The Bars of Iron - Ethel May Dell (top novels .txt) 📗

stiff, just as he had held himself on that day in the winter when she had so indignantly intervened to save his dog from his ungovernable fury. But he did not seem to resent her attack, and in spite of herself Avery's own resentment began to wane. She suddenly remembered that her very protest was an admission of intimacy of which he would not scruple to avail himself if it suited his purpose, and with this thought in her mind she paused in confusion.
"Won't you finish?" said Piers.
She turned to leave him. "That's all I have to say."
He put out a restraining hand. "Then may I say something?"
The request was so humbly uttered that she could not refuse it. She remained where she was.
"I should like you to know," said Piers, "that I have never given Miss Rose or any other girl with whom I have flirted the faintest shadow of a reason for believing that I was in earnest. That is the truth--on my honour."
"I wonder if--they--would say the same," said Avery.
He shrugged his shoulders. "No one ever before accused me of being a lady-killer. As to your other charge against me, it was not I who deceived my grandfather. It was he who deceived himself."
"Isn't that a distinction without a difference?" said Avery, in a low voice.
She was beginning to wish that she had not spoken with such vehemence. After all, what were his delinquencies to her? She almost expected him to ask the question; but he did not.
"Do you mind explaining?" he said.
With an effort she made response. "You can't say it was honourable to let your grandfather come home in the belief that you wanted to become engaged to Miss Rose."
"Have I said so?" said Piers.
Avery paused. She had a sudden feeling of uncertainty as if he had kicked away a foothold upon which she had rashly attempted to rest.
"You admit that it was not?" she said.
He smiled a little. "I admit that it was not strictly honest, but I didn't see much harm in it. In any case it was high time we came home, and it gave him the impetus to move."
"And when are you going to tell him the truth?" said Avery.
Piers was silent.
Looking at him through the dusk, she was aware of a change in his demeanour, though as to its nature she was slightly doubtful.
"And if I don't tell him?" said Piers at length.
"You will," she said quickly.
"I don't know why I should." Piers' voice was dogged. "He'll know fast enough--when she gets engaged to Guyes."
"Know that you have played a double game," said Avery.
"Well?" he said. "And if he does?"
"I think you will be sorry--then," she said.
Somehow she could not be angry any longer. He had accepted her rebuke in so docile a spirit. She did not wholly understand his attitude. Yet it softened her.
"Why should I be sorry?" said Piers.
She answered him quickly and impulsively. "Because it isn't your nature to deceive. You are too honest at heart to do it and be happy."
"Happy!" said Piers, an odd note of emotion in his voice. "Do you suppose I'm ever that--or ever likely to be?"
She recoiled a little from the suppressed vehemence of his tone, but almost instantly he put out his hand again to her with a gesture of boyish persuasion.
"Don't rag me, Avery! I've had a filthy time lately. And when I saw you cut and run at sight of me--I just couldn't stand it. I've been wanting to answer your letter, but I couldn't."
"But why should you?" Avery broke in gently. "My letter was the answer to yours."
She gave him her hand, because she could not help it.
He held it in a hungry clasp. "I know--I know," he said rather incoherently. "It--it was very decent of you not to be angry. I believe I let myself go rather--what? Thanks awfully for being so sweet about it!"
"My dear boy," Avery said, "you thank me for nothing! The matter is past. Don't let us re-open it!"
She spoke with unconscious appeal. His hand squeezed hers in instant response. "All right. We won't. And look here,--if you want me to tell my grandfather that he has been building his castle in the air,--it'll mean a row of course, but--I'll do it."
"Will you?" said Avery.
He nodded. "Yes--as you wish it. And may I come to tea with Jeanie to-morrow?"
His dark eyes smiled suddenly into hers as he dropped her hand. She had a momentary feeling of uncertainty as she met them--a sense of doubt that disquieted her strangely. It was as if he had softly closed a door against her somewhere in his soul.
With a curious embarrassment she answered him. "Jeanie has not been well all the winter. Dr. Tudor has ordered a change, and we are going--she and I--to Stanbury Cliffs to-morrow."
"Are you though?" He opened his eyes. "Just you and she, eh? What a cosy party!"
"The other children will probably join us for the Easter holidays," Avery said. "It's a nice place, they say. Do you know it?"
"I should think I do. Victor and I used to go there regularly when I was a kid. It was there I learnt to swim."
"Who is Victor?" asked Avery, beginning to walk on up the hill.
"Victor? Oh, he's my French nurse--the best chap who ever walked. We are great pals," laughed Piers. "And so you're off to-morrow, are you? Hope you'll have a good time. Give my love to the kiddie! She isn't really ill, what?"
"Dr. Tudor is not satisfied about her," Avery said.
"Oh, Tudor!" Piers spoke with instant disparagement. "I don't suppose he's any good. What does he say anyway?"
"He is afraid of lung trouble," Avery said. "But we hope the change is going to do wonders for her. Do you know, I think I must run in now? I have several little jobs still to get through this evening."
Piers stopped at once. "Good-bye!" he said. "I'm glad I saw you. Take care of yourself, Avery! And the next time you see me coming--don't run away!"
He set his foot in the stirrup and swung himself up into the saddle. Pompey immediately began to execute an elaborate dance in the roadway, rendering further conversation out of the question. Piers waved his cap in careless adieu, and turned the animal round. In another moment he was tearing down the lane at a gallop, and Avery was left looking after him still with that curious sense of doubt lying cold at her heart.
The sight of a black, clerical figure emerging from the churchyard caused her to turn swiftly and pursue her way to the Vicarage gate. But the sounds of those galloping hoofs still wrought within her as she went. They beat upon her spirit with a sense of swift-moving Destiny.


CHAPTER XXVIII
THE EVESHAM DEVIL

"Confound the boy!" said Sir Beverley.
He rose up from the black oak settle in the hall with a jerky movement of irritation, and tramped to the front-door.
It had been one of those strange soft days that sometimes come in the midst of blustering March storms, and though the sun had long gone down the warmth still lingered. It might have been an evening in May.
He opened the great door with an impatient hand. What on earth was the boy doing? Had he gone love-making to Wardenhurst? A grim smile touched the old man's grim lips as this thought occurred to him. That he was not wasting his time nearer home he was fairly convinced; for only that morning he had heard from Lennox Tudor that the mother's help at the Vicarage, over whom in the winter Piers had been inclined to make a fool of himself, had taken one of the children away for a change. It seemed more than probable by this time that Piers' wandering fancy had wholly ceased to stray in her direction, but the news of her absence had caused Sir Beverley undoubted satisfaction. He hoped his boy would not encounter that impertinent, scheming woman again until he was safely engaged to Ina Rose. That this engagement was imminent Sir Beverley was fully convinced. His only wonder was that it had not taken place sooner. The two had been thrown together almost daily during the sojourn of Colonel Rose and his daughter at Mentone, and they had always seemed to enjoy each other's society. Of course Sir Beverley did not like the girl. He actively disliked the whole female species. But she belonged to the county, and she seemed moreover to be a normal healthy young woman who would be the mother of normal healthy children. And this was the sort of wife Piers wanted. For Piers--drat the boy!--was not normal. He inherited a good deal of his Italian grandmother's temperament as well as her beauty. And life was not likely to be a very easy matter for him in consequence.
But an ordinary young English wife of his own rank would be a step in the right direction. So reasoned Sir Beverley, who had taken that fatal step in the wrong one in his youth and had never recovered the ground thus lost.
Standing there at the open door, he dwelt upon his boy's future with a kind of grim pleasure that was not unmixed with heartache. He and his wife would have to go and live at the Dower House of course. No feminine truck at the Abbey for him! But the lad should continue to manage the estate with him. That would bring them in contact every day. He couldn't do without that much. The evenings would be lonely enough. He pictured the long silent dinners with a weary frown. How infernally lonely the Abbey could be!
The steady tick of the clock in the corner forced itself upon his notice. He swore at it under his breath, and went out upon the steps.
At the same instant a view-halloo from the dark avenue greeted him, and in spite of himself his face softened.
"Hullo, you rascal!" he shouted back. "What the devil are you up to?"
Piers came running up, light-footed and alert. "I've been unlucky," he explained. "Had two punctures. I left the car at the garage and came on as quickly as I could. I say, I'm awfully sorry. I've been with Dick Guyes."
Sir Beverley growled inarticulately, and turned inwards. So he had not been to the Roses' after all!
"Get along with you!" he said. "And dress as fast as you can!"
And Piers bounded past him and went up the stairs in three great leaps. He seemed to have grown younger during the few days that had elapsed since their return, more ardent, more keenly alive. The English spring seemed to exhilarate him; but for the first time Sir Beverley began to have his doubts as to the reason for his evident pleasure in returning. What on earth had he been to see Guyes for? Guyes of all people--who was well-known as one of Miss Ina's most devoted adorers!
It was evident that the news he desired to hear would not be imparted to him that night, and Sir Beverley considered himself somewhat aggrieved in consequence. He was decidedly short with Piers when he reappeared--a fact which in no way disturbed his grandson's equanimity. He talked cheery commonplaces throughout dinner without effort, regardless of Sir Beverley's discouraging attitude, and it was not till dessert was placed upon the table that he allowed his conversational energies to flag.
Then indeed, as David finally and ceremoniously withdrew, did he suddenly seem to awake to the fact that conversation was no longer a vital necessity, and forthwith dropped into an abrupt, uncompromising silence.