"Nearly twenty! You don"t say so! She might be fourteen at the present moment. Look at that! Look at it!" For Toby was suddenly whizzing like a b.u.t.terfly across the lawn in a giddy flight that seemed scarcely to touch the ground, the little girl still upon her shoulder, the elder child standing apart and clapping her hands in delighted admiration.
"Yes, she is rather like fourteen," Maud said, with her tender smile. "Do you know what she did the other day? It was madness of course, and my husband was very angry with her. I was frightened myself though I have more faith in her than he has. She climbs like a cat, you know, and she actually took both those children up to a high bough of the old beech tree; I don"t know in the least how she did it. None of the party seemed to think there was any cause for alarm till Jake came on the scene. He fetched them down with a ladder--all but Toby who went higher and pelted him with beech nuts till he retreated--at my urgent request."
"And what happened after that?" questioned Saltash, with his eyes still upon the dancing figure. "From what I have observed of Jake, I should say that an ignominious retreat is by no means in his line."
Maud laughed a little. "Oh, Jake can be generous when he likes. He had it out with her of course, but he wasn"t too severe. Ah, look! She is going to jump the sun dial!"
Sheila turned to her. "Surely you are nervous! If she fell, the little one might be terribly hurt."
"She won"t fall," Maud said with confidence.
And even as she spoke, Toby leapt the sun dial, leaving the ground as a bird leaves it, without effort or any sort of strain, and alighting again as a bird alights from a curving flight with absolute freedom and a natural adroitness of movement indescribably pleasant to watch.
"A very pretty circus trick!" declared the General, and even Bunny"s clouded brow cleared a little though he said nothing.
"A circus trick indeed!" said Sheila, as if speaking to herself. "How on earth did she do it?"
"She is like a boy in many ways," said Maud.
Sheila looked at her. "Yes. She is just like a boy, or at least--" Her look went further, reached Saltash who lounged on Maud"s other side, and fell abruptly away.
As Toby came up with the two children, all of them flushed and laughing, Toby herself in her white frock looking like a child just out of school, she rose and turned to Bunny.
"We ought to go now," she said. "I am going to fetch the car round for Dad."
"I"ll do it," he said.
But she went with him as he had known she would. They left the group at the window and moved away side by side in silence as they had walked that afternoon.
Saltash stood up and addressed Maud. "I"m going too. Bunny is dining with me tonight. I suppose you won"t come?"
She gave him her hand, smiling. "I can"t thank you. Ask me another day!
You and Bunny will really get on much better without me."
"Impossible!" he declared gallantly, but he did not press her.
He turned to the General and took his leave.
Toby and the two children walked the length of the terrace with him, all chattering at once. She seemed to be in a daring, madcap mood and Saltash laughed and jested with her as though she had been indeed the child she looked. Only at parting, when she would have danced away, he suddenly stopped her with a word.
"Nonette!"
She stood still as if at a word of command; there had been something of compulsion in his tone.
He did not look at her, and the smile he wore was wholly alien to the words he spoke.
"Be careful how you go! And don"t see Bunny again--till I have seen him!"
A hard breath went through Toby. She stood like a statue, the two children clasping her hands. Her blue eyes gazed at him with a wide questioning. Her face was white.
"Why? Why?" she whispered at length.
His look flashed before her vision like the grim play of a sword. "That girl remembers you. She will give you away. She"s probably at it now.
I"ll see him--tell him the truth if necessary. Anyhow--leave him to me!"
"Tell him--the truth?" The words came from her like a cry. There was a sudden terror in her eyes. He made a swift gesture of dismissal. "Go, child! Go! Whatever I do will make it all right for you. I"m standing by. Don"t be afraid! Just--go!"
It was a definite command. She turned to obey, the little girls still clinging to her. The next moment she was running lightly back with them, and Saltash turned in the opposite direction and pa.s.sed out of sight round the corner of the house on his way to the stable-yard.
CHAPTER XIII
THE TRUTH
He went with careless tread as his fashion was, whistling the gay air to which all England was dancing that season. His swarthy countenance wore the half-mischievous, half-amused expression with which it was his custom to confront--and baffle--the world at large. No one knew what lay behind that facile mask. Only the very few suspected that it hid aught beyond a genial wickedness of a curiously attractive type.
His spurs rang upon the white stones, and Sheila Melrose, standing beside her father"s car in the shadow of some buildings, turned sharply and saw him. Her face was pale; it had a strained expression. But it changed at sight of him. She regarded him with that look of frozen scorn which once she had flung him when they had met in the garish crowd at Valrosa.
Bunny was stooping over the car, but he became aware of Saltash almost in the same moment, and stood up straight to face him. Sheila was pale, but he was perfectly white, and there were heavy drops of perspiration on his forehead. He looked full at Saltash with eyes of blazing accusation.
Saltash"s face never changed as he came up to the car. He ceased to whistle, but the old whimsical look remained. He seemed unaware of any tension.
"Car all right?" he asked smoothly. "Can I lend a hand? The general is beginning to move."
Sheila turned without a word and got into the car.
Bunny neither moved nor spoke. He stood like a man paralysed. It was Saltash who, with that royal air of amusing himself, stooped to the handle and started the engine.
The girl at the wheel did not even thank him. She looked beyond. Only as he stood aside and the car slid forward, she turned stiffly to Bunny.
"Good-bye!" she said.
He made a jerky movement. Their eyes met for a single second. "You will write?" he said.
His throat was working spasmodically, the words seemed to come with gigantic effort. She bent her head in answer and pa.s.sed between them through the white gate into the drive that led round to the house.
Saltash turned with a lightning movement to Bunny. "Walk back with me and we can talk!" he said.
Bunny drew sharply back. The movement was one of instinctive recoil. But still no words came. He stood staring at Saltash, and he was trembling from head to foot.
"Don"t be an a.s.s now!" Saltash said, and his voice was oddly gentle, even compa.s.sionate. "You"ve stumbled on a mare"s nest. It"s all right. I can explain."
Bunny controlled himself with a jerk. His face was like death, but he found his voice. "You can keep your d.a.m.ned lies to yourself," he said.
"I"ve no use for them."