LANDMARKS.
When the ladies had left the table and gone into the garden Elizabeth
moved restlessly from one to another. Before very long the gentlemen
joined them, when Edmonson, after a little engineering, a few moments of
detention here and there, came up to her as she was sauntering with
several others on the bank of the little river. He contrived to separate
her from the rest and walked with her a few steps behind them. His
vivacity had not deserted him, and she felt that it would be no effort
to talk to him, and that in listening she should be enough interested
not to forget herself.
"How beautiful it is here," she began.
"Yes, but I don't care much for landscape when I can get anything
better, and a woman who knows life and understands how to make herself
entertaining is a great deal better. Therefore, at present I have no
eyes for scenery."
"Well, what is it?" cried Elizabeth, with a smile that was a flash,
possibly of annoyance, rather than a gleam of pleasure. "As the saying
goes, what axe have you to grind, Master Edmonson? All this flattery
must be for some object. Can I do anything for you? If only I had
influence with the Grand Mogul, or any other high official, I would
speak to him for you with pleasure. You see your cause is already won,
so don't waste any more powder." And she turned to him with a little
laugh that was both bitter and defiant. It was a bad time to tell
Elizabeth Royal that she had powers of fascination. It was possible that
Edmonson understood her, for his observations, though not openly
expressed like Sir Temple Dacre's, were more pertinent. But this seemed
to him an opportunity not to be lost. "The voice that soothes the wounds
of vanity is always welcome," he mused. "I only meant that it pleased me
to talk with you," he answered. "I had no intention of gilding refined
gold. As you so frankly conclude I have an axe to grind, there is no
reason why I should hide the fact. But you can not grind it, else I
should come to you. I am equal to that. And he looked at her, first with
a cool audacity in his eyes, which he knew she would meet; and then as
he held her gaze with a sudden softening from which she turned away.
"Then, if I can not, why don't you ask some one who can, Colonel
Archdale, for instance? He likes to be obliging--that is, I take it for
granted he does."
"Perhaps I shall." They had left the water now and were following the
path up toward the house. There was a pause. "The air of this place does
not agree with you," he began abruptly, "You are much paler than when
you came."
"I am happy to say it is quite the contrary with you," she answered.
"Our sea breezes have given you the hue of health."
"Yes, that--and other things. You turn away from any reference to your
self, but you can never prevent my caring more for your welfare than for
anything else in the world." He was speaking softly in tones that were
deep with earnestness. There was no doubt that in some way she did
fascinate him.
She came to a halt and looked him full in the face without a blush, an
added pallor, or any sign of emotion. At that moment she felt herself
Archdale's wife, and felt, too, that Edmonson considered her so.
"You can't have any great objects in your life, then, if you fritter
away your interest on an idle acquaintance whom you will forget as soon
as you are out of her sight, and, if you'll pardon me, who will forget
you, except when something calls up your name, or a reminiscence of
you." Even Edmonson as he stood staring at her drew his breath like one
recovering from a shock. Then as he looked her face changed and he saw
tears on her lashes. She reached out her hand toward him and raised her
eyes to his with a pathetic appeal. "I know it's the habit of gentlemen
to make gallant speeches," she said, "probably more in your own country
than here; we are more simple, and as for me, I'm ignorant, I know that
very well. I am not as quick as other people, I suppose, but I don't
like this sort of thing, I never shall. Somehow, it hurts me, it seems
as if one despised me. Well, never mind, it's not that, of course; you
are in the habit of doing it, because it's the fashion. But why won't
you talk to me naturally, just as other people do?"
Edmonson looked at her with absorbed attention. He was convinced. The
thing was incredible, but it was true. She was not feigning, she did not
understand him. Her blindness came from one of two causes, either she
was incapable of passion, or her heart was not yet aroused. For he
argued that if she had loved any one she must have read him.
"I will do as you ask me," he said simply, taking the only course that
was open to him unless he had wished to banish himself entirely. But as
he walked slowly on beside her again the evil look came into his
downcast eyes, and the shadow darted out in his thoughts terrible and
triumphant.
When they were near the house, and she was about to turn back again
toward the others, still enjoying the summer air, he said. "Will you
come with me into the hall? I want to ask you about something I noticed
there." This was only so far true that he had found the antlers which he
remembered hung there an excuse to stand face to face with her a few
moments longer, and to talk with her, and have her answers even about
these trivial things all to himself before the others came. It was of no
use to pretend to himself now that disappointed ambition was the cause
of his chagrin at losing Elizabeth; his feeling was not chagrin, it was
something like fury. He had never denied himself anything, he would not
deny himself now. As to this woman who the higher he found, and the more
he admired her, the more she eluded him, and with every unconscious
movement drew tighter the chain that bound him; he had a purpose
concerning her. He was not capable of deep or continued devotion, but
when he had an object in view nothing mattered to him but that. If he
gained it, doubtless something else would absorb him; if he
lost--blackness filled this blank, but here he had resolved not to lose.
As he stood in the hall with Elizabeth beside the open door and watched
her delicate face and perceived the readiness with which she answered
his questions in full, as if glad of so simple a subject, he said to
himself, "That fancy of hers for me was lighter than I thought. She has
not yet quaffed the nectar of love--not yet--not yet." He gave little
attention to her story of the shooting of the stag, Stephen's feat when
a boy of fourteen; she did not of course know as much of the history of
the Archdales as did the petted young beauty to whom he had been talking
before dinner, and she in the midst of her fluent account wondered in
her own mind where she had heard it all, and remembered that it had been
one of Katie's stories when they were at school together.
"You see how large a creature it must have been," she finished, "the
forehead hangs quite low, but I can't touch the tip of the under branch
of this antler." She made the effort as she spoke, and reaching up on
tiptoe, caught at the antler to steady herself. It swung a little on one
side, and she stood looking at the hole torn in the tapestry by
Stephen's gun on that day, when he had gone into the woods in desperate
mood. It had been covered, and no one had noticed it, unless, possibly,
the servants in dusting, but, if so, they had not told of the accident,
not wishing to run the risk of being blamed for it.
"Did I do that?" asked Elizabeth. It seemed to her as if to have injured
an Archdale to the value of a pin would be intolerable.
"No indeed," said Edmonson. "I saw it just as you moved. The antler is
smooth here, see." And he made her pass her hand over the polished
surface above the tear. "Perhaps there is some roughness in the wall,"
he added, "it may be a nail under the tapestry that somebody found out
before we came."
She reached up eagerly.
"No," she said, "something must have struck against it and caught it,
for so far from being rough here, it's hollow. I can put my finger into
it; it is one of the openings between the beams." They went on talking
while Elizabeth's finger was unconsciously tapping the wall through the
torn hanging. All at once she broke off in the midst of what she was
saying to cry, "Why, there certainly is something very strange here; it
is like the canvas of a picture. Touch it, and see if it does not feel
so to you."
Edmonson reached up his hand as she withdrew hers. His eyes seemed to
scintillate as he felt the surface of the canvas under his finger; his
face flushed deeply; it was with effort that he restrained a jubilant
cry, and his tones betrayed a triumph that he could not hide, while
excitement broke through his barriers of measured words.
"Really, we must look into this," he said. "This may be El Dorado
to--some of us. Let us wager, Mistress Royal, whom it most concerns,
you, or me."
"I suppose it's some old family portrait and belongs to the Colonel,"
she answered.
"Yes, I suppose so," he said, waiving the question of the wager as she
had done. "Don't you propose to ask him?"
Elizabeth looked amazed, then flushed deeply as she realized her
imprudence in having spoken of the canvas.
"Certainly not," she answered. "I don't see how what Colonel Archdale
has on his walls concerns me."
"I should think a possible daughter-in-law would feel somewhat
differently." She winced, then answered coolly; "She ought not."
"Well, at least, _I_ am curious. I own it. I must see what we have
unearthed here. Won't you ask the Colonel to show us his private
portrait gallery? He will do anything for you, I notice."
"Certainly not," she answered.
"Certainly he won't do everything for you, or certainly you will not ask
him--which?" insisted Edmonson.
"Both. I shall never test him, and I shall make no comments on what I
may find on his walls. Nor will you, Master Edmonson, for no gentleman
would."
"Do you object to my seeing it?" She looked at him wonderingly.
"Why should I, if it were open? But I will tell you what I do object to,
to my coming here and seeming to pry upon--the family. I wish it had
been somebody else instead of me who had found it, or that it had never
been found at all. I beg you will spare me, Master Edmonson," And she
looked at him with the rare entreaty of a proud nature.
"Perhaps it's not a picture after all," he said. "You may be mistaken.
Don't you think so?"
"No," she answered. "I am not mistaken, but--."
"Don't fear that I shall speak one word," he cried as she hesitated. "I
would sooner lose my life than annoy you, to say nothing of losing my
amusement. If I can't see what is behind the hanging without doing that,
why, I'll not see it at all."
"Thank you," she said gratefully, dwelling only upon the first part of
his speech. "I was sure you would feel so."
"Yes, words and questions would be a clumsy way. I'll show you a
better." And while she looked at him wondering what he meant, he turned
from her and in an instant, bringing up a chair, had stepped upon it and
made with his penknife a line across what he judged would be the top of
the picture. Feeling along the length of this with his finger he cut a
perpendicular line from each end of it, so that the tapestry fell down
like the end of a broad ribbon, and showed that Elizabeth had not been
at fault in her supposition. He had stepped down from the chair,
replaced it, and returned to her side while she still stood in dumb
consternation. He was smiling. "There!" he said. The thing had been done
in a flash; he had scarcely glanced at the painting, until, as he spoke,
he fell back a step. Then he caught her arm.
"Look!" he cried hoarsely, "Look!"
But he need not have told her to look, she was doing it with eyes wide
open and lips parted and motionless. "I was right, you see. I had a
right to do this," he said.
She drew away from the grasp that he still laid on her arm in his
absorption. "Yes, I was right," he repeated. "Do you see?"
"No," she answered, "I understand nothing. Explain yourself. Or wait. It
is time now to call Colonel Archdale. You will explain to him this
liberty, and the meaning of this--this strange coincidence."
"Ah, ha!" he cried. "You see it? Everybody will see it; isn't it so?
Tell me," he insisted.
"I suppose so," she faltered, looking at his triumphant face and feeling
a presentiment that some evil was to fall upon the Archdale family. If
so she would have helped to bring it.
"Let us send for him," repeated Edmonson. "Or, no. Let us surprise them
all, give them an entertainment not planned by mine admirable host.
Come, let us go out into the garden, and when we return, here will be a
new face to greet us. That will be more as you wish it? I want it to be
as you wish."
"You have not considered me at all."
"The day will come when you will not say that," he answered, looking at
her fixedly, then turning away with abruptness. "We must name our new
friend," he added. "Suppose we call him Banquo's ghost? Banquo's ghost,
you remember, existed to only one person. Did you ever see him on the
stage? You must, some day in London. He rises up in solemn majesty from
a secret trap door, and overwhelms Mac--Well! here's the trap door."
And he touched the slashed tapestry with his finger. "Shall I tell you
why I call him so?" he went on, coming close to her as if about to
whisper some secret.
"No," she said, drawing back. "If you know any secrets belonging to this
family, I don't want to hear them. You will be obliged to apologize to
the Colonel for defacing his wall, and whatever explanation you have to
give, will be given to him."
Edmonson watched her with a smile.
"Do you know," he said, "that you have an exaggerated conscience? But
you have the faculty of making it seem charming. As you please, then. I
will give my explanation to the Colonel as soon as he is ready for
it--as soon, and even before. Shall we go into the garden again until
somebody comes?"
Elizabeth did not answer immediately. She stopped on the threshold where
she had been standing and looked at the speaker with an expression he
could not read. She had thought well of this young man. Was it going to
be that she could no longer believe in him? She did not care so much for
that in itself, but it seemed as if all the world in which she had
moved, the ideal world founded on beauty and nobleness, even if, indeed,
one cornerstone of it were pain, had fallen to pieces about her. Among
so many ruins the ruin of another ideal would not be so very much, but
it would give more pain than was due to itself. As she looked up at him
Edmonson's face lost its exultation. "Perhaps I am mistaken; I ought to
hear before I judge," she thought.
"I would rather stay here," she said at last. "There are footsteps
now--it is Master Archdale." She thought as she spoke that the girlish
figure walking beside him was Katie's, but when the two came nearer she
saw that it was not his cousin to whom Stephen was talking so merrily,
but another of his mother's guests. Katie was in the distance with
Kenelm Waldo. Bulchester had disappeared for the moment--no, he was with
Madam Archdale. As these and others sauntered up to the hall, Edmonson
partially closing the opening by pushing the tapestry behind the
antlers, retreated, and occupied himself with an examination of these
long branches that like a personal weapon had divided the thick
underbrush of his way before him. It was not until most of the party
were in the hall, not until the Colonel had come in with Madam
Pepperell, that he suddenly went forward and drew down the cut tapestry,
and at the moment put himself into the same attitude with the man in the
picture, and in this attitude stood with his eyes glancing keenly from
one to another of the spectators.
There was a murmur, not rising to articulateness, which seemed to be
surprise at the sight of the portrait so unexpectedly disclosed. Then
followed a breathless hush. It was in the hush that Edmonson's eyes were
busiest. But that, too, was short. For, a cry of astonishment rose from
nearly every one in the hall. This, though coming from many throats, had
but one import.
"What a likeness! Perfect! Wonderful! How came it there? How came
_he_ here? What does it mean?"
From Edmonson, standing motionless, the assembly looked toward Stephen,
and from him, plainly as much at a loss as themselves, they turned their
eyes where his were already fixed, upon the face of his father. But the
Colonel, pale and amazed, with a dark shadow fallen upon his face from
the door near by him--or perhaps from some door opening in his own
breast--seemed no more able than the others to read the riddle. Indeed,
he was the first to ask the explanation that all were seeking.
"When and how did you bring that picture here?" he said. "And whose
portrait is it?" For he had rejected the first suggestion of its being
Edmonson himself. The dress belonged to an earlier period, and the face
was that of a man somewhat older; it could not be thought of as the
portrait of the young man standing beside it; it was simply a marvellous
likeness.
"I found it here," returned Edmonson with a bow. "I have seen the copy
of it many times, this is the original painting by Lely. It came here--I
mean to the Colonies--by one of those mistakes that one member of a
family sometimes, perpetrates upon the others. How it ever got behind
this hanging it is out of my province to tell. I yield the field to
Colonel Archdale."
"I know nothing of it," said that gentleman. "The house was built when I
was a child. It was one of the preparations for my father's second
marriage. The tapestry is an heirloom; it is so old that I am always
afraid of its tearing, and it is never taken from the wall. My house is
at the disposal of my guests, to be sure, but none of them could have
destroyed anything else that I should have felt the injury to so
keenly."
"It was not willingly done," returned Edmonson, "it was by the impulse
of fate. As to the picture, it does not seem strange that we expect
Colonel Archdale to know whom his own family portraits represent."
"It may not seem strange, but it is not unprecedented to be ignorant,"
answered his host. "My father must have known, but in obeying his
injunctions as to care of the tapestry I had no idea that I was keeping
anything but bare walls from view. Even these antlers are fastened to a
great nail in one of the beams. I remember it since I was a child. The
hanging was fitted over it, and I was glad when it was put to use in
this way."
"Yes, no doubt he could tell us about the portrait if we could only get
at him," returned Edmonson coming back to his subject. "But as to who
the gentleman is, and why you have flattered me so far as to be able to
discover any likeness between us, I owe you all an explanation. And
Colonel Archdale, another one besides, which I am most ready to make,
for having presumed to search out the painting when I found by accident
that there was one behind here. No time is so good as the present. Then,
too, I have aroused the curiosity of these ladies and gentlemen, and I
am afraid they will owe me a grudge if I don't gratify it by telling the
whole story."
"Indeed we shall," cried Katie Archdale.
Bulchester had entered behind the others unseen in the concentration of
attention upon the portrait and its exhibitor, and had spent his moment
of amazement in silence. He now glided up to Edmonson and said something
to him in an undertone too low to be caught by anyone else. The other
replied by a look of scorn, and a muttered something that sounded very
like, "You always were a fool." Then he stood silent, glancing first at
Stephen, and then at the Colonel. The young man faced him in haughty
defiance of his manner which made his words almost insulting. The elder
stood with his suavity a little disturbed, it is true; but no one except
Edmonson found fear in his face, or interpreted what he said as a desire
of postponement when he suggested that if there were anything
interesting to be heard they should wait until all the stragglers had
come up, and then adjourn to the drawing-room where they would be more
comfortable.
Edmonson bowed slightly in answer, smiled, thanked him, but observed
that it was most flattering to an orator to find his audience increase
as he went on, and began:
"I am to tell you who this gentleman of the portrait is, and why I
resemble him."
All at once Stephen glanced at Elizabeth. He had found her in the hall
with Edmonson. Had she any hand in this unveiling of an ancestral face?
He thought of the possibility of shame that might follow--of shame,
because he remembered the talk of the two men in the woods and the old
butler's look at Edmonson that very morning. If this triumphant fellow
had any such thing to tell, did she already know it? Was she upon such
terms of intimacy with him as this? She stood apart, still near the
doorway where Edmonson had left her. None of the curiosity expressed
everywhere else was in her face. She seemed scarcely listening; she
looked as if she were far away and the people about her and the words
they were saying belonged to a different world. But it was not so, for
it was the consciousness that she was in the world about her and bound
to it that gave her the expression of struggle. Chains held her when she
wanted to be free. She was one too many here. Before her was Archdale's
face as he had looked at Katie, and between these two a stupid woman
whom she had no patience with, whom she hated--herself. And now there
might be coming an added pain that she had brought. She did not care
especially for Archdale's pain, except that it was of her bringing.
But Edmonson went on talking, and Stephen, like the others, forgot
everything in listening. He saw his father's brows contract, and knew
that he was biting his under lip hard, as he did when he was much
troubled.
Edmonson still went on with his story. He certainly made it interesting.
Stephen's secret uneasiness passed into surprise, distrust, conviction,
inward disturbance as he stood with his haughty air unchanged.