The Man with the Double Heart Part 52

"I don't know what you'll get to eat"--the pretty grey-haired woman smiled--"half the servants have gone to Scotland--Bertram and I lead the simple life!"

"I'm not particular"--he laughed--"so long as you don't give me rabbit!"

This was an old joke between them. Once they had stayed in a country house where the hostess was noted for frugality and rabbit had figured on the menu to an alarming extent. Beginning with cold pie at breakfast, a curry (with suspicious bones) had proved the hot dish at lunch and a "chicken cream" figured at dinner in which McTaggart had found a shot!

So he declared. And ever after the hostess in private had been named "Bunny" in Lady Leason's set. McTaggart smiled at the recollection.

He was going that afternoon to take Miss Uniacke for a final drive, with Jill and Roddy; for on the morrow she was leaving her sister-in-law.

With the quick recuperative power that many nervous women possess the invalid had cast off the yoke of her recent illness rapidly.

Already keen to return to work, despite Aunt Elizabeth's many lectures, the very fact of her late ordeal had fired her vivid imagination.

She held that her public demonstration had given her at last the right to consider herself not only a martyr but a worthy Champion of the Cause.

But behind her desire for active work lay dormant the thought of Stephen's friends.h.i.+p. She had suffered from the enforced estrangement, yet was shrewdly aware of the reason.

She knew that Miss Uniacke did not approve of the intimacy, but imagined too that the little old maid was no lover of the opposite s.e.x.

She had been honestly amazed at her att.i.tude toward McTaggart. It never occurred to her that Jill was the link between the curious pair.

Nor could she realize in the girl a charm that would warrant the supposition.

Although she loved her only daughter and was secretly proud of her own offspring, she would have been greatly surprised had an outsider pointed out the fact of Jill's attraction to men.

The girl was so unlike herself!

It is a curious human trait that a mother can rarely appreciate a different type in her daughter. And yet some hidden law of Nature presiding at the children's birth most frequently endows a girl with the characteristics of the father. Jill was the picture of Colonel Uniacke. Roddy, with his bright colour, high cheek bones, and bird-like glance, was far more like the mother, though a stronger edition, in miniature.

But Jill, tall, gracefully formed, was rounded too; with wide grey eyes and her father's well-shaped hands and feet. Her mouth was a shade too large for beauty, but full of character, fresh and curved, with the deep corners that spell humour, and her chin held a note of obstinacy.

She had her father's clear judgment, sense of proportion and of balance, his strong vitality, warm heart and an almost pa.s.sionate love of justice. Her greatest stumbling block was pride.

Many a time as a tiny child had she wept in secret over a fault, but refused to apologize. She was 'sent to Coventry' once for a week for some unwise rebellious speech, but at the end of the punishment the little girl was still stubborn.

"I'm sorry that I hurt you, Mother--I _am_ sorry"--the tears rolled down--"but I meant every word I said--and I do still--I can't help it!"

Colonel Uniacke was called, prompted by his indignant wife.

He took Jill on his knee.

"Now, then, child--out with it!"

"I said"--her arms went round his neck--"I simply hated Miss Bellew"

... (she referred to the new governess). "She's a perfect sneak and she hit Roddy--I know I'm naughty"--she wailed aloud--"but I _do_ hate her--she's a beast! and I won't 'kiss and make friends'--not to please anybody!..."

"All right, then, you needn't." The child stared with wide eyes. "But while she's in authority you'll treat her with a proper respect. If she's a foe you're still bound--more than ever bound in honour--to show her every courtesy. And now go and kiss your mother."

Jill slid down, her sobs checked. This was a new point of view. Her father watched her thoughtfully.

"Of course," he said, "it's rather hard on Miss Bellew, when you think of it. She's paid to teach you--it's her living--she doesn't do it out of pleasure. You are the daughter of the house. She's my guest..."

He shrugged his shoulders.

Jill turned without a word, and went back into the schoolroom.

From the pa.s.sage outside, her parents heard her explain the matter.

"Miss Bellew"--she stood there in her crumpled pinafore, stiff and forlorn, tears still on her cheeks. "I'm sorry I was rude to you. I'm sorry I said you were a beast. But you hit Roddy--that finished it--and I don't like you--I never shall! But I won't call you names again. No--I don't _want_ to be kissed ... but I'm going to be a good girl ... as long (sniff) ... as you're Father's guest."

She kept her word. Weeks later she explained the truce to Colonel Uniacke.

"We're 'honourable foes,' you see--like Coeur de Lion and Saladin."

The story had become a cla.s.sic, and in the quiet garden one evening Aunt Elizabeth repeated it to the much-amused McTaggart.

"It's just like Jill"--he commented--"she's got a man's code of honour.

I've never met a girl like her ... it's a character in a thousand."

Aunt Elizabeth looked up slyly--and caught the light in the blue eyes.

"I think we're both of us fond of Jill," she said, letting the words sink in. Then started briskly to talk of Mrs. Uniacke's improvement, drifting off into her pet aversion--Woman's Suffrage and Militant ways.

But her stray shot had missed the mark. The purely brotherly terms on which McTaggart met his girl friend were still untouched by sentiment.

He hardly knew how much he cared; content with a sense of friends.h.i.+p so totally distinct from all his other dealings with her s.e.x.

He knew that Jill liked him. Not for a moment did he guess the presence of a deeper feeling. She supplied the want he had keenly felt in his own lack of home life. It was good to know that in one house he was always a welcome guest without the fear of intrigue or wearisome social convention.

For during the long months abroad many traps had been laid for him, and it bred a shrewd distrust of girls, based on more than vanity.

Now as he strolled slowly along toward his club through the Mayfair streets his thoughts ran back to Cydonia.

He walked past the Cadells' door. The blinds were down, the shutters fixed. Obedient to the decree of fas.h.i.+on they had moved on with the social tide.

But a feeling of thankfulness possessed him. He knew well that he had escaped a life with a woman who would have bored him, chained to the "obvious orthodox"!

And he wondered...

Was there a way of love that could survive monotony? Could he ever rely on himself to recognize the "one woman"?

Had his "double heart" been the cause of the indecision that beset him?--these swift pa.s.sions that burned out like straw. Would he ever know the sacred flame?

And suddenly the gypsy's words rose up into his mind.

"Between two fires you shall burn and burn." ... He felt a thrill of superst.i.tion.

She had foretold his "golden crown," the fortune "coming over-seas" ...

What was it she had prophesied later? He knit his brows, searching his memory.

Like a head on a coin, clear and raised, he saw again the swarthy face; he heard the strange pattering voice, felt her warm touch on his hand.