The House 'Round the Corner Part 32

Apparently, she had grabbed her hat and mackintosh coat when pa.s.sing through the hall, and was carrying them, because the sun was glinting in her coils of brown hair. No stranger who met her would take her for other than a summer visitor. Certainly, no one would guess the storm of grief and terror that raged in her heart.

The bicycle sped along with a silent speed that soon lessened the distance between the two. Armathwaite did not wish to startle her by a too sudden appearance, so he rang the bell when yet fifty yards in the rear.

She turned instantly. When she saw who the pursuer was, she stopped.

Neither spoke until Armathwaite had alighted, and the two had exchanged a long and questioning look.

Then she said:

"I'm going to my father. My place is with him. He must be hidden somewhere. I dare not wait until my mother came or wrote. I'm sorry, Bob. I could not even explain, though I should have telegraphed from York. Please don't ask me to say any more, or try to detain me."

"Any explanation is unnecessary," he said, smiling gravely into the sweet face with its aspect of unutterable pain. "I squeezed the facts out of Percy Whittaker. I'm afraid I hurt him, but that is immaterial."

"You made him tell you what he said to me?" and the brown eyes momentarily lost their wistfulness in a whirl of surprise and maidenly dismay.

"Yes."

"Everything--even his threat?"

"Everything."

"Oh, Bob! What am I to do? I must go to dad!"

"Undoubtedly; but I don't see why you should walk fourteen miles practically without food. I've brought some breakfast--of a sort. We'll go shares--half the sandwiches and half the milk. Then you'll ride on the step of the bike when the road permits, and trudge the remainder, and we'll be in Leyburn in half the time it would take you to walk. Here are the eatables, and this is just the place for a picnic."

He spoke and behaved in such a matter-of-fact way that he almost persuaded the bewildered girl that her conduct, and his, and Percy Whittaker's was ruled and regulated by every-day conditions. Placing the bicycle by the roadside, he produced the package prepared by Betty, and was uncorking the milk when a strangled sob caught his ear.

Marguerite had turned to hide her face, for a rush of emotion had proved too much for her self-control. Laying the bottle on a bank of turf, he caught the girl's shoulder, and turned her gently until her swimming eyes met his.

"There's nothing to be gained by hailing trouble half way, Meg," he said. "I don't wish to hide my belief that you are faced with conditions of a most extraordinary nature, but I am convinced that they will shape themselves differently to any forecast we can arrive at now. I followed you for two reasons. I wanted you to begin a long journey better prepared than was possible after flight on a moment's notice, and I did not want you to go away thinking I was in ignorance of your motives. I can tell you here and now that you will save your father, if his position is such that he needs safe-guarding; further, you will never be compelled to marry Percy Whittaker."

"Bob," she whispered brokenly. "I would rather die!"

Then Armathwaite flung restraint to the winds. He gathered her in his arms, and lifted the tear-stained face to his.

"Sweetheart," he said, "in the midst of such madness, let you and me be sane. I love you! You are the only woman I have ever loved. If I am allowed by Providence to begin life once more, you are the only woman I shall ever love. You were brought to me by a kindly fate, and I refuse to let you go now without telling you that you carry my heart with you.

I ask for no answer at this moment. Some day in the future, when the clouds have lifted from your young life, I'll come to you--"

But Marguerite gave him her answer then. Lifting herself on tip-toe, she kissed him on the lips.

"Bob," she said tremulously, "I think I knew you were my chosen mate, if G.o.d willed it, when we parted on that first night in the Grange."

That first night! It was hardly thirty-six hours ago, yet these two had crowded into that brief s.p.a.ce more tribulation than many lovers undergo in a lifetime; and sorrow knits hearts more closely and lastingly than joy.

Armathwaite could hardly credit the evidence of his senses. He had come to regard himself as so immeasurably older than this delightful girl that it seemed wildly improbable that she could return the almost hopeless love which had sprung into sudden and fierce activity in his breast. Yet, here she was, lying snug in his embrace, and gazing up at him with glistening eyes, her lips distended, her arms clasping him, her heart beating tumultuously in the first transports of pa.s.sion.

He kissed her again and again, and could have held her there seemingly forever; but they were driven apart by a curious humming sound which bore a singular resemblance to the purr of a powerful automobile climbing a steep hill.

Marguerite disengaged herself from her lover's embrace with a flus.h.i.+ng self-consciousness that was, in itself, vastly attractive.

"Bob," she murmured, stooping to pick up a fallen hat and mackintosh, "miracles are happening. Here are you and I forgetting a world in which evil things find a place, and here is a motor-car crossing Elmdale moor for the first time in history."

"It would not surprise me in the least if the visitant proved to be a flying-machine," he laughed, finding it hard to withdraw his ardent gaze from those flushed cheeks and that tangled ma.s.s of brown hair.

But the insistent drumming of an engine grew ever louder, and soon a long, low-built touring car swept into view over the last undulation.

Apparently, it was untenanted save by a chauffeur, and Armathwaite's brain, recovering its balance after a whirl of delirium, was beginning to guess at a possible explanation of this strange occurrence, when the car slowed as it neared them, and finally halted.

"Are you Mr. Armathwaite, sir?" inquired the chauffeur.

"Yes."

The man lifted his cap.

"This is the car you ordered from York last night, sir."

"How thoughtful of you to follow!" cried Armathwaite, overjoyed by this quite unexpected bit of good fortune. He had not only forgotten that the car was on order--an impulse of the moment when he realized how tied he and all others were to the house if anything in the nature of a sudden and rapid journey came on the _tapis_--but, in any event, he had not looked for its arrival before mid-day, and the hour was yet barely ten o'clock.

"Your servants thought you might need me, sir," explained the man, "so I came after you. It's a scorcher of a road for the first mile, but the rest isn't so bad, if it keeps in the same condition."

Now, what had actually happened was this. The chauffeur had reached the Grange about twenty minutes after Armathwaite's departure. At that moment Smith was chaining and padlocking the gate, but Betty heard the snorting of the car, and came to find out its cause.

When the chauffeur told her that he was there in response to an order, the quick-witted girl told him to hurry up the moor road. He looked at it, and grinned.

"What! Take a valuable machine over a track like that! Not me!" he said.

"Can't it go there?" she inquired.

"It can go anywhere, for that matter."

"Are you afraid, then?"

"Afraid of what? D'ye think I want to twist an axle or smash a wheel?"

Then one of the laboring men joined in.

"I reckon you don't know t' maister," he said. "He wouldn't care a pin if you smashed yourself, but you've got to obey orders. He's one of the sort who has his own way. Good pay, no beer, an' hard work is _his_ motter. It is, an' all."

Between maid and man, the chauffeur decided to risk it. When all was said and done, it would be a bad beginning in a new job if the servants reported his refusal to follow on.

"Is he far ahead?" he inquired.

"Mebbe a mile over t' top."

Starting the engine on the switch, he put the car at the hill, and, like many another difficulty, it was not insurmountable when tackled boldly.

So, behold! A comfortable and easy way was opened to Leyburn, at any rate, and Armathwaite laughed gayly.

"Now we'll breakfast, and discuss," said he. "The G.o.ds have sent us a chariot!"