Chapter 19

Van Hert said nothing, but he was looking at her unconsciously, with a light in his eyes that staggered her. Other men had looked at her with admiration, but this man had an expression that seemed to envelop her with himself. She felt throughout her pulses that he was all fire and eagerness and intensity, a strong, wilful, obstinate, fierce, virile personality that reached out mute, unconscious arms to her level-headed coolness. The fire in his eyes was only smouldering as yet, but it seemed to tell her that he was a fine-toned, brilliant instrument that she, and perhaps she only, could play upon as she liked, bringing forth both thundering chords and enveloping sweetness.

And in the sudden silence that had fallen upon the verandah, Diana knew that she liked to play, would always like to play, that with this man at least boredom would never fret her restless soul.

Then she plunged into words with him, and they sparred delightedly, and that work he had spoken of as awaiting him at home was left to take care of itself.

Later, Diana went outside on the verandah of her room and Meryl's and looked at the stars. The tables had turned utterly, but it was doubtful if either of them perceived it. Meryl went quietly to bed with only a few words, and either slept, or feigned sleep. Diana loitered on the verandah, and looked at the stars. She hardly knew why, only some strange half-consciousness was springing up inside her that made her restless. Somehow van Hert seemed to be gaining a hold over her. She could not gauge how, nor why, nor wherefore; but as she thought of his fine dark eyes in the starlight, with that luminous, glad expression when he looked at her, she had a sense of violent antipathy one moment, and of a gladness that made her blush secretly the next.

But within three days the date of the wedding was fixed, and all the papers paragraphed it far and wide.

It appeared in Salisbury the day after Ailsa had had her talk with Carew, and it came as a shock to both of them. It left just three weeks for action, and no more. What was to be done? Ailsa tried to get another interview with Carew at once, and found he had had to ride to some place twenty miles distant, and might not be back until the morrow. So, in distress, she sought Henry Delcombe. What he had to tell her was faintly reassuring. Carew had gone to see him after he left Ailsa, and had asked for proofs of his heirship to the marquisate of Toxeter. Delcombe had been able to satisfy him, and he had been gravely friendly, but that was all. At last, in desperation, Ailsa decided to write to Diana. The mail left that morning, and would reach Johannesburg in three days. Diana was full of resource, and she might think of a plan. Ailsa decided to tell her as much as she could without betraying any confidence. She said no word of the tragedy. That only concerned Meryl, and if she were to hear it at all, she must hear it from him. Neither did she mention his changed position; that also he should tell himself. She contented herself with letting Diana know that he had admitted he loved Meryl.

In the meantime she waited anxiously for Carew to return, but heard no word of him until the Sunday afternoon. In reply to an urgent little note he came to see her. She had wondered if he would be changed at all; if his new position would shed a ray of gladness in his steady eyes. But he seemed exactly the same, and she could read nothing.

"Did you see the announcement yesterday?" she asked. "There is so little time. I had to see you."

"I did."

"And what are you going to do?"

He looked down at the carpet, lost in thought. "I hardly know," he said.

"O, won't you at least go to Johannesburg?..." she pleaded. "See Meryl once. If you fail her now, perhaps you will never forgive yourself."

"On the other hand, I may only disturb her mind. How do you know she has not cared for this man for a long time? In any case, what right have I to cross _his_ path now?"

"O, your logic!..." she cried. "The way you men think this and that and the other, when a woman just _knows_! Go and see her. Go and make sure of things for yourself."

But he shook his head in doubt and perplexity. To him it seemed almost like stealing to go and attempt to take from this other man what he had won fairly and openly; and though Ailsa tried other arguments, she could not move him. Only one half-hope she extracted from him.

"Perhaps," he said, "I will write to Mr. Pym and ask his advice."

Then he went back to the hours of desperate mental stress, that were steadily increasing the grey about his temples. To Ailsa he might have seemed cold and self-contained as ever, but if she could have known it, all his being was torn with conflict. With the hourly growing ache and longing to throw everything to the winds and to try to carry Meryl off while there was yet time there was the fear lest a wrong step on his part should shatter for her some newly found content.

XXVIII

DIANA'S PERPLEXITIES INCREASE

The two days after Diana came home early from her dinner-party were chiefly noticeable for the fact that for the first time since the engagement van Hert remained away from Hill Court. No one knew why, and the excuse he sent was of the vaguest. Diana asked her own heart and was troubled. When he came on the third day, he walked into the drawing-room to look for Meryl, and found Diana reading in the window alone. They discovered each other suddenly, and it was almost as if he gave a guilty start; and he looked unusually pale, with haggard eyes, as if he had slept badly of late. Diana saw it all, but gave no sign.

"You are something of a stranger, Meinheer van Hert," she said lightly. "My sword had almost time to rust."

"It would never do that. The best of swords is none the worse for an occasional rest; unless"--with a somewhat tired gleam of humour--"you have been keeping it bright at the expense of poor Aunt Emily."

"No, it has had a real rest. I am saving it again for the best swordsman worthy of it."

His eyes came suddenly to her face, and she realised at once that until that moment he had scarcely looked at her; and in that second's flash she saw something in them that hurt: a swift, deep trouble that he was struggling to hide. He looked away again quickly, noting the lovely shades of the room, the masses of violets, the general airiness and elegance.

"Is Meryl at home?"

"Yes. I will go and tell her you are here."

Diana went upstairs very slowly, lost in thought. And when she had told Meryl, she stood a long time at the window, thinking still. Presently Meryl came back. "William came to ask me to definitely fix the date of the wedding. We decided on the fifth; that will give us just a week before he must go to Cape Town." Then, as if she did not expect Diana to make any comment, she added, "The invitations must go out to-night."

That evening van Hert came as usual, but, simply because he was gayer than usual, Diana perceived that his gaiety was forced; and she saw also that he shunned meeting her eyes, looking anywhere, nowhere, rather than into her face.

The next day she rode in a direction where she and Meryl often met and joined him for a gallop. Meryl had suggested coming as usual, but Diana had contrived to put her off. She wanted if possible, without quite knowing why, to see van Hert alone; and as it happened, Fortune favoured her, for he appeared up a side road suddenly, and had no time to escape her, even had he wished. So they rode together, and he tried to talk to her as usual. When they came to a spot where they often dismounted, and sat to enjoy the lovely view of distant hills, Diana prepared to get off her horse. She saw him hesitate, and then he muttered something about an important engagement.

"O, nonsense!..." with a gay, airy smile. "If I'm not in a hurry, you can't be. I only want to sit for about fifteen minutes."

So they gave their horses' reins to the smart black groom, who always rode with the girls, and sat on the rustic bench where the three had several times sat together.

And suddenly, Diana, giving rein to her impulsive temperament, said, "What is your opinion of a man who marries one woman and loves another?"

She saw him start and stiffen, but he tried to parry the thrust. "What a question to ask a fiancé of a few weeks, on the eve of becoming a bridegroom!..."

"Well, that's why! I thought you would have formed many opinions on the subject of love and marriage."

"And why do you want to know?"

"O, just a fancy! I know men sometimes do that kind of thing. Personally I think it is rather cowardly."

"Why cowardly?..."

"Because it shows a man hasn't the pluck to own he has made a mistake. He would rather go on with it, and pretend everything is all right."

She saw him bite his lip, and felt more thoroughly that he would not meet her eyes.

"It is hard on the other woman, the one he _does_ love, too. It might make her very happy to be told. One joy is better than two miseries any day, even if his lordship did have to own to a mistake and look rather silly!..." with a little laugh.

"Perhaps I shall know more about it when I am married," trying to speak carelessly. "You must ask me later."

"Probably I shall not want to know then; my fancies are always varying. What should _you_ do, for instance, if you suddenly found you cared for someone else more than Meryl?"

She was watching him closely, and she saw the swift, tell-tale blood rush to his face.

"I'm sure I don't know," he answered, with a forced, unnatural laugh. "It is rather a remote probability now."

"O, one never knows!..." Diana spoke with assumed lightness, and looked away to the hills, feeling a little unnerved by the sudden, swift palpitating in her blood. "Shall we go on now?" rising and turning her back to him. "I mustn't keep you any longer from that important engagement."

She might have added that she had learnt what she came out to learn; but instead she put her horse to a smart gallop, and rode back without scarcely speaking, flinging him a gay good-bye over her shoulder when their roads separated.

When she reached home she found Meryl surrounded by dressmakers, and trying hard to assume an interest in the proceedings; but Diana's clear eyes saw the effort as plainly as if it had been written across her forehead. She saw that she looked ill, too; ill and worn and joyless, as if something had damped for ever her natural fount of gaiety. And withal she was so sweet-tempered and considerate, studying everybody else's feelings in this wedding of hers; everyone's apparently except her own. Diana wanted to shake her one moment, and howl round her neck the next. Instead of doing either she was a little more snappy than usual.

"Will you have your dress fitted now?" Meryl asked her. "Madame has it all ready."

"No," shortly. "I haven't time this morning; and besides, one can't be fitted just after a ride. I'm going to have a hot bath and a cigarette," and she flung out of the room, leaving Meryl a little perplexed and Madame considerably perturbed.

In her own apartment she tossed things about, and was very irritable with her maid. Later, she went out into the garden to a shady nook where she was not likely to be disturbed, because she wanted to think. But thinking was no easy matter. On every side were perplexities.

"It's just the devil's own mess," she summed up at last, unable to think of any other sufficiently strong description. "Meryl doesn't want to marry van Hert, and van Hert doesn't want to marry Meryl; they both want to marry someone else; and yet they both mean to go on to the bitter end, because of some rotten-cotton notion about serving South Africa. O! I've no patience with these heroic attitudes! They are not suited to commonplace everyday life. If they'd a little more sound common sense, and a little less of the noble and lofty soul spirit, they would perceive they will only do more harm than good by going against nature and trying to force inclinations. But the absurd thing is, that neither has yet had the perspicacity to perceive the other's unwilling frame of mind. That exactly bears out my point. These heroic attitudes do not suit the exigencies of everyday life. If they weren't both so bent on doing the noble thing, they would perceive they are merely making fools of themselves, and incidentally straining my powers of resource beyond all reason. Of course it can't go on; but what in the name of all that's wonderful can I do to stop it?... Send for The Bear, and compel him to make the best of the awful fact that Meryl possesses a fortune, and console dear Dutch Willie myself, I suppose!..." And she smiled grimly. Then her face softened, and tears unexpectedly gleamed in her eyes. She brushed them away, apostrophising herself impatiently. Then she swallowed down a sob, murmuring, "I can't bear the thought of Meryl, standing with that smile on her lips and that expression in her eyes, to be fitted for her wedding-dress. It makes one want to tear the whole world to pieces, and sink South Africa in the nethermost ocean. No wonder uncle shuts himself in his study so much nowadays. He must be just as hard put to it as I am to know what to do." A step disturbed her cogitations at that moment, and Aunt Emily came into view.

"Ah, my dear, I thought I saw you come down the garden. There is a letter for you with a Rhodesian stamp. I thought you might like to have it." And she handed it to her, at the same time sitting down on the garden-seat beside her.

"Have you seen Meryl's dress," she enquired, with an expression that had suddenly grown sentimental. "The dear child. To think of her in her wedding-dress, so soon to be a bride!"

"Well, that's a commonplace enough event! Girls like Meryl usually do become brides, and later on they wear shrouds, and have a nice little coffin all to themselves. There really isn't very much difference!..."

"O, my dear!... What a dreadful remark to make! I am sure it is unlucky to speak like that."

"Then I hope it will be unlucky enough to postpone the wedding indefinitely."

Aunt Emily turned and looked at her niece as if she thought she had taken leave of her senses, but that was not by any means a new expression upon the face of Henry Pym's sister confronting Henry Pym's niece.

"Really, Diana!..." she expostulated. "I think it is hardly a subject for jesting. Marriage is a very serious thing. I hope God will bless dear Meryl with great happiness. I confess, at first, I was disappointed that she chose a Dutch husband; but Mr. van Hert has very good Huguenot blood in his veins, and he is undoubtedly a very charming man; and then, of course, her children will only be half Dutch."

"Her children ought to be bear cubs!" snapped Diana, wishing her aunt would go away and leave her to read her letter in peace.

For a moment Aunt Emily was too horrified to reply, and then Diana added, "Don't trouble to expostulate any more. I'm not really mad, only eccentric. I never could see why people make such a silly fuss about weddings; anyhow, they are all the same and all commonplace. When I marry, I shall give all my friends the shock of their lives, something to talk about for a year, and then for once in my life I shall be a public benefactor. I see Helen looking about on the terrace as if she wanted you. Shall I ask her?..."

"No, I will go in to her"; and she got up and walked towards the house, still wearing a shocked expression.

"I wonder if Helen will have the sense to manufacture some request?" thought Diana, glancing after her. "As if I could see the terrace from here!..."

Then she opened her letter.

When she had read it through once, she turned back to the beginning and read it through again. And all the time she was so rigidly still, that a little bird hopped close up to her foot to investigate.

Then she laid the letter down and looked out across the garden. Five minutes later she got to her feet.

In a moment of crisis Diana was the type who courageously follows an inspiration, without overmuch weighing and sifting. She had faith in her own keen woman's instinct and she knew there were times when sharp, decisive action is better than lengthy, minute attention to all the laws of war, and far-reaching considerations of what might or might not result.

A gate at the far end of the garden led out to the main road, and not very far down was a post office. Diana went straight to it, and sent a wire, with prepaid reply, directed to Major Carew, which ran:--

"Can you come at once? Urgently wanted. Go to Carlton and send message on arrival to me.

"DIANA PYM."

XXIX

A USEFUL BLUNDER

The railway journey from Salisbury to Johannesburg takes three and sometimes four days; so that whether Carew responded to her urgent message or not, Diana had rather a long time to possess her soul in patience and make up her mind what course to take next. She was in two minds whether to take her uncle into her confidence or not, but decided men were always apt to bungle, and she had better trust entirely to her own guidance. Beyond a doubt the situation required the most delicate and skilful handling. First of all, she felt she must convey to van Hert some suggestion that would prepare him for the shock of what might be expected to follow upon Carew's arrival, supposing he came. Meryl she did not worry greatly about. She might be expected to be swept off her feet and go with the tide, by the very suddenness of it all. The two men presented the obstacles. Carew would have to be inveigled with the greatest finesse into an interview with Meryl, without ever letting him perceive a woman was leading him. In her heart Diana was a little afraid of the steady, unbending face. He was not likely to prove pliable; he might even refuse to come. Nothing she could say could alter the fact that he was a policeman and Meryl was burdened with a fortune, and that was the only barrier Diana was aware of. She laughed a little to herself as she wondered whether it would help matters if Mr. Pym made a will disinheriting Meryl, and dividing his money between her and charities. She could easily give it back to Meryl later. Then she sighed. "More heroics!... and they tell us it is a base world. Here am I driven out of my senses nearly, positively suffocated with high-mindedness, because three delightful people can't come down from their unlivable altitude and exhibit a little practical common sense."

Then, of course, there was van Hert's pride to consider. What in the world, at this time of all others, was to be made of an English girl jilting a prominent Dutch politician a week before the wedding day! "It's almost enough to cause another war!" sighed poor Diana. "I'm really beginning to wish I had let them all go their own foolish ways. If I don't mind I shall end in becoming a heroine myself, and that's really too alarming!..."

However, the bull having been taken by the horns, it was wiser to keep a firm hold of them; though more than once Diana felt herself very entirely in sympathy with Mark Twain when he says, "It is better to take hold by the tail, because then you can let go when you like."

Obviously van Hert must be tackled first, but she waited until the morning after sending her wire, hoping for a reply. It came early, and fortune favoured her in that she received her orange-coloured envelope unknown to anyone. She carried it upstairs and opened it with a beating, anxious heart. It contained only two words, and was not signed:--

"Arrive Saturday."

For a moment she felt a little dazed. He was coming then, the stern soldier-policeman. What in the world was she to say to him?...

Then a flood of gladness began to well up in her heart. After all, it meant before all things, that a day of great joy might be at hand for Meryl. Did anything else really matter?... If she personally came through the transaction a little battered--well, it wouldn't really matter, if Meryl and The Bear were safely off the rocks. Rather than let any shadowy good for South Africa come between them now she would marry van Hert herself, and at that she gave a little low laugh. In the meantime she had three days to think out a plan and convey to van Hert some sort of preparation.

When he came that Wednesday evening it was easily seen that he was feverish. His eyes were unnaturally bright and his face flushed, and at dinner he only played with his food and ate nothing. He talked and laughed gaily, but with intermittent shivering which he tried hard to hide. Everyone saw it, and Meryl grew concerned. He tried to laugh it off, but was not successful. Finally Mr. Pym advised him to go home to bed. And then Aunt Emily made the crowning blunder of her life, and like some other big blunders now historical, it proved a blessing in disguise.

She glanced at Diana with a scared face and exclaimed in perturbation, "Now if the wedding is put off it will be your fault, Diana. I told you it must bring ill-luck to speak about it as you did."

There was an awkward pause, and in spite of herself Diana flushed scarlet.

"What did Diana say?" van Hert asked of Aunt Emily, half grave and half casual.

The poor lady, having quickly discovered she had made an unfortunate remark and become considerably flurried, made matters worse by stammering guiltily, "O, it was nothing much; she was only talking at random. She ... she ..."--distressfully discovering van Hert's eyes still fixed upon her--"said something about hoping the wedding would be postponed, and I said it was unlucky."

For a moment the constraint was painful. Meryl had grown as white as the tablecloth, and Mr. Pym looked thoroughly worried. Diana, however, had quickly recovered herself, and was now the most composed of any. She gave a little sniff and glanced defiantly at van Hert. His eyes roved round the table and finally fixed themselves upon hers. She did not waver, but looked steadily back at him. He gave a self-conscious, constrained laugh. "I presume you had your reasons?" he said.

She narrowed her eyes a little as she replied with a directness probably he alone understood, "Yes, I suppose I had. It was yesterday, Tuesday. Tuesday is often a queer day with me."

And he knew she was referring to their conversation during the morning's ride.

Then Meryl got up to relieve the tension, and because she began to feel a little uncertain of herself.

"Di often has queer days, but they have nothing to do with your feverishness, William. Jackson had better go back with you, and we will telephone Dr. Smythe to look in and see how you are." She went away to order the motor, and van Hert seized an opportunity to speak to Diana unheard.

"I know what you are alluding to," he said, gravely. "We cannot very well leave it like this. Will you ride the same way to-morrow?"

"But if you have fever?" hesitatingly.

"In the war I fought all day long with fever on me. Surely I can ride! You will be there?"

"Yes."

When van Hert arrived at the meeting-place next morning, he wore an overcoat and looked as if he ought to be in bed, and Diana's heart smote her. But she comforted herself with the thought that his fever was very much of the mind, and her medicine, if drastic, might still do him more good than any physician's.

They rode side by side to the seat they had sat upon before, and without saying much he helped her to alight and gave the reins of both horses to the black groom.

Once seated, however, he turned to her and said, gravely, "Of course, that remark of yours had to do with our conversation the last time we sat here?"

"Of course," agreed Diana, calmly. The intricacies of the task she had set herself were beginning to interest more than scare her, and she was not afraid as to her skill in handling van Hert.

"May I ask in what exact particular?"

"Merely that you are the man about to marry a woman you do not love."