The Knave of Diamonds by Ethel May Dell

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Nap entered--sleek, trim, complacent; followed by Bertie, whose brown
face looked unmistakably sullen.

"Sorry we are late," drawled Nap, "Bertie will make our excuses."

But Bertie said nothing, and it was left to Mrs. Damer to step into
the breach.

She did so quite gallantly, if somewhat clumsily. "I am very pleased to
see you, Nap; but, you know, it was your brother whom we expected. I
didn't so much as know that you were at home."

"Oh, quite so," smiled Nap. "Don't apologise--please!" He bent slightly
over her hand. "So good of you not to mind the exchange. I know I am a
poor substitute. But my brother is entertaining an old friend who has
arrived unexpectedly, so I persuaded him to send me in his place. He
charged me with all manner of excuses and apologies, which I have not
delivered since I know them to be unnecessary."

Mrs. Damer found it impossible not to smile at his calm effrontery, even
though she knew Major Shirley to be frowning behind her back.

"When did you return?" she asked. "Someone said you were in the States."

"I was," said Nap. "I returned half an hour ago; hence our late arrival,
for which I humbly beg to apologise, and to entreat you not to blame
Bertie, who, as you perceive, is still speechless with suspense."

"Oh, you Americans!" laughed Mrs. Damer. "You are never at a loss. Do let
us go in to dinner. No, Nap! The doctor will take me. Will you take Miss
Waring? But you won't be able to sit together. You have disarranged all
my plans, so I shall treat you as of no importance."

"Miss Waring won't quarrel with either you or me on that account,"
commented Nap, as he offered his arm to the rector's daughter with
ironical courtesy. "Come along, Miss Waring! Shut your eyes and bolt me.
It will soon be over."

Dot was young enough to make a face at him, but the hard stare with which
he countered it reduced her almost instantly to confusion. Whereupon he
transferred his attention and looked at her no more.

But compensation was in store for her, for at the dinner-table she found
herself placed between Bertie and the doctor, a pleasing situation in
which she speedily recovered her spirits, since the doctor talked to his
hostess, and Bertie's partner, Mrs. Shirley, strenuously occupied the
attention of her host, who was seated on her other side.

Major Shirley fell as usual to Mrs. Randal, over which circumstance Anne,
catching a tragic glance from the latter, failed somewhat conspicuously
to repress a smile.

"Yes, it's mighty funny, isn't it?" said Nap, and with a sharp start she
discovered that he was seated upon her right.

"I--didn't see you," she faltered.

"No?" he said coolly. "Well, it's all right. I was told to sit
here--obviously decreed by the gods. You'll think me uncanny if I tell
you that it was just this that I came for."

"You are uncanny," she said.

He made her a brief bow. It seemed to her that a mocking spirit gleamed
in his eyes. She had never felt less confident of him, less at her ease
with him, than at that moment. She felt as if in some subtle fashion,
wholly beyond her comprehension, he were playing some deep-laid game, as
if he were weaving some intricate web too secret and too intangible to be
understood or grappled with. Upon one point only was she quite clear. He
would suffer no reference to their last meeting. Whatever the effect of
that terrible punishment upon him, he did not choose that she should see
it. She had seen him in the utmost extremity of his humiliation, but she
should never see the scars that were left.

This much of his attitude she could understand, and understanding could
pardon that part which baffled her. But she could not feel at her ease.

"And so you are afraid," said Nap. "That's a new thing for you."

She glanced round the table. In the general hubbub of talk they were as
isolated as though they were actually alone together.

"No," she said. "Why should I be afraid? But--I feel as if I am talking
to--a stranger."

"Perhaps you are," said Nap.

He uttered a laugh she could not fathom, and then with a certain
recklessness: "Permit me to present to your majesty," he said, "the Knave
of Diamonds!"

There was that in his tone that hurt her vaguely, little as she
understood it. She smiled with a hint of wistfulness.

"Surely I have met him before!" she said.

"Without knowing him," said Nap.

"No," she maintained. "I have known him for a long while now. I believe
him to be my very good friend."

"What?" he said.

She glanced at him, half startled by the brief query; but instantly she
looked away again with a curious, tingling sense of shock. For it was to
her as though she had looked into the heart of a consuming fire.

"Aren't you rather behind the times?" he drawled. "That was--as you
say--a long while ago."

The shock passed, leaving her strangely giddy, as one on the edge of
inconceivable depth. She could say no word in answer. She was utterly and
hopelessly at a loss.

With scarcely a pause Nap turned to Violet Shirley, who was seated on his
right, and plunged without preliminary into a gay flirtation to which all
the world was at liberty to listen if it could not approve. Ralph Waring,
thus deprived of his rightful partner, solaced himself with Mrs. Randal,
who was always easy to please; and the major on her other side relapsed
into bearish gloom.

It was with unspeakable relief that Anne rose at length from that
dinner-table. She had a deep longing to escape altogether, to go back to
the quiet Manor, where at least all was peace. He had hurt her more
subtly than she could have deemed possible. Had his friendship really
meant so much to her? Or was it only her pride that suffered to think he
valued hers so lightly? It seemed that he was fickle then, fickle as
everyone declared him to be. And yet in her heart she did not for a
moment believe it. That single glimpse she had had, past the gibing devil
in his eyes, deep into the man himself, had told her something different.

He hated her then, he hated her as the cause of his downfall. This seemed
the more likely. And yet--and yet--did she really believe this either?

"Dear Lady Carfax, do play to us!" urged her hostess. "It will be such a
treat to hear you."

She rose half-mechanically and went to the piano, struck a few chords and
began to play, still so deep in her maze of conjecture that she hardly
knew what she had chosen.

Mrs. Randal came to sit near her. Mrs. Shirley edged close to Mrs. Damer
and began to whisper. The two girls went softly into the conservatory.

Anne's fingers played on. Now and then Mrs. Randal spoke to her, thanked
her or begged her to continue. But presently she moved away and Anne did
not miss her. She was far too deeply engrossed in her own thoughts.

"Lady Carfax!"

She started, every nerve suddenly on the alert.

"Don't stop playing!" he said, and as it were involuntarily she
continued to play.

"I am coming to see you to-morrow," he went on. "What time would you like
me to call?"

She was silent. But the blood had risen in a great wave to her face and
neck. She could feel it racing in every vein.

"Won't you answer me?" he said. "Won't you fix a time?"

There was that in his voice that made her long earnestly to see his face,
but she could not. With a great effort she answered:

"I am generally at home in the afternoon."

"Then will you be out to the rest of the world?" he said.

She stilled the wild tumult of her heart with desperate resolution. "I
think you must take your chance of that."

"I am not taking any chances," he said. "I will come at the fashionable
hour if you prefer it. But--"

He left the sentence unfinished with a significance that was more
imperious than a definite command.

Anne's fingers were trembling over the keys. Sudden uncertainty seized
her. She forgot what she was playing, forgot all in the overwhelming
desire to see his face. She muffled her confusion in a few soft chords
and turned round.

He was gone.

CHAPTER II

THE KERNEL OF THE DIFFICULTY

"I want to know!" said Capper, with extreme deliberation.

He was the best-known surgeon in the United States, and he looked like
nothing so much as a seedy Evangelical parson. Hair, face, beard, all
bore the same distinguishing qualities, were long and thin and yellow.
He sat coiled like a much-knotted piece of string, and he seemed to
possess the power of moving any joint in his body independently of the
rest. He cracked his fingers persistently when he talked after a fashion
that would have been intolerable in anyone but Capper. His hands were
always in some ungainly attitude, and yet they were wonderful hands,
strong and sensitive, the colour of ivory. His eyes were small and
green, sharp as the eyes of a lizard. They seemed to take in everything
and divulge nothing.

"What do you want to know?" said Lucas.

He was lying in bed with the spring sunshine full upon him. His eyes were
drawn a little. He had just undergone a lengthy examination at the hands
of the great doctor.

"Many things," said Capper, somewhat snappishly. "Chief among them, why
your tomfool brother--you call him your brother, I suppose?--brought me
over here on a fool's errand."

"He is my brother," said Lucas quietly. "And why a fool's errand? Is
there something about my case you don't like?"

"There is nothing whatever," said Capper, with an exasperated tug at his
pointed beard. "I could make a sound man of you. It wouldn't be easy.
But I could do it--given one thing, which I shan't get. Is the sun
bothering you?"

He suddenly left his chair, bent over and with infinite gentleness raised
his patient to an easier posture and drew forward the curtain.

"I guess I won't talk to you now," he said. "I've given you as much as
you can stand and then some already. How's that? Is it comfort?"

"Absolute," Lucas said with a smile. "Don't go, doctor. I am quite able
to talk. I suppose matters haven't altered very materially since you
saw me last?"

"I don't see why you should suppose that," said Capper. "As a matter of
fact things have altered--altered considerably. Say, you don't have those
fainting attacks any more?"

"No. I've learnt not to faint." There was a boyishly pathetic note about
the words though the lips that uttered them still smiled.

Capper nodded comprehendingly. "But the pain is just as infernal, eh?
Only you've the grit to stand against it. Remember the last time I
overhauled you? You fainted twice. That's how I knew you would never face
it. But I've hurt you worse to-day, and I'm damned if I know how you
managed to come up smiling."

"Then why do you surmise that you have been brought here on a fool's
errand?" Lucas asked.

"I don't surmise," said Capper. "I never surmise. I know." He began to
crack his fingers impatiently, and presently fell to whistling below his
breath. "No," he said suddenly, "you've got the physical strength and
you've got the spunk to lick creation, but what you haven't got is zeal.
You're gallant enough, Heaven knows, but you are not keen. You are
passive, you are lethargic. And you ought to be in a fever!"

His fingers dropped abruptly upon Lucas's wrist, and tightened upon it.
"That brother of yours that you're so fond of, now if it were he, I could
pull him out of the very jaws of hell. He'd catch and hold. But you--you
are too near the other place to care. Say, you don't care, do you, not a
single red cent? It's all one to you--under Providence--whether you live
or die. And if I operated on you to-morrow you'd die--not at once, but
sooner or later--from sheer lack of enthusiasm. That's my difficulty.
It's too long a business. You would never keep it up."

Lucas did not immediately reply. He lay in the stillness habitual to
him, gazing with heavy eyes at the motes that danced in the sunshine.

"I guess I'm too old, doctor," he said at last. "But you are wrong in one
sense. I do care. I don't want to die at present."

"Private reasons?" demanded Capper keenly.

"Not particularly. You see, I am the head of the family. I hold myself
responsible. My brothers want looking after, more or less."

"Brothers!" sniffed Capper, with supreme contempt. "That
consideration wouldn't keep you out of heaven. It's only another
reason for holding back."

"Exactly," Lucas said quietly. "I don't know what Nap will say to me. He
will call me a shirker. But on the whole, doctor, I think I must hold
back a little longer."

"He'd better let me hear him!" growled Capper. "I wish to heaven you
were married. That's the kernel of the difficulty. You want a wife.
You'd be keen enough then. I shouldn't be afraid of your letting go when
I wasn't looking."

"Ah!" Lucas said, faintly smiling. "But what of the wife?"

"She'd be in her element," maintained Capper stoutly. "She'd be to you
what the mainspring is to a watch, and glory in it. Haven't you seen such
women? I have, scores of 'em, ready made for the purpose. No, you will
only go through my treatment with a woman to hold you up. It's a process
that needs the utmost vitality, the utmost courage, and--something great
to live for--a motive power behind to push you on. There's only one
motive power that I can think of strong enough to keep you moving. And
that is most unfortunately absent. Find the woman, I tell you, find the
woman! And--under Providence--I'll do the rest!"

He dropped back in his chair, cracking his fingers fiercely, his keen
eyes narrowly observant of every shade of expression on his patient's
face.

Lucas was still smiling, but his eyes had grown absent. He looked
unutterably tired.

"Yes," he said slowly at length. "I am afraid you have asked the
impossible of me now. But, notwithstanding that, if I could see my way
to it, I would place myself in your hands without reservation--and take
my chance. There are times now and then--now and then--" his words
quickened a little, "when a man would almost give the very soul out of
his body to be at peace--to be at peace; times when it's downright agony
to watch a fly buzzing up and down the pane and know he hasn't even the
strength for that--when every muscle is in torture, and every movement
means hell--" He broke off; his lips usually so steady had begun to
twitch. "I'm a fool, Capper," he murmured apologetically. "Make
allowances for a sick man!"

"Look here!" said Capper. "This is a big decision for you to make
off-hand. You can take three months anyway to think it over. You are
getting stronger, you know. By then you'll be stronger still. You won't
be well. Nothing but surgical measures can ever make you well. And you'll
go on suffering that infernal pain. But three months one way or another
won't make much difference. I am due in London in September for the
Schultz Medical Conference. I'll run over then and see if you've made up
your mind."

"Will you, doctor? That's real kind of you." Lucas's eyes brightened. He
stretched out a hand which Capper grasped and laid gently down. "And if
you undertake the job--"

"If you are fit to go through it," Capper broke in, "I'll do it right
away before I leave. You'll spend the winter on your back. And in the
spring I'll come again and finish the business. That second operation is
a more delicate affair than the first, but I don't consider it more
dangerous. By this time next year, or soon after, you'll be walking like
an ordinary human being. I'll have you as lissom as an Indian."

He cracked his fingers one after the other in quick succession and rose.
A moment he stood looking down at the smooth face that had flushed
unwontedly at his words; then bending, he lightly tapped his patient's
chest. "Meanwhile, my friend," he said, "you keep a stiff upper lip, and
_cherchez la femme--cherchez la femme toujours_! You'll be a sound man
some day and she won't mind waiting if she's the right sort."

"Ah!" Lucas said. "You will have to forego that condition, doctor. I am
no ladies' man. Shall I tell you what a woman said to me the other day?"

"Well?"

"That I was like a mother to her." Again without much mirth he smiled.
His lips were steady enough now.

"I should like to meet that woman," said Capper.

"Why?"

The doctor's hand sought his beard. "P'r'aps she'd tell me I was like a
father. Who knows?"

Lucas looked at him curiously. "Are you fond of women?"

"I adore them," said Capper without enthusiasm. He never satisfied
curiosity.

Lucas's eyes fell away baffled. "I'll take you to see her this afternoon
if you can spare the time," he said.

"Oh, I can spend the afternoon philandering so long as I catch the night
train to Liverpool," Capper answered promptly. "Meanwhile you must get a
rest while I go and take a dose of air and sunshine in the yard."

His straight, gaunt figure passed to the door, opened it, and disappeared
with a directness wholly at variance with his lack of repose when seated.

As for Lucas, he lay quite still for a long while, steadily watching the
motes that danced and swam giddily in the sunshine.

Nearly half an hour went by before he stirred at all. And then a heavy
sigh burst suddenly from him, shaking his whole body, sending a flicker
of pain across his drooping eyelids.

"_Cherchez la femme_!" he said to himself. And again with a quivering
smile, "_Cherchez la femme_! God knows she isn't far to seek. But--my
dear--my dear!"

CHAPTER III

THE FIRST ORDEAL

All the birds in the Manor garden were singing on that afternoon in May.
The fruit trees were in bloom. The air was full of the indescribable
fragrance of bursting flowers. There was no single note of sadness in all
the splendid day. But the woman who paced slowly to and fro under the
opening lilacs because she could not rest knew nothing of its sweetness.

The precious peace of the past few weeks had been snatched from her. She
was face to face once more with the problem that had confronted her for a
few horror-stricken minutes on that awful evening in March. Then she had
thrust it from her. Since she had resolutely turned her back upon it. But
to-day it was with her, and there was no escaping it. It glared at her
whichever way she turned, a monster of destruction waiting to devour. And
she was afraid, horribly, unspeakably afraid, with a fear that was
neither physical nor cowardly, yet which set her very soul a-trembling.

Restlessly she wandered up and down, up and down. It was a day for
dreams, but she was terribly and tragically awake.

When Nap Errol came to her at length with his quick, light tread that was
wary and noiseless as a cat's, she knew of his coming long before he
reached her, was vividly, painfully aware of him before she turned to
look. Yesterday she had longed to look him in the face, but to-day she
felt she dared not.

Slim and active he moved across the grass, and there came to her ears a
slight jingle of spurs. He had ridden then. A sudden memory of the man's
free insolence in the saddle swept over her, his domination, his
imperial arrogance. Turning to meet him, she knew that she was quivering
from head to foot.

He came straight up to her, halted before her. "Have you no welcome for
me?" he said.

By sheer physical effort she compelled herself to face him, to meet the
fierce, challenging scrutiny which she knew awaited her. She held out her
hand to him. "I am always glad to see you, Nap," she said.

He took her hand in a sinewy, compelling grip. "Although you prefer good
men," he said.

The ground on which she stood seemed to be shaking, yet she forced
herself to smile, ignoring his words.

"Let us go and sit down," she said.

Close by was a seat under a great lilac tree in full purple bloom. She
moved to it and sat down, but Nap remained upon his feet, watching
her still.

The air was laden with perfume--the wonderful indescribable essences of
spring. Away in the distance, faintly heard, arose the bleating of lambs.
Near at hand, throned among the purple flowers above their heads, a
thrush was pouring out the rapture that thrilled his tiny life. The whole
world pulsed to the one great melody--the universal, wordless song. Only
the man and the woman were silent as intruders in a sacred place.

Anne moved at last. She looked up very steadily, and spoke. "It seems
like holy ground," she said.

Her voice was hushed, yet it had in it a note of pleading. Her eyes
besought him.

And in answer Nap leaned down with a sudden, tigerish movement and laid
his hand on hers. "What have I to do with holiness?" he said. "Anne, come
down from that high pedestal of yours! I'm tired of worshipping a
goddess. I want a woman--a woman! I shall worship you none the less
because I hold you in my arms."

It was done. The spell was broken. Those quick, passionate words had
swept away her last hope of escape. She was forced to meet him face to
face, to meet him and to do battle.

For a long second she sat quite still, almost as if stunned. Then sharply
she turned her face aside, as one turns from the unbearable heat and
radiance when the door of a blast-furnace is suddenly opened.

"Oh, Nap," she said, and there was a sound of heart-break in her words,
"What a pity! What a pity!"

"Why?" he demanded fiercely. "I have the right to speak--to claim my own.
Are you going to deny it--you who always speak the truth?"

"You have no right," she answered, still with her face averted. "No man
has ever the faintest right to say to another man's wife what you have
just said to me."

"And you think I will give you up," he said, "for that?"

She did not at once reply. Only after a moment she freed her hands from
his hold, and the action seemed to give her strength. She spoke, her
voice very clear and resolute. "I am not going to say anything unkind to
you. You have already borne too much for my sake. But--you must know that
this is the end of everything. It is the dividing of the ways--where we
must say good-bye."

"Is it?" he said. He looked down at her with his brief, thin-lipped
smile. "Then--if that's so--look at me--look at me, Anne, and tell me
that you don't love me!"

She made an almost convulsive gesture of protest and sat silent.

For a little he waited. Then, "That being so," he said very deliberately,
"there is no power on earth--I swear--I swear--that shall ultimately
come between us!"

"Oh, hush!" she said. "Hush!" She turned towards him, her face white
and agitated. "I will not listen to you, Nap. I cannot listen to you!
You must go."

She stretched a hand towards him appealingly, and he caught it, crushing
it against his breast. For a moment he seemed about to kneel, and then he
altered his purpose and drew her to her feet. Again she was aware of that
subtle, mysterious force within him, battling with her, seeking to
dominate, to conquer, to overwhelm her. Again there came to her that
sense of depth, depth unutterable, appalling. She seemed to totter on the
very edge of the pit of destruction.

Very quietly at length his voice came to her. It held just a touch of
ridicule. "What! Still doing sacrifice to the great god Convention? My
dear girl, but you are preposterous! Do you seriously believe that I will
suffer that drunken maniac to come between us--now?"

He flung his head back with the words. His fiery eyes seemed to scorch
her. And overhead the rapturous bird-voice pealed forth a perfect paean
of victory.

But Anne stood rigid, unresponsive as an image of stone. "He is my
husband," she said.

She felt his hand tighten upon hers, till the pressure was almost more
than she could endure. "You never felt a spark of love for him!" he said.
"You married him--curse him!--against your will!"

"Nevertheless, I married him," she said.

He showed his teeth for a moment, and was silent. Then imperiously he
swept up his forces for the charge. "These things are provided for in the
States," he said. "If you won't come to me without the sanction of the
law, I will wait while you get it. I will wait till you are free--till I
can make you my lawful wife. That's a fair offer anyway." He began to
smile. "See what a slave you have made of me!" he said. "I've never
offered any woman marriage before."

But Anne broke in upon him almost fiercely. "Oh, don't you know me better
than that?" she said. "Nap, I am not the sort of woman to throw off the
yoke like that. It is true that I never loved him, and I do not think
that I shall ever live with him again. But still--I married him, and
while he lives I shall never be free--never, never!"

"Yet you are mine," he said.

"No--no!"

She sought to free her hand, but he kept it. "Look at me!" he said. "Do
you remember that day in March--the day you saw me whipped like a dog?"

Involuntarily she raised her eyes to his. "Oh, don't!" she whispered,
shuddering. "Don't!"

But he persisted. "You felt that thrashing far more than I did, though it
made a murderer of me. You were furious for my sake. Did you never ask
yourself why?" Then in a lower voice, bending towards her, "Do you think
I didn't know the moment I saw your face above mine? Do you think I
didn't feel the love in your arms, holding me up? Do you think it isn't
in your eyes--even now?"

"Oh, hush!" she said again piteously. "Nap, you are hurting me. I cannot
bear it. Even if it were so, love--true love--is a sacred thing--not to
be turned into sin."

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