Ingram, on his feet, in a rage which was the most manly he could have suffered, went after him at a run, and caught him up. "You blackguard," he said, and panted. "Turn and fight with me."
Glyde stopped. "I"ll not fight with you, Ingram," was his measured reply, "because I"ve that in me which would kill you. No mercy for you there. You can go as you please; you can send me to gaol or not; but you shan"t get me hanged. I"ve something to do with my life--as much of it as you leave me; and I want it." As Ingram glared at him, crimson now, with bulging eyes and teeth at lips, the other went on. "I"m going no farther to-day than my lodging. Your police will find me there when you send "em. I shan"t fight them, because I can"t afford it; and I shan"t fight you, dog that you are, for the same reason." Ingram cursed, and sprang at him, but Glyde stiffened his arm and held him off. Master was no match for man, and felt no better for the knowledge of that. It did serve, however, to bring him to his senses. He saw that he was making an a.s.s of himself.
"You"ll hear more of this," he said, and turned and walked rapidly back to the house.
Mortification inflamed his rage; his furious walking blew into it a sense of incurable injury. Injury, shocked pride, and animal heat altogether made a devil of him. He went directly to his own room, and rang the bell.
"Send Miss Percival to me," he told Minnie, "at once."
Then he waited for her, with a face like a rat.
XI
She might have gathered warning from Minnie"s panting summons, but had been busy over her accounts and had noticed nothing amiss.
"He wants you, Miss Percival! Don"t go!" She had scarcely heard. She said, "Who wants me? Mr. Ingram? I"ll come;" and though the maid stammered, "I wouldn"t, oh, I wouldn"t," had gone.
The face he showed her from his bureau, where he sat huddled over a litter of papers, prepared her instantly for crisis; snarling, white and wicked, yet it had tragedy in it--as if he knew that he had himself to reckon with beyond all.
For some time he seemed not to see her, though he looked at her. He sat glooming, like a man dumb in high fever, working his lower jaw, s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g and uns.c.r.e.w.i.n.g his hands. Afterwards she believed that he had been groping for the cruellest thing he could say, and was goaded into what he did say by the sense that he could find nothing.
"So that was your work? Your choice way! To set one of my own servants to club me."
She looked at him blankly; but her face glowed with sudden fire. "I haven"t the least notion what you mean. Who has clubbed you?"
His eyes flickered. "Glyde. Your friend. You seek your champions all about, it seems. You make things snug for yourself. It"s master or man with you--it"s all one."
He spluttered his venom broadcast. She held up her head. "Are you insulting me?" He wheeled round full in his chair.
"Is it possible to insult you?"
At that she lowered her panoply of fire, and grew still. "I see that you are. I can"t allow that."
He foamed. "Bullies in your hire. Now I see what Bill Chevenix was after.
And Glyde-faugh! who else?"
She watched him steadily without fear or disgust. His words held no meaning for her. "I think you must be mad," she said. "It will be better if I go."
He scoffed at her. "Better! You are right." He rose in his place. "You"ll go to-day."
Sanchia regarded him deeply, almost curiously, as if he had been a plant, interesting for its rarity.
"Naturally," she said, and left him in his staring fit.
The ordered little realm of Wanless went on its diurnal course. Luncheon was served at two by a trembling parlour-maid; the coffee was set in the hall, the cigar-box, the spirit-flame. Frodsham came for orders, Mr.
Menzies reported Glyde absent without leave. These things were done by rote: yet the whole house knew the facts. Sanchia, dining in the middle of the day, plied her knife and fork with composure. It was her way to face facts once for all, tussle with them, gain or lose, and be done with them.
She had been angry with Glyde, but now could think of him as "poor Struan," Punchinello in a rustic comedy. Of Ingram, deliberately, she thought nothing. It had been necessary to survey her feelings of eight years ago, to make a sour face of disgust over them, before she could shake them out of her head. Now they were gone, and he with them: the world, with May beginning, was too sweet a place for such vermin to fester in. She had swept and ridded herself, rinsed her mouth with pure water, and now could sit to her dinner and review her plans.
But the storm burst over Wanless, at half-past four. Minnie came into her room, breathless, Mrs. Benson stertorous in her traces.
Minnie wailed, "Oh, Miss, oh, Miss Sanchia, oh, dear Miss Percival, what"s going to become of us? Struan"s beaten the Master, and the Sergeant"s here!"
"Apes and tigers"--Mrs. Benson tolled like a bell. "Apes and tigers. What says the Book?"
Sanchia let them run, so the distorted tale was pieced together. At a quarter to twelve--it must have been that, because Emma heard the stableclock chime the half-hour--Struan was seen in his blacks. He came out of the wood-house, an ashplant in his hand. "Apes and tigers, apes and tigers," from Mrs. Benson--his face was dreadful to see. Who said so? Who saw him? Not Minnie, for sure. It was Bella the laundrymaid--she saw him from the window, and had a turn. The window was open. "Why, Struan," she said--but he told her to shut mouth and eyes. "The less you see, and know," he said, "the better for you." Poor Struan, with his tragedy airs!
Bella told that to Minnie, and that she would never forget it to her dying day. It turned the beer in her stomach, she said--and now she was lying down. As he went out of the yard, a cloud came over the sun, and Bella felt the chill. She had the goose-flesh all up her back. That, they say, betokens a person walking over your grave. Somewhere in England we all have our grave-ground lying green under turf. It awaits the spade and the hour. In the morning it is green and groweth up--this was Mrs. Benson"s piece, but Minnie had the rest of the stage.
The saddle-horse came flinging into the yard at one o"clock--no later.
That"s certain, because Frodsham was at his after-dinner pipe--or should have been: instead of which he came running in after him. Just about that time, or maybe a little before, Mr. Menzies had been asking for Struan?
Where was he? Did anyone ever see such a wastrel? No man"s account, he called him. Mrs. Benson tolled her apes and tigers all.
It was Minnie had seen the Master when the bell pealed. She had gone with her heart in her mouth--and oh, his collar and tie! His red ear! She had never seen anything like his face, and never must again on this side of the tomb. Wicked, oh, wicked! He showed his teeth. His face was as white as a clout. His voice was like a nutmeg-grater. "Miss Percival--here--at once." It was all he said. She did her bidding, for servants must--but her heart bled for Miss Percival, and she felt like fainting at any minute when she waited at luncheon. He drank brandy--jerked his head towards the sideboard when he wanted more. Never said a word. And how he ate, wrenching at his food! Fit to choke him. How she had lived through the luncheon she didn"t know at all. But that Struan, that quiet in an ordinary way, should have dared--with a stick in his violent hand! And the Sergeant ready for his warrant--stiff in the hall.
"A villain has got his deserts," boomed Mrs. Benson. "My dear, you"re going, it seems, and I with you. This is no place for a young lady--no, nor ever was, G.o.d be good! I know my place, to all parties; but I know that better--and now it"s come upon us like a thief in the night. Well, well, well--my pretty young lady! Old women must put up with what they get, we all know--but not murderers in gentlemen"s seats: no, nor beastly doings in and out of doors. I shall go, my dear, when you go--ah, me! When the wicked man ... but he"s got his deserts. What! a widower--with duty and pleasure before him, combined for once, and no thanks to him!--to dally with a French doll--movable eyes and separate teeth and all--when he might have gone on his knees to a splendid young lady! And I"d have kept him there to say his prayers, which he"s never done before, not since his mother died, poor old gentlewoman, worn out by the gnashings of a tiresome, G.o.d-Almighty, wicked old man, and a slip of sin who nothing was too good for. Not in this world, no! But it will be made up to him in the next, by the unquenchable worm--as he"ll find out when he tries his "down, dog" tricks; his "drop that, will you?" None of that down there in the fire. What says the Book? My dear, my dear," and she took the girl in her arms with a fine look about her of Niobe amid arrows, "I"ve a bosom for your head and a roof to shelter us both, and we"ll see what we shall see.
There"s castles and towers for the great oneyers and their minions; but mine is in the Fulham Road, my dear; my own property out of a building society that does business for the widow and the orphan--makes it their special line, as I understand, and have treated me squarely throughout-- that I will say. Yes, yes, and I"ll tend you fairly, will Sarah Benson, widowed mother of a graceless son, who can feel for her poor dead mistress, mother of a worse. My lamb, you shall want for nothing."
Fast in a good pair of arms, Sanchia snuggled and smiled. She patted Mrs.
Benson"s cheek, and put up her lips to her. Minnie, like a thawing icepack, ran rivers of water.
"You _are_ good to me," she said; "you _are_ sweet to me. I don"t mind anything when I can be sure of such friends. But you mustn"t leave, you know. Really, you ought not. I shan"t forget you, be sure of that, whether you stay or go."
Mrs. Benson crooned over her, "Oh, you"re not one that forgets, my precious, with your golden heart. And there"s more than me will find it out." She wiped her spectacles, breathing on the gla.s.ses, and Sanchia shook out her plumage, escaped from the nest. Ingram, without knocking, came into the room.
His rage was now cold and keen. He took in conspiracy with one glance at the three.
He spoke to Minnie. "I have been ringing for twenty minutes. The brandy in my room, and some soda-water. At once." Scared Minnie fled. Then he turned half to Sanchia, but didn"t look at her.
"I understood you were leaving this afternoon. You had better order a fly.
There"s the telephone." He held out an envelope. "I think that you will find this correct."
Sanchia was at her bureau. "Put it on the table, please," she said, without turning; and while Ingram hovered, Mrs. Benson heaving like the sea, gathered into a combing wave and, breaking, swallowed him up.
"Money-ah! You come with money to a lady of the land! Offer me money, Mr.
Ingram, if you dare. Your bread I"ve eaten, having baked it, and your father"s bread, and not choked yet, though each mouthful might be my last.
By every word out of the mouth of G.o.d, says the Book; and what shall He say of you? I"ve watched for this, I"ve seen it coming. You keep long accounts, but there"s One keeps longer--and in His head, as we read. To breaking mother"s heart so much, to scandal of matrimony so much--and to perjury and dirty devices, wicked dalliance, so much. When she came here-- this fine young lady, so fresh and sweet--I wailed. I shook my fist at you, Mr. Ingram; "I know what this means," I said, "a false tongue and a young heart." And I waited, I tell you--for I could do nothing else. She could have come to me at any hour of any day and welcome; and I"d have told her, "He"s bad--he"s rotten at the heart. He"ll tire of you--neglect you--trick you--and cast you out." But she was too proud for that; she bore it all, and not a word. And she did your work as never before, not in your time, nor your father"s time; and made friends of the poor, and kept her place--sweetly and smoothly it was done. And you on your travels with foreign women--"
Ingram now emerged from the flood. "Are you mad?" he said. A dreadful calm came over Mrs. Benson, succeeding the tempest.
""I am not mad, most n.o.ble Festus,"" she said; "but I am mother of a graceless son, and will not be cook to another. I leave your service from this hour. Your dinner is a-making, and Emma is a steady worker." She turned to Sanchia. "The best vegetable-hand I ever had under me, Miss Percival, and I"ve had a score." One further cut at Ingram she allowed herself. "I would not take a penny piece of your money now, not to save my darling from the lions."
"You won"t get it, you know," said Ingram. "But you"ve had lots of "em."
She braved that truth.
"And earned them, Mr. Ingram, as you know, better than I do."