CHAPTER IX—THE MASTER OF STAPLE

IT was too dark to distinguish details as the big car flew-along, but Jean found herself yielding instinctively to the still, mysterious charm of the country-side at even.

A slender young moon drifted like a curled petal in the dusky blue of the calm sky, its pale light faintly outlining the tops of the trees and the dim, gracious curves of distant hills, and touching the mist that filled the valleys to a nebulous, pearly glimmer, so that to Jean’s eager eyes the foot of the hills seemed laved by some phantom sea of faery.

She felt no inclination to talk. The smooth rhythm of the pulsing car, the chill sweetness of the evening air against her face, the shadowy, half-revealed landscape all combined to lull her into a mood of tranquil appreciation, aloof and restful after the fatigue of her journey and the shock of her unexpected meeting with the Englishman from Montavan. She knew that later she would have to take up the thread of things again, adjust her mind to the day’s surprising developments, but just for the moment she was content to let everything else slide and simply enjoy this first exquisite revelation of twilit Devon.

For a long time they drove in silence, Tormarin seeming no more disposed to talk than she herself.

Presently, however, he slowed the car down and, half-turning in his seat, addressed her abruptly.

“This is somewhat in the nature of an anti-climax,” he remarked, the comment quite evidently springing from the thoughts which had been absorbing him.

He spoke curtly, as though he resented the march of events.

Jean felt herself jolted suddenly out of the placid reverie into which she had fallen.

“Yes. It is odd we should meet again so soon,” she assented hurriedly.

“The silence has been broken—after all! You may be sure, Miss Peterson, it was by no will of mine.”

Jean smiled under cover of the darkness.

“You’re not very complimentary,” she returned. “I’m sorry our meeting seems to afford you so little satisfaction.” There was a ripple of laughter in her tones.

“It’s not that.” As he spoke, he slackened speed until the car was barely moving. “You know it’s not that,” he continued, his voice tense. “But, all the same, I’m going to ask you to—forget Montavan.”

Jean’s heart gave a violent throb, and the laughter went suddenly out of her voice as she repeated blankly:

“To forget Montavan?”

“Please. I said—and did—a few mad things that day we spent together. It was to be an uncounted day, you know, and—oh, well, the air of the Alps is heady! I want you to forgive me—and to blot out all remembrance of it.”

He seemed to speak with some effort, yet each word was uttered deliberately, searing its way into her consciousness like red-hot iron.

The curt, difficultly spoken sentences could only signify one thing—that he had meant nothing, not even good, honest comradeship, that day at Montavan. He had merely been amusing himself with a girl whom he never expected to meet again, and now that circumstances had so unexpectedly brought them together he was clearly anxious that she should be under no misapprehension in the matter.

Jean’s pride writhed beneath the insult of it. It was as though he feared she might make some claim upon his regard and had hastened to warn her, almost in so many words, not to set a fictitious value upon anything that had occurred between them. The glamour was indeed torn from her stolen day on the mountains! The whole memory of it, above all the memory of that pulsing moment of farewell, would henceforth he soiled and vulgarised—converted into a rather sordid little episode which she would gladly have blotted out from amongst the concrete happenings of life.

The feminine instinct against self-betrayal whipped her into quick speech.

“I’ve no wish to forget that you practically saved my life,” she said. “I shall always”—lightly—“feel very much obliged for that.”

“You exaggerate my share in the matter,” he replied carelessly. “You would have extricated yourself from your difficulties without my assistance, I have no doubt. Or, more truly”—with a short laugh—“you would never have got into them.”

He said no more, but let out the car and they shot forward into the gathering dusk. Presently they approached a pair of massive iron gates admitting to the manor drive, and as these were opened in response to a shrill hoot from Tormarin’s horn the car swung round into an avenue of elms, the bare boughs, interlacing overhead, making a black network against the moonlit sky.

Still in silence they approached the house, its dim grey bulk, looming indeterminately through the evening mist, studded here and there with a glowing shield of orange from come unshaded window, and almost before Tormarin had pulled up the car, the front door flew open and a wide riband of light streamed out from the hall behind.

Jean was conscious of two or three figures grouped in the open doorway, dark against the welcoming blaze of light, then one of them detached itself from the group and hastened forward with outstretched hands.

“Here you are at last!”

For an instant Jean hesitated, doubtful as to whether the speaker could be Lady Anne. The voice which addressed her was so amazingly young—clear and full of vitality like the voice of a girl. Then the light flickered on to hair as white as if it had been powdered, and she realized that this surprisingly young voice must belong to her hostess.

“I was so sorry I could not meet you at the station myself,” continued Lady Anne, leading the way into the house. “But a tiresome visitor turned up—one of those people who never know when it’s time to go—and I simply couldn’t get away without forcibly ejecting her.”

In the fuller light of the hall, Jean discerned in Lady Anne’s appearance something of that same quality of inherent youth apparent in her voice. The keen, humorous grey eyes beneath their black, arched brows were alertly vivacious, and the quite white hair served to enhance, rather than otherwise, the rose-leaf texture of her skin. Many a much younger woman had envied Lady Anne her complexion; it was so obviously genuine, owing nothing at all to art.

“And now”—Jean felt herself pulled gently into the tight—“let me have a good look at you. Oh, yes!”—Lady Anne laughed amusedly—“You’re Glyn Peterson’s daughter right enough—you have just his chin with that delicious little cleft in it. But your eyes and hair are Jacqueline’s.” She leaned forward a little and kissed Jean warmly. “My dear, you’re very welcome at Staple. There is nothing I could have wished more than to have you here—except that you could have prevailed upon Glyn to bring you himself.”

“When you have quite finished going into the ancestral details of Miss Peterson’s features, madonna, perhaps you will present me.”

Lady Anne laughed good-humouredly.

“Oh, this is my pushful younger son, Jean. (I’m certainly going to call you Jean without asking whether I may!) You’ve already made acquaintance with Blaise. This is Nick.”

Nick Brennan was as unlike his half-brother as he could possibly be—tall, and fair, and blue-eyed, with a perfectly charming smile and an air of not having a care in the world. Jean concluded he must resemble closely the dead Claude Brennan, since, except for a certain family similarity in cut of feature, he bore little resemblance to his mother.

“Blaise has had an hour’s start of me in getting into your good graces, Miss Peterson,” he said, shaking hands. “I consider it very unfair, but of course I had to be content—as usual—with the younger son’s portion.”

Jean liked him at once. His merry, lazy blue eyes smiled friendship at her, and she felt sure they should get on together. She could not imagine Nick “glooming” about the world, as one of the women at the hotel had declared his half-brother did.

It occurred to her that it would simplify matters if both he and Lady Anne were made aware at once of her former meeting with Blaise, so she took the opportunity offered by Nick’s speech.

“He’s had more than that,” she said gaily. “Mr. Tor-marin and I had already met before—at Montavan.”

“At Montavan?” Lady Anne gave vent to an ejaculation of amused impatience. “If we had only known! Blaise could have accompanied you back and saved you all the bothersome details of the journey. But we had no idea where he was. He went off in his usual way”—smiling a shade ruefully—“merely condescending to inform his yearning family that he was going abroad for a few weeks.” Then, as Tormarin, having surrendered the car to a chauffeur, joined the group in the hall, she turned to him and continued with a faint note of expostulation in her voice: “You never told us you had already met Miss Peterson, Blaise.”

“I didn’t know it myself till I found her marooned on the platform at Coombe Eavie,” he returned. His eyes, meeting Jean’s, flickered with brief amusement as he added nonchalantly: “I did not catch Miss Peterson’s name when we met at Montavan.”

“No, we were not formally introduced,” supplemented Jean. “But Mr. Tormarin was obliging enough to pull me out of an eight-foot deep snowdrift up in the mountains, so we allowed that to count instead.”

“What luck!” exclaimed Nick with fervour.

“Yes, it was rather,” agreed Jean. “To be smothered in a snowdrift isn’t exactly the form of extinction I should choose.”

“Oh, I meant luck for Blaise,” explained Nick. “Opportunities of playing knight-errant are few and far between nowadays”—regretfully.

They all laughed, and then Lady Anne carried Jean off upstairs.

Here she found that a charming bedroom, with a sitting-room connecting, had been allotted her—“so that you’ll have a den of your own to take refuge in when you’re tired of us,” as Lady Anne explained.

Jean felt touched by the kindly thought. It takes the understanding hostess to admit frankly that a guest may sometimes crave for the solitude of her own company—and to see that she can get it.

The rooms which were to constitute Jean’s personal domain were delightfully decorated, old-world tapestries and some beautiful old prints striking just the right note in conjunction with the waxen-smooth mahogany of Chippendale. From the bedroom, where a maid was already busying herself unstrapping the traveller’s manifold boxes, there opened off a white-tiled bathroom frankly and hygienically modern, and here Jean was soon splashing joyfully. By the time she had finished her bath and dressed for dinner she felt as though the fatigue of the journey had slipped from her like an outworn garment.

The atmosphere at dinner was charmingly informal, and presently, when the meal was at an end, the party of four adjourned into the hall for coffee. As Jean’s eyes roved round the old-fashioned, raftered place, she was conscious of a little intimate thrill of pleasure. With its walls panelled in Jacobean oak, and its open hearth where a roaring fire of logs sent blue and green flames leaping up into the chimney’s cavernous mouth, it reminded her of the great dining-hall at Beirnfels. But here there was a pleasant air of English cosiness, and it was obvious that at Staple the hall had been adopted as a living-room and furnished with an eye to comfort. There were wide, cushioned window-seats, and round the hearth clustered deep, inviting chairs, while everywhere were the little, pleasant, home-like evidences—an open book flung down here, a piece of unfinished needlework there—of daily use and occupation.

Nick at once established himself at Jean’s side, kindly informing her that now that his inner man was satisfied he was prepared to make himself agreeable. Upon which Lady Anne apologised for his manners and Nick interrupted her, volubly pointing out that the fault, if any (which he denied), was entirely hers, since she had been responsible both for his upbringing and inherited tendencies. They both talked at once, wrangling together with huge zest and enjoyment, and it was easily apparent that the two were very close friends indeed.

Blaise took no part in the stream of chatter and nonsense which ensued, but stood a little apart, his shoulder propped against the chimney-piece, drinking his coffee in silence.

Jean’s glance wandered reflectively from one brother to the other. They presented a striking contrast—the stern, dark-browed face of the elder man, with its bitter-looking mouth and that strange white streak lying like some, ghostly finger-mark across his dark hair, and the bubbling, blue-eyed charm of the younger. The difference between them was as definite as the difference between sunlight and shadow.

Nick was full of plans for Jean’s entertainment, suggestions for boating and tennis occupying a prominent position in the programme he sketched out.

“It’s really quite jolly paddling about on our lake,” he rattled on. “The stream that feeds it hails from Dartmoor, of course. All Devonshire streams do, I believe—at least, you’ll never hear of one that doesn’t, the Moor being our proudest possession. Besides, people always believe that your water supply must be of crystalline purity if you just casually mention that its source is a Dartmoor spring. So of course, we all swear to the Dartmoor origin of our domestic waterworks. It sounds well—even if not always strictly true.”

“Miss Peterson must find it a trifle difficult to follow your train of thought,” commented Blaise a little sharply. “A moment ago you were discussing boating, and now it sounds as though you’ll shortly involve yourself—and us—in a disquisition upon hygiene.”

Nick smiled placidly.

“My enthusiasm got away with me a bit,” he admitted with unruffled calm. “But I haven’t the least doubt that Miss Peterson will like to know these few reassuring particulars. However——” And he forthwith returned enthusiastically to the prospects of tennis and kindred pastimes.

Once again Blaise broke in ungraciously. It seemed as though, for some reason, Nick’s flow of light-hearted nonsense and the dozen different plans he was proposing for Jean’s future divertisement, irritated him.

“Your suggestions seem to me remarkably inept, Nick,” he observed scathingly, “seeing that at present it is midwinter and the lake frozen over about a foot deep. Quite conceivably, by the time that tennis and boating become practicable, Miss Peterson may not be here. She may get tired of us long before the summer comes,” he added quickly, as though in a belated endeavour to explain away the suggestion of inhospitality which might easily be inferred from his previous sentence.

But if the hasty addition were intended to reassure Jean, it failed of its purpose. The idea that her coming to Staple was not particularly acceptable to its master had already taken possession, of her. Originally the consequence of the conversation she had overheard at the hotel, Tormarin’s reluctantly given welcome when he met her at Coombe Eavie Station had served to increase her feeling of embarrassment And now, this last speech, though so hastily qualified, convinced her that her advent was regarded by her host in anything but a pleasurable light.

“Yes, I don’t think you must count on me for the tennis season, Mr. Brennan,” she said quickly, “I don’t propose to billet myself on you indefinitely, you know.”

“Oh, but I hope you do, my dear,” Lady Anne interposed with a simple sincerity there was no doubting. “You must certainly stay with us till your father comes home, and”—with a smile—“unless Glyn has altered considerably, I imagine Beirnfels will not see him again under a year.”

“But I couldn’t possibly foist myself on to you for a year!” exclaimed Jean. “That would be a sheer imposition.”

Lady Anne smiled across at her.

“My dear,” she said, “I’ve never had a daughter—only these two great, unmanageable sons—and I’m just longing to play at having one. You’re not going to disappoint me, I hope?”

There was something irresistibly winning in Lady Anne’s way of putting the matter, and Jean jumped up and kissed her impulsively.

“I should hate to!” she answered warmly.

But she evaded giving a direct promise; there must be a clearer understanding between herself and Tormarin before she could accept Lady Anne’s hospitality as frankly and fully as it was offered.

The opportunity for this clearer understanding came with the entry of Baines, the butler, who brought the information that a favourite young setter of Nick’s had been taken ill and that the stableman feared the dog had distemper.

Nick sprang up, his concern showing in his face.

“I’ll come out and have a look at him,” he said quickly.

“I’ll come with you,” added Lady Anne.

She slipped her hand through his arm, and they hurried off to the stables, leaving Blaise and Jean alone together.

For a moment neither spoke. Blaise, smoking a cigarette, remained staring sombrely into the fire. Apparently he did not regard it as incumbent on him to make conversation, and Jean felt miserably nervous about broaching the subject of her visit. At last, however, fear lest Lady Anne and Nick should return before she could do so drove her into speech.

“Mr. Tormarin,” she said quietly—so quietly that none would have guessed the flurry of shyness which underlay her cool little voice—“I am very sorry my presence here is so unwelcome to you. I’m afraid you will have to put up with me for a week or two, but I promise you I will try to make other arrangements as soon as I can.”

He turned towards her abruptly.

“May I ask what you mean?” he demanded. It was evident from the haughty, almost arrogant tone of his voice that something had aroused his anger, though whether it was the irritation consequent upon her presence there, or because he chose to take her speech as censuring his attitude, Jean was unable to determine. His eyes were stormy and inwardly she quailed a little beneath their glance; outwardly, however, she retained her composure.

“I think my meaning is perfectly clear,” she returned with spirit. “Even at the station you made it quite evident that my appearance came upon you in the light of an unpleasant surprise. And—from what you said just now to Mr. Brennan—it is obvious you hope my visit will not be a long one.”

If she had anticipated spurring him into an impulsive disclaimer, she was disappointed.

“I am sorry I have failed so lamentably in my duties as host,” he said coldly.

The apology, uttered with such an entire lack of ardour, served to emphasise the offence for which it professed to ask pardon. Jean’s face whitened. She would hardly have felt more hurt and astonished if he had struck her.

“I—I——” she began. Then stopped, finding her voice unsteady.

But he had heard the break in the low, shaken tones, and in a moment his mood of intolerant anger vanished.

“Forgive me,” he said remorsefully—and there was genuine contrition in his voice now. “I’m a cross-grained fellow, Miss Peterson; you’ll find that out before you’ve been here many days. But never think that you are unwelcome at Staple.”

“Then why—I don’t understand you,” she stammered. She found his sudden changes of humour bewildering.

He smiled down at her, that rare, strangely sweet smile of his which when it came always seemed to transform his face, obliterating the harsh sternness of its lines.

“Perhaps I don’t quite understand, either,” he said gently. “Only I know it would have been better if you had never come to Staple.”

“Then—you wish I hadn’t come?”

“Yes,”—slowly. “I think I do wish that.”

She looked at him a little wistfully.

“Is that why you were angry—because I’ve come here? Lady Anne and—and Mr. Brennan seemed quite pleased,” she added as though in protest.

“No doubt. Nick, lucky devil, has no need to economise in magic moments.”

She felt her cheeks flush under the look he bent upon her, but she forced herself to meet it.

“And—and you?” she questioned very low.

“I have”—briefly.

It was long before sleep visited Jean that night The events of the day marched processionally through her mind, and her thoughts persisted in clustering round the baffling, incomprehensible personality of Blaise Tormarin.

His extreme bitterness of speech she ascribed to the unfortunate episode that lay in his past. But she could find no reason for his strange, expressed wish to disregard their former meeting at Montavan—to wipe out, as it were, all recollection of it.

That he did not dislike her she felt sure; and a woman rarely makes a mistake over a man’s personal attitude towards her. But for some reason, it seemed to her, he was afraid to let himself like her! It was as though he were anxious to bolt and bar the door against any possibility of friendship between them. From whichever way she looked at it, she could find no key to the mystery of his behaviour. It was inexplicable.

Only one thing emerged from the confusion of thought; the lost glamour of that night at Montavan had returned—returned with fresh impulse and persuasiveness. And when at last she fell asleep, it was with the beseeching, soul-haunting melody of Valse Triste crying in her ears.