Part 33 (2/2)

”You are wrong. There is Captain Willoughby. He came to Devons.h.i.+re six weeks ago. He brought with him a white feather which he gave to Miss Eustace, as a proof that he withdrew his charge of cowardice against Harry Feversham.”

Sutch stopped the pony in the middle of the road. He no longer troubled to conceal the joy which this good news caused him. Indeed, he forgot altogether Durrance's presence at his side. He sat quite silent and still, with a glow of happiness upon him, such as he had never known in all his life. He was an old man now, well on in his sixties; he had reached an age when the blood runs slow, and the pleasures are of a grey sober kind, and joy has lost its fevers. But there welled up in his heart a gladness of such buoyancy as only falls to the lot of youth.

Five years ago on the pier of Dover he had watched a mail packet steam away into darkness and rain, and had prayed that he might live until this great moment should come. And he had lived and it had come. His heart was lifted up in grat.i.tude. It seemed to him that there was a great burst of sunlight across the world, and that the world itself had suddenly grown many-coloured and a place of joys. Ever since the night when he had stood outside the War Office in Pall Mall, and Harry Feversham had touched him on the arm and had spoken out his despair, Lieutenant Sutch had been oppressed with a sense of guilt. Harry was Muriel Feversham's boy, and Sutch just for that reason should have watched him and mothered him in his boyhood since his mother was dead, and fathered him in his youth since his father did not understand. But he had failed. He had failed in a sacred trust, and he had imagined Muriel Feversham's eyes looking at him with reproach from the barrier of the skies. He had heard her voice in his dreams saying to him gently, ever so gently: ”Since I was dead, since I was taken away to where I could only see and not help, surely you might have helped. Just for my sake you might have helped,--you whose work in the world was at an end.”

And the long tale of his inactive years had stood up to accuse him. Now, however, the guilt was lifted from his shoulders, and by Harry Feversham's own act. The news was not altogether unexpected, but the lightness of spirit which he felt showed him how much he had counted upon its coming.

”I knew,” he exclaimed, ”I knew he wouldn't fail. Oh, I am glad you came to-day, Colonel Durrance. It was partly my fault, you see, that Harry Feversham ever incurred that charge of cowardice. I could have spoken--there was an opportunity on one of the Crimean nights at Broad Place, and a word might have been of value--and I held my tongue. I have never ceased to blame myself. I am grateful for your news. You have the particulars? Captain Willoughby was in peril, and Harry came to his aid?”

”No, it was not that exactly.”

”Tell me! Tell me!”

He feared to miss a word. Durrance related the story of the Gordon letters, and their recovery by Feversham. It was all too short for Lieutenant Sutch.

”Oh, but I am glad you came,” he cried.

”You understand at all events,” said Durrance, ”that I have not come to repeat to you the questions I asked in the courtyard of my club. I am able, on the contrary, to give you information.”

Sutch spoke to the pony and drove on. He had said nothing which could reveal to Durrance his fear that to renew those questions was the object of his visit; and he was a little perplexed at the accuracy of Durrance's conjecture. But the great news to which he had listened hindered him from giving thought to that perplexity.

”So Miss Eustace told you the story,” he said, ”and showed you the feather?”

”No, indeed,” replied Durrance. ”She said not a word about it, she never showed me the feather, she even forbade Willoughby to hint of it, she sent him away from Devons.h.i.+re before I knew that he had come. You are disappointed at that,” he added quickly.

Lieutenant Sutch was startled. It was true he was disappointed; he was jealous of Durrance, he wished Harry Feversham to stand first in the girl's thoughts. It was for her sake that Harry had set about his difficult and perilous work. Sutch wished her to remember him as he remembered her. Therefore he was disappointed that she did not at once come with her news to Durrance and break off their engagement. It would be hard for Durrance, no doubt, but that could not be helped.

”Then how did you learn the story?” asked Sutch.

”Some one else told me. I was told that Willoughby had come, and that he had brought a white feather, and that Ethne had taken it from him. Never mind by whom. That gave me a clue. I lay in wait for Willoughby in London. He is not very clever; he tried to obey Ethne's command of silence, but I managed to extract the information I wanted. The rest of the story I was able to put together by myself. Ethne now and then was off her guard. You are surprised that I was clever enough to find out the truth by the exercise of my own wits?” said Durrance, with a laugh.

Lieutenant Sutch jumped in his seat. It was mere chance, of course, that Durrance continually guessed with so singular an accuracy; still it was uncomfortable.

”I have said nothing which could in any way suggest that I was surprised,” he said testily.

”That is quite true, but you are none the less surprised,” continued Durrance. ”I don't blame you. You could not know that it is only since I have been blind that I have begun to see. Shall I give you an instance?

This is the first time that I have ever come into this neighbourhood or got out at your station. Well, I can tell you that you have driven me up a hill between forests of pines, and are now driving me across open country of heather.”

Sutch turned quickly towards Durrance.

”The hill, of course, you would notice. But the pines?”

”The air was close. I knew there were trees. I guessed they were pines.”

”And the open country?”

”The wind blows clear across it. There's a dry stiff rustle besides. I have never heard quite that sound except when the wind blows across heather.”

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