Part 49 (1/2)

”Poor Hemming,” said Rames. ”That's bad luck. The disappointment must have hit him hard.”

”You can understand that,” said Cynthia steadily.

”Yes. He would have written, you see, if he had taken it more lightly.

He has nothing to say. That is what his blank sheet of paper means.

That is what it must mean. Well, I must go and write to the Chamber of Commerce, Cynthia;” and gathering up his letters he went out of the room.

As for Cynthia, she remembered that the North Warwicks.h.i.+re met that morning at eleven o'clock four miles from the house. She rode to the meet and followed the hounds over a good gra.s.s country flying her hedges on a big horse which old Mr. Daventry had given to her on the very first day when she had hunted over six years ago. It had always been her experience that when troubles and fears overburdened her, a hard day's hunting was her best medicine. It smoothed out the creases of her mind, whipped up the blood in her veins, set her pulses dancing with the joy of living and unrolled her courage like a banner. The sunlight, the swift rush through the air, the rhythm of movement, the keenness of the animal beneath her, the flight over hedge and ditch, had never failed her up till now. It always seemed to her that by some process, of which she was quite unconscious, the direct and simple thing to do emerged from the confusion of her thoughts and shone out unmistakably. And it shone out to-day. But she could not bring herself to accept it. As she rode homeward through the lanes she was at her arguments again.

”No! With time contentment will come to him. He will be subdued to the matter he works in. And I cannot let him go.”

Mr. Benoliel's warning obstinately confronted her.

”One party doesn't keep the bargain or keeps it half-heartedly as an irksome thing and day by day the separation grows more complete until you are living with your enemy or living quite alone.”

But she would not be convinced; she battled against it. ”There was a saving clause. 'Unless on both sides there is love.' In that case a way could be found. And on both sides there may be love.”

She had treasured up little acts of thoughtfulness on Harry Rames's part, the merest small things which women are quick to notice and to build upon; such as having a cloak ready for her shoulders almost before she was aware that she was cold. She ran these trifles over in her mind, clutching at them for proof that the longed for change was coming--nay, perhaps had come. There had been a constant watchfulness, a constant care for her shown by her husband during this last year. It might be of course that a certain remorse was stirring in him--remorse that he was only keeping his side of the bargain in the letter and not the spirit.

”But I cannot let him go,” she insisted. The perils, the hards.h.i.+ps, the dangers of snow-storms and cold and s.h.i.+pwreck and famine which had all seemed so trivial to her in her days of romance now loomed up before her terrible and dark. It was no use to argue that other men had gone that road and had come back. This one might not. She reached her home with her distress as heavy upon her as when she had set out; and was told that Mr. Benoliel was waiting to see her.

She went at once into the drawing-room and gave Mr. Benoliel some tea.

”Will you tell Mr. Rames,” she said to her butler, ”that Mr. Benoliel is here.”

”He's not in the house,” said Benoliel. ”He's in Ludsey. I asked for him when I heard that you were out. I am glad. For I should like to tell you my news first.”

The butler left the room and Mr. Benoliel became at once mysterious and omniscient.

”Sir George Carberley is going to resign,” he said.

Cynthia looked at him in surprise.

”The member for our division?”

The white house was not within the borough limits of Ludsey. It stood in the Hickleton Division of the county of Warwicks.h.i.+re and Sir George Carberley, an important unit of the opposition, was Harry Rames's representative in the House of Commons.

”Yes,” said Mr. Benoliel. ”He has sat for the division for forty years now and he is tired. He intends to resign when this session is over.”

”Are you sure?” asked Cynthia. ”How do you know this?”

”Ah!” said Benoliel with a smile. ”You mustn't ask me that, Cynthia.

Indeed I am not quite sure that I ought to have told you the news at all. But I thought that it was so important for you to know it at once that I stretched a point of confidence.”

”Thank you,” said Cynthia. ”But what I don't understand is why it is so important for us to have the news before the others?”

”Captain Rames is on the executive of your a.s.sociation, isn't he?”

”Yes.”

”Then he will have a voice in the selection of the candidate who will fight the seat from your political point of view.”