CHAPTER XV
We dashed home to get news of Diana, and it was a relief to find everything decorous and apparently serene at the house. We were informed by a band of footmen, hired with powder and pomatum inclusive, for the occasion, that the bride had arrived safely. There was no stare of consternation or half-hidden horror on any face. But in the flower-decked drawing-room, with its effective marble pillars (Di and Father had taken the house on the strength of that drawing-room, so well designed for a wedding reception), the bride and bridegroom had not yet stationed themselves to smile and be congratulated, although guests had begun to arrive. Father, however, was there, at his best and reassuring everybody. Diana had been a "little upset by the fright, don't you know, and Vandyke was looking after her"; but it was nothing—nothing at all. She would be down presently.
"What is it, Father? What did happen?" I found a chance to whisper; but to my surprise he gave me for answer only a frown which seemed inexplicably to say, "Whatever it is, you'd better not ask! Don't pretend innocence, it doesn't suit you."
"Do find out something from somebody," I said hastily to Tony, and ran upstairs in search of Kitty Main, who, having deserted us to return home with Father, was nevertheless not to be found in the drawing-room. She was sure to know everything, I thought, and delighted to talk. But the first person I met was Sidney Vandyke in the act of closing Diana's door and coming out into the hall. Seeing me, a set and gloomy expression, most unsuitable to a bridegroom, changed to a look of actual fury. If I had been a small tame dog which had unexpectedly sprung up to bite him, he could not have glared more venomously.
Since he had come to London we had met almost every day, and when necessary I had been as dully polite as a book on etiquette. But only when necessary. At other times I had effaced myself; now, though I was keen for news of Di, I didn't care to get it from him, especially after that look. Never since the episode of the photograph in camp at El Paso had I of my own free will begun a conversation with Major Vandyke, and it was now my intention to wait until he was out of the way before going to Kitty or Diana. But when I would quietly have slid past the bridegroom in the corridor, he stopped me.
"You've always been the enemy," he said in a tone of repressed rage, subdued to reach my ears only, "but I did think you fought fair. I didn't expect you to hit me in the back—and strike your sister, too, on her wedding day. You're a cruel and cowardly little enemy, after all. And let me tell you this: neither of us will forgive you as long as we live."
I stared at him in amazement. "I don't know what you mean!"
"I shouldn't lie on top of the rest, if I were you," he sneered. "I forbid you to go to Di. She's borne enough. A little more, and she'd not be able to face those people downstairs."
"I tell you again, and I don't lie, because Eagle March himself taught me to speak the truth," I said, "that I've no idea what you're driving at. I have done nothing, except live. I don't know what's happened. I want to know."
"You shan't have the satisfaction of hearing anything from me!" Sidney flung the words at my head. Then he turned on his heel, and opened Diana's door again without knocking. I think he would have shut it in my face; but Kitty Main was ready to come out, and must have had her hand on the knob when it was snatched from her fingers.