"It"s cold here," she found herself saying. "I was just going up. I don"t like dungeons. Do you?"
"I like this one," said he. "Anywhere where _you_ are, don"t you know--a palace and all that--"
"I really must go," she said. "My brother won"t know where I am."
"No," he said, with meaning, "he won"t." And he set his two hands to the pillars of the arch under which he stood and swayed to and fro, looking at her.
"I must really go. Will you let me pa.s.s, Mr. Schultz, please."
"Not till you tell me to send for my car. I"ve set my heart on those drives with you. Our brother can stay behind if he doesn"t care for motoring. _I_ don"t want him, and I"ll take care _you_ don"t miss him."
"Do, please," she said, "let me pa.s.s."
"No," said he. "I"ve got you and I mean to keep you. Your brother--"
"He"s not my brother," she said, on a sudden resolution. "We told you that because, because--"
"Don"t bother to explain," he said, smiling. That smile, in the days when that dungeon _was_ a dungeon, might have cost him his life if the lady before him had had a knife and the skill to use it. Even now it was to cost him something.
"He"s not my brother--we"re married," she said. And at that he laughed.
"I know, my dear girl," he said. "I know all about it. But marriages like that don"t last forever, and they don"t prevent another gentleman playing for his own hand. I was there when he wasn"t, and you let me help you."
"I wish I hadn"t," said she. "I wish I"d walked all the way to London first. I didn"t think--"
"You didn"t think I"d got the sense to put two and two together," said he; "but I have. Come, look here. I liked your looks from the first. I thought-- Never mind about that, though. I was wrong. But even now I like you better than any girl I"ve ever come across. Now, look here--"
"Don"t say any more," she urged, almost wildly. "Don"t! I am married.
You don"t believe me, but I am. You were kind once; be kind now and let me go--"
It was like a prisoner imploring a jailer.
"Let you go?" he echoed. "I know better. Not till you say, "Send for the motor," and that you"ll go out in it with me. Say that and you"re free as air."
And she might have said it, for the terror that lurked in that tower was coming back, in a new dress, but the same terror. But he went on, "Come, say it, and seal the bargain prettily."
And then she said, "If you don"t let me pa.s.s I swear I"ll--"
What the threat would have been she hardly knew, and he never knew, for he took a step toward her with his hands outstretched, and words seemed at once to become weak and silly. She clutched her rosy sunshade at about half its length and struck full at his head. The sunshade broke.
He put his hands to his temples and held them a moment.
"Now, by G.o.d," he said, "after that--" and came toward her.
And even as he moved the feet of the deliverer sounded on the stairs.
Hurried feet, spurning the stones, feet swifter than a man"s, lighter than a woman"s--little feet that gave out a thin, quick sound not like the sound of human footsteps. She called aloud on the name of the deliverer and he came, swift as the arrow from the bow of a master-archer.
"Charles!" she cried. "Charles, seize him! Hold him!"
And Charles, coming headlong into that dark place like a shaft of live white light, seized him, and held, by the leg.
Mr. Schultz did his best to defend himself, but he had no stick, and no blows of the human fist confused or troubled that white bullet head, no curses affected it, and against those white teeth no kicks or struggles availed.
"Hold him! hold him!" she cried, the joy of vicarious battle lighting her eyes.
"Confound it!" said Schultz. "Call the devil off."
"I will," said she, "from the top of the stairs. And I"ll leave you this for comfort: If you behave yourself for the future I won"t tell my husband about this. He"d half kill you."
"I don"t know about that," said Schultz, even with Charles"s teeth quietly but persistently boring his leg. "I don"t know so much about that."
"I do," she said, with almost the conviction of the woman in love.
"You"d better stay here till we"ve gone away. I"m not ungrateful for what you did for me on that day, and if you never dare to speak to me again I"ll never tell."
"I don"t care what you tell," said Schultz. "Call the devil off, I say."
She ran up the stairs, and at the top called out, "Charles, drop it.
Come here, sir."
And Charles dropped it and came.
It was then for the first time that she felt that she was Charles"s mistress, even as Edward was Charles"s master.
The dog and the woman went out together into the sunshine, and there, between blue sky and green gra.s.s, embraced with all the emotions proper to deliverer and delivered. When Edward rejoined them, five minutes later, she was able to say, quite calmly:
"Yes, he found me out. He _is_ clever. He is a darling."
"He deserves a jolly good hiding," said Edward, "and I"ve a jolly good mind to give it to him."
"Let him off this time," she said, "it was so clever of him to find me out. He hadn"t hurt any of the sheep, had he?"
"No," said he, "but he might have."
"Oh, if we come to might-have-beens," said she, "I might not be here, he might not be here. We all might not be here. Think of that. No, don"t look at him with that "wait-till-I-get-you-home" expression. Forgive him and be done with it."
And when she looked at him like that, as he told himself, what could he do but forgive the dog?
"Why," he said, "of course I"ll forgive him!" adding, with one of those diabolical flashes of insight to which our subconscious selves are sometimes liable. "Why, I"d forgive Schultz himself if you asked me like that."
"It isn"t Mr. Schultz I want you to forgive," she said, "it"s Charles--Charles that I love."
"Not Schultz whom you like."
"I hate Schultz," said she, so vehemently that he wondered. Because always before she had defended the man and called him kind and helpful.
It was, however, so pleasant to him that she should hate Schultz that he put his wonder by to taste that pleasure.
She had the self-control to wait till they were gliding through the streets of Warwick before she said, "Do you want to stay here any longer?"
"Not if you don"t," said he.