Volume Two—Chapter Seventeen.
“Give us Long Rest... Dare Death or Dreamful Ease.”
We left Lilian crushed beneath the weight of this fresh blow dealt her by the man who had been the curse of her life.
To a night of anguish—anguish so poignant that she sometimes feared for her very reason—succeeded days of dull and hopeless apathy. Her whole being, body and soul alike, seemed to be numb and dead. She could not talk, she dared not think, nor could she pray. Even that last resource was denied her; for there came upon her a miserable feeling of fatality, that her God had forsaken her, leaving her to be the sport of some cruel demon. And, amid her apathy, her thoughts would, in spite of herself, float dreamily back in a mechanical kind of way to all that had gone before. She had been sad-hearted then in the temporary separation from her lover; but now! that time was ecstasy itself in comparison with this. Somehow, it never occurred to her to doubt one word of Truscott’s statement. He had been so positive, so resolute, that it must be true. And then she remembered the hundred and one little incidents—hints that her lover had let fall—uneasiness manifested on an occasion—the veiled compunction with which he had touched upon his former life—all stood out now in startling conspicuousness. Even that day had opened so propitiously, and lo, within one single hour, life was ended for her.
Sorely anxious were the Paynes over this fell change which had come upon her on that sunny afternoon. They could elicit nothing from her. She was not well, she admitted, but would be all right in a day or two, no doubt. And this, with such a ghost of a smile upon her white face, that Payne, suddenly struck with an idea, snatched up his hat and rushed down into the town to inquire if any fresh news had been received from the seat of war. Had she, unknown to them, heard that harm had befallen her lover? If so, that would amply account for the depression. So he went diligently to work to hunt up news; but no telegrams of a dispiriting nature had been received, quite the contrary—the enemy had had another thrashing, and there was no mention of loss on the colonial side. All this was a relief to Payne. But sorely puzzled; indeed, completely baffled; he returned to his wife and reported accordingly.
“I tell you what, George,” she began, and her face wore a troubled and concerned expression. “I’ve heard something—something that makes me think this Captain Truscott’s at the bottom of it.”
“Eh?”
“Well, he was here yesterday afternoon for more than two hours, and Lilian hasn’t been herself since. She didn’t tell me, but I heard it while you were out.”
Payne stared at her blankly, but made no reply.
“You know I never did like that man,” continued she. “I told you so at first. And I’m perfectly certain that he and Lilian are something more than merely old acquaintances.” And then she told him of the latter’s dismayed look on first recognising Truscott in the crowd, and one or two other things that had not escaped her observation. “He has been persecuting her in some way, I’m sure, and I won’t have her persecuted,” concluded the warm-hearted little woman.
Payne was whistling meditatively. He had a high opinion of his wife’s intelligence in all matters relating to the idiosyncrasies of her sex, so he would just let her go on.
“Well, what’s to be done?” he said. “We can’t ask the fellow what the devil he’s been up to, and Lilian won’t tell us.”
“Can’t we? I think we can, and ought.”
Payne shook his head, and looked gloomy. The affair was beginning to assume a serious phase. It was a delicate business, and the honest frontiersman felt thoroughly perplexed. He did not want to make a fool of himself, or of any one else, through officiousness or meddling.
“I know a trick worth two of that, Annie,” he said at last.
“What is it?”
“Wire to Claverton. Eh?”
She paused. “Well, perhaps that would be the best plan.”
“Good. I’ll cut down and do it now.” And, sliding from the table whereon he had been seated swinging his legs, he reached down a jar of tobacco from a shelf, and hastily cramming his pipe, started off. “What shall I tell him, though?” he asked, suddenly stopping in the doorway. “Won’t do to pitch it too strong, eh?”
“N-no. Wait a bit,” and then she concocted the message which we have seen Claverton receive; and Payne being on his way to despatch it, she turned away with a look of relief over the prospect of decreasing responsibility.
Lilian, meanwhile, had become a mere shadow of her old self, and the one spark of comfort left to her was that her persecutor had kept himself out of her sight. For he had left the city, bound for the seat of war, and, for reasons of his own, he had refrained from bidding farewell to the Paynes in person, but had sent a note explaining that he was ordered off at a minute’s warning. He had got a command at last, he said; only some levies, at present, but still that was something to go on with, and he must leave for the front immediately. Which missive was read by its recipients with feelings of decided relief.
The fact was, the gallant Truscott began to suspect that it might be advisable for him to take himself out of the way for a time, and he had no desire to meet his rival in person. Let the two settle it as best they might, was his cynical reflection; settle it they must, and to his, Truscott’s, satisfaction—on that point he felt perfectly safe. He had played a bold game and had won, and, now that he had won, it would never do to spoil it by any chance blundering. So with a few lines of renewed warning, merciless, pithy, and to the point, posted to Lilian—the wily scoundrel departed for the seat of war, and unless a well-aimed bullet should pierce the black, scheming heart, and of that there was but small chance, there would be no more happiness for her on earth. There were times when she would almost make up her mind to throw off the hateful thrall, to defy him to do his worst, whatever that worst might be; but then would rise up the frightful facts, as he had laid them before her in all their nakedness, and she would fall asleep, only to be haunted by a series of terrible dreams; visions of a crowded court hushened to a deathly silence in expectation of the dread sentence; of a small group in a grim gaol-yard, in the chill morning—one face among them lit up with fiendish exaltation—a noose, a gallows, and a black, hideous beam.
“My love—my sweet lost love!” she would moan, waking from one of these frightful fantasies in a flood of streaming tears. “Was it for this you were restored to me again? Ah, why did we ever meet?” And the black, silent hours melted away into dawn, but brought with them no comfort. More than once had her affectionate hostess tried to get at the secret of her grief—but Lilian was firm. Meanwhile, the Paynes began to grow seriously alarmed. A very little more of this, and the results would be disastrous. Nothing had been heard of the telegram, and they became more and more anxious every day.
“Miss Strange, do let’s go for a walk when I come back; it’ll be such a lovely evening.” The speaker was Rose Payne, who was hurriedly gathering up her books, and cramming them into a bag, preparatory to starting for afternoon school.
“So we will, dear. Only you must come back in good time.”
“Won’t I?” gleefully cried the little girl, flinging her arms round Lilian’s neck. She was rapturously fond of her former preceptress, all the more so, perhaps, now that she was subjected to the sterner discipline of school; and a long, quiet evening walk with Lilian, all to herself, was a treat indeed. “Won’t I just come straight back! It’ll be nice and cool then, and we can go ever so far over the hill, above Fern Kloof. So long, till four.”
“Good-bye, Rosie dear,” replied Lilian, kissing the child affectionately, and, with a sigh, watching her bound light-heartedly away. Then she turned from the doorway, and, with a drooping gesture of abandonment, threw herself into a low chair. The Paynes were out somewhere, and, as on that former afternoon, she had the house entirely to herself. The soft air came in through the open windows, warm but not oppressive, from the tree-fringed shade. A great striped butterfly floated in, and, scarcely aware of its mistake, fluttered around a large vase of flowers upon the table. And still she sat, heedless of everything, with her hands pressed to her face, thinking, thinking—ever thinking.
“Only four days ago,” she said to herself, “four short days—and now! Ah, God, it is too cruel!” and the tears welled forth and slowly began to force their way through the closed fingers.
The hum of the voices of a couple of passers-by sound drowsily upon the calm; then, the ring of hoofs coming up the street at a rapid canter. It stops, as if some one had reined in before the door—but she heeds it not. Some one dismounting at the next house, she thinks. Then a quick, firm tread in the passage, and a man is standing inside the room. With a low, startled cry, Lilian looks up and falls back in her chair in a deathly faint. It is Claverton.
In a moment he is beside her, and has her in his arms. “Oh, Lilian, my darling! What is this? They did right to send for me—Good God, Lilian! Why, what have you been doing with yourself to get like this?” he adds, in a tone of undisguised alarm, startled by her white and dejected looks.
But no reply can she make. Fairly taken by storm, she is clinging tightly to him, her face buried in his breast. Only a convulsive sob shakes her frame from head to foot.
“What have you been doing with yourself, child?” he continues, vehemently. “Why, you are as white and pale as the mere ghost of your former self. Lilian!” but still she cannot answer. “Lilian; look at me, I say. I have ridden straight here, day and night as hard as I could ride, to come to you and never to leave you again.”
He paused; but the expected words of joy and of love came not. Suddenly she drew herself away from him, and the look on her face was as the look of death. Already she had failed to keep her side of the compact—that compact written in tears, and sealed with the throes of a breaking heart—and she had doomed him. No, but she would not.
“Arthur, you must leave me. Now, at once, before it is too late,” she exclaimed, in a quick, alarmed tone.
“Lilian. Are you mad?”
Not a shade of anger or reproach is there in his voice. Amazement and indulgent tenderness alone are to be traced.
And she? Frantic with apprehension, she knew not what to say. To warn him of danger would be but to drive him right into its jaws. What should she do? Ah! That was it. The old promise.
“Lilian, what has come between us, now? Only tell me, darling, and it will all be cleared away.”
It was terrible. Her brain reeled as, with wild, dilated eyes, she stood gazing at him. His presence was so unexpected—it had burst upon her like a thunderbolt. He had, as he said, travelled night and day to reach her side—and now she must bid him leave her for ever though it broke her heart, as it certainly would. They two must never look upon each other again in life. Then her brain grew cold and steady. She must not flinch, she must save him from this ruthless enemy at all and whatever cost to herself. To herself! Ah, but—and to him? The answer to this question flashed across her determination—the consciousness of how valueless would be the life she was about to save. Yet—O God! the recollection of those terrible, menacing words! She sank her head into her clasped hands and shuddered. Again, so softly, so tenderly, he repeated his question:
“Lilian; what has come between us? Tell me, darling!”
She threw back her head with a quick movement, as if quivering beneath the torture.
“My former promise, Arthur. You remember,” and averting her face, again she shuddered from head to foot. “He is not—dead—as I thought.”
“And then—?”
“I cannot break it. I thought him dead—but now—I cannot break it. God help me!—help us both!”
A devil took possession of Claverton’s heart, and the fixed, vengeful look in his face was awful to behold as he murmured to himself: “God help him. If he is not dead he soon will be—or I.” Then aloud: “Lilian, you vowed once that nothing ever should part us. You remember, darling.”
The voice was even more gentle than before. Had it been otherwise she could almost better have borne it—and yet not. A fraction of a second and she had yielded, had thrown herself into his arms; but again the savage threats of Truscott and the diabolical malice of his tones and looks rose up before her, and she felt strong again. In a paroxysm of that love, which was at once her strength and her weakness, she cried:
“I cannot—I cannot, Arthur. I am too weak, and that you must see. I cannot break that promise. You must go—go and curse my name and memory—if it be worth cursing, to the end of your days. And I—O God! let me die!”
The forced, unnatural hardness which she had thrown into her voice, struck upon his ear, filling him with amazement and dismay. It was all like a bad dream. He could hardly realise that she was actually trying to cast him off. From any other living soul guilty of such vacillating treachery, he would have turned away in scarcely surprised scorn. To this woman, rather than speak one word of anger, reproach, or blame—and what is harder—rather than think it, he would have died a thousand deaths. How he loved her! Her very weakness was sacred to him. It was thrown upon his tenderness, now; it was for him to handle it tenderly, not to crush it—and her. And a curious thrill of ghastly comfort shot through him in the thought that even at this fearful moment, when his heart was sick with bitter despair, he was really proving the strength of his love by something more than words. Three times now had she repulsed him, each under circumstances more cruel than the previous one—but the loyal love of the man never flinched—never swerved by a single hair’s breadth. And he must be very gentle and indulgent with her now.
“Lilian, my sweet, you hardly know what you are saying,” he answered, imprinting a shower of passionate kisses on the trembling, ashy lips. “I’m not going to take what you tell me, in earnest at all.”
“Spare me—spare me,” she moaned, shuddering in his embrace. “I meant it—all, and—”
“Hi—Halloa! Here’s some fellow’s horse got into the garden!” cried a man’s voice outside. “Yek—yek! Hi! Jafta. Turn the infernal brute out. He’s broken down the fence in two places—confound it—which means a claim for five pounds from old Cooke next door. Out, you brute!” and a sound was heard of a stone, launched by an incensed hand, striking violently against the paling, while the offending quadruped, tearing his way through and carrying with him two yards of fence, bolted off, snorting and kicking, down the road.
“What’ll the owner do, George?” said another voice approaching the front door. “Goodness knows where that horse’ll bolt to, now.”
“Blazes, I hope—and his owner after him,” replied Payne, surveying resentfully the receding form of the trespasser. “Why the deuce can’t fellows tie their horses up when they leave ’em in the streets? O Lord!”
This last ejaculation was caused by the sight of Claverton, who had come quickly to the door to meet them and to give Lilian time to recover herself, and at whom the speaker stood staring open-mouthed and somewhat dismayed.
“Was that your horse, old chap?” he asked, dubiously, shaking hands with the new arrival and experiencing a sensation of huge relief because of his presence.
“It was; but it may be the possession of some one else by now. Bother the horse, though. I say, Payne, I want to talk to you.”
“One minute, old chap. Here, Jafta—Jafta,” he called out to his boy. “Go and catch that horse again. Look sharp—run like the devil. If you bring him back within a quarter of an hour I’ll give you a shilling.”
Away went Jafta, and Payne, glad of the momentary delay, returned to Claverton sorely perplexed. He had sent for him, indeed, but didn’t know what the deuce to say to him now that he had come. It was more within a woman’s province, he thought; and there and then his spouse came to the rescue, taking the affair into her own hands.
“Come inside, Mr Claverton,” she said. “I’m so glad you’re here.” And then, when they were alone, she told him everything that had happened, from the day they had first seen Truscott until the moment of their going out that afternoon just before his arrival.
He listened quietly. A deadly resolve was shaping itself within his heart.
“What sort of a man is this Truscott—I mean what sort of a looking man?” he asked.
She described him, and the listener immediately recognised the portrait. The whole scheme was clear to him now. There was no question of money at the bottom of this man’s hostility towards him. Either the mulatto was lying when he had told him this, or, more probably, the other had given such a reason in order to conceal the real one. No. It was to rob him of Lilian that his would-be assassin was plotting. He was wise, indeed, to hire the bravo’s steel in the shape of Sharkey—for he might have been sure that only death would part him from Lilian. Ralph Truscott, look to yourself now. It is no woman, weak in the very helplessness of her love, with whom you have to deal this time. You have, indeed, cause to meditate.
“He’s gone to the front, has he?” continued Claverton. “Whereabouts? Do you know?”
Annie Payne looked at him with a troubled air. She knew well her interlocutor’s determination and daring, and she saw breakers ahead.
“But it will be all right now that you are back again,” she ventured. She greatly feared otherwise; still, one must hope for the best.
The dark look deepened over his features. He hardly seemed to hear her, but stood gazing through the open window.
“I must go,” he exclaimed, suddenly. “Where is Lilian?” and with three strides he gained the other room. It was empty. “Ah, better so, perhaps,” he muttered to himself. “Mrs Payne, tell her, with my love, that a very few days will see me back here again, and everything will come right then. Now I must not lose another moment. Good-bye, for a few days.”
“What are you going to do?” was the reply, spoken in a tone of alarm. “Wait. Don’t be in such a hurry. You can’t rush off at once. You must off-saddle if only for an hour. Anyhow, wait until George comes back. Ah, there he is.”
For at that moment George appeared, leading the runaway by the bridle. The joint exertions of himself and his stable-boy had availed to catch the trespasser just in time to prevent his doing further damage.
Claverton was firm in his refusal. He had his own reasons for wishing to leave that house. Not even the smallest risk would he run of being tempted to forego the purpose he had in hand, for a single instant.
“Here’s your critter, old chap,” cried Payne, panting from the effects of his ran. “Je—rusalem! What a chevvy we had after the beggar—Eh? What? Going away! Not to be thought of.”
“But I am!” replied the other in a tone of settled resolve, as he prepared to fling the bridle over the animal’s neck. “Shall be back again in four or five days. Hold on. Just walk a little way down the street with me.”
They walked on. Payne’s brow growing more and more serious as he listened. He had a great regard for this man, who had stepped in to his rescue twice at a very critical moment.
“My dear Claverton, be careful what you are about,” he said, gravely. “It’s a devilish awkward business, and at any other time than during the war it would be impossible.”
“Oh, I’ve served my apprenticeship in a good school for caution, never fear. But, you’ll see me again in a few days or—you’ll never see me at all.”
Payne made no reply. Suddenly he looked up at a house they were passing. It was a small house standing back from the street.
“By the way. We were awfully sorry to hear about that poor fellow Armitage,” he said. “His wife is staying there.”
“Staying there? In that house? Why, I thought she was in ‘King.’”
“No. She came down here about a week ago—she only heard about the poor fellow the day before yesterday.”
“Is she very much cut up?”
“Dreadfully, I’m told. She is staying with another friend of yours—Mrs Hicks.”
“Then she’s in good hands. Look here, Payne. I’ll go in for a moment and ask after her—poor little thing. And if I’m not out in five minutes, just take my horse round to Wood’s and make them off-saddle him and give him a feed. It’s all on my way and it’ll save time. I’ll join you there, if you don’t mind waiting.”
Quickly walking up the little gravel path bordered with orange-trees, and shaded with trellised vines, Claverton knocked gently at the door. A subdued footstep in the silent passage, and it was opened—by Laura. She stared at him in amazement.
“Why, when did you come? I thought you were away at the front. Do come in.” A superfluous request, seeing that she had already shut the door behind him. “Poor Gertie will like to see you.”
“How does she bear it?”
“She is dreadfully down-hearted. At first I was quite alarmed for her, but I think the worst is over now. She was very fond of poor Jack.”
“So were we all. Even such a leather-hearted curmudgeon as your humble servant.”
“It is no fault of yours that the poor fellow is not alive at this moment,” rejoined Laura, with warmth. “We heard all about it.” All this time she had been furtively watching him, and noting, with some astonishment, his listless and dejected air. It was owing to no regret for his deceased comrade, she was certain of that. What could be going wrong with him?
“My dear Laura, I give you my word for it there was nothing to hear,” he replied; and seeing that the subject was distasteful to him, she left him, to go and prepare poor Gertie for his visit.
Claverton wished he could have forgotten his own trouble as he stood in the presence of the young widow—this mere girl—sorrowing for the loss of him with whom she had begun to tread life’s path. Very happy and bright had that path been to her—to them both—during those short two years. Very happy and peaceful would it have continued to be; but now he was gone—snatched away from her suddenly by the merciless bullet of the savage foe—shot down in the dark forest. He lay, cold in his grave, far away in the wilds of Kafirland; and his gleeful laugh, and sunny glance, would gladden her heart and her eyes no more. No wonder a rush of tears came to her eyes, as she remembered under what circumstances she had last seen her visitor. And now she was desolate and alone.
Claverton held her hand in his strong, friendly grasp, and, when the first paroxysm of her reopened grief was spent, gently he narrated the circumstances of poor Armitage’s last moments; how his last thoughts and care had been for her; how her name had been almost the last words upon his lips. Then he dwelt upon the dead man’s popularity, and the blank his loss would leave in the ranks of his comrades, not one of whom but would have risked life to save him had they known before it was too late. And there was that in the gentle, sympathetic voice, which soothed and comforted the girl-widow, sorrowing there as one who had no hope.
“My bright-hearted Jack! I shall never see you again. Would that I had been more loving to you while you were here,” she murmured, and, bowing her head into her hands, again she wept.
“That I am sure you could not have been,” answered Claverton, gently, placing his hand upon her shoulder, and looking down on her with infinite pity. “Child, believe me, there are losses more bitter even than those inflicted upon as by death. Now, I must go. Good-bye—I am returning to camp now; but I shall come and see you again soon, and you must try and keep up your spirits.”
She seized his hand. “You risked your life to save his. No—it’s of no use denying it—you did. God bless you for it, and those who were with you. Tell them from me, when you go back, that I thank them. Good-bye. God bless you—and Lilian.”
This was too much. The chord of his own grief thus suddenly touched, vibrated loudly. With a silent pressure of the hand, he left her.
“Any message for Hicks?” he asked, as Laura met him in the passage.
“What! Why, you are never going back to the front already?” answered she, gazing at him in astonishment.
“I am—straight. In an hour’s time I shall be at least eight or nine miles on the road.”
She saw that he meant it, and her woman’s wit saw at once that something was wrong.
“I am very sorry,” she said. “Do wait ten minutes while I write a line to Alfred. He will like to get it direct, and the post is such a chance.”
A superstitious foreboding took hold of Claverton’s mind as he watched her bending over her writing-case at the other side of the room. This miserable war had made one widow immediately within their own circle, Heaven grant that it might not make two. It seemed that nothing but ill-luck had befallen that once happy circle since he had joined it—as if his presence had something baleful about it, and was destined to work harm to all with whom he came in contact. Ah, well, he had one more mission to fulfil, and then what became of him did not much matter. So Laura having finished her letter he bade her farewell, promising to deliver it as soon as he reached the camp.
“I tell you what it is, Claverton. You’ll have to ride that animal rather carefully, or he’ll never carry you all the way,” remarked Payne, eyeing the horse critically as his rider, having hastily buckled the last strap, swung himself into the saddle.
“No, I’ve ridden his tail nearly off as it is. But I shall meet Sam on the road, and shall change. Good-bye, or rather, so long. You’ll see me again in about a week—barring accidents.”
Payne’s heart sank within him. There wae a reckless, determined ring in the other’s tone that meant volumes; and he shook his head sadly as he watched him ride away down the street. Then he walked slowly home, lost in thought.