Complete Works of Stanley J Weyman

by Stanley J Weyman

  “But it is so fine,” Peggy pleaded, driven to defend her friend. “You really mustn’t scold her, Lady Bicester. It was my doing. I’m sure she has been—”

  She stopped. Charlotte felt her weight sink suddenly on the arm by which she supported her, and, turning, she saw that the colour had drained from her face. Peggy’s eyes, and they were frightened eyes, were fixed on some object beyond Lady Bicester. “Peggy!” Charlotte exclaimed, as she passed her arm round her. “What is it? What is it, my dear? Are you ill? You mustn’t — you mustn’t give way. Let us get in!”

  “There!” Lady Bicester said, between alarm and triumph. “What did I tell you? She was no more fit to come out than I am to dance the Boulanger! What you can have been thinking of—”

  She stopped. For Peggy, whom Charlotte expected at every moment to collapse, freed herself by an abrupt movement from her friend’s hold and crying “Sir Albery — it’s Sir Albery!” she left them, gliding away as if moved by a spring. She passed Lady Bicester, she was half a dozen paces away before Charlotte recovered her wits.

  The path, though safe, was narrow, and Charlotte lost not a moment in recapturing her. “No, Peggy, no!” she said. “No! Let him come to us, if it is Sir Albery!” Then, a glance assuring her that Peggy’s anxiety had not misled her, “See, they are coming!” she urged, gently restraining Peggy, as the urgency of the crisis rose before her and redoubled her desire to have the girl within doors. “They are coming, dear! Be guided by me! They will tell us in the house.”

  “But he’s — he’s not with him,” Peggy cried, feebly withstanding her. For her there was only one “he.”

  “He could not be! It isn’t likely,” Charlotte argued. “Come in — come in, and they will tell us!” And while Lady Bicester, divided between curiosity and excitement, fluttered about them like an excited hen, Charlotte as good as forced Peggy through the wicket and into the house.

  She would have placed her in a chair, but the moment they were over the threshold Peggy, though she shook in every limb, drew herself up and waved her off. Her face, white as chalk, seemed to be all eyes, but she held herself erect, and “I will know! I will know!” she cried passionately. “What is it to you?”

  Fortunately Wyke was close on their heels. He took in the scene at a glance, and he went straight to Peggy, whose colourless face and dilated eyes were as points of light in a dark room. He took her cold hand, and his look spoke before his voice. “He is alive,” he said. “He is alive and safe, Mrs. Bligh. He will be here presently.”

  No doubt his instinct was right, and he was wise to speak. But the news was overwhelming, and as Charlotte sprang forward and took her to her generous bosom, Peggy fainted.

  CHAPTER XXXV

  CHARLOTTE laid her down, and in masterly fashion seized the woman’s advantage. She swept them all out, the Rector and the old Captain, who had followed Wyke in at the critical moment, even her mother — the last protesting much, but vainly. “Leave her to me!” Charlotte commanded. “Go, good people, go! You have done all the harm you can!” But while she scolded, her words were but the mask beneath which she hid her feelings, while the look that her wet eyes gave Sir Albery blessed him.

  Yet when she had turned them all out, there was one who stayed. As she bent over Peggy she found him at her elbow, she felt his hurried breathing on her cheek; when she began to busy herself, loosening the neck of Peggy’s frock, she had to take a grip of herself. “Silly man!” she said. “How do you suppose she is to breathe if you hold her like that! Be of some use! There, get the brandy out of that cupboard! Surely you know the one! Oh, clumsy!” she exclaimed a moment later. “Now you’ve broken the glass! A good thing it was not the bottle, or where should we be!”

  “You don’t think—” He got as far as that, and then the fear that had unnerved his hand burst forth in anger — he was suffering the worst torments of suspense. “He was too quick!” he cried. “He was too quick! He should have broken it to her!”

  “Broken it to her!” Charlotte replied brutally. “Rubbish! There, let her be, and give her air!

  And if you must be doing something, man, rub her hands instead of mumbling there! What a fuss! What a pother, and you alive, after all!”

  He thought her heartless. He did not know the moment that the life, that seemed to hover ready to fly from the frail form, might not escape, and this girl drolled. He thought her incredibly cruel, unfeeling, barbarous. But when he turned to rend her he saw that, though the hand that moistened Peggy’s lips was steady, the woman’s tears were running down her face. And then he understood. He stayed the passionate remonstrance that rose to his lips, and “You don’t think — you don’t think,” he pleaded, “that she—”

  “I don’t think anything except that she has swooned — just that!” Charlotte said, keeping her pose as well as she could. She felt Peggy’s pulse, and nodded. “She will come round in a minute,” she said. “And do you act when she does as if you had never been away. Let her take you for granted, and we shall have no more of this nonsense. I don’t know which is the bigger baby of the two!” she added with a laugh that ended abruptly.

  But she did not deceive him now. “God bless you!” he said, and he had barely said it twice, before Charlotte’s prediction was fulfilled. Peggy opened her eyes. For a few seconds she stared at the ceiling. Then she seemed to grasp that things were not right and to wonder why she lay there; and she tried to rise, but feeling her weakness sank back on her elbow. As she did so her eyes fell on the brown hand that clasped hers, and for a moment she considered it. Slowly, in growing wonder, she followed the arm upwards until her eyes reached the man’s face. She did not 6tart, but a look of unspeakable content transfigured her features, and as if it were the most natural thing in the world she sank like a tired child on his breast. He held her to him, held her close, murmuring the broken words that love and worship and tenderness and all the poignant joys of a reunion, so often pictured, so often despaired of, brought stumbling to his lips.

  Charlotte watched them with hungry eyes. “So that is it, is it?” she thought. But aloud, “Steady, young people,” she said, as she set the glass on the floor beside them. “Gently, gently! And do you, my friend, give her a little more of this when you have time to think of it.”

  She saw that her hour was past, that she was not wanted, and she went out softly, closing the door behind her. She joined the group that waited on the path. They had been too anxious to talk. They had stood about, exchanging anxious glances, the Rector pacing a little apart from the others, his lips moving in prayer or, it might be, in thanksgiving. The old Captain had not ceased to wipe the grateful tears from his eyes, while Lady Bicester, between starting to speak and crying “Hush!” when anyone else spoke, had three times said that she must go.

  They crowded about Charlotte, and with a word she relieved their fears. “It is all right,” she said. “Glory be, good people!”

  “Thank God!” the Rector murmured, as he turned away to hide his emotion. “Thank God!”

  And Charlotte was a great help to them. With a bravado that she did not feel and that her eyes belied, “Why shouldn’t it be right?” she asked flippantly. “And what next, eh?” She looked round upon them. “What has the hero to tell us?”

  “Haven’t you left him inside?” Wyke reminded her.

  “I don’t think so,” Charlotte retorted. “Suppose you tell us the tale, Sir Albery, while they are billing and cooing.”

  In outline, it was quickly told, Wyke gliding rapidly over much that his listeners had no difficulty in supplying. Encouraged by the favourable reception that he had met with at Whitehall, and by the notice that Bligh’s achievement had won, he had followed up his enquiries by requesting a safe-conduct for France.

  He had been told at once that this was impossible, that it was unheard of, that it was out of the question. Mr. Nepean at the Admiralty had held up his hands in horror — were we not at war? But Sir Albery had stuck to his point, prompted by rumours,
heard at his club and echoed in the Press. Using his influence to the utmost he had gone from door to door, he had made himself a nuisance in this and that Government Office, and in the end a Devon member, a man of acres and weight whose nod was Olympic in more than one borough, had been persuaded to say a word to the party whip. The whip had dropped a hint to a certain Secretary, the Secretary had gone in to Lord Hawkesbury, the Foreign Minister had pooh-poohed the matter. But a suggestion had somehow come round to Wyke that if he would call on a mysterious Mr. Otto residing in Bond Street — a private gentleman of no occupation who was amusing himself, seeing the sights of London — something might be done.

  He had not needed to be told twice. He had called, and Mr. Otto had shown himself amiable and anxious to oblige. Still he had feared that nothing could be done. He had shaken his head, he had doubted, considered, hesitated; at the same time he had spoken eloquently on the claims of humanity and the hardships of war.

  “I cannot think how you persisted!” the Rector exclaimed.

  Sir Albery looked at one of his listeners in a way that made her heart leap. “I knew that there was one doing as much,” he said. “And I could not bear to disappoint her.”

  Finally, he said, Mr. Otto had yielded. He had whispered that two gentlemen, who had urgent business in Paris, were crossing on a certain night, and that the addition of a third, if duly accredited and carrying a letter in his, Mr. Otto’s, handwriting, might conceivably pass unnoticed. Wyke had felt and expressed becoming gratitude, and three days later, cloaked in some capacity that he did not understand, but that everywhere met with consideration, he had crossed, landed on the enemy’s soil, and after spending a night at Dessein’s at Calais and a night at Amiens had found himself installed at Pujol’s Hotel in Paris. There he was apparently free to do what he pleased, but he had not doubted that unwinking eyes watched him and that none of his words fell to the ground.

  Prudently he had lost no time in going about his business. He had presented Mr. Otto’s letter at the Ministry of Marine, and had been received with the same mysterious politeness, though in an office which might have been cleaner. He had been heard with patience, and after some delay had been invited to repeat his visit in three or four days. He had spent the interval in renewing his acquaintance with a city so interesting to English eyes, and in visiting the places that a few years before had witnessed the passage of the tumbrils to the guillotine. He missed the old magnificence, the outward decency. He found the streets dirty, their very names altered. Buildings, the splendour of which he recalled, stood sadly in need of repair, the faces that he met in the street were reserved and suspicious, while the vehicles that drove him into the gutter and splashed him to the eyes would have disgraced a cockney tradesman. In every public place an astonishing indecorum flaunted itself.

  But everywhere he met with courtesy and passed unchallenged, and his success on the fourth day when he called at the Ministry surpassed his hopes. He was informed that the persons about whose well-being he was solicitous were confined in the prison at Quimper, and that the Capitaine de Corsaire Bligh was alive and recovering from his injuries; that as a mark of the Minister’s particular consideration, evoked by the amiable representations made to him, an order for the Capitaine’s release would be issued and such arrangements made as would enable him to join the English Milord at Boulogne. Of the matelots taken with him, care would be taken until — the smiling official had bowed and left it to be understood that an unnamed but happy event loomed in the future.

  “And that’s — that’s all,” the narrator concluded lamely.

  “All!” one of his listeners cried. “All?”

  “Or, no, not quite all,” he replied, correcting himself with a smile. “I called at the Admiralty on my return to thank Mr. Nepean. He made me no definite promise — promises are not much in their way — but he said as much as that — that Mr. Bligh’s case would be considered. I think, therefore, that there is good hope that—’ He broke off. “For God’s sake, sir, don’t!” he exclaimed, retreating in ludicrous dismay before the old Captain, who, overcome by his feelings, had fallen on his knee and would have kissed his hand. “For God’s sake, sir, I beg you to get up.”

  It was an absurd scene: Sir Albery’s horror, the old man’s inability to raise himself without help, Lady Bicester’s amazement, the Rector’s kindly interposition. Yet, though they smiled, there was hardly a dry eye among them, and when Charlotte softly clapped her hands, and cried “Who is the hero now?” the laugh that followed brought a welcome relief from tension. They crowded about the Captain, taking him by the hand, forgiving him and giving him joy.

  Bravo!” Charlotte said. “And now, good people, there is someone else who would like to thank Sir Albery. And the Rector will no doubt wait and see Peggy. But my work is done, and I am for home. Come, mother, better late than never!”

  The Rector, however, said he would see his daughter by and by, when, however, she was more composed; and Sir Albery, sheering off with craven alacrity, said he would accompany him. So while the old Captain, bareheaded and mumbling thanksgivings, pegged away to his lodging, the other four took the upward path. As far as the churchyard they walked in couples, the Rector leading with Wyke.

  “I suppose you have heard Bligh’s story?” the Rector asked.

  “Yes. And a very fine story it is, sir,” Wyke assured him.

  The Rector did not evince as much enthusiasm as the other expected. His face was serious, and when he spoke again his words came haltingly. “Did he — what was his impression, I mean — about the corvette? Did he think that she was lying by for the Lively Peggy? Waiting for her, I mean?”

  “Waiting for her? I don’t think that he gave me that impression. What makes you think so?”

  “But didn’t he learn after the capture? I should have thought that he would have learned — if it was so. From her papers or her people?”

  “If he had I think he would have told me,” Wyke declared. “I had long talks with him, and he said nothing to that effect to me. I don’t think he had it in his mind. It was not as if the Peggy cruised regularly and they had reason to expect her. What made you think of it?”

  The Rector’s answer was lame. “I fancy that it was a word that fell from Copestake,” he explained. But he seemed, having said this, to shake a weight from his shoulders, and he walked with a lighter step, he swung his cane. “She fell in with the brig so handily, I wondered, you see.”

  “As far as I gathered, the corvette was in her usual track, and the Peggy had just the bad luck to cross it at the moment.”

  “Just so, just so,” the Rector agreed. “But — one moment!” He stopped abruptly. The worried look had returned to his face. “Joe Fewster? Budgen’s nephew, you know. He — he was one of the — of the lost, I fear?”

  “Fewster?” Wyke laughed. “Why, he’s here. He came over with us. You hadn’t time to hear, I suppose. The scamp passed himself off as the Captain’s servant, fetched and carried for him and got an extra ration, which was just what he was fit for! They released him with Bligh. Joe lost?” Wyke shrugged his shoulders. “No such luck, sir! He’s the kind of bad penny that is sure to turn up when better men like poor Toll are lost.” And then, “Why, Rector,” he added in surprise, “you look as if you had — as if that little scamp’s life or death mattered much to any one.”

  But the Rector was not heeding him. He seemed to be unconscious of his presence. He took off his hat and looked over the sea. “Dear Lord,” he murmured in a tone of feeling so real that it redoubled Wyke’s surprise, “I thank Thee!” And for a space he stood uncovered and let the breeze fan his face.

  Wyke wondered. “But man alive!” he protested, “there are better men gone, and for my part I could have spared Fewster very well.”

  The Rector put on his hat, and came back to himself. Yet not to his ordinary self, for his face wore a brightness that would have kept his companion puzzling if he had not, in a shamefaced fashion, explained himself. “Ye
s, to be sure,” he said. “But he was the last life in Budgen’s lease — of the Cove, you know. And it would have been a sore blow to the man.”

  Wyke nodded. “I see,” he said. “Well, it does you credit.” Then before he could say more Lady Bicester, leaning on Charlotte’s arm, overtook them. Steep ascents did not suit her figure, and she had stood more than once to admire the view. They all passed into the churchyard together, but changed partners there, Sir Albery falling back with Charlotte, and following the others.

  The girl’s heart was full, and though she knew it would be wiser to be silent she could not refrain from speech. “You have done so much! So much for her!” she said with feeling. “I am sorry that she cannot show her gratitude as you deserve.”

  Wyke looked at her. “Who cannot?” he asked.

  “Peggy. You have done so much for her, I don’t know how she can bear it!”

  “She can bear it very well,” he said. “Here, let us go round this way!” He turned right-handed towards the walk that hung over the sea.

  Charlotte stopped. “But my mother will be waiting,” she said.

  “Let her wait,” he replied coolly. “Come this way.”

  Then, as she reluctantly complied, “Now,” he said bluntly, “tell me what you meant by that.”

  “What I meant?” Charlotte began, but she did not find it easy to explain. She was not at her best. “You know what I mean without my telling you. What is the use of — of pretending?”

  “None. But you’ve got to tell me all the same.”

  “Good gracious! Why, Sir Albery, when you know? If Peggy were unmarried or — or widowed, poor girl—” She shrugged her shoulders.

  But he seemed to be determined to make her say it. “Well,” he retorted, “and if Peggy were unmarried, or — or widowed, what then?”

  “You want to drive me into a corner,” she protested.