IV

Simon Orts knelt, abstractedly wiping Aluric Floyer's sword upon the corner

of a rug. It may be that he derived comfort from this manual employment

which necessitated attention without demanding that it concentrate his

mind; it may have enabled him to forget how solitary the place was, how

viciously his garments rustled when he moved: the fact is certain that he

cleaned the sword, over and over again.

Then a scraping of silks made him wince. Turning, he found Lady Allonby

half-erect upon the settle. She stared about her with a kind of Infantile

wonder; her glance swept, over Lord Rokesle's body, without to all

appearance finding it an object of remarkable interest. "Is he dead?"

"Yes," said Simon Orts; "get up!" His voice had a rasp; she might from his

tone have been a refractory dog. But Lady Allonby obeyed him.

"We are in a devil of a mess," said Simon Orts; "yet I see a way out of

it--if you can keep your head. Can you?"

"I am past fear," she said, dully. "I drown, Simon, in a sea of feathers. I

can get no foothold, I clutch nothing that is steadfast, and I smother. I

have been like this in dreams. I am very tired, Simon."

He took her hand, collectedly appraising her pulse. He put his own hand

upon her bared bosom, and felt the beat of her heart. "No," said Simon

Orts, "you are not afraid. Now, listen: You lack time to drown in a sea of

feathers. You are upon Usk, among men who differ from beasts by being a

thought more devilish, and from devils by being a little more bestial; it

is my opinion that the earlier you get away the better. Punshon has orders

to pass Simon Orts. Very well; put on this."

He caught up his long cloak and wrapped it about her. Lady Allonby stood

rigid. But immediately he frowned and removed the garment from her

shoulders.

"That won't do. Your skirts are too big. Take 'em off."

Submissively she did so, and presently stood before him in her

under-petticoat.

"You cut just now a very ludicrous figure, Anastasia. I dare assert that

the nobleman who formerly inhabited yonder carcass would still be its

tenant if he had known how greatly the beauty he went mad for was beholden

to the haberdasher and the mantua-maker, and quite possibly the chemist.

_Persicos odi_, Anastasia; 'tis a humiliating reflection that the hair of a

dead woman artfully disposed about a living head should have the power

to set men squabbling, and murder be at times engendered in a paint-pot.

However, wrap yourself in the cloak. Now turn up the collar,--so. Now pull

down the hatbrim. Um--a--pretty well. Chance favors us unblushingly. You

may thank your stars it is a rainy night and that I am a little man. You

detest little men, don't you? Yes, I remember." Simon Orts now gave his

orders, emphasizing each with a not over-clean forefinger. "When I open

this door you will go out into the corridor. Punshon or one of the others

will be on guard at the farther end. Pay no attention to him. There is

only one light--on the left. Keep to the right, in the shadow. Stagger as

you go; if you can manage a hiccough, the imitation will be all the more

lifelike. Punshon will expect something of the sort, and he will not

trouble you, for he knows that when I am fuddled I am quarrelsome. 'Tis a

diverting world, Anastasia, wherein, you now perceive, habitual drunkenness

and an unbridled temper may sometimes prove commendable,--as they do

to-night, when they aid persecuted innocence!" Here Simon Orts gave an

unpleasant laugh.

"But I do not understand--"

"You understand very little except coquetry and the proper disposition

of a ruffle. Yet this is simple. My horse is tied at the postern.

Mount--astride, mind. You know the way to the Vicarage, so does the horse;

you will find that posturing half-brother of mine at the Vicarage. Tell

Frank what has happened. Tell him to row you to the mainland; tell him to

conduct you to Colonel Denstroude's. Then you must shift for yourself; but

Denstroude is a gentleman, and Denstroude would protect Beelzebub if he

came to him a fugitive from Vincent Floyer. Now do you understand?"

"Yes," said Lady Allonby, and seated herself before the fire,--"yes, I

understand. I am to slip away in the darkness and leave you here to answer

for Lord Rokesle's death--to those devils. La, do you really think me as

base as that?"

Now Simon Orts was kneeling at her side. The black cloak enveloped her from

head to foot, and the turned-up collar screened her sunny hair; in the

shadow of the broad hatbrim you could see only her eyes, resplendent and

defiant, and in them the reflection of the vaulting flames. "You would

stay, Anastasia?"

"I will not purchase my life at the cost of yours. I will be indebted to

you for nothing, Simon Orts."

The Vicar chuckled. "Nor appeared Less than archangel ruined," he said.

"No, faith, not a whit less! We are much of a piece, Anastasia. Do you

know--if affairs had fallen out differently--I think I might have been a

man and you a woman? As it is--" Kneeling still, his glance devoured her.

"Yes, you would stay. And you comprehend what staying signifies. 'Tis

pride, your damnable pride, that moves you,--but I rejoice, for it proves

you a brave woman. Courage, at least, you possess, and this is the first

virtue I have discovered in you for a long while. However, there is no

necessity for your staying. The men of Usk will not hurt Simon Orts."

She was very eager to believe this. Lady Allonby had found the world a

pleasant place since her widowhood. "They will not kill you? You swear it,

Simon?"

"Why, the man was their tyrant. They obeyed him--yes, through fear. I am

their deliverer, Anastasia. But if they found a woman here--a woman not

ill-looking--" Simon Orts snapped his fingers. "Faith, I leave you to

conjecture," said he.

They had both risen, he smiling, the woman in a turbulence of hope and

terror. "Swear to it, Simon!"

"Anastasia, were affairs as you suppose them, I would have a curt while to

live. Were affairs as you suppose them, I would stand now at the threshold

of eternity. And I swear to you, upon my soul's salvation, that I have

nothing to fear. Nothing will ever hurt me any more."

"No, you would not dare to lie in the moment of death," she said, after

a considerable pause. "I believe you. I will go. Good-bye, Simon." Lady

Allonby went toward the door opening into the corridor, but turned there

and came back to him. "I shall never see you again. And, la, I think that

I rather hate you than otherwise, for you remind me of things I would

willingly forget. But, Simon, I wish we had gone to live in that little

cottage we planned, and quarrelled over, and never built! I think we would

have been happy."

Simon Orts raised her hand to his lips. "Yes," said he, "we would have been

happy. I would have been by this a man doing a man's work in the world, and

you a matron, grizzling, perhaps, but rich in content, and in love opulent.

As it is, you have your flatterers, your gossip, and your cards; I have my

gin. Good-bye, Anastasia."

"Simon, why have you done--this?"

The Vicar of Heriz Magna flung out his hands in a gesture of impotence. "I

dare confess now that which even to myself I have never dared confess. I

suppose the truth of it is that I have loved you all my life."

"I am sorry. I am not worth it, Simon."

"No; you are immeasurably far from being worth it. But one does not justify

these fancies by mathematics. Good-bye, Anastasia."

V

Holding the door ajar, the Vicar of Heriz Magna heard a horse's hoofs slap

their leisurely way down the hillside. Presently the sound died and he

turned back into the hall.

"A brave woman, that! Oh, a trifling, shallow-hearted jilt, but a brave

creature!

"I had to lie to her. She would have stayed else. And perhaps it is true

that, in reality, I have loved her all my life,--or in any event, have

hankered after the pink-and-white flesh of her as any gentleman might.

Pschutt! a pox on all lechery says the dying man,--since it is now

necessary to put that strapping yellow-haired trollop out of your mind,

Simon Orts--yes, after all these years, to put her quite out of your mind.

Faith, she might wheedle me now to her heart's content, and my pulse would

never budge; for I must devote what trivial time there is to hoping they

will kill me quickly. He was their god, that man!"

Simon Orts went toward the dead body, looking down into the distorted face.

"And I, too, loved him. Yes, such as he was, he was the only friend I

had. And I think he liked me," Simon Orts said aloud, with a touch of shy

pride. "Yes, and you trusted me, didn't you, Vincent? Wait for me, then,

my Lord,--I shall not be long. And now I'll serve you faithfully. I had to

play the man's part, you know,--you mustn't grudge old Simon his one hour

of manhood. You wouldn't, I think. And in any event, I shall be with you

presently, and you can cuff me for it if you like--just as you used to do."

He covered the dead face with his handkerchief, but in the instant he drew

it away. "No, not this coarse cambric. You were too much of a fop, Vincent.

I will use yours--the finest linen, my Lord. You see old Simon knows your

tastes."

He drew himself erect exultantly.

"They will come at dawn to kill me; but I have had my hour. God, the man I

might have been! And now--well, perhaps He would not be offended if I said

a bit of a prayer for Vincent."

So the Vicar of Heriz Magna knelt beside the flesh that had been Lord

Rokesle, and there they found him in the morning.