The Way of an Eagle - Ethel May Dell (i read books TXT) 📗

feeling for his flask, and for the first time his hands shook uncontrollably. But as the raw spirit touched her lips, he saw her eyelids quiver, and a great gasp of relief went through him. As she opened her eyes he stayed his hand. It seemed cruel to bring her back. But the suffering and the half instinctive look of horror passed from her eyes like a shadow, as they rested upon him. There was even the very faint flicker of a smile about them.
She turned her face slightly towards him with the gesture of a child nestling against his breast. Yet though she lay thus in his arms, he felt keenly, bitterly, that she was very far away from him.
He hung over her, still holding himself in with desperate strength, not daring to speak lest he should disturb the holy peace that seemed to be drawing all about her.
The sunset glory deepened. For a few seconds the crags above them glittered golden as the peaks of Paradise. And in the wonderful silence Muriel spoke.
"Do you see them?" she said.
He saw that her eyes were turned upon the shining mountains. There was a strange light on her face.
"See what, darling?" he asked her softly.
Her eyes came back to him for a moment. They had a thoughtful, wondering look.
"How strange!" she said slowly. "I thought it was--an eagle."
The detachment of her tone cut him to the heart. And suddenly the pain of it was more than he could bear.
"It is I--Nick," he told her, with urgent emphasis. "Surely you know me!"
But her eyes had passed beyond him again. "Nick?" she questioned to herself. "Nick? But this--this was an eagle."
She was drawing away from him, and he could not hold her, could not even hope to follow her whither she went. A great sob broke from him, and in a moment, like the rush of an overwhelming flood from behind gates long closed, the anguish of the man burst its bonds.
"Muriel!" he cried passionately. "Muriel! Stay with me, look at me, love me! There is nothing in the mountains to draw you. It is here--here beside you, touching you, holding you. O God," he prayed brokenly, "she doesn't understand me. Let her understand,--open her eyes,--make her see!"
His agony reached her, touched her, for a moment held her. She turned her eyes back to his tortured face.
"But, Nick," she said softly, "I can see."
He bent lower. "Yes?" he said, in a choked voice. "Yes?"
She regarded him with a faint wonder. Her eyes were growing heavy, as the eyes of a tired child. She raised one hand and pointed vaguely.
"Over there," she said wearily. "Can't you see them? Then perhaps it was a dream, or even--perhaps--a vision. Don't you remember how it went? 'And behold--the mountain--was full--of horses--and chariots--of--fire!' God sent them, you know."
The tired voice ceased. Her head sank lower upon Nick's breast. She gave a little quivering sigh, and seemed to sleep.
And Nick turned his tortured eyes upon the pass below him, and stared downwards spellbound.
Was he dreaming also? Or was it perchance a vision--the trick of his fevered fancy? There, at his feet, not fifty yards from where he sat, he beheld men, horses, guns, winding along in a narrow, unbroken line as far as he could see.
A great surging filled his ears, and through it he heard himself shout once, twice, and yet a third time to the phantom army below.
The surging swelled in his brain to a terrific tumult--a confusion indescribable. And then something seemed to crack inside his head. The dark peaks swayed giddily against the darkening sky, and toppled inwards without sound.
The last thing he knew was the call of a bugle, tense and shrill as the buzz of a mosquito close to his ear. And he laughed aloud to think how so small a thing had managed to deceive him.


PART II

CHAPTER VIII
COMRADES

The jingling notes of a piano playing an air from a comic opera floated cheerily forth into the magic silence of the Simla pines, and abruptly, almost spasmodically, a cracked voice began to sing. It was a sentimental ditty treated jocosely, and its frivolity rippled out into the mid-day silence with something of the effect of a monkey's chatter. The _khitmutgar_ on the verandah would have looked scandalised or at best contemptuous had it not been his role to express nothing but the dignified humility of the native servant. He was waiting for his mistress to come out of the nursery where her voice could be heard talking imperiously to her baby's _ayah_. He had already waited some minutes, and he would probably have waited much longer, for his patience was inexhaustible, had it not been for that sudden irresponsible and wholly tuneless burst of song. But the second line was scarcely ended before she came hurriedly forth, nearly running into his stately person in her haste.
"Oh, dear, Sammy!" she exclaimed with some annoyance. "Why didn't you tell me Captain Ratcliffe was here?"
She hastened past him along the verandah with the words, not troubling about his explanation, and entered the room whence the music proceeded at a run.
"My dear Nick," she cried impulsively, "I had no idea!"
The music ceased in a jangle of wrong notes, and Nick sprang to his feet, his yellow face wearing a grin of irrepressible gaiety.
"So I gathered, O elect lady," he rejoined, seizing her outstretched hands and kissing first one and then the other. "And I took the first method that presented itself of making myself known. So they beguiled you to Simla, after all?"
"Yes, I had to come for my baby's sake. They thought at first it would have to be home and no compromise. I'm longing to show him to you, Nick. Only six months, and such a pet already! But tell me about yourself. I am sure you have come off the sick list too soon. You look as if you had come straight from a lengthy stay with the _bandar-log_."
"_Tu quoque!_" laughed Nick. "And with far less excuse. Only you manage to look charming notwithstanding, which is beyond me. Do you know, Mrs. Musgrave, you don't do justice to the compromise? I should be furious with you if I were Will."
Mrs. Musgrave frowned at him. She was a very pretty woman, possessing a dainty and not wholly unconscious charm. "Tell me about yourself, Nick," she commanded. "And don't be ridiculous. You can't possibly judge impartially on that head, as you haven't the smallest idea as to how ill I have been. I am having a rest cure now, you must know, and I don't go anywhere; or I should have come to see you in hospital."
"Good thing you didn't take the trouble," said Nick. "I've been sleeping for the last three weeks, and I am only just awake."
Mrs. Musgrave looked at him with a very friendly smile. "Poor Nick!" she said. "And Wara was relieved after all."
He jerked up his shoulders. "After a fashion. Grange was the only white man left, and he hadn't touched food for three days. If Muriel Roscoe had stayed, she would have been dead before Bassett got anywhere near them. There are times when the very fact of suffering actively keeps people alive. It was that with her."
He spoke briefly, almost harshly, and immediately turned from the subject. "I suppose you were very anxious about your cousin?"
"Poor Blake Grange? Of course I was. But I was anxious--horribly anxious--about you all." There was a quiver of deep feeling in Mrs. Musgrave's voice.
"Thank you," said Nick. He reached out a skeleton finger and laid it on her arm. "I thought you would be feeling soft-hearted, so I have come to ask you a favour. Not that I shouldn't have come in any case, but it seemed a suitable moment to choose."
Mrs. Musgrave laughed a little. "Have you ever found me anything but kind?" she questioned.
"Never," said Nick. "You're the best pal I ever had, which is the exact reason for my coming here to-day. Mrs. Musgrave, I want you to be awfully good to Muriel Roscoe. She needs some one to help her along just now."
Mrs. Musgrave opened her eyes wide, but she said nothing at once, for Nick had sprung to his feet and was restlessly pacing the room.
"Come back, Nick," she said at last. "Tell me a little about her. We have never met, you know. And why do you ask this of me when she is in Lady Bassett's care?"
"Lady Bassett!" said Nick. He made a hideous grimace, and said no more.
Mrs. Musgrave laughed. "How eloquent! Do you hate her, too, then? I thought all men worshipped at that shrine."
Nick came back and sat down. "I nearly killed her once," he said.
"What a pity you didn't quite!" ejaculated Mrs. Musgrave.
Nick grinned. "Sits the wind in that quarter? I wonder why."
"Oh, I hate her by instinct," declared Mrs. Musgrave recklessly, "though her scented notes to me always begin, 'Dearest Daisy'! She always disapproved of me openly till baby came. But she has found another niche for me now. I am not supposed to be so fascinating as I was. She prefers unattractive women."
"Gracious heaven!" interjected Nick.
"Yes, you may laugh. I do myself." Daisy Musgrave spoke almost fiercely notwithstanding. "She's years older than I am anyhow, and I shall score some day if I don't now. Have you ever watched her dance? There's a sort of snaky, coiling movement runs up her whole body. Goodness!" breaking off abruptly. "I'm getting venomous myself. I had better stop before I frighten you away."
"Oh, don't mind me!" laughed Nick. "No one knows better than I that she is made to twist all ways. She hates me as a cobra hates a mongoose."
"Really?" Daisy Musgrave was keenly interested. "But why?"
He shook his head. "You had better ask Lady Bassett. It may be because I had the misfortune to set fire to her once. It is true I extinguished her afterwards, but I don't think she enjoyed it. It was a humiliating process. Besides, it spoilt her dress."
"But she is always so gracious to you," protested Daisy.
"Honey-sweet. That's exactly how I know her cobra feelings. And that brings me round to Muriel Roscoe again, and the favour I have to ask."
Daisy shot him a sudden shrewd glance. "Do you want to marry her?" she asked him point blank.
Nick's colourless eyebrows went up till they nearly met his colourless hair. "Dearest Daisy," he said, "you are a genius. I mean to do that very thing."
Daisy got up and softly closed the window. "Surely she is very young," she said. "Is she in love with you?"
She did not turn at the sound of his laugh. She had almost expected it. For she knew Nick Ratcliffe as very few knew him. The bond of sympathy between them was very strong.
"Can you imagine any girl falling in love with me?" he asked.
"Of course I can. You are not so unique as that. There isn't a man in the universe that some woman couldn't be fool enough to love."
"Many thanks!" said Nick. "Then--I may count upon your support, may I? I know Lady Bassett will put a spoke in my wheel if she can. But I have Sir Reginald's consent. He is Muriel's guardian, you know. Also, I had her father's approval in the first place. It has got to be soon, you see, Daisy. The present state of affairs is unbearable. She will be miserable with Lady Bassett."
Daisy still stood with her back to him. She was fidgeting with the blind-cord, her pretty face very serious.
"I am not sure,"