Click went the machine; round buzzed the wheels; out from George"s eyes shot the sparkles. He jumped to his feet, his face red. "Is his cat!" he cried. "His Rose of Sharon! I see it! I see it! By Gad, I"ll do it! Look here now--"
"No, I will not," the Professor said. "I do not wish to know anything about it. I hear my wife"s step."
"I understand. All right. But don"t tell a soul--not even Bill."
"I cannot tell, because I do not know. But I suspect it is something very funny," and the Professor burst into a very deep "Ho! ho! ho!"
"My dearest," said Mrs. Wyvern at the door, "whatever can you be laughing at so loudly?"
"Ho! ho! ho! ho!" boomed the Professor, belling like a bloodhound. "It is something very funny."
Mrs. Wyvern kissed the thin hairs on the top of his mighty head. "Dear William, I do trust it was not one of those painful stories of your young days."
George stayed to dinner. By nine he left the house. He did not make for home. Striking through lanes he climbed an ascending field, mounted a stile, and here, with an unseeing eye upon Herons" Holt twinkling its bedroom lights in the valley below, he smoked many pipes, brooding upon his scheme.
III.
It was not a melancholy process. Every now and again a crack of laughter jerked him; once he took his pipe from his mouth and put up a ringing peal of mirth that sent a brace of bunnies, flirting near his feet, wildly scampering for safety. Long he brooded....
A church clock gave him eleven. At ten he had been too deeply buried.
Now his head was pushed clear from the burrow in which he had been working, and the sound caught his attention. No light now p.r.i.c.ked Herons" Holt upon the dusky chart stretched beneath him. Its occupants were abed.
"I"ll do it to-night!" cried George. "I"ll do it at once!"
He drew on his pipe. A full cloud of smoke came. The pipe was well alight, and caution bidding him that it were well to bide a while so that sleep might more cosily warm the beds of the household, he determined that he would have out his last smoke as plotter: his next would be smoked as doer of the deed.
He rehea.r.s.ed his plan. A knife would slip back the catch of the window behind which the Rose of Sharon lay. Possessing himself of her person he would speed to that tumbled hut in the copse. There she might lie in safety for the night: neither hut nor copse was in any man"s road.
Upon the morrow, when the hideous circ.u.mstance had been discovered, he would bear himself as events seemed to demand. He would be boundless in his sympathy, a leader in the search. If the idea of reward did not occur to Mr. Marrapit, he must suggest it. Unlikely that in the first moment of loss, when the Rose would still seem to be near, the reward would approach the figure at which he aimed. That was for his cunning to contrive. But obviously it would be impossible permanently to keep the Rose in the hut. To-morrow, when pretending to search for her he could guard the place where she lay; but he could not always be sentinel. The countryside would be scoured; no stone left unturned, no spinney unbeaten.
As he saw the matter, the plan would be to get somewhere down the railway line on pretext of a clue, taking the Rose of Sharon with him; for the success of the whole scheme depended upon his concealing the cat until Mr. Marrapit should be upon his bended knees in his distress, in deepest despair as to the Rose"s recovery, and hence would be transported to deepest grat.i.tude when it was restored to his arms. George told himself he must be prepared against the eventuality of his uncle failing to offer in public reward so large a sum as 500 pounds. That did not greatly distress. Best indeed if that sum were offered, but, failing it, it was upon Mr. Marrapit"s grat.i.tude that George ultimately reckoned. Surely when he "found" the cat it would be Mr. Marrapit"s natural reply to give in exchange the sum he had that afternoon so violently refused. At the least, he could not refuse to lend it.
Early in his brooding George had decided he must not tell his Mary.
First, it would be cruel to set her upon the rack of acting a part before Mr. Marrapit, before the household, before every questioner she must encounter; second--second, my ign.o.ble George had doubts as to in what spirit his Mary would regard this plot did he make her partner in it. That it was wholly justifiable he personally would have contended before archangels. This miserly uncle was keeping from him money that was as incontestably his own as the being which also his mother had given him. Before all the angelic host he would thus have protested- without stammer, without blush; with the inspiration of righteousness, with the integrity of innocence. But to protest his cause before his Mary was another matter. There might be no occasion to protest; his Mary might see eye to eye with him in the matter. She might; but it was an eventuality he did not care to try against a test. His Mary was a girl--and girls are in their conduct narrowed by scruples that do not beset men. His Mary--and this it was that would make a test so violent--his Mary was his Mary, and well he knew, and loved, the little heart so delicately white as instantly to discover the finest specks of sootiness--if specks there were--in any breeze that might cross its surface.
No, he would not tell his Mary. When the thing was done--when he, the black-hearted rogue, had the little saint safe in the toils she would find so delicious, then--then he would tell her, would silence her frightened squeals--if she squealed--by his intention to pay back the money, whether won as reward (which was improbable) or earned as token of grat.i.tude (which was highly likely). He had only asked to borrow, and it should only be a loan.
Across the dark fields in spirit he kissed his little saint. ... Of course--of course--one must admit these brutal things--of course the scheme might fail. Anything might happen to crash it about his ears.
That was a deadly, dismal thought, but he flattened it from sight with that l.u.s.ty hammer that gay youth uses--"I shan"t be any worse off if it does fail."
The smoke came through his pipe in burning whiffs. He shook it bowl downwards. Ashes and sparks fell in a shower. The pipe was done.
_Whoop! forrard!_ The game was afoot.
IV.
A moon as clear as that which shone when Bill stole to Herons" Holt to woo his blessed damosel, gave a clear light to George as now he approached the house. He took his way across the fields, and his progression was that of no stealthy-footed conspirator. Two miles of downward-sloping land lay between the stile whereon he had brooded and the home that his plottings were to disturb. In buoyant spirits--for this was action, and action makes l.u.s.ty appeal to youth--he trotted or galloped as the descent was easy or sharply inclined; the low hedges he took in great sprawling jumps, the ditches in vast giant strides-- arms working as balance-pole, humming as he ran.
Upon the lawn he became more cautious. But the moon showed Herons"
Holt sleepy-eyed-blinds drawn.
The cats" parlour, back of the house, gave upon a little strip of turf that kept away the kitchen garden. George drew his knife; approached the window. Now he was a criminal indeed.
To slip the catch was easy work; between upper and lower sash there was clear s.p.a.ce. George inserted his pen-knife. Tip of blade grated against catch; a little pressure--an answering movement; a little more--and, _click_, the trick was done!
Now he raised the sash, and now he is in the room. Glimmer of a match shows him the sleeping-baskets; its steadier flame discloses the Rose, snugly curled, a little free of her silken coverlet.
Wake, now, Rose--as an older school of novelists would have addressed you. Wake, Rose! Wake, pretty Rose! Queenly Rose, awake! Wake precious, virgin Rose! Squeal! scratch! bite! Claw those wicked hands descending into your pure bed! Spring like spotless maiden aroused to find ravisher at her couch! Spring, Rose, spring! Squawking news of outrage to all the house, bound wildly, Rose, about this room that else you shall not see until through searing perils you have pa.s.sed!
Spring! Rose, spring!
Not Rose!
II.
The ravisher"s hands descended upon her person--she only purred. They pa.s.sed about her warm and exquisite form--she purred the more. They tickled her as they laid hold--she stretched a leg; purred with fuller note. Perchance this virgin cat dreamed of some gallant young Tom wooing her bed; perchance these ticklings had their deliciously transfigured place in her visions; perchance--she only purred.
Now George tucked her beneath his arm. Legs dangled wretchedly; gallant young Tom leapt from her dreams and she awoke. She stirred.
George had a foot upon the window-sill, and the night air ruffled her downy coat. She was pressed against bony ribs; a rough arm squeezed her wretchedly; long, poky fingers tortured her flank; her legs draggled dismally. She voiced protest in a plaintive, piercing, long- drawn _"Mi-aow!"_
_Clout!_
Ah, Rose! Pretty, foolish Rose--as our older school again would have written--why did you entertain sensuous dreams when you should have been stirring?
_"Mi-aow!"_
_Clout!_
Too late, Rose! Too late! That beauteous head--that prize-winning head which from kittenhood upwards has known none other than caress, is now a mark for battering b.u.mps if you do but open those perfect jaws--those prize-winning jaws. Too late, Rose! Too late! Do not cry now, Rose! The ravisher has you. His blood congeals in terror at your plaintive cry. In his brutish panic he will answer it with thuds. Too late, Rose! Too late!
"_Mi-aow!_"
_Clout!_
Ah, Rose, Rose!
He is outside now. "Shut up, you fat idiot!" he hisses. Squeezing her yet more villainously with one arm, with the other he draws down the sash. Through the gate, into the lane, over the stream, down the ride, into the copse--up to the hut.
The outer door hangs grinningly upon its hinges. The door going to the inner room has a working latch; George kicks it open; elbows it to behind him; drops the Rose with jarring plump; strikes a match. There is the dusty pile of Old Tom bottles, there the little heap of bracken upon which Mrs. Major doubtless had reclined while with Old Tom she talked. Excellent!
The match goes out. He lights another. The Rose is standing forlornly at his feet. While the match lasts he lifts her to the bracken bed; presses her down; backs out; closes the door.
His watch, put beneath the moon, tells him it is upon one o"clock. He pulls to the outer door; wedges beneath it a stump of wood that keeps it firmly shut; makes for home.
In an hour he is sleeping the dreamless, childlike slumber that comes to those who, setting their hand to the plough, have manfully laboured a full day"s work.