CHAPTER XI
"So, Connie, you don't want to go out with me this afternoon?" said LadyLangmoor, bustling into the Eaton Square drawing-room, where Connie satwriting a letter at a writing-table near the window, and occasionallyraising her eyes to scan the street outside.
"I'm afraid I can't, Aunt Sophia. You remember, I told you, Mr. Sorellwas coming to fetch me."
Lady Langmoor looked rather vague. She was busy putting on her whitegloves, and inspecting the fit of her grey satin dress, as she saw it inthe mirror over Connie's head.
"You mean--to see the young man who was hurt? Dreadfully sad of course,and you know him well enough to go and see him in bed? Oh, well, ofcourse, girls do anything nowadays. It is very kind of you."
Connie laughed, but without irritation. During the week she had beenstaying in the Langmoors' house, she had resigned herself to the factthat her Aunt Langmoor--as it seemed to her--was a very odd and hardlyresponsible creature, the motives of whose existence she did not evenbegin to understand. But both her aunt and Lord Langmoor had been verykind to their new-found niece. They had given a dinner-party and atea-party in her honour; they had taken her to several crushes a night,and introduced her to a number of their own friends. And they would havemoved Heaven and earth to procure her an invitation to the Court ballthey themselves attended, on the day after Connie's arrival, if only,as Lady Langmoor plaintively said--"Your poor mother had done the rightthing at the right time." By which she meant to express--withoutharshness towards the memory of Lady Risborough--how lamentable it wasthat, in addition to being christened, vaccinated and confirmed,Constance had not also been "presented" at the proper moment. HoweverConstance probably enjoyed the evening of the Court ball more than anyother in the week, since she went to the Italian Embassy after dinner tohelp her girl friend, the daughter of Italy's new Prime Minister, ElisaBardinelli, to dress for the function; and the two girls were soenchanted to see each other, and had so much Roman gossip to getthrough, that Donna Elisa was scandalously late, and the Ambassadoralmost missed the Royal Procession.
But that had been the only spot of pleasure in Connie's fortnight. LadyLangmoor was puzzled by her pale looks and her evident lack of zest forthe amusements offered her. She could only suppose that her niece wastired out with the balls of Commem., and Connie accepted the excusegratefully. In reality she cared for nothing day after day but thelittle notes she got from Sorell night and morning giving her news ofRadowitz. Till now he had been too ill to see her. But at last thedoctor had given leave for a visit, and as soon as Lady Langmoor hadgone off on her usual afternoon round of concerts and teas, Connie movedto the window, and waited for Sorell.
How long was it since she had first set foot in England and Oxford?Barely two months! And to Constance it seemed as if these months hadbeen merely an unconscious preparation for this state of oppression anddistress in which she found herself. Radowitz in his misery andpain--Falloden on the Cherwell path, defending himself by thosepassionate retorts upon her of which she could not but admit the partialjustice--by these images she was perpetually haunted. Certainly she hadno reason to look back with pleasure or self-approval on her Oxfordexperiences. In all her dealings with Falloden she had behaved with areckless folly of which she was now quite conscious; courting risks; inlove with excitement rather than with the man; and careless whither theaffair might lead, so long as it gratified her own romantic curiositiesas to the power of woman over the masculine mind.
Then, suddenly, all this had become serious. She was like the playingchild on whose hand the wasp sat down. But in this case the moral stingof what had happened was abidingly sharp and painful. The tragedy ofRadowitz, together with the charm interwoven with all her fewrecollections of him, had developed in Connie feelings of unbearablepity and tenderness, altogether new to her. Yet she was constantlythinking of Falloden; building up her own harrowed vision of hisremorse, or dreaming of the Marmion ball, and the ride in the bluebellwood,--those two meetings in which alone she had felt happiness withhim, something distinct from vanity, and a challenging love of power.Now it was all over. They would probably not meet again, till he hadforgotten her, and had married some one else. She was quite aware of hisfixed and businesslike views for himself and his career--as to marriage,travel, Parliament and the rest; and it had often pleased her wilfulnessto think of modifying or upsetting them. She had now far more abundantproof of his haughty self-centredness than their first shortacquaintance on the Riviera had given her; and yet--though she tried tohide it from herself--she was far more deeply absorbed in the thought ofhim. When all was said, she knew that she had treated him badly. Theeffect of his violence and cruelty towards Radowitz had been indeed tomake her shudder away from him. It seemed to her still that it would beimpossible to forgive herself should she ever make friends with DouglasFalloden again. She would be an accomplice in his hardness of heart anddeed. Yet she recognised guiltily her own share in that hardness. Shehad played with and goaded him; she had used Radowitz to punish him; herchampionship of the boy had become in the end mere pique with Falloden;and she was partly responsible for what had happened. She could notrecall Falloden's face and voice on their last walk without realisingthat she had hit him recklessly hard, and that her conduct to him hadbeen one of the causes of the Marmion tragedy.
She was haunted by these thoughts, and miserable for lack of somecomforting, guiding, and--if possible--absolving voice. She missed hermother childishly day and night, and all that premature self-possessionand knowledge of the world, born of her cosmopolitan training, which atOxford had made her appear so much older than other English girls oftwenty, seemed to have broken away, and left her face to face withfeelings she could not check, and puzzles she wanted somebody elseto judge.
For instance--here was this coming visit to her aunts in Yorkshire.Their house in Scarfedale was most uncomfortably near to Flood Castle.The boundaries of the Falloden estate ran close to her aunts' village.She would run many chances of coming across Douglas himself, howevermuch she might try to avoid him. At the same time Lady Marcia wrotecontinually, describing the plans that were being made to entertainher--eager, affectionate letters, very welcome in spite of their oddityto the girl's sore and orphaned mood. No she really couldn't frame someclumsy excuse, and throw her aunts over. She must go, and trust to luck.
And there would be Sorell and Otto to fall back upon--to take refugewith. Sorell had told her that the little rectory on the moors, whitherhe and Otto were bound as soon as the boy could be moved, stoodsomewhere about midway between her aunts' house and Flood, on theScarfedale side of the range of moors girdling the Flood Castle valley.
It was strange perhaps that she should be counting on Sorell'sneighbourhood. If she had often petulantly felt at Oxford that he wastoo good, too high above her to be of much use to her, she might perhapshave felt it doubly now. For although in some undefined way, ever sincethe night of the Vice-Chancellor's party, she had realised in him a deepinterest in her, even a sense of responsibility for her happiness, whichmade him more truly her guardian than poor harassed Uncle Ewen, she knewvery well that she had disappointed him, and she smarted under it. Shewanted to have it out with him, and didn't dare! As she listened indeedto his agitated report on Radowitz's injuries, after the first verdictof the London surgeons, Connie had been conscious of a kind of moralterror. In the ordinary man of the world, such an incident as theMarmion ragging of a foreign lad, who had offended the prejudices of afew insolent and lordly Englishmen, would have merely stirred a jest. InSorell it roused the same feelings that made him a lover of Swinburneand Shelley and the nobler Byron; a devoted reader of everythingrelating to the Italian Risorgimento; and sent him down every longvacation to a London riverside parish to give some hidden service tothose who were in his eyes the victims of an unjust social system. Forhim the quality of behaviour like Falloden's towards Otto Radowitz wasbeyond argument. The tyrannical temper in things great or small, andquite independent of results, represented, for him, the worst trea
sonthat man can offer to man. In this case it had ended in hideouscatastrophe to an innocent and delightful being, whom he loved. But itwas not thereby any the worse; the vileness of it was only made manifestfor all to see.
This hidden passion in him, as he talked, seemed to lay a fiery hand onConstance, she trembled under it, conscience-stricken. "Does he see thesame hateful thing in me?--though he never says a word to hurtme?--though he is so gentle and so courteous?"
* * * * *
A tall figure became visible at the end of the street. Connie shut upher writing and ran upstairs to put on her things. When she came down,she found Sorell waiting for her with a furrowed brow.
"How is he?" She approached him anxiously. Sorell's look changed andcleared. Had she put on her white dress, had she made herself a visionof freshness and charm, for the poor boy's sake? He thought so; and hisblack eyes kindled.
"Better in some ways. He is hanging on your coming. But these areawfully bad times for the nurses--for all of us."
"I may take him some roses?" she said humbly, pointing to a basket shehad brought in with her.
Sorell smiled assent and took it from her. As they were speeding in ahansom towards the Portland Place region, he gave her an account of thedoctors' latest opinion. It seemed that quite apart from theblood-poisoning, which would heal, the muscles and nerves of the handwere fatally injured. All hope of even a partial use of it was gone.
"Luckily he is not a poor man. He has some hundreds a year. But he had agreat scheme, after he had got his Oxford degree, of going to the newLeschetizsky school in Vienna for two years, and then of giving concertsin Warsaw and Cracow, in aid of the great Polish museum now being formedat Cracow. You know what a wild enthusiasm he has for Polish history andantiquities. He believes his country will rise again, and it was hispassion--his most cherished hope--to give his life and his gift to her.Poor lad!"
The tears stood in Connie's eyes.
"But he can still compose?" she urged piteously.
Sorell shrugged his shoulders.
"Yes, if he has the heart--and the health. I never took much accountbefore of his delicacy. One can see, to look at him, that he's notrobust. But somehow he was always so full of life that one never thoughtof illness in connection with him. But I had a long talk with one of thedoctors last week, who takes rather a gloomy view. A shock like thissometimes lets loose all the germs of mischief in a man's constitution.And his mother was undoubtedly consumptive. Well, we must do our best."
He sighed. There was silence till they turned into Wimpole Street andwere in sight of the nursing home. Then Connie said in a queer, strainedvoice: "You don't know that it was partly I who did it."
Sorell turned upon her with a sudden change of expression. It was asthough she had said something he had long expected, and now that it wassaid a great barrier between them had broken down. He looked at her withshining eyes from which the veil of reserve had momentarily lifted. Shesaw in them both tenderness and sorrow.
"I don't think you need feel that," he said gently. Her lips trembled.She looked straight before her into the hot vista of the street.
"I just played with him--with his whole future, as it's turnedout--without a thought."
Sorell knew that she was thinking of the Magdalen ball, of which he hadby now heard several accounts. He guessed she meant that her provocationof Falloden had contributed to the tragedy, and that the thoughttormented her. But neither of them mentioned Falloden's name. Sorell putout his hand and grasped hers. "Otto's only thought about you is thatyou gave him the happiest evening he ever spent in England," he saidwith energy. "You won't misunderstand."
Her eyes filled with tears. But there was no time to say more. Thehansom drew up.
_Connie sat down beside Radowitz and they looked at eachother in silence_]
They found Radowitz lying partly dressed on the balcony of his backroom, which overlooked a tiny walled patch of grass and two plane-trees.The plane-tree seems to have been left in pity to London by somedeparting rural deity. It alone nourishes amid the wilderness of brick;and one can imagine it as feeling a positive satisfaction, a quiettriumph, in the absence of its stronger rivals, oak and beech and ash,like some gentle human life escaped from the tyrannies of competition.These two great trees were the guardian genii of poor Otto's afternoons.They brought him shade and coolness, even in the hottest hours of aburning June.
Connie sat down beside him, and they looked at each other in silence.Sorell, after a few gay words, had left them together. Radowitz held herhand in his own left. The other was bandaged and supported on a pillow."When she got used to the golden light filtering through the planeleaves, she saw that he was pale and shrunken, that his eyes were moreliving and blue than ever, and his hair more like the burnished halo ofsome Florentine or Siennese saint. Yet the whole aspect was of somethingstricken. She felt a foreboding, a terror, of which she knew she mustlet nothing appear.
"Do you mind my staring?" he said presently, with his half-sad,half-mischievous smile. "You are so nice to look at."
She tried to laugh.
"I put on my best frock. Do you like it?"
"For me?" he said, wondering. "And you brought me these roses?"
He lifted some out of the basket, looked at them, then let them droplistlessly on his knee. "I am afraid I don't care for such things, as Iused to do. Before--this happened, I had a language of my own, in whichI could express everything--as artists or poets can. Now--I am struckdumb. There is something crying in me--that can find no voice. And whenone can't express, one begins not to feel!"
She had to check the recurring tears before she could reply.
"But you can still compose?"
Her tone, in repeating the same words she had used to Sorell, fell intothe same pleading note.
He shook his head, almost with irritation.
"It was out of the instrument--out of improvisation--that all mycomposing grew. Do you remember the tale they tell of George Sand, howwhen she began a novel, she made a few dots and scratches on a sheet ofpaper, and as she played with them they ran into words, and then intosentences--that suggested ideas--and so, in half an hour, she hadsketched a plot, and was ready to go to work? So it was with me. As Iplayed, the ideas came. I am not one of your scientific musicians whocan build up everything _in vacuo_. I must translate everything intosound--through my fingers. It was the same with Chopin." He pointed to alife of Chopin that was lying open on the couch beside him.
"But you will do wonders with your left hand. And your right willperhaps improve. The doctors mayn't know," she pleaded, catching atstraws. "Dear Otto--don't despair!"
He flushed and smiled. His uninjured hand slipped back into hers again.
"I like you to call me Otto. How dear that was of you! May I call youConstance?"
She nodded. There was a sob in her throat that would not let her speak.
"I don't despair--now," he said, after a moment. "I did at first. Iwanted to put an end to myself. But, of course, it was Sorell who savedme. If my mother had lived, she could not have done more."
He turned away his face so that Constance should not see it. When helooked at her again, he was quite calm and smiling.
"Do you know who come to see me almost every day?"
"Tell me."
"Meyrick--Lord Meyrick, and Robertson. Perhaps you don't know him. He'sa Winchester man, a splendid cricketer. It was Robertson I wasstruggling with when I fell. How could he know I should hurt myself? Itwasn't his fault and he gave up his 'choice' for the Oxford Eleven. Theyput him in at the last moment. But he wouldn't play. I didn't know tillafterwards. I told him he was a great fool."
There was a pause. Then Connie said--with difficulty--"Did--did Mr.Falloden write? Has he said anything?"
"Oh yes, he sent a message. After all, when you run over a dog, you senda message, don't you?" said the lad with sudden bitterness. "And Ibelieve he wrote a letter--after I came here. But I didn't open it. Igave it to Sorell
."
Then he raised himself on his pillows and looked keenly at Connie.
"You see the others didn't mean any harm. They were drunk, and it was arow. But Falloden wasn't drunk--and he did mean--"
"Oh, not to hurt you so?" cried Connie involuntarily.
"No--but to humble and trample on me," said the youth with vehemence,his pale cheeks flaming. "He knew quite well what he was about. I feltthat when they came into my room. He is cruel--he has the temper of thetorturer--in cold blood--"
A shudder of rage went through him. His excitable Slav nature broughteverything back to him--as ugly and as real as when it happened.
"Oh, no--no!" said Constance, putting her hand over her eyes.
Radowitz controlled himself at once.
"I won't say any more," he said in a low voice, breathing deep--"I won'tsay any more." But a minute afterwards he looked up again, his browcontracting--"Only, for God's sake, don't marry him!"
"Don't be afraid," said Constance. "I shall never marry him!"
He looked at her piteously. "Only--if you care for him--what then? Youare not to be unhappy!--you are to be the happiest person in the world.If you did care for him--I should have to see some good in him--and thatwould be awful. It is not because he did me an injury, you understand.The other two are my friends--they will be always my friends. But thereis something in Falloden's soul that I hate--that I would like tofight--till either he drops or I. It is the same sort of feeling I havetowards those who have killed my country."
He lay frowning, his blue eyes sombrely fixed and strained.
"But now"--he drew himself sharply together--"you must talk of somethingelse, and I will be quite quiet. Tell me where you have been--what youhave seen--the theatre--the opera--everything!"
She did her best, seeing already the anxious face of the nurse in thewindow behind. And as she got up to go, she said, "I shall come againvery soon. And when you go to Yorkshire, I shall see you perhapsevery day."
He looked up in astonishment and delight, and she explained that atScarfedale Manor, her aunts' old house, she would be only two or threemiles from the high moorland vicarage whither he was soon to be moved.
"That will do more for me than doctors!" said Radowitz with decision.Yet almost before she had reached the window opening on the balcony, hispain, mental and physical, had clutched him again. He did not look up asshe waved farewell; and Sorell hurried her away.
Thenceforward she saw him almost every day, to Lady Langmoor'sastonishment. Sorell too, and his relation to Connie, puzzled hergreatly. Connie assured her with smiles that she was not in love withthe handsome young don, and never thought of flirting with him. "He wasmother's friend, Aunt Sophia," she would say, as though that settled thematter entirely. But Lady Langmoor could not see that it settled it atall. Mr. Sorell could not be much over thirty--the best time of all forfalling in love. And here was Connie going to pictures with him, and theBritish Museum, and to visit the poor fellow in the nursing home. It wastrue that the aunt could never detect the smallest sign of love-makingbetween them. And Connie was always putting forward that Mr. Sorelltaught her Greek. As if that kind of thing wasn't one of the best andoldest gambits in the great game of matrimony! Lady Langmoor would havefelt it her solemn duty to snub the young man had it been at allpossible. But it was really not possible to snub any one possessed ofsuch a courteous self-forgetting dignity. And he came of a goodAnglo-Irish family too. Lady Langmoor had soon discovered that she knewsome of his relations, and placed him socially to a T. But, of course,any notion of his marrying Connie, with her money, her rank, and hergood looks, would be simply ridiculous, so ridiculous that Lady Langmoorsoon ceased to think about it, accepted his visits, and began to likehim on her own account.
* * * * *
One evening towards the end of the first week in July, a hansom drew upbefore a house in Portman Square. Douglas Falloden emerged from it, asthe door was opened by a maidservant.
The house, which had been occupied at the beginning of the season by thefamily, was given over now to a charwoman and a couple of housemaids,the senior of whom looked a little scared at the prospect of having towait on the magnificent gentleman who had just entered the house. Ingeneral, when Mr. Douglas came up to town in the absence of his family,he put up at his own very expensive club, and the servants in PortmanSquare were not troubled with him. But they, like every one else, knewthat something was going wrong with the Fallodens.
Falloden walked into the deserted and dust-sheeted house, while thecabman brought in his portmanteau. "Is Mr. Gregory here?" he enquiredof the maid.
"Yes, sir, he is in the library. Please, sir, Mrs. O'Connor wants toknow if you'll want dinner."
Falloden impatiently said "No," and walked on down a long passage to thelibrary, which had been built out at the back of the house. Here theblinds had been drawn up, only to reveal the dusty desolation of anunused room, in which a few chairs had been uncovered, and a tablecleared. A man rose from a chair beside the table, and he and Fallodenshook hands. He was a round-faced and broad-shouldered person, with oneof the unreadable faces developed by the life of a prominent solicitor,in contact with all sorts of clients and many varieties of business; andFalloden's sensitive pride had soon detected in his manner certainshades of expression to which the heir of Flood Castle was notaccustomed.
"I am sorry to hear Sir Arthur is not well." Mr. Gregory spoke politely,but perhaps without that accent of grave and even tragic concern whichsix months earlier he would have given to the same words. "There is agreat deal of heavy, and, I am afraid, disagreeable business tobe done."
"My father is not fit for it," said Falloden abruptly. "I must do thebest I can."
Mr. Gregory gave a sign of assent. He drew a packet of documents fromhis pocket, and spreading out a letter from Sir Arthur Falloden on thetable, proceeded to deal with the points in it seriatim. Falloden satbeside him, looking carefully through the various documents handed tohim, asking questions occasionally, and making notes of his own. In thedusty northern light of the room, his face had a curiously purple andcongested look; and his eyes were dead tired. But he showed so muchshrewdness in his various remarks that the solicitor secretly admittedhis capacity, reflecting indeed once or twice that, young as he was, itwould have been a good thing if his father had taken him into counselearlier. After the discussion had lasted half an hour, Falloden pushedthe papers away.
"I think I see. The broad facts are that my father can raise no moremoney, either on his securities, or on the land; his two banks arepressing him; and the Scotch mortgages must be paid. The estates, ofcourse, will have to be sold. I am quite willing."
"So I understand. But it will take time and the bank overdrafts areurgent. Mason's Bank declare that if their debt is not paid--or freshlysecured--within a month from now, they will certainly take proceedings.I must remind you they have been exceedingly forbearing."
"And the amount?" Falloden consulted his papers.
"Forty thousand. The securities on which Sir Arthur obtained it are nownot worth more than eight."
The lawyer paused a moment, looked at his companion, and at last said--
"There are, of course, your own expectations from Lord Dagnall. I do notknow whether you and your father have considered them. But I imagine itwould be possible to raise money on them."
Falloden laughed. The sound was a mixture of irritation and contempt.
"Uncommonly little! The fact is my uncle--at seventy-two--isphilandering with a lady-housekeeper he set up a year ago. She seems tobe bent on netting him, and my father thinks she'll do it. If she does,my uncle will probably find himself with an heir of his own. Anyway thevalue of my prospects is enormously less than it was. All the neighboursare perfectly aware of what is going on. Oh, I suppose he'll leave mesomething--enough to keep me out of the workhouse. But there's nothingto be got out of it now."
There was another silence. Falloden pondered the figures before him.
"
There are always the pictures," he said at last, looking up.
The lawyer's face lightened.
"If you and Sir Arthur will sell! But as you know they are heirlooms,and you could stop it."
"On the contrary, I am ready to agree to it," said Falloden briefly."But there will be a lot of legal business, won't there?"
"Certainly. But it can all be put through in time. And directly it wasknown that you would sell, the whole situation would be changed."
"We might save something out of the wreck?" said Falloden, looking up.
The lawyer nodded gravely.
"Something--certainly."
"What are they worth?" said Falloden, taking a note-book from hispocket, and looking at a list scribbled on its first page.
Mr. Gregory laughed.
"There is no market in the ordinary sense for such pictures as yours.There are only half a dozen millionaires in the world who could buythem--and one or two museums." He paused a moment, looking thoughtfullyat the young man before him. "There happens, however,"--he spokeslowly--"to be a buyer at this moment in London, whom it would bedifficult to beat--in the matter of millions."
He mentioned the name.
"Not an American? Well, send him along." Falloden raised his eyebrows."If my father doesn't feel able to see him, I can tackle him. He canchoose his own day and hour. All our best pictures are at Flood."
"And they include--"
"Four Rembrandts," said Falloden, looking at his list, "two Titians, twoTerburgs, a Vermeer of Delft, heaps of other Dutchmen--four full-lengthGainsboroughs, and three half-lengths--two full-length Reynoldses, threesmaller--three Lawrences, a splendid Romney, three Hoppners, twoConstables, etc. The foreign pictures were bought by my grandfather fromone of the Orleans collections about 1830. The English pictures--theportraits--have all been at Flood since they were painted, and very fewof them have ever been exhibited. I scribbled these few facts downbefore I left home. There is, of course, an elaborate catalogue."
For the first time the lawyer's countenance as he listened showed aflash of active sympathy. He was himself a modest collector, and hishouse at Richmond contained a number of pretty things.
"Sir Arthur will mind parting with them very much, I fear," he said withreal concern. "I wish with all my heart it had been possible to findsome other way out. But we have really done our best."
Falloden nodded. He sat looking straight before him, one hand drummingon the table. The whole attitude was haughtily irresponsive. The slightnote of compassion in Mr. Gregory's tone was almost intolerable to him,and the lawyer guessed it.
"Insolent cub!" he thought to himself; and thenceforward allowed himselfno departure from a purely business tone. It was settled that thebuyer--with legal caution, Mr. Gregory for the moment threw no furtherlight upon him--was, if possible, to be got hold of at once, and anappointment was to be made for Flood Castle, where Falloden, or hisfather, would receive him.
Then the solicitor departed, and Falloden was left to pace up and downthe dismal room, his hands in his pockets--deep in thought.
He looked back upon a fortnight of unbroken worry and distress. The newswith which his father had received him on his return from Oxford hadseemed to him at first incredible. But the facts on which it was basedwere only too substantial, and his father, broken in health and nerve,now that silence was once thrown aside, poured out upon his son a floodof revelation and confession that soon made what had happened tragicallyclear. It was the familiar story of wealth grasping at yet more wealth,of the man whose judgment and common sense begin to play him false, whenonce the intoxication of money has gone beyond a certain point. Dazzledby some first speculative successes, Sir Arthur had become before long agambler over half the world, in Canada, the States, Egypt, Argentina.One doubtful venture supported another, and the City, no less than thegambler himself, was for a time taken in. But the downfall of a greatEgyptian company, which was to have extracted untold wealth from a stripof Libyan desert, had gradually but surely brought down everything elsein its train. Blow after blow fell, sometimes rapidly, sometimestardily. Sir Arthur tried every expedient known to the financier _inextremis_, descending ever lower in the scale of credit and reputation;and in vain. One tragic day in June, after a long morning with theGregory partners, Sir Arthur came home to the splendid house inYorkshire, knowing that nothing now remained but to sell the estates,and tell Douglas that his father had ruined him. Lady Laura's settlementwas safe; and on that they must live.
The days of slow realisation, after Douglas's return, had tried bothfather and son severely. Sir Arthur was worn out and demoralised by longmonths of colossal but useless effort to retrieve what he had done.Falloden, with his own remorse, and his own catastrophe to think over,was called on to put it aside, to think for and help his father. He hadno moral equipment--no trained character--equal to the task. Butmercifully for them both, his pride came into play; his shrewdintelligence also, and his affection for his father--the most penetrablespot so far in his hard and splendid youth. He had done his best--ahaughty, ungracious best--but still he had done it, and in the course ofa few days, now that the tension of concealment was over, Sir Arthur hadbecome almost childishly dependent upon him.
A church clock struck somewhere in the distance. Falloden looked at hiswatch. Time to go to some restaurant and dine. With Gregory's figuresrunning in his head, he shrank from his Club where he would be sure tomeet a host of Harrow and Oxford acquaintance, up for the Varsity match,and the latter end of the season. After dinner he would look into amusic-hall, and about eleven make his way to the Tamworth House ball.
He must come back, however, to Portman Square sometime to dress. LadyTamworth had let it be known privately that the Prince and Princesswere coming to her ball, and that the men were expected to appear inknee-breeches and silk stockings. He had told his valet at Flood to packthem; and he supposed that fool of a housemaid would be equal tounpacking for him, and putting out his things.
* * * * *
"How do you do, Douglas?" said Lady Tamworth, an imposing, bejewelledfigure standing at the head of the galleried staircase of TamworthHouse. "Saw your father yesterday and thought him looking very seedy."
"Yes, he's not the thing," said Douglas. "We shall have to get him awayto Marienbad, or somewhere of that kind."
Lady Tamworth looked at him closely, her eyelids fluttering just alittle. Douglas noticed the flutter, and knew very well what it meant.Lady Tamworth and his father were first cousins. No doubt all theirrelations were busy discussing their affairs day and night; the City, heknew, was full of rumours, and certain newspapers had already scentedthe quarry ahead, and were beginning to make ghoulish hints andgibberings. As he passed on into the ballroom, every nerve in him wassensitive and alive. He seemed to have eyes at the back of his head, tocatch everywhere the sudden attention, the looks of curiosity, sometimesof malice, that followed him through the crowd. He spoke to a great manyacquaintance, to girls he had been accustomed to dance with and theirmothers. The girls welcomed him just as usual; but the casual orinterrupted conversation, which was all the mothers could spare him,showed him very soon how much was known or guessed, of the familydisasters. He understood that he was no longer in the running for theseexquisite creatures in their silks and satins. The campaigning mothershad already dropped him out of their lists. His pride recoiled inself-contempt from its own smart. But he had been accustomed to walkthis world as one of its princelings, and indifference to what it mightthink of him was not immediately attainable.
All the same, he was still handsome, distinguished, and well born. Noone could overlook him in a ballroom, and few women could be quiteindifferent to his approach. He danced as much as he wished, and withthe prettiest girls. His eyes meanwhile were always wandering over thecrowd, searching in vain for a delicate face, and a wealth of brownhair. Yet she had told him herself that Lady Langmoor was to bring herto this ball. He only wanted to see her--from a distance--not to speakto her--or be
spoken to.
"Douglas," said a laughing voice in his ear--"will you dance the royalquadrille with me? Something's happened to my partner. Mother sent meto ask you."
He turned and saw the youngest daughter of the house, Lady Alice, withwhom he had always been on chaffing, cousinly terms; and as she spoke asudden stir and hush in the room showed that the royal party hadarrived, and were being received in the hall below.
Falloden's first irritable instinct was to refuse. Why should he go outof his way to make himself a show for all these eyes? Then a secretexcitement--an expectation--awoke in him, and he nodded a laughingcomment to Lady Alice, who just stayed to throw him a mocking complimenton his knee-breeches, and ran away. Immediately afterwards, the royalparty came through the lane made for them, shaking hands with theiracquaintance, and bowing right and left. As they disappeared into theroom beyond, which had been reserved for them, the crowd closed upbehind them. Falloden heard a voice at his elbow.
"How are you? I hear you're to be in the quadrille. You'll have thepretty lady we saw at Oxford for a colleague."
He turned to see Mrs. Glendower, very much made-up and glittering withdiamonds. Her face seemed to him to have grown harder and plainer, hersmile more brazen since their Oxford meeting. But she filled up timeagreeably till the quadrille was ready. She helped him to pin on thesmall rosette made of the Tamworth colours which marked all the dancersin the royal quadrille, and she told him that Constance Bledlow was todance it with the Tamworths' eldest son, Lord Bletchley.
"There's a great deal of talk about her, as perhaps you know. She's verymuch admired. The Langmoors are making a great fuss about her, andpeople say she'll have all their money as well as her own some day--notto speak of the old aunts in Yorkshire. I shouldn't wonder if theTamworths had their eye upon her. They're not really well off."
Falloden gaily declared that he would back his cousin Mary Tamworth toget anything she wanted. Mrs. Glendower threw him a sudden, sharp look.Then she was swept into the crowd. A couple of men in brilliant uniformcame by, clearing a space in the centre of the room, and Falloden sawLady Alice beckoning.
In another minute or two he and she were in their places, and what thenewspapers who record these things call "a brilliant scene" was in fulltide:--the Prince and Princess dancing with the master and mistress ofthe house, and the rest of the quadrille made up of the tallest men andhandsomest women that Lady Tamworth, with a proper respect both to rankand to looks, had been able to collect.
The six-foot-three Falloden and his fairylike partner were muchobserved, and Lady Alice bubbling over with fun and spirits, found hercousin Douglas, whom in general she disliked, far better company thanusual. As for him, he was only really conscious of one face and form inthe stately dance itself, or in the glittering crowd which was eagerlylooking on. Constance Bledlow, in filmy white, was his _vis-a-vis_. Hesaw her quick movement as she perceived him. Then she bowed slightly, heceremoniously. Their hands touched at intervals, and not a few of thespectators noticed these momentary contacts with a thrill ofpleasure--the splendid physique of the young man, the flowerlike graceof the girl. Once or twice, as they stood together in the centre of the"chain," a few words would have been possible. But Constance neverspoke, nor did Falloden. He had thought her very pale at first sight.But her cheek flushed with dancing; and with every minute that passedshe seemed to him more lovely and more remote, like a spirit fromanother world, into which he could not pass.
"Isn't she pretty!--Connie Bledlow?" said Lady Alice enthusiastically."She's having a great success. Of course other people are muchhandsomer, but there's something--"
Yes, there was something!--and something which, like an exquisitefluttering bird, had just escaped from Douglas Falloden, and would now,he supposed, forever escape him.
When the quadrille was over he watched her delicate whiteness disappearamid the uniforms, the jewels, and the festoons or roses hanging acrossthe ballroom. The barbaric, overdecorated scene, with all itssuggestions of a luxurious and self-confident world, where every one wasrich and privileged, or hunting riches and privilege--a world withoutthe smallest foreboding of change, the smallest doubt of its own rightto exist--forced upon him by contrast the recollection of the hour hehad just spent with Mr. Gregory in his father's dusty dismantledlibrary. He and his were, it seemed, "ruined"--as many people herealready guessed. He looked at the full-length Van Dycks on the wall ofthe Tamworths' ballroom, and thought, not without a grim leap of humour,that he would be acting showman and auctioneer, within a few daysperhaps, to his father's possessions of the same kind.
But it was not the loss of money or power that was separating him fromConstance Bledlow. He knew her well enough by now to guess that in spiteof her youth and her luxurious bringing up, there was that in her whichwas rapidly shaping a character capable of fighting circumstance, as herheart might bid. If she loved a man she would stand by him. No, it wassomething known only to her and himself in all those crowded rooms. Assoon as he set eyes on her, the vision of Radowitz's bleeding hand andprostrate form had emerged in consciousness--a haunting presence,blurring the many-coloured movements of the ballroom.
And yet it was not that maimed hand, either, which stood between himselfand Constance. It was rather the spiritual fact behind the visible--thatinstinct of fierce, tyrannical cruelty which he had felt as he laid hishands on Radowitz in the Oxford dawn a month ago. He shrank from it nowas he thought of it. It blackened and degraded his own image of himself.He remembered something like it years before, when he had joined in thebullying of a small boy at school--a boy who yet afterwards had becomehis good friend. If there is such a thing as "possession," devilishpossession, he had pleaded it on both occasions. Would it, however, haveseemed of any great importance to him now, but for Constance Bledlow'shorror-struck recoil? All men of strong and vehement temperament--so hisown defence might have run--are liable to such gusts of violent, evenmurderous feeling; and women accept it. But Constance Bledlow,influenced, no doubt, by a pale-blooded sentimentalist like Sorell, hadrefused to accept it.
"I should be always afraid of you--of your pride and your violence--andlove mustn't be afraid. Good-bye!"
He tried to scoff, but the words had burnt into his heart.