Halcyone Part 31

"Thank you, no--" he said. "You are far too good. I will not take anything from you until the bargain is completed."

Then their eyes met and in his there was a flash of steel.

And when she had gone from the room he lay and quivered, a sense of hideous humiliation flooding his being.

The following day she came in the morning. She looked girlish in her short tennis frock and was rippling with smiles. She sat on the bed and kissed him--and then slipped her hand into his.

"John, darling," she said sweetly. "People will begin to talk if I stay here at Wendover now that you are getting better--and you would hate that as much as I--so I have settled to go to Carlsbad with Lady Maulevrier--just for three weeks. By that time my splendid John will be himself again and we can settle about our wedding--" then she bent and kissed him once more before he could speak. "Arabella is going to get her mother to come down," she went on, "and you will be safe here with these devoted old ladies and your Brome who is plainly in love with you, poor thing!" and she laughed gayly. "Say you think it is best, too, John, dearest?"

"Whatever you wish," he answered with some sudden quick sense of relief.

"I know I am an awful bore lying here, and I shall not be able to crawl to a sofa even for another week, these doctors say."

"You are not a bore--you are a darling," she murmured, patting his hand.

"And if only I were allowed to stay with you--night and day--and nurse you like Brome, I should be perfectly happy. But these s.n.a.t.c.hed sc.r.a.ps--John, darling, I can't bear it!"

He wondered if she were lying. He half thought so, but she looked so beautiful, it enabled him to return her caresses with some tepid warmth.

"It is too sweet of you, Cecilia," he said, as he kissed her. He had not yet used one word of intimate endearment--she had never been his darling, his sweet and his own, like Halcyone.

After she had gone again, all details having been settled for her departure upon the Monday, he almost felt that he hated her. For, when she was in this apparently loving mood, it seemed as if her bonds tightened round his throat and strangled him to death. "Octopus arms" he remembered Cheiron had called them.

When Mrs. Cricklander got back to her own favorite long seat out on the terrace, she sat down, and settling the pillows under her head, she let her thoughts ticket her advantages gained, in her usual concrete fas.h.i.+on.

"He is absolutely mine, body and soul. He does not love me--we shall have the jolliest time seeing who will win presently--but I have got the dollars, so there is no doubt of the result--and what fun it will be! It does not matter what I do now, he cannot break away from me. He has let me see plainly that my money has influenced him--and, although Englishmen are fools, in his cla.s.s they are ridiculously honorable. I've got him!" and she laughed aloud. "It is all safe, he will not break the bargain!"

So she wrote an interesting note to Mr. Hanbury-Green with a pencil on one of the blocks which she kept lying about for any sudden use--and then strolled into the house for an envelope.

And, as John Derringham lay in the darkened room upstairs, he presently heard her joyous voice as she played tennis with his secretary, and the reflection he made was:

"Good Lord, how thankful I should be that at least I do not love her!"

Then he clenched his hands, and his aching thoughts escaped the iron control under which since his engagement he had tried always to keep them, and they went back to Halcyone. He saw again with agonizing clearness her little tender face, when her soft, true eyes had melted into his as she whispered of love.

"This is what G.o.d means in everything." Well, G.o.d had very little to do with himself and Cecilia Cricklander!

And then he suddenly seemed to see the brutishness of men. Here was he--a refined, honorable gentleman--in a few weeks going to play false to his every instinct, and take this woman whom he was growing to despise--and perhaps dislike--into his arms and into his life, in that most intimate relations.h.i.+p which, he realized now, should only be undertaken when pa.s.sionate calls of tenderest love imperatively forced it. She would have the right to be with him day--and night. She might be the mother of his children--and he would have to watch her instincts, which he surely would have daily grown to loathe, coming out in them.

And all because money had failed him in his own resources and was necessary to his ambitions, and this necessity, working with an appeal to his senses when fired with wine, had brought about the situation.

G.o.d Almighty! How low he felt!

And he groaned aloud.

Then from a small dispatch box, which he had got his servant to put by his bed, he drew forth a little gold case, in which for all these years he had kept an oak leaf. He had had it made in the enthusiasm of his youth when he had returned to London after Halcyone, the wise-eyed child, had given it to him, and it had gone about everywhere with him since as a sort of fetish.

It burnt his sight when he looked at it now. For had he been "good and true"? Alas! No--nothing but a sensual, ambitious weakling.

CHAPTER XXVII

The Professor and his protegee spent the whole of that July wandering in Brittany--going from one old-world spot to another. There had not been much opposition raised by Mr. and Mrs. Anderton to Halcyone's accompanying her old master. They themselves were going to Scotland, and there Mabel had decided she would no longer be kept in the schoolroom, and intended to come forward as a grown-up girl a.s.sisting in the hospitalities of her father's shooting lodge. And Mrs. Anderton, knowing her temper, thought a rival of any sort might make difficulties. So, as far as they were concerned, Halcyone might start at once. They always left for the north in the middle of the month, and if the Professor wanted to get away sooner, they did not wish to interfere with his arrangements. Halcyone must come and pay them another visit later on.

As for the Aunts La Sarthe--their heads appeared to be completely turned by their sojourn at the seaside! They proposed to remain there all the summer, and put forward no objection to their niece's excursion with Mr.

Carlyon. The once quiet spot of their youth had developed into a fas.h.i.+onable Welsh watering place, and Miss Roberta was taking on a new lease of health and activity from the pleasure of seeing the crowded parade, while the Aunt Ginevra allowed that the exhilarating breezes and cerulean waters were certainly most refres.h.i.+ng!

Before the Professor could leave for a lengthy trip abroad, it was necessary that he should return to the orchard house for a day, and Halcyone accompanied him, leaving Priscilla in London. Her mission was to secure the G.o.ddess's head--but, as there was no one at La Sarthe Chase, she decided just to go there and get her treasure and sleep the night at Cheiron's.

It would be an excursion of much pain to her, to be so near to her still loved lover and to feel the cruel gulf between them, but she must face it if she desired Aphrodite to accompany them. The Professor suggested she might take him through the secret pa.s.sage and try with his help to open the heavy box. No such opportunity had ever occurred before or was likely to occur again, her aunts being absent and even old William nowhere about. It made the chance one in a thousand. So she agreed, and determined to force herself to endure the pain which going back would cause her.

She was perfectly silent all the way from London to Upminster--and Mr.

Carlyon watched her furtively. He knew very well what was pa.s.sing in her mind, and admired the will which suppressed the expression of it. She grew very pale indeed in the station-fly when they pa.s.sed the gates of Wendover. It was about half past three in the afternoon--and the Professor had promised to come to the archway opening of the secret pa.s.sage at five.

So Halcyone left him and took her way down the garden and through the little gate into the park. It seemed like revisiting some scene in a former life, so deep was the chasm which separated the last time she walked that way from this day. She pa.s.sed the oak tree without stopping.

She would not give way to any weakness or the grief which threatened to overwhelm her. She kept her mind steadily fixed upon the object she had in view, with a power of concentration which only those who live in solitude can ever attain to.

Aphrodite was there still in the bag lying on top of the heavy iron-bound box in the secret pa.s.sage, and she carried her out into the sunlight and once more took the wrappings from the perfect face.

"You are coming with us, sweet friend," she whispered, and gazed long into the G.o.ddess's eyes. What she saw there gave her comfort.

"Yes, I know," she went on gently. "I did say that, whatever came, I would understand that it was life--And I do--and I know this evil pain is only for the time--and so I will not admit its power. I will wait and some day joy will return to me, like the swallow from the south. Mother, I will grieve not."

And all the softest summer zephyrs seemed to caress her in answer, and there she sat silent and absorbed, looking out to the blue hills for more than an hour.

Then she saw Cheiron advancing up the beech avenue, and covering up Aphrodite she went to meet him.

They came back to the second terrace and started upon their quest.

Mr. Carlyon had the greatest difficulty in keeping his old head bent to get through the very low part of the dark arched place, and he held Halcyone's hand. But at last they emerged into the one light spot and there saw the breastplate and the box. But at first it seemed as if they could not lift it; it had fallen with the lock downward. Cheiron, although a most robust old man, had pa.s.sed his seventieth year, and the thing was of extreme heaviness. But at last they pushed and pulled and got it upright, and finally, with tremendous exertions with a chisel Mr.

Carlyon had brought, managed to break open the ancient lock.

It gave with a sudden snap, and in breathless excitement they raised the lid.

Inside was another case of wood. This also was locked, but at its side lay an old key. The Professor, as well as his chisel, had prudently brought a small bottle of oil, and eventually was able to make the key turn in the lock, and they found that the box was in two compartments, one entirely filled with gold pieces, and the other containing some smaller heavy object enwound with silk.

They lifted it out and carried it to the light, and then with great excitement they unrolled the coverings. It proved to be a gold-and-jeweled crucifix and beneath it lay a parchment with a seal.

Leaving the pieces of gold in the box, they carried the crucifix and the parchment out on to the terrace, and then the Professor adjusted his strongest spectacles and prepared to read what he could, while Halcyone examined the beautiful thing.

The writing was still fairly dark and the words were in Latin. It stated, so the Professor read, that the money and the crucifix were the property of Timothy La Sarthe, Gentleman to Queen Henrietta Maria, and that, should aught befall him in his flight to France upon secret business for Her Majesty, the gold and the crucifix belonged to whichever of his descendants should find it--or it should be handed to; that all others were cursed who should touch it, and that it would bring the owner fortune, as it was the work of one Benvenuto Cellini, an artist of great renown in Florence before his day, and therefore of great value. The quaintly phrased deed added that if it were taken to one Reuben Zana, a Jew in the Jewry at the sign of the Golden Horn, he would dispose of it for a large sum to the French king. The crucifix had been brought from Florence in the dower of his wife Donna Vittoria Tornabuoni, now dead. If his son Timothy should secure it, he was advised not to keep it, as its possession brought trouble to the family.

"Then it is legally ours and not treasure-trove," said Halcyone. "Oh, how good! It will make the Aunts La Sarthe quite rich perhaps, and look how beautiful it is, the jeweled thing."

They examined it minutely. It was a masterpiece of that great craftsman and artist and of untold value. Cheiron silently thrilled with the delight of it--but Halcyone spoke.

"I am glad Ancestor Timothy suggested selling it," she said. "I would never keep a crucifix, the emblem of sorrow and pain. For me, Christ is always glorified and happy in heaven. Now what must we do, Master? Must we at once tell the aunts? But I will not consent to anyone knowing of this staircase. That would destroy something which I could never recover. We must pretend we have found it in the long gallery; there is a recess in the paneling which no one knows of but I, and there we can put it and find it again. It will be quite safe. Shall we leave it there, Cheiron, until we come back from abroad? How much do you think it is worth?"