Complete Works of F Marion Crawford

by F. Marion Crawford

  “What is that?”

  “Why, wanting things and getting them, of course — wanting a ten cent thing a dollar’s worth, and having it.”

  “What a definition!” exclaimed Mrs. Darche. “But I really do believe you enjoy your life.”

  “Though it would bore you to extinction.”

  “Possibly. The alternate wild attacks of teaching and flirting to which you are subject would probably not agree with me.”

  “Perhaps you could do either, but not both at the same time.”

  “I suppose I could teach if I knew anything,” said Mrs. Darche thoughtfully. “But I do not,” she added with conviction.

  “And I have no doubt you could flirt if you loved anybody. It is a pity you do not.”

  “Oh, my flirting days are over,” answered Marion laughing. “You seem to forget that I am married.”

  “Do you not forget it sometimes?” asked Dolly, laughing, but with less genuine mirth.

  “Do not be silly!” exclaimed Marion with a slight shade of annoyance. She had been helping Dolly with the roses, all of which, with the exception of two, were now arranged in a vase.

  “These will not go in,” she said, holding up the remaining flowers. “You might stick them into that little silver cup.”

  “To represent you — and the other man. A red and a white rose. Is that it?”

  “Or you and me,” suggested Mrs. Darche in perfect innocence. “Why not?”

  “Tell me,” said Dolly, when they had finished, “who is he?”

  “Why, Russell Vanbrugh, of course.”

  “Oh!” exclaimed Dolly, turning her head away. “Why of course?”

  “Oh, because—”

  “Why not Harry Brett?” asked Dolly, with the merciless insistence peculiar to very young people.

  In all probability, if no interruption had occurred, the conversation of that morning would have taken a more confidential turn than usual, and poor Dolly might then and there have satisfied her curiosity in regard to the relations between Marion and Russell Vanbrugh.

  It would be more correct, perhaps, to use a word of less definite meaning than relation. Dolly suspected indeed that Vanbrugh loved Mrs. Darche in his own quiet and undemonstrative fashion, and that this was the secret of his celibacy. She believed it possible, too, that her friend might be more deeply attached to Vanbrugh than she was willing to acknowledge even in her own heart. But she was absolutely convinced that whatever the two might feel for one another their feelings would remain for ever a secret. She had gone further than usual in asking Marion whether she were happy, and whether she had not at some time or another almost forgotten that she was married at all. And Marion had not resented the words. Dolly felt that she was on the very point of getting at the truth, and was hoping that she might be left alone half-an-hour longer with her friend, when the door opened and Simon Darche entered the room. At the sight of the two young women his pink silk face lighted up with a bright smile. He rubbed his hands, and the vague expression of his old blue eyes gave place to a look of recognition, imaginary, it is true, but evidently a source of pleasure to himself.

  “Good morning, my dear,” he said briskly, taking Marion’s hand in both of his and pressing it affectionately. “Good morning, Mrs. Chilton,” he added, smiling at Dolly.

  “Dolly Maylands,” suggested Marion in an undertone.

  “Dolly? Dolly?” repeated the old man. “Yes, yes — what did you say? What did you say, Marion? Dolly Chilton? Silly child. Dolly Chilton has been dead these twenty years.”

  “What does he mean?” asked Dolly in a whisper. Simon Darche turned upon her rather suddenly.

  “Oh yes, I remember,” he said. “You are the little girl who used to talk about Darwin, and the soul, and monkeys without tails, and steam engines, when you were seven years old. Why, my dear child, I know you very well indeed. How long have you been married?”

  “I am not married,” answered the young girl, suppressing a smile.

  “Why not?” inquired Mr. Darche with startling directness. “But then — oh, yes! I am very sorry, my dear. I did not mean to allude to it. I went to poor Chilton’s funeral.”

  Just then, Stubbs, the butler, entered again, bearing this time a note for Mrs. Darche. While she glanced at the contents he waited near the door in obedience to a gesture from her. Old Mr. Darche immediately went up to him, and with hearty cordiality seized and shook his reluctant hand.

  “Happy to meet you, old fellow!” he cried. “That is all right. Now just sit down here and we will go through the question in five minutes.”

  “Beg pardon, sir,” said the impassive butler. It was not the first time that his master had taken him for an old friend.

  “Eh, what!” cried Simon Darche. “Calling me ‘sir’? Did you come here to quarrel with me, old man? Oh, I see! You are laughing. Well come along. This business will not keep. The ladies will not mind if we go to work, I daresay.”

  And forthwith he dragged Stubbs to a table and forced him into a chair, talking to him all the time. Dolly was startled and grasped Marion’s arm.

  “What is it?” she asked under her breath. “Oh, Marion, what is it? Is he quite mad?”

  Mrs. Darche answered her only by a warning look, and then, turning away, seemed to hesitate a moment. Stubbs was suffering acutely, submitting to sit on the edge of the chair to which his master had pushed him, merely because no means of escape suggested itself to his mechanical intelligence.

  “Why can you not sit down comfortably?” asked Mr. Darche, with a show of temper. “You are not in a hurry, I know. Oh I see, you are cold. Well, warm yourself. Cold morning. It will be warm enough in Wall Street to-morrow, if we put this thing through. Now just let me explain the position to you. I tell you we are stronger than anybody thinks. Yes sir. I do not see any limit to what we may do.”

  Marion took a flower from one of the vases and went up to the old gentleman.

  “Just let me put this rose in your coat, before you go to work.”

  Mr. Darche turned towards her as she spoke, and his attention was diverted. With a serio-comic expression of devout thankfulness, Stubbs rose and noiselessly glided from the room.

  “Thank you, thank you,” said the old gentleman, and as he bent to smell the blossom, his head dropped forward rather helplessly. “I was always fond of flowers.”

  The note which Stubbs had brought conveyed the information that the three doctors who were to examine old Mr. Darche with a view of ascertaining whether he could properly be held responsible for his actions, would come in half an hour. It was now necessary to prepare him for the visit, and Marion had not decided upon any plan.

  It was evidently out of the question to startle him by letting him suspect the truth, or even by telling him that his visitors belonged to the medical profession. Mrs. Darche wished that she might have the chance of consulting Dolly alone for a moment before the doctors came, but this seemed equally impossible. She silently handed the note to her friend to read and began talking to the old gentleman again. He answered at random almost everything she said. It was clear that he was growing rapidly worse and that his state was changing from day to day. Marion, of course, did not know that the medical examination was to be held by order of the committee conducting the inquiry into the Company’s affairs. Her husband had simply told her what she already knew, namely, that his father was no longer able to attend to business and that the fact must be recognised and a new president elected. It would be quite possible, he thought, to leave the old gentleman in the illusion that he still enjoyed his position and exercised his functions. There could be no harm in that. To tell him the truth might inflict such a shock upon his faculties as would hasten their complete collapse, and might even bring about a fatal result. He had impressed upon her the necessity of using the utmost tact on the occasion of the doctors’ visit, but had refused to be present himself, arguing, perhaps rightly, that his appearance could be of no use, but that it might, on the contrary, tend
to complicate a situation already difficult enough.

  The only course that suggested itself to Mrs. Darche’s imagination, was to represent the three doctors as men of business who came to consult her father-in-law upon an important matter. At the first mention of business, the old gentleman’s expression changed and his manner became more animated.

  “Eh, business?” he cried. “Oh yes. Never refuse to see a man on business. Where are they? Good morning, Mrs. Chilton. I am sorry I cannot stay, but I have some important business to attend to.”

  He insisted upon going to his study immediately in order to be ready to receive his visitors.

  “Wait for me, Dolly,” said Marion, as she followed him.

  Dolly nodded and sat down in her own place by the fireplace, taking up the magazine she had begun to cut and thoughtfully resuming her occupation. Under ordinary circumstances she would perhaps have gone away to occupy herself during the morning in some of the many matters which made her life so full. But her instinct told her that there was trouble in the air to-day, and that the affairs of the Darches were rapidly coming to a crisis. She liked difficulties, as she liked everything which needed energy and quickness of decision, and her attachment to her friend would alone have kept her on the scene of danger.

  Marion did not return immediately, and Dolly supposed that she had determined to stay with the old gentleman until the doctors came. It was rather pleasant to sit by the fire and think, and wonder, and fill out the incidents of the drama which seemed about to be enacted in the house. Dolly realised that she was in the midst of exciting events such as she had sometimes read of, but in which she had never expected to play a part. There were all the characters belonging to the situation. There was the beautiful, neglected young wife, the cruel and selfish husband, the broken-down father, the two young men who had formerly loved the heroine, and last, but not least, there was Dolly herself. It was all very interesting and very theatrical, she thought, and she wished that she might watch it or watch the developments in the successive scenes, entirely as a spectator, and without feeling what was really uppermost in her heart — a touch of sincere sympathy for her friend’s trouble.

  Just as she was thinking of all that Marion had to suffer, John Darche, the prime cause and promoter of the trouble, entered the room, pale, nervous, and evidently in the worst of humours.

  “Oh, are you here, Miss Maylands?” he inquired, discontentedly.

  Dolly looked up quietly.

  “Yes. Am I in the way? Marion has just gone with Mr. Darche to his study. This note came a few moments ago and she gave it to me to read. I think you ought to see it.”

  John Darche’s brow contracted as he ran his eye over the page. Then he slowly tore the note to shreds and tossed them into the fire.

  “I do not know why my wife thinks it necessary to take all her friends into the confidences of the family,” he said, thrusting his hands into his pockets and going to the window, thereby turning his back upon Dolly.

  Dolly made no answer to the rude speech, but quietly continued to cut the pages of the magazine, until, seeing that Darche did not move and being herself rather nervous, she broke the silence again.

  “Am I in the way, Mr. Darche?”

  “Not at all, not at all,” said John, waking, perhaps, to a sense of his rudeness and returning to the fireplace. “On the contrary,” he continued, “it is as well that you should be here. There will probably be hysterics during the course of the day, and I have no doubt you know what is the right thing to do under the circumstances. There seems to be a horticultural show here,” he added, as he noticed for the first time the vases of flowers on the tables.

  “They are beautiful roses,” answered Dolly in a conciliatory tone.

  “Yes,” said John, drawing in his tin lips. “Beautiful, expensive — and not particularly appropriate to-day. One of my wife’s old friends, I suppose. Do you know who sent them?”

  “Stubbs brought them in, a little while ago,” Dolly replied. “I believe there was no note with them.”

  “No note,” repeated John, still in a tone of discontent. “It is rude to send flowers without even a card. It is assuming too much intimacy.”

  “Is it?” asked Dolly innocently.

  “Of course it is,” answered John.

  “Half an hour,” he said, after a moment’s pause. “Half an hour! How long is it since that note came?”

  “About twenty minutes I should think.”

  “Doctors are generally punctual,” observed Darche. “They will be here in a few minutes.”

  “Shall you be present?” asked Dolly.

  “Certainly not,” John answered with decision. “It would give me very little satisfaction to see my father proved an idiot by three fools.”

  “Fools!” repeated Dolly in surprise.

  “Yes. All doctors are fools. The old gentleman’s head is as clear as mine. What difference does it make if he does not recognise people he only half knows? He understands everything connected with the business, and that is the principal thing. After all, what has he to do? He signs his name to the papers that are put before him. That is all. He could do that if he really had softening of the brain, as they pretend he has. As for electing another president at the present moment it is out of the question.”

  “Yes, so I should suppose,” said Dolly.

  John turned sharply upon her.

  “So you should suppose? Why should you suppose any such thing?”

  “I have heard that the Company is in trouble,” answered Dolly, calmly.

  John opened his lips as though he were about to make a sharp answer, but checked himself and turned away.

  “Yes,” he said more quietly, “I suppose that news is public property by this time. There they are,” he added, as his ear caught the distant tinkle of the door bell.

  “Shall I go?” asked Dolly for the third time.

  “No,” answered Darche, “I will go out and meet them. Stay here please. I will send my wife to you presently.”

  CHAPTER V.

  THE VERDICT OF the doctors was a foregone conclusion. The family physician, who was one of the three, the other two being specialists, stayed behind and explained to John Darche the result of the examination. There was no hope of recovery, he said, nor even of improvement. The most that could be done was to give the old gentleman the best of care so long as he remained alive. Little by little his faculties would fail, and in a few years, if he did not die, he would be quite as helpless as a little child.

  John Darche was not in a state to receive the information with equanimity, though he had expected nothing else and knew that every word the doctor said was true — and more also. He protested, as he had protested to Dolly half an hour earlier, that Mr. Darche was still a serviceable president for the Company, since he could sign his name, no matter whether he understood the value of the signature or not. The doctor, who, like most people, was aware of the investigation then proceeding, shook his head, smiled incredulously, asked after Mrs. Darche and went away, pondering upon the vanity of human affairs and consoling himself for the sins of the world with the wages thereof, most of which ultimately find their way to the doctor’s bank-book, be the event life or death.

  Old Mr. Darche, supremely unconscious of what had taken place, and believing that he had been giving the benefit of his valuable advice to the directors of a western railroad, had lighted one of his very fine cigars and had fallen asleep in his easy chair in his own study before it was half finished. Marion had returned to Dolly in the library and John had sent for his stenographer and had taken possession of the front drawing-room for the morning, on pretence of attending to the business which, in reality, had already been withdrawn from his hands during several weeks.

  He was in great suspense and anxiety, for it was expected that the work of the investigating committee would end on that afternoon. He knew that in any event he was ruined, and even he felt that it would be humiliating to live on his wife’s income. They
would go abroad at once, he thought, New York had become hateful to him. He had as yet no apprehension of being deprived of his liberty, even temporarily. Whatever action was taken against him must be of a civil nature, he thought. He did not believe that any judge would issue a warrant for his arrest on such evidence as could have been collected by the committee. Simon Darche was incapable of remembering what he had done even a week previously, and since the doctors declared that his mind was gone, almost anything might be attributed to him — anything, in fact, about which the slightest trace of irregularity could be discovered. John had been cautious enough in his actions when he had been aware that he was violating the law, though he had been utterly reckless when he had appealed to chance in the hope of retrieving his losses, and recovering himself. He believed himself safe, and indulged in speculations about the future as a relief to the excessive anxiety of the moment.

  Mrs. Darche had some right to know the result of the consultation which had taken place, but her husband either intended to leave her in ignorance or forgot her existence after the doctors had left the house. During some time she remained with Dolly in the library, expecting that John would at least send her some message, if he did not choose to come himself. At last she determined to go to him.

  “I am very busy now,” he said as she entered the room and glanced at the secretary.

  “Yes,” answered Mrs. Darche, “I see, but I must speak to you alone for a minute.”

  “Well — but I wish you would choose some other time.” He nodded to the secretary who rose and quietly disappeared.

  “What is it?” asked Darche, when they were alone.

  “What did the doctors say?”

  “Oh, nothing at all. They talked as doctors always do. Keep the patient in good health, plenty of fresh air, food and sleep.” He laughed sourly at his own words.

  “Is that all?” inquired Marion, rather incredulously. “They must have said something else. Why, we can all see that he is not himself. There is something very seriously wrong. I am quite sure that he did not recognise me yesterday.”