Part 10

"He is not the sort of man to let it rest there; he will ask questions, all sorts of questions, he will insist on knowing what I mean, what I intend to do. How will it end? The only thing that he can never think of is the truth. He will think of everything else under the sun. Oh, the thing is too hopeless! I shall have to let him think that I don't care for him--oh, but if I do that he will go away, I shall not see him again; in time he will marry some one else--how could I bear that? He must not go. I'll say anything, anything, short of giving my secret away. Ah, that horrible oath! So needless, so useless! and to think that, on top of all the rest, this should come! and that I may be compelled to give up my only chance of happiness in the future. I won't give it up! I won't! Life is too cruel. I'll do anything to prevent him leaving me. And then there is not only my pain if he did--but he would suffer, too. No, it is not to be thought of for a moment. He must stay."

"Well, I suppose I really shouldn't have thrown away my ace when hearts hadn't been played at all, but then you know I never stick to rules."

"If only he hadn't written that note, asking to see me to-night. If only I could have put off answering him a little longer. If I refuse to let him go home with me it will be equivalent to refusing him, altogether. It is out of the question. I must settle it one way or another at once. What is it to be?"

"Oh, don't tell me the queen hasn't been played, yet? Why, I thought it was out ages ago--oh, I really think I ought to have that back"--

"What will he say when I answer him--that is, if I tell him the truth? How will it sound? 'I do care for you but I can't marry you just now, perhaps not for several years, I can't say exactly when.' The thing is incredible. A woman of my age, presumably sane, to answer a proposal of marriage in that fashion. Ah, if only I were indifferent to him how easy things would be; and yet what would I have then in life? When Liol--dies--oh, I can't think of that! Where is he to-night, I wonder? What is he doing? Liol, Liol! if only you were dead! and yet, oh, I can't wish that. What will my life be when he is gone? Gone! Think of it! How can I marry, then? what will my life be worth? how shall I live and hide my grief? oh, Liol, Liol!"

"Upon my word, Mr. Coote! where were your eyes? Didn't you know that the nine of clubs wasn't out?"

"One thing is certain; much as I love Gerald, nothing and nobody can ever be to me what Liol was and is. Is that very strange? am I entirely different to all other girls. How could any strange man, however dear, be as much in your life as a person like Liol, with whom your very heart-strings were entwined; who came when your heart was empty and filled it? My Lionel! my little brother! my last charge from my dead mother! Oh, if the years could only be wiped out and if I could see him again as he once was, the same sweet dear child, how happily I could die--yes, how happily I could give up everything--Gerald, everything. But--I must live; and Lionel is--oh, I can't say, I can't think what he is; and he is dying by inches; and there is only one other person in the world for whom I care, only one other person for whom I ever shall care but him; and I may have to give him up. If only Lionel didn't need me so; if only he didn't need all my money, all my thought, all my care--imagine my deserting him and starting to choose a trousseau. A trousseau! when any day he may need a shroud."

"A penny for your thoughts, Lynn."

Mrs. Hadwell had come up, unnoticed and was standing at Lynn's side.

"Did I startle you?" she asked, brightly. "You were looking straight in front of you like Cassandra or Joan of Arc or some other unpleasant historical character. What was it? Indigestion?"

"A fit of the blues, perhaps," said Lynn. "Don't mind me, Del. It was most ungrateful of me to cast a shade over the festivities and, to tell you the truth, I wasn't aware that I was doing it. Who has the highest score?"

"Erma Reed, so far. Isn't she a beauty? Lynn, what's the matter with you?"

"Nothing, silly!--that is, nothing much. You know we all get a little despondent at times."

"But not you, that is, not until lately. What has come over you?"

"Age, I suppose."

"If you don't want to confide in me, don't--"

"I don't!"

--"But I think it's most unkind, when I always tell you everything."

"There's nothing that I can confide in you, silly-billy!" said Lynn, rousing herself and speaking with forced cheerfulness. "Nothing in the world. Now, will that satisfy you? You know practically all my affairs except those which concern other people and which I have promised not to tell."

"Is that true?"

"There is just one thing which I might tell you--but, after all, it's nothing to tell"--

"Oh, what is it?"

"A man--but this is silly for there is really nothing to tell and, anyway, I don't want to discuss it."

"How logical you are," said Mrs. Hadwell, calmly. "But I know all about that, so you needn't bother. He is going to propose to-night, he told me so. And he begged me to make sure that he wasn't deputed to take anyone else home, as you had not answered his note and so he couldn't be sure"--

"He told you! How queer! How very unlike him!"

"I skated with him to-day and we had tea together. And you know how I can always make any man tell me the inmost secret of his heart if I can once get him alone for five minutes. And you're the inmost core of his."

"Del!"

"He as good as told me so. And I promised to put in a good word for him. So this is the good word. If you _will_ be so foolish as to refuse Lighton--who is, by far, the better match of the two--why, you might do worse than Amherst."

"Thank you."

"But I can't help hoping, of course, that you will never be so foolish as to refuse Lighton."

"Mr. Amherst would be delighted if he could only hear your warm advocacy of his cause."

"Oh, I told him what I was going to say. I was perfectly frank. But I felt constrained to admit that you were such a hopeless idiot that I was very much afraid that you were going to refuse Lighton, if you had not done so, already. However, as I said, you were quite capable of committing the lesser idiocy of refusing him, afterwards. I don't know that I was quite so nice a confidante as usual; but then you must remember that Gerald Amherst absolutely refused to sanction my efforts at flirtation with him, this fall, and you can't expect me to forgive that all at once. I told him that, too."

"Del!"

"Oh, he's a good sort. He said that, once you accepted him, his mind would be free and, if I would then renew my attentions, he would accept them most gratefully--always provided you didn't kick. Well, he didn't put it just that way, but that was his meaning. Only he didn't mean a word of it. Lynn, if ever a man was hopelessly enamoured of a woman, you are that woman. You're doing pretty well, all things considered. Two proposals in one winter and one a good catch--a _particularly_ good catch--don't glare so, Lynn, it's rude! and the other an extremely nice man and not too poor, either. My goodness! but you ought to be thankful. Look at the way some people work and work and then don't get much at the end; and here you just sit with hands folded, so to speak, and watch the desirables canter in. At your age, too! only you mustn't dally any longer, you know; it's time to make up your mind."

"Yes, you're right. It's high time I made up my mind."

"Good. Now then, make it up."

"My dear, my mind isn't like a bed that can be made up while you wait. I must think a bit."

"What do you want to think about, I should like to know? Are you weakening on the idea of refusing Lighton?"

"No. To tell you the truth--I may just as well tell you, I suppose--I've refused him, already."

"_What_? When? Where? No, never mind telling me, either. Let's stick to the point. Now that you have refused him, there is only one thing left to do--marry Amherst and thank your stars that he proposed just when he did. Otherwise, everyone would say that Lighton had neglected to 'come up to scratch.' Gracious! how fortunate that you had two strings to your bow."

"You know that old proverb about 'falling between two stools,' don't you?" Lynn asked, smiling faintly.

"Yes, and it's perfect rubbish. The people who talk about 'falling between two stools' are the people who've never had but one stool in their lives and who've sat firmly down on that to prevent it getting up and running away. Two stools, indeed! Twenty, if you can get them! But two will do very nicely indeed, when they are two like these. One being gone, you grab the other just as quickly as you know how. Now don't stop to tell me that I am getting vulgar; practical people always seem vulgar to visionaries. The question is, what are you going to say to Amherst to-night?"

"I'm not going to say anything, Del, for I simply can't let him take me home. I must have a little more time to think. No, don't argue; I am serious. Tell him that I am frightfully tired--which is literally true--and that you have asked me to spend the night here; but that, if he will be so good as to take me home after the hockey match to-morrow night, I shall be eternally obliged. Or no, don't put it like that; say that--oh well, say what you think best, Del, you always know how to put these things. Really I am so tired that I simply can't think to-night. Will you arrange it for me? and you won't mind putting me up for the night, will you?"

"No, dear child, I shall be delighted to have you. And I'll give him the message though I think you are foolish to postpone the thing. But I won't tease you, for I am sure you are going to be sensible in the end; and we won't talk any more about it if you don't want to. See here, do look at that table! and please listen to the conversation between Agatha and that unfortunate wretch of a Haldern. I know who won't be Agatha's 'latest.' _Do_ listen."

"But--excuse me for asking, Miss Ladilaw--but what did you make it 'no trumps' on?" inquired a masculine voice.

"Why--why--why, I'll tell you, Mr. Haldern," said Agatha looking up at him, confidingly. "My own hand was so perfectly awful--so appalling--that I felt sure Dummy must have a lot of aces and things. But you see it didn't."

"But, in that case, why didn't you leave it to me?"

"Because I--I was _so_ afraid that you would make it spades. And I had quite good diamonds."

"But don't you see?"--

"Oh, I _always_ believe in trusting something to Dummy," Agatha interrupted gently but with an air of finality. "Don't let us discuss it any further, Mr. Haldern."

"Del," whispered Lynn to her hostess, "I may not be very kind-hearted, but I would not inflict Agatha on any man."

"Oh, they'll change partners at the next table. And I think it's good for men to play with Agatha: they appreciate the next partner they get so much more than they otherwise would. Well, Lynn, how do you like my twins?"

"Charming; and they do seem to enjoy everything so. Did they only get here to-day? They look so cheerful and fresh. I thought they would probably want to rest, the first evening; but they seem to be enjoying it."

"Yes. They're nineteen. At nineteen one enjoys everything but rest. I knew that and so I determined to start in without a moment's delay. I'm perfectly delighted with them, myself. I don't see how in the world that old curmudgeon of a brother of Henry's ever contrived to have two such good-looking, good-humoured children. And their names are so cute--Bert and Bertie; and the likeness is something extraordinary."

It was. Lynn, who had elected to remain outside the game and keep her hostess company, glanced from the cosy corner where she was ensconced to a table in the middle of the room where Miss Bertha Hadwell was sitting: then a little further on to where Mr. Albert Hadwell was scooping up tricks with a dexterity which bespoke long practice. The boy was slightly, very slightly taller than the girl; but, apart from that, one might have fancied that one was the other's double. The same olive cheeks, slightly tinged with rose-red: the same impish, restless dark eyes: the same long, thin mouth, ever parting to show gleaming, irregular white teeth.

They were an attractive pair: and Lynn's eyes rested on them for several moments before they wandered slowly over the rest of the room. The usual company was present: the pretty girl who never counted the tricks and continually appealed to her partner to tell her "what was trumps"; the stout woman who remembered everything and berated her confrere soundly if he forgot the thirteenth card; the mild-looking man who smiled sweetly as his lady partners trumped his tricks and cursed them bitterly on his way home; the pompous man who never failed to instruct all the rest of the table; the excitable debutante who invariably dropped the wrong card on the trick, then shrieked aloud and sought permission to "take it back" on the ground that she "hadn't been thinking"; and, last but not least, the bad-tempered man who regarded bridge as a religion, and burned to slay the sacrilegious ones who violated its tenets.

"Oh, Lynn," whispered Mrs. Hadwell with a sigh of contentment, "aren't people a treat? I wonder if they're getting hungry. Do you think I had better give orders to have supper served?"

"It mightn't be a bad idea. Let me go with you, Del."

"Such a queer thing has happened to-day, Lynn," whispered Mrs. Hadwell, confidentially, as they went out together. "You remember my speaking to you of my prize housekeeper? the one beside whose frigid nature my own showed in the light of a volcano? Well, she has actually shown signs of being human for once. To-day she approached me with a request for an extra night out: at least she didn't call it that, but it was practically what she wanted. Under the circumstances--the twins arriving and the bridge people coming here, to-night--I demurred a little and asked if to-morrow wouldn't do. She then told me--with an air of wishing she didn't have to--that General Shaftan--_the_ General Shaftan--had been an old friend of hers in childhood days; and that she had just received an urgent message, asking that she go without fail to his house to-night. He must be better; it is queer, for I understood that he had been quite given up: he has two nurses and is never left for a moment, day or night. Imagine! Of course I told her to go--but what in the world do you suppose it means? You know the story about the General and the bewitching Langham-Greene, of course? They were engaged to be married some twenty years ago when Langham-Greene--who was plain Bill Greene, then--hove upon the scene with his half a million: and 'the scene was changed.' My lady dropped Shaftan like a hot potato and transformed Bill into a Benedict and a Langham-Greene. Then she drove him to drink: at least they say so! I don't believe, myself, that he took much driving. At all events he was thoughtful enough to drink himself to death: and thoughtless enough to speculate and leave her very poorly off--comparatively speaking, of course! Shaftan, in the meantime, had left the city and gone to India: and just about the time that Bill Greene drank his last glass, he blossomed out as a General and dear knows what all. Wasn't it rich? Poor Julia thought she had only to hold out a welcoming hand, when he returned; but to every one's surprise, he had neither forgotten nor forgiven. If he had even refused to meet her it would have been some solace to her vanity, but he was quite ready to go so far and was extremely polite when he did: only he would never talk to her if he could help it. She gave him up at last as a bad job. Now, when the papers can talk of nothing else but the career of the famous General Shaftan and his approaching death he sends for my housekeeper--and by the way, Mrs. Waite knew the Langham-Greene well when she was a girl, for the latter told me so, adding in her pleasant way that the poor thing had never had but the one offer which she accepted."

"I wish she had said that to me."

"She knows your tongue too well, my dear. And you make a great mistake in not conciliating the creature. Never make an enemy of a cad, male or female; for 'it' can use weapons which you would disdain to touch, and those weapons are frequently poisoned. If you must make enemies, make them of honourable people, who will simply let you alone, and not be trying to injure you; and be careful to see that every obnoxious kind of human reptile loves you. But what's the use of talking? one can't teach you common sense."

When the business of ascertaining the highest scores had been attended to Miss Erma Reed was found to be the winner of the lady's prize. Mrs. Hadwell was much amused by the warmth of Mr. Bert Hadwell's congratulations. Such plaudits as he bestowed upon her are rarely called forth by the most amazing skill: and his aunt by marriage laughed and pinched Miss Thayer's arm as she listened to them.

"When one considers Erma's height and proportions and the almost unnatural whiteness of her skin, one sees that it is merely to be expected that such a slender and brown individual as Bert should be impressed by her cleverness at bridge.... Here is your prize, dear! I am so glad you won it and I think it will go nicely with your pretty dress."

"It" was a pearl pendant which Erma received with something as nearly approaching animation as that stately and somewhat shy damsel ever showed. She was, beyond all doubt, one of the most beautiful girls in Montreal; her absolutely flawless skin and generous though graceful proportions instinctively recalling the masterpieces of Grecian sculpture. Yet it was a cold beauty, unlit by intellectual or mirthful fires: and some of the unthinking who merely assimilate the general effect without noticing details had been heard to say openly that they preferred Mrs. Hadwell's vivacious prettiness to the younger woman's more stately charms. No one had laughed more freely at this than Mrs. Hadwell, herself. She was well aware that, devoid of artificial advantages, she would be a most insignificant little nonentity, but that fact gave her no uneasiness and diminished nothing of her graciousness toward the younger and prettier girls who thronged her entertainments and sang her praises without stint. Yet she could not bear "green girls."

"Lynn," she would say to her friend, "you have no idea what a comfort it is to feel that I can get away from them sometimes and take a rest with you. After these giggling, insipid debutantes you are like a--a cocktail! Yet it is the thing for nice women to be adored by young girls and so I must be adored, worse luck!"

*CHAPTER XV*

*"BE PITIFUL, O GOD!"*

"O God! to clasp those fingers close and yet to feel so lonely, To see a light within those eyes that is the daylight only-- Be pitiful, O God!" --_E. Barrett Browning_.

Amy Waite walked swiftly down the path which led from Hadwell Heights to Pine Avenue. The night was a cold one; the moon hung bright and glittering in the starlit heavens and the white, still earth seemed to her as cruel as Life, as inexorable as Time. She shivered as she walked and drew her shabby fur more closely around her throat. When would this cruel walk end? When would this crueler interview be over?

She reached her destination at length and rang the bell. General Shaftan had no relatives in Montreal, but his fame and character had won him many friends. Yet he lay dying alone in his handsome house; alone, save for the ministrations of a hired nurse. Mrs. Waite's thin lips curved in a smile more tragic than most tears are as she stood on the doorstep of the silent house while the keen winds blew dismally about her. Alone! What freak had made him send for her at such a time?

A silent man-servant admitted and conducted her upstairs. Amy paused long enough to remove her wraps and, while she waited, the nurse came out from the sickroom and spoke, softly.

"The General is failing fast," she whispered. "He was determined to see you this evening and so I sent you that urgent message. This afternoon he saw his lawyer on business connected with his will and I wanted him to wait till to-morrow for this, but he would not. He seemed to fear that he might not live to see another day." Her voice trembled; she was a kind-hearted soul and the General had a way of endearing himself to all with whom he came in contact. Mrs. Waite, however, stood erect and tearless, and the nurse, after a half-wondering, half-resentful glance, directed her to enter.

"He wants to see you, alone," she said, reluctantly. "But, if any change should take place in him, be sure to let me know at once."

Mrs. Waite gave the required promise and left her. The General lay, half-propped up with pillows; his bronzed face was pale with the pallor of approaching dissolution, but his eyes were the eyes of twenty. Amy's dead youth sprang to sudden life beneath them and something akin to the hopeless, useless rapture of thirty years ago awoke and cried in her heart. Her face was set and pallid, and the hands which clasped the dying soldier's were cold as his own. They looked at one another in silence which the woman could not break. The man spoke at last, a little disappointed at her lack of feeling.

"Well, Amy?" he whispered, half-quizzically.

"You--wanted to see me, Arnold?"

"I did--very much. I'm dying--I suppose you know that, eh?"

"I had heard so. I didn't know"----

"Oh, it's true enough. Don't I show in my looks that I am?"

Amy did not answer immediately nor did her face betray any especial interest in the statement. The General, after scrutinizing her closely, almost anxiously for a moment, relinquished her hand and laughed, half in amusement, half in disappointment.

"You're a cold-blooded little creature, Amy," he cried. "You always were. But you're a faithful little soul--I'd trust you through thick and thin--and I want to do something for you before I go. Also I want you to help me to pay off old scores and spite my lady Julia--you won't mind lending a hand in that, I'll wager." His still brilliant grey eyes twinkled significantly.

Amy watched him passively and smiled a little, wondering why an ugly, faded woman of forty-eight with a sordid past should feel as keenly and cruelly as an untrained girl of eighteen. No answer suggested itself and she sat in silence, watching the dying man and wishing that she, herself, had died long ago.

The General laughed feebly as he looked at her. She was, as he had told her, such a cold-blooded little thing--rather unpleasantly like a fish--but, after all, poor little soul! she had had a beastly hard time of it; why, she looked like an old woman at fifty. He could do one good turn to a friend before he died, at all events.