19
Bill leaned his back against the gate that separated the grounds ofthe bee-farm from the high road and mused pleasantly. He was alone.Elizabeth was walking up the drive on her way to the house to tellthe news to Nutty. James, the cat, who had come down from the roofof the outhouse, was sharpening his claws on a neighbouring tree.After the whirl of excitement that had been his portion for the pastfew hours, the peace of it all appealed strongly to Bill. It suitedthe mood of quiet happiness which was upon him.
Quietly happy, that was how he felt now that it was all over. Thewhite heat of emotion had subsided to a gentle glow of contentmentconducive to thought. He thought tenderly of Elizabeth. She hadturned to wave her hand before going into the house, and he wasstill smiling fatuously. Wonderful girl! Lucky chap he was! Rum,the way they had come together! Talk about Fate, what?
He stooped to tickle James, who had finished stropping his clawsand was now enjoying a friction massage against his leg, and beganto brood on the inscrutable way of Fate.
Rum thing, Fate! Most extraordinary!
Suppose he had never gone down to Marvis Bay that time. He hadwavered between half a dozen places; it was pure chance that hehad chosen Marvis Bay. If he hadn't he would never have met oldNutcombe. Probably old Nutcombe had wavered between half a dozenplaces too. If they hadn't both happened to choose Marvis Bay theywould never have met. And if they hadn't been the only visitorsthere they might never have got to know each other. And if oldNutcombe hadn't happened to slice his approach shots he wouldnever have put him under an obligation. Queer old buster, oldNutcombe, leaving a fellow he hardly knew from Adam a cool millionquid just because he cured him of slicing.
It was at this point in his meditations that it suddenly occurred toBill that he had not yet given a thought to what was immeasurablythe most important of any of the things that ought to be occupyinghis mind just now. What was he to do about this Lord Dawlishbusiness?
Life at Brookport had so accustomed him to being plain BillChalmers that it had absolutely slipped his mind that he wasreally Lord Dawlish, the one man in the world whom Elizabethlooked on as an enemy. What on earth was he to do about that? Tellher? But if he told her, wouldn't she chuck him on the spot?
This was awful. The dreamy sense of well-being left him. Hestraightened himself to face this problem, ignoring the hint ofJames, who was weaving circles about his legs expectant of moretickling. A man cannot spend his time tickling cats when he has toconcentrate on a dilemma of this kind.
Suppose he didn't tell her? How would that work out? Was a marriagelegal if the cove who was being married went through it under afalse name? He seemed to remember seeing a melodrama in his boyhoodthe plot of which turned on that very point. Yes, it began to comeback to him. An unpleasant bargee with a black moustache had said,'This woman is not your wife!' and caused the dickens of a lot ofunpleasantness; but there in its usual slipshod way memory failed.Had subsequent events proved the bargee right or wrong? It was aquestion for a lawyer to decide. Jerry Nichols would know. Well,there was plenty of time, thank goodness, to send Jerry Nichols acable, asking for his professional opinion, and to get the straighttip long before the wedding day arrived.
Laying this part of it aside for the moment, and assuming that thething could be worked, what about the money? Like a chump, he hadtold Elizabeth on the first day of his visit that he hadn't anymoney except what he made out of his job as secretary of the club.He couldn't suddenly spring five million dollars on her andpretend that he had forgotten all about it till then.
Of course, he could invent an imaginary uncle or something, andmassacre him during the honeymoon. Something in that. He picturedthe thing in his mind. Breakfast: Elizabeth doling out thescrambled eggs. 'What's the matter, Bill? Why did you exclaim likethat? Is there some bad news in the letter you are reading?'
'Oh, it's nothing--only my Uncle John's died and left me fivemillion dollars.'
The scene worked out so well that his mind became a little aboveitself. It suggested developments of serpentine craftiness. Whynot get Jerry Nichols to write him a letter about his Uncle Johnand the five millions? Jerry liked doing that sort of thing. Hewould do it like a shot, and chuck in a lot of legal words to makeit sound right. It began to be clear to Bill that any move hetook--except full confession, at which he jibbed--was going toinvolve Jerry Nichols as an ally; and this discovery had asoothing effect on him. It made him feel that the responsibilityhad been shifted. He couldn't do anything till he had consultedJerry, so there was no use in worrying. And, being one of thoserare persons who can cease worrying instantly when they haveconvinced themselves that it is useless, he dismissed the entireproblem from his mind and returned to the more congenialoccupation of thinking of Elizabeth.
It was a peculiar feature of his position that he found himselfunable to think of Elizabeth without thinking of Claire. He triedto, but failed. Every virtue in Elizabeth seemed to call up therecollection of a corresponding defect in Claire. It became almostmathematical. Elizabeth was so straight on the level they calledit over here. Claire was a corkscrew among women. Elizabeth wassunny and cheerful. Querulousness was Claire's besetting sin.Elizabeth was such a pal. Claire had never been that. The effectthat Claire had always had on him was to deepen the conviction,which never really left him, that he was a bit of an ass.Elizabeth, on the other hand, bucked him up and made him feel asif he really amounted to something.
How different they were! Their very voices--Elizabeth had a sortof quiet, soothing, pleasant voice, the kind of voice that somehowsuggested that she thought a lot of a chap without her having tosay it in so many words. Whereas Claire's voice--he had noticed itright from the beginning--Claire's voice--
While he was trying to make clear to himself just what it wasabout Claire's voice that he had not liked he was granted theopportunity of analysing by means of direct observation itsfailure to meet his vocal ideals, for at this moment it spokebehind him.
'Bill!'
She was standing in the road, her head still covered with thatwhite, filmy something which had commended itself to Mr Pickering'seyes. She was looking at him in a way that seemed somehow to strikea note of appeal. She conveyed an atmosphere of softness andrepentance, a general suggestion of prodigal daughters revisitingold homesteads.
'We seem always to be meeting at gates, don't we?' she said, witha faint smile.
It was a deprecating smile, wistful.
'Bill!' she said again, and stopped. She laid her left handlightly on the gate. Bill had a sort of impression that there wassome meaning behind this action that, if he were less of a chumpthan Nature had made him, he would at this point receive some sortof a revelation. But, being as Nature had made him, he did not getit.
He was one of those men to whom a girl's left hand is simply agirl's left hand, irrespective of whether it wears rings on itsthird finger or not.
This having become evident to Claire after a moment of silence,she withdrew her hand in rather a disappointed way and prepared toattack the situation from another angle.
'Bill, I've come to say something to you.'
Bill was looking at her curiously. He could not have believedthat, even after what had happened, he could face her with suchcomplete detachment; that she could so extraordinarily not matter.He felt no resentment toward her. It was simply that she had goneout of his life.
'Bill, I've been a fool.'
He made no reply to this for he could think of no reply that wassufficiently polite. 'Yes?' sounded as if he meant to say thatthat was just what he had expected. 'Really?' had a sarcasticring. He fell back on facial expression, to imply that he wasinterested and that she might tell all.
Claire looked away down the road and began to speak in a low,quick voice:
'I've been a fool all along. I lost you through being a fool. WhenI saw you dancing with that girl in the restaurant I didn't stopto think. I was angry. I was jealous. I ought to have trusted you,but--Oh, well, I was a fool.'
'My dear girl, you
had a perfect right--'
'I hadn't. I was an idiot. Bill, I've come to ask you if you can'tforgive me.'
'I wish you wouldn't talk like that--there's nothing to forgive.'
The look which Claire gave him in answer to this was meek andaffectionate, but inwardly she was wishing that she could bang hishead against the gate. His slowness was maddening. Long beforethis he should have leaped into the road in order to fold her inhis arms. Her voice shook with the effort she had to make to keepit from sharpness.
'I mean, is it too late? I mean, can you really forgive me? Oh,Bill'--she stopped herself by the fraction of a second from adding'you idiot'--'can't we be the same again to each other? Can'twe--pretend all this has never happened?'
Exasperating as Bill's wooden failure to play the scene in thespirit in which her imagination had conceived it was to Claire,several excuses may be offered for him: He had opened the eveningwith a shattering blow at his faith in woman. He had walked twentymiles at a rapid pace. He had heard shots and found a corpse, andcarried the latter by the tail across country. Finally, he had hadthe stunning shock of discovering that Elizabeth Boyd loved him.He was not himself. He found a difficulty in concentrating. Withthe result that, in answer to this appeal from a beautiful girlwhom he had once imagined that he loved, all he could find to saywas: 'How do you mean?'
Claire, never an adept at patience, just succeeded in swallowingthe remark that sprang into her mind. It was incredible to herthat a man could exist who had so little intuition. She had notanticipated the necessity of being compelled to put the substanceof her meaning in so many blunt words, but it seemed that only socould she make him understand.
'I mean, can't we be engaged again, Bill?'
Bill's overtaxed brain turned one convulsive hand-spring, and cameto rest with a sense of having dislocated itself. This was toomuch. This was not right. No fellow at the end of a hard eveningought to have to grapple with this sort of thing. What on earthdid she mean, springing questions like that on him? How could theybe engaged? She was going to marry someone else, and so was he.Something of these thoughts he managed to put into words:
'But you're engaged to--'
'I've broken my engagement with Mr Pickering.'
'Great Scot! When?'
'To-night. I found out his true character. He is cruel andtreacherous. Something happened--it may sound nothing to you, butit gave me an insight into what he really was. Polly Wetherby hada little monkey, and just because it bit Mr Pickering he shot it.'
'Pickering!'
'Yes. He wasn't the sort of man I should have expected to do amean, cruel thing like that. It sickened me. I gave him back hisring then and there. Oh, what a relief it was! What a fool I wasever to have got engaged to such a man.'
Bill was puzzled. He was one of those simple men who take theirfellows on trust, but who, if once that trust is shattered, cannever recover it. Like most simple men, he was tenacious of ideaswhen he got them, and the belief that Claire was playing fast andloose was not lightly to be removed from his mind. He had foundher out during his self-communion that night, and he could neverbelieve her again. He had the feeling that there was somethingbehind what she was saying. He could not put his finger on theclue, but that there was a clue he was certain.
'I only got engaged to him out of pique. I was angry with you,and--Well, that's how it happened.'
Still Bill could not believe. It was plausible. It sounded true.And yet some instinct told him that it was not true. And while hewaited, perplexed, Claire made a false step.
The thing had been so close to the top of her mind ever since shehad come to the knowledge of it that it had been hard for her tokeep it down. Now she could keep it down no longer.
'How wonderful about old Mr Nutcombe, Bill!' she said.
A vast relief rolled over Bill. Despite his instinct, he had beenwavering. But now he understood. He had found the clue.
'You got my letter, then?'
'Yes; it was forwarded on from the theatre. I got it to-night.'
Too late she realized what she had said and the construction thatan intelligent man would put on it. Then she reflected that Billwas not an intelligent man. She shot a swift glance at him. To allappearances he had suspected nothing.
'It went all over the place,' she hurried on. 'The people at thePortsmouth theatre sent it to the London office, who sent it home,and mother mailed it on to me.'
'I see.'
There was a silence. Claire drew a step nearer.
'Bill!' she said softly.
Bill shut his eyes. The moment had come which he had dreaded. Noteven the thought that she was crooked, that she had been playingwith him, could make it any better. She was a woman and he was aman. That was all that mattered, and nothing could alter it.
'I'm sorry,' he said. 'It's impossible.'
Claire stared at him in amazement. She had not been prepared forthis. He met her eyes, but every nerve in his body was protesting.
'Bill!'
'I'm sorry.
'But, Bill!'
He set his teeth. It was just as bad as he had thought it wouldbe.
'But, Bill, I've explained. I've told you how--'
'I know.'
Claire's eyes opened wide.
'I thought you loved me.' She came closer. She pulled at hissleeve. Her voice took on a note of soft raillery. 'Don't beabsurd, Bill! You mustn't behave like a sulky schoolboy. It isn'tlike you, this. You surely don't want me to humble myself morethan I have done.' She gave a little laugh. 'Why, Bill, I'mproposing to you! I know I've treated you badly, but I'veexplained why. You must be just enough to see that it wasn'taltogether my fault. I'm only human. And if I made a mistake I'vedone all I can do to undo it. I--'
'Claire, listen: I'm engaged!'
She fell back. For the first time the sense of defeat came to her.She had anticipated many things. She had looked for difficulties.But she had not expected this. A feeling of cold fury surged overher at the way fate had tricked her. She had gambled recklessly onher power of fascination, and she had lost.
Mr Pickering, at that moment brooding in solitude in the smoking-roomof Lady Wetherby's house, would have been relieved could he haveknown how wistfully she was thinking of him.
'You're engaged?'
'Yes.'
'Well!' She forced another laugh. 'How very--rapid of you! Towhom?'
'To Elizabeth Boyd.'
'I'm afraid I'm very ignorant, but who is Elizabeth Boyd? Theornate lady you were dancing with at the restaurant?'
'No!'
'Who then?'
'She is old Ira Nutcombe's niece. The money ought to have beenleft to her. That was why I came over to America, to see if Icould do anything for her.'
'And you're going to marry her? How very romantic--and convenient!What an excellent arrangement for her. Which of you suggested it?'
Bill drew in a deep breath. All this was, he supposed,unavoidable, but it was not pleasant.
Claire suddenly abandoned her pose of cool amusement. The firebehind it blazed through.
'You fool!' she cried passionately. 'Are you blind? Can't you seethat this girl is simply after your money? A child could see it.'
Bill looked at her steadily.
'You're quite wrong. She doesn't know who I am.'
'Doesn't know who you are? What do you mean? She must know by thistime that her uncle left his money to you.'
'But she doesn't know that I am Lord Dawlish. I came to Americaunder another name. She knows me as Chalmers.'
Claire was silent for a moment.
'How did you get to know her?' she asked, more quietly.
'I met her brother by chance in New York.'
'By chance!'
'Quite by chance. A man I knew in England lent me his rooms in NewYork. He happened to be a friend of Boyd's. Boyd came to call onhim one night, and found me.'
'Odd! Had your mutual friend been away from New York long?'
'Some months.'
'And in all t
hat time Mr Boyd had not discovered that he had left.They must have been great friends! What happened then?'
'Boyd invited me down here.'
'Down here?'
'They live in this house.'
'Is Miss Boyd the girl who keeps the bee-farm?'
'She is.'
Claire's eyes suddenly lit up. She began to speak in a loudervoice:
'Bill, you're an infant, a perfect infant! Of course, she's afteryour money. Do you really imagine for one instant that thisElizabeth Boyd of yours and her brother don't know as well as I dothat you are really Lord Dawlish? I always thought you had atrustful nature! You tell me the brother met you by chance.Chance! And invited you down here. I bet he did! He knew hisbusiness! And now you're going to marry the girl so that they willget the money after all! Splendid! Oh, Bill, you're a wonderful,wonderful creature! Your innocence is touching.'
She swung round.
'Good night,' she called over her shoulder.
He could hear her laughing as she went down the road.