I tried to murmur politely that, whatever it was, I was glad to see him--only the words refused to form themselves.
"Can"t we go out?" he asked, as I cast about me for chairs. "It"s so stuffy in here."
I led the way through the hall, picking up a rose-colored parasol of Mrs. Rossiter"s as we pa.s.sed the umbrella-stand.
"How much money have you got?" he asked, abruptly, as soon as we were on the terrace.
I made an effort to gather my wits from the far fields into which they had wandered.
"Do you mean in ready cash? Or how much do I own in all?"
"How much in all?"
I told him--just a few thousand dollars, the wreckage of what my father had left. My total income, apart from what I earned, was about four hundred dollars a year.
"I want it," he said, as we descended the steps to the lower terrace.
"How soon could you let me have it?"
I made the reckoning as we went down the lawn toward the sea. I should have to write to my uncle, who would sell my few bonds and forward me the proceeds. Mr. Strangways himself said that would take a week.
"I"m going to make a small fortune for you," he laughed, in explanation.
"All the nations of the earth are beginning to send to us for munitions, and Stacy Grainger is right on the spot with the goods. There"ll be a demand for munitions for years to come--"
"Oh, not for years to come!" I exclaimed. "Only till the end of the war."
""But the end is not by and by,"" he quoted from the Bible. "It"s a long way off from by and by--believe me! We"re up against the struggle mankind has been getting ready for ever since it"s had a history. I don"t want just to make money out of it; but, since money"s to be made--since we can"t help making it--I want you to be in on it."
I didn"t thank him, because I had something else on my mind.
"Perhaps you don"t know that I"m engaged to Hugh Brokenshire. We"re to be married before we move back to New York."
"Yes, I do know it. That"s the reason I"m suggesting this. You"ll want some money of your own, in order to feel independent. If you don"t have it the Brokenshire money will break you down."
I don"t know what I said, or whether I was able to say anything. There was something in this practical care-taking interest that moved me more than any love declaration he could have made. He was renouncing me in everything but his protection. That was going with me. That was watching over me. There was no one to watch over me in the whole world with just this sort of devotion.
I suppose we talked. We must have said something as we descended the slope; I must have stammered some sort of appreciation. All I can clearly remember is that, as we reached the steps going down to the Cliff Walk, Hugh was coming up.
I had forgotten that this sort of encounter was possible. I had forgotten Hugh. When I saw his innocent, blank face staring up at us I felt I was confronting my doom.
"Well!" he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed, as though he had caught us in some criminal conspiracy.
As it was for me to explain, I said, limply:
"Mr. Strangways has been good enough to offer to make some money for me, Hugh. Isn"t that kind of him?"
Hugh grew slowly crimson. His voice shook with pa.s.sion. He came up one step.
"Mr. Strangways will be kinder still in minding his own business."
"Oh, Hugh!"
"Don"t be offended, Mr. Brokenshire," Larry Strangways said, peaceably.
"I merely had the opportunity to advise Miss Adare as to her investments--"
"I shall advise Miss Adare as to her investments. It happens that she"s engaged to me!"
"But she"s not married to you. An engagement is not a marriage; it"s only a preliminary period in which two persons agree to consider whether or not a marriage between them would be possible. Since that"s the situation at present, I thought it no harm to tell Miss Adare that if she puts her money into some of the new projects for ammunition that I know about--"
"And I"m sure she"s not interested."
Mr. Strangways bowed.
"That will be for her to decide. I understood her to say--"
"Whatever you understood her to say, sir, Miss Adare is not interested!
Good afternoon." He nodded to me to come down the steps. "I was just coming over for you. Shall we walk along together?"
I backed away from him toward the stone bal.u.s.trade.
"But, Hugh, I can"t leave Mr. Strangways like this. He"s come all the way from New York on purpose to--"
"Then I shall defray his expense and pay him for his time; but if we"re going at all, dear--"
At a sign of the eyes from Larry Strangways I mastered my wrath at this insolence, and spoke meekly:
"I didn"t know we were going anywhere in particular."
"And you"ll excuse me, Mr. Brokenshire," our visitor interrupted, "if I say that I can"t be dismissed in this way by any one but Miss Adare herself. You must remember she isn"t your wife--that she"s still a free agent. Perhaps, if I explain the matter a little further--"
Hugh put up his hand in stately imitation of his father.
"Please! There"s no need of that."
"Oh, but there is, Hugh!"
"You see," Mr. Strangways reasoned, "it"s more than a question of making money. We shall make money, of course; but that"s only incidental. What I"m really asking Miss Adare to do is to help one of the most glorious causes to which mankind has ever given itself--"
I started toward him impulsively.
"Oh! Do you feel like that?"
"Not like that; that"s all I feel. I live it! I"ve no other thought."
It was curious to see how the force of this all-absorbing topic swept Hugh away from the merely personal standpoint.
"And you call yourself an American?" he demanded, hotly.
"I call myself a man. I don"t emphasize the American. This thing transcends what we call nationality."