COUNSEL'S OPINION.
The worst of it all was this: that the young man himself had not
invariably that confidence in his own affections which displayed itself
so bravely and so convincingly at a psychological moment. Not that
Manister was insincere, exactly. If you come to think of it, you may
deceive others with perfect innocence, having once deceived yourself.
And this was exactly what had happened.
There was one distinctive feature of the case: away from Christina
Luttrell the poor fellow had already had his doubts of himself; in her
presence those doubts were as certain to evaporate as snowflakes in the
warmth of the sun.
Even as he went down Mrs. Holland's stairs Manister was joined by
certain invisible companions--the misgivings that had made their escape
as Christina entered the room. They had waited for him on the landing
outside the door. They led and followed him downstairs. They linked
arms with him in the street. They stifled him in his hansom, which they
boarded ruthlessly. In one of the silent rooms of the club to which he
drove they talked to him silently, sitting on the arms of his
saddle-back chair and arguing all at once. Powerless to shake them off
he was forced to bear with them, to hear what they had to say, to answer
them where he could.
Mingling with the importunate voices of his inner consciousness were the
remembered words of the girl. She had asked him whether he had never
burst out laughing as the affair presented itself in certain lights; he
did so now, silently, it is true, but with exceeding bitterness. She had
told him that it was not enough that he should feel willing to wait for
her when they were together; and now that he had left her, though so
lately, he was certainly less inclined to be patient. She had suggested
that he was more fascinated than in love; and already he knew that her
suggestion had given shape and utterance to a vague suspicion of his own
soul. She had gone so far as to hint at the possible secret of his
infatuation, and there again she had hit the mark; though apart from
her talent of torture her sweet looks and charming ways had been strong
wine to Manister from the first. Still her snubs had piqued his passion
in the beginning of things out in Melbourne; and here in Europe she had
virtually refused him three times. Modest he might be, and yet know that
this were a rare experience for such as himself at the hands of such as
Tiny Luttrell. On the whole, the experience was sufficiently complete as
it stood; yet he could not help wishing to win; indeed, he had gone too
far to draw back, and for that reason alone the idea of defeat in the
end was intolerable to him. And this was the one spring of his actions
which seemed to have escaped Christina's notice; the others she had
detected with an acuteness which made him wonder, for the first time,
whether on her very merits she would be a comfortable person to live
with, after all.
Gradually, however, these echoes of the late interview grew fainter in
his ears, and its upshot came home to Manister with sensations of
chagrin sharper than any he had endured in all his life before. His
feelings when refused by this girl in the previous August, and under
peculiarly humiliating circumstances, were enviable compared with his
feelings now. Then he had deserved his humiliation--at least he was
generous enough to say so--and he had taken what he called his
punishment in a very manly spirit. But the desire to win had sent him on
a secret mission to Cintra, on the chance of seeing her there, and his
present feelings reminded him of those with which he had beaten his
retreat from Portugal. For he had gone there for a final answer, and had
come back without one; and to-day he had suffered afresh that selfsame
humiliation, only in an aggravated form, and more voluntarily than ever.
She had never asked him to wait; he had offered on both occasions to
wait six months--nay, he had insisted on waiting. Even now, within a
couple of hours after the event, he could scarcely credit his own
weakness and stultification. He was by no means so weak in affairs
wherein the affections played no part. He firmly believed that no other
woman could have twisted him round her finger as this one had done. But
here, perhaps, we have merely the everyday spectacle of a young man
discerning exceptional excuses for a realized infirmity; and the point
is that Manister realized his weakness this evening as he had never
done before. The girl herself had made him look inward. She had
suggested fascination, not love. That suggestion stuck painfully. Yet he
was not sure.
Never had he felt so horribly unsure of himself; in the midst of his
self-distrust there came to him, suddenly, the recollection that she
distrusted him no longer, and there was actually some comfort in this
thought, which is strange when you note its fellows, but due less to the
contradictoriness of human nature than to the supremacy of a young man's
vanity. He stood well with her now. She believed in him at last. Propped
up by these reflections, he began almost to believe in himself. At least
a momentary complacency was the result.
The improvement in his spirits allowed Lord Manister to give heed to
another portion of his organism which had for some time been inviting
him to go into another room and dine. Now he did so, with a sharp eye
for acquaintances, whom he had no desire to meet. For this reason he had
driven to the club which he had joined most recently; it was not a young
man's club, so he felt fairly safe from his friends. Yet he had hardly
ordered his soup, and was searching the wine list for the choice brand
which the circumstances seemed to demand, when a heavy hand dropped upon
his shoulder, and his glance leapt from the wine list to the last face
he expected or wished to see--that of his kinsman Captain Dromard.
Captain Dromard was a cousin of the present earl, and notoriously the
rolling stone of his house. Manister had seen him last in Melbourne, and
ever since had borne him a grudge which he was not likely to forget. Had
he dreamt that the captain (who had been last heard of in Borneo) was in
London, Manister would have shunned this club in order to avoid the risk
of meeting him; but it seemed that Captain Dromard had landed in England
only that morning: and they dined together, of course; and Manister made
the best of it. His kinsman was a big, grizzled, florid man, with an
imperial, and with a comic wicked cut about him which made one laugh.
But he retained an unpleasant trick of treating Manister as a mere boy:
for instance, he was in time to choose the brand, and, as he said before
the waiter, to prevent Manister from poisoning himself. He was,
however, an entertaining person, and at his best to-night, being wont to
delight in London for a day or two before realizing the infernal
qualities of the climate and arranging fresh travels. But Manister was
not entertained; he tried to appear so, but the captain saw through the
pretense, and immediately scented a woman. There were reasons why the
rolling stone was particularly good at detecting this element--which
always interested him. His interest was unusual in the present instance,
owing to certain reminiscences of Manister in Melbourne during his own
flying visit to that port. It was during a subsequent week-end in
England that Captain Dromard had alarmed the countess, with a result of
which he was as yet unaware; but he did not hesitate to make inquiries
now, and he began by asking Manister how he had managed to get out of
the scrape in which he had left him.
"I remember no scrape," said Manister stiffly.
"You don't? Well, perhaps I put it too strongly," conceded the captain.
"We'll say no more about it, my boy. Devilish pretty little thing,
though; remember her well, but could never recall her name. By the bye,
I'm afraid I terrified your mother over that; feared she was going to
cable you home next day; was sorry I spoke."
"So was I," Manister said dryly, but, by an effort, not forbiddingly, so
that the captain saw no harm in raising his glass.
"Well, here's to the lady's health, my boy, whoever she was, and
wherever she may be!"
Manister smiled across his glass and drained it in silence. There was a
glitter in his young eyes which made it difficult for the captain to
drop the subject finally. Manister had been drinking freely, without
becoming flushed, which is another sign of trouble. The captain could
not help saying confidentially:
"You know, Harry, your mother was so keen for you to marry one of old
Acklam's daughters. That's what frightened her. But it is to come off
some day, isn't it?"
"Can't say," said Lord Manister.
"It ought to, Harry. I like to see a young fellow with your position
marry properly, and settle down. I don't know which of the Garths it is,
but I've always heard one of 'em was the girl you liked."
"Suppose the girl you like won't marry you?" Manister exclaimed, with a
sudden change of manner, and in the tone of one consulting an authority.
"Well, there's an end on't."
"Ah, but suppose she can't make up her mind?"
"You might give her a month--though I wouldn't."
"Suppose a month is not enough for her?"
The captain stared; his bronzed forehead became barred with furrows; his
eyes turned stony with indignation.
"A month not enough for her to make up her mind--about you?" he said at
length incredulously. "Good God, sir, see her to the devil!"
Then Lord Manister showed his teeth. Though he had consulted the
captain, he took his advice badly. He said you could not be much in love
to be choked off so easily; he hinted that his kinsman had never been
much in love. Captain Dromard intimated in reply that whether that was
the case or not he was not without experience of a sort, and he could
tell Harry that no woman under heaven was worth kneeling in the mud to,
which Harry said hotly was unnecessary information. So they went
elsewhere to smoke, and later on to a music hall, the subject having
been left for good in the club coffee room. The following afternoon,
however, Lord Manister drove through the snow with a very resolute front
to show to Tiny Luttrell, who was just then passing Deal in the
_Ballaarat_, without having given him the faintest notion yesterday that
she was to sail to-day.