V
As I slowed down opposite the door, it occurred to me to ask whether O'Rane had made his peace with Tom Dainton.
"No. And never shall," he grunted. "Fortunately he's not here, though. If he were——"
The sentence was cut short as the doors were flung open, and Crabtree, gorgeous in white waistcoat and pink carnation, advanced into the white glare of the headlights.
"Stout fellows!" he cried heartily. "Haven't seen you for ages, Raney——"
"How do you do, Crabtree?" O'Rane responded, in a tone that would have chilled a blast furnace.
"Come along in! Never mind about the car, George; one of the men'll take it round. How are the lads of Oxenford, what? How's the House? How's everything?"
The questions were so clearly rhetorical that I attempted no answer. Sir Roger came in sight, crossing the hall, and I hurried in to shake hands with him, reflecting that full two-thirds of my antagonism to Crabtree arose from his inveterate use of my Christian name.
"The ladies have gone up to dress, George," said Dainton. "We shall find everyone else in the billiard-room. If you'd care for a drink——"
He hurried on ahead, hardly giving me time to shed my coat and cap, for all the world like a trusted old family servant making me at home in his master's absence. The impression was not altogether a capricious fancy: I remember a ball at Crowley Court where the stately wife of a newly honoured manufacturing chemist whispered loudly to her host, "Sir Zachary and Lady Smithe. Smithe, my man, not Smith, mind."
In the billiard-room we found Loring and Summertown perfunctorily practising fancy cannons, while Valentine Arden ostentatiously slumbered at full length on a divan. Tea was long past, dinner some way ahead; and, as Arden complained, he hadn't tasted a cocktail since leaving London.
"You may not know it, Raney," yawned Loring as Sir Roger closed the door behind us and hurried away to order whisky and soda, "but you've saved my life. Another ten minutes of Crabtree! It only shows the folly of staying in other people's houses. With the best intentions in the world they spring disquieting surprises on you. Really, after a certain episode not a thousand miles from—shall we say?—House of Steynes last autumn, I thought I should be safe in coming here. The rising generation beats me, and as for poor Valentine——"
Arden roused at sound of his own name.
"They offered one curried lobster for breakfast," he proclaimed, tremulous with indignation; "there were only two kinds of chutney, and no Bombay duck. One cannot eat curry without Bombay duck."
He relapsed into exhausted slumber, and Summertown seized upon O'Rane.
"Look here, young fellow, my lad," he said, "I'm properly in the soup. You remember the bilge my lady mother's been talking about my seeing more of the world...."
Arden stirred in his sleep and opened one eye.
"The desire of a mother that her son shall see rather more of the world," he observed, "not infrequently coincides with an ambition to see rather less of her son."
Summertown quelled the interruption at the end of a half-butt and continued to state his case.
"Well, when you seemed doubtful about coming, Crabtree butted in. He'd heard all ex's were to be paid. I shall be dans le consommé, as the French say, if you cry off."
O'Rane, who appeared to be tired and subdued, promised to think over the proposal.
"When do your rotten results come out?" persisted Summertown. "Time's getting on, you know. I want to be back in town by next season."
"I'll let you know to-night," said O'Rane, crossing the room and making a seat for himself at the end of Arden's divan.
I guessed then—what I afterwards found out for certain—that he was beginning to repent of his recent quixotism. The big, warm, comfortable house threw into striking relief the shanties and bleak skies that were likely to be his home and shelter for some years to come.
"Well, don't be a dirty dog," said Summertown, in conclusion. "If I get stuck with Crabtree.... Steady!"
He picked up his cue and began knocking the balls about as the door opened, and Crabtree entered. A moment or two passed before we could try a fresh cast in conversation, and it is more than probable that the newcomer guessed we had been discussing him.
"Aren't you lads going to dress?" he inquired, as he straightened his tie before a mirror and glanced at his watch.
"Presently, presently," answered Loring, who was in fact already on his feet and only delayed with the perversity of a man who dislikes being ordered about. "You coming up, Valentine? There's only just time, if you're going to have a bath."
"One is going to be very late," said Arden sleepily. "It may cut dinner a bit short. One is bored with dinner. One hates having to talk when one is eating; and, if one doesn't talk, other people will. One is bored with other people."
"Have a drink?" said Summertown encouragingly, as he helped himself again. "With enough alcohol you can bear almost anything. I can't stand playing five-pence a hundred auction, but I did last night—thanks to the tranquillizing influence of '47 port. True, I cut the match-box by an oversight, but that might have happened to anyone. And Lady Dainton told me I ought to wear glasses. Here you are, Valentine. Three times a day before meals or any other hour. Even our host brightened visibly last night. Another half glass, and there'd have been horrible revelations—second establishment in Brixton, undiscovered bank fraud—I think to-night I shall move round by him and keep the wine circulating."
"You talk too much, Summertown," said O'Rane, on whom the tone of the conversation was grating.
"So will old Dainton!" rejoined Summertown gleefully. "No, you're quite right, Raney. Dam' bad form to tighten a man up at his own table, specially if he's got a weak head. You hear that, Crabtree? Drink fair all round and no doping."
"I'd drink two to one against Dainton," Crabtree answered valiantly.
"All through?" asked Summertown, not without a certain admiration. "Bet you a pony you don't."
"Done! Jim shall hold the stakes, George umpire. I remember once when I was staying with my cousin Beaumorris——"
Loring was standing with his back to the fire, yawning and occasionally reminding Arden that it was time to dress. At the mention of his name he strolled into the light and crossed to the door, only pausing to remark:
"It's just as well to remember whose house you're in, Crabtree. Time to dress, Summertown." And, as he entered the hall, "Don't drink whisky on an empty stomach, young man."
Summertown, whose leading characteristics throughout his short life were a cheerful immaturity and chronic instability of temperament, became immediately contrite. His rare moments of seriousness were marked by a pathetic desire to stand well in Loring's eyes.
"Sorry, sorry, sorry!" he exclaimed. "It won't happen again, Loring. I swear it won't."
Loring laughed and caught his arm.
O'Rane and I were the last to leave the billiard-room, and, as we came to the foot of the staircase, Sonia appeared in sight on the landing above. For the moment we were invisible to her, and she pattered lightly down the stairs, waving one hand to Crabtree, who was standing astride the rug in front of the fire.
"Hope I haven't kept you waiting, Tony?" she called out.
Crabtree responded with some decorous conventionality, and in another second we came into the light and were face to face with Sonia.
"Hallo, children, where were you hiding?" she asked as we shook hands. "Have they elected you to your old fellowship, David?"
"I haven't finished yet," he answered. "I say, Sonia...."
He paused and looked almost anxiously at her. The firelight glowing across the hall struck sparks of gold out of her brown hair, and her arms and shoulders gleamed white through the transparent, blue gauze of her dress.
"Say on, MacDavid," she bade him.
"Summertown wants me to go abroad with him. I don't know whether to accept or not."
"He asked me, too." Crabtree called out. "I wish you'd make up your great mind, Raney."
O'Rane kept his eyes fixed on the face in front of him.
"Which is it to be, Sonia?" he asked.
"My dear, I don't care," she answered. "Of course, it'll be more amusing for Lord Summertown if Tony goes. There's a compliment for you," she called out, blowing a kiss across the hall. Crabtree bowed with mock gravity. "You're getting dreadfully ponderous in your old age, David. On the other hand, I don't believe I can spare Tony. How long are you going to be away?"
"Six months if Crabtree goes. Three to five years if I do. It won't be with Summertown the whole time; I shall have business to attend to. I didn't know whether you——"
Sonia clasped her hands with a dramatic gesture of surprise.
"My dear! you are humble all of a sudden! I'm honoured! Have I any wishes ...? Dear me!"
"Then I may take it you haven't?"
"It's for Lord Summertown to say," she answered impatiently. "I don't mind."
O'Rane nodded and began to walk up the stairs, while Sonia crossed the hall at a ragtime shuffle, humming a plantation song. As we reached the first landing, he remarked:
"I told you I was looking for an omen."
Before dressing he scribbled a note to Oxford, and, when we met in the drawing-room before dinner, I heard him tell Summertown that he would be ready to start by the end of the week.
In my uncle's phrase, women are the strangest of all the sexes, and I do not pretend to explain Sonia's frame of mind at this time. Perhaps O'Rane was right in thinking she must be allowed of her own accord to grow weary of the world that Crabtree and Summertown represented; perhaps she was piqued by his refusal to run errands for her; perhaps I am right in thinking she was at this time incapable of any deep emotion. It is all guesswork.
Crabtree took charge of the dinner that night in a hearty, efficient manner, though O'Rane and I suffered from the disability common to all late arrivals in a house-party: a mint of catchwords and private jokes had been coined before we came. It was impossible to understand without an explanation, and the explanation so often analysed the poor little jest out of life. Moreover, I was sleepy after my long drive, and the elderly girl whom I took in—I always suspected Sonia's guests of being selected as foils—persisted in discussing the higher education of women. As Valentine Arden observed half-way through when my indefatigable neighbour trained her batteries on him: "If a woman is good-looking, education is superfluous; if she is not it is inadequate." I was mortified to think how much I might have been spared if I had been able to frame that formula earlier in the evening.
When the ladies left us, I roused slightly with the effort of getting up and opening the door. Crabtree moved into the chair between Dainton and myself, and, leaning in front of us, whispered to Summertown:
"I've given him a stroke a hole all the way."
For a moment I did not follow the allusion, but, when Summertown shook his head and murmured "No takers,"—still more, when Crabtree hurriedly finished his second glass of port and reached for the decanter—I appreciated that he was seriously measuring hardness of head with his host, as he had backed himself to do before dinner in the billiard-room.
"Don't be an ass, Crabtree," I whispered, as he filled Dainton's glass for the third time.
A humorous wink was my reward, and in elaborate dumb-show he informed me that, while his host had drunk no more than three glasses of champagne and two of port he himself had achieved exactly double that figure.
"Just getting into my stride," he murmured, and, if I find few opportunities of praising Crabtree, let me do justice to his powers of consuming alcohol. Certain dining clubs of Oxford used to experiment on him, now trying to make an impression by sheer weight of metal, now cunningly seeking to sap his defences with injudicious mixtures. For all the success they achieved, the bottles might have been carried into the street and emptied down the nearest drain. The big round face never flushed, the sleek, black head never swam. Then, as now, the lustiest of his opponents dropped out of the race just as he was settling down.
At first no one else observed what was afoot. Loring and O'Rane were talking together at the other end of the room, and Summertown and Arden had drawn back their chairs till they were screened by my back. I alone noticed that Dainton had grown very silent, and, as Crabtree kept up a voluble monologue, every one else was free to listen or talk as he chose. The first warning came with a tinkle of broken glass and a deep stain on the cloth.
"Clumsy of me!" exclaimed Dainton. "I hope I didn't splash you? Extraordinarily clumsy of me. No; no more, thanks. I can't think how I came to be so clumsy." Crabtree waved away the protest and began filling a fresh glass. "I don't deserve it after being so clumsy, you know."
A moment later coffee was brought in, and I saw Dainton taking several matches to a cigar that he had not cut. Faithful to the terms of his wager, Crabtree achieved a successful right and left with the liqueurs and brought down one kummel as the tray was handed me and another as it reached him. Also, he very considerately helped his host to a glass.
"Drop it, Crabtree," I said, as the footman passed out of hearing. "This is getting beyond a joke."
He winked even more humorously than before and pointed to the two glasses beside his plate. I saw Loring turn and whisper in O'Rane's ear, their eyes were fixed for a moment on Dainton's face, and then O'Rane called out:
"Have you got any matches down there, Crabtree? Shy 'em over, will you?"
A heavy silver match-box was tossed in a parabola through the air. Raney lit his cigar and cried:
"Coming over!"
This time no parabola was described. The path of the projectile was a straight line from O'Rane's upraised hand to the stem of Dainton's glass.
"A1 direction and perfect elevation," Arden remarked. The glass fell where it was struck, spreading a film of white liquid over the dessert-plate, and O'Rane sprang to his feet with profuse—and I have no doubt sincere—regret for spoiling an eighteenth-century Venetian set.
"Am I plagiarizing anyone if I call you a cad, Crabtree?" he inquired twenty minutes later, as they crossed the hall to the drawing-room.
"Damn your soul ...!" began Crabtree, genuinely offended; but the door was reached before the theme could be developed.
There was a tell-tale spot of colour round O'Rane's cheek-bones, however, and Sonia with quick perception manœuvred Crabtree into a chair by her mother's side. She herself remained standing till the rest of us were seated and then beckoned to O'Rane to share a sofa with her by the other fire at the far end of the room.
"Look here, David," she began severely.
O'Rane was engrossed in his own reflections and began thinking aloud.
"He's not a white man, you know," he said musingly. "I beg your pardon, Sonia?"
She lay back disdainfully with her hands clasped behind her head.
"David, I've got an idea that you and Tony never meet without quarrelling. Other people get on with him. I get on with him. Well, if you think it's good form to go to other people's houses and pick quarrels with guests who are good enough for them——"
O'Rane shook his head.
"He's not. That's the whole trouble."
"I'm fairly particular in the people I care to have as friends, David," she answered, in a tone which even her companion recognized as dangerous.
"The Lord preserve you in that belief," he exclaimed ironically. "If you want my candid opinion——"
"I don't."
"Perhaps you're afraid to hear it?" he jeered.
Sonia shrugged her shoulders with an air of boredom.
"You may say what you like," she told him, "but perhaps you'll regret it afterwards."
"I'll risk that. Well, to use a word you English always fight shy of, the fellow's not a gentleman."
Sonia clenched her hands and bit her lip to keep control of herself.
"You dare to say that of a friend of mine?"
"That's the pity of it, Sonia," O'Rane returned easily. "You're too good to be contaminated with that kind of stuff. He hasn't the instincts of a gentleman."
From an early age most people had hastened to conciliate and agree with Sonia when she was angry. I know nothing more characteristic of O'Rane than his repetition of the insult. She collected herself and struck coolly at his most vulnerable part.
"Perhaps, from what I know of you, you're not in a position to be a very good judge," she suggested.
Eight years before when O'Rane was cast up on the shore at Melton, it is no exaggeration to say that such a remark would have brought the speaker within easy distance of being killed. Now he only went pale and sat very still until he could speak dispassionately.
"I shall be on the high seas in a week's time," he told her, "and we shan't meet again for some years. I've given you my parting advice——"
Sonia was worsted, but she would not admit defeat without a last struggle.
"And when you come back you will find us married," she answered in a level voice.
"I'll come back for your wedding!" he laughed.
"I forget how long you said...."
"My child, you won't be married to Crabtree in three years."
"David, to-night before dinner——"
O'Rane waved his hand in deprecation.
"I don't disbelieve you! Will you give me your blessing before I start? I'm supposed to be superstitious, and as I'm beginning again from the bottom of the ladder—God! it's nearly ten years since my last effort—Part friends, Sonia."
"I don't care if I never see you again!" she answered passionately. "You simply think of new ways of trying to humiliate me——"
"Lord be praised there's still some one fond enough of you to try," he murmured half to himself.
Late that night O'Rane sat on the foot of my bed detailing his last interview. I told him things that nobody but he would need to be told—that he had only himself to thank for his dismissal, that a spoiled and petted semi-professional beauty was not a good medium for his unduly direct methods and that he could congratulate himself on driving Sonia three-fourths against her will into Crabtree's arms—in the very terms of the warning I had given him at Lake House.
"You see, I don't want to marry a professional beauty," he objected.
"Then take Sonia at her word and don't meet her again," I said.
"But that's only one side of her, the artificial side, the London hothouse side. Before all this, when she was a child of twelve and I lived in a misery of spirit that would drive some men to suicide.... In those days Sonia—Bah! she's ashamed of it now, but she showed me the whole of her brave, tender, generous soul—I said, and I say still, that there's hope of salvation for the damned if he comes before the Judgement Seat and boasts that once, even for a moment——"
His voice rose and grew rich with the familiar Irish rhetoric till I begged him to remember the slumbering household.
"There are so many Sonia Daintons," he mused, "but that's the one I always see. It's the one I shall see for the next three years." He uncurled his legs and slid down from the bed. "I sail next week, George. Dine with me on Thursday to say good-bye."
"No, you dine with me."
"I asked you first—my last favour on English soil: I'll dine the night I get back."
"That's a little vague," I complained. "You may be gone ten years."
He rose gracefully to the bait.
"Make it as definite as you like. This is nineteen six. Say nineteen ten. I shall be back in—May. First of May, let's call it. Shall we say the Club?"
"By all means. Will eight o'clock suit you? And what shall I order?"
"Oh, you know I eat anything. Are black ties allowed at the Eclectic? No, wait a bit, it'll be the beginning of the Season, and the House'll be sitting; you'll either be in morning dress or full regimentals. You please yourself, and I'll come in a short jacket. Good night."
"Good night, Raney, you old ass."
"I shall be there," he insisted, as he switched off the light.
Six days later the papers announced to all whom it might concern that Lord Summertown and Mr. D. O'Rane had left Tilbury for Bombay by the P. & O. "Multan."