CHAPTER XXI.

A JOINT IN HIS ARMOUR.

Willie Ruston slept, on the night following his return to London, in the Carlins' house at Hampstead. The all-important question of the railway made a consultation necessary, and Ruston's indisposition to face his solitary rooms caused him to accept gladly the proffered hospitality. The little cramped place was always a refuge and a rest; there he could best rejoice over a victory or forget a temporary defeat. There he fled now, in the turmoil of his mind. The question of the railway had hurried him from Dieppe, but it could not carry away from him the memories of Dieppe. Yet that was the office he had already begun to ask of it--of it and of the quiet busy life at Hampstead, where he lingered till a week stretched to two and to three, spending his days at work in the City, and his evenings, after his romp with the children, in earnest and eager talk and speculation. He regretted bitterly his going to Dieppe. He had done what he condemned; he had raised up a perpetual reproach and a possible danger. He was not a man who could dismiss such a thing with a laugh or a sneer, with a pang of penitence and a swift reaction to the low levels of morality, with a regret for imprudence and a prayer against consequences. His nature was too deep, and the influence he had met too strong, for any of these to be enough. Yet he had suffered the question of the railway to drag him away at a moment's notice; and he was persuaded that he must take his leaving as setting an end to all that had passed. All that must be put behind; forgetfulness in thought might be a relief impossible to attain, a relief that he would be ashamed of striving to attain; but forgetfulness in act seemed a duty to be done. In his undeviating reference of everything to his own work in life and his neglect of any other touchstone, he erected into an obligation what to another would have been a shameless matter of course; or, again, to yet another, a source of shame-faced relief. His sins were sin first against himself, in the second degree only against the participant in them; his preoccupation with their first quality went far to blind him to the second.

Yet he was very sorry for Maggie Dennison. Nay, those words were ludicrously feeble for the meaning he wanted from them. Acutely conscious of having done her a wrong, he was vaguely aware that he might underestimate the wrong, and remembered uneasily how she had told him that he did not understand, and despaired because he could not understand. He felt more for her now--much more, it seemed to him; but the consciousness of failure to put himself where she stood dogged him, making him afraid sometimes that he could not realise her sufferings, sometimes that he was imputing to her fictitious tortures and a sense of ignominy which was not her own. Searching light, he began to talk to Carlin in general terms, of course, and by way of chance discourse; and he ran up against a curious stratum of Puritanism imbedded amongst the man's elastic principles. The narrowest and harshest judgment of an erring woman accompanied the supple trader and witnessed the surviving barbarian in Mr. Carlin; an accidental distant allusion displayed an equally relentless attitude in his meek hard-working little wife. Willie Ruston drew in his feelers, and, aghast at the evil these opinions stamped as the product of his acts, declared for a moment that his life must be the only and insufficient atonement. The moment was a brief one. He dismissed the opinions with a curse, their authors with a smile, and did not scorn to take for comfort even Maggie Dennison's own enthusiasm for his work. That had drawn them together; that must rule and limit the connection which it had created. An end--a bound--a peremptory stop (there was still time to stop) was the thing. She would see that, as he saw it. God knew (he said to himself) what a wrench it was--for she meant more to him than he had ever conceived a woman could mean; but the wrench must be undergone. He would rather die than wreck his work; and she, he knew, rather die than prove a wrecking siren to him.

Suddenly, across the desponding stubbornness of his resolves, flashed, with a bright white light, the news of the Baron's legacy, accompanying, but, after a hasty regretful thought and a kindly regretful smile, obliterating the fact of the Baron's death. Half the steps upward, he felt, which he had set himself painfully and with impatient labour to cut, were hewn deep and smooth for his feet; he had now but to tread, and lift his foot and tread again. From a paid servant of his Company, powerful only by a secret influence unbased on any substantial foundation, he leapt to the position of a shareholder with a larger stake than any man besides; no intrigue could shake him now, no sudden gust of petulant impatience at the tardiness of results displace him. He had never thought of this motive behind the Baron's large purchases of Omofaga shares; as he thought of it, he had not been himself had he not smiled. And his smile was of the same quality as had burst on his face when first Maggie Dennison dropped the veil and owned his sway.

One day he did not go down to the city, but spent his time wandering on the heath, mapping out what he would do in the fast-approaching days in Omofaga. The prospects were clearing; he had had two interviews with Lord Detchmore, and the Minister had fallen back from his own objections on to the scruples of his colleagues. It was a promising sign, and Willie was pressing his advantage. The fall in the shares had been checked; Tom Loring wrote no more; and Mrs. Carlin had forgotten to mourn the extinct coal business. He came home, with a buoyant step, at four o'clock, to find Carlin awaiting him with dismayed face. There was the worst of news from Queen Street. Mr. Dennison had written announcing resignation of his place on the Board.

"It's a staggering blow," said Carlin, thrusting his hands into his pockets. "Can't you bring him round? Why is he doing it?"

"Well, what does he say?" asked Ruston, a frown on his brow.

"Oh, some nonsense--pressure of other business or something of that kind. Can't you go and see him, Willie? He's back in town. He writes from Curzon Street."

"I don't know why he does it," said Ruston slowly. "I knew he'd been selling out."

"He hasn't made money at that."

"No. I've made the profit there," said Ruston, with a sudden smile.

"The Baron bought 'em, eh?" laughed Carlin. "You generally come out right side up, Willie. You'll go and see him, though, won't you?"

Yes. He would go. That was the resolution which in a moment he reached. If there were danger, he must face it, if there were calamity, he must know it. He would go and see Harry Dennison.

As he was, on the stroke of half-past four, he jumped into a hansom-cab, and bade the man drive to Curzon Street.

Harry was not at home--nor Mrs. Dennison, added the servant. But both were expected soon.

"I'll wait," said Willie, and he was shown up into the drawing-room.

As the servant opened the door, he said in his low respectful tones,

"Mrs. Cormack is here, sir, waiting for Mrs. Dennison."

A moment later Willie Ruston was overwhelmed in a shrilly enthusiastic greeting. Mrs. Cormack had been in despair from _ennui_; Maggie's delay was endless, and Mr. Ruston was in verity a godsend. Indeed there was every appearance of sincerity in the lady's welcome. She stood and looked at him with an expression of most wicked and mischievous pleasure. The remorse detected by Tom Loring was not visible now; pure delight reigned supreme, and gave free scope to her frivolous fearlessness.

"_Enfin!_" she said. "Behold the villain of the piece!"

He opened his eyes in questioning.

"Oh, you think to deceive me too? Why, I have prophesied it."

"You are," said Willie, standing on the hearth-rug, and gazing at her nervous restless figure, so rich in half-expressed hints too subtle for language, "the most outrageous of women, Mrs. Cormack. Fortunately you have a fling at everybody, and the saints come off as badly as the sinners."

A shrug asserted her opinion of his pretences. He answered,

"I really am so unfortunate as not to have the least idea what you're driving at."

An inarticulate scornful little sound greeted this protest.

"Oh, well, I shall wait till you say something," remarked Willie, with a laugh. "I can't deny villainies wholesale, and I can't argue against Gallic ejaculations."

"You still come here?" she asked, ignoring his rudeness, and coming to close quarters with native audacity.

He looked at her for a moment, and then walked up to her chair, and stood over her. She leant back, gazing up at him with a smile.

"Look here! Don't talk nonsense," he said brusquely; "even such talk as yours may do harm with fools."

"Fools!" she echoed. "You mean----?"

"More than half the world," he interrupted.

"Including----?" she began again in mockery.

"Some of our acquaintance," he answered, with the glimmer of a smile.

"Ah, I thought you were angry!" she cried, pointing at the smile on his lips.

"I shall be, if you don't hold your tongue."

"You beg me to be silent, Mr. Ruston?"

"I desire you not to chatter about me, Mrs. Cormack."

"Ah, what politeness! I shall say what I please," and she rose and stood facing him defiantly.

"I wish," he said, "that I could tell you what they do to gossiping women in Omofaga. It is so very disagreeable--and appropriate."

"Oh, I don't mind hearing."

"I can believe it, but I mind saying."

She flushed, and her breath came more quickly.

"No doubt you will enforce the treatment--in your own interest," she said.

"You won't be there," replied he, with affected regret.

"Well, here I shall say what I please."

"And who will listen?"

"One man, at least," she cried, in incautious anger. "Ah, you'd like to beat me, wouldn't you?"

"Why suggest the impossible?" he asked, smiling. "I can't beat every----" he paused, and added with deliberateness, "every vulgar-minded woman in London;" and turning his back on her, he sat down and took up a newspaper that lay on the table.

For full five or six minutes Mrs. Cormack sat silent. Willie Ruston glanced through the leading article, and turned the paper, folding it neatly. There was a letter from a correspondent on the subject of the watersheds of Central South Africa, and he was reading it with attention. He thought that he recognised Tom Loring's hand. The watersheds of Omofaga were not given their due. Ah, and here was that old falsehood about arid wastes round Fort Imperial!

"By Jove, it's too bad!" he exclaimed aloud.

Mrs. Cormack, who had for the last few moments been watching him, first with a frown, then with a half-incredulous, half-amazed smile, burst out into laughter.

"Really, one might as well be offended with a grizzly bear!" she cried.

He put down the paper, and met her gaze.

"How in the world," she went on, "does she--there, I beg your pardon. How does anyone endure you, Mr. Ruston?"

As she spoke, before he could answer, the door opened, and Harry Dennison came in. He entered with a hesitating step. After greeting Mrs. Cormack, he advanced towards Ruston. The latter held out his hand, and Harry took it. He did not look Ruston in the eyes.

"How are you?" said he. "You want to see me?"

"Well, for a moment, if you can spare the time--on business."

"Is it about my letter to Carlin?"

Ruston nodded. Mrs. Cormack kept a close watch.

"I--I can't alter that," said Harry, in a confused way. "Sir George is so crippled now, so much of the work falls on me; I have really no time."

"You might have left us your name."

"I couldn't do that, could I? Suppose you came to grief?" and he laughed uncomfortably.

Willie Ruston was afflicted by a sense of weakness--a vulnerability new in his experience--forbidding him to be urgent with the renegade. Had Carlin been present, he would have stood astounded at his chief's tonguetiedness. Mrs. Cormack smiled at it, and her smile, caught in a swift glance by Ruston, spurred him to a voluble appeal, that sounded to himself hollow and ineffective. It had no effect on Harry Dennison, who said little, but shook his head with unfailing resolution. Mrs. Cormack could not resist the temptation to offer matters an opportunity of development.

"But what does Maggie say to your desertion?" she asked in an innocently playful way.

Harry seemed nonplussed at the question, and Willie Ruston interposed.

"We needn't bring Mrs. Dennison into it," he said, smiling. "It's a matter of business, and if Dennison has made up his mind----"

He ended with a shrug, and took up his hat.

"I--I think so, Ruston," stumbled Harry.

"Where is Maggie?" asked Mrs. Cormack curiously. "They told me she would be in soon."

"I don't know," said Harry. "She went out driving. She's sometimes late in coming back."

Ruston was shaking hands with Mrs. Cormack, and, when he walked out, Harry followed him. The two men went downstairs in silence. Harry opened the front door. Willie Ruston held out his hand, but Harry did not this time take it. Holding the door-knob, he looked at his visitor with a puzzled entreaty in his eyes, and his visitor suddenly felt sorry for him.

"I hope Mrs. Dennison is well?" said Ruston, after a pause.

"No," answered Harry, with rough abruptness. "She's not well. I knew how it would be; I told you. You would go."

"My dear fellow----"

"You would talk to her about your miserable Company--our Company, if you like. I knew it would do her harm. I told you so."

He was pouring out his incoherent charges and repetitions in a fretful petulance.

"The doctor says her nerves are all wrong; she must be left alone. I see it. She's not herself."

"Then that," said Ruston, "is the real reason why you're severing yourself from us?"

"I don't want her to hear anything more about it; she got absorbed in it. I told you she would, but you wouldn't listen. Tom Loring thought just the same. But you would go."

"Is she ill?"

"Oh, I don't know that she's ill. She's--she's not herself. She's strange."

The note of distress in his voice grew more acute as he went on.

"I'm very sorry," said Willie, baldly. "Give her my best----"

"If you want to see me again about it, I--you'll always know where to find me in the City, won't you?" He shuffled his feet nervously, and twisted the door-knob as he spoke.

"You mean," asked Ruston, slowly, "that I'd better not come here?"

"Well, yes--just now," mumbled Harry; and he added apologetically, "She's seeing very few people just now, you know."

"As you please, of course," said Ruston, shortly. "I daresay you're right. I should like to say, Dennison, that I did not intend----." He suddenly stopped short. There was no need to rush unbidden into more falseness. "Good-bye," he said.

Harry took the offered hand in a limp grasp, but his eyes did not leave the ground. A moment later the door closed, and Ruston was alone outside--knowing that he had been turned out--in however ineffective blundering manner, yet, in fact, turned out--and by Harry Dennison. That Harry knew nothing, he hardly felt as a comfort; that perhaps he suspected hardly as a danger. He was angry and humiliated that such a thing should happen, and that he should be powerless to prevent, and without title to resent, the blow.

Looking up he caught sight dimly in the dim light of a lithe figure and a mocking face. Mrs. Cormack had regained her own house by means of the little gate, and stood leaning over the balcony smiling at him like some disguised fiend in a ballet or opera-bouffe. He heard a tinkling laugh. Had she listened? She was capable of it, and if she had, it might well be that she had caught a word or two. But perhaps his air and attitude were enough to tell the tale. She craned her neck over the parapet, and called to him.

"I hope we shall see you soon again. Of course, you'll be coming to see Maggie soon?"

"Oh, soon, I hope," he answered sturdily, and the low tinkle of laughter rang out again in answer.

Without more, he turned on his heel and walked down the street, a morose frown on his brow.

He had been gone some half-hour when, just before eight o'clock, Mrs. Dennison's victoria drove quickly up to the door. The evening was chilly and she was wearing her furs. Her face rose pale and rigid above them; and as she walked to the house, her steps dragged as though in weariness. She did not go upstairs, but knocked, almost timidly, at the door of her husband's study. Entering in obedience to his call, she found him sitting in his deep leathern arm-chair by the fire. She leant her arm on the back and stared over his head into the fire.

"Anyone been, Harry?" she asked.

He lifted his eyes with a start.

"Is it you, Maggie?" he cried, leaping up and seizing her hand. "Why, how cold you are, dear! Come and sit by the fire."

She did as he bade her.

"Any visitors?" she asked again.

"Ruston," he answered, turning and poking the fire as he did so. "He came to see me about the Company, you know."

"Is he long gone?"

"Yes, some time."

"He was angry, was he?"

"Yes, Maggie. But I stuck to it. I won't have anything more to do with the thing."

His petulance betrayed itself again in his voice. She said nothing, and, after a moment, he asked anxiously,

"Do you mind much? You know the doctor----?"

"Oh, the doctor! No, Harry, I don't mind. Do as you like. He can get on without us."

"If you really mind, I'll try----"

"No, no, no," she burst out. "You're quite right. Of course you're right. I don't want you to go on. I'm tired of it too."

"Are you?" he asked, with a face suddenly brightening. "Are you really? Then I'm glad I told Ruston not to come bothering about it here."

Had he been listening, he could have heard the sharp indrawing of her breath.

"What do you mean?" she asked.

"Why, I told him not to come and see you till--till you were stronger."

She shot a terrified glance at him. His expression was merely anxious and, according to its wont when he was in a difficulty, apologetic.

"And he won't be here much longer now," he added, comfortingly.

"No, not much," she forced herself to murmur.

"Won't you go and dress for dinner?" he asked, after a moment. "It's ordered for a quarter-past, and it's more than that now."

"Is it? I'll come directly. You go, and I'll follow you. I shan't be long."

He came near to where she sat.

"Are you feeling better?" he asked.

"Oh, Harry, Harry, I'm well, perfectly well! You and your doctor!" and she broke into an impatient laugh. "You'll persuade me into the grave before you've done."

He looked at her for a moment, and then, shaping his lips to whistle, sounded a few dreary notes and stole out of the room.

She heard the door close, and, sitting up, stretched her arms over her head. Then she sighed for relief at his going. It was much to be alone.