sit down a bit and talk over things," he said. "There's a grand view from here, Nellie—I could see Brigue, if it wasn't for the cloud."
"Do you want to see Brigue, Bob?"
"Do I want to see Brigue?—when I can look at you! I say, Nellie, how silky your hair is—and I do believe your lips are cold. Well, that ought to warm them anyway! Shall I do it again? I will if you like!"
She shook her head; but her colour was high, and her heart beat fast.
"Why do you treat me like this, Bob?"
"Because I love you, Nellie."
"Do you mean it—every word of it?"
"I'll swear a thousand oaths if you like."
"And you'll never love anyone else?"
She put both her hands upon his shoulders, and looked straight into his eyes.
Bob admitted in confidence to his friend Dick, whom he met presently, that it was the look which did it.
"I'll never love anybody else, if I live to two hundred, Nellie. You'll just be my little girl, and when we're married—"
He paused abruptly, wondering what he had said. Nellie, however, sealed the compact instantly. She gave him a smacking kiss on his lips, and held him so tightly that he could not utter a single word.
"I'll have to tell mother, Bob—I'll have to tell her when we get back. I'm sure she'll be kind about it. I know she likes you. Wasn't it lucky we came up here to-day? Wouldn't it have been dreadful to have gone with all those people? Oh, why didn't we bring our lunch—I'm sure I ought to have thought of it. Now, I suppose, we'll have to go down."
Bob shook his head. It really was very nice to be kissed like that, and he didn't mind how long the process continued. The future became as misty as the wraith of cloud floating over Mont Blanc. After all, things might be fixed up somehow, and his two hundred a year would be all right if they didn't get married until he got something to do.
"Anyway," he said, upon reflection, "we needn't move just yet, Nellie—let's stop up here and talk. Perhaps we shall see the hares. I wonder what Marjory will say when we tell her. You know Dick Fenton's awfully gone on her. It would be a game if he had proposed, wouldn't it?"
Nellie didn't like the flippant tone, and looked a little serious. Her keen eyes were roving the valley below; but not a sign either of hares or hounds did they detect. What she did see was a man walking to and fro upon the narrow bridle-track, near Vermala, and another man who dodged upon his heels, but took good care not to be discovered. The pantomime was so engaging that she pointed it out to Bob, despite her desire to pursue that singularly interesting subject, matrimony and its preliminaries.
"Look at that man," she exclaimed in her surprise. "He's being followed by the soldier. I'm quite sure of it. Bob, look at him!"
Bob had no particular curiosity in the matter—so he put his arm about her waist, and peeped over the steep as she desired. Sure enough, the play was going on just as she had indicated. A man walked leisurely upon the path, while another dodged him in the security of the woods. Such a game of hide-and-seek carried its own explanations. There were two who played it, and one spied upon the other.
"Why, it's a gendarme from Sierre!" exclaimed Bob presently. "I should know the fellow anywhere. What's he up to, I wonder; and who's the man? It must be one of the Vermala people—and look, he's dropped to it now—he knows what's going on!"
It really was vastly curious. The man who had been spied upon detected his enemy suddenly and stood quite still, as though meditating a plan. Presently he turned about, and began to climb the height in a direction which would have carried him to the very wood which now sheltered the lovers. This manoeuvre, closely observed by the gendarme, was not immediately answered by him; but presently he turned about and set off as though to return to the hotel at Vermala. So he became lost to view, and the wood hiding the other, the little comedy terminated abruptly.
"That's a queer game," Bob remarked presently.
Nellie, upon her part, could make nothing of it, nor had she any desire to do so. Suddenly, as they stood there, the hounds burst into view, in more or less full cry, according to their agility. Gliding, shuffling, sprawling, the thin white line made what haste it could toward the village of Andana, where lunch was waiting. No one cared very much about the hares; elderly ladies, repenting of their rashness, would have paid precious gold to have been carried to any destination; the girls desired only that the men should admire their dexterity; the men, that their tricks should not go unobserved by the girls. Here and there, a fine performer rejoiced in the magic of the exercise and swooped down the mountain-side with the dash of an eagle upon its prey. But dash—except as an expression of the language employed—was in the main lacking to thecortège, which moved as though in lingering agony.
Bob hazarded the opinion that they had better go down immediately to the "bun-scrap" in the village, and reluctantly, with a last prolonged embrace which threatened the stability of the feminine superstructure, they turned and began to ski gently down through the wood. Hardly, however, had they made a start, when there came, not from below but from above, a loud and prolonged cry, which echoed in the very heights of the Zaat, and brought them to a stand in an instant. Someone had fallen, up yonder, from one of the dangerous precipices—there could not be a doubt of it!
"It must have been that fellow who dodged the gendarme," said Bob, after a little interval of waiting. Nellie did not know what to make of it. The cry was not repeated, and the pines hid the truth from their view. Nevertheless both were a little awed, and it was impossible not to believe that something untoward had happened.
"I wonder if we ought to go up?" Bob asked her. She replied, with a very white face, that it was not their business.
"There are always plenty of people at Vermala, and I know some of ours have gone up to the Zaat to-day. We could do no good, Bob—I'm sure I would go, if I thought that we could—but is it our business, when there are so many others about?"
"And the whole thing just spoof, perhaps. By George, though; if it were not!—if it were murder, Nellie?"
"Murder?—you make me shudder. How can you be so horrid, Bob?"
Bob hastened to protest that horrors were what most girls doted on; but he was obviously ill at ease, and neither said much while they went down through the wood. A little further on they disturbed, maladroitly, a pair of lovers, who started up in guilty fashion to reveal the red face of a certain Mr. Richard Fenton, and the tousled hair of that amiable and athletic nymph, Miss Marjory Rider. It was the merriest meeting in all the world, and Nellie's "Oh!" when she espied her sister would have done credit to a lady of the theatre.
"Oh, Margy, how can you look me in the face—?"
"But we're engaged, Nell—I'm going to marry Dick."
Dick looked under his eyes at Bob, but he seemed rather abashed, and by no means a lover who would have done credit to the heroics of the poets.
Upon his part, Bob said never a word about his own predicament; but Nellie had it out in a twinkling, and there the four of them stood, giggling and laughing and blushing. It remained for Bob to set matters straight by a resounding cheer, which he did presently to the great scandal of hisfiancée, and the surprise of all in the vicinity of the wood. Then he discovered that he was hungry—a meagre lover sighing for baked meats.
"We shall miss the bun-scrap if we don't buck up," he said. "I'm sure old Gordon Snagg will eat all the sandwiches within half a mile of him. Let's make a dash for it, Nellie; these two will stop here spooning all day. It makes me sick to see them."
He did not wait for his friend to put on his skis, but taking Nellie by the hand, sailed with her down the nearest slope, and presently came out just above Benny's cottage. Here a little Frenchman, standing on the path which debouches from the woods below Vermala, waved his hand to them in a frantic and demoralised appeal, and when they approached him, began to tell them an excited tale which even one of his own countrymen might not have followed. As for Bob, who had forgotten the only irregular verb he ever knew, and Nellie, whose French hardly represented the guinea expended upon it per quarter, they were at their wits' end, until Benson himself came to their assistance; as he did almost immediately, lurching down from the chalet and asking gruffly what was up. To him the Frenchman now addressed himself, while Benny listened with an amused smile. Then he interpreted the rigmarole to the others.
"He says a man's fallen down from the height up yonder. That's steep, anyway; a baby would walk the path. Do you know anything of it? Did you see anything, Mr. Otway?"
"We saw a man and another following him," Bob said in a halting way. "I think the little man was a gendarme, for he had something bright on his hat. They went off toward the Zaat, and then we heard one of them shout out. I shouldn't wonder if this gentleman were right"—pointing to the Frenchman—"it's very likely the pair may have had a row."
To their great surprise and wonder, Benny turned as pale as a sheet. Muttering something about a silly tale, he, nevertheless, went about, and returned almost immediately to his chalet, leaving the young couple to appease the excited Frenchman as best they could. That worthy, perceiving their lack of understanding, renewed his appeals, this time to Dick Fenton and Marjory, who had just emerged from the wood.
"What does he say?" Dick asked his friend. Bob assumed an air of reproving superiority, and replied:
"Oh, a man has fallen off the Zaat—!"
Marjory said "Oh!" and turned very pale. Dick was not so sentimental.
"Well," he exclaimed rather pettishly, "why doesn't he go and pick him up? I expect it's all my eye; people don't fall off the Zaat, of all places. Why don't you tell him so, Bob?"
"He speakspatois—mine's no good to him. You have a shot, Dick, or perhaps Miss Marjory will?"
They laughed at this, and the Frenchman turned away in despair. These English assuredly were mad and without pity. He had told his story to half a dozen of them already, and all the answer he got was the gibberish of a tongue spoken neither in heaven nor on earth. Obviously, he must find one of his own countrymen, and they must go together to the slopes above. Failing that, he would return, and telephone to the police; an alternative which so pleased him that he was already half-way down to the hotel, when Benny, who had appeared on the scene again, overtook him and entered immediately into an exciting argument. Benny spoke French like a true Parisian—the stranger had no difficulty in understanding him.
The others, meanwhile, had gone down to the village of Andana. There in a little café, ordinarily shut during the winter, the hares and hounds browsed upon a common pasture. And curiously enough, while Bob and Dick ate with good appetite, their mood was hardly as joyous as it should have been; while those interesting young ladies, Miss Marjory and Miss Nellie Rider, wore already something of the staid demeanour of the married woman.
It was not until after lunch and much good Malvoisie that the young men drew aside to debate the situation in anxious whispers. Assuredly, as Bob admitted, they had "done it," and time alone and that far from amiable old lady, Mrs. Rider, could show them the way out.
In short, as Dick added savagely: "they were in a devil of a mess."