"Tony dear," I said softly, when he had finished, "I like you better
than any man I know, except one; and that one thinks of me as his good
little sister, so you needn't be afraid of _his_ interference.
But--there's something that _does_ interfere!"
"What is it?" he eagerly wanted to know.
"It is--that you don't really love me."
He stared at me through the deepening dusk. "Don't love you? Good Lord,
Lady Peggy, I'm a fool about you! Any dough-head can see that."
"Ah, but I'm not a dough-head. I know you don't love me. You proved that
last night."
"For the life of me, I can't think what you mean. I I told you I'd try
to be your friend, but you knew what that meant! Don't keep me in
suspense."
"You've hurt my feelings dreadfully. I've been brooding over it all
day."
"I--hurt your feelings? Why, you ought to know I wouldn't for the
world----"
"But you did. You refused to trust me. There can be no love without
trust."
"I'd trust you with my life. I can't to save myself guess what you're
driving at----" He stopped suddenly. My meaning had dawned on him in
that instant.
"Now you've guessed, haven't you?" I asked, when for a few seconds,
which I counted with heartbeats, he had sat tensely silent.
"Maybe I have. But see here, Peggy, you aren't holding that against me,
are you? It wouldn't be fair. I'd trust you with anything of my own; but
when it comes to other people's business--official business----"
"Did you ever hear the lines, 'Trust me not at all, or all in all?'" I
continued to torture him. "It was Tennyson who made Vivien say those
words to Merlin. She was deceiving him, and meant to ruin him when she'd
wormed out his secret; for that reason, it isn't a very appropriate
quotation. But, otherwise, it's particularly so. If you trusted me for
yourself, you'd trust me for others, too. It's the same thing--or else
it's nothing. I'm not like Vivien. I don't mean to deceive you, or ruin
you, or anything horrid. And I couldn't if I would!"
"You don't need to tell me that," said Tony, very miserable, and making
me miserable as well. "I know you're true blue--the truest and
bluest--but there are some things I've got no right to do, even for you,
Peggy. I'd cut my tongue out to please you, I do believe I would, but to
use it in a dishonourable way for your sake is dif----"
"There! I _told_ you you didn't love me!" I reproached him. "You accuse
me now of wanting you to do something dishonourable. I don't want you
to! I can't see that it would be dishonourable to put me out of suspense
about a dear friend like Captain March, a man who's in love with my
sister, and wants to marry her, as you surely know. But that settles
everything between us, of course. To be perfectly honest with you, Tony,
I must say that I'm not certain, even if you did what I have asked, that
I'd be able to do what _you_ ask--love you, except as a friend. I've
said before that I couldn't. But I might have changed my mind in future,
for all I know, if----"
"If!" echoed Tony. "That's a darned cruel way to put it!" And he looked
so much like the nicest Billiken ever seen on earth that I really did
love him, though not quite in the way he wanted.
"No doubt I am cruel as well as dishonourable," I replied frigidly. "So
now you can easily stop loving me, can't you?"
"No, I can't," he said. "See here, Peggy, what can I say or do to make
things right? I think you're the kindest and dearest and most honourable
girl whoever lived, and I----"
"Prove it then!" I cried. And I laid my hands on his.
"How? What can I do?"
"Tell me the whole truth about what happened last night. Oh--I'm not
trying to bribe you! I don't promise if you do tell, that I'll love you,
or marry you, or anything important of that sort. All I promise is to be
so grateful, so glad, that--who knows how I may feel to you afterward?
And anyhow, I'll let you kiss me, this very night--on my cheek."
"You will? Yet--you say you're not bribing me! You couldn't offer me a
much bigger bribe. Why, Peggy, I'd be happy just to die--after getting a
kiss from you--even on your cheek!" and he laughed at himself forlornly.
"You're a dear boy, Tony," I said, crushed with remorse. "The kiss won't
be a bribe, either. It will be a token of--of--I hardly know what. But
partly of gratitude, the deepest gratitude, if you can trust me enough
to believe I'll be true."
"I do believe that, indeed I do believe it, forever. And--and--by Jove!
I _will_ tell you," he broke out, with a kind of breathless gasp.
"You're too strong for me, Peggy. You've _got_ me! But after all,
there's no such great harm in telling, now. It's different from last
night. Then I didn't know--nobody knew, I suppose--what the upshot of
certain things might be. As it's turned out, some of the story will have
to be known. Not all--but the part you want to know most."
"Tell me that," I pleaded.
"You swear you'll never breathe anything I say to you?"
"I swear I never will, until you give me leave."
"Well, then, those three explosions you heard last night weren't
explosions at all. _They were shots from our field guns._ But I'll tell
you what happened exactly--both sides of the story."
"Both sides? How is it there are two?"
"Well, there's March's side, and----"
"And--what other one?"
"And Major Vandyke's side."
"I knew it!" I cried out sharply. "I knew that man would try to ruin
Eagle. I should like to shoot him with one of those very guns."
"Peggy, you mustn't talk like that," Tony warned me. "If you do, I can't
go on."
"Forgive me," I said, and let him hold my hand, happy for a moment in
the belief that he was soothing me.
"You know--you've heard, I guess, that Vandyke was in command last
night, because the colonel had a touch of the sun? But that isn't the
right way to begin my story. I'm hanged if I know how to begin it! We
were up there on the hill with the guns, on guard; I mean I was, and the
men. And March came along, and strolled off again a little way with his
field glasses. Maybe thirty or forty yards distant, he was. I wasn't
noticing anything--felt rather sleepy, and was trying all I knew to keep
awake. I was in charge of the guns, you see. I guess I was thinking
about you. I generally am. Anyhow, the first thing I knew, March hurried
back. He seemed queer and excited, and stood still a minute as if he was
struck all of a heap. Then to my amazement he rapped out an order to
load and fire number one and number two guns, aiming at a spot just
beyond the bridge. But before we'd had time to do more than gasp--I and
the gunners--he changed his order, and commanded us to fire blank. Lord,
that was a relief--though even blank would be bad enough for the lot of
us if it turned out that March had gone suddenly mad. You fire blank for
a salute, you know: but Mexico wasn't likely to take it as a compliment!
Luckily we'd some rounds of blank, served out to us in case we might
need to send a scare and not a peppering across the river. There was
nothing for it but to obey orders, though I couldn't help thinking about
'The Charge of the Light Brigade,' when every one knew that some one had
blundered. March shouted out, 'Go slow!' And you bet we did go slow! It
seemed as if he must be off his head--or somebody else was--for so far
as we could tell--and it was a fairly clear night--there wasn't a sign
of trouble on the other side of the river.
"We'd only fired the three shots, when Major Vandyke pounced on us,
ordered us to stop, and wanted to know what the devil and all his angels
March was up to. 'Carrying out _your_ orders,' said March. 'That's a
da----' but what's the use of repeating to you, Peggy, what they said to
each other? The principal thing is, Vandyke denied having given any
order to fire, and cursed March for all he was worth. Said he might be
the cause of bringing us and Mexico to grips over the incident. Then he
dashed off in his automobile, which was waiting for him under the hill
(he'd been in it, you know, or he couldn't have got to the spot so
soon); you must have read that in the papers; and so much of their story
was true. Whatever you may think of Vandyke, Peggy, that was _man's_
size work! He took his life in his hands, the way the Mexicans must have
been buzzing in their wasp's nest over there, after the hot water we'd
thrown on it."
"It was the sort of thing he'd love to do," I said implacably. "The
theatrical thing. He must have known, too, that the man driving the car
was the one in greater danger. But _he_ didn't drive!"
"He never does drive. He didn't just funk it at that one time; it's his
habit. I've always heard him say he hated to drive a car. Too lazy!
Anyhow, there was the very dickens to pay. Before leaving the hill for
his dash across the river he'd told March to consider himself under
arrest----"
"How dared he?" I fiercely wanted to know. "That wasn't his business."
"Oh, yes it was! He's March's superior officer. Besides any officer has
the right, if--but I won't worry your head with military rules and
regulations! What you want to know is, how this affects Captain March,
don't you?"
"Yes, that's the great thing to me," I admitted. "Tony, will it ruin
him?"
"It's early days to say as much as that, yet. It all depends on the
result of the court-martial."
"Will he be court-martialled?"
"Of course. There's nothing else for it. It's a question which of those
two men can establish his case, and a court-martial will have to decide
between them. But, I'm afraid, Peggy, it will go against March. The
circumstances were so very queer, and Vandyke's denial of giving any
order at all is so strong. Besides, it would be such a mad, improbable
thing for him to give such an order, as there was no danger of attack.
He'd have no motive."
"He would have a motive," I broke in. "I can prove that. Will they let a
woman bear witness for a prisoner in a military court-martial?"
"I suppose your evidence could be taken, if they were certain it had an
important bearing on the case. But I don't see how that could have,
Peggy. This isn't women's business, it's men's."
"And devils'," I finished for him. "We won't argue now whether my
evidence could be important or not. Tell me both sides of the story you
were speaking of, first Captain March's, then Major Vandyke's."
"Well, March says that while he was strolling about, at a short distance
from the guns, looking through his field glasses at a fire he could see
on the other side of the river, he saw a chap in khaki hurry up the
hill, wheeling a bicycle. As soon as the fellow came near enough to make
out his features, March says he recognized Vandyke's orderly, a man
who's been the major's soldier servant for a good length of time. This
orderly, according to March, brought a verbal order from Vandyke as
acting colonel, to begin firing number one and number two guns, and keep
them in action until further notice, aiming at a spot just beyond one of
the bridges on the Mexican side. March said he was so astounded at
getting such an order, he thought there must be some awful mistake, and
before obeying he wanted to have it on paper. So he took the risk of any
danger from delay in case the order was really all right, and scribbled
a few lines to Vandyke on a leaf torn out of his notebook----"
"A leaf torn out of his notebook!" I couldn't help echoing. "Perhaps it
was the one I gave him."
"Shouldn't wonder!" Tony went on, stolidly. "He says he repeated in
writing the command he'd just received, and begged Vandyke, if it was
correct, to confirm him in the same way. The messenger dashed off,
leaving March wondering like thunder what it all meant: whether there
was some fearful mistake, or whether there was a big crisis, and no time
for written orders. He could see, of course, that it might be possible,
and that Vandyke had ordered only those two guns to be fired just to
scare the Mexicans off from playing any trick they were at. The spot he
was to aim at suggested that explanation, for not much harm ought to be
done with a few shots directed that way. Not much of what you might call
'_material_ harm' I mean. But there was no end to the harm such an
incident could do, if there'd been nothing to provoke it. You see the
situation as March says he saw it, don't you?"
"Yes, I see. But what happened after that?"
"According to March, the orderly was back again in next to no time.
March had stopped where he was, waiting for him, as he didn't want to
give the snap away to me and the men till the last minute. And he was
hoping against hope, till he got the return message. It was verbal
again, in spite of his written request, and mighty peremptory, ordering
him to obey without any more nonsense. That's March's story. Not seeing
a way to get out of it, yet realizing the awful consequences should
there be anything wrong, March was going to pass on the order to load
and fire when he suddenly thought he'd compromise by firing blank only.
You see he was in an awful fix anyway, had to make an instant decision,
and did what he thought best at the moment, though in giving that order
to fire blank he was already disobeying the orders of his superior
officer. Vandyke's version is that he never sent any orders whatever.
That his orderly was with him in his car, and had never left it for a
minute. That March must have been deceived by some trick of
resemblance--a sort of 'Captain of Kopenick' (if you know that story);
getting off a hoax on him, a deadly hoax, meant to upset the whole
situation between the United States and Mexico. He says March ought to
have known better than to obey a verbal order when the thing was so
serious, and that he was something worse than an ass to mistake a
stranger for Johnson, the orderly, whose face March knew almost as well
as his own. There's where Vandyke scores an extra point against March.
It would be very unusual to send a verbal order."
"That's why Eagle doubted it," I argued breathlessly. "_Could_ he have
refused to obey the acting colonel, when the order was repeated?"
"That's the question. It's too big for me," Tony said with a sigh. "It's
for the court-martial to settle. There are no witnesses who can be of
much use on either side, so far as I can see. Johnson was wounded in the
lungs last night, you know, crossing the bridge in Vandyke's car, and
never so much as squeaked again. He's dead now, so Vandyke has to depend
on his own word alone; but everybody who knows about the business seems
to think that probabilities are with him. His story is that he knew
nothing of what was going on till he heard the guns at work. Luckily he
was near by in his car, as you've heard a dozen times, and dashed up to
the rescue."
"What about the message Eagle wrote in his notebook?"
"There's only his own word to prove it was ever written. Naturally
there's no trace of it."
"But you," I persisted, "you and your men who were in charge of the
guns; can't any of you bear witness for Captain March--that you saw
Major Vandyke's orderly?"
"Unfortunately for March, no, not a man Jack of us," said Tony. "If he'd
been close to us at the time, we must have seen and recognized anybody
who came and spoke to him. But I told you he'd strolled off. It wasn't
our business to watch him, and nobody was watching. A man on foot
wheeling a bicycle doesn't make much noise; and a khaki uniform is just
about the colour of the ground, on that yellow hill. There was no moon,
only stars, which means no black shadow. I shall be called on as a
witness for the defence, of course, worse luck--but I'm afraid I can't
say anything to help March. I wish to the Lord I could! I'm dashed if it
isn't the other way round. If I'm not mighty careful, I may do him harm
instead of good."
"You'd _like_ to do him good, wouldn't you?" I pleaded.
"You bet your life I would, Peggy. March is just about the finest chap I
ever met, and most people think the same of him. But what can I do?"
"I can't see," I said, "but I may, when things grow clearer. They _must_
grow clearer! You for one believe Eagle's word, don't you, Tony? You
believe it was Major Vandyke's orderly who came to him?"
As I asked this question, I stared through the twilight into Tony's
face, trying to read it even as he tried not to let it be read. He
looked wretchedly uneasy, and rather obstinate. "I can't say I'm sure of
that," he replied. "I'm sure some one came to him, and I'm sure March
_thought_ it was Vandyke's orderly. That's as far as I can go."
"Even when I've told you that I know there's a motive for Major
Vandyke's wanting to injure him, ruin him in his career if he can?"
"You seem to think Vandyke's a regular sort of villain out of
melodrama," said Tony, with an uncomfortable laugh. "I guess you don't
know men very well yet, Peggy--except in novels and plays--when it comes
down to bedrock. They're not much like that in real life, as far as I've
ever seen. They never go round plotting to ruin other chaps' careers,
even when they don't happen to get along very well with 'em."
"_You're_ not so very old. You haven't had much more experience of life
than I have," I taunted him.
Tony laughed. "Haven't I? That's all you know. You're a child, a little
baby-child, compared to me. I may be young, but anyhow, I'm a man, and
I've lived among men since I left West Point two years ago--even if you
don't count cadets as men. Vandyke's no angel, and he and March have
been doing a bit of the cat-and-dog act in a quiet way lately. But it's
pretty far-fetched to accuse Vandyke of hatching up a plot to wipe March
off the map, especially when it meant risking his own life and
sacrificing his orderly, who was devoted to him--a fellow he valued a
whole lot----"
"Ah!" I broke in. "So the orderly was 'devoted to him!' I wonder if the
court-martial will remember that fact for what it's worth?"
"For what it's worth, yes. I guess it can be trusted to do just that.
But what there is will be likely to tell in Vandyke's favour, I guess,
not against him. Johnson had good reasons for being devoted to the
major. The chap got consumption, and was in a bad way--would have had to
say good-bye to an army life--if Vandyke hadn't paid for his cure in one
of the best sanatoria in America, and used influence to keep his job
open for him, too. Nothing very black in that record, eh?"
"Major Vandyke's the kind of person to pay high for anything he really
wants himself," I said. "He must have badly wanted this Johnson man for
something or other."
"Johnson was born a sort of gentleman, but hadn't the art of getting
along in life, although he was pretty near being a genius at mathematics
as well as mechanics, and could do stunts in several languages, like
you. No shame to Vandyke to make use of the man's gifts. He must have
been jolly useful--too useful to waste."
"It won't make me love you better, Tony," I remarked with deliberate
injustice (for there are moods when any girl must feel a horrid
satisfaction in being unjust), "if you go on praising Major Vandyke to
the skies. Does it matter why the orderly was devoted to him, or he to
the orderly? The thing of importance is the tie between them. The more
devoted the man was, the more willing he would be to go to any lengths
for Major Vandyke."
"Oh, if you want to put it that way," Tony hedged. "But it's a girl's
notion, like the motive you attribute to Vandyke."
"How do you know what motive I mean?" I shot at him. "I haven't told
you!"
"'I may be an ass, but I'm not a _silly_ ass,'" quoted Tony. "I've
guessed."
"What have you guessed?"
"Oh, about Vandyke and March both being in love with Lady Diana. All the
owliest owls are on to that. First time Vandyke was ever caught for
keeps, the fellows say. But it would only do harm to March to bring
anything of that sort up in this business, to say nothing of the bad
taste, and how mad he'd be, and the unpleasantness for Lady Diana
and--and all your family."
"It wouldn't be agreeable, I know," I admitted. "But anything to save
Eagle, no matter how we sacrifice ourselves."
"I don't somehow hear Lady Di echoing that, though I agree with you.
Only there's more in the thing than you seem to see, because you keep
your eyes fixed on one spot. If Lady Diana's engaged to Major Vandyke,
then he'd have no incentive to strike at another man who was gone on
her. It would be the other way round. The chap who had lost her would be
the one, if any, to be up to melodramatic stunts. It might be said about
March that he risked trouble for himself, for the pleasure of having a
smack at Vandyke; putting the blame on him for a mad order to fire off
guns at the good little Mexicans, for instance, do you see?"
I did see, and seeing, suffered a sharp stab of disappointment. Tony had
taken my one weapon out of my hands. He was right. I had been wrong,
while thinking myself cleverer than he. "There must be some other way of
clearing Eagle," I said desperately.
"I hope so, with my whole heart; although I've always had a sneaking
admiration for Vandyke, too. He's such a dashed fine-looking chap, a
credit to the army, and all that. To clear March--really clear him,
without leaving a stain of carelessness even--means to ruin Vandyke. For
March can't be made white as snow without Vandyke being proved a liar,
and--by Jove, yes, a traitor to his country!"
"That's what he must be proved," I said.
"It'll be a tough proposition. As I see it, there's no proof."
"It must be found."
"That's easy to say. But if there's any, it ought to be found by the
court."
"When will the trial come on?" I asked.
"In a few days. I don't know yet just when."
"In the meantime, Eagle is under arrest?"
"Yes. It's sickening."
"Aren't his friends--I mean among the officers--indignant?"
"They're mighty sorry, all broken up, and don't know what to think. But,
of course, Major Vandyke's got a good many friends, too. As for the Fort
Bliss officers, they're so wild about the whole business that I'm afraid
they're a bit prejudiced against March--those of them who don't know him
personally. You see, there was an awful row on the hill after the
firing--but I didn't mean to tell you about that----"
"Why not, as I know the rest? I suppose some of them arrived----"
"I should say they did arrive! That's too slow a word. The noise shot
'em out of their blessed beds--those of 'em who had gone to bed--and
brought the others out of any old place they happened to be in: club,
hotel, friends' houses. The first thing we knew, we had the General
Commanding on us. They know _some_ language, those grand old Johnnies!
Poor March! He was up against it, I can tell you. His worst enemy would
have been sorry for him."
"Fiends! What did they do?" I gasped.
"It wasn't so much what they did as what they said. But I shan't
give you details, Peggy, so don't try and worm 'em out of me.
It'll only waste our valuable time. March was under arrest--that's
enough. I suppose he ought to be grateful that it's been 'judged
expedient'--that's the phrase--never to let the story in its full
enormity leak out. Vandyke was so smart at apologies and explanations in
that Mexican dash of his last night, and the part he played appealed
such a lot to the chaps over there, who're nothing if they're not
sensational, that it's hoped the incident won't have any serious
international results at all. The great thing is to keep the business
forever from the public on both sides of the Rio Grande. Luckily most
people had the willies so badly after the first shot that they couldn't
swear what sort of noise they _had_ heard. It's a hard job, too, for an
amateur to tell what direction a sound comes from, when his eyes haven't
helped his ears. If Vandyke hadn't put a stop to any danger of return
shots, the fat would have been in the fire for us. Thanks to him, that
story of an explosion among the ammunition could pass muster. As for
March's alleged 'wound,' that tale's to get him out of his social
engagements, without stirring up talk. But it won't be believed in for
long. The court-martial findings can be kept secret, but not the fact of
its taking place. It's to be put round that March was accused of gross
carelessness, and causing the 'accident' that occurred. So now you see,
Peggy, your keeping dark about what I've told you to-night is all for
March's good. If he's found guilty----"
"What then?" I breathed. "What will be the sentence?"
"Why, as the affair has to be hushed up forever he can't be 'chucked.'
He'll probably be 'given permission to resign.' And then he will resign.
And nobody outside will ever know why. Those inside will think he's
jolly well in luck to be let down so easy considering all ... what?"
"I didn't speak," I whispered.
"Why, Peggy, you're crying!"
I couldn't answer. I only bent down my head lest he should see my face.
"I felt from the first I oughtn't to have told you," growled Tony. "Now
I'm sure. Don't take it so hard, dear. Something may turn up we can't
think of, and March get off scot free. Who knows? Anyhow, he's nothing
but your friend. And your sister isn't likely to marry him now. I
shouldn't be surprised if she's engaged to Vandyke already."
"It wasn't settled between them," I said, swallowing my tears. "Only I
thought she liked Eagle better, and that if he'd plenty of money--but
it's all over. No hope since this thing has happened!"
"Would you like to have her marry March?" Tony wanted to know.
"I'm--not sure! But it will be too dreadful if she marries Major Vandyke
after what he has done. Why do you say you 'shouldn't wonder' if they're
engaged already? And a little while ago, too, you said 'if Lady Di is
engaged to Vandyke.' Di can't have heard yet that there's any reason
why--why the most disloyal coward should drop Eagle March."
"There are such things as telegrams. And the big California papers must
have got hold of the story printed in El Paso this morning. They're sure
to have correspondents here. I bet Lady Di had Vandyke as a hero served
up to her with her coffee at breakfast to-day. Wouldn't she wire and
congratulate him? Wouldn't he wire back to her, and strike while the
iron was hot, to get her promise? That's what I'd do if I were in his
place."
"I never thought----" I began; but no more words would come. I felt
broken. It seemed to me that I could look ahead and see the whole
future.
I let my hand lie in Tony's, and he stroked it gently, not speaking or
trying to make me speak. Silence was the only balm just then, if balm
there was, and a loud burst of music not far off struck on my brain like
the blow of a hammer.
We had forgotten all about the torchlight procession which we had come
out to see. But--by and by--Tony did not forget his kiss.