THE LAST ENTRENCHMENT
On that Friday morning Arthur's seclusion--for thus his stay at Hilsey
might be described, so remote it seemed from the rest of his life, so
isolated and self-contained--was invaded by the arrival of two letters
concerned with matters foreign to Hilsey and its problems or emotions.
The first he opened was from Joe Halliday and treated of the farce. Joe
wrote with his usual optimism; prospects were excellent; the company
which had been engaged was beyond praise. But there was a difficulty, a
hitch. The producer, Mr. Langley Etheringham, a man of authority in his
line, declared that the last act needed strengthening, and that he knew
what would strengthen it. The author, Mr. Claud Beverley, denied that it
needed strengthening and (still more vigorously) that Mr. Etheringham
knew how to do it. There was friction. Joe was undecided between the
two. "We three are going to meet on Sunday and have a good go at it," he
wrote. "Thrash the thing out, you know, and get at a decision. I've got
Claud to agree to so much after a lot of jaw--authors are silly asses,
sometimes, you know. Now I want you to come up to-morrow or next day,
and go through the piece with me, and then come on Sunday too. You'll
bring a fresh mind to it that will, I think, be valuable--I seem to know
it so well that I really can't judge it--and you've put in so much of
the money that both Claud and Langley (though he's a despotic sort of
gent) will be bound to listen to your opinion, whatever it is. Come if
you can, old chap. I've no doubt of success anyhow, but this is rather
important. Above all, we don't want Claud and Langley at loggerheads
even before we begin rehearsals."
Frowning thoughtfully, Arthur proceeded to read the second letter. It
came from Henry. "I beg to inform you that Messrs. Wills and Mayne rang
up at two o'clock to-day to ask if you were in town. I had to say that
you had been called away on business but could be here to-morrow (in
accordance with your instructions). They replied that they regretted the
matter could not wait. I did not therefore wire you, but I think it
proper to inform you of the matter. Yours obediently----"
Appeal from Joe Halliday, plain though tacit reproach from Henry! A
chance lost at the Temple! How big a chance there was no telling; there
never is in such cases. A cry for help from the Syndicate! His
legitimate mistress the Law was revenging herself for his neglect;
Drama, the nymph of his errant fancy, whom he had wooed at the risk of a
thousand pounds (or indeed, if a true psychology be brought to bear on
the transaction, of fifteen hundred), might do the like unless he
hastened to her side.
Pangs of self-reproach assailed Arthur as he sat on the lawn, smoking
his pipe. Moreover he was not in such perfect good humour with Hilsey as
he was wont to be. The miscarriage of his excursion rankled in his mind;
the perfection of his harmony with Bernadette was a trifle impaired;
there had been a touch of aloofness in her manner the last two days.
Godfrey was too grumpy for words. Finally, to-day Oliver Wyse was
coming. Was Hilsey really so fascinating that for its _beaux yeux_ a man
must risk his interests, neglect his profession, and endanger, even by
the difference of a hair, a dramatic success which was to outvie the
triumph of _Help Me Out Quickly_? Yet he was annoyed at having to put
this question to himself, at having to ask himself how he stood towards
Hilsey and how Hilsey stood to him. And, down in his heart, he knew that
it would be very difficult to go if Bernadette really wanted him to
stay--and a very distressful departure for him if it appeared that she
did not!
Judith came out of the house, crossed the lawn, and sat down in a chair
opposite him. They had met earlier in the day, and greeting did not seem
necessary to Arthur's preoccupied mind. He was smoking rather hard, and
still frowning over his problem. Judith, on the other hand, seemed to be
engaged with some secret source of amusement, although amusement of a
rather sardonic order. Her mouth was twisted in a satirical smile--not
at Arthur's expense, but at the expense of some person or persons
unknown.
Arthur did not notice her expression, but presently he announced to her
the outcome of his thoughts.
"I think I shall have to go back to town to-morrow for a bit; some
business has turned up."
Her eyes met his quickly and, somehow, rather suspiciously. "Oh, don't
you run away too!" she said.
"Run away too! What do you mean? Who's running away? What are you
grinning at, Judith?" The word, though not complimentary, really
described the character of her smile.
"Godfrey's gone to bed."
"Gone to bed? Why, he was at breakfast!"
"I know. But he says he got up feeling seedy, and now he feels worse. So
he's gone to bed."
Arthur looked hard at her, and gradually smiled himself. "What's the
matter with him?"
"He says he's got a bad liver attack. But I--I think he's left out the
first letter."
"Left out----? Oh, no, you don't mean----?" He burst out laughing.
"Well, I'm jiggered!"
"Oliveritis--that's my diagnosis. He does go to bed sometimes, you know,
when--well, when the world gets too hard for him, poor Godfrey!"
"Oh, I never heard of such a thing! It can't be that! Does he hate him
as much as that?"
"He doesn't like him."
"Do you think that's why he's been so grumpy lately?"
"I suppose he'd say that was the liver attack coming on, but--well, I've
told you!"
"But to go to bed!" Arthur chuckled again. "Well, I am jiggered!"
"You may be jiggered as much as you like--but must you go to London?"
"Does Bernadette know he's gone to bed?" Pursuing his own train of
amused wonder, Arthur did not mark Judith's question, with its note of
appeal.
"I told Barber to tell her. I didn't think I should look grave
enough--or perhaps Bernadette either!"
"Why, would she tumble to its being--Oliveritis?"
"She'd have her suspicions, I think. I asked you just now whether you
really must go to London, Arthur."
"Well, I don't want to--though I've a slight touch of that disease of
Godfrey's myself--but I suppose I ought. It's like this." He told her of
the lost chance at chambers, and of Joe Halliday's summons. "It's no use
going to-day," he ended, "but I expect I ought to go to-morrow."
"Yes, I expect you ought," she agreed gravely. "You mustn't miss chances
because of--because of us down here."
"It isn't obvious that I'm any particular sort of use down here, is it?"
"You're of use to me anyhow, Arthur."
"To you?" He was evidently surprised at this aspect of the case.
"Yes, but you weren't thinking of me, were you? However, you are. Things
aren't always easy here, as you may have observed, and it's a great
comfort to have someone to help--someone to grumble to or--or to share a
smile with, you know."
"That's very nice of you. You know I've always supposed you thought me
rather an ass."
"Oh, in some ways, yes, of course you are!" She laughed, but not at all
unpleasantly. "I should have liked to have you here through--well,
through Sir Oliver."
"The chap's a bit of a nuisance, isn't he? Well, I needn't make up my
mind till to-morrow. It's no use going to-day, and to-morrow's Saturday.
So Sunday for the piece, and chambers on Monday! That'd be all
right--especially as I've probably lost my only chance. I'll wait till
to-morrow, and see how Sir Oliver shapes!" He ended with a laugh as his
mind went back to Godfrey. "Gone to bed, poor old chap!"
Judith joined again in his laugh. Godfrey's course of action struck on
their humour as the culmination, the supreme expression, of his attitude
towards the world and its troubles. He could not fight them in the open;
he took refuge from them within his fortifications. If they laid siege
and the attack pressed hotly, he retreated from the outer to the inner
defences. What the philosopher found in a mind free from passions--a
citadel than which a man has nothing more secure whereto he can fly for
refuge and there be inexpugnable--Godfrey Lisle found in a more material
form. He found it in Bed!
But when Arthur went up to see his cousin, his amusement gave place, in
some measure, to sympathy. Pity for his forlornness asserted itself.
Godfrey insisted that he was ill; he detailed physical symptoms; he
assumed a bravado about "sticking it out" till to-morrow, and not having
the doctor till then, about "making an effort" to get up to-morrow.
Through it all ran a suspicion that he was himself suspected. Bernadette
was in the room part of the time. She too was sympathetic, very kind,
and apparently without any suspicion. True that she did not look at
Arthur much, but that might have been accidental, or the result of her
care for her husband. If it were a sign that she could not trust herself
in confidential glances, it was the only indication she gave of
scepticism as to the liver attack.
At lunch-time too her admirable bearing and the presence of Margaret
enforced gravity and a sympathetic attitude, though out of the patient's
hearing it was possible to treat his condition with less seriousness.
"He's fanciful about himself sometimes," said Bernadette. "It's nerves
partly, I expect. We must cheer him up all we can. Margaret can go and
sit with him presently, and you might go up again later, Arthur. He
likes to talk to you, you know. And"--She smiled--"if Godfrey's laid up,
you'll have to help me with Sir Oliver. You must be host, if he can't."
Bernadette had not practised any of her new graces on Arthur since the
miscarriage of the excursion; either the check to her sentiment, the
little wound to her vanity, prevented her, or else she had grown too
engrossed in the near prospect of Oliver Wyse's arrival. At all events
the new manner had been in abeyance. She had been her old self, with her
old unmeditated charm; it had lost nothing by being just a little
pensive--not low-spirited, but thoughtful and gentle. She had borne
herself thus towards all of them. She showed no uneasiness, no fear of
being watched. She was quite simple and natural. Nor did she pretend any
exaggerated indifference about Oliver. She accepted the fact that he
came as her particular friend and that she was glad of his coming in
that capacity. They all knew about that, of course, just as they knew
that Cousin Arthur was her devotee. All simple and natural--when Oliver
Wyse was not there. Arthur, who had not been at Hilsey during Sir
Oliver's first visit, was still in the dark. Judith Arden had her
certainty, gained from the observation of the two in the course of
it--and Godfrey his gnawing suspicion.
For Bernadette, absorbed, fascinated, excited, had been a little off her
guard then--and Oliver Wyse had not taken enough pains to be on his. He
was not clever at the concealment and trickery which he so much
disliked. His contempt for Godfrey Lisle made him refuse to credit him
with either the feelings or the vigilance of a husband. He had not
troubled his head much about Judith, not caring greatly whether she
suspected what he felt or not; what could she do or say about it? As his
power over Bernadette increased, as his assurance of victory had grown,
so had the signs of them--those signs which had given Judith certainty,
and the remembrance of which now drove Godfrey to that last citadel of
his. But to Bernadette herself they had seemed small, perceptible indeed
and welcome to her private eye, but so subtle, so minute--as mere signs
are apt to seem to people who have beheld the fulness of the thing
signified. She did not know herself betrayed, either by her own doing or
by his.
Oliver Wyse was expected to arrive about tea-time; he was bringing his
own car, as Bernadette had announced that morning at breakfast, not
without a meaning glance at Godfrey--nobody need grudgingly give up the
car to him this time! It was about four when Arthur again visited the
invalid. He found Margaret with her father; they were both reading
books, for Margaret could spell her way through a fairy-story by now,
and they seemed happy and peaceful. When Arthur came in, Godfrey laid
down his book readily, and received him with something more like his old
welcome. In reply to enquiries he admitted that he felt rather better,
but added that he meant to take no risks. "Tricky things, these liver
attacks!" Arthur received the impression that he would think twice and
thrice before he emerged from his refuge. He looked yellowish--very
likely he had fretted himself into some little ailment--but there was
about him an air of relief, almost of resignation. "At all events I
needn't see the man when he comes"--so Arthur imagined Godfrey's inner
feelings and smiled within himself at such weakness, at the mixture of
timidity and bearishness which turned an unwelcome arrival into a real
calamity, a thing to be feared and dodged. But there it was--old
Godfrey's way, his idiosyncrasy; he was a good old fellow really, and
one must make the best of it.
So for this hour the three were harmonious and content together. Timid
yet eager questions from Margaret about fairies and giants and their
varying ways, about rabbits and guinea-pigs and sundry diversities in
their habits; from Godfrey a pride and interest in his little daughter
which Arthur's easy friendship with her made him less shy of displaying;
Arthur's own ready and generous pleasure in encountering no more
grumpiness--all these things combined to make the hour pleasant. It was
almost possible to forget Oliver Wyse.
But presently Margaret's attendant came to fetch her; she was to have
her tea rather early and then change her frock--in order to go
downstairs and see Sir Oliver; such were mother's orders. Godfrey's face
relapsed into peevishness even while the little girl was kissing him
good-bye.
"Why should she be dragged down to see Wyse?" he demanded when she was
gone.
"Oh, I suppose it's the usual thing. Their mothers like showing them
off."
"All damned nonsense!" grumbled Godfrey, and took up his book again. But
he did not read it. He looked at his watch on the table by him.
"Half-past four! He'll be here directly."
"Oh, well, old chap, does it matter so much----?" Arthur had begun, when
Godfrey raised himself in his bed and held up his hand.
"There's a motor-horn!" he said. "Listen, don't you hear?"
"Yes, I suppose it's him." He strolled to the window, which looked on
the drive. "There is a car coming; I suppose it's his."
Godfrey let his hand drop, but sat upright for a few moments longer,
listening. The car passed the window and stopped at the door.
"Yes, it's Wyse all right. The car's open. I saw him." So saying, Arthur
left the window and sauntered back towards the bed, his face adorned
with a well-meaning smile of common sense and consolation. But Godfrey
lay down on the pillow again, and with an inarticulate grunt turned his
face to the wall. Arthur stood looking at him in amazement. His smile
grew grim--what a ridiculous old chap it was!
But there was no more to be got out of him just now; that was clear
enough. No more welcome, no more friendly talk! The sulks were back
again in full force; Godfrey was entrenched in his last citadel. On
Arthur himself devolved the function of acting as Sir Oliver's host.
Feeling no great desire to discharge his duties, he lounged slowly down
the stairs into the hall; he was conscious of a distinct touch of
Oliveritis.
The door which led from the hall to Bernadette's own room stood open.
They were standing together by the window, Bernadette with her back
towards Arthur. Wyse faced her, and her hand rested lightly on his
arm--just as it had so often rested on Arthur's own, in the little trick
of friendly caress that she had. He ought to have known just what--just
how much--could properly be inferred from it; none the less he frowned
to see it now. Then he noticed Oliver Wyse's face, rising over her
head--for Oliver was tall--and turned downwards towards her. Arthur was
in flannels and wore rubber shoes; his feet had made no sound on the
carpeted stairs. His approach was unnoticed.
The next minute he was crossing the hall with determined, emphatic,
highly audible steps. Slowly, as it seemed, Oliver Wyse raised his head,
and slowly a smile came to his lips as he looked over Bernadette's head
at the young man. Then she turned round--very quickly. She was smiling,
and her eyes were bright. But something in Arthur's face attracted her
attention. She flushed a little. Her voice was louder than usual, and
seemed as it were hurried, when she said:
"Here's Sir Oliver safe and sound, Arthur! He's done it in two hours and
twenty minutes."
"Not bad going, was it?" asked Oliver, still looking at Arthur with that
cool, self-confident, urbane smile. He was not embarrassed; rather it
seemed as though he were defying the intruder to embarrass him, whatever
he might have seen, whatever he might be pleased to think.
But Bernadette, his adored, his hopelessly idealised Bernadette--ah, the
vulgar, the contaminating suspicion!--Bernadette was looking as if she
had been caught! A sudden swift current of feeling ran through him--a
new feeling which made his blood hot with resentment of that confident
smile.
Bernadette's confusion was but momentary. She was quite herself again,
serene and at ease, as she said, "Will you show him his room? He'd like
a wash before tea. He's in the Red Room--over the porch, you know."
Arthur entered on his duties as deputy-host to the urbane and smiling
guest.