Part 11

“As for the English mees,” she said, calmly, “I would say to her, ‘Go home, my pretty demoiselle; don’t waste your time on that--that aged crocodile.’ The English, you know, have no sentiment. They call us unfeeling because French parents select a suitable man for an innocent young daughter to marry, and bid her feel for him all the tenderness possible. But those calculating English meeses would marry old Scaramouch himself if he had money enough.”

The Colonel did not like to hear his favorite nation abused, and rather squirmed under this; but he reflected that Madame de Fonblanque’s remarks were due, no doubt, to the traditional jealousy between the French and the English.

Madame de Fonblanque gave the straightest possible account of herself, including the desertion of her maid the day before.

“I thought, with my trusty Suzanne, I could face anything. I did not imagine I could go anywhere in this part of America that I would not find hotels, railroads, telegraph offices--”

“There is one tavern in the county, and that a very poor one, six miles away--and not a line of telegraph wire or railway nearer than two counties off,” explained Letty, smiling.

Madame de Fonblanque clapped her hands.

“How delicious! I shall tell this in France. It is like some of our retired places in the provinces, where the government has erected telegraph lines, but the people do not know exactly what they are meant for! And when that wretched Suzanne left me, I asked at once for the French consul--but I found there was none in town. All of my adventures here have been novel--and as I have met with such very great kindness, I shall always regard them as amusing.”

She showed no disposition to trespass on the hospitality so generously offered her, and looked out of the window anxiously when they rose to go to their rooms. But it had begun snowing early in the evening, and the ground was now perfectly white.

“No boat to-morrow, madam,” said the Colonel. “You will, I am sure, be forced to content yourself at Corbin Hall for some days yet.”

“I content myself perfectly,” replied Madame de Fonblanque, with ready grace; “but one must be careful not to take advantage of so much generosity as yours.”

When she was alone in the same old-fashioned bed-room that Farebrother had occupied, enjoying, as he had done, the sparkling wood-fire, she reflected gratefully upon the goodness of these refined and simple-minded people--but she also reflected with much bitterness upon the extremely slim prospect of her getting any money from Mr. Romaine. She had fully counted upon his dread of ridicule, his fear of publicity, to induce him to hand over a considerable sum of money; but she had not in the least counted upon what she considered his truly diabolical offer to come up to his word. To marry Mr. Romaine! She could have brought herself to it, reflecting that he could not live forever; but those few words he whispered to her showed her that it was out of her power to get any money at his death. She believed what he told her--it was so thoroughly characteristic of him--and she would by no means risk the horrors of marrying this embodied whim with that probability hanging over her. She turned it over and over in her mind, wearily, until past midnight, when she tossed to and fro until the gray dawn shone upon the snow-covered world.

But Mr. Romaine suffered from more than sleeplessness that night. The Chessinghams guessed from the accounts given by the servants of the strange visitor that Madame de Fonblanque had turned up miraculously with Colonel Corbin, and after a short interview with Mr. Romaine had disappeared. They knew all about the old report that Mr. Romaine had been very marked in his attentions at one time to the pretty widow and Chessingham shrewdly guessed very near the truth concerning her visit, which truth convulsed him with laughter.

“It is the most absurd thing,” he said to his wife and Ethel Maywood, in their own sitting-room that night. “No doubt the old fellow has some entanglement with her, and finding widows a little more difficult to impose upon than guileless maidens, he’s been trapped in some way.”

“And serves him right,” said Mrs. Chessingham, with energy. “I know he’s kind to us, Reggie--but--was there ever such another man as Mr. Romaine, do you think?”

“The Lord be praised, no,” answered Chessingham. “And he is not only mentally and morally different from any man I ever saw, but physically, too. I swear, after having been his doctor for two years, I don’t know his constitution yet. He will describe to me the most contradictory symptoms. He will profess to take a prescription and apparently it will have just the opposite effect from that intended. Sometimes I have asked myself if he has not, all the time, some disease that he rigorously conceals from me, and he simply uses these subterfuges to deceive me.”

“Anything is possible with Mr. Romaine,” said Ethel quietly. “And yet--he is the most generous of men. Our own father was not half so free with his money to us as Mr. Romaine is. And he seems to shrink from the least acknowledgment of it. How many men, do you think, would allow a doctor to carry his wife and sister-in-law around with him as he does, and do everything for us, as if we were the most valued friends and guests?”

“Oh, Romaine isn’t a bad man, so much as a perverse one,” replied Chessingham, lightly, “and he is a tremendously interesting one.”

At that very moment, Mr. Romaine was in the condition that any man but himself would have called for a doctor--but not for worlds would he have allowed Chessingham to see him then. He understood his own case perfectly--and the one human being near him that was in his confidence was Bridge.

The evening was a very unhappy one for Mr. Romaine--the more so that what the great specialist he had consulted had predicted was actually happening. Being disturbed in mind, he was becoming ill in body. How on earth had that cruel French woman found out about Dr. Chambers? So Mr. Romaine thought, sitting in his library chair, suffering acutely. Dr. Chessingham offered to come in and read to him, to play écarté with him--but it occurred to Mr. Romaine that perhaps a visit to the Chessinghams’ part of the house might divert his spirits and take his mind off the torturing subject of Madame de Fonblanque. He took Bridge’s arm and tottered off to the Chessinghams’ sitting-room. But the instant he entered the door his indomitable spirit asserted itself. He stood upright, walked steadily, and even forced a smile to his lips. Mrs. Chessingham and Ethel were at their everlasting fancy work, of which Mr. Romaine had never seen a completed specimen. Ethel rose and placed a chair for him--which, as he was old and infirm and needed it, nettled him extremely.

“Pray, my dear Miss Maywood, don’t trouble yourself. I do not yet require the kind coddling you would bestow upon me.”

Ethel, being an amiable and patient creature, took this with a smile.

“I am looking forward with great pleasure,” said Mr. Romaine, after having seated himself in a straight-backed chair, while he yearned for an easy one, “to the season in London. I have had my eye on that house in Prince’s Gate for several years, and, of course, feel pleased to have it. Being an old-fashioned man, I have kept pretty closely to the localities which were modish when I was a young attaché some years since--such as Belgravia, Grosvenor, and Lowndes Squares, and all those places. But there is something very attractive about the new Kensington--and I have intended for some years to take a house in that part of town for a season--and this one particularly struck my fancy.”

“It is very handsome--but very expensive,” said Mrs. Chessingham.

“Most handsome things are expensive, dear madam, but this house is reasonable, considering its charm, and I hope that you as well as your sister will enjoy some of its pleasures with me.”

Both young women smiled--it would be nice to have the run of the house at Prince’s Gate--and after going through with a winter in the country, and in Virginia, too, they thought they had earned it.

“Heretofore,” continued Mr. Romaine, stroking his white mustache with his delicate hand, “while I have been fond of entertaining, it has always been of a sedate kind--chiefly dinners. But last year I was beguiled into promising my young friend, Lady Gwendolen Beauclerc, a ball, if I could get a house with a ball-room--and a few days ago I received a very pretty reminder of my promise, in the shape of a photograph and a letter.”

“Better and better,” thought Ethel--“to be invited to a ball given to please Lady Gwendolen Beauclerc!” But Gladys spoke up with her usual simplicity and straightforwardness.

“I hardly think, being now married to a medical man with his way to make in the world, that I shall be asked to many swell balls--and perhaps it is better that I should not go.”

“But, Gladys, we went once to swell balls,” said Ethel, reproachfully.

“Oh, yes,” answered Gladys, “but that was over and done with when I married my husband--and he is well worth the sacrifice. Reggie himself is of good family, as you know, but he is on that account too proud to associate with people upon terms of condescension--so, when we were married, we agreed to be very careful about giving and accepting invitations.”

“The social prejudices of you English are peculiar,” remarked Mr. Romaine. “It is from you that we Virginia people inherit that profound respect for land. I found, early in life, when I first went to England and when Americans were scarce there, that it was more in my favor to be a landholder and a slave-owner than if I had been worth millions. The landed people in all countries are united by a powerful bond, which does not seem to exist with other forms of property. But because agriculture is perhaps the first and the most absorbing and conservative of all industrial callings, the people who own land are naturally bound together and appreciative of each other.”

While Mr. Romaine was giving this little disquisition, he suffered furious pain, but the only indication he gave of it was a furtive wiping of his brow.

“And the hold of the land upon one is peculiar. I could never bring myself to part with an acre of it which I had either bought or inherited. Of course, during my practical expatriation for many years, my landed property here has suffered. I have often wondered at myself for holding on to it, when I could have invested the money in an English estate which really would have been much more profitable--but I could never divest myself of the feeling that the land would yet draw me back to it. However,” he continued, quite gaily, “it is now so depreciated, and the new system is so impossible for the old masters to adopt, that I can’t sell it, and I can’t live on it--so I shall be compelled to buy an estate in England in the country, for a town house, even the Prince’s Gate one, is only endurable for five months in the year.”

Ethel’s eyes glistened--a town house at Prince’s Gate--an estate in the country! Might she not, after all, be Mrs. Romaine? And Mr. Romaine’s position was so much better than that of any other American she knew; the others were all striving for recognition, but Mr. Romaine had had an assured place in English society for a generation. He had not only dandled Lady Gwendolen Beauclerc, who was a duke’s daughter, on his knee, but he had danced, at a court ball, with the Queen herself, when she was a youthful matron, and he was a slim young diplomat. And in a flash of imagination, Ethel saw herself becomingly attired in widow’s weeds and leaving, by the hands of a footman in mourning livery, black-bordered cards, bearing the inscription, “_Mrs. Romaine_.”

XI

At last, Mr. Romaine was conquered by pain, and rose to leave the Chessinghams’ rooms about ten o’clock. As he said good-night, some strange impulse made him take Ethel’s soft, white hand in his, which was deathly cold and clammy. He looked at her in her fresh, wholesome beauty. He knew she was just as designing in her own way as Madame de Fonblanque--but the designing was different in the two women, according to their race. Ethel’s was the peculiarly artless and primitive designing, which is as near as the English character can come to deception--for it really deceives nobody. Madame de Fonblanque’s was the consummate designing of the Latin races, which could deceive almost anybody. At that very moment she was completely hoodwinking the people at Corbin Hall, and Letty, who had been disgusted with Ethel’s transparent devices to ensnare Mr. Romaine, never for a moment suspected that the graceful and tactful Madame de Fonblanque’s “business” with Mr. Romaine was an attempt to entrap him of a nature much more desperate and barefaced than Ethel would have dreamed of.

But as Mr. Romaine looked into Ethel’s rosy, fresh face, he saw a great deal of good there. She would not bedevil him as the French woman had done. She was amiable even in her disappointments, and if things had been otherwise, and she could have shared with him the town house, and the country house, and the carriage, would have tended him faithfully and kindly. Some dim idea of rewarding her by making her an offer as soon as he was clear of the French woman dawned upon his mind. Ethel, for her part, read a new look of gentleness in his expressive black eyes--and his hand-clasp was positively tender. But his pain showed in his glance--there was something agonizing in his eyes as Ethel’s met his. And fascinated by them she gazed into them with a strange and pathetic feeling that it was not “good-night” she was saying, but “good-by.” Mr. Romaine himself had something of this feeling--and so for a fall minute they stood hand in hand, and quite silent. Mrs. Chessingham moved away judiciously--and did not return until the door closed behind Mr. Romaine. Ethel stood in the same spot, with a pained face.

“Do you know, Gladys, I had a queer feeling just now--as if Mr. Romaine were really ill, and might die at any time? And all the time we have looked upon him as a hypochondriac.”

“Reggie says if anybody really expected Mr. Romaine to die he would live forever. But I have not heard him say he was ill, and I am sure Reggie does not suspect it. And, Ethel dear, I shouldn’t be surprised if, after all, that house at Prince’s Gate should be yours.”

“_I_ should be,” answered Ethel, “but if it ever is, I promise to be kind to the old gentleman.”

Bridge had met “the old gentleman” just outside the door, and had gone with him to the library, where he sat within easy call. Mr. Romaine, seated at his table, after a while seemed to recover from his paroxysm of pain. He unlocked a drawer and took out his will, which he read over, smiling all the time--he seemed to regard it as a very facetious document. Then he added something to it. He had a few valuable diamonds which he had collected for no particular purpose some years before, and he thought that Ethel Maywood might as well have them. And then he wrote his offer to Madame de Fonblanque, and sealed and addressed it. It seemed to give him such acute pleasure that he almost forgot his pain. He smiled, his black eyes sparkled, he smoothed his mustache coquettishly, and thought to himself:

“Checkmated, by Jove!”

It was then near twelve o’clock, and he rang for Bridge and went to his bed-room.

The man undressed him and put him to bed, and then Mr. Romaine said casually:

“You had better sit in this room to-night.”

Even with this servant, who knew the whole secret of his ailments, Mr. Romaine maintained a systematic kind of deceit which did not deceive.

Bridge stirred the fire into a ruddy blaze, and sat down by it to doze. Occasionally he rose and went toward the luxurious bed, where Mr. Romaine lay with wide-open, staring eyes, and every few moments he wanted something done for him. This alarmed Bridge, but he dared not show his uneasiness. At last, about two o’clock in the morning, when he had given up all attempts at dozing, he heard a sound which made him jump. It was a slight groan.

In all the sixteen years that he had served Mr. Romaine he had never known from him the slightest sign that pain was victor. Bridge fairly ran to the bed at this.

“What’s the matter?” sternly asked Mr. Romaine.

“Didn’t I hear you groan, sir?”

“Of course not--Bridge, you are in your dotage.”

Bridge went back to his place. In ten minutes came another groan--and another.

He rose and went to the bedside again.

“Mr. Romaine, I’m a-goin’ for Mr. Chessingham. I can’t stand this no longer.”

“I should think if I could stand it, you could.”

“No, sir. Can’t nobody stand what you can stand, and I’m a-goin’ for Mr. Chessingham.”

“If you dare,” said Mr. Romaine.

Bridge moved toward the door. By a tremendous effort Mr. Romaine rose up in bed, and seizing a carafe of water from the table at his side, sent it whizzing after Bridge. It missed its target by a very close shave, indeed.

“Next time,” said Mr. Romaine, “I will aim better.”

Bridge returned to his seat by the fire.

All night the struggle went on. Mr. Romaine writhed in agony, but the determination to disappoint Bridge brought him out alive. When morning broke, the worst was over, and he seemed as likely to live as he had done at any time since Bridge first knew him. But the unhappy valet showed the terrible experience he had been through with, and his pallid face and nervous hands brought a grim smile to Mr. Romaine’s face.

About ten o’clock Mr. Romaine announced that he would rise and dress, having made, many years before, a secret resolution that he would die with his boots on. Bridge, completely subdued, assisted at this toilet, and helped him into the library.

While shaving him, though, Mr. Romaine said, crossly:

“You are so afraid I am dying that you’ll probably cut my throat out of pure nervousness. I have half a mind to send for that black barber at Corbin Hall, who can give you points on shaving.”

Bridge was so frightened and uneasy about Mr. Romaine’s condition that he did not even resent this slur.

It was still intensely cold and snowing. But the roaring fire and heavy curtains made the room deliciously comfortable. Chessingham always came to Mr. Romaine at eleven--and on this particular morning he found Mr. Romaine in his usual place before the great, cheery fireplace. But he undoubtedly looked ill.

“What sort of a night did you have?” was the young doctor’s first inquiry.

“Only fairly good,” replied Mr. Romaine, and then went on with great seriousness to describe a multitude of trifling symptoms, such as any imaginative person can conjure up at any moment.

“The fact is,--to be perfectly candid with you,”--said Chessingham, who was a conscientious man, “if you allow yourself to dwell upon these trifling ailments they will entail real suffering upon you. Try and forget about your stiff shoulder, and your neuralgic headache, and that sort of thing.”

“But my dear fellow,” answered Mr. Romaine, with a flash of humor in his black eyes, “you know it is my infirmity to exaggerate my aches and pains. Last night, for what I acknowledge was a mere trifle, I actually lay in my bed and groaned.” This was for Bridge’s benefit, who was putting on Mr. Romaine’s immaculate boots at that moment.

Chessingham, however, did not know exactly what to make of Mr. Romaine’s statement. His practised eye saw that something was the matter. But if Mr. Romaine refused to tell the doctor whom he hired to take care of his health what ailed him, the doctor was not to blame. Chessingham went back to his part of the house, much puzzled and deeply annoyed.

“Do you know,” he said to his wife, “I doubt very much if I did a wise thing in accepting Mr. Romaine’s offer to stay with him. My object, of saving enough from my salary to start me in London, will be attained. But suppose Mr. Romaine should die of some disease that he has concealed from me--my professional reputation would be hurt.”

Gladys said some comforting words, and told him about Mr. Romaine’s plans for buying an estate in England, the Prince’s Gate house, the impending ball, etc. At every word she said, Chessingham looked more and more gloomy.

“Very bad, very bad,” he said. “Worse and worse. He must be very ill, indeed, if he thinks it necessary to talk that way.”

Gladys laughed at Chessingham’s interpretation of Mr. Romaine’s remarks, and reminded him of his oft-repeated prediction that Mr. Romaine would live to bury all of them.

“It is simply the same old puzzle,” he said at last, impatiently. “I thought heretofore that nothing ailed him except his diabolically ingenious imagination. Now, I believe that everything ails him--but I cannot tell.”

The day passed on with leaden feet to Mr. Romaine, sitting, suffering and smiling, in his easy-chair. At six o’clock, he called for Bridge to dress him for the evening as usual. Bridge, thoroughly frightened, turned pale at this.

“Mr. Romaine,” he said, pleadingly, “I’m afraid, sir, it’ll--be the death of you.”

“You’ll be the death of me another way,” vigorously responded Mr. Romaine. “You’ll enrage me so that I’ll break a blood vessel.”

Bridge went and got the necessary things, and Mr. Romaine made a ghastly toilet. He was always particular about the tying of his white cravat, and on this especial evening almost took poor Bridge’s head off and ruined four ties before one was done to suit him. When he got through, he was gasping for breath, but perfectly undaunted.

The nervous apprehension of the young doctor about Mr. Romaine communicated itself to everybody at Shrewsbury. They all, from the Chessinghams and Miss Maywood down to the very house dogs, that whined in their loneliness and imprisonment to the house, felt as if something ghastly and terrible was descending with the night. All except Mr. Romaine himself, who maintained an uncanny sort of gaiety all day long, and who, every time Chessingham visited him, was found cackling over some humorous journals that had arrived a day or two before. But the young doctor could not quite appreciate the funny cartoons and lively jokes, and his grave face seemed to afford Mr. Romaine much saturnine amusement.

The day that was so long at Shrewsbury was very short at Corbin Hall. The Colonel was simply delighted with Madame de Fonblanque, and harangued to Letty privately upon Romaine’s deuced unchivalric conduct to a noble, attractive, and blameless woman. This excellent man had accepted Madame de Fonblanque at her face value. Letty was more worldly wise than the Colonel, but she, too, had fallen a victim to Madame de Fonblanque’s charms and was only too ready to think Mr. Romaine a brute.

After a delightful day, spent chiefly in the comfortable old library, where they could bid defiance to the cold and snow without, a wholly unexpected visitor turned up just at nightfall. A loud knock at the front door, much yelping of dogs and stamping of booted feet announced an arrival.

There had been an understanding that Sir Archy was to repeat his visit later in the winter. He was liable to arrive at any day, and when the commotion in the large and dusky hall was heard, the Colonel only voiced the general impression of the group around the library fire when he said:

“It is no doubt our kinsman, Sir Archibald.” But it was not “Sir Archibald”--and the next minute Farebrother came walking in, as if he had just been around the corner. His face was ruddy with the biting wintry air, and his eyes were bright.