Works of Robert W Chambers

by Robert W. Chambers

  “You are mistaken. Caldera squeezed him; I did not. I knew nothing about it. My agents attend to such petty matters. What motive have I for disliking Quarren?”

  She shrugged her shoulders disdainfully: “Perhaps because you thought he was devoted to me — and I to him.... And you were right,” she added: “I am devoted to him because he is a man and a clean one.”

  “Have you ended?”

  “Ended what?”

  “Punishing me.”

  Her lips curled slightly: “I am afraid you are inclined to self-flattery, Langly. We chasten those whom we care for.”

  “Are you silly enough to dismiss me through sheer pique?” he said between his teeth.

  “Pique? I don’t understand. I’ve merely concluded that I don’t need your fortune and I don’t want your name. You, personally, never figured in the proposed arrangement.”

  His visage altered alarmingly:

  “Who have you got on the string now!” he broke out— “you little adventuress! What damned fool is damned fool enough to marry you when anybody could get you for less if they care to spend the time on you — —”

  Suddenly his arm shot out and he wrenched her bridle, dragging her horse around and holding him there.

  “Are you mad?” she whispered, white to the lips. “Take your hand off my bridle!”

  “For another word,” he said between clinched teeth, “I’d ride you down and spoil that face of yours! Hold your tongue and listen to me. I’ve stood all I’m going to from you. I’ve done all the cringing and boot-licking that is going to be done. You’re the sort that needs curb and spurs, and you’ll get them if you cut up with me. Is that plain?”

  She had carried no crop that morning or she would have used it; her bridle was useless; spurring might have dragged them both down under the horses’ feet.

  “For the last time,” he said, “you listen to me. I love you. I want you. You haven’t a cent; you could fill out any check you chose to draw over my signature. Now if you are not crazy, or a hopeless fool, behave yourself.”

  A great sob choked her; she forced it back and sat, waiting, eyes almost closed.

  “Strelsa, answer me!”

  There was no reply.

  “Answer me, for God’s sake!”

  She opened her eyes.

  “Will you marry me?”

  “No.”

  His eyes seemed starting from his head and the deep blood rushed to his face and neck, and he flung her bridle into her face with an inarticulate sound.

  Then, slowly, side by side they advanced along the road together. A groom met them at Witch-Hollow; Strelsa slipped from her saddle without aid and, leisurely, erect, smiling, walked up to the veranda where Molly stood reading the morning paper.

  “Hello dear,” she said. “Am I very late for luncheon?”

  “It’s over. Will you have a tray out here?”

  “May I?”

  “Don’t you want to change, first?”

  “Yes, thanks.”

  Molly glanced up from the paper:

  “Isn’t Langly stopping for luncheon with you?”

  “No.”

  Molly looked at her curiously:

  “Did you enjoy your gallop?”

  “We didn’t gallop much.”

  “Spooned?”

  Strelsa shuddered slightly. The elder woman dropped her paper and gazed at her.

  “You don’t mean to say it’s all off, Strelsa!”

  “Entirely. Please don’t let’s speak of it again — or of him — if you don’t mind — —”

  “I don’t! — you darling! — you poor darling! What has that creature done to you?”

  “Don’t speak of him, please.”

  “No, I won’t. Oh, I’m so glad, Strelsa! — I can’t tell you how happy, how immensely relieved — and that cat of an aunt of his here to make mischief! — and poor Mary Ledwith — —”

  “Molly, I — I simply can’t talk about it — any of it — —”

  She turned abruptly, entered the house, and ran lightly up the stairs. Molly waited for her, grimly content with the elimination of Langly Sprowl and already planning separate campaigns in behalf of Sir Charles and Quarren.

  She was still absorbed in her scheming when Strelsa came down. There was not a trace of any emotion except pleasure in her face. In her heart it was the same; only an immense, immeasurable relief reigned there, calming and exciting her alternately. But her face was yet a trifle pale; her hands still unsteady; and every delicate nerve, slowly relaxing from the tension, was regaining its normal quiet by degrees.

  Her appetite was excellent, however. Afterward she and Molly chose neighbouring rockers, and Molly, lighting a cigarette, opened fire:

  “Is it to be Sir Charles after all, darling?” she asked caressingly.

  “‘Is it to be Sir Charles after all, darling?’ she asked caressingly.”

  Strelsa laughed outright, then, astonished that she had not shrunk from a renewal of the eternal pressure, looked at Molly with wide gray eyes.

  “I don’t know what’s the matter with me to-day,” she said; “I seem to be able to laugh. I’ve not been very well physically; I’ve had a ghastly morning; I’m homeless and wretchedly poor — and I’m laughing at it all — the whole thing, Molly. What do you suppose is the matter with me?”

  “You’re not in love, are you?” asked Molly with calm suspicion.

  “No, I’m not,” said the girl with a quiet conviction that disconcerted the elder woman.

  “Then I don’t see why you should be very happy,” said Molly honestly.

  Strelsa considered: “Perhaps it’s because to-day I feel unusually well. I slept — which I don’t usually.”

  “You’re becoming devout, too,” said Molly.

  “Devout? Oh, you saw me reading in my Testament.... It’s an interesting book, Molly,” she said naïvely. “You know, as children, and at school, and in church we don’t read it with any intelligence — or listen to it in the right way.... People are odd. We have our moments of contrition, abasement, fright, exaltation; but at bottom we know that our religion and a fair observance of it is a sound policy of insurance. We accept it as we take out insurance in view of eventualities and the chance of future fire — —”

  “That’s flippant,” said Molly.

  “I really didn’t mean it so.... I was wondering about it all. Recently, re-reading the New Testament, I was struck by finding so much in it that I had never noticed or understood.... You know, Molly, after all Truth is the greatest thing in the world.”

  “So I’ve heard,” observed Molly drily.

  “Oh, I’ve heard it, too, but never thought what it meant — until recently. You see Truth, to me, was just telling it as often as possible. I never thought much about it — that it is the basis of everything worthy and beautiful — such as old pictures—” she added vaguely— “and those things that silversmiths like Benvenuto Cellini did — —”

  “What?”

  Strelsa coloured: “Everything worthy is founded on Truth,” she said.

  “That sounds like Tupper or a copy-book,” said Molly, laughing. “For surely those profound reflections never emanated originally from you or Rix — did they?”

  Strelsa, much annoyed, picked up the field glasses and levelled them on the river.

  Sir Charles was out there in a launch with Chrysos Lacy. Chrysos fished and Sir Charles baited her hook.

  “That’s a touching sight,” said Strelsa, laughing.

  Molly said crossly: “Well, if you don’t want him, for goodness’ sake say so! — and let me have some credit with the Lacys for engineering the thing.”

  “Take it, darling!” laughed the girl, “take the credit and let the cash go — to Chrysos!”

  “How indelicate you can be, Strelsa!”

  “Oh, I am. I’m in such rude health that it’s almost vulgar. After all, Molly, there’s an immense relief in getting rid of your last penny and knowing nothing worse can
happen to you.”

  “You might die.”

  “I don’t care.”

  “Everybody cares whether they live or die.”

  The girl looked at her, surprised.

  “I don’t,” she said, “ — really.”

  “Of course you do.”

  “But why should I?”

  “Nonsense, Strelsa. No matter how they crack up Heaven, nobody is in a hurry to go there.”

  “I wasn’t thinking of Heaven.... I was just curious to see what else there is — I’m in no hurry, but it has always interested me.... I’ve had a theory that perhaps to everybody worthy is given, hereafter, exactly the kind of heaven they expect — to Buddhist, Brahman, Mohammedan, Christian — to the Shinto priest as well as to the Sagamore.... There’s plenty of time — I’m in no hurry, nor would it be too soon to-morrow for me to find out how near I am to the truth.”

  “You’re morbid, child!”

  “Less this very moment than for years.... Molly, do you know that I am getting well? I wish you knew how well I feel.”

  But Molly was no longer listening. High above the distant hangars where the men had gathered since early morning, a great hawk-like thing was soaring in circles. And already the distant racket of another huge winged thing came to her ears on the summer wind.

  “I hope Jim will be careful,” she said.

  CHAPTER XIV

  Into the long stables at South Linden, that afternoon, Langly Sprowl’s trembling horse was led limping, his velvet flanks all torn by spurs and caked with mud, his tender mouth badly lacerated.

  As for his master, it seemed that the ruin of the expensive hunter and four hours’ violent and capricious exercise in his reeking saddle had merely whetted his appetite for more violence; and he had been tramping for an hour up and down the length of the library in his big sprawling house when Mr. Kyte, his confidential secretary, came in without knocking.

  Sprowl hearing his step swung on him savagely, but Kyte coolly closed the door behind him and turned the key.

  “Ledwith is here,” he said.

  “Ledwith,” repeated Sprowl, mechanically.

  “Yes, he’s on the veranda. They said you were not at home. He said he’d wait. I thought you ought to know. He acts queerly.”

  Langly’s protruding eyes became utterly expressionless.

  “All right,” he said in dismissal.

  Kyte still lingered:

  “Is there anything I can say or do?”

  “If there was I’d tell you, wouldn’t I?”

  Kyte’s lowered gaze stole upward toward his employer, sustained his expressionless glare for a second, then shifted.

  “Very well,” he said unlocking the library door; “I thought he might be armed, that’s all.”

  “Kyte!”

  Mr. Kyte turned on the door-sill.

  “What do you mean by saying that?”

  “Saying what?”

  “That you think this fellow Ledwith may be armed?”

  Kyte stood silent.

  “I ask you again,” repeated Sprowl, “why you infer that this man might have armed himself to visit this house?”

  Kyte’s eyes stole upward, were instantly lowered. Sprowl walked over to him.

  “You’re paid to act, not think; do you understand?” he said in a husky, suppressed voice; but his long fingers were twitching.

  “I understand,” said Kyte.

  Sprowl’s lean head jerked; Kyte went; and the master of the house strode back into the library and resumed his pacing.

  Boots, spurs, the skirts of his riding coat, even his stock were stained with mud and lather; and there was a spot or two across his sun-tanned cheeks.

  Presently he walked to the bay-window which commanded part of the west veranda, and looking out through the lace curtains saw Ledwith sitting there, his sunken eyes fixed on the westering sun.

  The man’s clothing hung loosely on his frame, showing bony angles at elbow and knee. Burrs and black swamp-mud stuck to his knickerbockers and golf-stockings; he sat very still save for a constant twitching of the muscles.

  The necessity for nervous and physical fatigue drove Sprowl back into the library to tramp up and down over the soft old Saraband rugs, up and down, to and fro, and across sometimes, ranging the four walls with the dull, aimless energy of a creature which long caging is rendering mentally unsound.

  Then the monotony of the exercise began to irritate instead of allaying his restlessness; he went to the bay-window again, saw Ledwith still sitting there, stared at him with a ferocity almost expressionless, and strode out into the great hallway and through the servant-watched doors to the veranda.

  Ledwith looked up, rose. “How are you, Langly?” he said.

  Sprowl nodded, staring him insolently in the face.

  There was a pause, then Ledwith’s pallid features twitched into a crooked smile.

  “I wanted to talk over one or two matters with you before I leave,” he said.

  “When are you leaving?”

  “To-night.”

  “Where are you going?”

  “I don’t know — to the Acremont Inn for a few days. After that — I don’t know.”

  Sprowl, perfectly aware that his footman was listening, walked out across the lawn, and Ledwith went with him. Neither spoke. Shadows of tall trees lay like velvet on the grass; the crests of the woods beyond grew golden, their depths dusky and bluish. Everywhere robins were noisily at supper, tilting for earthworms on the lawns; golden-winged woodpeckers imitated them; in the late sunlight the grackles’ necks were rainbow tinted.

  On distant hillcrests Sprowl could see his brood-mares feeding, switching their tails against the sky; farther away sheep dotted hillside pastures. Farther still the woods of Witch-Hollow lay banded with sunshine and shadow. And Sprowl’s protuberant gaze grew fixed and expressionless as he swung on across the meadows and skirted the first grove of oaks, huge outlying pickets of his splendid forest beyond.

  “We can talk here,” said Ledwith in a voice which sounded hoarse and painful; and, swinging around on him, Sprowl saw that he was in distress, fighting for breath and leaning against the trunk of an oak.

  “What do you want to talk about?” said Sprowl.

  The struggle for breath left Ledwith mute.

  “Can’t you walk and talk at the same time?” demanded Sprowl. “I need exercise.”

  “I’ve got to rest.”

  “Well, then, what have you got to say? — because I’m going on. What’s the matter with you, anyway,” he added sneeringly; “dope?”

  “Partly,” said Ledwith without resentment.

  “What else?”

  “Anxiety.”

  “Oh. Do you think you have a monopoly of that?”

  Ledwith, without heeding the sneering question, went on, still resting on his elbow against the tree-trunk:

  “I want to talk to you, Langly. I want straight talk from you. Do I get it?”

  “You’ll get it; go on,” said Sprowl contemptuously.

  “Then — my wife has returned.”

  “Your ex-wife,” corrected Sprowl without a shade of expression in voice or features.

  “Yes,” said Ledwith— “Mary. I left the house before she arrived, on my way to Acremont across country. She and your aunt drove up together. I saw them from the hill.”

  “Very interesting,” said Sprowl. “Is that all?”

  Ledwith detached himself from the tree and stood aside, under it, looking down at the grass.

  “You are going to marry her of course,” he said.

  “That,” retorted Sprowl, “is none of your business.”

  “Because,” continued Ledwith, not heeding him, “that is the only thing possible. There is nothing else for her to do — for you to do. She knows it, you know it, and so do I.”

  “I know all about it,” said Sprowl coolly. “Is there anything else?”

  “Only your word to confirm what I have just said.”

&nb
sp; “What are you talking about?”

  “Your marriage with Mary.”

  “I think I told you that it was none of your business.”

  “Perhaps you did. But I’ve made it my business.”

  “May I ask why?”

  “Yes, you may ask, Langly, and I’ll tell you. It’s because, recently, there have been rumours concerning you and a Mrs. Leeds. That’s the reason.”

  Sprowl’s hands, hanging at his sides, began nervously closing and unclosing:

  “Is that all, Ledwith?”

  “That’s all — when you have confirmed what I have said concerning the necessity for your marriage with the woman you debauched.”

  “You lie,” said Langly.

  Ledwith smiled. “No,” he said wearily, “I don’t. She admitted it to me.”

  “That is another lie.”

  “Ask her. She didn’t care what she said to me any more than she cared, after a while, what she did to me. You made her yours, soul and body; she became only your creature, caring less and less for concealment as her infatuation grew from coquetry to imprudence, from recklessness to effrontery.... It’s the women of our sort, who, once misled, stop at nothing — not the men. Prudence to the point of cowardice is the amatory characteristic of your sort.... I don’t mean physical cowardice,” he added, lifting his sunken eyes and letting them rest on Sprowl’s powerful frame.

  “Have you finished?” asked the latter.

  “In a moment, Langly. I am merely reminding you of what has happened. Concerning myself I have nothing to say. Look at me. You know what I was; you see what I am. I’m not whining; it’s all in a lifetime. And the man who is not fitted to take care of what is his, loses. That’s all.”

  Sprowl’s head was averted after an involuntary glance at the man before him. His face was red — or it may have been the ruddy evening sun striking flat across it.

  Ledwith said: “You will marry her, of course. But I merely wish to hear you say so.”

  Sprowl swung on him, his thick lips receding:

  “I’ll marry whom I choose! Do you understand that?”

  “Of course. But you will choose to marry her.”

  “Do you think so?”

  “Yes. Or — I’ll kill you,” he said seriously.