Books: Jeanne Of The Marshes
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E. Phillips Oppenheim >> Jeanne Of The Marshes
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"It is no concern of yours," the Princess answered, a little
sharply. "Major Forrest has had a somewhat eventful career, and he
has made enemies. It was chiefly his quarrel with Lord Ronald, and
it was over a somewhat serious matter. He has an idea that this man
Berners is connected with it in some way or other. Do find out if
you can, there's a dear child."
"I do not suppose," Jeanne said, "that Mr. Andrew would know
anything. However, when I see him I will ask him."
The Princess turned away from the open door, shivering.
"You are not really going out?" she said.
"Certainly I am," Jeanne answered. "I suppose you three will play
cards, and it does not interest me to watch you. There is nothing
which interests me here at all except the gardens and the sea. I am
going down to the beach, and then I shall sit there behind the
hollyhocks until it is bedtime."
The Princess looked at her curiously.
"You're a queer child," she said, turning away.
"It is not strange, that," Jeanne answered, with a little curl of
the lips.
The Princess went back to the library. Coffee and liqueurs had
already been served, and the card-table was set out, although none
of the three had the slightest inclination to play. Jeanne walked
along the beach and then came back to her favourite seat, sheltered
by the little grove of stunted trees and the tall hollyhocks which
bordered the garden. Her eyes were fixed upon the darkening sea,
whitened here and there by the long straight line of breakers. The
marshes on her right hand were hung with grey mists, floating about
like weird phantoms, and here and there between them shone the
distant lights of the village. She half closed her eyes. The soft
falling of the waves upon the sand below, and the murmur of the wind
through the bushes and scanty trees was like a lullaby. She sat
there she scarcely knew how long. She woke up with a start,
conscious that two men were standing talking together within a few
yards of her in the rough lane that led down to the sea.
CHAPTER XIV
The Princess was attempting a new and very complicated form of
patience. Forrest was watching her. Their host was making an attempt
to read the newspaper.
"In five minutes," the Princess declared, "I shall have achieved the
impossible. This time I am quite sure that I am going to do it."
A breathless silence followed her announcement. The Princess,
looking up in surprise, found that the eyes of her two companions
were fixed not upon her but upon the door. She laid down her cards
and turned her head. It was Jeanne who stood there, her hair tossed
and blown by the wind, her face ashen white.
"What is the matter, child?" the Princess demanded.
Jeanne came a little way into the room.
"There were two men," she faltered, "talking in the shrubbery close
to where I was sitting behind the hollyhocks. I could not understand
all that they said, but they are coming here. They were speaking of
Lord Ronald."
"Go on," Forrest muttered, leaning forward with dilated eyes.
"They spoke as though something might have happened to him here,"
the girl whispered. "Oh! it is too horrible, this! What do you think
that they meant?"
She looked at the three people who confronted her. There was nothing
reassuring in the faces of the two men. The Princess leaned back in
her chair and laughed.
"My dear child," she said, "you have been asleep and dreamed these
foolish things; or if not, these yokels to whom you have been
listening are mad. What harm do you suppose could come to Lord
Ronald here?"
"I do not know," Jeanne said, speaking in a low tone, and with the
fear still in her dark eyes.
"I told you," the Princess continued, "that there was some sort of a
quarrel. What of it? Lord Ronald simply chose to go away. Do you
suppose that there is any one here who would think of trying to
hinder him? Look at us three and ask yourself if it is likely. Look
at Major Forrest here, for instance, who never loses his temper, and
whose whole life is a series of calculations. Or our host. Look at
him," the Princess continued, with a little wave of her hand. "He
may have secrets that we know nothing of, but if he is a desperate
criminal, I must say that he has kept the knowledge very well to
himself. As for me, you know very well that I quarrel with no one.
Le jeu ne vaut pas la peine."
Jeanne drew a little breath. Her face was less tragic. There was a
moment's silence. Then Cecil de la Borne moved toward the fireplace.
He was pale, but his manner was more composed. The Princess' speech,
drawn out, and very slowly spoken, of deliberate intent, had
achieved its purpose. The first terror had passed away from all of
them.
"I will ring the bell," Cecil said, "and find out who these
trespassers are, wandering about my grounds at this hour of the
night. Or shall we all go out and look for them ourselves?"
"As you will," Forrest answered. "Personally, I should think that
Miss Jeanne has overheard some gossip amongst the servants, and
misunderstood it. However, this sort of thing is just as well put a
stop to."
A sudden peal rang through the house. The front-door bell, a huge
unwieldy affair, seldom used, because, save in the depths of winter,
the door stood open, suddenly sent a deep resonant summons echoing
through the house. The bareness and height of the hall, and the fact
that the room in which they were was quite close to the front door
itself, perhaps accounted for the unusual volume of sound which
seemed created by that one peal. It was more like an alarm bell,
ringing out into the silent night, than any ordinary summons. Coming
in the midst of those tense few seconds, it had an effect upon the
people who heard it which was almost indescribable. Cecil de la
Borne was pale with the nervousness of the coward, but Forrest's
terror was a real and actual thing, stamped in his white face,
gleaming in his sunken eyes, as he stood behind the card-table with
his head a little thrust forward toward the door, as though
listening for what might come next. The Princess, if she was in any
way discomposed, did not show it. She sat erect in her chair, her
head slightly thrown back, her eyebrows a little contracted. It was
as though she were asking who had dared to break in so rudely upon
her pastime. Jeanne had sunk back into the window, and was sitting
there, her hands clasped together.
Cecil de la Borne glanced at the clock.
"It is nearly eleven o'clock," he said. "The servants will have gone
to bed. I must go and see who that is."
No one attempted to stop him. They heard his footsteps go echoing
down the silent hall. They heard the harsh clanking of the chain as
he drew it back, and the opening of the heavy door. They all looked
at one another in tense expectation. They heard Cecil's challenge,
and they heard muffled voices outside. Then there came the closing
of the door, and the sound of heavy footsteps in the hall. Forrest
grasped the table with both hands, and his face was bloodless. The
Princess leaned towards him.
"For God's sake, Nigel," she whispered in his ear, "pull yourself
together! One look into your face is enough to give the whole show
away. Even Jeanne there is watching you."
The man made an effort. Even as the footsteps drew near he dashed
some brandy into a tumbler and drank it off. Cecil de la Borne
entered, followed by the man who had been Andrew's guest and
another, a small dark person with glasses, and a professional air.
Cecil, who had been a little in front, turned round to usher them
in.
"I cannot keep you out of my house, gentlemen, I suppose," he said,
"although I consider that your intrusion at such an hour is entirely
unwarrantable. I regret that I have no other room in which I can
receive you. What you have to say to me, you can say here before my
friends. If I remember rightly," he added, "your name is Berners,
and you are lodging in this neighbourhood."
The man who had called himself Berners bowed to the Princess and
Jeanne before replying. His manner was grave, but not in any way
threatening. His companion stood behind him and remained silent.
"I have called myself Berners," he said, "because it is more
convenient at times to do so. I am Richard Berners, Duke of
Westerham. A recent guest of yours--Lord Ronald--is my younger
brother."
The silence which reigned in the room might almost have been felt.
The Duke, looking from one to the other, grew graver.
"I suppose," he continued, "I ought to apologize for coming here so
late at night, but my solicitor has only just arrived from London,
and reported to me the result of some inquiries he has been making.
Ronald is my favourite brother, although I have not seen much of him
lately. I trust, therefore," he continued, still speaking to Cecil
de la Borne, "that you will pardon my intrusion when I explain that
from the moment of quitting your house my brother seems to have
completely disappeared. I have come to ask you if you can give me
any information as to the circumstances of his leaving, and whether
he told you his destination."
Cecil de la Borne was white to the lips, but he was on the point of
answering when the Princess intervened. She leaned forward toward
the newcomer, and her face expressed the most genuine concern.
"My dear Duke," she said, "this is very extraordinary news that you
bring. Lord Ronald left here for London. Do you mean to say that he
has never arrived there?"
The Duke turned towards his companion.
"My solicitor here, Mr. Hensellman," he said, "has made the most
careful inquiries, and has even gone so far as to employ detectives.
My brother has certainly not returned to London. We have also wired
to every country house where a visit from him would have been a
probability, without result. Under those circumstances, and others
which I need not perhaps enlarge upon, I must confess to feeling
some anxiety as to what has become of him."
"Naturally," the Princess answered at once. "And yet," she
continued, "it is only a few days ago since he left here. Your
brother, Duke, who seemed to me a most delightful young man, was
also distinctly peculiar, and I do not think that the fact of your
not being able to hear of him at his accustomed haunts for two or
three days is in any way a matter which need cause you any anxiety."
The Duke bowed.
"Madam," he said, "I regret having to differ from you. I beg that
you will not permit anything which I say to reflect upon yourself or
upon Mr. De la Borne, whose honour, I am sure, is above question.
But you have amongst you a person whom I am assured is a very bad
companion indeed for boys of my brother's age. I refer to you, sir,"
he added, addressing Forrest.
Forrest bowed ironically.
"I am exceedingly obliged to you, sir," he said, "for your amiable
opinion, although why you should go out of your way to volunteer it
here, I cannot imagine."
"I do so, sir," the Duke answered, "because during the last two or
three days cheques for a considerable amount have been honoured at
my brother's bank, bearing your endorsement. I may add, sir, that I
came down here to see my brother. I wished to explain to him that
you were not a person with whom it was advisable for him to play
cards."
Forrest took a quick step forward.
"Sir," he exclaimed, "you are a liar!"
The Duke bowed.
"I do not quote my own opinion," he said. "I speak from the result
of the most careful investigations. Your reputation you cannot deny.
Even at your own clubs men shrug their shoulders when your name is
mentioned. I will give you the benefit of any doubt you wish. I will
simply say that you are a person who is suspected in any assembly
where gentlemen meet together, and that being so, as my brother has
disappeared from this house after several nights spent in playing
cards with you, I am here to learn from you, and from you, sir," he
added, turning to Cecil de la Borne, "some further information as to
the manner of my brother's departure, or to remain here until I have
acquired that information for myself."
The Princess rose to her feet and laid her hand upon Forrest's
shoulder. The veins were standing out upon his forehead, and his
face was black with anger. He seemed to be in the act of springing
upon the man who made these charges against him.
"Nigel," she said, "please let me talk to the Duke. Remember that,
after all, from his own point of view, what he is saying is not so
outrageous as it seems to us. Cecil, please don't interfere," she
added turning towards him. "Duke," she continued, speaking firmly,
and with much of the amiability gone from her tone, "you are playing
the modern Don Quixote to an extent which is unpardonable, even
taking into account your anxiety concerning your brother. Lord
Ronald was a guest here of Mr. De la Borne's, and to the best of my
knowledge he lost little more than he won all the time he was here.
In any case, on Major Forrest's behalf, and as an old friend, I deny
that there was any question whatever as to the fairness of any games
that were played. Your brother received a telegram, and asked to be
allowed the use of the car to take him to Lynn Station early on the
following morning. He promised to return within a week."
"You have heard from him since he left?" the Duke asked quickly.
"We have not," the Princess answered. "Only yesterday morning I
remarked that it was slightly discourteous. Your brother left here
on excellent terms with us all. You can interview, if you will, any
member of the household. You can make your inquiries at the station
from which he departed. Your appearance here at such an untimely
hour, and your barely veiled accusations, remind me of the fable of
the bull in the china shop. If you think that we have locked your
brother up here, pray search the house. If you think," she added,
with curling lip, "that we have murdered him, pray bring down an
army of detectives, invest the place, and pursue your investigations
in whatever direction you like. But before you leave, I should
advise you, if you wish to preserve your reputation as a person of
breeding, to apologize to Mr. De la Borne for your extraordinary
behaviour here to-night, and the extraordinary things at which you
have hinted."
The Duke smiled pleasantly.
"Madam," he said, "I came here to-night not knowing that you were
amongst the difficulties which I should have to deal with. I wish to
speak to Mr. De la Borne. You will permit me?"
The Princess shrugged her shoulders and turned away.
"I have ventured to speak for both of them," she remarked, "for the
sake of peace, because I am a woman and can keep my temper, and they
are men who might have resented your impertinence."
The Duke remained as though he had not heard her speech. He laid his
hand upon Cecil's shoulder.
"De la Borne," he said, "you and I are scarcely strangers, although
we have never met. There have been friendships in our families for
many years. Don't be afraid to speak out if anything has gone a
little wrong here and you are ashamed of it. I want to be your
friend, as you know very well. Tell me, now. Can't you help me to
find Ronald. Haven't you any idea where he is?"
"None at all," Cecil answered.
"Tell me this, then," the Duke said, his clear brown eyes fixed
steadily upon Cecil's miserable white face. "Were there any unusual
circumstances at all connected with his leaving here?"
"None whatever," Cecil answered, with an uneasy little laugh,
"except that I had to get up to see him off, and it was a beastly
cold morning."
The lawyer, who had been standing silent all this time, drew the
Duke for a moment on one side.
"I should recommend, sir," he whispered, "that we went away. If they
know anything they do not mean to tell, and the less we let them
know as to whether we are satisfied or not, the better."
The Duke nodded, and turned once more to Cecil.
"I am forced to accept your word, Mr. De la Borne," he said, "and
when my brother confirms your story I shall make a special visit
here to offer you my apologies. Madam," he added, bowing to the
Princess, "I regret to have disturbed your interesting occupation."
Forrest he completely ignored, turning his back upon him almost
immediately. Cecil went out with them into the hall. In a moment the
great front door was opened and closed. Cecil came back into the
room, and the perspiration stood out in great beads upon his
forehead. Now that the Duke had departed, something seemed to have
fallen from their faces. They looked at one another as the ghosts of
their real selves might have looked. Forrest stumbled toward the
sideboard. Cecil was already there.
"The brandy!" he muttered. "Quick!"
CHAPTER XV
Bareheaded, Jeanne walked upon the yellow sands close to the softly
breaking waves. Inland stretched the marshes, with their patches of
vivid green, their clouds of faintly blue wild lavender, their
sinuous creeks stealing into the bosom of the land. She climbed on
to a grassy knoll, warm with the sun's heat, and threw herself down
upon the turf. She turned her back upon the Hall and looked steadily
seawards, across the waste of sands and pasture-land to where sky
and sea met. Here at least was peace. She drew a long breath of
relief, cast aside the book which she had never dreamed of reading,
and lay full length in the grass, with her eyes upturned to where a
lark was singing his way down from the blue sky.
Andrew came before long, speeding his way out of the village harbour
in his little catboat. She watched him cross the sandy bar of the
inlet, and run his boat presently upon the beach below where she
sat. Then she shook out her skirts and made room for him by her
side.
"Really, Mr. Andrew," she said, resting her chin upon her hands, and
looking up at him with her full dark eyes, "you are becoming almost
gallant. Until now, when I have been weary, and have wished to talk
to you, I have had almost to come and fetch you. To-day it is you
who come to me. That is a good sign."
"It is true," he admitted. "I have kept my telescope fixed upon the
sands here for more than an hour. I wanted to see you."
"You have something to tell me about last night?" she asked gravely.
"No!" he answered, "I did not come here to talk about that."
"Did you know," she asked, "who your lodger really was?"
"Yes," he said, "I guessed! I will be frank with you, Miss Jeanne,
if you will allow me. I do not like your stepmother and I do not
like Major Forrest, but I think that the Duke is going altogether
too far when he suspects them of having anything to do with the
disappearance of his brother."
She drew a little sigh of relief.
"Oh! I am glad to hear you say that," she declared. "It is all so
horrible. I could not sleep last night for thinking about it."
"Lord Ronald will probably turn up in a day or two," Andrew said
gravely. "We will not talk any more about him."
She settled herself a little more comfortably, and smoothed out her
skirts. Then she looked up at him with faintly parted lips.
"What shall we talk about, Mr. Andrew?" she said softly.
"About ourselves," he answered, "or rather about you. It seems to me
that we both stand a little outside the game of life, as your
friends up there understand it."
He waved his large brown hand in the direction of the Hall.
"You are a child, fresh from boarding-school, too young to
understand, too young to know where to look for your friends, or
discriminate against your enemies. I am a rough sort of fellow,
also, outside their lives, from necessity, from every reason which
the brain of man could evolve. Sometimes we outsiders see more than
is intended. Is the Princess of Strurm really your stepmother?"
"Of course she is," Jeanne answered. "She was married to my father
when I was quite a little girl, and she has visited me at the
convent where I was at school, all my life, and when I left last
year it was she who came for me. Why do you ask so strange a
question?"
"Because," he said, "I should consider her about the worst possible
guardian that a child like you could have. Tell me, what is it that
goes on all day up at the Hall there--or rather what was it that did
go on before Engleton went away?--eating and drinking, cards, and
God knows what sort of foolishness! Nothing else, nothing worth
doing, not a thing said worth listening to! It's a rotten life for a
child like you. They tell me you're an heiress. Are you?"
She smoothed her crumpled skirts, and looked steadily at the tip of
her brown shoe.
"One of the greatest in Europe," she answered. "No one knows how
rich I am. You see all the money was left to me when I was six years
old, and it is so strictly tied up that no one has had power to
touch a single penny until I am of age. That is why it has gone on
increasing and increasing."
"And when are you of age?" he asked.
"Next year," she answered.
"By that time, I imagine," Andrew continued, "your stepmother will
have sold you to some broken-down hanger-on of hers. Haven't you any
other relations, Miss Jeanne?"
She laughed softly.
"You are a ridiculous person," she said. "I am very fond of my
stepmother. I think that she is a very clever woman."
"Bah!" he exclaimed in disgust. "A clever woman she may be, but a
good woman, no! I am sure of that. You may judge a person by the
company they keep. Neither she or this man Forrest are fit
associates for a child of your age."
She laughed softly.
"They don't do me any harm," she said. "Mr. De la Borne and Lord
Ronald have asked me to marry them, of course, but then every young
man does that when he knows who I am. My stepmother has promised me
at least that I shall not be bothered by any of them just yet. I am
going to be presented next season, we are going to have a house in
town, and I am going to choose a husband of my own."
It was Andrew now who looked long and steadily out seawards. She
watched him covertly from under her heavily lidded eyes.
"Mr. Andrew," she said softly, "I wish very much--"
Then she stopped short, and he looked at her a little abruptly.
"What is it that you wish?" he asked.
"I wish that you did not wear such strange clothes and that you did
not talk the dialect of these fishermen, and that you had more
money. Then you too might come and see me, might you not, when we
have that house in London?"
He laughed boisterously.
"I fancy I see myself in London, paying calls," he declared. "Give
me my catboat and fishing line. I'd rather sail down the home creek,
with a northeast gale in my teeth, than walk down Piccadilly in
patent boots."
She sighed.
"I am afraid," she admitted, "that as a town acquaintance you are
hopeless."
"I am afraid so," he answered, looking steadily seawards. "We
country people have strong prejudices, you see. It seems to us that
all the sin and all the unhappiness and all the decadence and all
the things that mar the beauty of the world, come from the cities
and from life in the cities. No wonder that we want to keep away. It
isn't that we think ourselves better than the other folk. It is
simply that we have realized pleasures greater than we could find in
paved streets and under smoke-stained skies. We know what it is to
smell the salt wind, to hear it whistling in the cords and the sails
of our boats, to feel the warmth of the sun, to listen to the song
of the birds, to watch the colouring of God's land here. I suppose
we have the thing in our bloods; we can't leave it. We hear the call
of the other things sometimes, but as soon as we obey we are
restless and unhappy. It is only an affair of time, and generally a
very short time. One cannot fight against nature."
"No!" she answered softly. "One cannot fight against nature. But
there are children of the cities, children of the life artificial as
well as children of nature. Look at me!"
He turned toward her quickly.
"Look at me!" she commanded, and he obeyed.
He saw her pale skin, which the touch of the sun seemed to have no
power to burn or coarsen. The clear, wonderful eyes, the delicate
eyebrows, the masses of dark hair, the scarlet lips. He saw her
white throat swelling underneath her muslin blouse. The daintiness
of her gown, airy and simple, yet fresh from a Paris workshop. The
stockings and shoes, exquisite, but strangely out of place with
their high heels buried in the sand.
"How do I know," she demanded, "that I am not one of the children of
the cities, that I was not fashioned and made for the gas-lit life,
to eat unreal food at unreal hours, and feed my brain upon the
unreal epigrams of the men whom you would call decadents. Two days
here, a week--very well. In a month I might be bored. Who shall
guarantee me against it?"
"No one," he answered. "And yet there is something in your blood
which calls for the truth, which hates the shams, which knows real
beauty. Why don't you try and cultivate it? In your heart you know
where the true things lie. Consider! Every one with great wealth can
make or mar many lives. You enter the world almost as a divinity.
Your wealth is reckoned as a quality. What you do will be right.
What you condemn will be wrong. It is a very important thing for
others as well as yourself, that you should see a clear way through
life."
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