To let base clouds o'ertake me in my way, Hiding thy bravery in their rotten smoke!"

--SHAKSPERE.

And away up in Simla, Rose Arden was enduring her own minor form of purgatory. The news of Lance Desmond's sudden death had startled and saddened her; had pierced through her surface serenity to the deep places of a nature that was not altogether shallow under its veneer of egotism and coquetry.

On a morning, near the end of April, she sat alone in the garden under deodar boughs ta.s.selled with tips of young green. In a border, beyond the lawn, spring flowers were awake; the bank was starred with white violets and wild-strawberry blossoms; and through a gap in the ilex trees beyond, she had a vision of far hills and flashing snow-peaks, blue-white in the sun, cobalt in shadow. Overhead, among the higher branches, a bird was trilling out an ecstatic love-song.

But the year's renewal, the familiar flutter of Simla's awakening, sharpened, rather, that new ache at her heart; the haunting, incredible thought that down there, in the stifling dusty plains, Lance Desmond lay dead in the springtime of his splendid manhood; dead of his own generous impulse to save Roy from hurt.

Since the news came, she had avoided sociabilities and, un.o.btrusively, worn no colours. Foolish and fatuous, was it? Perhaps. She only knew that--Lance being gone--she could not make _no_ difference in her daily round, whatever others might think or say.

And the mere fact of his being gone seemed strangely to revive the memory of his love for her, of her own genuine, if inadequate, response. For she had been more nearly in love with him than with any of his predecessors (and there had been several), who had been admitted to the privileged intimacies of the half-accepted lover. More: he had commanded her admiration; and she had not been woman could she have held out indefinitely against his pa.s.sionate, whole-hearted devotion.

After months of patient wooing--and he by nature impatient--he had insisted that matters be settled, one way or the other, before he went on leave; and she had almost reached the point of decision, when Roy, with his careless charm and challenging detachment, appeared on the scene....

And now--Lance was gone; Roy was hers; Bramleigh Beeches and a prospective t.i.tle were hers; but still....

The shock of Roy's revelation had upset her a good deal more than she dared let him guess. And the effect did not pa.s.s--in spite of determined efforts to be unaware of it. She knew, now, that her vaunted tolerance sprang chiefly from having ignored the whole subject. Half-castes she instinctively despised. For India and the Indians she had little real sympathy; and the rising tide of unrest, the increasing antagonism, had sharpened her negative att.i.tude to a positive dislike and distrust, acutely intensified since that evening at Anarkalli, when the sight of Lance and her stepfather, sitting there at the mercy of any chance-flung missile, had stirred the slumbering pa.s.sion in her to fury. For one bewildering moment she had scarcely been able to endure Roy's touch or look, because he was even remotely linked with those creatures, who mouthed and yelled and would have murdered them all without compunction.

The impression of those few nerve-wracking days had struck deep. Yet, in spite of all, Roy's hold on her was strong; the stronger perhaps because she had been aware of his inner resistance, and had never felt quite sure of him. She did not feel fundamentally sure of him, even now. His letters had been few and brief; heart-broken, naturally; yet scarcely the letters of an ardent lover. The longest of the four had given her a poignant picture of Lance's funeral; almost as if he knew, and had written with intent to hurt her. In addition to half the British officers of the station, the cemetery had been thronged with the men of his squadron, Sikhs and Pathans--a form of homage very rare in India.

Many of them had cried like children; and for himself, Roy confessed, it had broken him all to bits. He hardly knew how to write of it; but he felt she would care to know.

She cared so intensely that, for the moment, she had almost hated him for probing so deep, for stamping on her memory a picture that would not fade.

His next letter had been no more than half a sheet. That was three days ago. Another was overdue; and the post was overdue also.

Ah--at last! A flash of scarlet in the verandah and Fazl Ali presenting an envelope on a salver, as though she were a G.o.ddess and the letter an offering at her shrine.

It was a shade thicker than usual. Well, it ought to be. She had been very patient with his brevity. This time it seemed he had something to say.

Her heart stirred perceptibly as she opened it and read:--

"DEAREST GIRL,--

"I'm afraid my letters have been very poor things. Part of the reason you know and understand--as far as any one can. I'm still dazed. Everything's out of perspective. I suppose I shall take it in some day.

"But there's another reason--connected with _him_. Perhaps you can guess. I've been puzzled all along about you two. And now I _know_.

I wonder--does that hurt you? It hurts me horribly. I need hardly say _he_ didn't give you away. It was things you said--and Mrs Ranyard. Anyhow, that last evening, I insisted on having the truth.

But I couldn't write about it sooner--for fear of saying things I'd regret afterwards.

"Rose--what _possessed_ you? A man worth fifty of me! Of course, I know loving doesn't go by merit. But to keep him on tenterhooks, eating his heart out with jealousy, while you frankly encouraged me--you _know_ you did. And I--never dreaming; only puzzled at the way he sheered off after the first. Between us, we made his last month of life a torment, though he never let me guess it. I don't know how to forgive myself. And, to be honest, it's no easy job forgiving you. If that makes you angry, if you think me a prig, I can't help it. If _you'd_ heard him--all those hours of delirium--you might understand.

"When he wasn't raving, he had only one thought--mustn't blame _you_, or hurt you, on account of him. I'm trying not to. But if I know you at all, _that_ will hurt more than anything _I_ could say.

And it's only right I should tell it you.

"My dearest Girl, you can't think how difficult--how strange it feels writing to you like this. I meant to wait till I came up. But I couldn't write naturally, and I was afraid you mightn't understand.

"I'm coming, after all, sooner than I thought, for my fool of a body has given out, and Collins won't let me hang on, though _I_ feel the work just keeps me going. It must be Kohat first, because of Paul. Now things are calming down, he is getting away to be married. The quietest possible affair, of course; but he's keen I should be best man in place of Lance. And I needn't say how I value the compliment.

"No more trouble here or Amritsar, thank G.o.d--and a few courageous men. Martial Law arrangements are being carried through to admiration. The Lah.o.r.e C.O. seems to get the right side of every one. He has a gift for the personal touch that is everything out here; and in no time the poor deluded beggars in the City were shouting 'Martial Law _ki jai_' as fervently as ever they shouted for Ghandi and Co.

"One of my fellows said to me: 'Our people don't understand this new talk of "Committee Ki Raj" and "Dyarchy Raj." Too many orders make confusion. But they understand "_Hukm Ki raj_."'[36] In fact, it's the general opinion that prompt action in the Punjab has fairly well steadied India--for the present at least.

"Well, I won't write more. We'll meet soon; and I don't doubt you'll explain a good deal that still puzzles and hurts me. If I seem changed, you must make allowances. I can't yet see my way in a world empty of Lance. But we must help each other, Rose--not pull two ways. Don't bother to write long explanations. Things will be easier face to face.

"Yours ever, ROY."

"Yours ever," ... Did he mean that? He certainly meant the rest. Her hands dropped in her lap; and she sat there, staring before her--startled, angry, more profoundly disturbed and unsure of herself than she had felt in all her days. Though Roy had tried to write with moderation, there were sentences that struck at her vanity, her conscience, her heart. Her first overwhelming impulse was to write back at once telling him he need not trouble to come up, as the engagement was off. Accustomed to unquestioning homage, she took criticism badly; also--undeniably--she was jealous of his absorption in Lance. The impulse to dismiss him was mere hurt vanity.

And the queer thing was, that deep down under the vanity and the jealousy, her old feeling for Lance seemed again to be stirring in its sleep.

The love of such a man leaves no light impress on any woman; and Lance had unwittingly achieved two master-strokes calculated to deepen that impress on one of her nature. In the first place, he had fronted squarely the shock of her defection--patently on account of Roy. She could see him now--standing near her mantelpiece, his eyes sombre with pa.s.sion and pain; no word of reproach or pleading, though there smouldered beneath his silence the fire of his formidable temper. And just because he had neither pleaded nor stormed, she had come perilously near to an ignominious _volte-face_, from which she had only been saved by something in him, not in herself. If she did not know it then, she knew it now. In the second place, he had died gallantly--again on account of Roy. s.n.a.t.c.hed utterly out of reach, out of sight, his value was enhanced tenfold; and now, to crown all, came Roy's revelation of his amazing magnanimity....

Strange, what a complicated affair it was, for some people, this simple natural business of getting married. Was it part of the price one had to pay for being beautiful? Half the girls one knew slipped into it with much the same sort of thrill as they slipped into a new frock. But those were mostly the nice plain little things, who subsided gratefully into the first pair of arms held out to them. And probably they had their reward.

In chastened moods, Rose did not quite care to remember how many times she had succ.u.mbed, experimentally, to that supreme temptation. Good heavens! What would her precious pair think of her--if they knew! At least, she had the grace to feel proud that the tale of her conquests included two such men.

But Lance was gone--on account of Roy--where no spell of hers could touch him any more; and Roy--was he going too ... on account of Lance...? Not if she could prevent him; and yet ... goodness knew!

The sigh that shivered through her sprang from a deeper source than mere self-pity.

Rattle of rickshaw wheels, puffing and grunting of _jhampannis_, heralded the return of her mother, who had been out paying a round of preliminary calls. It took eight stalwart men and a rickshaw of special dimensions to convey her formidable bulk up and down Simla roads; and affectionate friends hinted that the men demanded extra pay for extra weight!

A glance at her florid face warned Rose there was trouble in the air.

"Oh, Rose--_there_ you are. I've had the shock of my life!" Waving away her _jhampannis_, she sank into an adjacent cane chair that creaked and swayed ominously under the a.s.sault. "It was at Mrs Tait's. My dear--would you _believe_ it? That fine fiance of yours--after worming himself into our good graces--turns out to be practically a _half-caste_. A superior one, it seems. But still--the deceitfulness of the man! Going about looking like everybody else too! And grey-blue eyes into the bargain!"

At that Rose fatally smiled--in spite of genuine dismay.

"I can't see anything _funny_ in it!" snapped her mother. "I thought you'd be furious. Did you ever notice----? Had you the least suspicion?"

"Not the least," Rose answered, with unruffled calm. "I knew."

"You _knew_? Yet you were fool enough to accept him--and wilfully deceive your own mother! I suppose he insisted, and you----"

"No. _I_ insisted. I knew my own mind. And I wasn't going to have him upset----"

"But if _I'm_ upset it doesn't matter a bra.s.s farthing?"

"It does matter. I'm very sorry you've had such a jar." Rose had some ado to maintain her coolness; but she knew it for her one unfailing weapon. "Of course, I meant to tell you later; in fact, as soon as he came up to settle things finally----"

"Most con_sider_ate of you! And when he _does_ come up, _I_ propose to settle things finally----" She choked, gulped, and glared. She was realising.... "The _position_ you've put me in! It's detestable!"

Rose sighed. It struck her that her own position was not exactly enviable. "I've said I'm sorry. And really--it didn't seem the least likely.... Who _was_ the officious instrument of Fate?"

"Young Joe Bradley, of the Forests. We were talking of the riots and poor Major Desmond, and Mrs Tait happened to mention Roy Sinclair. Mr Bradley asked--was he the artist's son; and told how he once went to tea there--when his mother was staying with Lady Despard--and had a stand-up fight with Roy. He said Roy's mother was rather a swell native woman--a _pucca_ native; and Roy went for him like a wild thing, because he called her an ayah----"

Again Rose smiled in spite of herself. "He would!"