"Thanks! I accept your kind hospitality, Sir Everard, on two conditions."
"On any conditions you choose, _mon ami_. What are they?"
"That no one shall know it but yourself, and that I may depart before day-dawn."
"I dislike that last condition very much; but it must be as you say.
Sleep in safety, most mysterious youth; no one shall know you are under my roof, and I will come and wake you myself at the first peep of day.
Will that do?"
"Admirably. You are very kind to take all this trouble for a nameless tramp, Sir Everard."
"Am I? Even when the nameless tramp saved my life?"--yet Sir Everard winced a little while saying it. "And that reminds me, we must hasten, if yonder fallen villain is to recover from his wound. His condition is not an enviable one at this moment."
"How did it happen?" the boy asked.
And the young baronet repeated the story of d.i.c.k Darkly"s provocation and vow of revenge.
As he concluded they pa.s.sed through the stately gates, up the majestic sweep of drive, to the imposing old mansion.
"Home!" Sir Everard said, gayly. "Solitude and darkness reign, you see. The family have long since retired, and we can pa.s.s to our respective dormitories unseen and unheard."
The boy looked up with his brilliant, glowing eyes. But he did not speak. In silence he followed Sir Everard in, up the n.o.ble marble stair-way, along richly carpeted, softly lighted corridors, and into a stately chamber.
"You will sleep here," Sir Everard said. "My room is near, and I am a light sleeper. To-morrow morning at five I will rouse you. Until then adieu, and pleasant dreams."
He swung out and closed the door, and not once had he seen the face of his guest. That guest stood in the center of the handsome chamber, and gazed around.
"At last!" he hisses between his set white teeth--"at last, after two years" weary waiting! At last, oh! my mother, the time has come for me to keep my vow!"
He raised one arm with a tragic gesture, removed the slouched hat, and stood uncovered in the tranquil half light.
The face was wonderfully handsome, of gypsy darkness, and the eyes shone like black stars; but a scarlet handkerchief was bound tightly around his head, and concealed every vestige of hair. With a slow smile creeping round his mouth, the boy took his handkerchief off.
"To-morrow he will come and call me, but to-morrow I shall not leave Kingsland Court. No, my dear young baronet, I have not saved your life for nothing! I shall have the honor of remaining your guest for some time."
CHAPTER IX.
MISS SYBILLA SILVER
Meantime Sir Everard had aroused his valet and a brace of tall footmen, and dispatched them to the aid of the wounded man in the wood. And then he sought his own chamber, and, after an hour or two of aimless tossing, dropped into an uneasy sleep.
And sleeping, Sir Everard had a singular dream. He was walking through Brithlow Wood with Lady Louise on his arm, the moonlight sifting through the tall trees as he had seen it last. Suddenly, with a rustle and a hiss, a huge green serpent glided out, reared itself up, and glared at them with eyes of deadly menace. And somehow, though he had not yet seen the lad"s face, he knew the hissing serpent and the preserver of his life were one and the same. With horrible hisses the monster encircled him. Its fetid breath was in his face, its deadly fangs ready to strike his death-blow, and, with a suffocating cry, Sir Everard a-woke from his nightmare and started up in bed.
"Good heavens! such a night of horrors, waking and sleeping! A most ungrateful dream, truly! It is time I awoke my unknown preserver."
The mysterious youth lay fast asleep upon the bed, dressed as he had left him, with the exception of the slouched hat and the red cotton handkerchief. They lay on the carpet; and over the pillows, and over the coa.r.s.e velveteen jacket streamed such a wealth of blue-black hair as the baronet in all his life never before beheld.
"Powers above!" Sir Everard gasped, in his utter amaze, "what can this mean?"
He advanced with bated breath, bent over and gazed at the sleeper"s face. One look, and his flashing first suspicion was a certainty.
This dark, youthful, faultlessly beautiful face was a woman"s face. A girl in velveteen shooting-jacket and pantaloons, handsome as some dusky Indian princess, lay asleep before him.
Sir Everard Kingsland, in the last stage of bewilderment and amaze, retreated precipitately and shut the door.
The instant the chamber door closed the mysterious young man raised himself on his elbow, very wide awake, his handsome face lighted with a triumphant smile.
"So," he said, "step the second has been taken, and Sir Everard has discovered the s.e.x of his preserver. As he is too delicate to disturb a slumbering lady in disguise, the slumbering lady must disturb him!"
He--or rather she--leaped lightly off the bed, picked up the scarlet bandanna, twisted scientifically the abundant black hair, bound it up with the handkerchief, and crushed down over all the slouched hat.
Then, with the handsome face overshadowed, and all expression screwed out of it, she opened the door, and saw, as she expected, the young baronet in the pa.s.sage.
He stopped at once at sight of her. He had been walking up and down, with an exceedingly surprised and perplexed face; and now he stood with his great, Saxon-blue eyes piercingly fixed upon the young person in velveteen, whose jacket and trousers told one story, and whose streaming dark hair told quite another.
"It is past sunrise, Sir Everard," his preserver began, with a reproachful glance, "and you have broken your promise. You said you would awake me."
"I beg your pardon," retorted Sir Everard, quietly; "I have broken no promise. I came to your room ten minutes ago to arouse you, as I said I would. I knocked thrice, and received no reply. Then I entered.
You must excuse me for doing so. How was I to know I was entertaining angels unaware?"
With a low cry of consternation his hearer"s hands flew up and covered his face, to hide the blushes that were not there.
"Your red handkerchief and hat do you good service in your masquerade, mademoiselle. I confess I should never suspect a lady in that suit of velveteen."
With a sudden theatrical abandon the "lady in velveteen" flung herself on her knees at his feet.
"Forgive me!" she cried, holding up her clasped hands. "Have pity on me! Don"t reveal my secret, for Heaven"s sake."
"Forgive you!" repeated Sir Everard, hastily. "What have I to forgive?
Pray get up; there is no reason you should kneel and supplicate pity from me."
He raised her imperatively. Her head dropped in womanly confusion, and, hiding her face, she sobbed.
"What must you think? How dreadful it must look! But, oh, Sir Everard! if you only knew!"
"I should like to know, I confess. Come here in this window recess and tell me, won"t you? Come, look up, and don"t cry so. Tell me who you are."
"I am Sybilla Silver, and I have run away from home, and I will die sooner than ever go back!"
She looked up with a pa.s.sionate outbreak, and Sir Everard saw the splendor of a pair of flashing Spanish eyes.
"I shall not send you back, depend upon it. Why did you run away, Miss Silver?"
"Do you really wish to know?" she asked. "Oh, Sir Everard Kingsland, will you indeed be my friend?"
"Your true and faithful friend, my poor girl!" he answered, moved by the piteous appeal. "Surely I could hardly be less to one who so bravely saved my life."