Part 32 (1/2)

'I insist on your coming home, Viva!--Mr. Lucanaster, sir, let my wife go!'

'd.a.m.n!' said Jack Raymond under his breath. Ha grasped the situation in a second and saw its hopelessness.

'Go 'way, sir--go 'way,' came in Mr. Lucanaster's voice; 'don't be foolish.' There was a faint elation as well as elision in the words; no more, but it seemed to make them sound more contemptuous.

'Yes; don't be foolish, Chris. I'm going to dance this valse with Mr.

Lucanaster. You can go home if you like.'

The woman's voice had the note of defiance in it which means danger; but Chris did not recognise the fact. He had been working himself up to this revolt all the evening, and now, having begun it, he went on in strict accordance to what he had settled with himself was the proper and dignified course to pursue.

'Sir,' he said, drawing himself up and speaking with great deliberation, 'you are a scoundrel, and I shall take the earliest opportunity of allowing you to prove the contrary if you choose. In the meantime, pray do not let us quarrel before ladies. I request you to unhand my wife.'

It was not only a man who laughed, it was a woman; and at the sound Jack Raymond swore under his breath again, and slipped towards the voices.

The gleam of pink and white and the 'Ring-tailed Roarer' must evidently have been sitting out in a small summer-house, where Chris had found them; and Mr. Lucanaster must have risen and tried to pa.s.s out with the pink tarlatane, for Chris stood barring the way boldly enough. But that laugh was fatal to him. It brought back in a rush the sense of his own helplessness, his inexperience, and with it came the self-pity which is ever so close to tears.

'Viva!' he began, 'surely you----'

Mr. Lucanaster waved his hand lightly, as he might have waved a beggar away.

'Don't be an idiot, my good man. What the deuce have you got to do with an English lady?--Come, Jennie, this two-time valse is ripping.'

'Excuse me,' said Jack Raymond, stepping forward; 'but Mrs. Davenant is engaged to me. If you don't think so, Lucanaster, we can settle the point by and by, but for the present I advise you not to have a row. It won't pay.'

The a.s.sertion varied not at all from that made by poor Chris; but the method was different, and Mr. Lucanaster fell back on bl.u.s.ter.

'You're d--d impertinent, sir; but, of course, if Mrs. Davenant----'

'It will not pay Mrs. Davenant to waste time either,' interrupted Jack coolly, holding out his arm, 'especially as she is so fond of dancing.

It has been a capital ball, hasn't it?' he added, as if nothing unusual had occurred, when, with a half-apologetic look at her partner, she accepted the proffered arm, and they pa.s.sed on. 'A pity it is over, but--_perhaps_--you _may_ have others like it. Davenant! if you will find the dogcart, I will take your wife to get her cloak, and I daresay she would like a cup of soup before driving. I know it is ready.'

When they were alone, she tried a little bl.u.s.ter too, but he met it with a smile. 'My dear lady,' he said, 'it only wants a very little to kick Lucanaster out of the club, so please look at the business unselfishly. It is always a pity to risk one's position for a trifle.'

As he handed Mrs. Chris into the dogcart, duly fortified by hot soup, Chris tried to wring his hand and say something grateful, with the result that Jack Raymond felt he had been a fool to interfere, since the catastrophe must come sooner or later.

The sooner the better. It was always a mistake to prolong the agony in anything.

He felt unusually low in his mind, and so, after having waited to the very last as in duty bound, to turn any would-be revellers decently out of the club, he lit another cigar--his first one having been interrupted--and wandered out into the Garden Mound again. Most of the lights were out, only a belated lantern or two swung fitfully among the trees, but a crescent moon was showing, and there was just that faint hint of light in the sky which tells of dawn to come. He sat down on the step of the granite obelisk, which held on all four sides the close-ranged names of those who had given their lives to keep the English flag flying, and, full of cynical disgust at much he had seen that evening, asked himself if Nushapore was likely to bring such heroism again to the storehouse of the world's good deeds?

Perhaps; but even so, it would have to be something very different from that past story,--something that Englishmen and women could not monopolise. For if, after forty years of government, our rule had failed to win over the allegiance of men--like Chris Davenant, for instance--would not that, in itself, be a condemnation?

And had it won such allegiance? With that scene fresh in his memory, Jack Raymond doubted if it were possible.

Truly the conditions had changed, indeed! As he had said, Brian O'Lynn's breeches were not in it for topsyturveydom!

But with the thought came also the memory of what he had said about Jerry and the carrying on of British rule; and with that came the memory of what the Thakoor had said about the boy.

Dear little chap!

A great tenderness swept through him for the child. And for the child's mother, the woman who had refused----?