CHAPTER III
THE LAST RIDE TOGETHER
Durrance, meanwhile, walked to his lodging alone, remembering a day, nowtwo years since, when by a curious whim of old Dermod Eustace he hadbeen fetched against his will to the house by the Lennon River inDonegal, and there, to his surprise, had been made acquainted withDermod's daughter Ethne. For she surprised all who had first held speechwith the father. Durrance had stayed for a night in the house, andthrough that evening she had played upon her violin, seated with herback toward her audience, as was her custom when she played, lest a lookor a gesture should interrupt the concentration of her thoughts. Themelodies which she had played rang in his ears now. For the girlpossessed the gift of music, and the strings of her violin spoke to thequestions of her bow. There was in particular an overture--the Melusineoverture--which had the very sob of the waves. Durrance had listenedwondering, for the violin had spoken to him of many things of which thegirl who played it could know nothing. It had spoken of long perilousjourneys and the faces of strange countries; of the silver way acrossmoonlit seas; of the beckoning voices from the under edges of thedesert. It had taken a deeper, a more mysterious tone. It had told ofgreat joys, quite unattainable, and of great griefs too, eternal, andwith a sort of nobility by reason of their greatness; and of manyunformulated longings beyond the reach of words; but with never a singlenote of mere complaint. So it had seemed to Durrance that night as hehad sat listening while Ethne's face was turned away. So it seemed tohim now when he knew that her face was still to be turned away for allhis days. He had drawn a thought from her playing which he was at somepains to keep definite in his mind. The true music cannot complain.
Therefore it was that as he rode the next morning into the Row his blueeyes looked out upon the world from his bronzed face with not a jot lessof his usual friendliness. He waited at half-past nine by the clump oflilacs and laburnums at the end of the sand, but Harry Feversham did notjoin him that morning, nor indeed for the next three weeks. Ever sincethe two men had graduated from Oxford it had been their custom to meetat this spot and hour, when both chanced to be in town, and Durrance waspuzzled. It seemed to him that he had lost his friend as well.
Meanwhile, however, the rumours of war grew to a certainty; and when atlast Feversham kept the tryst, Durrance had news.
"I told you luck might look my way. Well, she has. I go out to Egypt onGeneral Graham's staff. There's talk we may run down the Red Sea toSuakin afterward."
The exhilaration of his voice brought an unmistakable envy intoFeversham's eyes. It seemed strange to Durrance, even at that moment ofhis good luck, that Harry Feversham should envy him--strange and ratherpleasant. But he interpreted the envy in the light of his own ambitions.
"It is rough on you," he said sympathetically, "that your regiment hasto stay behind."
Feversham rode by his friend's side in silence. Then, as they came tothe chairs beneath the trees, he said:--
"That was expected. The day you dined with me I sent in my papers."
"That night?" said Durrance, turning in his saddle. "After we had gone?"
"Yes," said Feversham, accepting the correction. He wondered whether ithad been intended. But Durrance rode silently forward. Again HarryFeversham was conscious of a reproach in his friend's silence, and againhe was wrong. For Durrance suddenly spoke heartily, and with a laugh.
"I remember. You gave us your reasons that night. But for the life of meI can't help wishing that we had been going out together. When do youleave for Ireland?"
"To-night."
"So soon?"
They turned their horses and rode westward again down the alley oftrees. The morning was still fresh. The limes and chestnuts had lostnothing of their early green, and since the May was late that year, itsblossoms still hung delicately white like snow upon the branches andshone red against the dark rhododendrons. The park shimmered in a hazeof sunlight, and the distant roar of the streets was as the tumbling ofriver water.
"It is a long time since we bathed in Sandford Lasher," said Durrance.
"Or froze in the Easter vacations in the big snow-gully on Great End,"returned Feversham. Both men had the feeling that on this morning avolume in their book of life was ended; and since the volume had been apleasant one to read, and they did not know whether its successors wouldsustain its promise, they were looking backward through the leavesbefore they put it finally away.
"You must stay with us, Jack, when you come back," said Feversham.
Durrance had schooled himself not to wince, and he did not, even at thatanticipatory "us." If his left hand tightened upon the thongs of hisreins, the sign could not be detected by his friend.
"If I come back," said Durrance. "You know my creed. I could never pitya man who died on active service. I would very much like to come by thatend myself."
It was a quite simple creed, consistent with the simplicity of the manwho uttered it. It amounted to no more than this: that to die decentlywas worth a good many years of life. So that he uttered it withoutmelancholy or any sign of foreboding. Even so, however, he had a fearthat perhaps his friend might place another interpretation upon thewords, and he looked quickly into his face. He only saw again, however,that puzzling look of envy in Feversham's eyes.
"You see there are worse things which can happen," he continued;"disablement, for instance. Clever men could make a shift, perhaps, toput up with it. But what in the world should I do if I had to sit in achair all my days? It makes me shiver to think of it," and he shook hisbroad shoulders to unsaddle that fear. "Well, this is the last ride. Letus gallop," and he let out his horse.
Feversham followed his example, and side by side they went racing downthe sand. At the bottom of the Row they stopped, shook hands, and withthe curtest of nods parted. Feversham rode out of the park, Durranceturned back and walked his horse up toward the seats beneath the trees.
Even as a boy in his home at Southpool in Devonshire, upon a woodedcreek of the Salcombe estuary, he had always been conscious of a certainrestlessness, a desire to sail down that creek and out over the levelsof the sea, a dream of queer outlandish countries and peoples beyond thedark familiar woods. And the restlessness had grown upon him, so that"Guessens," even when he had inherited it with its farms and lands, hadremained always in his thoughts as a place to come home to rather thanan estate to occupy a life. He purposely exaggerated that restlessnessnow, and purposely set against it words which Feversham had spoken andwhich he knew to be true. Ethne Eustace would hardly be happy outsideher county of Donegal. Therefore, even had things fallen outdifferently, as he phrased it, there might have been a clash. Perhaps itwas as well that Harry Feversham was to marry Ethne--and not anotherthan Feversham.
Thus, at all events, he argued as he rode, until the riders vanishedfrom before his eyes, and the ladies in their coloured frocks beneaththe cool of the trees. The trees themselves dwindled to ragged mimosas,the brown sand at his feet spread out in a widening circumference andtook the bright colour of honey; and upon the empty sand black stonesbegan to heap themselves shapelessly like coal, and to flash in the sunlike mirrors. He was deep in his anticipations of the Soudan, when heheard his name called out softly in a woman's voice, and, looking up,found himself close by the rails.
"How do you do, Mrs. Adair?" said he, and he stopped his horse. Mrs.Adair gave him her hand across the rails. She was Durrance's neighbourat Southpool, and by a year or two his elder--a tall woman, remarkablefor the many shades of her thick brown hair and the peculiar pallor onher face. But at this moment the face had brightened, there was a hintof colour in the cheeks.
"I have news for you," said Durrance. "Two special items. One, HarryFeversham is to be married."
"To whom?" asked the lady, eagerly.
"You should know. It was in your house in Hill Street that Harry firstmet her; and I introduced him. He has been improving the acquaintance inDublin."
But Mrs. Adair already understood; and it was plain that the news waswelcome.
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nbsp; "Ethne Eustace!" she cried. "They will be married soon?"
"There is nothing to prevent it."
"I am glad," and the lady sighed as though with relief. "What is yoursecond item?"
"As good as the first. I go out on General Graham's staff."
Mrs. Adair was silent. There came a look of anxiety into her eyes, andthe colour died out of her face.
"You are very glad, I suppose," she said slowly.
Durrance's voice left her in no doubt.
"I should think I was. I go soon, too, and the sooner the better. I willcome and dine some night, if I may, before I go."
"My husband will be pleased to see you," said Mrs. Adair, rather coldly.Durrance did not notice the coldness, however. He had his own reasonsfor making the most of the opportunity which had come his way; and heurged his enthusiasm, and laid it bare in words more for his own benefitthan with any thought of Mrs. Adair. Indeed, he had always rather avague impression of the lady. She was handsome in a queer, foreign waynot so uncommon along the coasts of Devonshire and Cornwall, and she hadgood hair, and was always well dressed. Moreover, she was friendly. Andat that point Durrance's knowledge of her came to an end. Perhaps herchief merit in his eyes was that she had made friends with EthneEustace. But he was to become better acquainted with Mrs. Adair. He rodeaway from the park with the old regret in his mind that the fortunes ofhimself and his friend were this morning finally severed. As a fact hehad that morning set the strands of a new rope a-weaving which was tobring them together again in a strange and terrible relationship. Mrs.Adair followed him out of the park, and walked home very thoughtfully.
Durrance had just one week wherein to provide his equipment andarrange his estate in Devonshire. It passed in a continuous hurry ofpreparation, so that his newspaper lay each day unfolded in his rooms.The general was to travel overland to Brindisi; and so on an evening ofwind and rain, toward the end of July, Durrance stepped from the Doverpier into the mail-boat for Calais. In spite of the rain and the gloomynight, a small crowd had gathered to give the general a send-off. As theropes were cast off, a feeble cheer was raised; and before the cheer hadended, Durrance found himself beset by a strange illusion. He wasleaning upon the bulwarks, idly wondering whether this was his last viewof England, and with a wish that some one of his friends had come downto see him go, when it seemed to him suddenly that his wish wasanswered; for he caught a glimpse of a man standing beneath a gas-lamp,and that man was of the stature and wore the likeness of HarryFeversham. Durrance rubbed his eyes and looked again. But the wind madethe tongue of light flicker uncertainly within the glass; the rain, too,blurred the quay. He could only be certain that a man was standingthere, he could only vaguely distinguish beneath the lamp the whitenessof a face. It was an illusion, he said to himself. Harry Feversham wasat that moment most likely listening to Ethne playing the violin under aclear sky in a high garden of Donegal. But even as he was turning fromthe bulwarks, there came a lull of the wind, the lights burned brightand steady on the pier, and the face leaped from the shadows distinct infeature and expression. Durrance leaned out over the side of the boat.
"Harry!" he shouted, at the top of a wondering voice.
But the figure beneath the lamp never stirred. The wind blew the lightsagain this way and that, the paddles churned the water, the mail-boatpassed beyond the pier. It was an illusion, he repeated; it was acoincidence. It was the face of a stranger very like to HarryFeversham's. It could not be Feversham's, because the face whichDurrance had seen so distinctly for a moment was a haggard, wistfulface--a face stamped with an extraordinary misery; the face of a mancast out from among his fellows.
Durrance had been very busy all that week. He had clean forgotten thearrival of that telegram and the suspense which the long perusal of ithad caused. Moreover, his newspaper had lain unfolded in his rooms. Buthis friend Harry Feversham had come to see him off.
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