“I don’t care!” said Lexy to herself. “I’ll come back!”
She did not wish to have her bag sent after her. She packed it in great haste, put on her hat and coat, and, opening the door of her room, stepped out cautiously and looked up and down the corridor. There was no one in sight, so she picked up her bag and set forth.
She was running away—worse than that, she was being driven away; but just at the moment she could see no other course open to her. She could not appeal to Captain Grey while he was in such distracting anxiety about his sister. It would be cruel, and it would be useless. What could he do? If Dr. Quelton did not want her in his house, certainly his brother-in-law could not insist upon her staying.
“No!” she reflected. “He would only think it was his duty as a gentleman to leave with me, and he would be miserable, not knowing what became of his sister. I’ve got to go, that’s all; but, by jiminy, I’ll come back! And then we’ll see how much more wanton mischief this irresponsible child can manage!”
There was in her heart a steady flame of anger. Hatred was not natural to her, but her feeling for Dr. Quelton came dangerously near to it. For Caroline’s disappearance, for Mrs. Quelton’s pitiful state, for her own humiliation and suffering, she held him responsible; and she meant to settle that score.
She met no one on her way through the house. She went down the stairs, opened the door, and stepped out into the dazzling sunshine. It was a warm day, her bag was very heavy, and the three-mile walk to Mrs. Royce’s was not inviting. It had to be done, however, and off she started.
The lane was thick with dust, and it was hard walking with that heavy bag, but she went on at a smart pace as long as she thought any one could possibly see her from the cupola. Then she set down the bag and rested for a moment.
“There’s a certain way to carry things without strain,” she thought. “I read about it in a magazine. You use the muscles of your back, or your shoulders, or something.”
But she couldn’t remember how this was to be done; so, picking up the bag in her usual way, went on again. Obviously her way was a very wrong way, for by the time she had reached the end of the lane her fingers were cramped and painful, and her arms ached; and there was the highway, stretching endlessly before her under the hot noonday sun—two miles of it or more. There was no reasonable chance of a taxi, and she knew no one in the neighborhood who might come driving by. There was nothing in sight but a man walking along the road toward her, and that didn’t interest her.
She went on as far as she could, and then stopped under a tree, to rub her stiffening arms.
“I wonder,” she thought, “if I could hide this darned old bag somewhere, and send Joe for it later!”
But her nicest clothes were in it, and the risk was too great. With a resentful sigh she lifted it and stepped out again. The man coming along the road was quite close to her now. She stopped short, and so did he.
“Lexy!” he shouted, and came toward her on a run, with a wide grin on his sunburned face.
She dropped the bag with a thump, and stood waiting for him. He held out both hands, and she took them.
“Oh, golly!” she cried. “I’m so glad you’ve come, Mr. Houseman!”
“So am I!” he said. “Ever since I got that last letter from you—”
“Last! I only wrote one.”
“Well, I got two,” he told her. “The second one came yesterday, about this doctor, and the roses, you know.”
“Mrs. Royce must have posted it!” said Lexy. “I wrote it, but I didn’t mean it to be sent to you unless something happened to me.”
“Enough has happened to you already!”
“More things are going to happen,” said she. “Lots more!”
It suddenly occurred to her that the proper moment had come for withdrawing her hands from Mr. Houseman’s firm grasp. Indeed, she thought the proper moment might already have passed, and a warm color came into her cheeks.
The young man flushed a little himself.
“I didn’t mean to call you that,” he said; “but Caroline used to write a lot about you, and she always called you ‘Lexy,’ so I got into the way of thinking of you—like that.”
“I don’t mind,” Lexy conceded.
There was a moment’s silence.
“Charles is my name,” he observed.
Another silence.
“Queer, isn’t it?” he said seriously.
“Here we’ve only seen each other once, and yet somehow it seems to me as if I’d known you for years!”
“Well, the circumstances are rather unusual,” said Lexy.
“You’re right! But look here—we’ve got to talk about all this. Where were you going?”
“Back to Mrs. Royce’s.”
“Let’s go!” he said cheerfully, and picked up the bag as if it were nothing at all.
“But where were you going?” asked Lexy.
“To find you. You see, we ran into some awfully bad weather, and the engines broke down, and we came back for repairs; so I got your letters. I explained to the old man that I’d have to have leave, for some very important business, and off I came to Wyngate. Your Mrs. Royce told me you’d gone out to the Queltons’. I didn’t like that. Why did you go there, after what had happened?”
“I’ll tell you all about that later,” said Lexy; “but now you’ve got to tell me things. How did you ever meet Caroline? How in the world did she manage to write to you?”
“Well, you see, I met her about a year ago, on board the Ormond. She and her parents were coming back from France, and I was third officer, you know. Her mother and father were seasick most of the time, so we had a chance to—to talk to each other; and, you see—”
“Yes, I see!” said Lexy gently.
“One of the servants—a girl called Annie—used to post Caroline’s letters for her, and I used to write to her in care of Annie’s mother. We never had a chance to meet again, after that trip. I wanted to come to the house and see her people, but she said it wasn’t any use; and from what I saw of them on the Ormond I dare say she was right. I wouldn’t have suited them. I haven’t any money, you know—nothing but my pay; but it was enough for us to live on. Other fellows manage!”
He was silent for a moment.
“After all,” he said, “I’m not a beggar. I can hold my own pretty well in the world, and I could look after a wife.”
“I know it!” cried Lexy, with vehemence. She felt curiously touched by his words, and quite indignant against the Enderbys and any one else who did not appreciate him.
“I asked Caroline to marry me,” he went on. “I told her I couldn’t give her much, but we could have had a jolly sort of life. Look here! Are you crying?”
“A little bit,” Lexy admitted; “but don’t pay any attention to it. Go on!”
“That’s about all there is. She said she would meet me here in Wyngate, because that’s the nearest station of the main line to some little place where a nurse or a governess of hers lived.”
“Miss Craigie!”
“Never heard the name. Anyhow, she wanted to go there after we got married, and—I wish you wouldn’t look like that!”
“But I’m so awfully sorry for you!”
“It was pretty hard, at first,” he said; “but—well, you see, I’ve thought a bit about it, and after all I’m glad we didn’t get married.”
“Oh!” cried Lexy, profoundly shocked. “But that’s—”
“Because I—you see, she didn’t—well, I don’t think she really liked me very much.”
Lexy was astounded.
“Fact!” said he. “What she wanted was romance, and all that sort of thing. She wanted to get away from home, and I was the only chance she had; so there you are!”
“That wasn’t very fair to you!”
“I don’t blame her,” he said thoughtfully. “We were both—but what’s the sense of talking about all that? The thing is to find her!”
Lexy agreed to that promptly.
“Now I’ll tell you everything that’s happened,” she said.
He listened to her with alert attention. He interrupted her often to ask questions, but they were always questions that she could answer. He wanted all the facts, and what Lexy told him he unquestioningly accepted as fact. When she said she had seen Caroline at the doctor’s house, he believed her. He didn’t suggest that her eyes might have deceived her. He trusted her—not only her good intentions, but her good sense.
At last she came to the part of her story about which she was most doubtful—the episode of the emptied bottle. She told it with reluctance.
“I don’t know now,” she said. “Perhaps I did wrong. Perhaps that really was wanton mischief. I did so hate that horrible drug that changed her so! When I did it, it seemed right; but now—”
“It was right,” said he. “Any one’s better off dead than being drugged. Everything you’ve done was right and splendid. You’re the pluckiest girl I ever heard of—the best and most loyal little pal to poor Caroline! There’s no one like you!”
After Mrs. Enderby’s cold and skeptical smile, after Dr. Quelton’s parting sneer, after Captain Grey’s doubts and uncertainties, this speech rather went to Lexy’s head. The world seemed a different place. She glanced at the young man, and he happened at that moment to be looking at her. They both looked away hastily.
“This fellow—this Captain Grey,” said Charles. “He seems to me to be rather a chump!”
“Oh, he’s not!” protested Lexy. “He’s as nice as can be!”
Charles Houseman, who had believed everything that Lexy had said, did not appear convinced of this; and for some inexplicable reason Lexy was not greatly displeased by his lack of belief.