Lady Rose's Daughter Part 55

"Not at all. You have your own rug, and one that the captain provided. I keep myself quite warm with moving about."

There was a pause. His mind began to fill with alarm. He was not of the men who act a part with ease; but, having got through so far, he had calculated on preserving his secret.

Flight was best, and he was just turning away when a gesture of hers arrested him. Again he stooped till their faces were near enough to let her voice reach him.

"Why are you in evening-dress?"

"I had intended to dine with a friend. There was not time to change."

"Then you did not mean to cross to-night?"

He delayed a moment, trying to collect his thoughts.

"Not when I dressed for dinner, but some sudden news decided me."

Her head fell back wearily against the support behind it. The eyes closed, and he, thinking she would perhaps sleep, was about to rise from his seat, when the pressure of her hand upon his arm detained him. He sat still and the hand was withdrawn.

There was a lessening of the roar in their ears. Under the lee of the English sh.o.r.e the wind was milder, the "terror-music" of the sea less triumphant. And over everything was stealing the first discriminating touch of the coming light. Her face was clear now; and Delafield, at last venturing to look at her, saw that her eyes were open again, and trembled at their expression. There was in them a wild suspicion.

Secretly, steadily, he nerved himself to meet the blow that he foresaw.

"Mr. Delafield, have you told me all the truth?"

She sat up as she spoke, deadly pale but rigid. With an impatient hand she threw off the wraps which had covered her. Her face commanded an answer.

"Certainly I have told you the truth."

"Was it the whole truth? It seems--it seems to me that you were not prepared yourself for this journey--that there is some mystery--which I do not understand--which I resent!"

"But what mystery? When I saw you, I of course thought of Evelyn's telegram."

"I should like to see that telegram."

He hesitated. If he had been more skilled in the little falsehoods of every day he would simply have said that he had left it at the hotel.

But he lost his chance. Nor at the moment did he clearly perceive what harm it would do to show it to her. The telegram was in his pocket, and he handed it to her.

There was a dim oil-lamp in the shelter. With difficulty she held the fluttering paper up and just divined the words. Then the wind carried it away and blew it overboard. He rose and leaned against the edge of the shelter, looking down upon her. There was in his mind a sense of something solemn approaching, round which this sudden lull of blast and wave seemed to draw a "wind-warm s.p.a.ce," closing them in.

"Why did you come with me?" she persisted, in an agitation she could now scarcely control. "It is evident you had not meant to travel. You have no luggage, and you are in evening-dress. And I remember now--you sent two letters from the station!"

"I wished to be your escort."

Her gesture was almost one of scorn at the evasion.

"Why were you at the station at all? Evelyn had told you I was at Bruges. And--you were dining out. I--I can't understand!"

She spoke with a frowning intensity, a strange queenliness, in which was neither guilt nor confusion.

A voice spoke in Delafield's heart. "Tell her!" it said.

He bent nearer to her.

"Miss Le Breton, with what friends were you going to stay in Paris?"

She breathed quick.

"I am not a school-girl, I think, that I should be asked questions of that kind."

"But on your answer depends mine."

She looked at him in amazement. His gentle kindness had disappeared. She saw, instead, that Jacob Delafield whom her instinct had divined from the beginning behind the modest and courteous outer man, the Jacob Delafield of whom she had told the d.u.c.h.ess she was afraid.

But her pa.s.sion swept every other thought out of its way. With dim agony and rage she began to perceive that she had been duped.

"Mr. Delafield"--she tried for calm--"I don't understand your att.i.tude, but, so far as I do understand it, I find it intolerable. If you have deceived me--"

"I have not deceived you. Lord Lackington is dying."

"But that is not why you were at the station," she repeated, pa.s.sionately. "Why did you meet the English train?"

Her eyes, clear now in the cold light, shone upon him imperiously.

Again the inner voice said: "Speak--get away from conventionalities.

Speak--soul to soul!"

He sat down once more beside her. His gaze sought the ground. Then, with sharp suddenness, he looked her in the face.

"Miss Le Breton, you were going to Paris to meet Major Warkworth?"

She drew back.

"And if I was?" she said, with a wild defiance.

"I had to prevent it, that was all."

His tone was calm and resolution itself.

"Who--who gave you authority over me?"

"One may save--even by violence. You were too precious to be allowed to destroy yourself."

His look, so sad and strong, the look of a deep compa.s.sion, fastened itself upon her. He felt himself, indeed, possessed by a force not his own, that same force which in its supreme degree made of St. Francis "the great tamer of souls."

"Who asked you to be our judge? Neither I nor Major Warkworth owe you anything."

"No. But I owed you help--as a man--as your friend. The truth was somehow borne in upon me. You were risking your honor--I threw myself in the way."

Every word seemed to madden her.