A SUCCESSFUL MISSION
Efforts were on foot to avert the scandal and public disaster which so
imminently threatened the Courtlands. Grantley Imason, who had a real
friendship for Tom, interested himself in them. Not merely the home was
in danger, but Tom's position and career, also Tom's solvency. He had
always lived up to his income; now, without doubt, he was spending sums
far beyond it; and, as has been seen, the precautions which he had
declared he would use were falling into neglect as the sense of
hopelessness grew upon his mind. From such neglect to blank effrontery
and defiance looked as though it would be but a short step. And he
refused obstinately to make any advances to his wife; he would not hear
of suing for peace.
"My dear fellow, think of the children!" Grantley urged.
Poor Tom often thought of the children, and often tried not to. He knew
very well where he was going and what his going there must mean to them.
Yet he held on his way, obstinately assuring himself that the fault for
which they must suffer was not his.
"I do think of them, but---- It was past bearing, Grantley."
"I think you must have given her a real fright by now. Perhaps she'll be
more amenable."
"Harriet amenable! Good Lord!"
"Look here, if she can be got to express regret and hold out the olive
branch, you know, will you drop all this, and give the thing one more
trial?"
It was a favourable moment for the request, since Tom happened to be
cross with his pleasures too--they were so very expensive. He allowed
himself to be persuaded to say yes.
But who was to beard Lady Harriet in her den? There was no eagerness to
undertake the task; yet everybody agreed that a personal interview was
the only chance. Grantley fairly "funked it," and honestly said so.
Raymore's nerves were still so upset that his excuses were accepted--it
was morally certain that Harriet, if she became angry, would taunt him
about his boy. Selford? That was absurd. And it was not a woman's work.
The lot fell on John Fanshaw--John, with his business prestige and high
reputation for common sense. And Lady Harriet liked him best of them
all. The choice was felt to be excellent by everyone--except John
himself.
"Haven't I enough worries of my own?" he demanded. "Why the devil am I
to take on Tom Courtland's too?"
"Oh, do try! It can't hurt you if she does fly into a passion, John."
He grumbled a great deal more; and Christine, in an unusually chastened
mood, performed the wifely function of meeting his grumbles with mingled
consolation and praise.
"Well, I'll go on Sunday," he said at last, and added, with a look
across the table: "Perhaps some of my own troubles will be off my mind
by then."
Christine flushed a little.
"Oh, I hope so," she said rather forlornly.
"I do hope so!" he declared emphatically. "I build great hopes on it. It
is to-day you're going, isn't it?"
"Yes, to-day. After lunch I said I'd come."
"Did he write back cordially?"
"Well, what could the poor man do, John?"
"Ha, ha! Well, I suppose a fellow generally does answer cordially when a
pretty woman proposes to call on him. Ha, ha!" John's hopes made him
merry and jovial. "I say, I shall get back as early as I can from the
City, and try to be here in time to welcome you. And if it's gone all
right, why----"
"Don't let yourself be too sure."
"No, I won't. Oh, no, I won't do that!"
But it was not hard to see how entirely he built all his trust on this
last remaining chance. He rose from the breakfast-table.
"All right. To-day's Thursday. I'll go to Lady Harriet on Sunday. Not
much harm can happen in three days. Good-bye, old girl, and--and good
luck!"
Christine suffered his kiss--a ceremony not usual to their daily parting
in the morning. When he had gone, she sat on a long while behind the
tea-things at the breakfast-table, deep in thought, trying to picture
the work of the day which lay before her. It was extraordinarily hateful
to her, and she had hardly been able to endure John's jocularity and his
talk about pretty women coming to call.
Because there had once been some talk, she had told Caylesham that she
would bring a friend with her, naming Anna Selford. Anna would go in
with her, and wait in another room while they had their meeting.
Caylesham thought this rather superfluous, but had no objection to make.
He could not form any idea why she was coming, until it occurred to him
that perhaps he had a few letters of hers somewhere, and that women were
apt to get frights about letters, picturing sudden deaths, and not
remembering that a wise man chooses a discreet executor. With this
notion in his head he hunted about, and did find two or three letters.
But they were quite harmless; in order to see this he read them through,
and then laid them down with a smile. After a few moments of reflection
he put them into an envelope, sealed them up, and placed them on a table
by him, ready for Christine. He was a man of forty-five, and he looked
it. But he was tall, thin, well set-up, and always exceedingly well
turned-out. Beyond his rank and his riches, his only fame lay in
sporting circles. He and John Fanshaw had first made acquaintance over
horses, and he still went in for racing on a considerable scale. He was
unmarried, and likely to remain so. There was a nephew to inherit: and
he had pleased himself so much that he found it hard to please himself
any more now. And he had, unlike Walter Blake, no aspirations. He had a
code of morals, and a very strict one, so far as it went; but it was not
co-extensive with more generally recognised codes.
Directly Christine came in, he noticed how pretty and dainty and young
she looked; she, at least, pleased him still. He greeted her with great
cordiality and with no embarrassment, and made her sit down in a chair
by the fire. She was a little pale, but he did not observe that; what he
noted--and noted with a touch of amusement--was that she met his eyes as
seldom as possible.
"I really couldn't think to what I owed this pleasure----" he began.
But she interrupted him.
"You couldn't possibly have guessed. I've got to tell you that."
"It's not these?"
He held up the letters in their envelope.
"What are they?"
"Only two or three notes of yours--all I've got, I think."
"Notes of mine? Oh, put them in the fire! It wasn't that."
"I suppose we may as well put them in the fire," he agreed.
As the fire burnt up the letters, Christine looked at the fire and said:
"John has sent me here."
"John sent you here?"
He was surprised, and again perhaps a trifle amused.
"You don't suppose I should have come of my own accord? I hate coming."
"Oh, don't say that! We're always friends, always friends. But suppose
you do insist on 'hating' to come--well, why have you come?"
She looked at him now.
"I couldn't help it. I refused at first, but I--I had no reason to give
if I'd gone on refusing. He'd have--suspected."
"Ah!" The explanation drew an understanding nod from him.
"So I came. He's sent me to borrow money from you."
"To borrow money? What, is John----?"
"Yes, he's in great difficulties. He wants a lot of money at once."
"But why didn't he come himself? It's rather odd to----"
"I suppose he hated it too. He has done it once. I mean, he's been to
Grantley Imason. And--and he thought--you'd be more likely to do it if I
asked."
"Did he? Does that mean----?"
"No, no, not in the least. He only thought you were--that you liked
pretty women." She held out a piece of paper. "He's put it all down
there. I think I'd better give it to you. It says what he wants, and
when he must have it, and how he'll pay it back. I promised to tell you
all that, but you'd better read it for yourself."
He took the paper from her and studied it. She looked round the room,
which she had known very well. It was quite unchanged. Then she watched
him while he read. He had grown older, but he had not lost his
attractiveness. For a moment or two she forgot the present state of
things.
"Fifteen thousand! It's a bit of money!" This remark recalled
Christine's thoughts. "Has Imason lent him that?"
"Yes, on the same terms that he suggests there."
"Well, Imason's a good fellow, but he's a banker, and--well, I should
think he expects to get it back. I say, John's been having a bit of a
plunge, eh? Consequently he's in deep water now? Is he very much cut
up?"
"Terribly! It means ruin, and the loss of his reputation, and--oh, I
don't know what besides!"
"Poor old John! He's a good chap, isn't he?"
She made no answer to that, and he muttered:
"Fifteen thousand!"
"Frank," she said, "I've done what I had to do, what I promised to. I've
shown you the paper; I've told you how much this money means to us; I've
told you it means avoiding ruin and bankruptcy and all that disgrace.
That's what John made me promise to tell you, and its all I have to tell
you from him. I've done what I said I would on his behalf."
"Yes, yes, that's all right. Don't distress yourself, Christine. I just
want to have another look at this paper, and to think it over a little.
It is a goodish bit of money, you know. But then old John's always been
a good friend of mine, and if times weren't so uncommon bad----"
He wrinkled his brow over the paper again.
"And now I have to speak on my own account. Frank, you must find some
good, some plausible, reason for refusing. You mustn't lend John the
money."
"Hallo?"
He looked up from the paper in great surprise.
"You see, John doesn't know the truth," she answered.
He rose and stood by the fire, looking down on her thoughtfully.
"No, of course he doesn't, or--or you wouldn't be here," he said after a
pause.
Then he fell into thought again.
"And if he did know, he'd never ask you for the money," she said.
Caylesham made a wry little grimace. That might be true of John, but he
would hesitate to say the same about every fellow. Christine, however,
did not see the grimace.
"And you don't want me to lend it--not though it means all this to
John?"
"I don't want you to lend it, whatever it means. Pray don't lend it,
Frank!"
"Is that---- Well, I don't quite know how to put it. I mean, is that on
John's account or on your own?"
"I can't give you reasons; I can't put them in words. It's just terribly
hateful to me."
He was puzzled by the point of view, and still more by finding it in
her. Perhaps the last six years had made a difference in her way of
looking at things; they had made none in his.
"And if I do as you wish, what are you going to say to John? Are you
going to say to him that in the end you told me not to lend the money?"
"Of course not. I shall say that you said you couldn't; you'll have to
give me the reasons."
He looked discontented.
"It'll look rather shabby," he suggested.
"Oh, no! It's a large sum. It would be quite likely that it wouldn't be
convenient to you."
"Is he expecting to get it?"
"I don't think that has anything to do with it. I suppose--well,
drowning men catch at straws."
She smiled dolefully.
The phrase was unlucky for her purpose. It stirred Caylesham's pity.
"Poor old John!" he murmured again. "What'll he do if he doesn't get
it?"
"I don't know--I told you I didn't know."
He was puzzled still. He could not get down to the root of her
objection; and she could not, or would not, put it plainly to him. She
could not express the aspect of the affair that was, as she said, so
terribly hateful to her. But it was there. All she had given she had
given long ago--given freely long ago. Now was she not asking a price
for it--and a price which her husband was to share? Only on that ground
really was she there. For now the man loved her no more; there was no
glamour and no screen. After all these years she came back and asked a
price--a price John was to share.
But the case did not strike Caylesham at all like this. John suspected
nothing, or John would not have sent his wife there. John had been a
very good friend, he would like to do John a good turn. In his case the
very circumstances which so revolted Christine made him more inclined to
do John a good turn. Although he could not pretend that the affair had
ever made him uncomfortable, still its existence in the past helped
John's cause with him now.
"You're not a very trustworthy ambassador," he said, smiling. "I don't
think you're playing fair with John, you know."
"Why, do you--you--expect me to?" she asked bitterly.
He shrugged his shoulders in a discreet evasion, seeing the threatened
opening of a discussion of a sort always painful and useless.
"John will take failure and all that devilish hard."
He took up the paper again and looked at it. He knew the business was a
very good one; after such a warning as this a man would surely go
steady; and Grantley Imason had lent money. He built a good deal on
that. And--yes--in the end he was ready to run a risk, being a
good-natured man and fond of John, and feeling that it would be a very
becoming thing in him to do a service to John.
"Look here, I shall attend to your official message. I shan't take any
notice of these private communications," he said lightly, but kindly,
almost affectionately. "And you mustn't feel that sort of way about it.
Why, I've got a right to help you, anyhow; and I can't see why I mustn't
help John."
He went to the table and wrote. He came back to her, holding a cheque in
his hand.
"Here it is," he said. "John will send me a letter embodying the
business side. I've post-dated the cheque four days, because I must see
my bankers about it. Oh, it's not inconvenient; only needs a few days'
notice--and it'll be in time for what John wants. Here, take it,
Christine."
He pressed the cheque into her hands, and with a playful show of force
shut her fingers upon it.
"I know this has been a--a----" He looked round the room, seeming to
seek an apt form of expression. "This has been an uncomfortable job for
you, but you really mustn't look at it like that, you know."
"If you give it me, I must take it. I daren't accept the responsibility
of refusing it."
He was quite eager to comfort her.
"You're doing quite right. You were perfectly square with me; now you're
being perfectly square with John."
Perfectly square with John! Christine's lips curved in a smile of scorn.
But--well, sometimes one loses the right or the power to be perfectly
square.
"And I'm downright glad to help--downright glad you came to me."
"I only came because I couldn't help it."
"Then I'm downright glad you couldn't help it."
She had loved this unalterable good-temper of his, and admired the
tactful way he had of humouring women. If they wouldn't have it in one
way, he had always been quite ready to offer it to them in the other, so
long as they took it in the end; and this they generally did. She rose
to her feet, holding the cheque in her hand.
"Your purse, perhaps?" he suggested, laughing. "You see, it might puzzle
your young friend. And give old John my remembrances--and good luck to
him. Are you going now?"
"Yes, Frank, I'm going now."
"Good-bye, Christine. I often think of you, you know. I often
remember---- Ah, I see I mustn't often remember! Well, you're right, I
suppose. But I'm always your friend. Don't be in any trouble without
letting me know."
"I shall never come to you again."
He grew a little impatient at that, but still he was quite good-natured
about it.
"What's the use of brooding?" he asked. "I mean, if you're running
straight now, it's no good being remorseful and that sort of thing; it
just wears you out. It would make you look old, if anything could. But I
don't believe anything could, you know."
She gave him her hand. Her lips trembled, but she smiled at him now.
"Good-bye, Frank. If I have any hard thoughts, they won't be about you.
You can always"--she hesitated a minute--"always disarm criticism, can't
you?"
Caylesham stooped and kissed her hand lightly.
"Don't fret, my dear," he said. "You're better than most by a long way.
Now take your cheque off to poor old John, and both of you be as jolly
as you can." He pressed her hand cordially and led her to the door. "I'm
glad we've settled things all right. Good-bye."
She shook her head at him, but still she could not help smiling as she
said her last good-bye. With the turning of her face the smile
disappeared.
Caylesham's smile lasted longer. He stood on his hearthrug, smiling as
he remembered; and an idea which forced its way into his head did not
drive away the smile. He wondered whether, by any chance, old John had
any vague sort of--well, hardly suspicion--but some vague sort of an
inkling. He would not have hinted that to Christine, since evidently she
did not believe it, and it might have upset her. But really, in the end,
was it not more odd to send Christine if he had no inkling at all than
if he had just some sort of an idea that there was a reason why her
request might be very much more potent than his own? He was inclined to
think that John suspected just a flirtation. The notion made him
considerably amused at John, but not at all angry with him. It was not a
thing he would have done himself, perhaps. Still you can never tell what
you will do when you are in a really tight corner. His racing
experiences had presented him with a good many cases which supported
this conclusion.
Christine felt very tired, but she was not going to give way to that;
Anna Selford was too sharp-witted. She chatted gaily as they drove home,
mainly about the subject which grieved them both so much--Mrs. Selford's
taste in frocks. Matters were in an even more dire way now; Anna could
get no frocks! Between pictures and dogs, she declared, her wardrobe
stood no chance. Christine was genuinely unable to comprehend such a
confusion of relative importance.
"I detest fads," she said severely.
"It doesn't give me a fair chance," lamented Anna, "because I should pay
for dressing, shouldn't I, Mrs. Fanshaw?"
Christine reiterated her belief to that effect. It was a melancholy
comfort to poor Anna.
"Suppose I'd been going to see Lord Caylesham, dressed like this!"
"My dear, he's old enough to be your father."
"That doesn't matter. He's so smart and good-looking. I see him riding
sometimes with Mr. Imason, and he's just the sort of man I admire. I
know I should fall in love with him."
Christine laughed, but turned her face a little away.
"I won't help you there; our alliance is only on the subject of frocks."
But how well she knew what Anna meant and felt! And now she was a trifle
uneasy. Had any of that talk filtered through leaky Selford
conversations to Anna's eagerly listening ears?
"Mamma once told me he'd been very, very wild."
"Stuff! They always say that about a man if he's a bachelor. Sheer
feminine spite, in my belief, Anna!"
"What did you go to see him about? Oh, is it a secret?"
Christine was really rather glad to hear the question. It showed that
nothing very much of the talk had filtered. And she had her story ready.
"Oh, about a horse. You know we've had to sell our bays, and he's got
one that we thought we could buy cheap. John was so busy that I went.
But, alas, it's beyond us, after all."
"Yes, you told me you'd sold a pair." Anna nodded significantly.
Christine smiled. She was reflecting how many crises of life demand a
departure from veracity, and what art resides in the choice of a lie.
She had chosen one which, implying that Anna was in her confidence,
pleased and quieted that young woman, and sent her off home without any
suspicions as to the visit or its connection with the financial crisis
otherwise than through the horses.
She did not ask Anna in to tea, because John would be there, home early
from the City, waiting. Now that the thing was done, she was minded to
make as light of it as possible. Since she had been compelled to go, let
John forget under what pressure and how unwillingly she had gone. Thus
the faintest breath of suspicion would be less likely to rest on her
secret. She trusted to her self-control; she would chaff him a little
before she told him of the success of her mission.
But the first sight of his face drove the idea out of her head. It might
be safer for her; it would actually be not safe for him. She was
convinced of this when she saw the strain in his eyes and how his whole
figure seemed in a tension of excitement. She closed the door carefully
behind her.
"Well," he cried, "what news? By God, I've been able to do no work! I
haven't been able to think of anything else all day. Don't--don't say
you've failed!"
"No," she said, opening her purse, "I haven't failed. Here's a cheque
from Lord Caylesham. It's post-dated, but only a day or two. That
doesn't matter?"
She came to him and gave him the cheque. He put it on the table and
rested his head on his arm. He seemed almost dazed; the stiffness had
gone out of his body.
"By Jove, he's a good sort! By Jove, he is a good sort!" he murmured.
"He was very kind indeed. He made no difficulties. He said he was sure
he could trust you, and was glad to help you. And he sent his
remembrances and good luck to you, John."
She had taken off her fur coat and her hat as she was speaking, and now
sank down into a chair.
"By Jove, he is a good sort!" John suddenly sprang up. "It means
salvation!" he cried. "That's what it means--salvation! I can pay my
way. I can look people in the face. I shan't bring the business to ruin
and shame. Oh, I've had my lesson--I go steady now! And if I don't pay
these good chaps every farthing call me a scoundrel! They are good
chaps, Grantley and old Caylesham--devilish good chaps!"
"Don't go quite off your head, John dear! Try to take it quietly."
"Ah, you take it quietly enough, don't you, old girl?" he exclaimed,
coming up to her. "But you've done it all--yes, by heaven you have! I
know you didn't like it; I know you hated it. You're so proud, and I
like that in you too. But it wasn't a time for pride, and you put yours
in your pocket for my sake--yes, for my sake, I know it. We've had our
rows, old girl, but if ever a man had a good wife in the end, I have,
and I know it."
He caught hold of her hands and pulled her to her feet, drawing her
towards him at the same time.
"Quietly, John," she said, "quietly."
"What, don't you want to give me a kiss?"
"I'll give you a kiss, but quietly. Poor old John!"
She kissed him lightly on the cheek.
"Now let me go! I--I'm tired."
"Well, you shall rest," he said good-naturedly, and let her go.
She sank back in her seat and watched him turn to the cheque again.
"It's salvation!" he repeated, and paid no heed to a sudden quick gasp
of breath from her throat.
Even Caylesham would have allowed that he had no suspicion. But
Christine sat a prey to vague forebodings. She felt as though the thing
were not finished yet. The dead would not bury its dead.