Part 5

Even his own relatives admitted the impossibility of him when, at the age of sixty, he gave effect to the most old-fashioned of all conceivable notions by marrying for love. If an elderly widower with a little son of nine wants somebody to make a home and help to rear the child, he should invite some middle-aged female cousin to come to his assistance; but if he wants a charming, attractive girl to renounce the joys and hopes of youth in order to soothe and gladden his dull remnant of years—well, he _oughtn’t_ to want it, and really it is not quite nice when he does.

Lady Jane Armitage, an ancient aunt, put this thought into very plain words and forced Sir John to listen to them. A mistake—not even a fair bargain. What is Cynthia to get, on her side? A seat in a carriage, a liberal dress allowance, perhaps a few more loose sovereigns than she has been accustomed to carry in that silly little gold purse of hers!

“The idea of money,” said Sir John gruffly, “has never entered Cynthia’s head.”

“Perhaps not. But what else can you offer her? To hold your landing-net while you do your stupid fishing; to perform the duties of a nursery-governess for Jack; to enjoy the privilege of playing hostess when you entertain half a dozen other generals and their frumpish wives.”

Sir John echoed his aunt’s last adjective ironically.

“Yes,” said Lady Jane, “but I’m different. I _know_ I’m a frump, and your friends aren’t aware of their misfortune. No, John, I tell you frankly, it isn’t a fair bargain.”

Sir John bit his grey moustache, ran a strong hand through his shock of grey hair, contracted his heavy brows, and then laughed and shrugged his shoulders.

“Inexplicable to you, eh, Aunt Jane? Well, let’s leave it at that. But be kind to Cynthia all the same, won’t you? Save her from the _other_ frumps,” and, ceasing to laugh, he stared at Lady Jane almost fiercely.

He was one of those men who consider it beneath their dignity to betray tender emotion, and who perhaps look sternest and most forbidding when they are feeling unusually soft and gentle. At any rate, he would not explain to his aunt that he believed the marriage to be an eminently fair bargain—an old-fashioned exchange—love for love—as much love on the girl’s side as on his.

Lady Jane made no promise, but she proved very kind indeed to her new niece; endeavouring to find innocent amusement for pretty Cynthia, acting as her chaperon, watching over her, and growing fonder and fonder of her. She said that the young Lady Beckford was a model wife and a pattern stepmother. No one could have been more devoted to or wiser in her training of Master Jack.

Now, after five years, the boy was ready to go to a public school, and during these long summer days a holiday tutor had been giving him final preparation, ultimate crammed knowledge, and topmost polish of tone and manners. August had been spent at the Beckfords’ country house in Devonshire, and the early weeks of September at their flat in Victoria Street. Lady Jane approved of everything that concerned these arrangements, except one thing. She approved of the public school, of the engaging of a holiday tutor, of all the care, devotion, and forethought with which the little man was being launched from the home circle; but she did not approve of the fact that Sir John had thrown the whole burden on Cynthia’s slender shoulders, while he did his stupid salmon-fishing four hundred miles away in Scotland.

Not quite fair to Cynthia—leaving her all alone with a schoolboy and his tutor. Lady Jane, at considerable inconvenience, ran down to Devonshire to cheer and enliven her. Came back to London and at worse inconvenience stayed there, so as to be handy to act as companion, chaperon, advisory ally, whenever Cynthia wanted her.

But Cynthia wanted her scarcely at all, and allowed poor Lady Jane to perceive at last that uninvited companions are sometimes a tedium rather than a solace.

* * * * *

It was the last night of the holidays. To-morrow Master Jack and his tutor would disappear from Victoria Street.

Dinner had been ordered at an early hour, and Jack was scampering through his meal with excited swiftness. One last treat had been arranged for him. He was to be dispatched to a theatre presently in charge of George, the footman.

“I wish you were coming,” said Jack, and as he turned to Mr. Ridsdale his eyes expressed eloquently enough the hero-worship that is so easy to kindle in young and ingenuous hearts.

“It would be scarcely polite,” said Mr. Ridsdale, “for both of us to desert Lady Beckford.”

“No,” said Jack; “but I wish she’d come with us,” and he turned to his stepmother. “Won’t you change your mind?”

“I really don’t feel up to it, Jack. I’m tired—I’ve had a headache since the day before yesterday.”

“It might drive the headache away,” said Jack, eagerly. “They say it’s a tip-top piece.”

His stepmother and his tutor both smiled as they looked at his bright and animated face. Lady Beckford’s smile was simply affectionate; Mr. Ridsdale’s was indulgent and patronising.

“A rousing melodrama, Jack! All noise and stamping.”

“Yes,” cried Jack, enthusiastically. “Murder and sudden death—just what I like.”

“But not,” said Mr. Ridsdale, “exactly indicated as a cure for a headache.”

“Well, if I can’t persuade you——” and Jack turned to Yates, the butler. “Has George changed his things?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Then I’ll be off.” Jack pushed his plate away with a gesture that elegant Mr. Ridsdale could not approve of. It was too childish for a boy of fourteen—a little more polish required, in spite of so much polishing. “Good night,” and Jack kissed Lady Beckford. “I shan’t say good night to you, Mr. Ridsdale, because you won’t have turned in before I get back, will you?”

“No; I’ll sit up for you,” and Mr. Ridsdale, smiling, spoke with rather strained facetiousness. “I’ll be waiting to hear how the heroine was extricated from her misfortunes, how the villain got scored off by the funny man, and how virtue triumphed all round in the end. There! Cut along. Your escort is waiting for you.”

Master Jack hurried gaily from the dining-room, and his boyish voice sounded for a few moments as he prattled to the footman. Then the hall door of the flat opened and shut, and the two elders were left alone to finish their dinner at leisure.

“Ah!” Mr. Ridsdale drew in his breath with a little sigh, and, looking at his hostess, spoke quietly and meditatively. “I know you often read people’s thoughts, but I wonder if you could guess what I’m thinking now?”

“I’ll try, if you like. You were thinking that perhaps, after all, Jack is too young still for the rough-and-tumble life of a big school.”

“Oh, no,” said Mr. Ridsdale, carelessly. “Jack’ll do all right. They’ll soon lick him into shape. No”—and his tone softened and deepened, though he was speaking almost in a whisper—“no; I was thinking this is the last night of my—my holidays; possibly the last time I shall ever sit in this pleasant room, or see you wearing that beautiful dress, or hear you playing classical music, that I don’t understand, but love to listen to.”

Truly it seemed a pleasant room, a remarkably pleasant room for a London flat. The evening was just cold enough to justify a fire, and small logs of wood in a basket grate sent dancing flames to light up the oak panels of the walls; electric lamps flashed brightly on silver and glass; a golden basket of peaches and another of grapes made the table appear a symbolised announcement of ease, luxury, even of sumptuousness; the butler, moving to and fro so promptly and yet so sedately, offered one delicate food and stimulating wine. It was all very, very pleasant.

Pretty things wherever one glanced—a mirror in a sculptured frame, some blue and white china on a long shelf, and, seen faintly, with the electric light just indicating their existence, rows of handsomely bound books behind latticed glass; altogether what would be described in stage language as a charming interior.

Any tutor, accustomed to the hard seats and coarse fare of a school hall, might feel regret at leaving such a room irrevocably, and might long afterwards yearn to see again the pretty things that it contained. But just now Mr. Ridsdale was looking only at his hostess, and he repeated the compliment about her dress.

“I admire you in that more than in any of the others,” he said, softly, and rather sorrowfully.

“Because it is black, I suppose. It’s quite old. But men always like black dresses. My husband does.”

The dress was made of velvet, with some silver decoration across the front of the bodice, and it certainly appeared becoming. In it Cynthia Beckford looked very slim and young; fair-haired, but dark-eyed, naturally pale, but with a rapid flicker of colour; a person of frank, kind outlook, a simple and truthful sort of person, and yet with underlying depths of character or sensibility that proved astoundingly interesting to the few people who had studied her closely. Frenchmen would describe her beauty, such as it was, as belonging to the order that slowly troubles rather than quickly fascinates.

“But I’m not like the General,” said Mr. Ridsdale. “I admire _that_ black dress, not _any_ black dress.”

He said it with a perceptible insistence, quietly but obstinately; as if conscious of subtle values in his own taste, and unwilling that it should be confounded with the ordinary likes and dislikes of another person—even though that person were as worthy and respectable as his temporary employer.

Mr. Ridsdale was a good-looking man of thirty, tall and thin, of easy carriage and elegant manners. Boys, big and small, among whom he had passed the better part of his life, always looked up to him, and sometimes adored him, as a perfect type of school-trained manhood; and girls, too, were frequently subjugated by his charms. He was the sort of man who is not as a rule dreaded by other men as likely to prove a dangerous rival; and yet one might well suppose that in certain circumstances he would be dangerous—for instance, if paying slow and unhindered court to a foolish and otherwise neglected woman. The dark eyes, the smooth, silky voice, the insidious flattery of its softening tones, might all be effective in a protracted attack on feminine foolishness of a certain age.

“To-morrow,” he said, dreamily; “to-morrow—almost to-day,” and he sighed as he took a peach from the gold basket.

Yates, the butler, had put cigarettes and matches on the table, and was about to leave the room, when the outer bell rang shrilly and sharply.

“Who can that be?” said Ridsdale, looking up. “A visitor! Oh, do tell him to say you’re not at home.”

The butler paused, waiting for instructions.

“It can’t be a visitor,” said Cynthia Beckford. “Some tradesman’s messenger!”

“It may be old Lady Jane.”

“She wouldn’t come so late as this.”

“I don’t know,” said Ridsdale, eagerly. “She comes at all hours. With your headache she would bore you to death.” He leaned forward in his chair and spoke very softly. “And, remember, my last evening! You—you promised that you would play to me.”

Cynthia Beckford hesitated a moment, and then told the butler that she was not at home.

“Yes, my lady. Not at home to anybody?”

“No.”

The flicker of colour showed in her pale cheeks as she added explanatorily to Ridsdale, “It can’t be anybody of importance.”

Mr. Ridsdale sat listening. Then he got up, and spoke with an impatience that he did not attempt to conceal.

“That fool has let some one in—a man!”

Yes, a man’s heavy footstep in the hall, and a man’s voice—loud and assured, not making polite inquiries, but issuing curt directions.

“I have left my tackle and luggage at Euston. Get a cab presently and go and fetch it. Take this ticket.”

“Yes, Sir John. Her ladyship is in the dining-room.”

“Open the door, then.”

Cynthia Beckford ran across the room to meet her husband; but, encumbered with a hand-bag and a travelling-rug, he was not able at once to accept her welcoming embrace.

“Well, Cynthia, my dear! Ridsdale, my dear fellow, how are you? But where’s Jack?”

General Beckford put his hand-bag on a chair by the sideboard, dropped his rug upon the floor, and, coming to the table, took Master Jack’s vacated seat.

“We have sent him to a theatre,” said Cynthia, “with George. I’d no idea that you were coming home, of course.”

“Oh, I see. Gone to the play—with George?”

“We were all three going,” said Mr. Ridsdale, “but Lady Beckford had a headache, so I strongly advised her to stay at home,” and he smiled. “Rather fortunate—or you would have had a double disappointment.”

“It would have been my own fault,” and the General smiled too. “I ought to have sent you a telegram, Cynthia.”

“What has brought you back so unexpectedly?”

“Impulse.”

“Fish not rising?” asked Ridsdale.

“No. Wretchedly poor sport. So this morning I suddenly made up my mind that I’d had enough of it, and that home, sweet home, was the place for me. Well, well, what about the home news?”

Cynthia Beckford was instructing Yates as to her husband’s dinner, but the General declared that he had eaten all he wanted in the train.

“I can’t call it dinner,” and he laughed good-humouredly. “But nothing more, thank you—unless perhaps a biscuit and a whisky-and-soda. Now, sit ye down. Don’t let me disturb you. Go on with your dessert, Ridsdale—and then I’ll join you in a cigarette, if my lady permits us,” and he bowed to his wife with the antiquated air of courtesy that always seems so odd in these free-and-easy times.

They sat together, talking of Jack’s health, his progress, his future career; and Mr. Ridsdale was able to speak most favourably of his pupil’s prospects.

“Capital,” said the General. “I’m enormously indebted to you, Ridsdale. You seem to have done wonders. But I knew you would; I knew the boy was in good hands—— Seen much of Aunt Jane?” he asked his wife, abruptly.

“Yes.” Cynthia was looking at the painted decoration on her dessert-plate, and she answered slowly. “Yes; Aunt Jane was with us at Lynton for a fortnight—quite a fortnight.”

“I know; but I mean after that. She is in London, isn’t she?”

Then Cynthia smilingly confessed that the long fortnight in Devonshire had exhausted the attraction of Lady Jane’s society, and that she had lately avoided it.

“She is too kind for words, but”—Cynthia looked at her husband deprecatingly—“dear Aunt Jane can be rather boring.”

The General laughed tolerantly.

“Ah, no companion for _you_. She belongs to another generation.” His bushy eyebrows contracted and his voice became grave. “_My_ generation. We old folk are poor companions.”

“She doesn’t belong to your generation.” Cynthia flushed, and her lips trembled. She put out her hand and laid it on her husband’s arm. “You are the best of companions—a companion that I have missed dreadfully.”

“There!” General Beckford laughed gaily. “Did you hear that, Ridsdale? That’s the sort of thing we old chaps like—even if we aren’t vain enough to think we deserve it. Leave that where it is, Yates.”

Yates was about to remove the hand-bag and take it to his master’s room.

“Very good, Sir John.”

“And you can go to Euston now—no hurry. Take a bus.”

“Yes, Sir John.”

“Smoking permitted?” And the General bowed again to his wife. “Light your cigarette, Ridsdale. No, I mustn’t have any coffee on top of whisky and soda.”

The little group at the table sat comfortably enough and talked lightly and easily. But somehow the presence of General Beckford had destroyed the graceful charm of the room.

He looked too big, too rough and shaggy for his delicately pretty surroundings. His grey hair was rumpled and unbrushed after the journey; his coarse grey suit suggested wild moorlands and brawling streams; his whole aspect was savagely picturesque rather than neatly refined.

No contrast could have been greater than that offered by the smooth, well-brushed, nicely polished young man who sat opposite to him on the other side of the small round table. The electric light shone upon Mr. Ridsdale’s black cloth and black silk, his stiff white shirt and soft white waistcoat, his jewelled buttons, his pearl studs, his butterfly tie, his white hand fingering a cigarette-tube, his smooth forehead, and his sleek hair plastered and brushed back with studious art and infinite care. He seemed elegant, shapely, even beautiful, when you compared him with his travel-stained, unkempt host.

All the charm had been banished by the new-comer. It was another room now. And the ugly hand-bag on the distant chair seemed like an aggressive symbol of proprietorship. It seemed to be saying that, although one might wish the General at the deuce, one could not ask him to go there, because in sober fact the room belonged to him.

Yet, to an understanding eye, there was something noble and knightlike about the man; the ruggedness seemed blended with a certain fine simplicity, and even the old-fashioned tricks of manner and speech, by removing him from the commonplace mode of the hour, served to stimulate an effort to get at the man’s real character. Certainly no _poseur_—a direct, straightforward creature. On reflection one might perhaps guess that a young romantic girl, whose imagination had been fired by the splendour of his fighting life, his deeds of daring, and so forth, could quite conceivably be cajoled into giving her untried heart to him.

“One more question, Cynthia.” The conversation had languished while the General puffed at his second cigarette. “How’s the music? Have you been assiduous in your practice?”

“Yes; I’ve played nearly every evening.”

Mr. Ridsdale was conscious of an irksome constraint. Two are company and three are none. Deciding to leave the husband and wife together, he pushed back his chair and got up.

But the General would not let him go.

“No, no,” he said. “Sit ye down, my dear fellow.” Then to his wife: “If the headache isn’t too bad, play something this evening. Run over your latest studies. Ridsdale and I will follow you directly.”

Cynthia Beckford rose obediently and turned towards the drawing-room door. Her husband reached the door before Mr. Ridsdale could get to it, and he held it open for her, bowing low as she passed out.

“There!” He had switched on the light in the other room, and he stood in the doorway watching her. “Now delight our ears with your deft touch.”

Lady Beckford seated herself at the piano and began to play a plaintive and dreamy prelude by Bach.

“Beautiful! Your hand has not lost its cunning. Now go on playing—and don’t think me ungallant if for a few minutes I close the door. A word or two with Ridsdale—on business. But we shall hear you, even through the door.” Then he gently, and as if regretfully, shut the drawing-room door and came back to the table.

“Ridsdale”—and there was an apologetic tone in the General’s lowered voice—“that wasn’t quite honest of me. A ruse! I asked her to play the piano because I didn’t want her to disturb us—and I didn’t want her to hear what we were saying.”

“Oh, really?” Ridsdale smiled, and glanced at the closed door.

“A confidence! I may trust you, mayn’t I?”

“Of course.”

“Implicitly, eh? But that goes without saying. I _have_ trusted you so greatly already, haven’t I? The boy to consign him to your guidance. Well, you know what he is to me. I couldn’t have better shown the faith I had in you——”

“You’re very kind, General. I—I’ve done my best with him.”

“Exactly. But—well, this isn’t about the boy. It’s about myself. I am in trouble.”

“Really?”

“I wasn’t honest, either, in my explanation of why I came hurrying home. No, Ridsdale, it wasn’t a sudden caprice. I had serious reasons for coming.”

“Oh, had you?”

“Yes. I am in great trouble.” And the General looked at Ridsdale keenly, as if seeking in his impassive face some expression of sympathy or encouragement; then he dropped his eyes and paused before he continued speaking. “I wonder if I ought to tell you? Yes, I will. You are one of ourselves. We have _made_ you one of ourselves—something more than an acquaintance—a _friend_, eh? Yes, I’ll tell you the whole thing.”

“I am all attention.”

“Thank you.”

From the other room came the sound of Cynthia’s plaintive melody, and, half-consciously listening to it, the General seemed to have transferred its wistful cadence to his own voice. His manner had changed completely. He looked preternaturally grave and sad, as he sat frowning at the tablecloth and tracing a small circle of its pattern with a strong brown finger, while he murmured his story.

“No, Ridsdale, what brought me home was a letter—a warning letter—about my wife.”

“Before you tell me any more, may I say this? As a schoolmaster I often have to deal with anonymous letters, and my experience has convinced me that the only thing to do with them is just to chuck them into the——”

“Just so. But this wasn’t an anonymous letter.”

“No?”

“No. The writer is a tried friend—a person of my own blood. I have the letter in my pocket here, but I won’t bother you to read it. The warning conveyed was simple enough. It amounted to this: I was to guard my wife carefully if I did not want to risk losing her—because a man was attacking my peace and honour.”

“Oh, I say”—Mr. Ridsdale spoke indignantly—“it would be an insult to Lady Beckford not to treat such a communication with the absolute contempt and——”

“But, my dear Ridsdale,” said the General, sombrely, “it is the communication that I have always prepared myself to receive, that I have been expecting to receive at any hour in the last few years.”

“Nothing,” said Mr. Ridsdale, firmly, “would persuade me to suspect Lady Beckford of——”

“No, no, of course not. Please leave her out of it. I’m not thinking of her. I’m thinking only of myself—the attempted blow to _me_.”

“You shouldn’t for one moment believe——”

“Why not?” said the General, sadly. “One is vain, but there are limits to one’s vanity. One hopes just at first, perhaps—but later one begins to think and to understand. You know, with Cynthia and me, it was a convenient marriage—although it wasn’t a marriage of convenience.”

“Indeed, no—I know that well.”

“Regard—and more than regard—entered into it. But there was the difference of years. At my age one has not the adaptability of youth; one cannot change one’s ways, even if one wishes to. So I foresaw that with marriages of that sort a crisis sooner or later comes. Well, our crisis has come.”

“I—I am sure you are mistaken.”

“You heard what she said about Lady Jane boring her. Well, _I_ bore her. Recently she has shown it plainly. In fact, that is why I went away—not to give myself, but to give her, a holiday.”

“My good sir,” said Mr. Ridsdale, earnestly, almost irritably, “I can assure you she has spoken of you every day in the most affectionate terms—regretting your absence, saying how she missed you, and so on.”

“Has she?” said the General, with a sigh. “That may have been from a sense of duty—contrition—remorse. Pity for the old fogey whose presence could but weary her.”

He got up, went to the drawing-room door, and opened it.

“Thank you, Cynthia. Charming! Don’t stop playing. Please go on,” and he shut the door again.

Ridsdale, rising from the table also, had gone to the fireplace. He pulled out a cambric handkerchief, and rubbed the palms of his hands with it. Then he put his hands in his pockets, and, standing with his back to the fire, turned towards the General, politely attentive to, if not cordially sympathetic with, the General’s doubts and fears.

“Now, look here, Ridsdale, that’s all about it. I’ve given you the facts, and I ask you to help me.”

“Delighted. But how could I possibly——”

“Help me to find the man.”

“Why, I don’t believe he exists.”

“Oh, yes, he does.”

“Did your friend give you no hints—of any kind?”

“None whatever.”

“Ah, just what I thought! Believe me, it’s some ridiculous misapprehension.”