SHORTER VISTAS
Larry had assembled his effects in the library, and to
my surprise, Stoddard appeared with his own hand-bag.
“I’m going to see Donovan well on his way,” said the
clergyman.
“It’s a pity our party must break up,” exclaimed my
grandfather. “My obligations to Mr. Donovan are very
great—and to you, too, Stoddard. Jack’s friends are
mine hereafter, and when we get new doors for Glenarm
House you shall honor me by accepting duplicate
keys.”
“Where’s Bates?” asked Larry, and the man came in,
respectfully, inperturbably as always, and began gathering
up the bags.
“Stop—one moment! Mr. Glenarm,” said Larry.
“Before I go I want to congratulate you on the splendid
courage of this man who has served you and your house
with so much faithfulness and tact. And I want to tell
you something else, that you probably would never learn
from him—”
“Donovan!” There was a sharp cry in Bates’ voice,
and he sprang forward with his hands outstretched entreatingly.
But Larry did not heed him.
“The moment I set eyes on this man I recognized
him. It’s not fair to you or to him that you should not
know him for what he is. Let me introduce an old
friend, Walter Creighton; he was a student at Dublin
when I was there,—I remember him as one of the best
fellows in the world.”
“For God’s sake—no!” pleaded Bates. He was deeply
moved and turned his face away from us.
“But, like me,” Larry went on, “he mixed in politics.
One night in a riot at Dublin a constable was killed.
No one knew who was guilty, but a youngster was suspected,
—the son of one of the richest and best-known
men in Ireland, who happened to get mixed in the row.
To draw attention from the boy, Creighton let suspicion
attach to his own name, and, to help the boy’s case
further, ran away. I had not heard from or of him until
the night I came here and found him the defender of
this house. By God! that was no servant’s trick,—it was
the act of a royal gentleman.”
They clasped hands; and with a new light in his face,
with a new manner, as though he resumed, as a familiar
garment, an old disused personality, Bates stood transfigured
in the twilight, a man and a gentleman. I think
we were all drawn to him; I know that a sob clutched
my throat and tears filled my eyes as I grasped his hand.
“But what in the devil did you do it for?” blurted
my grandfather, excitedly twirling his glasses.
Bates (I still call him Bates,—he insists on it)
laughed. For the first time he thrust his hands into his
pockets and stood at his ease, one of us.
“Larry, you remember I showed a fondness for the
stage in our university days. When I got to America I
had little money and found it necessary to find employment
without delay. I saw Mr. Glenarm’s advertisement
for a valet. Just as a lark I answered it to see
what an American gentleman seeking a valet looked
like. I fell in love with Mr. Glenarm at sight—”
“It was mutual!” declared my grandfather. “I never
believed your story at all,—you were too perfect in the
part!”
“Well, I didn’t greatly mind the valet business; it
helped to hide my identity; and I did like the humor
and whims of Mr. Glenarm. The housekeeping, after
we came out here, wasn’t so pleasant”—he looked at his
hands ruefully—“but this joke of Mr. Glenarm’s making
a will and then going to Egypt to see what would
happen,—that was too good to miss. And when the
heir arrived I found new opportunities of practising
amateur theatricals; and Pickering’s efforts to enlist
me in his scheme for finding the money and making me
rich gave me still greater opportunities. There were
times when I was strongly tempted to blurt the whole
thing; I got tired of being suspected, and of playing
ghost in the wall; and if Mr. Glenarm hadn’t got here
just as he did I should have stopped the fight and
proclaimed the truth. I hope,” he said, turning to
me, “you have no hard feelings, sir.” And he threw
into the “sir” just a touch of irony that made us all
roar.
“I’m certainly glad I’m not dead,” declared my grandfather,
staring at Bates. “Life is more fun than I ever
thought possible. Bless my soul!” he said, “if it isn’t a
shame that Bates can never cook another omelette for
me!”
We sent Bates back with my grandfather from the
boat-house, and Stoddard, Larry and I started across the
ice; the light coating of snow made walking comparatively
easy. We strode on silently, Stoddard leading.
Their plan was to take an accommodation train at the
first station beyond Annandale, leave it at a town forty
miles away, and then hurry east to an obscure place in
the mountains of Virginia, where a religious order
maintained a house. There Stoddard promised Larry
asylum and no questions asked.
We left the lake and struck inland over a rough country
road to the station, where Stoddard purchased tickets
only a few minutes before the train whistled.
We stood on the lonely platform, hands joined to
hands, and I know not what thoughts in our minds and
hearts.
“We’ve met and we’ve said good-by in many odd corners
of this strange old world,” said Larry, “and God
knows when we shall meet again.”
“But you must stay in America—there must be no
sea between us!” I declared.
“Donovan’s sins don’t seem heinous to me! It’s simply
that they’ve got to find a scapegoat,”—and Stoddard’s
voice was all sympathy and kindness. “It will
blow over in time, and Donovan will become an enlightened
and peaceable American citizen.”
There was a constraint upon us all at this moment of
parting—so many things had happened that day—and
when men have shared danger together they are bound
by ties that death only can break. Larry’s effort at
cheer struck a little hollowly upon us.
“Beware, lad, of women!” he importuned me.
“Humph! You still despise the sex on account of
that affair with the colleen of the short upper lip.”
“Verily. And the eyes of that little lady, who guided
your grandfather back from the other world, reminded
me strongly of her! Bah, these women!”
“Precious little you know about them!” I retorted.
“The devil I don’t!”
“No,” said Stoddard, “invoke the angels, not the
devil!”
“Hear him! Hear him! A priest with no knowledge
of the world.”
“Alas, my cloth! And you fling it at me after I have
gone through battle, murder and sudden death with you
gentlemen!”
“We thank you, sir, for that last word,” said Larry
mockingly. “I am reminded of the late Lord Alfred:
“I waited for the train at Coventry;
I hung with grooms and porters on the bridge,
To watch the three tall spires,—’ ”
he quoted, looking off through the twilight toward St.
Agatha’s. “I can’t see a blooming spire!”
The train was now roaring down upon us and we
clung to this light mood for our last words. Between
men, gratitude is a thing best understood in silence;
and these good friends, I knew, felt what I could not
say.
“Before the year is out we shall all meet again,” cried
Stoddard hopefully, seizing the bags.
“Ah, if we could only be sure of that!” I replied. And
in a moment they were both waving their hands to me
from the rear platform, and I strode back homeward
over the lake.
A mood of depression was upon me; I had lost much
that day, and what I had gained—my restoration to the
regard of the kindly old man of my own blood, who had
appealed for my companionship in terms hard to deny—
seemed trifling as I tramped over the ice. Perhaps
Pickering, after all, was the real gainer by the day’s
event. My grandfather had said nothing to allay my
doubts as to Marion Devereux’s strange conduct, and
yet his confidence in her was apparently unshaken.
I tramped on, and leaving the lake, half-unconsciously
struck into the wood beyond the dividing wall, where
snow-covered leaves and twigs rattled and broke under
my tread. I came out into an open space beyond St.
Agatha’s, found the walk and turned toward home.
As I neared the main entrance to the school the door
opened and a woman came out under the overhanging
lamp. She carried a lantern, and turned with a hand
outstretched to some one who followed her with careful
steps.
“Ah, Marian,” cried my grandfather, “it’s ever the
task of youth to light the way of age.”