Louisa said nothing. She was trying to understand the un-understandable. Luke almost smiled at the other man"s bewilderment.
"No, sir," he said, "not mad I think. I only want to know how I stand."
"How you stand, man?" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Colonel Harris with uncontrolled vehemence. "Great Heavens, don"t you realize that here is some d.a.m.ned conspiracy as mysterious as it is d.a.m.nable, and that you will have to look this seriously in the face, if you don"t wish to find yourself in the dock before the next four and twenty hours?"
"I am," replied Luke simply, "looking the matter squarely in the face, sir, but I don"t quite see how I can avoid standing in the dock as you say, before the next four and twenty hours. You see I had quarrelled with Philip, and my stick--which contained a dagger--was found in the park, covered with mud, as you say, and other stains."
"But, hang it all, man! you did not murder your cousin!"
This was not a query but an a.s.sertion. Colonel Harris"s loyalty had not wavered, but he could not contrive to keep the note of anxiety out of his voice: nor did he reiterate the a.s.sertion when Luke made no answer to it.
Once more the latter pa.s.sed his hand over the back of his head. You know that gesture. It is so English! and always denotes a certain measure of perturbation. Then he said with seeming irrelevance:
"I suppose I had better go now."
His eyes sought Louisa"s, trying to read what she thought and felt.
Imagine the awful moment! For he loved her, as you know, with that intensity of pa.s.sion of which a nature like his--almost cramped by perpetual self-containment--is alone capable. Then to have to stand before her wondering what the next second would reveal, hardly daring to exchange fear for cert.i.tude, because of what that cert.i.tude might be.
He sought her eyes and had no difficulty in finding them. They had never wandered away from his face. To him--the ardent worshipper--those eyes of hers had never seemed so exquisitely luminous. He read her soul then and there as he would a book. A soul full of trust and br.i.m.m.i.n.g over with compa.s.sion and with love.
Colonel Harris was loyal to the core; he clung to his loyalty, to his belief in Luke as he would to a rock, fearful lest he should flounder in a maze of wonderment, of surmises, of suspicions. G.o.d help him! But in Louisa even loyalty was submerged in a sea of love. She cared nothing about suspicions, about facts, about surmises. She had no room in her heart for staunchness: it was all submerged in love.
There was no question, no wonderment, no puzzle in the eyes which met those of Luke. You see she was just a very ordinary kind of woman.
All she knew was that she loved Luke: and all that she conveyed to him by that look, was just love.
Only love.
And love--omnipotent, strange, and capricious love--wrought a curious miracle then! For Colonel Harris was present in the room, mind you, a third--if not an altogether indifferent--party, there where at this moment these two should have been alone.
It was Colonel Harris"s presence in the room that transformed the next instant into a wonderful miracle: for Luke was down on his knees before his simple-souled Lou. She had yielded her hand to him and he had pressed an aching forehead against the delicately perfumed palm.
In face of that love which she had given him, he could only worship: and would have been equally ready to worship before the whole world.
And therein lay the miracle. Do you not agree, you who know Englishmen of that cla.s.s and stamp? Can you conceive one of them falling on his knees save at the bidding of omnipotent Love, and by the miracle which makes a man forget the whole world, defy the whole world, give up the whole world, driven to defiance, to forgetfulness, to self-sacrifice, for the sake of the torturing, exquisite moments of transcendental happiness?
CHAPTER XXIII
WHY ALL THIS MYSTERY?
I have often smiled myself at the recollection of Luke de Mountford walking that selfsame afternoon with Louisa Harris up and down the long avenue of the Ladies" Mile: the selfsame Luke de Mountford who had knelt at his Lou"s feet in humble grat.i.tude for the love she gave him: the selfsame Luke de Mountford who stood under suspicion of having committed a dastardly and premeditated murder.
The puppets were once more dangling on the string of Convention. They had readjusted their masks and sunk individuality as well as sentiment in the whirlpool of their world"s opinion.
Louisa had desired that Luke should come with her to the park, since convention forbade their looking at chrysanthemums in the Temple Gardens, on the day that Philip de Mountford lay dead in the mortuary chamber of a London police court: but everybody belonging to their own world would be in the park on this fine afternoon. And yet, the open air, the fragrance of spring flowers in the formal beds, would give freedom to the breath: there would not reign the oppressive atmosphere of tea-table gossip; the early tulips bowing their stately heads would suggest aloofness and peace.
And so they went together for a walk in the park, for she had wished it, and he would have followed her anywhere where she had bidden him to go.
He walked beside her absolutely unconscious of whisperings and gossip which accompanied them at every step.
"I call it bad form," was a very usual phrase enunciated by many a rouged lip curled up in disdain.
This was hurled at Louisa Harris. The woman, in such cases, always contrives to get the lion"s share of contempt.
"Showing herself about with that man now! I call it vulgar."
"They say he"ll be arrested directly after the inquest to-morrow. I have it on unimpeachable authority."
"Oh! I understand that he has been arrested already," a.s.serted a lady whose information was always a delightful mixture of irresponsible vagueness and firm conviction.
"How do you mean?"
"Well, you see he is only out on--what do they call it?--I mean he has had to give his word that he won"t run away--or something. I heard Herbert say something about that at lunch--oh! what lovely tulips! I dote on that rich coppery red, don"t you?"
"Then does he go about in Black Maria escorted by a policeman?"
"Probably."
This somewhat more vaguely, for the surmise was doubtful.
"I can"t understand Louisa Harris, can you?"
"Oh, she thinks it"s unconventional to go about with a murderer. She only does it for notoriety."
But the Countess of Flintshire, who wrote novels and plays under the elegant _nom de plume_ of Maria Annunziata, was deeply interested in Luke and Louisa, and stopped to talk to them for quite a considerable time. She said she wanted "to draw Luke de Mountford out." So interesting to get the impressions of an actual murderer, you know.
The men felt uncomfortable. Englishmen always do when the unconventional hovers about in their neatly ordered atmosphere.
Common-sense--in their case--whispered loudly, inking that this man in the Sackville Street clothes, member of their own clubs, by Jove!
could not just be a murderer! Hang it all! Harris would not allow his daughter to go about with a murderer!
So they raised their hats as they pa.s.sed by Louisa Harris and said, "h.e.l.lo! How de do?" to Luke quite with a genial smile.
But Luke and Louisa allowed all this world to wag on its own irresponsible way. They were not fools, they knew their _milieu_. They guessed all that was being said around them and all that remained unspoken. They had come here purposely in order to see and to be seen, to be gossiped about, to play their role of puppet before their world as long as life lasted, and whilst Chance and Circ.u.mstance still chose to hold up the edifice of their own position of their consideration, mayhap of their honour.
The question of the crime had not been mooted between them again: after the understanding, the look from her to him, and his humble grat.i.tude on his knees, they had left the mystery severely alone. He had nothing to say, and she would never question, content that she would know in good time; that one day she would understand what was so un-understandable just now.
Colonel Harris alone was prostrated with trouble. Not that he doubted Luke, but like all sober-sensed Englishmen he loathed a moral puzzle.
Whilst he liked and trusted Luke, he hated the mystery which now met him at every turn, just as much as he hated the so-called problem plays which alien critics try to foist on an unwilling Anglo-Saxon public.
He would have loved to hear Luke"s voice saying quite frankly:
"Of course I did not kill my cousin. I give you my word, colonel, that I am incapable of such a thing."
That was the only grievance which the older man of the world had against the younger one. The want of frankness worried him. Luke was innocent of course; but, d--n it, why didn"t he say so?
And how came that accursed stick behind the railings of the park?