Part 15 (1/2)
She bent low and almost whispered the words in his ear. Her hand covered his fingers caressingly. His forehead touched the lace upon her robe and he could hear her heart beating. An impulse almost irresistible came upon him to take her in his arms and hold her there, and find in her embrace that knowledge of the perfect womanhood which had been his dream through the years. He knew not what held him back.
Anna watched him with a hope that was almost as an intoxication of doubt and curiosity. She loved him in that moment with all a young girl's ardor. She believed that the whole happiness of her life lay in the words he was about to speak.
CHAPTER XVI
THE INTRUDER
A man's voice, calling to them from the lawn, sent them instantly apart as though caught in some guilty confidence. Anna knew that something unwonted had happened and that w.i.l.l.y Forrest had returned.
”What has brought him back?” she exclaimed a little wildly; and then, ”Don't go away, Alban, I shall want you. My father would never forgive me if he heard of it. Of course he cannot stop here.”
Alban made no reply, but he helped her to the bank and they crossed the lawn together. In the light of the veranda, they recognized Forrest, carrying a motor cap in his hand and wearing a dust coat which almost touched his heels. He had evidently dined and was full of the story of his mishap.
”h.e.l.lo, Anna, here's a game,” he began, ”my old fumigator's broke down and I'm on the cold, cold world. Never had such a time in my life.
Shoved the thing from Taplow and nothing but petrol to drink--eh, what, can't you see me? I say, Anna, you'll have to put me up to-night. There isn't a billiard table to let in the town, and I can't sleep on the gra.s.s--eh, what--you wouldn't put me out to graze, now would you?”
He entered the dining-room with them, and they stood about the table while the argument was continued.
”Billy says the nag--what-d'yer-call-it's gone lame in the off fore-leg. She went down at the distance like a filly that's been hocussed. There were the two of us in the bally dust--and look at my fingers where I burned 'em with matches. After that a parson came along in a gig. I asked him if he had a whisky-and-soda aboard and he didn't quote the Scriptures. We couldn't get the blighter to move, and I ground the handle like Signor Gonedotti of Saffron Hill in the parish of High Holborn. You'd have laughed fit to split if you'd have been there, Anna--and, oh my Sammy, what a thing it is to have a thirst and to bring it home with you. Do I see myself before a mahogany one or do I not--eh, what? Do I dream, do I sleep, or is visions about? You'll put us up, of course, Anna? I've told Billy as much and he's shoving the car into the coach-house now.”
He stalked across the room and without waiting to be asked helped himself to a whisky-and-soda. Anna looked quickly at Alban as though to say, ”You must help me in this.” Twenty-four hours ago she would not have protested at this man's intrusion, but to-night the glamor of the love-dream was still upon her, the idyll of her romance echoed in her ears and would admit no other voice.
”w.i.l.l.y,” she said firmly, ”you know that you cannot stop. My father would never forgive me. He has absolutely forbidden you the house.”
He turned round, the gla.s.s still in his hand and the soda from the siphon running in a fountain over the table-cloth.
”Your father! He's in Paris, ain't he? Are we going to telegraph about it? What nonsense you are talking, Anna!”
”I am telling you what I mean. You cannot stop here and you must go to the hotel immediately.”
He looked at her quite gravely, cast an ugly glance upon Alban and instantly understood.
”Oh, so that's the game. I've tumbled into the nest and the young birds are at home. Say it again, Anna. You show me the door because this young gentleman doesn't like my company. Is it that or something else? Perhaps I'll take it that the old girl upstairs is going to ask me my intentions. The sweet little Anna Gessner of my youth has got the megrims and is off to Miss Bolt-up-Right to have a good cry together--eh, what, are you going to cry, Anna? Hang me if you wouldn't give the crocodiles six pounds and a beating--eh, what, six pounds and a beating and odds on any day.”
He approached her step by step as he spoke, while the girl's face blanched and her fear of him was to be read in every look and gesture.
Alban had been but a spectator until this moment, but Anna's distress and the bullying tone in which she had been addressed awakened every combative instinct he possessed, and he thrust himself into the fray with a resolute determination to make an end of it.
”Look here, Forrest,” he exclaimed, ”we've had about enough of this. You know that you can't stop here--why do you make a fuss about it? Go over to the hotel. There's plenty of room there--they told me so this afternoon.”
Forrest laughed at the invitation, but there was more than laughter in his voice when he replied:
”Thank you for your good intentions, my boy. I am very much obliged to your wors.h.i.+p. A top-floor attic and a marble bath. Eh, what--you want to put me in a garret? I'll see you the other side of Jordan first. Oh, come, it's a nice game, isn't it? Papa away and little Anna canoodling with the Whitechapel boy. Are we downhearted? No. But I ain't going, old pal, and that's a fact.”
He almost fell into an arm-chair and looked upon them with that bland air of patronage which intoxication inspires. Anna, very pale and frightened, was upon the point of summoning the servants; but Alban, wiser in his turn, forbade her to do so.
”You go to bed, Anna,” he said quietly, ”Captain Forrest and I will have a talk. I'm sure he doesn't expect you to sit up. Eh, Forrest, don't you think that Anna had better go?”