At Cross Saddle
Carleigh found himself presently crowded into the last seat of the last
car, beside the Honorable Julian.
The occupants were men exclusively, and the subject of debate was the
fire's origin. This was mingled with snatches of personal experiences.
"I fancy it started in the laundry drying-room," their host observed.
"Overheated pipes or something."
"How about crossed wires?" some one asked. "The electricity in the east
wing was out of commission from the start."
"But the flames showed first in the north extension," another man
contributed. "I was lying wide-awake and saw the glare from my window."
"Yes. And if it hadn't been for your wakefulness, old chap, we might
every one of us have been incinerated in our beds," Archdeacon observed
gratefully. "As it was, the east wing was totally cut off before we
could get to it."
He turned to Carleigh. "That's where you were, you know. We did our best
to reach your room, but you were hemmed in. We tried shying stones at
your windows, but it was too pitchy dark to locate them. Fancy what I
went through before you dropped onto the dahlia bed!"
Sir Caryll appeared far less grateful for his deliverance than was to
have been expected. He wasn't sure, indeed, that he was grateful at all.
What with one romance ended and another budding one interrupted by death
or disfigurement--life for him certainly was not worth the living.
"I suppose I did have a narrow squeak for it," he said.
Dawn had come, but it was a dark, indistinguishable dawn because of the
heavy black clouds that shrouded it. The hall at Cross Saddle was
brilliantly alight therefore when they arrived, and on the wide hearth
blazed a roaring fire of great logs.
Many of the earlier arrivals had already been provided for, but there
was still a waiting group, so smoke-stained and in such motley makeshift
attire as to have titillated the risibilities of any but the most stolid
British.
Sir Caryll's visage, black as a Senegambian's, was as long as the
proverbial arm of coincidence. Directly he began making inquiry for the
doctors in attendance on Nina, and learned with a mingling of
encouragement and dismay that they had already done what they could and
departed.
He ascertained also that Cecile Archdeacon was installed as nurse,
assisted by Nina's own maid. But beyond these two facts he could gather
nothing definite. Opinion at Cross Saddle appeared to be quite as
divided as opinion at Carfen.
Sir Guy Waldron, who would be most likely to know the exact facts--if
there were any exact facts to know--was already quartered, and anxious
as Carleigh was he would not think of disturbing the man he had come to
regard as a dangerous--and therefore hated--rival.
Lord Dalgries and his two sons were up and about, making arrangements
for the refugees. Some of the guests at the hall had been awakened, too,
and some not. Most of the men turned out and most of the women stayed
in.
Young Nevill Dalgries, a chap about Carleigh's own age, who had been to
school with him, had seen Mrs. Darling when she was carried in, and he
didn't mind telling Caryll that at that moment he wouldn't have wagered
tuppence on her life. But he had later been present when Dr. Dodson
talked with his father about her, and--
"The M. D. seemed to think she'd pull through. He'll be over again in
the forenoon. He said she was as comfortable as could be expected under
the circumstances."
"They always say that," returned Carleigh, attempting to wipe out
betraying signs of his emotion and leaving a gray-white streak across
the black of either cheek. "They fill 'em with opium or something."
Nevertheless, he felt in a measure relieved. If it was as speculative as
all the rest, it was, nevertheless, the speculation of authority and not
the mere guesswork of indifferent optimistic or pessimistic lay minds.
Still he hung about, talking to whomsoever would talk of the one topic
that engaged him until about all the rest had been led off to sleeping
places.
Then finally, with Nevill Dalgries for guide, he followed to where a bed
had been set up for him in one of the nurseries.
And there he lay awake, his brain teeming, until one of the footmen came
to him at a little after eight. Then he raised himself on one elbow and
asked whether the footman had heard how Mrs. Darling was.
"Mrs. Darling is very bad, sir," was the answer.
"But she was distinctly better when I turned in," Carleigh offered
protest.
"Yes, sir; I dare say, sir. But she's very bad this morning, sir. Her
maid was in the servants' hall not ten minutes ago, sir."
"And she said she was worse?"
"Oh, yes, sir. Very much worse, sir."
Sir Caryll let a long sigh escape him. He couldn't help it. The footman
heard it and drew a conclusion or two.
"They're likely to be worse in the morning, you know, sir. I had an aunt
once--begging your pardon, sir--that was burned most 'orribly. She was
always worse in the morning, sir."
"And she recovered--in the end?" asked the baronet anxiously.
"No, sir. Not at all, sir. She died at last, sir. In the morning, just
about this time, sir."
Carleigh dropped back on his pillow, and the footman, taking the action
as a signal for silence, proceeded to light a fire, to fill the bath,
and to lay out a very nice array of lent linen and morning garments for
the guest to select from.
When he went away Carleigh got up with a curious new kind of pain about
his heart and head which he was puzzled to account for.
Perhaps it was the smoke he had inhaled, or perhaps it was Mrs.
Darling's condition. He wasn't sure which. At any rate, it was very
real and very distressing.
He had bathed and scrubbed very carefully, as he thought, before lying
down. But the morning light revealed stains and blotches invisible by
candlelight--there was no electricity at Cross Saddle--and it took him
some time to remove them.
As a consequence he found, when he went down to breakfast, that nearly
every one was there before him. There was a general hubbub in the room
that was nigh to deafening.
Questions were flying about like buzzing insects; and then, too, there
was the more or less inevitable clatter of too hurried service.
He found a place at the table, and was just dropping a lump of sugar
into his tea when a most extraordinary and upsetting thing happened.
The door opened again and admitted--of all persons in the world--Miss
Rosamond Veynol.