A Speckled Bird

"Is Mr. Noel Herriott aboard? Message for Mr. Noel Herriott!"

"I am Mr. Herriott."

He went forward, signed his name in the receipt-book, and opened the envelope. He stood with his back to Eglah, and remained so motionless that she was seized by an apprehension some evil had overtaken her father. Just as she rose he turned and approached her.

"Has anything happened to father?

"This is not from the South. It does not refer to him. We may have to stop here. Keep your seat till I ascertain positively."

Very soon he returned, followed by a porter, who promptly collected satchels and magazines.

"I find I must wait here until two o'clock in the morning."

"Why delay reaching Woodbury? I beg of you let us hasten on."

"There are reasons necessitating it that will be explained later."

She had drawn back, but he took her arm.

"The train will move in a moment, and unless you wish to go on alone, we must be quick."

He assisted her into an omnibus, where several passengers waited, and they were driven to a hotel. Mr. Herriott ordered two rooms, and at the door of one said:

"I must see that the trunks are brought at once. I need mine."

Throwing aside her hat, Eglah began to pace the floor. His countenance had undergone a marked change – subtle, inexplicable – and an indefinable dread caught her heart as in a vise. It seemed to her that an hour passed before he tapped at the door, and she could scarcely articulate,

"Come in."

With a square package sealed in brown paper under one arm, Mr. Herriott entered, closed the door, and deposited the bundle on a small table. From his vest pocket he drew the folded telegram and gave it to her.

"Woodbury, 3 P.M.

"Duncan Keith died two days ago. Wired you at New York Club. Everything attended to here. Will meet you at Carville at 8 P.M.

"Herman Martin."

Her wide, terrified eyes gazed into his.

"What does it mean for me – now?"

"It means that probably some guilty bank officials will go 'unwhipped of justice.' Duncan's father had no relatives in America. He was a poor stowaway lad from England, and since the grandmother's death his son, Duncan, had only his mother's sister, Mrs. Martin. I could not hear from Duncan, to whom I wrote twice last week, and this telegram is an answer to one I sent Martin, telling him I could make only a very brief stop at Woodbury to-night. I have done my duty. I have kept my word. The prosecution of the guilty does not devolve on me, and Martin will never consent to undertake a suit for libel. It would involve money which he does not possess, and responsibility he will not dare to assume. Your father's letters, and the vouchers for large sums of money sent to 'Ely Twiggs,' are in a separate envelope. I shall burn them now, before I deliver the box to Martin."

She sprang forward, her hands on his shoulders, her lips quivering like rose-leaves in a gale.

"Do you mean it? Will you save my father?"

He took her wrists and held her away from him.

"Death saves him; certainly not I."

"No more sorrow can ever come to him?"

"Not from this box; and none through me."

The revulsion overwhelmed her. She sank back, and when he caught her and put his ear to her mouth he could not hear her breathe. He lifted and laid her upon a sofa, and stood looking down at her. So pure and white, so helpless, so beautiful! Legally his wife, but never to be his.

Dipping a towel in water he bathed her face, sprinkled it. The icy hands he chafed in his broad, warm palms, and as his fingers touched the wedding ring he ground his teeth. When her breathing grew stronger, he rose, relinquished her hands, and after a moment she opened her eyes.

"I thought you college-bred girls too well trained to faint."

She sat up, half dazed, and the water dripped from her hair.

"I never fainted before; something smothered me, and everything turned black. Mr. Herriott!"

He had gone to the table, but turned, and looked at her over his shoulder.

"Mr. Herriott, did not you say father was safe from shame and sorrow?"

"In a few moments he will be."

He opened the tin box, selected a small bundle of papers in an envelope marked "Ely Twiggs," and drew some matches from his case. In the grate he burned them one by one, then relocked and tied up the box.

"Eglah, what a pity Iphigenia did not know favorable winds were already blowing at Aulis before she yielded herself to her father's sacrificing hands! Poor Duncan had been dead twenty-four hours when the bishop performed that nuptial farce. If Martin's telegram had been forwarded, you would now be happy at home. I find it necessary to change my plans somewhat. I can spend but a single day at home, and, instead of going directly thence to Boston, shall make a few hours' stay in New York to see my lawyers."

"To alter your will? You need not. I have more than I require, and if I were a pauper I should never accept a cent from you. There is only one thing you can ever give me, and that I must want as long as I live."

He was walking slowly up and down the floor, his hands behind him, and paused beside the sofa.

"What is it?"

She pushed back the damp rings of hair, and lifted to his, pleading eyes pathetically sad.

"Your confidence – your old faith in me."

"Confidence! It lies with love in a grave so deep there can be no resurrection. The world is full of women – lovely, luscious women. Of fair flesh there is for most men no lack; but I wanted, I hungered, I longed for only one pair of dimpled arms folded about my neck, one woman's divinely tender eyes answering all the love in mine, one pair of proud, pure, sensitive, beautiful lips seeking and clinging to mine. Voluntarily you gave yourself to me – your precious self – and when bewildered with happiness I caught you to my heart, you stabbed me. I was mole blind, but sharp clipping has rid me of my cataracts. Let us make an end of this dismal farce. All my life I have fought my infernal temper, and now it has me by the throat. It will take an Arctic winter to cool the hot fury that possesses me; and because I must not speak harshly to you, I wish to ask if you will allow me to leave you here? I can telegraph your father to come at once."

For a moment wounded pride stifled her; she shrank as from a blow, and red signals swung back into her pale cheeks.

"As you please, Mr. Herriott. It is more painfully embarrassing for me to force my presence upon you than for you to endure the sight of me for a few hours longer. If you prefer to leave me here instead of at the place selected and designated before I left home, of course I shall submit. We have not many friends, and father's enemies will gossip over the fact that I was sent home before you sailed from Boston. This, however, is a minor matter in comparison with the fear that the change you suggest might lead father to suspect I had learned the object of your visit to Y – . Life will be unendurable to me if he finds out that I know the contents of that box. I would rather die than have him believe all the horrible facts are in my possession. For his sake I – "

"For his sake you would go down into Hades!"

"Where else am I now? What ordeal more fiery than last night and to-day? I know now that I did wrong, but the awful ruin seemed so imminent I fled through the only door of escape that appeared possible. I am punished, and I deserve all I suffer. Leave me here, or anywhere else, as you find most convenient and most comfortable for yourself."

"Pardon me. Of course your wishes determine the matter. I suggested the change, thinking that as your sole object in making this journey was to secure the papers, you would find it a relief to return as soon as you were sure of their destruction."

He wrote a few lines in his note-book and held it before her.

"Would this be entirely agreeable to you? 'Judge Allison Kent: Duncan died two days ago. I burned the "Ely Twiggs" papers to-night. Never mention them to Eglah. She wishes you to meet her in Philadelphia Saturday.'"

"Thank you; that is what I prefer. When you come back – "

"I hope never to come back. I will not lead a sham life, and I will not live under the same roof with one who, to please her father, tried to love me and found she could not."

"When you come back I shall try to be in Europe, and you may rest assured of no intrusion. My marriage gives me control of my own estate, and now I wish to know the amount it cost you to recover the bonds you delivered to the college."

"You must excuse me if I decline to answer. That matter concerns only Nina and myself. What I did was solely for her and my father."

"I shall find out, and send a check to your lawyers."

"My lawyers know absolutely nothing about it, and as your father must not suspect you heard the conversation, you will scarcely ask him. I have some letters to write, memoranda to arrange for Martin, and several telegrams to send immediately. Our train starts at two A.M., and you can get a sound sleep, which you sadly need. I ordered your dinner sent here. Do you wish your trunk?"

She shook her head.

"Try to get a good rest. You will be called in time for the train. I have papers to prepare that will keep me busy until then. Eglah – poor little girl – "

She looked up at him defiantly, but the peculiar expression in his brilliant eyes she could not understand.

He caught his mustache between his teeth, picked up the tin box, and left her.

CHAPTER XXII

The weather had changed. After rain a keen north wind curled the waters of the great lake into wreaths of foam, breaking against the terrace, and the old Scotch clock in the lower hall struck midnight as Mr. Herriott's carriage drew up before the open door of his house. When he stepped to the ground a wild uproar of rejoicing dogs greeted him, and it was some seconds before he could rid himself of caressing paws. He assisted Eglah out, and turning toward the light met Amos Lea.

"Why, old man! It was kind of you to sit up for us. You should be asleep in your bed. Here is Mrs. Herriott. You saw her one summer."

The gardener held out his rough, hard hand, and she laid hers in it.

"Welcome home, madam. I hope you will be good to the lad; he will always do right by you."

Mr. Herriott laughed as he led her up the stone steps.

"Amos, you can not lecture her as you do me."

The housekeeper and one of the maids came forward for wraps and satchels.

"Mrs. Orr, Mrs. Herriott is very tired. Did you receive my telegram from Carville?"

"Yes, sir; the blue room is in order; bath, fire, supper, everything all ready."

Drawing Eglah's arm through his, he ascended the wide oak staircase, saying:

"I had it papered and arranged especially for you that summer you came for a few days, and since then no one has been allowed to occupy it."

At the landing he called over the railing:

"Mrs. Orr, as it will be late when the trunks come, do not send up Mrs. Herriott's until morning. She needs rest, and I do not wish her disturbed before she rings her bell."

On a table drawn near the fire in the "blue room" a decanter and glasses glittered in the glow from an open hearth. Mr. Herriott poured out some Tokay.

"I am sorry I could not make your home-coming less dismal; but for you the worst is over, and, if you please, we will not refer to it again. To-morrow I shall be engaged with two committees, one relating to a scientific scholarship I wish to establish, and my time is so limited I can be with you very little. The necessity for going via New York, where I must stop, shortens my stay here; and I am compelled to allow some margin for delay en route from Boston to Sydney, where the vessel is due on the fifteenth. This is not exactly a 'loving-cup,' but you must join me."

He touched her glass with his, and a deep undercurrent of suppressed emotion surged through the quietly spoken words.

"Complete oblivion of all that has distressed you during the last forty-eight hours. Put me entirely out of your thoughts, and remember that now you can be happy with your father."

He emptied his glass and replaced it on the salver.

"No. I would not forget it if I could. I pray God that you may escape every danger; that you will come back in safety to your home; and while I may never see you again, I hope to hear you are far happier than I could ever have made you."

She sipped the wine, put it aside, and continued:

"You can not understand the utter ruin of hopes, ambitions, beliefs, that heretofore made my life worth living. In the awful wreck one thing survives – my faith in you, who walk always in the light of 'the high white star of Truth.' I honor and I trust you now as I never did before the ordeal of the last few hours. The fault was mine, not yours; and as I deserve, I wish I could bear all the pain, all the consequences, of my desperate rashness. You do not understand what I suffer."

She stood with her hands folded on her breast, so close to him that he noted how wan and drawn the young face had grown, how measureless the misery in eyes peering hopelessly into futurity.

"At least I fully and sorrowfully understand one thing – you know no more about love than that baby you nursed on the train."

In avoidance of his cold scrutiny, her strained gaze had wandered to the frieze of silver lilies on the wall, but now she looked at him.

"Mr. Herriott, you may be sure that when you go away and leave me forever, I shall never learn."

There was a sudden glint in his eyes, like a blue blade flash, but after a moment he listened to the clock, and turned away.

"Good-night. Get all the sleep you can. You will need it for your journey South to-morrow."

He closed the door, and she heard his quick step ring down the long stairway; then the joyful bark of the dogs told he had left the house.

She was an unusually healthy woman, and, impatient of the teasing pain in her temples, shook out her heavy coil of hair. She walked from door to fireplace, from bed to bathroom, up and down, around and around, too restless to lie down, dominated by a strange feeling she made no attempt to analyze. As the clock struck four, she still walked to and fro, never suspecting that Mr. Herriott stood in the hall, close to her door, listening to the slow sound of her feet on the polished oak floor, fighting down his longing to enter and take her in his arms.

The "blue room" looked out on the sickle-shaped beach and upon the lake, and when the sun rose above cliffs at the rear of the house, the racing waves leaped, crooned, flashed in golden light.

Looping back the lace draperies at the window, Eglah stood watching the flight of a loon, the quivering, silver flicker of ducks' wings against the pale pink sky-line, the gliding of a sloop with sails bending like a huge white butterfly balancing over some vast blue flower.

Walking slowly up the beach, Mr. Herriott was approaching the stile, and with him the collie Pilot, the Polish wolfhound Tzar, one on each side, and the wiry black-and-white Skye terrier Snap wriggling in front. At the stile Amos Lea sat waiting, and master and gardener talked for some minutes.

After a little the latter rose, put one hand on Mr. Herriott's shoulder, raised the other, and turned his rugged face toward heaven.

Eglah knew he was praying for the man now hurrying away to multitudinous dangers, and her eyes grew strangely humid. When the mist cleared, she saw they were shaking hands, and Amos disappeared behind the garden wall. As the master neared the terrace steps he glanced up at her window, took off his cap, and saluted her. He had never looked so commanding, so nobly built, so superior to all other men. Something stirred, quivered, woke up in her heart, and a swift spasm of pain seized her.

A half hour later Mr. Herriott knocked at her door. She opened it, and one quick glance at the ivory bed and its lace hangings told him she had not lain down.

"Good morning. Will you come down and give me my coffee, or shall I send breakfast to you here?"

"I prefer to come down."

He held up a bouquet of heliotrope, daintily arranged.

"Amos Lea's 'compliments to the madam,' and he hopes she will wear these flowers, as he always cut heliotrope for her when she visited here."

Afraid to trust her voice, she took the bouquet, inhaled its fragrance, and slipped the stems into the girdle of her silk morning gown.

At the head of the stairs he put his palm under her elbow to steady her steps, but at the door of the dining-room, where butler and housekeeper waited, he took her fingers in his, led her to the head of the table, and seated her. During breakfast he talked of the garden, of his horses, of some pheasants he knew she would admire, of a tazza on the library mantel she must be sure to examine, and she wondered at the complete control and composure he had attained. Was it merely the noblesse oblige of a courteous host?

After a second cup of coffee, he looked at the clock.

"Hawkins, tell Rivers to bring the dog-cart around. Eglah, come and see Amos Lea's gloxinias."

He put on his hat and light overcoat, and walked beside her to the hothouse.

"I shall be busy in town nearly all day, there are so many last things to be attended to. I had abandoned all idea of joining this expedition, when I received a letter telling me an important member of the party had lost his father, and family interests compelled him to stay at home. The request was urgent that I should cable my acceptance of the invitation, which I did; hence I have had little time for necessary preparation, and some things I am obliged to do this morning. Here comes the cart. We must be at the station by five o'clock this afternoon. Your train southbound starts just ten minutes before mine leaves for New York. Trunks will be sent in at three o'clock. While I am away in town I should be glad to have you look all over the house. Some of the rooms you have never seen – my laboratory and den. In my bedroom hangs a portrait of my lovely mother, that I particularly desire you to see. Good-bye."

He raised his hat, sprang into the cart, and was soon out of sight.

Five moments later the keen, solemn eyes of Amos peered at her from behind a cluster of tall palms.

"Why didn't you marry him sooner, and keep him at home?"

"I did not know he was going until the day we were married. I hoped and believed I could induce him to stay, but he had given his word."

"And that word of his he never breaks. Head, heart, purse, maybe will give way, but not the pledged word of old Fergus Herriott's boy. This self-murder that goes on in the name of 'science' is a sin in the nostrils of the Lord, and if only the blear-eyed, spectacled old fools that set up to know more about creation than Moses did, after he went to school to God for forty days, could swamp themselves under the ice, it would be silly enough, and no matter, but for my lad! Susan and I nursed, rocked him, prayed over his cradle since he was barely one year old, and now for him to be cast out like Jonah for fish bait. If God had wanted the North Pole handled and strung with flags it would never have been shut up in nights six months long, behind ice high as Ararat and wide as the flood. There will be lonesome days till the lad gets home – and if he never comes back! Where will his dear bones be in the resurrection?"

His bearded chin trembled, and his heavy, shaggy white eyebrows met over his nose.

"Mr. Lea, we must not cease to pray. God needs such noble men as Mr. Herriott, and He can protect him from every danger."

"Madam, don't 'mister' me. I am just Amos Lea – Noel's Amos. Study your Bible and you will find out the Lord needs no man; the best of us are but worthless cumberers of the ground."

He drew his sleeve across his eyes and left her.

Up and down the hothouses, through the shrubbery, over the stile, along the curving beach and back to the terrace she wandered, striving in vain to divert her thoughts from one fact that overshadowed everything else – the master was going away that afternoon, and she might never see him again. From public disgrace her father was safe, the crisis of acute terror on his account had passed; but now, as the smoke of the battle drifted away, she became dimly conscious that she carried a wound she had not suspected and could not explain. The ache in her heart was unlike any former pain; there was nothing with which to compare it, and she dared not analyze it at present. Through the house she walked aimlessly until she reached the suite of rooms set apart for the master. In the laboratory she did not linger, but the adjoining apartment she knew must be the "den," from the strong, pervading odor of cigar smoke. The wainscoting of carved walnut, five feet high, was surmounted by a shelf holding a miscellaneous collection of whips, pipes, geological specimens, flints from Indian mounds, a hematite hatchet, a copper maul, a jade adze. In one corner of the room stood a totem pole with a brooding owl; in another a "kahili" of white feathers, with richly inlaid handle; and upon the wall above the shelf, suspended by heavy silk cords, a gold-colored "ahulla." Two trunks strapped and ready for removal had been drawn to the middle of the apartment. On one lay a heavy overcoat fur lined, and a fine field glass in a leather shield; on the other a gun case and box of instruments.

She sat down in a deep morocco cushioned chair, from the brass knob of which hung a somewhat faded silk smoking jacket lined with quilted orange satin, and looked up at the steel engravings, the etchings, the water colors on the wall; at some marble and bronze busts on the mantel shelf, and on the top of a teak cabinet filled with curios from Crete, Uxmal, Labná, and the Mancos Cañon.

Over the writing desk and a neighboring table were strewn scientific journals, and on a sheet of paper that had fluttered to the floor on its way to the over-laden waste basket, bold headlines had been written by Mr. Herriott:

"First – Were the cliff-dwellers of Asiatic origin?

"Second – Are the Eskimos survivors of pre-glacial man who dwelt within the Arctic circle when its fauna and flora, under similar climatic conditions, corresponded with those now existing in Virginia and Maryland?

"Third – Are kames and drumlins infallible index fingers?"

Whether the page contained notes from some book that he wished to controvert, or his own views jotted down for future elaboration, she could not determine; but as she stooped to pick up and preserve it, a growl startled her, and around the corner of the desk she saw the red eyes of Tzar. She spoke to him, but he rose, showed his fangs, and stalked out of the room, the bristles stiff on his dun-colored back. How long she sat, plunged in painful, perplexed revery, she never knew; but finally she went to the open door of the bedroom, and leaned against the facing, unwilling to enter. Over the low, carved chimney-piece hung the portrait of Mrs. Herriott, a very beautiful young woman in black velvet and pearls, and the perfect features, the poise of head, the silky black hair, and especially the fine moulding of brow she gave to her son, though unlike his her soft, tender eyes matched her hair in color.

Below the portrait a silver frame held a photograph of Eglah in evening dress, taken in Washington; beside it another, wearing her college cap and gown. On the dressing table a glittering circle arrested her attention. Swiftly she entered, crossed the room, and leaned over it. An exquisitely painted miniature of herself, set with diamonds, and resting on a carved ivory easel, looked up at her. Two discarded photographs of Mr. Herriott lay with some torn letters under a neighboring chair. She snatched one and hurried away, fearing to trust herself; but passing the smoking jacket she caught it up, folded it under her arm, and escaped to her room.

Exchanging her trailing morning gown of cream silk for the travelling suit, she packed her trunk, hiding jacket and photograph beneath the tray, locked it, and sat down to wait. In the wreck of her overturned altar and shattered filial ideals, beyond and above the desolation of her cruel disenchantment, rose one image inflexible, incorruptible, absolutely invulnerable to temptation, that involved sacrifice of duty. As the mist cleared, strange new valuations loomed, and she thought of lines that limned his portrait: