Richard’s pale eyes flamed malevolently; a violent rage possessed him and flooded out his fear, for nothing can so goad a man as an offensive truth. Ruth approached him again; again she took him by the arm, seeking to soothe his over-troubled spirit; but again he shook her off. And then to save the situation came a servant from the house. So lost in anger was all Richard’s sense of decency that the mere supervention of the man would not have been enough to have silenced him could he have found adequate words in which to answer Mistress Horton. But even as he racked his mind, the footman’s voice broke the silence, and the words the fellow uttered did what his presence alone might not have sufficed to do.
“Mr. Vallancey is asking for you, sir,” he announced.
Richard started. Vallancey! He had come at last, and his coming was connected with the impending duel. The thought was paralyzing to young Westmacott. The flush of anger faded from his face; its leaden hue returned and he shivered as with cold. At last he mastered himself sufficiently to ask:
“Where is he, Jasper?”
“In the library, sir,” replied the servant. “Shall I bring him hither?”
“Yes — no,” he answered. “I will come to him.” He turned his back upon the ladies, paused a moment, still irresolute. Then, as by an effort, he followed the servant across the lawn and vanished through the ivied porch.
As he went Diana flew to her cousin. Her shallow nature was touched with transient pity. “My poor Ruth...” she murmured soothingly, and set her arm about the other’s waist. There was a gleam of tears in the eyes Ruth turned upon her. Together they came to the granite seat and sank to it side by side, fronting the placid river. There Ruth, her elbows on her knees, cradled her chin in her hands, and with a sigh of misery stared straight before her.
“It was untrue!” she said at last. “What Richard said of me was untrue.”
“Why, yes,” Diana snapped, contemptuous. “The only truth is that Richard is afraid.”
Ruth shivered. “Ah, no,” she pleaded — she knew how true was the impeachment. “Don’t say it, Diana.”
“It matters little that I say it,” snorted Diana impatiently. “It is a truth proclaimed by the first glance at him.”
“He is in poor health, perhaps,” said Ruth, seeking miserably to excuse him.
“Aye,” said Diana. “He’s suffering from an ague — the result of a lack of courage. That he should so have spoken to you! Give me patience, Heaven!”
Ruth crimsoned again at the memory of his words; a wave of indignation swept through her gentle soul, but was gone at once, leaving an ineffable sadness in its room. What was to be done? She turned to Diana for counsel. But Diana was still whipping up her scorn.
“If he goes out to meet Mr. Wilding, he’ll shame himself and every man and woman that bears the name of Westmacott,” said she, and struck a new fear with that into the heart of Ruth.
“He must not go!” she answered passionately. “He must not meet him!”
Diana flashed her a sidelong glance. “And if he doesn’t, will things be mended?” she inquired. “Will it save his honour to have Mr. Wilding come and cane him?”
“He’d not do that?” said Ruth.
“Not if you asked him — no,” was Diana’s sharp retort, and she caught her breath on the last word of it, for just then the Devil dropped the seed of a suggestion into the fertile soil of her lovesick soul.
“Diana!” Ruth exclaimed in reproof, turning to confront her cousin. But Diana’s mind started upon its scheming journey was now travelling fast. Out of that devil’s seed there sprang with amazing rapidity a tree-like growth, throwing out branches, putting forth leaves, bearing already — in her fancy — bloom and fruit.
“Why not?” quoth she after a breathing space, and her voice was gentle, her tone innocent beyond compare. “Why should you not ask him?” Ruth frowned, perplexed and thoughtful, and now Diana turned to her with the lively eye of one into whose mind has leapt a sudden inspiration. “Ruth!” she exclaimed. “Why, indeed, should you not ask him to forgo this duel?”
“How, how could I?” faltered Ruth.
“He’d not deny you; you know he’d not.”
“I do not know it,” answered Ruth. “But if I did, how could I ask it?”
“Were I Richard’s sister, and had I his life and honour at heart as you have, I’d not ask how. If Richard goes to that encounter he loses both, remember — unless between this and then he undergoes some change. Were I in your place, I’d straight to Wilding.”
“To him?” mused Ruth, sitting up. “How could I go to him?”
“Go to him, yes,” Diana insisted. “Go to him at once — while there is yet time.”
Ruth rose and moved away a step or two towards the water, deep in thought. Diana watched her furtively and slyly, the rapid rise and fall of her maiden breast betraying the agitation that filled her as she waited — like a gamester — for the turn of the card that would show her whether she had won or lost. For she saw clearly how Ruth might be so compromised that there was something more than a chance that Diana would no longer have cause to account her cousin a barrier between herself and Blake.
“I could not go alone,” said Ruth, and her tone was that of one still battling with a notion that is repugnant.
“Why, if that is all,” said Diana, “then I’ll go with you.”
“I can’t! I can’t! Consider the humiliation.”
“Consider Richard rather,” the fair temptress made answer eagerly. “Be sure that Mr. Wilding will save you all humiliation. He’ll not deny you. At a word from you, I know what answer he will make. He will refuse to push the matter forward — acknowledge himself in the wrong, do whatever you may ask him. He can do it. None will question his courage. It has been proved too often.” She rose and came to Ruth. She set her arm about her waist again, and poured shrewd persuasion over her cousin’s indecision. “To-night you’ll thank me for this thought,” she assured her. “Why do you pause? Are you so selfish as to think more of the little humiliation that may await you than of Richard’s life and honour?”
“No, no,” Ruth protested feebly.
“What, then? Is Richard to go out and slay his honour by a show of fear before he is slain, himself, by the man he has insulted?”
“I’ll go,” said Ruth. Now that the resolve was taken, she was brisk, impatient. “Come, Diana. Let Jerry saddle for us. We’ll ride to Zoyland Chase at once.”
They went without a word to Richard who was still closeted with Vallancey, and riding forth they crossed the river and took the road that, skirting Sedgemoor, runs south to Weston Zoyland. They rode with little said until they came to the point where the road branches on the left, throwing out an arm across the moor towards Chedzoy, a mile or so short of Zoyland Chase. Here Diana reined in with a sharp gasp of pain. Ruth checked, and cried to know what ailed her.
“It is the sun, I think,” muttered Diana, her hand to her brow. “I am sick and giddy.” And she slipped a thought heavily to the ground. In an instant Ruth had dismounted and was beside her. Diana was pale, which lent colour to her complaint, for Ruth was not to know that the pallor sprang from her agitation in wondering whether the ruse she attempted would succeed or not.
A short stone’s-throw from where they had halted stood a cottage back from the road in a little plot of ground, the property of a kindly old woman known to both. There Diana expressed the wish to rest awhile, and thither they took their way, Ruth leading both horses and supporting her faltering cousin. The dame was all solicitude. Diana was led into her parlour, and what could be done was done. Her corsage was loosened, water drawn from the well and brought her to drink and bathe her brow.
She sat back languidly, her head lolling sideways against one of the wings of the great chair, and languidly assured them she would be better soon if she were but allowed to rest awhile. Ruth drew up a stool to sit beside her, for all that her soul fretted at this delay. What if in consequence she should reach Zoyland Chase t
oo late — to find that Mr. Wilding had gone forth already? But even as she was about to sit, it seemed that the same thought had of a sudden come to Diana. The girl leaned forward, thrusting — as if by an effort — some of her faintness from her.
“Do not wait for me, Ruth,” she begged.
“I must, child.”
“You must not;” the other insisted. “Think what it may mean — Richard’s life, perhaps. No, no, Ruth, dear. Go on; go on to Zoyland. I’ll follow you in a few minutes.”
“I’ll wait for you,” said Ruth with firmness.
At that Diana rose, and in rising staggered. “Then we’ll push on at once,” she gasped, as if speech itself were an excruciating effort.
“But you are in no case to stand!” said Ruth. “Sit, Diana, sit.”
“Either you go on alone or I go with you, but go at once you must. At any moment Mr. Wilding may go forth, and your chance is lost. I’ll not have Richard’s blood upon my head.”
Ruth wrung her hands in her dismay, confronted by a parlous choice. Consent to Diana’s accompanying her in this condition she could not; ride on alone to Mr. Wilding’s house was hardly to be thought of, and yet if she delayed she was endangering Richard’s life. By the very strength of her nature she was caught in the mesh of Diana’s scheme. She saw that her hesitation was unworthy. This was no ordinary cause, no ordinary occasion. It was a time for heroic measures. She must ride on, nor could she consent to take Diana.
And so in the end she went, having seen her cousin settled again in the high chair, and took with her Diana’s feeble assurances that she would follow her in a few moments, as soon as her faintness passed.
CHAPTER IV. TERMS OF SURRENDER
“MR. WILDING rode at dawn with Mr. Trenchard, madam,” announced old Walters, the butler at Zoyland Chase. Old and familiar servant though he was, he kept from his countenance all manifestation of the deep surprise occasioned him by the advent of Mistress Westmacott, unescorted.
“He rode... at dawn?” faltered Ruth, and for a moment she stood irresolute, afraid and pondering in the shade of the great pillared porch. Then she took heart again. If he rode at dawn, it was not in quest of Richard that he went, since it had been near eleven o’clock when she had left Bridgwater. He must have gone on other business first, and, doubtless, before he went to the encounter he would be returning home. “Said he at what hour he would return?” she asked.
“He bade us expect him by noon, madam.”
This gave confirmation to her thoughts. It wanted more than half an hour to noon already. “Then he may return at any moment?” said she.
“At any moment, madam,” was the grave reply.
She took her resolve. “I will wait,” she announced, to the man’s increasing if undisplayed astonishment. “Let my horse be seen to.”
He bowed his obedience, and she followed him — a slender, graceful figure in her dove-coloured riding-habit laced with silver — across the stone-flagged vestibule, through the cool gloom of the great hall, into the spacious library of which he held the door.
“Mistress Horton is following me,” she informed the butler. “Will you bring her to me when she comes?”
Bowing again in silent acquiescence, the white-haired servant closed the door and left her. She stood in the centre of the great room, drawing off her riding-gloves, perturbed and frightened beyond all reason at finding herself for the first time under Mr. Wilding’s roof. He was most handsomely housed. His grandfather, who had travelled in Italy, had built the Chase upon the severe and noble lines which there he had learnt to admire, and he had embellished its interior, too, with many treasures of art which with that intent he had there collected.
She dropped her whip and gloves on to a table, and sank into a chair to wait, her heart fluttering in her throat. Time passed, and in the silence of the great house her anxiety was gradually quieted, until at last through the long window that stood open came faintly wafted to her on the soft breeze of that June morning the sound of a church clock at Weston Zoyland chiming twelve. She rose with a start, bethinking her suddenly of Diana, and wondering why she had not yet arrived. Was the child’s indisposition graver than she had led Ruth to suppose? She crossed to the windows and stood there drumming impatiently upon the pane, her eyes straying idly over the sweep of elm-fringed lawns towards the river gleaming silvery here and there between the trees in the distance.
Suddenly she caught a sound of hoofs. Was this Diana? She sped to the other window, the one that stood open, and now she heard the crunch of gravel and the champ of bits and the sound of more than two pairs of hoofs. She caught a glimpse of Mr. Wilding and Mr. Trenchard.
She felt the colour flying from her cheeks; again her heart fluttered in her throat, and it was in vain that with her hand she sought to repress the heaving of her breast. She was afraid; her every instinct bade her slip through the window at which she stood and run from Zoyland Chase. And then she thought of Richard and his danger, and she seemed to gather courage from the reflection of her purpose in this house.
Men’s voices reached her — a laugh, the harsh cawing of Nick Trenchard.
“A lady!” she heard him cry. “‘Od’s heart, Tony! Is this a time for trafficking with doxies?” She crimsoned an instant at the coarse word and set her teeth, only to pale again the next. The voices were lowered so that she heard not what was said; one sharp exclamation she recognized to be in Wilding’s voice, but caught not the word he uttered. There followed a pause, and she stirred uneasily, waiting. Then came swift steps and jangling spurs across the hall, the door opened suddenly, and Mr. Wilding, in a scarlet riding-coat, his boots white with dust, stood bowing to her from the threshold.
“Your servant, Mistress Westmacott,” she heard him murmur. “My house is deeply honoured.”
She dropped him a half-curtsy, pale and tongue-tied. He turned to deliver hat and whip and gloves to Walters, who had followed him, then closed the door and came forward into the room.
“You will forgive that I present myself thus before you,” he said, in apology for his dusty raiment. “But I bethought me you might be in haste, and Walters tells me that already have you waited nigh upon an hour. Will you not sit, madam?” And he advanced a chair. His long white face was set like a mask; but his dark, slanting eyes devoured her. He guessed the reason of her visit. She who had humbled him, who had driven him to the very borders of despair, was now to be humbled and to despair before him. Under the impassive face his soul exulted fiercely.
She disregarded the chair he proffered. “My visit... has no doubt surprised you,” she began, tremulous and hesitating.
“I’ faith, no,” he answered quietly. “The cause, after all, is not very far to seek. You are come on Richard’s behalf.”
“Not on Richard’s,” she answered. “On my own.” And now that the ice was broken, the suspense of waiting over, she found the tide of her courage flowing fast. “This encounter must not take place, Mr. Wilding,” she informed him.
He raised his eyebrows — fine and level as her own — his thin lips smiled never so faintly. “It is, I think,” said he, “for Richard to prevent it. The chance was his last night. It shall be his again when we meet. If he will express regret...” He left his sentence there. In truth he mocked her, though she guessed it not.
“You mean,” said she, “that if he makes apology...?”
“What else? What other way remains?”
She shook her head, and, if pale, her face was resolute, her glance steady.
“That is impossible,” she told him. “Last night — as I have the story — he might have done it without shame. To-day it is too late. To tender his apology on the ground would be to proclaim himself a coward.”
Mr. Wilding pursed his lips and shifted his position. “It is difficult, perhaps,” said he, “but not impossible.”
“It is impossible,” she insisted firmly.
“I’ll not quarrel with you for a word,” he answered, mighty agreeable. “Call i
t impossible, if you will. Admit, however, that it is all I can suggest. You will do me the justice, I am sure, to see that in expressing my willingness to accept your brother’s expressions of regret I am proving myself once more your very obedient servant. But that it is you who ask it — and whose desires are my commands — I should let no man go unpunished for an insult such as your brother put upon me.”
She winced at his words, at the bow with which he had professed himself once more her servant.
“It is no clemency that you offer him,” she said. “You leave him a choice between death and dishonour.”
“He has,” Wilding reminded her, “the chance of combat.”
She flung back her head impatiently. “I think you mock me,” said she.
He looked at her keenly. “Will you tell me plainly, madam,” he begged, “what you would have me do?”
She flushed under his gaze, and the flush told him what he sought to learn. There was, of course, another way, and she had thought of it; but she lacked — as well she might, all things considered — the courage to propose it. She had come to Mr. Wilding in the vague hope that he himself would choose the heroic part. And he, to punish for her scorn of him this woman whom he loved to hating-point, was resolved that she herself must beg it of him. Whether, having so far compelled her, he would grant her prayer or not was something he could not just then himself have told you. She bowed her head in silence, and Wilding, that faint smile, half friendliness, half mockery, hovering ever on his lips, turned aside and moved softly towards the window. Her eyes, veiled behind the long lashes of their drooping lids, followed him furtively. She felt that she hated him in very truth. She marked the upright elegance of his figure, the easy grace of his movements, the fine aristocratic mould of the aquiline face, which she beheld in profile; and she hated him the more for these outward favours that must commend him to no lack of women. He was too masterful. He made her realize too keenly her own weakness and that of Richard. She felt that just now he controlled the vice that held her fast — her affection for her brother. And because of that she hated him the more. “You see, Mistress Westmacott,” said he, his shoulder to her, his tone sweet to the point of sadness, “that there is nothing else.” She stood, her eyes following the pattern of the parquetry, her foot unconsciously tracing it; her courage ebbed, and she had no answer for him. After a pause he spoke again, still without turning. “If that was not enough to suit your ends” — and though he spoke in a tone of ever-increasing sadness, there glinted through it the faintest ray of mockery— “I marvel you should have come to Zoyland — to compromise yourself to so little purpose.”
Collected Works of Rafael Sabatini Page 163