Part 88 (1/2)

”How well done of you!” he said. ”How well arranged! But I'm afraid you didn't arrange it at all. It has merely happened. Where did you come from?”

”From America; got back yesterday.” T. Tembarom's hand-shake was a robust hearty greeting. ”It's all right.”

”From America!” The united voices of the solicitors exclaimed it.

Joseph Hutchinson broke into a huge guffaw, and he stamped in exultation.

”I'm danged if be has na' been to America!” he cried out. ”To America!”

”Oh!” Miss Alicia gasped hysterically, ”they go backward and forward to America like--like lightning!”

Little Ann had not risen at his entrance, but sat still with her hands clasped tightly on her lap. Her face had somehow the effect of a flower gradually breaking into extraordinary bloom. Their eyes had once met and then she remained, her soul in hers which were upon him, as she drank in every word he uttered. Her time had not yet come.

Lady Joan had remained standing by the chair, which a few moments before her manner had seemed to transform into something like a witness stand in a court of justice. Her hungry eyes had grown hungrier each second, and her breath came and went quickly. The very face she had looked up at on her last talk with T. Tembarom--the oddly human face--turned on her as he came to her. It was just as it had been that night --just as commonly uncommon and believable.

”Say, Lady Joan! You didn't believe all that guff, did you--You didn't?” he said.

”No--no--no! I couldn't!” she cried fiercely.

He saw she was shaking with suspense, and he pushed her gently into a chair.

”You'd better sit down a minute. You're about all in,” he said.

She might have been a woman with an ague as she caught his arm, shaking it because her hands themselves so shook.

”Is it true?” was her low cry. ”Is he alive--is he alive?”

”Yes, he's alive.” And as he answered he drew close and so placed himself before her that he s.h.i.+elded her from the others in the room.

He seemed to manage to shut them out, so that when she dropped her face on her arms against the chair-back her shuddering, silent sobbing was hidden decently. It was not only his body which did it, but some protecting power which was almost physically visible. She felt it spread before her.

”Yes, he's alive,” he said, ”and he's all right--though it's been a long time coming, by gee!”

”He's alive.” They all heard it. For a man of Palliser's make to stand silent in the midst of mysterious slowly acc.u.mulating convictions that some one--perilously of his own rarely inept type--was on the verge of feeling appallingly like a fool--was momentarily unendurable. And nothing had been explained, after all.

”Is this what you call `bluff' in New York?” he demanded. ”You've got a lot to explain. You admit that Jem Temple Barholm is alive?” and realized his asinine error before the words were fully spoken.

The realization was the result of the square-shouldered swing with which T. Tembarom turned round, and the expression of his eyes as they ran over him.

”Admit!” he said. ”Admit h.e.l.l! He's up-stairs,” with a slight jerk of his head in the direction of the ceiling.

The duke alone did not gasp. He laughed slightly.

”We've just got here. He came down from London with me, and Sir Ormsby Galloway.” And he said it not to Palliser but to Palford and Grimby.

”The Sir Ormsby Galloway?” It was an e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n from Mr. Palford himself.

T. Tembarom stood square and gave his explanation to the lot of them, so to speak, without distinction.

”He's the big nerve specialist. I've had him looking after the case from the first--before I began to suspect anything. I took orders, and orders were to keep him quiet and not let any fool b.u.t.t in and excite him. That's what I've been giving my mind to. The great stunt was to get him to go and stay at Sir Ormsby's place.” He stopped a moment and suddenly flared forth as if he had had about enough of it. He almost shouted at them in exasperation. ”All I'm going to tell you is that for about six months I've been trying to prove that Jem Temple Barholm was Jem Temple Barholm, and the hardest thing I had to do was to get him so that he could prove it himself.” He strode over to the hearth and rang a bell. ”It's not my place to give orders here now,” he said, ”but Jem commissioned me to see this thing through. Sir Ormsby'll tell you all you want to hear.”

He turned and spoke solely to the duke.

”This is what happened,” he said. ”I dare say you'll laugh when you hear it. I almost laughed myself. What does Jem do, when he thinks things over, but get some fool notion in his head about not coming back here and pus.h.i.+ng me out. And he lights out and leaves the country--leaves it--to get time to think it over some more.”