CHAPTER XII
MAKING A START
Self-possession was one of Jimmy's leading characteristics, but forthe moment he found himself speechless. This girl had been occupyinghis thoughts for so long that--in his mind--he had grown veryintimate with her. It was something of a shock to come suddenly outof his dreams, and face the fact that she was in reality practicallya stranger. He felt as one might with a friend whose memory has beenwiped out. It went against the grain to have to begin again from thebeginning after all the time they had been together.
A curious constraint fell upon him.
"Why, how do you do, Mr. Pitt?" she said, holding out her hand.
Jimmy began to feel better. It was something that she remembered hisname.
"It's like meeting somebody out of a dream," said Molly. "I havesometimes wondered if you were real. Everything that happened thatnight was so like a dream."
Jimmy found his tongue.
"You haven't altered," he said, "you look just the same."
"Well," she laughed, "after all, it's not so long ago, is it?"
He was conscious of a dull hurt. To him, it had seemed years. But hewas nothing to her--just an acquaintance, one of a hundred. But whatmore, he asked himself, could he have expected? And with the thoughtcame consolation. The painful sense of having lost ground left him.He saw that he had been allowing things to get out of proportion. Hehad not lost ground. He had gained it. He had met her again, and sheremembered him. What more had he any right to ask?
"I've crammed a good deal into the time," he explained. "I've beentraveling about a bit since we met."
"Do you live in Shropshire?" asked Molly.
"No. I'm on a visit. At least, I'm supposed to be. But I've lost theway to the place, and I am beginning to doubt if I shall ever getthere. I was told to go straight on. I've gone straight on, and hereI am, lost in the snow. Do you happen to know whereabouts DreeverCastle is?"
She laughed.
"Why," she said, "I am staying at Dreever Castle, myself."
"What?"
"So, the first person you meet turns out to be an experienced guide.You're lucky, Mr. Pitt."
"You're right," said Jimmy slowly, "I am."
"Did you come down with Lord Dreever? He passed me in the car justas I was starting out. He was with another man and Lady Julia Blunt.Surely, he didn't make you walk?"
"I offered to walk. Somebody had to. Apparently, he had forgotten tolet them know he was bringing me."
"And then he misdirected you! He's very casual, I'm afraid."
"Inclined that way, perhaps."
"Have you known Lord Dreever long?"
"Since a quarter past twelve last night."
"Last night!"
"We met at the Savoy, and, later, on the Embankment. We looked atthe river together, and told each other the painful stories of ourlives, and this morning he called, and invited me down here."
Molly looked at him with frank amusement.
"You must be a very restless sort of person," she said. "You seem todo a great deal of moving about."
"I do," said Jimmy. "I can't keep still. I've got the go-fever, likethat man in Kipling's book."
"But he was in love."
"Yes," said Jimmy. "He was. That's the bacillus, you know."
She shot a quick glance at him. He became suddenly interesting toher. She was at the age of dreams and speculations. From beingmerely an ordinary young man with rather more ease of manner thanthe majority of the young men she had met, he developed in aninstant into something worthy of closer attention. He took on acertain mystery and romance. She wondered what sort of girl it wasthat he loved. Examining him in the light of this new discovery, shefound him attractive. Something seemed to have happened to put herin sympathy with him. She noticed for the first time a latentforcefulness behind the pleasantness of his manner. His self-possessionwas the self-possession of the man who has been tried andhas found himself.
At the bottom of her consciousness, too, there was a faint stirringof some emotion, which she could not analyze, not unlike pain. Itwas vaguely reminiscent of the agony of loneliness which she hadexperienced as a small child on the rare occasions when her fatherhad been busy and distrait, and had shown her by his manner that shewas outside his thoughts. This was but a pale suggestion of thatmisery; nevertheless, there was a resemblance. It was a ratherdesolate, shut-out sensation, half-resentful.
It was gone in a moment. But it had been there. It had passed overher heart as the shadow of a cloud moves across a meadow in thesummer-time.
For some moments, she stood without speaking. Jimmy did not breakthe silence. He was looking at her with an appeal in his eyes. Whycould she not understand? She must understand.
But the eyes that met his were those of a child.
As they stood there, the horse, which had been cropping in aperfunctory manner at the short grass by the roadside, raised itshead, and neighed impatiently. There was something so human aboutthe performance that Jimmy and the girl laughed simultaneously. Theutter materialism of the neigh broke the spell. It was a noisydemand for food.
"Poor Dandy!" said Molly. "He knows he's near home, and he knowsit's his dinner-time."
"Are we near the castle, then?"
"It's a long way round by the road, but we can cut across thefields. Aren't these English fields and hedges just perfect! I lovethem. Of course, I loved America, but--"
"Have you left New York long?" asked Jimmy.
"We came over here about a month after you were at our house."
"You didn't spend much time there, then."
"Father had just made a good deal of money in Wall Street. He musthave been making it when I was on the Lusitania. He wanted to leaveNew York, so we didn't wait. We were in London all the winter. Then,we went over to Paris. It was there we met Sir Thomas Blunt and LadyJulia. Have you met them? They are Lord Dreever's uncle and aunt."
"I've met Lady Julia."
"Do you like her?"
Jimmy hesitated.
"Well, you see--"
"I know. She's your hostess, but you haven't started your visit yet.So, you've just got time to say what you really think of her, beforeyou have to pretend she's perfect."
"Well--"
"I detest her," said Molly, crisply. "I think she's hard andhateful."
"Well, I can't say she struck me as a sort of female CheerybleBrother. Lord Dreever introduced me to her at the station. Sheseemed to bear it pluckily, but with some difficulty."
"She's hateful," repeated Molly. "So is he, Sir Thomas, I mean. He'sone of those fussy, bullying little men. They both bully poor LordDreever till I wonder he doesn't rebel. They treat him like aschool-boy. It makes me wild. It's such a shame--he's so nice andgood-natured! I am so sorry for him!"
Jimmy listened to this outburst with mixed feelings. It was sweet ofher to be so sympathetic, but was it merely sympathy? There had beena ring in her voice and a flush on her cheek that had suggested toJimmy's sensitive mind a personal interest in the down-trodden peer.Reason told him that it was foolish to be jealous of Lord Dreever, agood fellow, of course, but not to be taken seriously. The primitiveman in him, on the other hand, made him hate all Molly's malefriends with an unreasoning hatred. Not that he hated Lord Dreever:he liked him. But he doubted if he could go on liking him for longif Molly were to continue in this sympathetic strain.
His affection for the absent one was not put to the test. Molly'snext remark had to do with Sir Thomas.
"The worst of it is," she said, "father and Sir Thomas are suchfriends. In Paris, they were always together. Father did him a verygood turn."
"How was that?"
"It was one afternoon, just after we arrived. A man got into LadyJulia's room while we were all out except father. Father saw him gointo the room, and suspected something was wrong, and went in afterhim. The man was trying to steal Lady Julia's jewels. He had openedthe box where they were kept, and was actually holding her rope ofdiamonds in his hand when fath
er found him. It's the mostmagnificent thing I ever saw. Sir Thomas told father he gave ahundred thousand dollars for it."
"But, surely," said Jimmy, "hadn't the management of the hotel asafe for valuables?"
"Of course, they had; but you don't know Sir Thomas. He wasn't goingto trust any hotel safe. He's the sort of a man who insists on doingeverything in his own way, and who always imagines he can do thingsbetter himself than anyone else can do them for him. He had had thisspecial box made, and would never keep the diamonds anywhere else.Naturally, the thief opened it in a minute. A clever thief wouldhave no difficulty with a thing like that."
"What happened?"
"Oh, the man saw father, and dropped the jewels, and ran off downthe corridor. Father chased him a little way, but of course it wasno good; so he went back and shouted, and rang every bell he couldsee, and gave the alarm; but the man was never found. Still, he leftthe diamonds. That was the great thing, after all. You must look atthem to-night at dinner. They really are wonderful. Are you a judgeof precious stones at all?"
"I am rather," said Jimmy. "In fact, a jeweler I once knew told me Ihad a natural gift in that direction. And so, of course, Sir Thomaswas pretty grateful to your father?"
"He simply gushed. He couldn't do enough for him. You see, if thediamonds had been stolen, I'm sure Lady Julia would have made SirThomas buy her another rope just as good. He's terrified of her, I'mcertain. He tries not to show it, but he is. And, besides having topay another hundred thousand dollars, he would never have heard thelast of it. It would have ruined his reputation for being infallibleand doing everything better than anybody else."
"But didn't the mere fact that the thief got the jewels, and wasonly stopped by a fluke from getting away with them, do that?"
Molly bubbled with laughter.
"She never knew. Sir Thomas got back to the hotel an hour before shedid. I've never seen such a busy hour. He had the manager up,harangued him, and swore him to secrecy--which the poor manager wasonly too glad to agree to, because it wouldn't have done the hotelany good to have it known. And the manager harangued the servants,and the servants harangued one another, and everybody talked at thesame time; and father and I promised not to tell a soul; so LadyJulia doesn't know a word about it to this day. And I don't see whyshe ever should--though, one of these days, I've a good mind to tellLord Dreever. Think what a hold he would have over them! They'dnever be able to bully him again."
"I shouldn't," said Jimmy, trying to keep a touch of coldness out ofhis voice. This championship of Lord Dreever, however sweet andadmirable, was a little distressing.
She looked up quickly.
"You don't think I really meant to, do you?"
"No, no," said Jimmy, hastily. "Of course not."
"Well, I should think so!" said Molly, indignantly. "After Ipromised not to tell a soul about it!"
Jimmy chuckled.
"It's nothing," he said, in answer to her look of inquiry.
"You laughed at something."
"Well," said Jimmy apologetically, "it's only--it's nothing really--only,what I mean is, you have just told one soul a good deal aboutit, haven't you?"
Molly turned pink. Then, she smiled.
"I don't know how I came to do it," she declared. "It just rushedout of its own accord. I suppose it is because I know I can trustyou."
Jimmy flushed with pleasure. He turned to her, and half-halted, butshe continued to walk on.
"You can," he said, "but how do you know you can?"
She seemed surprised.
"Why--" she said. She stopped for a moment, and then went onhurriedly, with a touch of embarrassment. "Why, how absurd! Ofcourse, I know. Can't you read faces? I can. Look," she said,pointing, "now you can see the castle. How do you like it?"
They had reached a point where the fields sloped sharply downward. Afew hundred yards away, backed by woods, stood the gray mass ofstone which had proved such a kill-joy of old to the Welsh sportsmenduring the pheasant season. Even now, it had a certain air ofdefiance. The setting sun lighted the waters of the lake. No figureswere to be seen moving in the grounds. The place resembled a palaceof sleep.
"Well?" said Molly.
"It's wonderful!"
"Isn't it! I'm so glad it strikes you like that. I always feel as ifI had invented everything round here. It hurts me if people don'tappreciate it."
They went down the hill.
"By the way," said Jimmy, "are you acting in these theatricals theyare getting up?"
"Yes. Are you the other man they were going to get? That's why LordDreever went up to London, to see if he couldn't find somebody. Theman who was going to play one of the parts had to go back to Londonon business."
"Poor brute!" said Jimmy. It seemed to him at this moment that therewas only one place in the world where a man might be even reasonablyhappy. "What sort of part is it? Lord Dreever said I should bewanted to act. What do I do?"
"If you're Lord Herbert, which is the part they wanted a man for,you talk to me most of the time."
Jimmy decided that the piece had been well cast.
The dressing-gong sounded just as they entered the hall. From adoor on the left, there emerged two men, a big man and a little one,in friendly conversation. The big man's back struck Jimmy asfamiliar.
"Oh, father," Molly called. And Jimmy knew where he had seen theback before.
The two men stopped.
"Sir Thomas," said Molly, "this is Mr. Pitt."
The little man gave Jimmy a rapid glance, possibly with the objectof detecting his more immediately obvious criminal points; then, asif satisfied as to his honesty, became genial.
"I am very glad to meet you, Mr. Pitt, very glad," he said. "We havebeen expecting you for some time."
Jimmy explained that he had lost his way.
"Exactly. It was ridiculous that you should be compelled to walk,perfectly ridiculous. It was grossly careless of my nephew not tolet us know that you were coming. My wife told him so in the car."
"I bet she did," said Jimmy to himself. "Really," he said aloud, byway of lending a helping hand to a friend in trouble, "I preferredto walk. I have not been on a country road since I landed inEngland." He turned to the big man, and held out his hand. "I don'tsuppose you remember me, Mr. McEachern? We met in New York."
"You remember the night Mr. Pitt scared away our burglar, father,"said Molly.
Mr. McEachern was momentarily silent. On his native asphalt, thereare few situations capable of throwing the New York policeman offhis balance. In that favored clime, savoir faire is represented by ashrewd blow of the fist, and a masterful stroke with the truncheonamounts to a satisfactory repartee. Thus shall you never take thepoliceman of Manhattan without his answer. In other surroundings,Mr. McEachern would have known how to deal with the young man whomwith such good reason he believed to be an expert criminal. Butanother plan of action was needed here. First and foremost, of allthe hints on etiquette that he had imbibed since he entered thismore reposeful life, came the maxim: "Never make a scene." Scenes,he had gathered, were of all things what polite society mostresolutely abhorred. The natural man in him must be bound in chains.The sturdy blow must give way to the honeyed word. A cold, "Really!"was the most vigorous retort that the best circles wouldcountenance. It had cost Mr. McEachern some pains to learn thislesson, but he had done it. He shook hands, and gruffly acknowledgedthe acquaintanceship.
"Really, really!" chirped Sir Thomas, amiably. "So, you findyourself among old friends, Mr. Pitt."
"Old friends," echoed Jimmy, painfully conscious of theex-policeman's eyes, which were boring holes in him.
"Excellent, excellent! Let me take you to your room. It is justopposite my own. This way."
In his younger days, Sir Thomas had been a floor-walker of no meancaliber. A touch of the professional still lingered in his briskmovements. He preceded Jimmy upstairs with the restrained suavitythat can be learned in no other school.
They parted from Mr. McEachern on the first land
ing, but Jimmy couldstill feel those eyes. The policeman's stare had been of the sortthat turns corners, goes upstairs, and pierces walls.
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