"Well, Dr. Anstice, I have come, as you see."
Cheniston entered the room on the stroke of nine, and Anstice turned
from the window with an oddly reluctant movement.
The golden day was dying, slowly, in the west. In the clear green sky
one or two silver stars shone steadily, and in the little garden beyond
the house the white moths circled eagerly round the tall yellow evening
primroses which reared arrogant heads among their sleeping brother and
sister flowers.
Anstice's room was lighted only by a couple of candles, placed on the
writing-table; but neither man desired a brilliant light
to-night--Anstice because he realized that this interview was a fateful
one, Cheniston because, although he had come here with the intention of
making havoc of a man's life, he was not particularly anxious to watch
that man's face during the process.
"Yes. I see you have come." Anstice pointed to a chair. "Sit down, won't
you? And will you have a drink?"
"No, thanks." Somehow Anstice's manner made Cheniston feel
uncomfortable; and it was suddenly impossible to accept hospitality of
any kind from his rival.
"Well?" As Cheniston made no attempt to seat himself, Anstice, too,
stood upright, and the two faced one another with the lighted candles
between them.
"I wonder----" Cheniston drew out his cigarette case and selected a
cigarette, which he proceeded to light with extreme care. "I wonder if
you have any idea what I have come to say?"
On his side Anstice took a cigarette from an open box before him, but he
did not light it, yet.
"I was never very good at guessing conundrums," he said coolly. "Suppose
you tell me, without more ado, why you have--honoured me to-night?"
His tone, the deliberate pause before he uttered the word, showed
Cheniston plainly that his motive was suspected, and his manner
hardened.
"I will tell you, as you wish, without more ado," he said. "Only--it is
always a little awkward to introduce a lady's name."
"Awkward, yes; and sometimes unnecessary." Anstice's eyes, stern beneath
their level brows, met the other man's in a definitely hostile gaze.
"Are you quite sure it is necessary now?"
"I think so." His tone was every whit as hostile. "The lady to whom I
refer is, as you have doubtless guessed by now, Miss Wayne."
"I gathered as much from your manner." Anstice spoke coldly. "Well? I
really don't see why Miss Wayne's name should be mentioned between us,
but----"
"Don't you?" Cheniston's blue eyes gleamed in his brown face. "I think
you do. Look here, Anstice. There is nothing to be gained by hedging.
Let us fight fair and square, gloves off, if you like, and acknowledge
that we both admire and respect Miss Wayne very deeply."
"I quite agree with that." Anstice's eyes, too, began to glitter.
"And--having said so much, what then?"
"Well, having cleared the ground so far, suppose we go a little further.
I think--you will correct me if I am wrong in my surmise--I think I am
right in saying that we both cherish a dream in regard to Miss Wayne."
His unexpected phraseology made Anstice pause before he replied. There
was a touch of pathos, an unlooked-for poetry about the words which
seemed to intimate that whatever his attitude towards the world in
general, Cheniston's regard for Iris Wayne was no light thing; and when
he replied Anstice's voice had lost a little of its hostility.
"As to your dreams I can say nothing," he said quietly. "For mine--well,
a man's dreams are surely his own."
"Certainly, when they interfere with no other man's visions." Bruce
hesitated a moment. "But in this case--look here, Anstice, once before
you shattered a dream of mine, broke it into a thousand fragments; and
by so doing took something from my life which can never be replaced. I
think you understand my meaning?"
White to the lips Anstice answered him:
"Yes. I do understand. And if ever a man regretted the breaking of a
dream I have regretted it. But----"
"Wait." Cheniston interrupted him ruthlessly. "Hear me out. It is three
years since that day in India when the woman I loved died by your hand.
Oh"--Anstice had made an involuntary movement--"I am not here to heap
blame upon you. I have since recognized that you could have done nothing
else----"
"For that, at least, I thank you," said Anstice bitterly.
"But you can't deny you did me an ill turn on that fatal morning.
And"--Cheniston threw away his cigarette impatiently--"are you prepared
to make amends--now--or not?"
For a second Anstice's heart seemed to stop beating. Then it throbbed
fiercely on again, for he knew he had guessed Bruce Cheniston's meaning.
"Make amends?" He spoke slowly to gain time. "Will you explain just what
you mean?"
"Certainly." Yet for all his ready reply Cheniston hesitated. "I
mean--we're both of us in love with Iris Wayne. Oh"--Anstice had
muttered something--"let's be honest, anyway. As to which--if either--of
us she prefers, I'm as much in the dark as you. But"--his voice was cold
and hard as iron--"having robbed me of one chance of happiness, are you
going to rob me--try to rob me--of another?"
In the silence which followed his last words a big brown moth, attracted
by the yellow candlelight, blundered into the room, and began to flutter
madly round the unresponsive flame; and in the poignant hush the beating
of his foolish wings sounded loudly, insistently.
Then Anstice spoke very quietly.
"You mean I am to stand aside and let you have a fair field with the
lady?" He could not bring himself to mention her name.
"Yes. That's just what I do mean." Cheniston spoke defiantly--or so it
seemed to the man who listened.
Again the silence fell, and again the only sound to be heard was the
soft flutter of the brown wings as the moth circled vainly round the
candle flame which would inevitably prove fatal to him by and by.
"I see." Anstice's face was very pale now. "At least you do me the
honour of looking upon me in the light of a possible rival."
"I do--and I'll go further," said Cheniston suddenly. "I have an
uncomfortable notion that if you tried you could cut me out. Oh--I'm not
sure"--he regretted the admission as soon as it was made--"after all,
Miss Wayne and I are excellent friends, and upon my soul I sometimes
dare to think I have a chance. But she has a great regard for you, I
know, and if you really set out to win her----"
"I'm afraid you overrate my capabilities," said Anstice rather
cynically. "Miss Wayne has certainly never given me the slightest reason
to suppose she would be ready to listen to me, did I overstep the bounds
of friendship."
"Of course not!" Cheniston smiled grimly. "Miss Wayne is not the sort of
girl to give any man encouragement. But as a man of honour,
Anstice"--again his voice cut like steel--"don't you think I have the
prior right to the first innings, so to speak?"
"You mean I am to stand aside, efface myself, and let you chip in before
me?" His colloquial speech accorded badly with his formal tone. "I quite
see your point of view; and no doubt you think yourself justified in
your demand; but still----"
"I do think I'm justified, yes," broke in Cheniston coolly. "After all,
if one man has a precious stone, a diamond, let us say, and another man
manages to lose it, well in the unlikely event of the two of them
discovering another stone, which of them has the best right to the new
one?"
"That's a pretty ingenious simile," said Anstice slowly. "But it's a
false premise all the same. The diamond would naturally have no voice in
the matter of its ownership. But the woman in the case might reasonably
be expected to have the power of choice."
"But that's just what I'm anxious to avoid." So much in earnest was the
speaker that he did not realize the fatuity of his words till they were
out of his mouth. Then he uttered an impatient exclamation.
"Oh, hang it all, don't let's stand here arguing. You see the point,
that's enough. I honestly feel that since it was through you that I lost
Hilda Ryder"--even though he was prepared to woo another woman his voice
softened over the name--"it will be doubly hard if you are to come
between me and the only other girl I've ever put in Miss Ryder's place."
"I see the point, as I said before," returned Anstice deliberately. "But
what I don't see is the justice of it. You've admitted I was not to
blame in doing what I did that day; yet in the same breath in which you
acquit me of the crime you expect me to pay the penalty!"
For a second this logical argument took Cheniston aback. Then, for his
heart was set on winning Iris Wayne, he condescended to plead.
"Yes. I admit all that--and I can see I haven't a leg to stand on.
But--morally--or in a spiritual sense so to speak, don't you think
yourself that I have just the shadow of a right to ask you to stand
aside?"
"Yes." His assent was unflinching, though his lips were white. "You have
that right, and that's why I'm listening to you to-night. But--don't you
think we are both taking a wrong view of the matter? What faintest
grounds have we for supposing Miss Wayne will listen to either of us?"
"Oh, that's not an insurmountable obstacle." Cheniston saw the victory
was won, and in an instant he was awake to the expediency of clinching
the matter finally. "We don't know, of course, that she will listen
either to me or to you. But for my part I am ready to take my chance.
And"--at the last moment the inherent honesty of the man came to the
surface through all the unscrupulous bargain he was driving--"my chance
is a hundred times better if you withdraw from the contest."
"I see." With an effort Anstice crushed down the tide of revolt which
swept over his heart. "As you say, I owe you something for that evil
turn I did you, unwittingly, in India. And if you fix this as the price
of my debt I suppose, as an honourable man, there is nothing for me to
do but to pay that price."
Bruce Cheniston looked away quickly. Somehow he did not care to meet the
other man's eyes at that moment.
"One thing only I would like to ask of you." Anstice's manner was not
that of a man asking a favour. "If Miss Wayne remains impervious to your
entreaties"--Cheniston coloured angrily, suspecting sarcasm--"will you
be good enough to let me know?"
"Certainly." Cheniston was suddenly anxious to leave the house, to quit
the presence of this man who spoke so quietly even while his black eyes
flamed in his haggard face. "I will try my luck at once--within the next
week or two. See here, Miss Wayne's birthday dance comes off shortly.
If, after that, I have not won her consent, I will quit the field. Is
that fair?"
"Quite fair." Suddenly Anstice laughed harshly. "And you think I can
then step forward and try my luck. Why, you fool, can't you see that for
both of us this is the psychological moment--that the man who hangs back
now is lost? I am to wait in the background while you go forward and
seize the golden minute? Well"--his voice had a bitter ring--"I've
agreed, and you've got your way; but for God's sake go before I repent
of the bargain."
Cheniston, startled by his manner, moved backward suddenly; and a chair
went over with a crash which set the nerves of both men jarring.
"When you've quite done smashing my furniture"--Anstice's jocularity was
savage--"perhaps you'll be good enough to clear out. I won't pretend I'm
anxious for more of your company to-night!"
Cheniston picked up the chair, and placed it against the table with
quite meticulous care.
"I'll go." He suddenly felt as though the man who stood opposite, the
flame from the candles flickering over his face with an odd effect of
light and shadow, had after all come off the best in this horrible
interview. "I--I suppose it's no use saying any more, Anstice. You know,
after all"--in spite of his words he felt an irresistible inclination to
justify himself--"you do owe me something----"
"Well? Have I denied it?" Now his tone was coldly dangerous. "I have
promised to pay a debt which after all was incurred quite blamelessly;
but if you expect me to enter into further details of the transaction,
you are out in your reckoning."
"I see." Suddenly the resentment which Cheniston had felt for this man
since their first meeting flamed into active hatred. "Well, I have your
word, and that's enough. As you say, this is a business transaction, and
the less said the better. Good night."
He turned abruptly away and plunged through the shadowy room towards the
door. As he reached it, Anstice spoke again.
"Cheniston." There was a note in his voice which no other man of
Anstice's acquaintance had ever heard. "In proposing this bargain, this
payment of a debt, I think you show yourself a hard and a pitiless
creditor. But if, in these circumstances, you fail to win Miss Wayne, I
shall think you are a fool--a damned fool--as well. That's all. Good
night."
Without, another word Cheniston opened the door and went out, letting it
fall to behind him with a bang. And Anstice, left alone, extinguished
both candles impatiently, as though he could not bear even their feeble
light; and going to the open window stood gazing out over the starlit
garden with eyes which saw nothing of the green peacefulness without.
And on the table, the big brown moth, scorched to death by his adored
flame in the very moment of his most passionate delight, fluttered his
burnt wings feebly and lay still.