The Red Symbol

by John Ironside

  CHAPTER L

  ENGLAND ONCE MORE

  I started up at that.

  "Fraulein Pendennis!" I gasped. "You know her?"

  "I should do so, after nursing her through such an illness,--and soshort a time since!"

  "But,--when did you nurse her,--where?"

  "Why, here; not in this room, but in the hotel. It is three--no, nearerfour months since; she also was taken ill on her way from Russia. Thereis a strange coincidence! But hers was a much more severe illness. Wedid not think she could possibly recover; and for weeks we feared forher brain. She had suffered some great shock; though the Herr, herfather, would not say what it was--"

  She looked at me interrogatively; but I had no mind to satisfy hercuriosity, though I guessed at once what the "shock" must have been, andthat Anne had broken down after the strain of that night in the forestnear Petersburg and all that had gone before it. She had never referredto this illness; that was so like her. Anything that concerned herself,personally, she always regarded as insignificant, but I thought now thatit had a good deal to do with her worn appearance.

  "And Herr Pendennis, where is he?" I demanded next.

  "I do not know; they left together, when the Fraulein was at last ableto travel. Ah, but they are devoted to each other, those two! It isbeautiful to see such affection in these days when young people so oftenseem to despise their parents."

  It was strange, very strange. The more I tried to puzzle things out, themore hopeless the tangle appeared. Why had Pendennis allowed her toreturn alone to Russia, especially after she had come through such asevere illness? Of course he might be attached to some other branch ofthe League, but it seemed unlikely that he would allow himself to beseparated from her, when he must have known that she would be surroundedby greater perils than ever. I decided that I could say nothing to thisgarrulous woman--kindly though she was--or to any other stranger. Idreaded the time when I would have to tell Mary something at least ofthe truth; though even to her I would never reveal the whole of it.

  The manager came to my room presently, bringing my money and papers, andthe miniature, which he had taken charge of; lucky it was for me that Ihad fallen into honest hands when I reached Berlin!

  He addressed me as "Herr Gould" of course, and was full of curiosity toknow how I got through, and if things were as bad in Warsaw as thenewspapers reported. Berlin was full of Russian refugees; but he had notmet one from Warsaw.

  "They say the Governor will issue no passports permitting Poles to leavethe city," he said. "But you are an American, which makes all thedifference."

  "I guess so," I responded, wondering how Loris had managed to obtainthat passport, and if it would have served to get me through if I hadstarted from the city instead of making that long _detour_ to Kutno.

  I assured my host that the state of affairs in the city of terror I hadleft was indescribable, and I'd rather not discuss it. He seemed quitedisappointed, and with a queer flash of memory I recalled how the littlechattering woman--I forget her name--had been just as disappointed whenI didn't give details about Cassavetti's murder on that Sunday eveningin Mary's garden. There are a lot of people in this world who have aninsatiable appetite for horrors,--when they can get them at second-hand.

  "They say it's like the days of the terror in the 'sixties' overagain,--tortures and shootings and knoutings; and that the Cossacksstripped a woman and knouted her to death one day last week; did youhear of that?"

  "I tell you I don't mean to speak of anything that I've seen or heard!"I said, feeling that I wanted to kick him. He apologized profusely, andthen made me wince again by referring to the miniature, with moreapologies for looking at it, when he thought it necessary to takepossession of it.

  "But we know the so-amiable Fraulein and Herr Pendennis so well; theyhave often stayed here," he explained. "And it is such a marvellouslikeness; painted quite recently too, since the illness from which theFraulein has so happily recovered!"

  I muttered something vague, and managed to get rid of him on the pleathat I felt too bad to talk any more, which drew fresh apologies; butwhen he had gone I examined the miniature more closely than I'd had anopportunity of doing since Loris gave it me.

  It was not recently painted, I was quite sure of that, and yet itcertainly did show her as I had known her during these last few weeks,before death printed that terrible change on her face,--and not as shewas in London. But that must be my imagination; the artist had caughther expression at a moment when she was grave and sad; no, not exactlysad, for the lips and eyes were smiling,--a faint, wistful, inscrutablesmile like the smile of the Sphinx, as it gazes across thedesert--across the world, into space, and eternity.

  As I gazed on the brave sweet face, the sordid misery that had envelopedmy soul ever since that awful moment when I saw her dead body bornepast, in the square, was lifted; and I knew that the last poignant agonywas the end of a long path of thorns that she had trodden unflinchingly,with royal courage and endurance for weary months and years; that shewas at peace, purified by her love, by her suffering, from all taint ofearth.

  "Dumb lies the world; the wild-yelling world with all its madness isbehind thee!"

  * * * * *

  I started for England next evening, and travelled right through. I sentone wire to Jim from Berlin and another from Flushing,--where I found areply from him waiting me. "All well, meeting you."

  That "all well" reassured me, for now that I had leisure to think, myconscience told me how badly I'd treated him and Mary. It's true thatbefore I started from London with Mishka I wrote saying that I was offon secret service and they must not expect to hear from me for a time,but I should be all right. That was to smooth Mary down, for I knew whatshe was,--dear little soul,--and I didn't want her to be fretting aboutme. If she once got any notion of my real destination, she'd havefretted herself into a fever. But if she hadn't guessed at the truth, Imight be able to evade telling her anything at all; perhaps I mightpitch a yarn about having been to Tibet, or Korea, for she wouldcertainly want to know something of the reason for my changedappearance. I scarcely recognized myself when I looked at my reflectionin the bedroom mirror at Berlin. A haggard, unkempt ruffian,gray-haired, and with hollow eyes staring out of a white face,disfigured by a half-healed cut across the forehead. I certainly was amiserable looking object, even when I'd had my hair cut and my beardshaved, since I no longer needed it as a disguise. Mary had alwaysdisliked that beard, but I doubted if she'd know me, even without it.

  I landed at Queensboro' on a typical English November afternoon; raw anddark, with a drizzle falling that threatened every moment to thickeninto a regular fog. There were very few passengers, and I thought atfirst I was going to have the compartment to myself; but, at the lastmoment, a man got in whom I recognized at once as Lord Southbourne. Ihadn't seen him on the boat; doubtless he'd secured a private stateroom.He just glanced at me casually,--I had my fur cap well pulleddown,--settled himself in his corner, and started reading a Londonpaper,--one of his own among them. He'd brought a sheaf of them in withhim; though I'd contented myself with _The Courier_. It was pleasant tosee the familiar rag once more. I hadn't set eyes on a copy since I leftEngland.

  I didn't speak to Southbourne, though; I don't quite know why, exceptthat I felt like a kind of Rip van Winkle, though I'd only been away alittle more than a couple of months. And somehow I dreaded that lazy butpenetrating stare of his, and the questions he would certainly fire offat me. So I lay low and said nothing; keeping the paper well before myface, till we stopped at Herne Hill for tickets to be taken. As thetrain started again, he threw down his paper, and moved opposite me, andheld out his hand.

  "Hello, Wynn!" he drawled. "Is it you or your ghost? Didn't you know me?Or do you mean to cut me? Why, man alive, what's wrong?" he added, witha quick change of tone. I'd only heard him speak like that oncebefore,--in the magistrate's room at the police court, after the murdercharge was dismissed.

  "Nothing; except that
we've had a beastly crossing," I answered, with apoor attempt at jauntiness.

  "Where have you come from,--Russia?" he demanded.

  I nodded.

  "H'm! So you went back, after all. I thought as much! Who's had yourcopy?"

  "I've sent none; I went on private business," I protested hotly. Itangered me that he should think me capable of going back on him.

  "I oughtn't to have said that; I apologize," he said stiffly, stillstaring at me intently. "But--what on earth have you been up to? Moreprison experiences? Well, keep your own counsel, of course. I've kept itfor you,--as far as I knew it. Mrs. Cayley believes I've sent you off tothe ends of the earth; and I've been mendaciously assuring her thatyou're all right,--though Miss Pendennis has had her doubts, and nearlybowled me out, once or twice."

  "Miss--_who_?" I shouted.

  "Miss Pendennis, of course. Didn't you know she was staying with yourcousin again? A queer coincidence about that portrait! Hello, here weare at Victoria. And there's Cayley!"