XV
He had, as he walked into the hall, an overwhelming sense that everything that was occurring to him had happened to him before, and it was only part of this dream-conviction that Crispin should pause and say:
"Here they are, waiting for us," and lead him up to the girl who, half an hour before, had been with him in the little gallery. He had even a moment of protesting panic crying to the little imp whose voice he had already heard that evening: "Let me out of this. I am not so passive as you fancy. It is a holiday I am here for. There is no knight errantry in me—you have caught the wrong man for that."
But the girl's face stopped him. She was beautiful. He had from the first instant of seeing her no doubt of that, and it was as though her voice had already built her up for him in that dim room.
Straight and dark, her face had child-like purity in its rounded cheeks, its large brow and wondering eyes, its mouth set now in proud determination, but trembling a little behind that pride, its cheeks very soft and faintly coloured. Her hair was piled up as though it were only recently that it had come to that distinction. She was wearing a very simple white frock that looked as though it had been made by some little local dressmaker of her own place. She had been proud of it, delighted with it, Harkness could be sure, perhaps only a week or two ago. Now experiences were coming to her thick and fast. She was clutching them all to her, determined to face them whatever they might be, finding them, as Harkness knew from what he had overheard, more terrible than she had ever conceived.
She had been crying, as he knew, only half an hour ago, but now there were no traces of tears, only a faint shell-like flush on her cheeks.
The man standing beside her was not much more than a boy, but Harkness thought that he had seldom perceived an uglier countenance. A large broad nose, a long thin face like a hatchet, grey colourless eyes and a bony body upon which the evening clothes sat awkwardly, here was ugliness itself, but the true unpleasantness came from the cold aloofness that lay in the unblinking eyes, the hard straight mouth.
"He might be walking in his sleep," Harkness thought, "for all the life he's showing. What a pair for the girl to be in the hands of!" Harkness was introduced:
"Hesther, my dear, this is Mr. Harkness who is going to give us the pleasure of dining with us. Mr. Harkness, this is my boy, Herrick."
The little man led the way, and it was interesting to perceive the authoritative dignity with which he moved. He had a walk that admirably surmounted the indignities that the short legs and stumpy body would, in a less clever performer, have inevitably entailed. He did not strut, nor trot, nor push out his stomach and follow it with proud resolve.
His dignity was real, almost regal, and yet not absurd. He walked slowly, looking about him as he went. He stopped at the entrance of the dining-hall now crowded with people, spoke to the head waiter, a stout pompous-looking fellow, who was at once obsequious, and started down the room to a reserved table.
The diners looked up and watched their progress, but Harkness noticed that no one smiled. When they came to their table in the middle of the room, Mr. Crispin objected to it and they were at once shown to another one beside the window and looking out to the sea.
"It will amuse you to see the room, Hesther. You sit there. You can look out of the window too when you are bored with people. Will you sit here, Mr. Harkness, on my right?"
Harkness was now opposite the girl and looking out to the sea that was lit with a bronze flame that played on the air like a searchlight. The window was slightly open, and he could hear the sounds from the town, the merry-go-round, a harsh trumpet, and once and again a bell.
"Do you mind that window?" Crispin asked him. "I think it is rather pleasant. You don't mind it, Hesther dear? They are having festivities down there this evening. The night of their annual ceremony when they dance round the town—something as old as the hill on which the town is built, I fancy. You ought to go down and look at them, Mr. Harkness."
"I think I shall," Harkness replied, smiling.
He noticed that now that the man was seated he did not look small. His neck was thick, his shoulders broad, that forehead in the brilliantly-lit room absolutely gleamed, the red hair springing up from it like a challenge. The mention of the dance led Crispin to talk of other strange customs that he had known in many parts of the world, especially in the East. Yes, he had been in the East very often and especially in China. The old China was going. You would have to hurry up if you were to see it with any colour left. It was too bad that the West could not leave the East alone.
"The matter with the West, Mr. Harkness, is that it always must be improving everything and everybody. It can't leave well alone. It must be thrusting its morals and customs on people who have very nice ones of their own—only they are not Western, that's all. We have too many conventional ideas over here. Superstitious observances that are just as foolish as any in the South Seas—more foolish indeed. Now I'm shocking you, Hesther, I'm afraid. Hesther," he explained to Harkness, "is the daughter of an English country doctor—a very fine fellow. But she hasn't travelled much yet. She only married my son a month ago. This is their honeymoon, and it is very nice of them to take their old father along with them. He appreciates it, my dear."
He raised his glass and bowed to her. She smiled very faintly, staring at him for an instant with her large brown eyes, then looking down at her plate.
"I have been driven," Crispin explained, "into the East by my collector's passions as much as anything. You know, perhaps, what it is to be a collector, not of anything especial, but a collector. Something in the blood worse than drugs or drink. Something that only death can cure. I don't know whether you care for pretty things, Mr. Harkness, but I have some pieces of jade and amber that would please you, I think. I have, I think, one of the best collections of jade in Europe."
Harkness said something polite.
"The trouble with the collector is that he is always so much more deeply interested in his collection than any one else is, and he is not so interested in a thing when he owns it as he was when he was wondering whether he could afford it.
"However, women like my jade. Their fingers itch. It is pleasant to see them. Have you ever felt the collector's passion yourself?"
"In a tiny way only," said Harkness. "I have always loved prints very dearly, etchings especially. But I have so small and unimportant a collection that I never dream of showing it to anybody. I have not the means to make a real collection, but if I were a millionaire it is in that direction that I think I would go. Etchings are so marvellously human, unaccountably personal."
"Why, Herrick, listen to that! Mr. Harkness cares about etchings! We must show him some of ours. I have a 'Hundred Guilders' and a 'De Jonghe' that are truly superb. Do you know my favourite etcher in the world? I am sure that you will never guess."
"There is a large field to choose from," said Harkness, smiling.
"There is indeed. But Samuel Palmer is the man for me. You will say that he goes oddly enough with my jade, but whenever I travel abroad 'The Bellman' and 'The Ruined Tower' go with me. And then Lepère—what a glorious artist! and Legros's woolly trees and our old friend Callot—yes, we have an enthusiasm in common there."
For the first time Harkness addressed the girl directly:
"Do you also care about etchings, Mrs. Crispin?"
She flushed as she answered him: "I am afraid that I know nothing about them. Our things at home were not very valuable, I am afraid—except to us," she added.
She spoke so softly that Harkness scarcely caught her words. "Ah, but Hesther will learn," Crispin said. "She has a fine taste already. It needs only some more experience. You are learning already, are you not, Hesther?"
"Yes," she answered almost in a whisper, then looked up directly at Harkness. He could not mistake her glance. It was an appeal absolutely for help. He could see that she was at the end of her control. Her hand was trembling against the cloth. She had been drinking some of her Burgundy, and he guessed that this was a desperate measure. He divined that she was urging herself to some act from which, during all these weeks, she had been shuddering.
His own heart was beating furiously. The food, the wine, the lights, Crispin's strange and beautiful voice were accompaniments to some act that he saw now hanging in front of him, or rather waiting, as a carriage waits, into which now of his own free-will he is about to step to be whirled to some terrific destination.
He tried to put purpose into his glance back to her as though he would say "Let me be of some use to you. I am here for that. You can trust me."
He felt that she knew that she could. She might, such was her case, trust any one at this crisis, but she had been watching him, he felt sure, throughout the meal, listening to his voice, studying his movements, wondering, perhaps, whether he too were in this conspiracy against her.
He had the sudden conviction that on an instant she had resolved that she could trust him, and had he had time to do as was usual with him, to step back and regard himself, he would have been amazed at his own happiness.
They had come to the dessert. Crispin, as though he had no purpose in life but to make every one happy, was cracking walnuts for his daughter-in-law and talking about a thousand things. There was nothing apparently that he did not know and nothing that he did not wish to hand over to his dear friends.
"It is too bad that I can't show you my 'Hundred Guilders.'" He cracked a walnut, and his soft boneless fingers seemed suddenly to be endued with an amazing strength. "But why shouldn't I? What are you doing this evening?"
"I have no plans," said Harkness; "I thought I would go perhaps down to the market and look at the fun."
"Yes—well. . . . Let me see. But that will fit splendidly. We have an engagement for an hour or two—to say good-bye to an old friend. Why not join us here at—say—half-past ten? I have my car here. It is only half an hour's drive. Come out for an hour or two and see my things. It will give me so much pleasure to show you what I have. I can offer you a good cigar too and some brandy that should please you. What do you say?"
Harkness looked across at the girl. "Thank you," he said gravely, "I shall be delighted."
"That's splendid. Very good of you. The house also should interest you. Very old and curious. It has a history too. I have rented it for the last year. I shall be quite sorry to leave it."
Then, smiling, he lent across—"What do you say, Hesther? Shall we have our coffee outside?"
"Yes, thank you," she answered, with a curious childish inflection as though she were repeating some lesson that was only half remembered.
She rose and started down the room. Harkness followed her. Half-way to the door Crispin was stopped for a moment by the head waiter and stayed with his son.
Harkness spoke rapidly. "There is no time at all, but I want you to know that I was in the room at the top of the house just now when you were there. I heard everything. I apologise for overhearing. I could not escape, but I want you to know that if there's anything I can do—anything in the world—I will do it. Tell me if there is. We have only a moment."
On looking back afterwards he thought it marvellous of her that, realising who was behind them, she scarcely turned her head, showed no emotion, but speaking swiftly, answered:
"Yes, I am in great trouble—desperate trouble. I am sure you are kind. There is a thing you can do."
"Tell me," he urged. They were now nearly by the door and the two men were coming up.
"I have a friend. I told him that if I would agree to his plan I would send a message to him to-night. I did not mean to agree, but now—I'm not brave enough to go on. He is to be at half-past nine at a little hotel—'The Feathered Duck'—on the sea-front. Any one will tell you where it is. His name is Dunbar. He is young, short, you can't mistake him. He will be waiting there. Go to him. Tell him I agree. I'll never forget . . ."
Crispin's forehead confronted them. "What do you say to this? Here is a sheltered corner."
Dunbar? Dunbar? Where had he heard the name before?
They all sat down.