Helena's Path

It was playing a high stake on a risky hand. Plainly it assumed an interest in himself on the part of the Marchesa – an interest so strong that absence and mystery (if perchance he achieved a flavor of that attraction!) would foster and nourish it more than presence and friendship could conduce to its increase. She might think nothing about him during the week! Impossible surely – with all that had gone before, and with his proposal to come at the end! But if it were so – why, so he was content. "In that case, she's a woman of no imagination, of no taste in the picturesque," he said.

For five days the Marchesa gave no sign, no clue to her feelings which the anxious watchers could detect. She did indeed suffer Colonel Wenman to depart all forlorn, most unsuccessful and uncomforted – save by the company of his brother-in-arms, Captain Irons; and he was not cheerful either, having failed notably in certain designs on Miss Dufaure which he had been pursuing, but whereunto more pressing matters have not allowed of attention being given. But Lord Lynborough she never mentioned – not to Miss Gilletson, nor even to Norah. She seemed to have regained her tranquillity; her wrath at least was over; she was very friendly to all the ladies; she was markedly cordial to Roger Wilbraham on his visits. But she asked him nothing of Lord Lynborough – and, if she ever looked from the window toward Scarsmoor Castle, none – not even her observant maid – saw her do it.

Yet Cupid was in the Grange – and very busy. There were signs, not to be misunderstood, that Violet had not for handsome Stillford the scorn she had bestowed on unfortunate Irons; and Roger, humbly and distantly worshiping the Marchesa, deeming her far as a queen beyond his reach, rested his eyes and solaced his spirit with the less awe-inspiring charms, the more accessible comradeship, of Norah Mountliffey. Norah, as her custom was, flirted hard, yet in her delicate fashion. Though she had not begun to ask herself about the end yet, she was well amused, and by no means insensible to Roger's attractions. Only she was preoccupied with Helena – and Lord Lynborough. Till that riddle was solved, she could not turn seriously to her own affairs.

On the night of the twenty-second she walked with the Marchesa in the gardens of the Grange after dinner. Helena was very silent; yet to Norah the silence did not seem empty. Over against them, on its high hill, stood Scarsmoor Castle. Roger had dined with them, but had now gone back.

Suddenly – and boldly – Norah spoke. "Do you see those three lighted windows on the ground floor at the left end of the house? That's his library, Helena. He sits there in the evening. Oh, I do wonder what he's been doing all this week!"

"What does it matter?" asked the Marchesa coldly.

"What will he propose, do you think?"

"Mr. Stillford thinks he may offer to pay me some small rent – more or less nominal – for a perpetual right – and that, if he does, I'd better accept."

"That'll be rather a dull ending to it all."

"Mr. Stillford thinks it would be a favorable one for me."

"I don't believe he means to pay you money. It'll be something" – she paused a moment – "something prettier than that."

"What has prettiness to do with it, you child? With a right of way?"

"Prettiness has to do with you, though, Helena. You don't suppose he thinks only of that wretched path?"

The flush came on the Marchesa's cheek.

"He can hardly be said to have seen me," she protested.

"Then look your best when he does – for I'm sure he's dreamed of you."

"Why do you say that?"

Norah laughed. "Because he's a man who takes a lot of notice of pretty women – and he took so very little notice of me. That's why I think so, Helena."

The Marchesa made no comment on the reason given. But now – at last and undoubtedly – she looked across at the windows of Scarsmoor.

"We shall come to some business arrangement, I suppose – and then it'll all be over," she said.

All over? The trouble and the enmity – the defiance and the fight – the excitement and the fun? The duel would be stayed, the combatants and their seconds would go their various ways across the diverging tracks of this great dissevering world. All would be over!

"Then we shall have time to think of something else!" the Marchesa added.

Norah smiled discreetly. Was not that something of an admission?

In the library at Scarsmoor Lynborough was inditing the proposal which he intended to submit by his ambassadors on the morrow.

Chapter Twelve

AN EMBASSAGE

The Marchesa's last words to Lady Norah betrayed the state of her mind. While the question of the path was pending, she had been unable to think of anything else; until it was settled she could think of nobody except of the man in whose hands the settlement lay. Whether Lynborough attracted or repelled, he at least occupied and filled her thoughts. She had come to recognize where she stood and to face the position. Stillford's steady pessimism left her no hope from an invocation of the law; Lynborough's dexterity and resource promised her no abiding victory – at best only precarious temporary successes – in a private continuance of the struggle. Worst of all – whilst she chafed or wept, he laughed! Certainly not to her critical friends, hardly even to her proud self, would she confess that she lay in her antagonist's mercy; but the feeling of that was in her heart. If so, he could humiliate her sorely.

Could he spare her? Or would he? Try how she might, it was hard to perceive how he could spare her without abandoning his right. That she was sure he would not do; all she heard of him, every sharp intuition of him which she had, the mere glimpse of his face as he passed by on Sandy Nab, told her that.

But if he consented to pay a small – a nominal – rent, would not her pride be spared? No. That would be victory for him; she would be compelled to surrender what she had haughtily refused, in return for something which she did not want and which was of no value. If that were a cloak for her pride, the fabric of it was terribly threadbare. Even such concession as lay in such an offer she had wrung from him by setting his friends against him; would that incline him to tenderness? The offer might leave his friends still unreconciled; what comfort was that to her when once the fight and the excitement of countering blow with blow were done – when all was over? And it was more likely that what seemed to her cruel would seem to Stabb and Roger reasonable – men had a terribly rigid sense of reason in business matters. They would return to their allegiance; her friends would be ranged on the same side; she would be alone – alone in humiliation and defeat. From that fate in the end only Lynborough himself could rescue her; only the man who threatened her with it could avert it. And how could even he, save by a surrender which he would not make? Yet if he found out a way?

The thought of that possibility – though she could devise or imagine no means by which it might find accomplishment – carried her toward Lynborough in a rush of feeling. The idea – never wholly lost even in her moments of anger and dejection – came back – the idea that all the time he had been playing a game, that he did not want the wounds to be mortal, that in the end he did not hate. If he did not hate, he would not desire to hurt. But he desired to win. Could he win without hurting? Then there was a reward for him – applause for his cleverness, and gratitude for his chivalry.

Stretching out her arms toward Scarsmoor Castle, she vowed that according to his deed she could hate or love Lord Lynborough. The next day was to decide that weighty question.

The fateful morning arrived – the last day of the armistice – the twenty-third. The ladies were sitting on the lawn after breakfast when Stillford came out of the house with a quick step and an excited air.

"Marchesa," he said, "the Embassy has arrived! Stabb and Wilbraham are at the front door, asking an audience of you. They bring the proposal!"

The Marchesa laid down her book; Miss Gilletson made no effort to conceal her agitation.

"Why didn't they come by the path?" cried Norah.

"They couldn't very well; Lynborough's sent them in a carriage – with postilions and four horses," Stillford answered gravely. "The postilions appear to be amused, but the Ambassadors are exceedingly solemn."

The Marchesa's spirits rose. If the piece were to be a comedy, she could play her part! The same idea was in Stillford's mind. "He can't mean to be very unpleasant if he plays the fool like this," he said, looking round on the company with a smile.

"Admit the Ambassadors!" cried the Marchesa gaily.

The Ambassadors were ushered on to the lawn. They advanced with a gravity befitting the occasion, and bowed low to the Marchesa. Roger carried a roll of paper of impressive dimensions. Stillford placed chairs for the Ambassadors and, at a sign from the Marchesa, they seated themselves.

"What is your message?" asked the Marchesa. Suddenly nervousness and fear laid hold of her again; her voice shook a little.

"We don't know," answered Stabb. "Give me the document, Roger."

Roger Wilbraham handed him the scroll.

"We are charged to deliver this to your Excellency's adviser, and to beg him to read it to you in our presence." He rose, delivered the scroll into Stillford's hands, and returned, majestic in his bulk, to his seat.

"You neither of you know what's in it?" the Marchesa asked.

They shook their heads.

The Marchesa took hold of Norah's hand and said quietly, "Please read it to us, Mr. Stillford. I should like you all to hear."

"That was also Lord Lynborough's desire," said Roger Wilbraham.

Stillford unrolled the paper. It was all in Lynborough's own hand – written large and with fair flourishes. In mockery of the institution he hated, he had cast it in a form which at all events aimed at being legal; too close scrutiny on that score perhaps it would not abide successfully.

"Silence while the document is read!" said Stillford; and he proceeded to read it in a clear and deliberate voice:

"'Sir Ambrose Athelstan Caverly, Baronet, Baron Lynborough of Lynborough in the County of Dorset and of Scarsmoor in the County of Yorkshire, unto her Excellency Helena Vittoria Maria Antonia, Marchesa di San Servolo, and unto All to whom these Presents Come, Greeting. Whereas the said Lord Lynborough and his predecessors in title have been ever entitled as of right to pass and repass along the path called Beach Path leading across the lands of Nab Grange from the road bounding the same on the west to the seashore on the east thereof, and to use the said path by themselves, their agents and servants, at their pleasure, without let or interference from any person or persons whatsoever – '"