CHAPTER XXVIII
THE MAN IN THE WHEELED CHAIR
Echo sat under the Botticelli blue of a perfect afternoon on the terrace of the Hotel Splendid in Nice. Through the hot, bright air, set in the purple creases of the hazeless hills, she could see tinted villas drowsing in golden gardens aflame with flowers, and below under the dizzying sunlight beyond the long esplanade, tiny swells spilled over the pearly beech like molten sapphire.
The past months had been packed with new sights and sounds. There had been the ocean passage, with all the gaiety that mill-pond weather and a total absence of mal de mer evokes, a leisurely motor trip through the northern counties of England, shopping and theatre-going in Paris, and then a final fortnight on the Riviera. From the first day at sea, when the dimming shores of home had slipped away into the vaporous distance across the swinging, grey-green heave, Echo had thrown herself eagerly into the new experiences. It had seemed to her at first as though she was leaving behind all her pain and problem and flying whither the dogging ghosts could not follow. From time to time she felt a wave of that shame that had overwhelmed her as she sat in the court-room. When she reflected, she felt astonishment at her own temerity—at the morbid curiosity which had impelled her to witness the rehearsal of an episode whose very memory thrilled her with pain and dread. But at length this, too, had faded. She had told herself that Harry would have returned before her and that all would again be well between them. With all her power she had striven to thrust the pain and apprehension from the mind and amid new and varying scenes she had partially succeeded.
But though the acute strain and distress, the piteous terror had dulled, her heart ached always with its burden, and there were many times when all of Mrs. Spottiswoode's effervescent moods could not call forth response. Across the fairest scenes the ghosts, uncalled, would thrust themselves, and in her brain a mocking voice would whisper—
"You will never tell him! You will never dare! There will always be a secret between you! You will be deceiving him—all your life. For if you told him the truth—the whole truth—would he believe you? The letters for which you made that visit, even if you could show them, are ashes now. And even if he believed in the necessity that drove you to win them from Craig, what might he imagine had been the price! You know what the world would think: you heard it in the court-room. He would think the same thing! You were in Craig's house, alone, that midnight—and you will never dare tell him! Can you say to him, 'It was I who was in Cameron Craig's library! I was the mysterious woman the police were searching for—I whom you love!'?"
The sneering voices were whispering in her ear to-night, as she sat looking out across the blended harmonies of sky and sea, her wistful face bent beneath the soft halo of her hair.
There welled up in her with fresh force the aching resentment, the sick anger and rebellion against the sardonic fate that had so enmeshed her. Why should Craig have ever seen and desired her? Why should his fancy not have fallen upon some other woman? Yet, had that been so, her father's name would have been ruined! That, at least, had not befallen. If only she had not written that note to Harry! So she reflected, not knowing that that fateful note itself had been the key to another series of incidents which had in fact wrought for her salvation—so curiously interwoven is the mystic fabric that man calls chance. By that note, she told herself, she had thrust his love from her. Would anything less than the whole truth bring it back? And in any case, if she did not tell him the whole, would she ever be safe in that love? For Craig could betray her if he regained his faculties. A single word could overwhelm her. There was that lost night when she had been believed to be at her aunt's—a dropped stitch in time's weave which might unravel the whole! If he recovered Craig would hold her happiness in his grasp as surely as he had once held her father's honour.
The cogent reasons that had influenced Harry in his speculation on the same subject had been based on his keen masculine observation and familiarity with Craig's type; Echo had only her knowledge of his relentless passion and lack of scruple, and her instinct was clouded by long anxiety and fear. She had lately striven to banish from her mind the idea that he might recover, but to-night it was upon her with strange force. A baleful thought thrust itself into her mind, an incarnate temptation: If Craig would only die! As it came to her she felt her face blush, and she shrank, feeling that a wicked thing had found lodgment in her soul; but it came again and again.
A little group of people who had arrived that morning had issued from the dining-room and now were seated about one of the small tables on the terrace drinking their coffee—two men, one elderly, one younger, a handsome woman and a girl. They continued the conversation begun inside—evidently a discussion of some one who had been on the train. All at once the lady touched the speaker beside her on the arm.
"Hush!" she cautioned. "There he is now!"
The voices stilled. Glancing around Echo saw that a wheeled-chair was being pushed onto the far end of the terrace. A man sat in it, huddled in a steamer-rug.
"Is he married?" asked the lady, after a pause.
"No," replied the elderly man. "He has no family or near relatives. The men with him are a nurse and a secretary. They say he is very rich."
"Poor fellow!" she exclaimed. "What a dreadful thing! Death is immensely preferable, of course, to life under such conditions. Where are they taking him?"
"To Hungary, I believe. There's a celebrated authority on brain-surgery in Buda-Pesth. The surgeons think it's pressure on some nerve-centre, and the case calls for the particular operation that is this chap's specialty. It's a forlorn hope, I imagine."
"I don't know," said the younger man, lighting a cigarette. "They do marvellous things nowadays. And anyway, if it fails, it can't be any worse for the patient. As it is, he has no mind at all—no speech, no memory, nothing!"
Echo turned her head; there was a fierce little smile on her lips. So here was another! Had he, too, like the one of whom she had been thinking, been overtaken by a righteous Nemesis in the moment of evil triumph? And somewhere, perhaps, was there a woman to whom his death would be a gladness and a relief?
The lady looked toward the wheeled-chair. "How was the injury caused?" she asked interestedly.
"He was shot," said the elderly man. "Shot by a burglar. I remember reading of it in the newspapers at the time."
Echo started. A little tremor ran over her. The scarf she held slipped from her hand.
"It seems a pity sometimes," went on the voice, "that the law must graduate its penalties so nicely. Here is a man who, to all intents and purposes, was murdered. If he doesn't recover, his is a living death. Yet because he continues to breathe, the most that can be given to the scoundrel who shot him is a term of imprisonment. He ought to have been hanged!"
The girl beside her pushed back her chair petulantly. "Oh, let's do something!" she cried. "I want to get him out of my mind. I sat where I had to look at him in the train all day. It's too horrible! Fancy having to be like that, not being able to walk or talk or even to feed one's self! I want to go to the Casino and see something funny!"
When the sound of their voices had died away in the corridor, Echo rose from her seat and walked along the terrace, quite to the end, where stood the wheeled-chair. On a bench near by an attendant was immersed in a newspaper.
Then she turned and looked at the pallid, vacuous face above the steamer-rug.
Yes—it was Cameron Craig.