CHAPTER III.

"Shall I cool desire By looking at those lovely eyes of hers, That pa.s.sionate love prefers To his own brand, for setting hearts on fire."

--EDMUND GOSSE.

But neither the work he loved, nor his budding intimacy with Miss Arden, deterred him from accepting a week-end invitation from the Maharajah of Kapurthala--the friendly, hospitable ruler of a neighbouring Sikh State.

The Colonel was going, and Lance, and half a dozen other good sportsmen.

They set out on Thursday, the military holiday, in a state of high good-humour with themselves and their host; to return on Sunday evening, renewed in body and mind by the pursuit of pig and the spirit of Shikar, that keeps a man sane and virile, and tempers the insidious effect, on the white races, of life and work in the climate of India. It draws men away from the rather cramping station atmosphere. It sets their feet in a large room. And in this case it did not fail to dispel the light cloud that had hovered between Lance and Roy since the day of the wedding.

In the friendly rivalries of sport, it was possible to forget woman complications; even to feel it a trifle derogatory that one should be so ignominiously at the mercy of the thing. Thus Roy, indulging in a spasmodic declaration of independence; glorying in the virile excitement of pig-sticking, and the triumph of getting first spear.

But returning on Sat.u.r.day, from a day after snipe and teal, he found himself instinctively allotting the pick of his 'bag' to Miss Arden; just a complimentary attention; the sort of thing she would appreciate.

Having refused a ride with her because of this outing, it seemed the least he could do.

Apparently the same strikingly original idea had occurred to Lance; and by the merest fluke they found one another out. To Roy's relief, Lance greeted the embarra.s.sing discovery with a gust of laughter.

"I say--this won't do. You give over. It's too much of a joke.

Besides--cheek on your part."

Though he spoke lightly, the hint of command in his tone promptly put Roy on the defensive.

"Rot! Why shouldn't I? But--the _two_ of them...! A bit overwhelming!"

And suddenly he remembered his declaration of independence. "After all--why should either of us? Can't we let be, just for four days? Look here, Lance. You give over too. Don't send yours. And I won't send mine."

Lance--having considered that inspired proposal--turned a speculative eye on Roy.

"Lord, what a kid you are, still!"

"Well, I mean it. Out here, we're clear of all that. Over there, the women call the tune--we dance. Sport's the G.o.d-given antidote! Though it won't be so much longer--the way things are going. We shall soon have 'em after pig and on the polo ground----"

"G.o.d forbid!" It came out with such fervour that Roy laughed.

"He doesn't--that's the trouble! He gives us all the rope we want. And the women may be trusted to take every available inch. I'm not sure there isn't a grain of wisdom in the Eastern plan; keeping them, so to speak, in a separate compartment. Once you open a c.h.i.n.k, they flow in and swamp everything."

Up went Lance's eyebrows. "That--from you?" And Roy made haste to add: "I wasn't thinking of mothers and sisters; but the kind you play round with ... before you marry. They've a big pull out here. Very good fun of course. And if a man's keen on marrying----"

"Aren't you keen?" Lance cut in with a quick look.

"N-no. Not just yet, anyway. It's a plunge. And I'm too full up with other things.--But what about the birds?"

"Oh, we'll let be--as you sagely suggest!"

And they did.

More pig-sticking next morning, with two tuskers for trophies; and thereafter, they travelled reluctantly back to harness, by an afternoon train, feeling--without exception--healthier, happier men.

None of them, perhaps, was more conscious of that inner renewal than Lance and Roy. The incident of the game seemed in some way to have cleared the air between them; and throughout the return journey, both were in the maddest spirits, keeping the whole carriage in an uproar.

Afterwards, driving homeward, Roy registered a resolve to spend more of his time on masculine society and the novel; less of it dancing and fooling about in Lah.o.r.e....

A vision of his table, with its inviting disarray, and the picture of his mother for presiding genius, gave his heart a lift. He promised himself a week of uninterrupted evenings, alone with Terry and his thronging thoughts; when the whole house was still and the reading-lamp made a magic circle of light in the surrounding gloom....

Meantime, there were letters: one from his father, one from Jeffers; and beneath them a too familiar envelope.

At sight of it, he felt a faint tug inside him; as it were a whispered reminder that, away at Kapurthala, he had been about as free as a bird with a string round its leg. He resented the aptness of that degrading simile. It was a new sensation; and he did not relish it. The few women he intimately loved had counted for so much in his life that he scarcely realised his abysmal ignorance of the power that is in woman--the mere opposite of man; the implicit challenge, the potent lure. Partly from temperament, partly from principle, he had kept more or less clear of 'all that'. Now, weaponless, he had rashly entered the lists.

He opened Miss Arden's note feeling antagonistic. But its friendliness disarmed him. She hoped they had enjoyed themselves immensely and slain enough creatures to satisfy their primitive instincts. And her mother hoped Mr Sinclair would dine with them on Wednesday evening: quite a small affair.

His first impulse was to refuse; but her allusion to the slain creatures touched up his conscience. To cap the omission by refusing her invitation might annoy her. No sense in that. So he decided to accept; and sat down to enjoy his home letters at leisure.

Lance, it transpired, had not been asked. He and Barnard were the favoured ones,--and, on the appointed evening, they drove in together.

Roy had been writing nearly all day. He had reached a point in his chapter at which a break was distracting. Yet here he was, driving Barnard to Lah.o.r.e, cursing his luck, and--yes--trying to ignore a flutter of antic.i.p.ation in the region of his heart....

As far as mere l.u.s.t of the eye went--and it went a good way with Roy--he had his reward the moment he entered Mrs Elton's overloaded drawing-room. Rose Arden excelled herself in evening dress. The carriage of her head, the curve of her throat, and the admirable line from ear to shoulder made a picture supremely satisfying to his artist's eye.

Her negligible bodice was a filmy affair--ivory white with glints of gold. Her gauzy gold wedding-sash, swathed round her hips, fell in a fringed knot below her knee. Filmy sleeves floated from her shoulders, leaving the arms bare and unadorned, except for one gold bangle, high up--the latest note from Home. For the rest, her rope of amber beads and long earrings only a few tones lighter than her astonishing hazel eyes.

Face to face with her beauty, and her discreetly veiled pleasure at sight of him, he could not be ungracious enough to curse his luck. But his satisfaction cooled at sight of Talbot Hayes by the mantelpiece, inclining his polished angularity to catch some confidential t.i.t-bit from little Mrs Hunter-Ranyard. Of course that fellow would take her in.

He, Roy, had no official position now; and without it one was negligible in Anglo-India. Besides, Mrs Elton openly favoured Talbot Hayes. Failing Rose, there were two more prospective brides at Home--twins; and Hayes was fatally endowed with all the surface symptoms of the 'coming man': the supple alertness and self-a.s.surance; the instinct for the right thing; and--supreme a.s.set in these days--a studious detachment from the people and the country. In consequence, needless to say, he remained obstinately sceptical as regards the rising storm.

Very early, Roy had put out feelers to discover how much he understood or cared; and Hayes had blandly a.s.sured him: "Bengal may bl.u.s.ter and the D.C. may pessimise, but you can take it from me, there will be no serious upheaval in the North. If ever these people are fools enough to manoeuvre us out of India, so much the worse for them; so much the better for us. It's a beastly country."

Nevertheless Roy observed that he appeared to extract out of the beastly country every available ounce of enjoyment. In affable moments, he could even manage to forget his career--and unbend. He was unbending now.

A few paces off, the dyspeptic Judge was discussing 'the situation' with his host--a large unwieldy man, so nervous of his own bulk and unready wit that only the discerning few discovered the sensitive, friendly spirit very completely hidden under a bushel. Roy, who had liked him at sight, felt vaguely sorry for him. He seemed a fish out of water in his own home; overwhelmed by the florid, a.s.sured personality of his wife.

They were the last, of course; nearly five minutes late. Trust Roy. Only four other guests; Dr Ethel Wemyss, M.B., lively and clever and new to the country; Major and Mrs Garten of the Sikhs, with a stolid good-humoured daughter, who unfailingly wore the same frock and the same disarming smile.

The Deputy Commissioner's wife permitted herself few military intimates.

But she had come in touch with Mrs Garten over a _dhobi's_[19] chit and a recipe for pumelo gin. Both women were consumedly Anglo-Indian. All their values were social;--pay, promotion, prestige. All their lamentations pitched in the same key:--everything dearer, servants 'impossible,' hospitality extinct, with every one saving and sc.r.a.ping to get Home. Both were deeply versed in bazaar prices and the sins of native servants. Hence, in due course, a friendship (according to Mrs Ranyard) 'broad based on _jharrons_[20] and charcoal and kerosene'!

The two were lifting up their voices in unison over the mysterious shortage of kerosene (that arch-sinner Mool Chand said none was coming into the country) when dinner was announced; and Talbot Hayes--inevitably--offered his arm to Miss Arden.

Roy, consigned to Dr Wemyss, could only pray heaven for the next best thing--Miss Arden on his left. Instead, amazedly, he found himself promoted to a seat beside her mother, who still further amazed him by treating him to a much larger share of her attention than the law of the dinner-table prescribed. Her talk, in the main, was local and personal; and Roy simply let it flow; his eyes flagrantly straying down the table towards Miss Arden and Hayes, who seemed very intimate this evening.

Suddenly he found himself talking about Home. It began with gardens. Mrs Elton had a pa.s.sion for them, as her _malis_[21] knew to their cost; and the other day a friend had told her that somebody said Mr Sinclair had a lovely place at Home, with a _wonderful_ old garden----?

Mr Sinclair admitted as much, with masculine brevity.

Undeterred, she drew out the sentimental stop:--the charm of a _real_ old English garden! Out here, one only used the word by courtesy.

Laborites, of course, were specially favoured; but do what one would, it was never _quite_ the same thing--was it...?

Not quite, Roy agreed amicably--and wondered what the joke was down there. He supposed Miss Arden must have had some say in the geography of the table....