A CHANCE FOR THE ROMANTIC
All was as ready as all could be made. The plans were laid, the
approaches prepared, the battalions marshaled. For so much a commander
must wait--a good one waits no longer. We went ahead. The Thursday which
Jenny had forecasted as likely to be busy turned out to be busy in fact.
One thing happened for which she gave the word--another which, as I am
persuaded, did not surprise her very much. It had to come--it had better
be over and done with. In all likelihood she gave the word for this
second thing also.
How were these words given? Ah, there I am out of my depth. In our
relations to the other sex we men are naturally on the aggressive. The
man pursued of woman exists no doubt--but as an abnormality--a queer
by-product of a civilization intent on many things non-natural. The
normal man is on the attack, and ignorant, by consequence, of the
minutiae of the science of defense. Whether the intent be surrender, or
whether it be that the moment has come for a definitive repulse of the
main attack, there are, no doubt, preliminary operations. Scouts are
called in, pickets withdrawn, skirmishes retired; all these have served
their function--have given information, have foretold the attack, have
felt the strength of the opposing forces, and held them in check while
the counsels of the defense were taken and its measures perfected. The
order is issued--Let them come on--and on they come, to their triumph or
their overthrow. But all this is woman's campaigning--to be dimly
understood in its outlines, vaguely grasped in its general principles;
but how precisely those preliminary operations are performed man, when
he has the best opportunity of discovering, is generally too flurried to
observe nicely, too deeply engaged in developing his attack to see, more
than half blindly, the maneuvers that allow him an open field for it.
Somehow then, on that Thursday, Jenny offered battle--and on two fronts.
She threw her ally Margaret open to Lacey's assault; she accepted, on
her own account, a direct attack from Dormer. She wished the offensive
operations to be practically simultaneous, and substantially achieved
the object. One took place before four in the afternoon--the other not
later than nine o'clock at night.
Keenly recognizing the fact that I was not wanted at the Priory--I am
not sure that Jenny's pointed remark that she would be glad to see me
"after dinner" did not assist the recognition--I remained in my own
quarters after returning from our couple of hours' morning work. I
rather thought that I might be called into action again later on, but I
was not concerned in the present operations.
At five in the afternoon Lacey came to me--in a state of the greatest
agitation. He just strode in, without asking any leave, and plumped
himself down by my hearthstone. His eyes were very bright, his hands and
legs seemed quite unable to keep still. Obviously something decisive had
happened.
"I've done it, Austin!" he said. "I never thought I should be so happy
in my life--and I never thought I should feel such a beast either."
"Congratulations! And explanations? It sounds a curious frame of mind."
"Margaret's accepted me--and I'm on my way to Fillingford to tell my
father. Miss Driver insisted on my doing it at once--said it was the
only square thing. Otherwise--By Jove, I'd rather charge a battery!"
He got up and began to walk about the room; its dimensions were far too
small, whether for his long legs or for his explosive state of mind.
"By gad, Austin, you should have seen how she looked!"
"Miss Driver?"
"No, no, man, Margaret. I was awfully doubtful--well, a fellow doesn't
want to talk about his feelings nor about--about what happens on that
sort of occasion, you know. Only if it hadn't been for Miss Driver, I
couldn't have bucked myself up to it, you know. Taking away her
friend--leaving her all alone again, too!" he paused a moment. "I tell
you I did think of that," he added rather vehemently.
"Most men wouldn't have thought about that at all--perhaps oughtn't to
have."
"Ah, but then what she is to both of us! Well, it went right, Austin, it
went right, by Jove!"
His voice was exalted to the skies of triumph. In an instant it dropped
to the pit of dismay. "And now I've got to tell the governor!"
"All this has happened thousands of times before," I ventured to remark
urbanely, as I filled my pipe and watched his restless striding up and
down.
That brought him to a stand--and cooled him into the bargain. "Not
quite," he said. "Not quite, Austin." His voice had become more quiet.
"You must see that there are elements in this case which--which make it
a bit different? My father's been a good friend to me. Things aren't
very flourishing with us, as I daresay you know. But I've always had
everything--and I've spent all I had, too. The election was a squeeze
for him; of course he wouldn't let me take any subscription--it was the
honor of the family. He thought of putting things straight himself
once--you know how. He'd sooner die than do that now. I'm doing what's
pretty nearly as bad to his thinking--and not putting things straight at
all! I daresay you don't sympathize with all this, but I've been brought
up to think that there's such a thing as loyalty to the family--and not
to be ashamed of it. Well, I've cut all that adrift. I couldn't help it.
But I don't know whether we can go on. It may mean"--he threw out his
hands--"a general break-up!"
"But you're set on it?" I asked.
"Isn't it a good deal too late to talk about that? When I've tried to
make her love me--and--and she does?"
"Yes, it's late in the day now. You must go to your father."
"I think I'd sooner be taken home to him with a bullet in my head."
"You'll find it won't be quite so bad as you think. Bad, but not quite
so bad, you know."
"Ah, you don't allow for--" He stopped. "Well, you remember Hatcham
Ford?"
"It seems rather long ago, Lacey."
"Not to him: he broods. If only she wasn't----!"
"'Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou Romeo!'"
"That didn't end so deuced happily, did it?"
"Only because Romeo got back at the wrong moment! Miss Driver, you say,
was pleased?"
"Yes--oh, more than that! But for her I don't believe I could have done
it. Still it's my own job--and I'm ready to face it. These things must
be meant to come, Austin."
I glanced at the clock. He laughed reluctantly and nervously. "Give a
fellow five minutes more!" he said.
"With pleasure. Spend it in thinking not of yourself, nor even of your
father--but of Margaret."
"Yes, that's right," he said eagerly. "That's the thing to think about.
That'll carry me through." He gave another unwilling laugh. "If he'd
only be violent, or kick me out, or something of that sort--like the
silly old fools in the plays! Not he! He'll behave perfectly, be very
calm and very quiet--particularly civil about Margaret herself! He'll
tell me I must judge for myself--just as he did about coming to
Breysgate. And all the while he'll be breaking his heart." He smiled at
me ruefully. "Aunt Sarah'll do the cursing--but who cares for that?"
"A good many people besides Lady Sarah will have a word to say, no
doubt."
"I don't care a damn for the lot of them--except my father," he
said--and I was glad to hear him say it. It expressed--vigorously--my
own feelings in the matter. "And don't you think I'm the happiest man on
earth?" he added a moment later.
"Earth's not heaven. Try to let Lord Fillingford see what you've shown
me."
"What do you mean, Austin?"
"You don't mind my saying it? It's another of those things that one
generally doesn't care to talk about. Try to show him that you love her
very much, and that next in order--and not quite out of sight
either--comes your father. Don't treat it casually--as if you were
telling him you were going to dine out--though I daresay that's the
etiquette. Try the open heart against the hidden one. You appreciate his
case. Show him you do. That's my advice."
"It's good advice. I'll try." He came to me holding out his hand. "And
wish me good luck!"
"You've had as fine a slice of luck to-day as happens to most men.
Here's to another!"
He wrung my hand hard. "I've made an ass of myself, I suppose!" That was
homage to the etiquette. "I'll remember what you've said. He has a case,
by Jove, and a strong one!" He smiled again. "Somehow Margaret's case
won, though," he ended.
He went his way--a straight lad and a simple gentleman. He had no idea
that any schemes had been afoot, that any wires had been pulled, either
for him or against his father--if to get this thing done were indeed
against Fillingford. Nor had he any idea that his scruples about family
loyalty were to be annihilated by the intervention of a fairy godmother.
Jenny had stuck to the romantic color of her scheme. She sent him forth
to meet his father with no plea in extenuation, with no proffer of gold
wherewith to gild the hated name of Octon. His fight was to be
single-handed. So she chose to prove his metal--with, perhaps, a
side-thought that the fairy godmother's intervention, coming later,
might be more effective--and would certainly gain in picturesqueness!
That notion, unflattering maybe, one could not easily dismiss when the
workings of her mind were in question. Yet it might be that a finer idea
was there--that it was not only Lacey's metal which was to be proved
that night. She had said that she was ready to bribe, that she might
have to bully--and implied that she was prepared to do both at once, if
need be. But had it come across her thoughts that, by divine chance, she
might have to do neither? She knew Fillingford's love for his son; she
had sent Margaret to met Fillingford that he might see her as she was.
She might be minded now to prove if love alone would not serve the turn.
The battalions might all be held in leash--and the God of Love himself
sent forth as herald to a parley. If Fillingford surrendered to that
pleading, the victory would not be so purely Jenny's: but she would, I
believed, have the grace to like it better. That it was a less
characteristic mode of proceeding had to be admitted: but to-day there
would be an atmosphere at the Priory which might incline her to it. She
would not force Fillingford, if she need not--neither by threats nor by
bribes. Being myself, I suppose, somewhat touched by Amyas Lacey's
exaltation, I found myself hoping that she would try--first--the appeal
of heart to heart. That she would accept it as final--I knew too much to
look for that.
The case could not, in its nature, be so simple. With the appeal of love
must come that relief from a greater fear which she had carefully
implanted, on which she certainly reckoned. That was in the very marrow
of her plan; no romantic fancies could get rid of it. The best excuse
for it lay in the fact that it would certainly be useful, and was
probably necessary. When things are certainly useful and probably
necessary, the world is apt to exhibit toward them a certain leniency of
judgment. Jenny did not set herself above the world in moral matters.
I went up to the Priory after dinner, availing myself of Jenny's
strictly defined invitation. But up there I made a blunder. I blundered
into a room where one person at least did not want me--I am not so sure
about the other. Dormer had gone clean out of my head; more serious
matters were to the front. Heedlessly I charged into the library; there
were he and Jenny! Luckily I seemed to have arrived only at the tail-end
of their conversation. "Quite final," were the words I heard from her
lips as I opened the door. She was standing opposite Dormer, looking
demurely resolute, but quite gentle and friendly. He was looking not
much distressed, but most remarkably sulky.
I tried to back out, but she called me in. "Come in, Austin. You're just
in time to bid Mr. Dormer good night."
He shrugged his shoulders. "I suppose I'd better be off. I'll pick up
the car at the stables."
"Good night. We shall see you again some day soon?"
"I don't know about that. I may go away for a bit--and anyhow I expect
to be pretty busy."
"Oh, yes, we shall see you again some day soon!" she said very kindly
and persuasively. "You won't let it be too long, will you? And you will
see Mr. Cartmell about that business, won't you?"
He nodded in an offhand surly fashion--but he might be excused for being
a little out of temper. Evidently he was not going to get Jenny's land;
apparently she was still to get what she wanted of his. "You'll have to
pay for them!" he reminded her, almost threateningly.
"A fancy price for my fancy? Well, I'm always ready to pay that," said
Jenny. "Good night and, mind you, quite soon!" Her tone implied real
anxiety to see her friend again; under its influence he gave a
half-unwilling nod of assent.
I escorted him as far as the hall door--further than that he declined my
company. I held a match for him to light his cigar and gave him a
stirrup-cup. "Good night, Austin!" Then his irritation got the better of
him. "Damn it, does she want Lacey for herself, after all?" Evidently
the great event of the day--from our point of view--had not been
confided to him.
"Oh, no, you may be sure she doesn't."
"Then what the deuce she does want I don't know--and I don't believe she
does!" With this parting grumble he slouched off sulkily toward the
stable.
As a humane man, I was sorry for his plight; Jenny was still serenely
ruthless.
"Annoyed, isn't he?" she asked when I rejoined her. "Really I was rather
glad when you came in. He had got as far as hinting that I--he put a
good deal of emphasis on his 'you'--ought to have jumped at him! It's
quite possible that he'd have become more explicit--though it wouldn't
have come very well from him under the circumstances."
"You've deluded the young man, you know."
"Oh, it'll do him good," she declared impatiently. "Didn't he deserve to
be deluded? He wanted me for what I had, not for myself. Well, I don't
so much mind that, but I tell you, Austin, he patronized me! I may be a
sinner, but I'm not going to be patronized by Gerald Dormer without
hitting back."
"Did you quarrel?"
She smiled. "No. I'm never going to quarrel any more. He'll be back here
in no time--and have another try most likely! You see, I'm going into
training--a course of amiability, so as to be ready for Lady Sarah." She
sprang to her feet. "Do you know that this is a most exciting evening?"
"Oh, yes, I can imagine that. I've had a long talk with Lacey."
"Have you? Isn't he splendid, poor boy? You should have seen his face
when I sent him to her! He thought of nothing but her then--but I like
him for thinking of his father now. And I've brought it off, Austin! He
thinks there may be just a pretty wedding present--a trousseau check,
perhaps!" She came up to me. "This is a good thing I've done--to set
against the rest."
"I think it is. But the boy feels horribly guilty."
She nodded. "I know--and so does poor Margaret. I'm afraid she's crying
up in her own den--and that's not right for to-night, is it?"
"Love's joy and woe can be simultaneous as well as alternate, I'm
afraid."
"I can't stand it much longer." She looked at the clock. "He's to send
word over to-night, if he can--by a groom--how he's got on--breaking
the news, you know. Let's go out into the garden and wait for this
important messenger. But, whatever he says, I believe I shall have to
put my oar in to-morrow. I can't have my poor Margaret like this much
longer. She knows now why she was taken to Mr. Alison's, and does
nothing but declare that she behaved atrociously!"
We were a silent pair of watchers. Jenny's whole soul seemed absorbed in
waiting. She spoke only once--in words which betrayed the line of her
thoughts. "If I'd thought it would be as bad as this--for her, I mean--I
believe I'd have brought her here under another name, in spite of
everything, and perpetrated a fraud! I could have told them after the
wedding!"
I was afraid that she would have been quite capable of such villainy
where Margaret was in question, and not altogether averse from a
_denoument_ so dramatic.
"Either Lacey's shirked the interview--or it's been a very long one," I
remarked, as the clock over the stables struck half-past ten. "Poor
Dormer's home by now--to solitude!"
"Oh, bother Mr. Dormer and his solitude! Listen, do you hear hoofs?"
"I can't say I do," I rejoined, lighting my pipe.
"How you can smoke!" she exclaimed scornfully. Really I could not do
anything else--in view of the tension.
A voice came from above our heads: "Jenny, are there any signs?"
"Not yet, dear," called Jenny, and waved her arms despairingly. "Ah!"
She held up her hand and rose quickly to her feet. Now we heard the
distant sound of hoofs. "I wonder if he's written to me or to her!" She
started walking toward the drive.
"To you, I'll be bound!" I answered as I followed.
In a few moments the groom rode up. Jenny was waiting for him, took the
letter from him, and opened it.
"No answer," she said. "Thank you. You'll ask them to give you a glass
of beer, won't you?"
The man thanked her, touched his hat, and rode off to the servants'
quarters.
"In old days the bearer of bad tidings wouldn't have got a glass of
beer," I suggested.
"The tidings are doubtful." She gave me the letter: "He is terribly cut
up. He promises me an answer to-morrow. I haven't told him yet that I
must stick to it _anyhow_. That's for to-morrow, too, if it must come.
My love to her.--AMYAS."
"It'd be so much better if he never had to say that," Jenny reflected
thoughtfully.
Certainly it would. If the thing could be managed without a rupture,
without defiance on the one side or an unyielding posture on the other,
it would be much more comfortable for everybody afterwards.
"Still, you know, he's ready to do it if he must." Her pride in her
romantic handiwork spoke again.
Suddenly Margaret was with us, out of breath from her run downstairs,
gasping out a prayer for the letter. Jenny gave it to her, and she read
it. She looked up to Jenny with terrified eyes.
"He mustn't do it for me. I must give him up, Jenny," she murmured,
woefully forlorn.
Very gently, just the least scornfully, Jenny answered, "We don't give
things up at Breysgate." She stooped and kissed her. "Go and dream that
it's all right. It will be by this time to-morrow. Austin and I have a
little business to talk over."
Having thus dismissed Margaret (who carried off the precious distressful
letter with her), Jenny led me back into the library, bidding me to go
on smoking if I really must. She sat down, very thoughtful.
"It's delicate," she said. "Of course I'm trying to bribe him, but I
don't want to seem to do it. If I make my offer before he decides, that
looks like bribing. If he decides against us, and we make it
then--bribery still! But in addition to bribery, there'll be the bad
feeling between Amyas and him. No, we must do it before he decides! Only
you'll have to be very diplomatic--very careful how you do it."
"I shall have to be?" I exclaimed fairly startled. "I----!"
"Well, I can't go to him, can I?" she asked. "That really would be too
awkward!" She smiled at the thought of the suggested interview.
"Pens, ink, and paper!" I suggested, waving a hand toward the
writing-table.
"No, no--I want the way felt. If you see he's going to give in
without--without the bribe--of course you say nothing about it till he's
consented. That'd be best of all; then there's no bribe really. But if
he looks like deciding against us, then you tactfully offer the bribe.
You must be feeling his mind all the time, Austin."
"And if he has already decided against us?"
She looked at me resolutely. "Remind him that it's not as bad as it
might be."
"Bribe--and bully?"
"Yes." She met my eyes for a minute, then turned her head away, with a
rather peevish twist of her lips.
"This is a pleasant errand to send a respectable man on! Do you want me
to go to him at the Manor?"
"Yes--the very first thing after breakfast, so as to catch him, if you
can, before he has had time to pronounce against us, if that's what he's
going to do. A man surely wouldn't do a thing like that before
breakfast! You'll go for me, Austin?"
"Of course I'll go for you if you want me to."
"Then I'll give you your instructions."
She gave them to me clearly, concisely, and with complete decision. I
heard her in a silence broken only once--then by a low whistle from me.
She ended and lay back in her chair, her eyes asking my views.
"You're in for another big row if you do this, you know," I remarked to
her.
"Another row? With whom?"
"Why, with Cartmell, to be sure! It's so much more than's necessary."
"No, it's not," she declared rather hotly. "It may be more than's
necessary for her, or perhaps for Lord Fillingford. It's not more than
is necessary for me--nor for Leonard."
I shrugged my shoulders. She laughed rather impatiently. "One's friends
always want one to be a niggard!" She leaned forward to me, breaking
into a coaxing smile, "Remember 'the handsome thing,' dear Austin."
I came to her and patted her hand. "I'm with you right through. And,
after all, you'll still have a roof over your head."
She looked at me with eyes merry, yet foreseeing. "I shan't be in at all
a bad position." She laughed. "No harm in that--so long as it doesn't
interfere with Margaret?"
"No harm in the world. I was only afraid that you'd lost sight of it."
Jenny sighed and smiled. "You needn't be afraid of such a complete
transformation as that," she said.