to read her meaning it was hid from me. But this I marked; that she did
draw aside from me, and that her face was cold and still, and that her
lips were pressed together as if not all nor any should ever make her
speak again.
At this sharp crisis, when a look or word would cost me more than death
and my dear lady her honor, it was the colonel who, all unwittingly,
stood my friend. A breath of doubt upon my lie and we were lost; and
once I thought he would have breathed it. But he did not. Instead, he
broke out in a laugh, with a gibe flung first at Gilbert Stair and then
at Falconnet.
"God save us! I give you joy, Mr. Stair, and you, Sir Francis. These two
have duped you bravely. By heavens! Sir Frank; 'twas you who should have
had the sword thrust in the duel. In that event you might have stood in
Captain Ireton's shoes, and so had the priest fetched for your benefit."
Then he turned to Margery with a bow that had no touch of mockery in it.
"I crave your pardon, Madam; I knew not you were pleading for your
husband's life an hour ago. It grieves me that I may not spare him to
you longer than the night, but war is cruel at its best."
She stood like any statue done in cold Carrara while he spoke; and when
she made no sign he gave the word to recommit me.
"Take him away, Lieutenant Tybee, and see he has a bribe-proof man this
time to keep him company. Madam Ireton, I'll put you on your honor: you
may have access to him, but there must be no messages carried in or out.
To your quarters, gentlemen. We must ride far and hard to-morrow."
When his final word had set her free, my frozen maiden came to life and
ran to throw herself in helpless sobbings, not upon her father, as you
would think, but upon the good priest. And it was Father Matthieu who
led her, still crying softly, out of the throng and up the low stair;
and now I marked that all the rough soldiery stood aside and made way
for her with never a man among them to scoff or sneer or point a gibe.
At her going, Tybee drew his sword and cut the cord that bound me.
"These youngling cubs are over-cautious, Captain Ireton. We shall not
make it harder for each other than we must," he said, with bluff good
nature. And then: "Will you lead the way to your room, sir?"--this to
give the youngling cub another lesson, I suppose.
I walked beside him to the stair, and when I stumbled, being weak and
spent, he took my arm and steadied me, and I did think it kindly done.
At my own door he gave me precedence again, saying, with a touch of the
grateful Old World courtesy, "After you, sir," and standing aside to let
me enter first. When we were both within he touched upon the colonel's
mandate.
"I must obey my orders, Captain Ireton, but by your good leave I shall
not lock you up with any trooper; I'll stay with you myself."
I thought this still more kindly than aught he had done before, and so I
told him. But he put it off lightly.
"'Tis little enough any one can do for you, my friend, but I will do
that little as I can. You are like to have a visitor, I take it; if you
have, I'm sure 'twill be a comfort if your body-guard can be stone
blind and deaf."
So saying, he dragged the big wicker chair into the window-bay, planted
himself deep within it with his back to all the room, and so left me to
my own devices.
Being spent enough to sleep beneath the shadow of a gibbet, I threw
myself full-length upon the bed and was, I think, adrift upon the ebb
tide of exhaustion and forgetfulness when once again the shifting of the
wooden door-bar roused me. I rose up quickly, but Tybee was before me.
There was some low-voiced conference at the door; then Tybee came to me.
"'Tis Mr. Gilbert Stair," he said. "He has permission from the colonel
and insists that he must see you _solus_. I'll take your word and leave
you, if you like."
At first I hung reluctant, wanting little of the host who came so late
to see his guest. Then, as if a sudden flash of lightning had revealed
it, I realized, as I had not before, how I had set the feet of my dear
lady in a most hideous labyrinth of deception; how this lie that I had
told to bridge a momentary gap must leave her neither maid nor widow in
the morning.
"Yes, yes; for God's sake let him in, Mr. Tybee!" I burst out. "I am
fair crazed with weariness, and had forgot. 'Tis most important, I do
assure you."
The thing was done at once, and before I knew it I was alone with the
old man who, though he was my supplanter, was also Margery's father. He
entered cautiously, shielding his bedroom candle with his hand and
peering over it to make me out, as if his venturing in were not
unperilous. And I marked that when he put the candle down upon the
table, he edged away and felt behind him for the door as if to make sure
of his retreat in case of need.
"Sit down, Captain Ireton; sit down, I beg of you," he said, in his
thin, rasping treble. And when I had obeyed: "I think you must know what
I've come for, Captain Ireton?"
I said I could guess; and he began again, volubly now, as if to have it
over in the shortest space.
"'Twas not a gentlemanly thing for you to do, Captain Ireton--this
marrying of a foolish girl out of hand while you were here a guest; and
as for the priest that did it, I--I'll have him hanged before the army
leaves, I promise you. But now 'tis done, I hope ye're prepared to make
the best of it?"
I saw at once that his daughter had not yet confided in him; that he was
still entangled in my lie. So I thought it well to probe him deeper
while I might.
"What would you call 'the best' if I may ask?" said I, growing the
cooler with some better seeing of the way ahead.
"The marriage settlements!" he cried shrilly, coming to the point at
once, as any miser would. "'Tis the merest matter of form, as ye may
say, for your title to Appleby Hundred is well burnt out, I promise you.
But for the decent look of it you might make over your quitclaim to your
wife."
"Aye, truly; so I might."
"And so you should, sir; that you should, ye miserable, spying
runag"--he choked and coughed behind his hand and then began again
without the epithets. "'Tis the very least ye can do for her now, when
you have the rope fair around your curs--ahem--your--your rebel neck.
Only for the form's sake, to be sure, ye understand, for she'd inherit
after you in any case."
I saw his drift at last, and, not caring to spare him, sped the shaft of
truth and let it find the joint in his harness.
"'Tis as you say, Mr. Stair. But as it chances, Mistress Margery is not
my wife."
If I had flung the candle at him where he stood fumbling behind him for
the door-latch,'twould not have made him shrink or dodge the more.
"Wha--what's that ye say?" he piped in shrillest cadence. "Not married?
Then you--you--"
"I lied to save her honor--that was all. A wife might do the thing she
did and go scot free of any scandal; but not a maid, as you could see
and hear."
For some brief time it smote him speechless, and in the depth of his
astoundment he forgot his foolish fear of me and fell to pacing up and
down, though always with the table cannily between us. And as he
shuffled back and forth the thin lips muttered foolish nothings, with
here and there a tremulous oath. When all was done he dropped into a
chair and stared across at me with leaden eyes; and truly he had the
look of one struck with a mortal sickness.
"I think--I think you owe me something now beyond your keeping, Captain
Ireton," he quavered, at length, mumbling the words as do the palsied.
"Since you are Margery's father, I owe you anything a dying man can
pay," said I.
"Words; empty words," he fumed. "If it were a thing to do, now--"
"You need but name the thing and I will do it willingly."
Instead of naming it he shot a question at me, driving it home with
certain random thrustings of the shifty eyes.
"Who is your next of kin, Captain Ireton?"
"Septimus, of the same name, master of Iretondene, on the James River,
and a major in the Virginia line," I answered, wondering how my cousin
once removed should figure in the present coil. But Gilbert Stair's next
question dispelled the mystery.
"If you should die intestate, this Septimus would be your heir?"
"As next of kin, I should suppose he would. But I have nothing to
devise."
"True; and yet"--he paused again as if the wording of it were not easy.
"Be free to speak your mind, Mr. Stair," said I.
"'Tis this," he cried, gathering himself as with an effort. "You've
claimed my daughter as your wife before them all, and when you die
to-morrow morning you'll leave her neither wife nor maid. I think--I
think you'd best make that lie of yours the truth."
If one of his thin hands that clutched the chair arms had pressed a
secret spring and loosed a trap to send me gasping down an oubliette, I
should have been the less astounded. Indeed, for some short space I
thought him mad; yet, on second thought, I saw the method in his
madness. Could Margery be brought to view it calmly, this was a sword to
cut the knot of all entanglements.
As matters stood, the world would call her widow at my death; and since
a woman is first of all the keeper of her own good name, she would never
dare aver the truth. So in common justice she should own the name the
world would call her by. Again, as matters stood, no wrong could come of
it to her, or Richard Jennifer, or any. Dick would love her none the
less because a dying man had given her his name for some few hours. And
if, at any future time, the Ireton title should revive and this poor
double-dealing miser should be forced to quit his hold on Appleby
Hundred, my father's acres would be hers in her own right. One breach in
all this sudden-builded wall I saw, but could not mend it. With the
Ireton acres hers by double right, the baronet would press his suit with
greater vigor than before. But as to this, no further act of mine could
help or hinder; and if I died her husband she would in decency delay a
while.
So summing up in far less time than it has cost to write it out for you,
I gave my host his answer.
"I told you you might name the deed, and I would do it, Mr. Stair. If
you can make your daughter understand--"
"The jade will do as she is bid," he cut in wrathfully. "If she will
drag my good name in the mire, I'm damned if she sha'n't pay the scot.
And now about the settlements, Captain Ireton; you'll be making her
legatee residuary?"
At this I saw his drift again, most clearly; that he would never stickle
for his daughter's honor, but for the quieting of his title to my
father's lands--a title that my cousin Septimus might dispute. It was
enough to set me obstinate against him; but I constrained myself to
think of Margery and Richard Jennifer, and not at all of this poor petty
miser.
"I'll sign a quitclaim in her favor, if that is what you mean," I said.
"But 'tis a mere pen-scratch for the lawyers to haggle over. As you said
a while ago, the wife will be the husband's heir-at-law, in any event."
"True; but we'd best be at it in due and proper form." He rose and
hobbled to the door and was so set upon haste that his shaking hand
played a rattling tattoo on the latch. "I--I'll go and have the papers
drawn, and you will sign them, Captain Ireton; I have your passed word
that you will sign them?"
"Aye; they shall be signed."
He went away at that, and Tybee entered. Much to my comfort, the
lieutenant asked no questions; so far from it, he crossed the room
without a word, flung himself into the great chair and left me to my own
communings.
These were not altogether of assurance. Though I had promised readily
enough to make my lie a truth, I saw that all was yet contingent upon my
lady's viewing of the proposal. That I could win her over I had some
hope, if only they would leave the task for me. But there was room to
fear that this poor miser father would make it all a thing of property
and so provoke her to resistance. And, notwithstanding what he
said--that she would do as she was bid--I thought I knew her temper well
enough to prophesy a hitch. For I made sure of one thing, that if she
put her will against the world, the world would never move her.
'Twas past midnight, with Tybee dozing in his chair, when next I heard
some stirrings in the corridor. As before, it was the lifting of the
wooden bar that roused my friendly guard, and when he went to parley at
the door I stood apart and turned my back.
When I looked again my company was come. At the table, busied with a
parchment that might have been a ducal title deed for size, stood
Gilbert Stair and the factor-lawyer, Owen Pengarvin. A little back of
them the good old Father Matthieu had Margery on his arm. And in the
corner Tybee stood to keep the door.
I grouped them all in one swift eye-sweep, and having listed them,
strove to read some lessoning of my part in my dear lady's face. She
gave me nothing of encouragement, nor yet a cue of any kind to lead to
what it was that she would have me say or do. As I had seen it last,
under the light of the flaring torches in the room below, her face was
cold and still; and she was standing motionless beside the priest,
looking straight at me, it seemed, with eyes that saw nothing.
It was the factor-lawyer who broke the silence, saying, with his
predetermined smirk, that the parchment was ready for my signature.
Thinking it well beneath me to measure words with this knavish
pettifogger, I looked beyond him and spoke to his master.
"I would have a word or two in private with your daughter before this
matter ripens further, Mr. Stair," I said.
My lady dropped the priest's arm and came to stand beside me in the
window-bay. I offered her a chair but she refused to sit. There was so
little time to spare that I must needs begin without preliminary.
"What has your father told you, Margery?" I asked.
"He tells me nothing that I care to know."
"But he has told you what you must do?"
"Yes." She looked with eyes that saw me not.
"And you are here to do it of your own free will?"
"No."
"Yet it must be done."
"So he says, and so you say. But I had rather die."
"'Tis not a pleasing thing, I grant you, Margery; notwithstanding, of
our two evils it is by far the less. Bethink you a moment: 'tis but the
saying of a few words by the priest, and the bearing of my name for some
short while till you can change it for a better."
Her deep-welled eyes met mine, and in them was a flash of anger.
"Is that what marriage means to you, Captain Ireton?"
"No, truly. But we have no choice. 'Tis this, or I must leave you in the
morning to worse things than the bearing of my name. I would it had not
thus been thrust upon us, but I could see no other way."
"See what comes of tampering with the truth," she said, and I could see
her short lip curl with scorn. "Why should you lie and lie again, when
any one could see that it must come to this--or worse?"
"I saw it not," I said. "But had I stopped to look beyond the moment's
need and seen the end from the beginning, I fear I should have lied yet
other times. Your honor was at stake, dear lady."
"My honor!"--this in bitterest irony. "What is a woman's honor, sir,
when you or any man has patched and sewed and sought to make it whole
again? I will not say the word you'd have me say!"
"But you must say it, Margery. 'Tis but the merest form; you forget that
you will be a wife only in name. I shall not live to make you rue it."
"You make me rue it now, beforehand. _Mon Dieu!_ is a woman but a thing,
to stand before the priest and plight her troth for 'merest form'?
You'll make me hate you while I live--and after!"
"You'd hate me worse, Margery dear, if I should leave you drowning in
this ditch. And I can bear your hatred for some few hours, knowing that
if I sinned and robbed you, I did make restitution as I could."
She heard me through with eyelids down and some fierce storm of passion
shaking her. And when she answered her voice was low and soft; yet it
cut me like a knife.
"You drive me to it--listen, sir, _you drive me to it_! And I have said
that I shall hate you for it. Come; 'tis but a mockery, as you say; and
they are waiting."
I sought to take her hand and lead her forth, but this she would not
suffer. She walked beside me, proud and cold and scornful; stood beside
me while I sat and read the parchment over. It was no marriage
settlement; it was a will, drawn out in legal form. And in it I
bequeathed to Margery Ireton as her true jointure, not any claim of
mine to Appleby Hundred, _but the estate itself_.
I read it through as I have said, and, looking across to these two
plotters, the miser-master and his henchman, smiled as I had never
thought to smile again.
"So," said I; "the truth is out at last. I wondered if the confiscation
act had left you wholly scatheless, Mr. Stair. Well, I am content. I
shall die the easier for knowing that I have lain a guest in my own
house. Give me the pen."
'Twas given quickly, and I signed the will, with Tybee and the lawyer
for the witnesses; Margery standing by the while and looking on; though
not, I made sure, with any realizing of the business matter.
When all was done the priest found his book, and we stood before him;
the woman who had sworn to hate, and the man who, loving her to full
forgetfulness of death itself, must yet be cold and formal, masking his
love for her dear sake, and for the sake of loyalty to his friend. And
here again 'twas Tybee and the lawyer who were the witnesses; the one
well hated, and the other loved if but for this; that when the time came
for the giving of the ring, he drew a gold band from his little finger
and made me take and use it.
And so that deed was done in some such sorry fashion as the time and
place constrained; and had you stood within the four walls of that upper
room you would have thought the chill of death had touched us, and that
the low-voiced priest was shriving us the while we knelt to take his
benediction. All through this farce--which was in truth the grimmest of
all tragedies--my lady played her part as one who walks in sleep; and at
the end she let her father lead her out with not a word or look or sign
to me.
You'd guess that I would take it hard--her leaving of me thus, as I made
sure, for all eternity; and I did take it hard. For when the strain was
off, and there was no one by to see or hear save my good-hearted
death-watch, I must needs go down upon my knees beside the bed in
childish weakness, and sob and choke and let the hot tears come as I had
not since at this same bedside I had knelt a little lad to take my
mother's dying love.
XII
HOW THE NEWS CAME TO UNWELCOME EARS
Though all the western quarter of the sky was night-black and spangled
yet with stars, the dawn was graying slowly in the east when Tybee
roused me.
"They have not come for you as yet," he said; "so I took time by the
forelock and passed the word for breakfast. It heartens a man to eat a
bite and drink a cup of wine just on the battle's edge. Will you sit and
let me serve you, Captain Ireton?"
"That I will not," said I; adding that I would blithely share the
breakfast with him. Whereat he laughed and clipt my hand, and swore I
was a true soldier and a brave gentleman to boot.
So we sat and hobnobbed at the table; and Tybee lighted all the remnant
candle-ends, and broached the wine and pledged me in a bumper before we
fell to upon the cold haunch of venison.
My summons came when we had shared the heel-tap of the bottle. It was my
toast to this kind-hearted youngster, and we drained it standing what
time the stair gave back the tread of marching men. Tybee crashed his
glass upon the floor and wrung my hand across the table.
"Good by, my Captain; they have come. God damn me, sir, I'll swear they
might do worse than let you go, for all your spying. You've carried off
this matter with the lady as a gentleman should, and whilst I live, she
shall not lack a friend. If you have any word to leave for her--"
I shook my head. "No," said I; then, on second thought: "And yet there
is a word. You saw how I must see the matter through to shield the
lady?"
"Surely; 'twas plain enough for any one to see."
"Then I shall die the easier if you will undertake to make it plain to
Richard Jennifer. He must be made to know that I supplanted him only in
a formal way, and that to save the lady's honor."
The lieutenant promised heartily, and as he spoke, the oaken bar was
lifted and my reprieve was at an end.
Having the thing to despatch before they broke their fast, my soldier
hangmen marched me off without ado. The house and all within it seemed
yet asleep, but out of doors the legion vanguard was astir, and newly
kindled camp-fires smoked and blazed among the trees. In shortest space
we left these signs of life behind, and I began to think toward the end.
'Tis curious how sweet this troubled life of ours becomes when that day
wakes wherein it must be shuffled off! As a soldier must, I thought I
had held life lightly enough; nay, this I know; I had often worn it
upon my sleeve in battle. But now, when I was marching forth to this
cold-blooded end without the battle-chance to make it welcome, all
nature cried aloud to me.
The dawn was not unlike that other dawn a month past when I had ridden
down the river road with Jennifer; a morning fair and fine, its cup
abrim and running over with the wine of life. I thought the cool, moist
air had never seemed so sweet and fragrant; that nature's garb had never
seemed so blithe. There was no hint nor sign of death in all the wooded
prospect. The birds were singing joyously; the squirrels, scarce alarmed
enough to scamper out of sight, sat each upon his bough to chatter at us
as we passed. And once, when we were filing through a bosky dell with
softest turf to muffle all our treadings, a fox ran out and stood with
one uplifted foot, and was as still as any stock or stone until he had
the scent of us.
A mile beyond the outfields of Appleby Hundred we passed the legion
picket line, and I began to wonder why we went so far; wondered and made
bold to ask the ensign in command, turning it into a grim jest and
saying I misliked to come too weary to my end.
The ensign, a curst young popinjay, as little officer cubs are like to
be, answered flippantly that the colonel had commuted my sentence; that
I was to be shot like a soldier, and that far enough afield so the
volleying would not wake the house.
So we fared on, and a hundred yards beyond this point of question and
reply came out into an open grove of oaks: then I knew where they had
brought me--and why. 'Twas the glade where I had fought my losing battle
with the baronet. On its farther confines two horses nibbled
rein's-length at the grass, with Falconnet's trooper serving-man to hold
them; and, standing on the very spot where he had thrust me out, my
enemy was waiting.
'Twas all prearranged; for when the ensign had saluted he marched his
men a little way apart and drew them up in line with muskets ported. But
at a sign from Falconnet, two of the men broke ranks and came to strap
me helpless with their belts. I smiled at that, and would not miss the
chance to jeer.
"You are a sorry coward, Captain Falconnet, as bullies ever are," I
said. "Would not your sword suffice against a man with empty hands?"
He passed the taunt in silence, and when the men had left me, said: "I
have come to speed your parting, Captain Ireton. You are a thick-headed,
witless fool, as you have always been; yet since you've blundered into
serving me, I would not grudge the time to come and thank you."
"I serve you?" I cried. "God knows I'd serve you up in collops at the
table of your master, the devil, could I but stand before you with a
carving tool!"
He laughed softly. "Always vengeful and vindictive, and always because
you must ever mess and meddle with other men's concerns," he retorted.
"And yet I say you've served me."
"Tell me how, in God's name, that I may not die with that sin unrepented
of."
"Oh, in many small ways, but chiefly in this affair with the little lady
of Appleby."
"Never!" I denied. "So far as decent speech could compass it, I have
ever sought to tell her what a conscienceless villain you are."
He laughed again at that.
"You know women but indifferently, my Captain, if you think to breach a
love affair by a cannonade of hard words. But I am in no humor to
dispute with you. You have lost, and I have won; and, were I not here to
come between, you'd look your last upon the things of earth in shortest
order, I do assure you."
"You?--you come between?" I scoffed. "You are all kinds of a knave, Sir
Francis, but your worst enemy never accused you of being a fool!"
There was a look in his eyes that I could never fathom.