XXIX. DO YOU KNOW MY BROTHER
Her hands were thrust out to repel, her features were fixed; her beautysomething wonderful. Orlando Brotherson, thus met, stared for a momentat the vision before him, then slowly and with effort withdrawing hisgaze, he sought the face of Mr. Challoner with the first sign of opendisturbance that gentleman had ever seen in him.
"Ah," said he, "my welcome is readily understood. I see you far fromhome, sir." And with an ironical bow he turned again to Doris, who haddropped her hands, but in whose cheeks the pallor still lingered in away to check the easy flow of words with which he might have sought tocarry off the situation. "Am I in Oswald Brotherson's house?" he asked."I was directed here. But possibly there may be some mistake."
"It is here he lives," said she; moving back automatically till shestood again by the threshold of the small room in which she had receivedMr. Challoner. "Do you wish to see him to-night? If so, I fear it isimpossible. He has been very ill and is not allowed to receive visitsfrom strangers."
"I am not a stranger," announced the newcomer, with a smile few couldsee unmoved, it offered such a contrast to his stern and dominatingfigure. "I thought I heard some words of recognition which would proveyour knowledge of that fact."
She did not answer. Her lips had parted, but her thought or at least theexpression of her thought hung suspended in the terror of this meetingfor which she was not at all prepared. He seemed to note this terror,whether or not he understood its cause, and smiled again, as he added:
"Mr. Brotherson must have spoken of his brother Orlando. I am he, MissScott. Will you let me come in now?"
Her eyes sought those of Mr. Challoner, who quietly nodded. Immediatelyshe stepped from before the door which her figure had guarded and,motioning him to enter, she begged Mr. Challoner, with an imploringlook, to sustain her in the interview she saw before her. He had nodesire for this encounter, especially as Mr. Brotherson's glance in hisdirection had been anything but conciliatory. He was quite convincedthat nothing was to be gained by it, but he could not resist her appeal,and followed them into the little room whose limited dimensions madethe tall Orlando look bigger and stronger and more lordly in hisself-confidence than ever.
"I am sorry it is so late," she began, contemplating his intrusivefigure with forced composure. "We have to be very quiet in the eveningsso as not to disturb your brother's first sleep which is of greatimportance to him."
"Then I'm not to see him to-night?"
"I pray you to wait. He's--he's been a very sick man."
"Dangerously so?"
"Yes."
Orlando continued to regard her with a peculiar awakening gaze, showing,Mr. Challoner thought, more interest in her than in his brother, andwhen he spoke it was mechanically and as if in sole obedience to theproprieties of the occasion.
"I did not know he was ill till very lately. His last letter was acheerful one, and I supposed that all was right till chance revealedthe truth. I came on at once. I was intending to come anyway. I havebusiness here, as you probably know, Miss Scott."
She shook her head. "I know very little about business," said she.
"My brother has not told you why he expected me?"
"He has not even told me that he expected you."
"No?" The word was highly expressive; there was surprise in it and atouch of wonder, but more than all, satisfaction. "Oswald was alwaysclose-mouthed," he declared. "It's a good fault; I'm obliged to theboy."
These last words were uttered with a lightness which imposed upon histwo highly agitated hearers, causing Mr. Challoner to frown and Doristo shrink back in indignation at the man who could indulge in a sportivesuggestion in presence of such fears, if not of such memories, as thesituation evoked. But to one who knew the strong and self-containedman--to Sweetwater possibly, had he been present,--there was in thisvery attempt--in his quiet manner and in the strange and fitful flashof his ordinarily quick eye, that which showed he was labouring--and hadbeen labouring almost from his first entrance, under an excitement ofthought and feeling which in one of his powerfully organised nature mustend and that soon in an outburst of mysterious passion which would carryeverything before it. But he did not mean that it should happen here. Hewas too accustomed to self-command to forget himself in this presence.He would hold these rampant dogs in leash till the hour of solitude;then--a glittering smile twisted his lips as he continued to gaze, firstat the girl who had just entered his life, and then at the man he hadevery reason to distrust, and with that firm restraint upon himselfstill in full force, remarked, with a courteous inclination:
"The hour is late for further conversation. I have a room at the hoteland will return to it at once. In the morning I hope to see my brother."
He was going, Doris not knowing what to say, Mr. Challoner not desirousof detaining him, when there came the sound of a little tinkle from theother side of the hall, blanching the young girl's cheeks and causingOrlando Brotherson's brows to rise in peculiar satisfaction.
"My brother?" he asked.
"Yes," came in faltering reply. "He has heard our voices; I must go tohim."
"Say that Orlando wishes him a good night," smiled her heart's enemy,with a bow of infinite grace.
She shuddered, and was hastening from the room when her glance fell onMr. Challoner. He was pale and looked greatly disturbed. The prospect ofbeing left alone with a man whom she had herself denounced to him as hisdaughter's murderer, might prove a tax to his strength to which she hadno right to subject him. Pausing with an appealing air, she made him aslight gesture which he at once understood.
"I will accompany you into the hall," said he. "Then if anything iswrong, you have but to speak my name."
But Orlando Brotherson, displeased by this move, took a step whichbrought him between the two.
"You can hear her from here if she chooses to speak. There's a point tobe settled between us before either of us leaves this house, and thisopportunity is as good as another. Go to my brother, Miss Scott; we willawait your return."
A flash from the proud banker's eye; but no demur, rather a gesture ofconsent. Doris, with a look of deep anxiety, sped away, and the two menstood face to face.
It was one of those moments which men recognise as memorable. What hadthe one to say or the other to hear, worthy of this preamble and themore than doubtful relation in which they stood each to each? Mr.Challoner had more time than he expected in which to wonder and girdhimself for whatever suffering or shock awaited him. For, OrlandoBrotherson, unlike his usual self, kept him waiting while he collectedhis own wits, which, strange to say, seemed to have vanished with thegirl.
But the question finally came.
"Mr. Challoner, do you know my brother?"
"I have never seen him."
"Do you know him? Does he know you?"
"Not at all. We are strangers."
It was said honestly. They did not know each other. Mr. Challoner wasquite correct in his statement.
But the other had his doubts. Why shouldn't he have? The coincidenceof finding this mourner if not avenger of Edith Challoner, in hisown direct radius again, at a spot so distant, so obscure and sodisconnected with any apparent business reason, was certainly startlingenough unless the tie could be found in his brother's name and closerelationship to himself.
He, therefore, allowed himself to press the question:
"Men sometimes correspond who do not know each other. You knew that aBrotherson lived here?"
"Yes."
"And hoped to learn something about me?"
"No; my interest was solely with your brother."
"With my brother? With Oswald? What interest can you have in him apartfrom me? Oswald is--"
Suddenly a thought came--an unimaginable one; one with power toblanch even his hardy cheek and shake a soul unassailable by all smallemotions.
"Oswald Brotherson!" he repeated; adding in unintelligible tones tohimself--"O. B. The same initials! They are following up these initials.Poor Oswald." The
n aloud: "It hardly becomes me, perhaps, to questionyour motives in this attempt at making my brother's acquaintance.I think I can guess them; but your labour will be wasted. Oswald'sinterests do not extend beyond this town; they hardly extend to me. Weare strangers, almost. You will learn nothing from him on the subjectwhich naturally engrosses you."
Mr. Challoner simply bowed. "I do not feel called upon," said he, "toexplain my reasons for wishing to know your brother. I will simplysatisfy you upon a point which may well rouse your curiosity. Youremember that--that my daughter's last act was the writing of a letterto a little protegee of hers. Miss Scott was that protegee. In seekingher, I came upon him. Do you require me to say more on this subject?Wait till I have seen Mr. Oswald Brotherson and then perhaps I can doso."
Receiving no answer to this, Mr. Challoner turned again to the man whowas the object of his deepest suspicions, to find him still in thedaze of that unimaginable thought, battling with it, scoffing at it,succumbing to it and all without a word. Mr. Challoner was without clewto this struggle, but the might of it and the mystery of it, drove himin extreme agitation from the room. Though proof was lacking, thoughproof might never come, nothing could ever alter his belief from thismoment on that Doris was right in her estimate of this man's guilt,however unsubstantial her reasoning might appear.
How far he might have been carried by this new conviction; whetherhe would have left the house without seeing Doris again or exchanginganother word with the man whose very presence stifled him, he hadno opportunity to show, for before he had taken another step, heencountered the hurrying figure of Doris, who was returning to herguests with an air of marked relief.
"He does not know that you are here," she whispered to Mr. Challoner,as she passed him. Then, as she again confronted Orlando who hastenedto dismiss his trouble at her approach, she said quite gaily, "Mr.Brotherson heard your voice, and is glad to know that you're here. Hebade me give you this key and say that you would have found things inbetter shape if he had been in condition to superintend the removal ofthe boxes to the place he had prepared for you before he became ill.I was the one to do that," she added, controlling her aversion withmanifest effort. "When Mr. Brotherson came to himself he asked if I hadheard about any large boxes having arrived at the station shipped tohis name. I said that several notices of such had come to the house.At which he requested me to see that they were carried at once to thestrange looking shed he had had put up for him in the woods. I thoughtthat they were for him, and I saw to the thing myself. Two or threeothers have come since and been taken to the same place. I think youwill find nothing broken or disturbed; Mr. Brotherson's wishes areusually respected."
"That is fortunate for me," was the courteous reply.
But Orlando Brotherson was not himself, not at all himself as he boweda formal adieu and withdrew past the drawn-up sentinel-like figure of Mr.Challoner, without a motion on his part or on the part of that gentlemanto lighten an exit which had something in it of doom and dread presage.