‘You look rather comfortable,’ she said, and the happy ripple was in her voice.
‘Why, yes. There’s nothing else to sit on, and the grass is wet. Do you want to get off?’
‘I thought we might make some tea presently,’ answered Lady Maud. ‘I’ve brought my basket.’
‘Now I call that quite sweet!’ Mr. Van Torp seemed very much pleased, and he looked down at the shabby little brown basket hanging at her saddle.
He slipped to the ground, and she did the same before he could go round to help her. The old thoroughbred nosed her hand as if expecting something good, and she produced a lump of sugar from the tea-basket and gave it to him.
Mr. Van Torp pulled a big carrot from the pocket of his tweed jacket and let his horse bite it off by inches. Then he took the basket from Lady Maud and the two went towards the ruin.
‘We can sit on the Earl,’ said Lady Maud, advancing towards a low tomb on which was sculptured a recumbent figure in armour. ‘The horses won’t run away from such nice grass.’
So the two installed themselves on each side of the stone knight’s armed feet, which helped to support the tea-basket, and Lady Maud took out her spirit-lamp and a saucepan that just held two cups, and a tin bottle full of water, and all the other things, arranging them neatly in order.
‘How practical women are!’ exclaimed Mr. Van Torp, looking on. ‘Now I would never have thought of that.’
But he was really wondering whether she expected him to speak first of the grave matters that brought them together in that lonely place.
‘I’ve got some bread and butter,’ she said, opening a small sandwich-box, ‘and there is a lemon instead of cream.’
‘Your arrangements beat Hare Court hollow,’ observed the millionaire. ‘Do you remember the cracked cups and the weevilly biscuits?’
‘Yes, and how sorry you were when you had burnt the little beasts! Now light the spirit-lamp, please, and then we can talk.’
Everything being arranged to her satisfaction, Lady Maud looked up at her companion.
‘Are you going to do anything about it?’ she asked.
‘Will it do any good if I do? That’s the question.’
‘Good? What is good in that sense?’ She looked at him a moment, but as he did not answer she went on. ‘I cannot bear to see you abused in print like this, day after day, when I know the truth, or most of it.’
‘It doesn’t matter about me. I’m used to it. What does your father say?’
‘He says that when a man is attacked as you are, it’s his duty to defend himself.’
‘Oh, he does, does he?’
Lady Maud smiled, but shook her head in a reproachful way.
‘You promised me that you would never give me your business answer, you know!’
‘I’m sorry,’ said Mr. Van Torp, in a tone of contrition. ‘Well, you see, I forgot you weren’t a man. I won’t do it again. So your father thinks I’d better come out flat-footed with a statement to the press. Now, I’ll tell you. I’d do so, if I didn’t feel sure that all this circus about me isn’t the real thing yet. It’s been got up with an object, and until I can make out what’s coming I think I’d best keep still. Whoever’s at the root of this is counting on my losing my temper and hitting out, and saying things, and then the real attack will come from an unexpected quarter. Do you see that? Under the circumstances, almost any man in my position would get interviewed and talk back, wouldn’t he?’
‘I fancy so,’ answered Lady Maud.
‘Exactly. If I did that, I might be raising against another man’s straight flush, don’t you see? A good way in a fight is never to do what everybody else would do. But I’ve got a scheme for getting behind the other man, whoever he is, and I’ve almost concluded to try it.’
‘Will you tell me what it is?’
‘Don’t I always tell you most things?’
Lady Maud smiled at the reservation implied in ‘most.’
‘After all you have done for me, I should have no right to complain if you never told me anything,’ she answered. ‘Do as you think best. You know that I trust you.’
‘That’s right, and I appreciate it,’ answered the millionaire. ‘In the first place, you’re not going to be divorced. I suppose that’s settled.’
Lady Maud opened her clear eyes in surprise.
‘You didn’t know that, did you?’ asked Mr. Van Torp, enjoying her astonishment.
‘Certainly not, and I can hardly believe it,’ she answered.
‘Look here, Maud,’ said her companion, bending his heavy brows in a way very unusual with him, ‘do you seriously think I’d let you be divorced on my account? That I’d allow any human being to play tricks with your good name by coupling it with mine in any sort of way? If I were the kind of man about whom you had a right to think that, I wouldn’t deserve your friendship.’
It was not often that Rufus Van Torp allowed his face to show feeling, but the look she saw in his rough-hewn features for a moment almost frightened her. There was something Titanic in it.
‘No, Rufus — no!’ she cried, earnestly. ‘You know how I have believed in you and trusted you! It’s only that I don’t see how—’
‘That’s a detail,’ answered the American. ‘The “how” don’t matter when a man’s in earnest.’ The look was gone again, for her words had appeased him instantly. ‘Well,’ he went on, in his ordinary tone, ‘you can take it for granted that the divorce will come to nothing. There’ll be a clear statement in all the best papers next week, saying that your husband’s suit for a divorce has been dismissed with costs because there is not the slightest evidence of any kind against you. It will be stated that you came to my partner’s chambers in Hare Court on a matter of pure business, to receive certain money, which was due to you from me in the way of business, for which you gave me the usual business acknowledgment. So that’s that! I had a wire yesterday to say it’s as good as settled. The water’s boiling.’
The steam was lifting the lid of the small saucepan, which stood securely on the spirit-lamp between the marble knight’s greaved shins. But Lady Maud took no notice of it.
‘It’s like you,’ said she. ‘I cannot find anything else to say!’
‘It doesn’t matter about saying anything,’ returned Mr. Van Torp. ‘The water’s boiling.’
‘Will you blow out the lamp?’ As she spoke she dropped a battered silver tea-ball into the water, and moved it about by its little chain.
Mr. Van Torp took off his hat, and bent down sideways till his flat cheek rested on the knight’s stone shin, and he blew out the flame with one well-aimed puff. Lady Maud did not look at the top of his head, nor steal a furtive glance at the strong muscles and sinews of his solid neck. She did nothing of the kind. She bobbed the tea-ball up and down in the saucepan by its chain, and watched how the hot water turned brown.
‘But I did not give you a “business acknowledgment,” as you call it,’ she said thoughtfully. ‘It’s not quite truthful to say I did, you know.’
‘Does that bother you? All right.’
He produced his well-worn pocket-book, found a scrap of white paper amongst the contents, and laid it on the leather. Then he took his pencil and wrote a few words.
‘Received of R. Van Torp £4100 to balance of account.’
He held out the pencil, and laid the pocket-book on his palm for her to write. She read the words with out moving.
‘“To balance of account” — what does that mean?’
‘It means that it’s a business transaction. At the time you couldn’t make any further claim against me. That’s all it means.’
He put the pencil to the paper again, and wrote the date of the meeting in Hare Court.
‘There! If you sign your name to that, it just means that you had no further claim against me on that day. You hadn’t, anyway, so you may just as well sign!’
He held out the paper, and Lady Maud took it with a smile and wrote her signature.
&nb
sp; ‘Thank you,’ said Mr. Van Torp. ‘Now you’re quite comfortable, I suppose, for you can’t deny that you have given me the usual business acknowledgment. The other part of it is that I don’t care to keep that kind of receipt long, so I just strike a match and burn it.’ He did so, and watched the flimsy scrap turn black on the stone knight’s knee, till the gentle breeze blew the ashes away. ‘So there!’ he concluded. ‘If you were called upon to swear in evidence that you signed a proper receipt for the money, you couldn’t deny it, could you? A receipt’s good if given at any time after the money has been paid. What’s the matter? Why do you look as if you doubted it? What is truth, anyhow? It’s the agreement of the facts with the statement of them, isn’t it? Well, I don’t see but the statement coincides with the facts all right now.’
While he had been talking Lady Maud had poured out the tea, and had cut some thin slices from the lemon, glancing at him incredulously now and then, but smiling in spite of herself.
‘That’s all sophistry,’ she said, as she handed him his cup.
‘Thanks,’ he answered, taking it from her. ‘Look here! Can you deny that you have given me a formal dated receipt for four thousand one hundred pounds?’
‘No—’
‘Well, then, what can’t be denied is the truth; and if I choose to publish the truth about you, I don’t suppose you can find fault with it.’
‘No, but—’
‘Excuse me for interrupting, but there is no “but.” What’s good in law is good enough for me, and the Attorney-General and all his angels couldn’t get behind that receipt now, if they tried till they were black in the face.’
Mr. Van Torp’s similes were not always elegant.
‘Tip-top tea,’ he remarked, as Lady Maud did not attempt to say anything more. ‘That was a bright idea of yours, bringing the lemon, too.’
He took several small sips in quick succession, evidently appreciating the quality of the tea as a connoisseur.
‘I don’t know how you have managed to do it,’ said Lady Maud at last. ‘As you say, the “how” does not matter very much. Perhaps it’s just as well that I should not know how you got at the Patriarch. I couldn’t be more grateful if I knew the whole story.’
‘There’s no particular story about it. When I found he was the man to be seen, I sent a man to see him. That’s all.’
‘It sounds very simple,’ said Lady Maud, whose acquaintance with American slang was limited, even after she had known Mr. Van Torp intimately for two years. ‘You were going to tell me more. You said you had a plan for catching the real person who is responsible for this attack on you.’
‘Well, I have a sort of an idea, but I’m not quite sure how the land lays. By the bye,’ he said quickly, correcting himself, ‘isn’t that one of the things I say wrong? You told me I ought to say how the land “lies,” didn’t you? I always forget.’
Lady Maud laughed as she looked at him, for she was quite sure that he had only taken up his own mistake in order to turn the subject from the plan of which he did not mean to speak.
‘You know that I’m not in the least curious,’ she said, ‘so don’t waste any cleverness in putting me off! I only wish to know whether I can help you to carry out your plan. I had an idea too. I thought of getting my father to have a week-end party at Craythew, to which you would be asked, by way of showing people that he knows all about our friendship, and approves of it in spite of what my husband has been trying to do. Would that suit you? Would it help you or not?’
‘It might come in nicely after the news about the divorce appears,’ answered Mr. Van Torp approvingly. ‘It would be just the same if I went over to dinner every day, and didn’t sleep in the house, wouldn’t it?’
‘I’m not sure,’ Lady Maud said. ‘I don’t think it would, quite. It might seem odd that you should dine with us every day, whereas if you stop with us people cannot but see that my father wants you.’
‘How about Lady Creedmore?’
‘My mother is on the continent. Why in the world do you not want to come?’
‘Oh, I don’t know,’ answered Mr. Van Torp vaguely. ‘Just like that, I suppose. I was thinking. But it’ll be all right, and I’ll come any way, and please tell your father that I highly appreciate the kind invitation. When is it to be?’
‘Come on Thursday next week and stay till Tuesday. Then you will be there when the first people come and till the last have left. That will look even better.’
‘Maybe they’ll say you take boarders,’ observed Mr. Van Torp facetiously. ‘That other piece belongs to you.’
While talking they had finished their tea, and only one slice of bread and butter was left in the sandwich-box.
‘No,’ answered Lady Maud, ‘it’s yours. I took the first.’
‘Let’s go shares,’ suggested the millionaire.
‘There’s no knife.’
‘Break it.’
Lady Maud doubled the slice with conscientious accuracy, gently pulled the pieces apart at the crease, and held out one half to her companion. He took it as naturally as if they had been children, and they ate their respective shares in silence. As a matter of fact Mr. Van Torp had been unconsciously and instinctively more interested in the accuracy of the division than in the very beautiful white fingers that performed it.
‘Who are the other people going to be?’ he asked when he had finished eating, and Lady Maud was beginning to put the tea-things back into the basket.
‘That depends on whom we can get. Everybody is awfully busy just now, you know. The usual sort of set, I suppose. You know the kind of people who come to us — you’ve met lots of them. I thought of asking Miss Donne if she is free. You know her, don’t you?’
‘Why, yes, I do. You’ve read those articles about our interview in New York, I suppose.’
Lady Maud, who had been extremely occupied with her own affairs of late, had almost forgotten the story, and was now afraid that she had made a mistake, but she caught at the most evident means of setting it right.
‘Yes, of course. All the better, if you are seen stopping in the same house. People will see that it’s all right.’
‘Well, maybe they would. I’d rather, if it’ll do her any good. But perhaps she doesn’t want to meet me. She wasn’t over-anxious to talk to me on the steamer, I noticed, and I didn’t bother her much. She’s a lovely woman!’
Lady Maud looked at him, and her beautiful mouth twitched as if she wanted to laugh.
‘Miss Donne doesn’t think you’re a “lovely” man at all,’ she said.
‘No,’ answered Mr. Van Torp, in a tone of child-like and almost sheepish regret, ‘she doesn’t, and I suppose she’s right. I didn’t know how to take her, or she wouldn’t have been so angry.’
‘When? Did you really ask her to marry you?’ Lady Maud was smiling now.
‘Why, yes, I did. Why shouldn’t I? I guess it wasn’t very well done, though, and I was a fool to try and take her hand after she’d said no.’
‘Oh, you tried to take her hand?’
‘Yes, and the next thing I knew she’d rushed out of the room and bolted the door, as if I was a dangerous lunatic and she’d just found it out. That’s what happened — just that. It wasn’t my fault if I was in earnest, I suppose.’
‘And just after that you were engaged to poor Miss Bamberger,’ said Lady Maud in a tone of reflection.
‘Yes,’ answered Mr. Van Torp slowly. ‘Nothing mattered much just then, and the engagement was the business side. I told you about all that in Hare Court.’
‘You’re a singular mixture of several people all in one! I shall never quite understand you.’
‘Maybe not. But if you don’t, nobody else is likely to, and I mean to be frank to you every time. I suppose you think I’m heartless. Perhaps I am. I don’t know. You have to know about the business side sometimes; I wish you didn’t, for it’s not the side of myself I like best.’
The aggressive blue eyes softened a little as he spoke, and t
here was a touch of deep regret in his harsh voice.
‘No,’ answered Lady Maud, ‘I don’t like it either. But you are not heartless. Don’t say that of yourself, please — please don’t! You cannot fancy how it would hurt me to think that your helping me was only a rich man’s caprice, that because a few thousand pounds are nothing to you it amused you to throw the money away on me and my ideas, and that you would just as soon put it on a horse, or play with it at Monte Carlo!’
‘Well, you needn’t worry,’ observed Mr. Van Torp, smiling in a reassuring way. ‘I’m not given to throwing away money. In fact, the other people think I’m too much inclined to take it. And why shouldn’t I? People who don’t know how to take care of money shouldn’t have it. They do harm with it. It is right to take it from them since they can’t keep it and haven’t the sense to spend it properly. However, that’s the business side of me, and we won’t talk about it, unless you like.’
‘I don’t “like”!’ Lady Maud smiled too.
‘Precisely. You’re not the business side, and you can have anything you like to ask for. Anything I’ve got, I mean.’
The beautiful hands were packing the tea-things.
‘Anything in reason,’ suggested Lady Maud, looking into the shabby basket.
‘I’m not talking about reason,’ answered Mr. Van Torp, gouging his waistcoat pockets with his thick thumbs, and looking at the top of her old grey felt hat as she bent her head. ‘I don’t suppose I’ve done much good in my life, but maybe you’ll do some for me, because you understand those things and I don’t. Anyhow, you mean to, and I want you to, and that constitutes intention in both parties, which is the main thing in law. If it happens to give you pleasure, so much the better. That’s why I say you can have anything you like. It’s an unlimited order.’
‘Thank you,’ said Lady Maud, still busy with the things. ‘I know you are in earnest, and if I needed more money I would ask for it. But I want to make sure that it is really the right way — so many people would not think it was, you know, and only time can prove that I’m not mistaken. There!’ She had finished packing the basket, and she fastened the lid regretfully. ‘I’m afraid we must be going. It was awfully good of you to come!’
Complete Works of F Marion Crawford Page 1216
