The Message

“By the way, an old friend of yours is staying with me,” she said – “Mrs. Laing – you knew her better as Rosamund Miller, I fancy?”

Warden schooled his features into a passable imitation of a smile. Mrs. Laing – the pretty, irresponsible Rosamund Miller – was the last person he wished to encounter, but he was quick to see the twinkle in Lady Hilbury’s eyes, and he accepted the inevitable.

“I shall be glad to renew the acquaintance,” he said. “It was broken off rather abruptly – at Government House if I remember aright.”

“Poor Rosamund! That was her mother’s contriving. She never really liked Laing, but he was what people term ‘a good match,’ and he has at least justified that estimate of his worth by dying suddenly and leaving his widow nearly two hundred thousand pounds.”

“A most considerate man,” murmured Warden.

“Then you have not forgiven her?”

“Forgive! What a harsh word from your lips. Pray consider. On your own estimate she owes me two hundred thousand thanks.”

“Arthur, I don’t like you as a cynic. I am old enough to be your mother. Indeed, it was my love for your mother that first led me to take an interest in your welfare, and I should be doing wrong if I hid from you the fact that it nearly broke Rosamund’s heart to throw you over.”

“I trust the lapse of years has healed the fracture,” he said.

Lady Hilbury looked at him in silence for a moment. She remembered the white–faced subaltern who heard, at her hospitable table, that Rosamund Miller had married a wealthy planter at Madeira – married him suddenly, within a month after her departure from the coast.

“Is there another woman?” she asked quietly.

“Not single spies but whole battalions. How I have managed to escape their combined charms all these years is a marvel. Seriously, Lady Hilbury, you would not have me take a wife to my special swamp, and I would not care to leave her in England drawing half my pay. All my little luxuries would vanish at one fell swoop.”

“I would like to see you happy, Arthur, and there is always the possibility of marrying some one who would demand no sacrifices.”

“Is Mrs. Laing out?” he inquired.

“Yes. Of course you want to meet her again?”

“I think not. I don’t mean to be unkind, but the tender recollections I cherish are too dear to be replaced by a fresh set.”

“That sounds theatrical – a sarcastic line out of some comedy of manners. If so, you shall have a wider stage than my boudoir. We lunch at one o’clock. It is 12.45 now, and Rosamund is always punctual.”

Warden, though raging at the dilemma, made the best of it.

“How long has Mrs. Laing been a widow?” he said.

“Nearly a year. Evidently your bush campaign shut out the usual sources of intelligence.”

He glanced at his watch.

“I really must catch the three o’clock train to Cowes,” he explained. “I am on Government service, and I suppose it would be quite impossible to arrange everything in a couple of hours. I am unacquainted with the formalities, but even a special license demands – “

“How unkind! Arthur, what has happened to you? How you are changed!”

“Never changed where you are concerned, Lady Hilbury!” he cried, sentiment for once gaining the upper hand – “you, to whom I owe so much! That, indeed, would be the wintry wind of ingratitude. Now, let me make amends. My behavior shall be discreet – my decorous sympathy worthy of a High Church curate. I was staggered for a few seconds, I admit, but the effects of the blow have passed, and my best excuse is that other things are perplexing me. I have no secrets from you, you know, so let me tell you why I am here.”

Sure of an interested listener in the wife of an ex–ruler of the great Niger territory, Warden plunged into an account of recent events. It was not necessary to mention Evelyn Dane in order to hold her attention. The first reference to Figuero and the Oku chiefs attained that end. No mean diplomatist herself, Lady Hilbury understood much that would perforce be hidden from all save those acquainted with West Africa.

“You will permit me to tell Charles?” came the eager question when he had finished.

“Of course. Why not?”

“There are those in the administration who are jealous of his record,” she said. “Not every one has his tact in dealing with natives. It is no secret that our relations with the emirs of the interior have been strained almost to breaking point of late – ”

A motor stopped outside the house and a bell rang. Lady Hilbury bent forward. Her voice sank to a new note of intense conviction.

“You have been given a great opportunity, Arthur. It may come sooner than you think. Grasp it firmly. Let no man supplant you, and it will carry you far.”

Her ladyship’s manner no less than her earnest words told Warden that there were forces in motion of which he was yet in complete ignorance. It was sufficiently puzzling to find an Under Secretary so well informed as to the identity of certain visitors to Cowes, but when a woman in the position of his hostess – with her wide experience of the seldom–seen workings of the political machine – went out of her way to congratulate him on a “great opportunity,” he was thrilled with a sudden elation.

Thus, when his hand closed on that of Rosamund Laing, there was a flush on his bronzed face, a glint of power and confidence in his eyes, that might well be misinterpreted by a woman startled almost to the verge of incoherence.

When she asked where Lady Hilbury was, and if she were alone, the footman merely announced the fact that a gentleman had called and would make one of the luncheon party. Rosamund entered the boudoir with an air of charming impulsiveness practised so sedulously that it had long ceased to be artificial. For once in her life it abandoned her. Warden’s friendly greeting was such a bolt from the blue that she faltered, paled and blushed alternately, and actually stammered a few broken words with the shy diffidence of a schoolgirl.

The phase of embarrassment passed as quickly as it had arisen. Both the man and the woman were too well–bred to permit the shadows of the past to darken the present. Lady Hilbury, too, rose to the occasion, and they were soon chatting with the unrestrained freedom of old and close acquaintanceship.

Then Warden discovered that the lively impetuous girl who taught him the first sharp lesson in life’s disillusionment had developed into a beautiful, self–possessed, almost intellectual woman of the world. She was gowned with that unobtrusive excellence which betokens perfect taste and a well–lined purse. Certain little hints in her costume showed that the memory of her late husband did not press too heavily upon her. The fashionable modiste can lend periodicity to grief, and Mrs. Laing was passing through the heliotrope stage of widowhood.

Her exquisite complexion was certainly somewhat bewildering to the untrained glance of the mere male. Warden’s recollection, vivid enough now, painted a dark–skinned, high–colored girl of nineteen, with expressive features, a mop of black hair, and a pair of brilliant eyes that alternated between tints of deepest brown and purple.

The eyes remained, though their archness was subdued, but, for the rest, he saw a neck and forehead of marvelous whiteness, a face of repose, cheeks and ears of delicate pink, and a waved and plaited mass of hair of the hue known as Titian red. He found himself comparing her with Evelyn Dane, whose briar–rose coloring shone through clusters of delightful little freckles, and, somehow, the contrast was displeasing.

The conventional smile of small talk must have yielded to the strain, because Rosamund Laing noticed his changed expression.

“Dear me, what have I said now?” she asked. They were seated at table, at the end of a pleasant meal, and the talk had wandered from recent doings to a long–forgotten point to point steeple–chase won by Warden on a horse which Rosamund herself had nominated.

He recovered his wandering wits instantly.

“It is not anything that you have said, Mrs. Laing, but my own thoughts that are worrying me,” he said. “I have been trying to dodge the unpleasant knowledge that I must gather up my traps and fly to Waterloo. Lady Hilbury knows that I was en route to the Solent when I called – and – if I hesitated – which is unbelievable – she prevailed on me to stay by the overwhelming argument that you would appear forthwith.”

It was the simplest of compliments, but it sufficed. Rosamund imperilled her fine complexion by blushing again deeply.

“I was indulging in the vain hope that we might see you often, now that we are all in England,” she said.

“Captain Warden has still six months’ furlough at his disposal,” put in Lady Hilbury. “He is leaving town on business at the moment, but I shall take care he returns at the earliest date.”

He stood for a moment in a strong light when he was to say good–by. Mrs. Laing noticed the scar on his forehead.

“Have you had an accident?” she asked, with a note of caressing tenderness in her voice.

“Nothing to speak of. A slight knock on the head while swimming in the Solent – that is all.”

The door had scarce closed on him when Rosamund turned to her friend. She spoke slowly, but Lady Hilbury saw that the knuckles of a white hand holding the back of a chair reddened under the force of the grip.

“I dared not asked him,” came the steady words, “but – perhaps you can tell me – is he unmarried?”

“Yes.”