IT was only four miles to Shrewsbury, and Dodson did not spare the horses, but it took them an hour to make it, and it was ten o’clock before they drew up to the door. Madame de Fonblanque had remained perfectly silent during the drive. But the Colonel, remembering that he must, of necessity, soon go the perilous way that Mr. Romaine was now traversing, was all remorse. He reproached himself for his estrangement from Mr. Romaine, and remembered only their boyhood together, when they had been really fond of one another.
As the carriage crunched along the drive across the lawn, the house door opened, and Mrs. Chessingham appeared. The Colonel assisted Madame de Fonblanque up the steps, and in the full glare of the light Mrs. Chessingham saw the woman that had made such a commotion the night before. She was struck by the dignity of Madame de Fonblanque’s bearing, and could imagine how even so fastidious a person as Mr. Romaine might be fascinated by her.
“He has been asking for you for the last half hour,” she said, helping Madame de Fonblanque off with her wraps, and escorting her to the door of Mr. Romaine’s library.
Mr. Chessingham came out with a troubled face, and, closing the door behind him, was presented to Madame de Fonblanque.
“Do you think he is dying?” she asked.
“Undoubtedly. And he knows it himself, and is perfectly prepared, but when I ventured to hint as much to him, he told me he thought Carlsbad was the place for him, and he was going there next summer.”
A faint smile appeared upon the faces of all three. Majestic death was at hand, but Mr. Romaine had to have his quip with the Destroyer before going upon the great journey.
“And I frankly admit,” said Chessingham, worried almost beyond bearing, “that Mr. Romaine has never yet told me what ailed him, and I do not know any more than you do what he is dying of. I suspect, of course—but it may be one of a half dozen things, any one of which would be equally fatal. He will not let me know his pulse, temperature, or anything, and his perversity about his symptoms is simply phenomenal. He will not even be undressed and go to bed. If you will believe me, he had his evening clothes put on him, and there he sits, dying.”
Madame de Fonblanque, without another word, advanced and opened the door for herself, shutting it carefully after her.
There, indeed, sat Mr. Romaine in his easy-chair, with his feet in exquisite dancing pumps, stretched out to the fire. His face was ghastly white—but as it was always white, it did not make a great deal of difference. His eyes, though, were quite unchanged—in fact, they seemed to glow with an added fire and brilliance. Still, he was plainly dying.