THE UNWILLING GUEST
"But, my dear child, you must appear!" urged the bride, with a piteous
little twist of the lips. "I can't go unsupported into that dreadful
crowd."
"Oh, Mother!" Maud said. And that was all; for what was the good of
saying more? Her mother had made the choice, and there was no turning
back. They could only go forward now along the new course,
whithersoever it led. "I'll come," she said, after a moment.
Her mother's smile was full of pathos. "We must all make sacrifices for
one another, darling," she said. "I have made a very big one for you
and Bunny. He--poor little lad--isn't old enough to understand. But
surely, you, at least can appreciate it."
She looked so wistful as she spoke that in spite of herself Maud was
moved to a very unusual show of tenderness. She turned and kissed her.
"I do hope you will be happy," she said. "I expect you will, you know,
when you are used to it."
She spoke out of a very definite knowledge of her mother's character.
She knew well the yielding adaptability thereof. Giles Sheppard's
standards would very soon be hers also, and she would speedily cease to
find anything wanting in his friends.
She turned with a sigh. "Let's go and get it over!" she said. "But I
can't stay long. I shall have to get back to Bunny."
She and Bunny had spent all the afternoon and evening settling into
their new quarters at the Anchor Hotel, and it had been a tiring task.
The bride and bridegroom had gone straight from the registry-office
where the ceremony had been performed to the county town some thirty
miles distant, in the one ramshackle little motor that the hotel
possessed, and had returned barely in time to receive the guests whom
Sheppard had invited to his wedding-feast.
Neither Maud nor her mother had been told much of the forthcoming
festivity, and the girl's dismay upon learning that she was expected to
attend it was considerable. She was feeling tired and depressed. Bunny
was in a difficult mood, and she knew that another bad night lay before
them. Still it was impossible to refuse. She could only yield with as
good a grace as she could muster.
"Make yourself pretty, won't you, dear?" said Mrs. Sheppard as, her
point gained, she prepared smilingly to depart. "Wear your white silk!
You look charming in that."
Maud had not the faintest wish to look charming, but yet again she could
not refuse to gratify a wish so amiably expressed. She donned the white
silk, therefore, though feeling in any but a festive mood, and prepared
herself for the ordeal with a grim determination to escape from it as
soon as possible.
She was not tall, but her extreme slenderness gave her a decidedly regal
pose. She held her head proudly and bore herself with distinction. Her
eyes--those wonderful blue-violet eyes--had the aloof expression of one
whose soul is far away.
Giles Sheppard watched her enter the drawing-room behind her mother, and
a bitter sneer crossed his bloated face. He was utterly incapable of
appreciating that innate pride of race that expressed itself in every
line of her. He read only contempt for him and his in the girl's still
face, and the deep resentment kindled the night before began to smoulder
within him with an ever-increasing heat. How dared she show her airs
and graces here?-- She, a penniless minx dependent now upon his charity
for the very bread she ate!
He turned with an ugly jest at her expense upon his lips to the man with
whom he had been talking at her entrance; but the jest was checked
unuttered. For the man, square, thickset as a bulldog, abruptly left
his side and moved forward.
The quick blood mounted in Maud's face as he intercepted her. She
looked at him for a second as if she would turn and flee. But he held
out a steady hand to her, and she had to place hers within it.
In a moment his peculiar voice accosted her. "You remember me, Miss
Brian? I'm Jake Bolton--the horse breaker. I had the pleasure of doing
your brother a small service yesterday."
Both hand and voice reassured her. She had an absurd feeling that he
was meting out to her such treatment as he would have considered
suitable for a nervous horse. She forced herself to smile upon him; it
was the only thing to do.
He smiled in return--his pleasant open smile. "Remember me now?" he
said.
"Quite well," she answered.
"Good!" he said briefly. "Let me find you a chair! I don't suppose you
know many of the people here."
She did not know any of them, and as Sheppard had seized upon his bride,
and was presenting her in rude triumph to each in turn with much noisy
laughter and coarse joking it was not difficult to slip into a corner
with Jake Bolton without attracting further attention.
He stood beside her for a space while covertly she took stock of him.
Yes, he actually had discarded his gaiters and was wearing evening
dress. It did not seem a natural garb for him, but he carried it better
than she would have expected. He still reminded her very forcibly of
horses, though she could not have definitely said wherein this strong
suggestion lay. His ruddy face and short, dominant nose might have
belonged to a sailor. But the brilliant chestnut eyes with their
red-brown lashes were somehow not of the sea. They made her think of
the reek of leather and the thud of galloping hoofs.
Suddenly he turned and caught her critical survey. She dropped her eyes
instantly in hot confusion, while he, as if he had just made up his
mind, sat down beside her.
"So you and your brother are going to live here?" he said.
She answered him in a low voice; the words seemed to leap from her
almost without her conscious volition. "We can't help ourselves."
He gave a short nod as of a suspicion confirmed, and sat in silence for
a little. The loud laughter of Giles Sheppard's guests filled in the
pause.
Maud held herself rigidly still, repressing a nervous shiver that
attacked her repeatedly.
Suddenly the man beside her spoke. "What's the matter with that young
brother of yours?"
With relief she came out of her tense silence. "It is an injury to the
spine. He had a fall in his babyhood. He suffers terribly sometimes."
"Nothing to be done?" he asked.
She shook her head. "No one very good has seen him. He won't let a
doctor come near him now."
"Oh rats!" exclaimed Jake Bolton unexpectedly.
She felt her colour rise as he turned his bright eyes upon her.
"You don't say that a kid like that can get the better of you?" he said.
She resented the question; yet she answered it. "Bunny has a strong
will. I never oppose it."
"And why not?" He was looking directly at her with a comical smile as
if he were inspecting some quaint object of interest.
Again against her will she made reply. "I try to give him all he wants.
He has missed all that is good in life."
He wrinkled his forehead for a moment as if puzzled, then broke into a
laugh. "Say, what a queer notion to get!" he said.
She stiffened on the instant, but he did not seem to notice it. He
leaned towards her, and laid one finger--a short, square fore-finger--on
her arm.
"Tell me now--what are the good things in life?"
She withdrew her arm from his touch, and regarded him with a hauteur
that did not wholly veil her embarrassment.
"You don't know!" said Jake. "Be honest and say so!"
But Maud only retired further into her shell. "I think we have wandered
rather far from the subject," she said coldly. "My brother is
unfortunately the victim of circumstance, and no discussion can alter
that fact."
He accepted the snub without a sign of discomfiture. "Is he here now?"
he asked.
She bent her head. "In this house--yes."
"Will you let me see him presently?" he pursued.
Distantly she made reply. "I am afraid that is impossible."
"Why?" he said.
She raised her dark brows.
"Tell me why!" he insisted.
Calmly she met his look. "It is not good for him to see strangers at
night. It upsets his rest."
"You think it would be bad for him to see me?" he questioned.
His voice was suddenly very deliberate. He was looking her full in the
face.
A curious little tremor went through her. She felt as if he had
pinioned her there before him.
Her reply astounded herself. "I don't say it would be bad for
him,--only--inadvisable. He is rather excited already."
"Will you ask him presently if he would cane to see me?" said Jake
Bolton steadily.
She bit her lip, hesitating.
"I shan't upset him," he said. "I won't excite him. I'll quiet him
down."
She did not want to yield--yet she yielded. "I will ask him--if you
wish," she said.
He smiled. "Thank you, Miss Brian. You didn't want to give in, did
you? But I undertake that you will not be sorry."
"Hullo, Jacob!" blared Sheppard's voice suddenly across the room. "What
are you doing over there, you rascal? Thought I shouldn't see you, eh?
Ah, you're a deep one, you are! I daresay now you've made up your mind
that that young woman is a princess in disguise. She isn't. She's just
my step-daughter, and a very cheap article, I assure you, Jake,--very
cheap indeed!"
The roar of laughter that greeted this sally filled the room, drowning
any further remarks. Sheppard stood in the centre, swaying a little,
looking round on the assembled company with a facetious grin.
Jake Bolton rose and went to him. He stood with him for a moment, and
Maud, shivering in her corner, marvelled that he did not look mean and
insignificant beside the other's great bulk. She wondered what he said.
It was only a few words, and they were not apparently uttered with much
urgency. But Sheppard's grin died away, and she fancied that for a
moment--only for a moment--he looked a little sheepish. Then he clapped
a great hand upon Bolton's shoulder.
"All right. All right. It's for you to make the running. Come along,
ladies and gentlemen! Let us feed!"
There was a general move, and a tall, lanky young man with a white face
and black hair that shone like varnish slouched up to Maud.
"I don't see why Bolton should have all the plums," he said. "May I
have the honour of conducting you to the supper table?"
She was on her feet. She looked at him with a disdain so withering that
the young man wilted visibly before her.
"No offence meant, I'm sure," he said, shuffling his feet. "But I
thought--as you were being so pally with Jake Bolton--you wouldn't
object to being pally with me."
Maud said nothing. She was in fact so quivering with rage that speech
would have been difficult.
A very stout elderly lady, with a neck and arms that were hardly
distinguishable from the red silk dress she wore, sailed up to them.
"Come, come, Miss!" she said, beaming good-temperedly upon Maud's pale
face. "We're not standing on ceremony to-night. We're all friends
here. You won't mind going in with my boy Tom, I'm sure. He's
considered quite the ladies' man, I can assure you."
"Oh, excuse me, Mrs. Wright? Miss Brian is going in with me," said Jake
Bolton's smooth voice behind her. "Tom, you git!"
Somehow--before she knew it--the black-haired young man was gone from
her path, and her hand lay trembling within Bolton's arm.
She did not utter a word, she could not. She felt choked.
Jake Bolton said nothing either. He only piloted her through the crowd
with the smile of the winner curving the corners of his mouth.
They readied the dining-room, and people began to seat themselves around
a long centre table. There was no formal arrangement, and some
confusion ensued in consequence.
"Fight it out among yourselves!" yelled Sheppard above the din of
laughter and movement. "Make yourselves at home!"
Bolton glanced round. "There's a table for two in that alcove," he
said. "Shall we make for that?"
"Anywhere!" she said desperately.
He elbowed a way for her. The table was near a window, the alcove
draped with curtains. He put her into a chair where she was screened
from the eyes of those at the centre table. He seated himself opposite
to her.
"Don't look so scared!" he said.
She smiled at him faintly in silence.
"I gather you don't enjoy this sort of bear-fight," he said.
She remained silent. The man disconcerted her. She was burningly
conscious that she had not been too discreet in taking him even so far
into her confidence.
He leaned slowly forward, fixing her with those relentless, lynx-like
eyes. "Miss Brian," he said, his voice very level, faultlessly
distinct. "I'm rough, no doubt, but please believe I'm white!"
She looked at him, startled, unhappy, not knowing what to say.
He nodded, still watching her. "Don't you forget it!" he said. "There
are plenty of beasts in the world, but I'm not one of 'em. You'll drink
champagne, of course."
He got up to procure it, and Maud managed in the interval to recover
some of her composure.
When he came back, she mustered a smile and thanked him.
"You look fagged out," he said, as he filled her glass. "What have you
been doing?"
"Getting straight in our new quarters here," she answered. "It takes
some time."
"Where are your rooms?" he asked.
She hesitated momentarily. "It is really only one room," she said.
"But it is a fine one. I have another little one upstairs; but it is a
long way off. Of course I shall sleep downstairs with Bunny."
"Do you always sleep with him?" he asked.
She coloured a little. "Yes."
"Is he a good sleeper?" He had moved round and was filling his own
glass.
She watched his steady hand with a touch of envy. She would have given
much for as cool a nerve just then.
"Is he a good sleeper?" He repeated the question as he set down the
bottle.
She answered it at once. "No; a very poor one."
"And you look after him night and day?" Bolton's eyes suddenly
comprehended her. "I guess that accounts for it," he said, in a tone of
enlightenment.
"For what?" She met his look haughtily, determined to hold her own.
But he smiled and refused the contest. "For much," he said. "Now, what
will you eat? Lobster? That's right. I want to see you started. What
a filthy racket they are making! I hope it won't upset your appetite
any."
She had never felt less hungry in her life, but out of a queer sensation
of gratitude she tried to eat what he put before her. He had certainly
done his best to shield her from that objectionable crowd, but she was
still by no means certain that she liked the man. He was too much
inclined to take her friendship for granted, too ready to presume upon a
very short acquaintance. And she was sure--quite sure now--that he had
recognized her from the very first moment, down on the parade the night
before. The knowledge was very disquieting. He was kind--oh, yes, he
was kind. But she felt that he knew too much.
And so a certain antagonism warred against her gratitude, and prevented
any gracious expression thereof. She only longed--oh, how
desperately!--to flee away from this new and horrible world into which
she had been so ruthlessly dragged and to see no more of its inhabitants
for ever.
Vain longing! Even then she knew, or shrewdly suspected, that her lot
was to be cast in that same world for the rest of her mortal life.