Half A Chance

by Frederic Stewart Isham

  CHAPTER XIV

  AN ANSWER

  The girl made no motion to obey and the knocking was repeated;mechanically she moved toward the threshold. "Yes?" All the color hadleft her face. "What--what is it?"

  "Don't mean to alarm you, my dear, but Mr. Gillett thinks the convictmight be concealing himself somewhere in the house; indeed, that it isquite likely. So we are making a little tour of inspection. Shall we notgo through your rooms? There! don't be frightened!" quickly, "only as amatter of precaution, you know."

  "I," she seemed to catch her breath, "it is really quite unnecessary. Ihave been through them myself."

  "Might have known that!" with an attempt at jocoseness. "But thought wewould make sure. Your balcony, you have looked there?"

  "Yes."

  "Very well; lock your window leading to it. Only as a matter ofprecaution," he repeated hastily. "No need of our coming in, I fancy.You had retired?"

  "I--was about to."

  "Quite right." A moment the party lingered. "Shall I send one of themaids to sleep in your dressing-room? Company, you know! Your voicesounds a little nervous."

  "Does it? Not at all!" she said hastily. "I am--not in the leastnervous."

  "Good night, then!" They went. "One of my men in the garden felt sure hehad seen him return toward the house," Mr. Gillett's voice was waftedback, became fainter, died away.

  The man in the room stood motionless now, his face like that of a statuesave for the light and life of his eyes. The clock beat the moments; helooked at her. The girl was almost turned from him; he saw more of thebright hair than the pale profile, so still against the delicatelycarved arabesques of the panel.

  "The other way would have been--preferable!"

  There was nothing reckless or bold in his bearing now; but, lookingaway, she did not see. Was he tempted, if only in an infinitesimaldegree, to suggest a plea of mitigating circumstances--not for his ownsake but for hers; that she might feel less keenly that sense of hurt,of outraged pride, for having smiled on him, admitted him to a certainfrank, free intimacy? Before the words fell from his lips, however, sheturned; her gaze arrested his purpose, made him feel poignantly,acutely, the distance now between them. "What were you," she hesitated,emphasized over-sharply the word, "transported for?"

  An instant his eyes flashed suddenly back at her, as if he were on thepoint of answering, telling her all, disavowing; but to what end? To askmore of her than of others, throw himself on her generosity?

  "What does it matter?"

  True; what did it matter to her; he had been in prisons before, by hisown words.

  "Your name, of course, is not John Steele?"

  He confessed it a purloined asset.

  "What was it?"

  He looked at her--beyond! To a storm-tossed ship, a golden-haired child,her curls in disorder, moving with difficulty, yet clinging sosteadfastly to a small cage. His name? It may be he heard again the loudpounding and knocking; held her once more to his breast, felt theconfiding, soft arms.

  "What does it matter?" he repeated.

  What, indeed? That which she had not been able to penetrate, tounderstand in him, this was it! This!

  "But why"--fragments of what he had said recurred to her; she spokemechanically--"when you found yourself recognized, did you not leaveEngland; why did you come here--to Strathorn House; incur the danger,the risk?"

  "Why?" He still continued to look straight before him. "Becauseyou--were here!" He spoke quietly, simply.

  "I?" she trembled.

  "Oh, you need not fear!" quickly. "You!" a bitter smile crossed hisface. "One may see a star and long to draw nearer it, though one knowsit is always beyond reach, unattainable! May even stumble forward, ledby its light--bright, beautiful! Whither?" He laughed abruptly. "One hasnot asked, nor cared."

  "Cared?" Her figure swayed; he too stood uncertainly; the lights seemedto tremble.

  The man suddenly straightened; then turned. "And now," his voice soundedharsh, tense; he stepped toward the balcony.

  His words, the abrupt action--what it portended, aroused her.

  "No; no!" The exclamation broke from her involuntarily; she seemed towaken as from something unreal that had momentarily held her."There--there may be a safer way!" She hardly knew what she was saying;one thought alone possessed her mind; she looked with strained, brightglance before her. "The Queen Elizabeth staircase leading into thegarden from my--" The words were arrested; her blue eyes, dark, dilated,lingered on him in an odd, impersonal way. "Wait!" Bright spots of colornow tinted her cheeks; she went quickly toward the door she had left,her manner that of one who hastens to some course on impulse, withoutpausing to reason. "A few minutes!" She listened, turned the key; thenopening the door, stepped hastily out into the hall.

  The latch clicked; the man stood alone. Whatever her purpose, only thedesire to act quickly, to have done with an intolerable situation movedhim. Once more he looked toward the window through which he had entered;first, however, before going, he bethought himself of something, ananswer to one of her questions. She should find the answer after he wasgone! His fingers thrust themselves into a breast-pocket; he took out asmall object, wrapped in velvet. An instant his eyes rested upon it;then, stooping, he picked up the bit of lace handkerchief from the floorand laying the dark velvet against it placed the two on the table.

  Would she understand? The debt he had felt he owed her long beforeto-night, that sense of obligation to the child who had reached out herhand, in a different life, a different world! No; she had, of course,forgotten; still he would leave it, that talisman so precious, which hehad cherished almost superstitiously.

  When a few minutes later the girl hastily reentered the room, shecarried on her arm a man's coat and hat; her appearance was feverish,her eyes wide and shining.

  "Your clothes are torn--would attract attention! These were on therack--I don't know whose--but I stole them!--stole them!"

  She spoke quickly with a little hard note of self-mockery. Her voicebroke off suddenly; she looked around her.

  The coat and hat slipped from her arm; she looked at the window; thecurtain still moved, as if a hand had but recently touched it. Shestared at it--incredulously. He had gone; he would have none of herassistance then; preferred--She listened, but caught only the rustlingof the heavy silk. When? Minutes passed; at her left, a candle,carelessly adjusted by the maid, dripped to the dresser; its over-longwick threw weird, ever-changing shadows; her own silhouette appeared invarious distorted forms on hangings and wall.

  Still she heard nothing, nothing louder than the faint sounds at thewindow; the occasional, mysterious creakings of old woodwork. He musthave long since reached the ground--the bottom of the old moat; perhaps,as the police agent and several of his men were in the house, he mighteven have attained the fringe of the wood. It was not so fardistant,--the space intervening from the top of the moat contained manyshrubs; in their friendly shadows--

  She stole to the corner of the window now and cautiously peered out. Thesky was overcast; below, faint markings could just be discerned; beyond,Cimmerian gloom--Strathorn wood.

  Had he reached, could he reach it? A cool breeze fanned her cheekswithout lessening the flush that burned there; her lips werehalf-parted. She stepped uncertainly back; a reaction swept over her;the most trivial thoughts came to mind. She remembered that she had notlocked the door of her boudoir; that Sir Charles had told her to do so.She almost started to obey; but laughed nervously instead. How absurd!What, however, should she do? She looked toward the next room. Go tobed? It seemed the commonplace, natural conclusion, and, after all, lifewas very commonplace. But the coat and hat she had brought there?Consideration of them, also, came within the scope of the commonplace.

  It did not take her long to dispose of them, not on the rack, however.Standing again, a few moments later, at the head of the stairway, in theupper hall, she heard voices approaching. Whereupon she quickly droppedboth hat and coat on a chair near-by and fled to her room.

>   None too soon! From above footsteps were descending; people now passedby; they evidently had been searching the third story. She could heartheir low, dissatisfied voices; the last persons to come she at oncerecognized by their tones.

  "You have made a bungling job of it," said Lord Ronsdale. There was asuppressed fierce bitterness in his accents, which, however, in theexcitement of the moment, the girl failed to notice.

  "He had made up his mind not to be taken alive, my Lord."

  "Then--" The other interrupted Mr. Gillett harshly, but she failed tocatch more of his words.

  "We've not lost him, my Lord," Mr. Gillett spoke again. "If he's not inthe house, he's near it, in the garden, and we have every way guarded."

  "Every way guarded!" The girl drew her breath; as they disappeared, thestriking of the clock caused her to start. One! two! About four hours ofdarkness, hardly that long remained for him! And yet she would havesupposed it later; it had been after one o'clock when she had come toher room.

  She became aware of a throbbing in her head, a dull pain, andmechanically seating herself near one of the tables, she put up her handand started to draw the pins from her hair, but soon desisted. Again shebegan to think, more clearly this time, more poignantly, of all she hadexperienced--listened to--that night!

  She, a Wray, sprung from a long line of proud, illustrious folk! And he?The breath of the roses outside was wafted upward; her eyes, deep,self-scoffing, rested, without seeing, on a small dark object on ahandkerchief on the table. What was it to her if they took him?--Whatindeed? Her fingers played with the object, closed hard on it. Whyshould she care if he paid the penalty; he, a self-confessed---

  Something fell from the velvet covering in her hand and struck with amusical sound on the hard, polished top. Amid a turmoil of thoughts, shewas vaguely aware of it gleaming there on the cold white marble, a smalldisk--a gold coin. At first it seemed only to catch without interestingher glance; then slowly she took it, as if asking herself how it camethere, on her handkerchief, which, she dimly remembered, had been lyingon the floor. Some one, of course, must have picked up the handkerchief;but no one had been in the room since she had noticed it except--

  Her gaze swung to the window; he, then, had left it. Why? What had sheto do with anything that had been his?

  More closely she scrutinized it, the shining disk on her rosy palm; aKing George gold piece! Above the monarch's face and head with itsflowing locks, appeared a tiny hole, as if some one had once worn it;beneath, just discernible, was the date, 1762. She continued to regardit; then looked again at the bit of velvet, near-by. It had been wrappedin that, carefully; for what reason? Like something more than what itseemed--a mere gold piece!

  "1762." Why, even as she gazed at the cloth, felt it, did the figuresseem to reiterate themselves in her brain? "1762." There could benothing especially significant about the date; yet even as she concludedthus, by some introspective process she saw herself bending over,studying those figures on another occasion. Herself--and yet--

  She was looking straight before her now; suddenly she started and sprangup. "A King George gold piece!" Her hair, unbound, fell around her,below her waist; her eyes like sapphires, gazed out from a veritableshimmer of gold. "Date--" She paused. "Why, this belonged to me once, asa child, and I--"

  The blue eyes seemed searching--searching; abruptly she found what shesought. "I gave it to the convict on the _Lord Nelson_." She almostwhispered the words. "The brave, brave fellow who sacrificed his lifefor mine." Her warm fingers closed softly on the coin; she seemedwrapped in the picture thus recalled.

  "Then how--" Her brows knitted, she swept the shining hair from herface. "If he were drowned, how could it have been left here by--" Hereyes were dark now with excitement. "Him? Him?" she repeated. "Unless,"her breast suddenly heaved--"he was not drowned, after all; he--"

  A sudden shot from the park rang out; the coin fell from the girl'shand; other shots followed. She ran out upon the balcony, a stifled cryon her lips; she stared off, but only the darkness met her gaze.

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