For a while he sat motionless staring at the dying embers, and then with a short, bitter laugh he rose to his feet.

"It's no go, my lady," he muttered to himself. "Thank Heaven I know the Suttons. . . ."

CHAPTER XV

Vane stepped into the train at Victoria the following afternoon, and took his seat in the Pullman car. It was a non-stop to Lewes, and a ticket for that place reposed in his pocket. What he was going to do--what excuse he was going to make, he had not yet decided. Although he knew the Suttons very well, he felt that it would look a little strange if he suddenly walked into their house unannounced; and he had been afraid of wiring or telephoning from London in case he should alarm Joan. He felt vaguely that something would turn up which would give him the excuse he needed; but in the meantime his brain was in an incoherent condition. Only one thought rose dominantly above all the others, and it mocked him, and laughed at him, and made him twist and turn restlessly in his seat. Joan was going to marry Baxter. . . .

Joan was going to marry Baxter. . . .

The rattle of the wheels sang it at him; it seemed to fit in with their rhythm, and he crushed the paper he was holding savagely in his hand.

By Heaven! she's not. . . . By Heaven! she's not. . . . Fiercely and doggedly he answered the taunting challenge, while the train rushed on through the meadows and woods of Suss.e.x. It slowed down for the Wivelsfield curve, and then gathered speed again for the last few miles to Lewes. With gloomy eyes he saw Plumpton race-course flash by, and he recalled the last meeting he had attended there, two years before the war. Then they roared through Cooksbridge and Vane straightened himself in his seat. In just about a minute he would come in sight of Melton House, lying amongst the trees under the South Downs. And Vane was in the condition when a fleeting glance of the house that sheltered Joan was like a drink of water to a thirsty man. It came and went in a second, and with a sigh that was almost a groan he leaned back and stared with unseeing eyes at the high hills which flank the valley of the Ouse, with their great white chalk pits, and rolling gra.s.s slopes.

He had determined to go to an hotel for the night, and next day to call at Melton House. During the evening he would have to concoct some sufficiently plausible tale to deceive the Suttons as to the real reason for having come--but sufficient unto the evening was the worry thereof. He walked slowly up the steep hill that led into the High Street, and booked a room at the first inn he came to. Then he went out again, and sauntered round aimlessly.

The town is not full of wild exhilaration, and Vane's previous acquaintance with it had been formed on the two occasions when he had attended race-meetings there. Moreover, it is very full of hills and after a short while Vane returned to his hotel and sat down in the smoking-room. It was unoccupied save for one man who appeared to be of the genus commercial traveller, and Vane sank into a chair by the fire.

He picked up an evening paper and tried to read it, but in a very few moments it dropped unheeded to the floor. . . .

"Know these parts well, sir?" the man opposite him suddenly broke the silence.

"Hardly at all," returned Vane shortly. He was in no mood for conversation.

"Sleepy old town," went on the other; "but having all these German prisoners has waked it up a bit."

Vane sat up suddenly. "Oh! have they got prisoners here?" The excuse he had been looking for seemed to be to hand.

"Lots. They used to have conscientious objectors--but they couldn't stand them. . . ." He rattled on affably, but Vane paid no heed. He was busy trying to think under what possible pretext he could have been sent down to deal with Boche prisoners. And being a man of discernment it is more than likely he would have evolved something quite good, but for the sudden and unexpected arrival of old Mr. Sutton himself. . . .

"Good Heavens! What are you doing here, my dear boy?" he cried, striding across the room, and shaking Vane's hand like a pump handle.

"How'd you do, sir," murmured Vane. "I--er--have come down to inquire about these confounded conscientious prisoners--Boche objectors--you know the blighters. Question of standardising their rations, don't you know. . . . Sort of a committee affair. . . ."

Vane avoided the eye of the commercial traveller, and steered rapidly for safer ground. "I was thinking of coming out to call on Mrs. Sutton to-morrow."

"To-morrow," snorted the kindly old man. "You'll do nothing of the sort, my boy. You'll come back with me now--this minute. Merciful thing I happened to drop in. Got the car outside and everything. How long is this job, whatever it is--going to take you?"

"Three or four days," said Vane hoping that he was disguising any untoward pleasure at the suggestion.

"And can you do it equally well from Melton?" demanded Mr. Sutton. "I can send you in every morning in the car."

Vane banished the vision of breakers ahead, and decided that he could do the job admirably from Melton.

"Then come right along and put your bag in the car." The old gentleman, with his hand on Vane's arm, rushed him out of the smoking-room, leaving the commercial traveller pondering deeply as to whether he had silently acquiesced in a new variation of the confidence trick. . . .

"We've got Joan Devereux staying with us," said Mr. Sutton, as the chauffeur piled the rugs over them. "You know her, don't you?"

"We have met," answered Vane briefly.

"Just engaged to that fellow Baxter. Pots of money." The car turned out on to the London road, and the old man rambled on without noticing Vane's abstraction. "Deuced good thing too--between ourselves. Sir James--her father, you know--was in a very queer street. . . . Land, my boy, is the devil these days. Don't touch it; don't have anything to do with it. You'll burn your fingers if you do. . . . Of course, Blandford is a beautiful place, and all that, but, 'pon my soul, I'm not certain that he wouldn't have been wiser to sell it. Not certain we all wouldn't be wiser to sell, and go and live in furnished rooms at Margate. . . . Only if we all did, it would become the thing to do, and we'd soon get turned out of there by successful swindlers. They follow one round, confound 'em--trying to pretend they talk the same language."

"When is Miss Devereux going to be married?" asked Vane as the old man paused for breath.

"Very soon. . . . Fortnight or three weeks. Quite a quiet affair, you know; Baxter is dead against any big function. Besides, he has to run over to France so often, and so unexpectedly, that it might have to be postponed a day or two at the last moment. Makes it awkward if half London has been asked."

The car swung through the gates and rolled up the drive to the house.

The brown tints of autumn were just beginning to show on the trees, and an occasional fall of dead leaves came fluttering down as they pa.s.sed underneath. Then, all too quickly for Vane, they were at the house, and the chauffeur was holding open the door of the car. Now that he was actually there--now that another minute would bring him face to face with Joan--he had become unaccountably nervous.

He followed Mr. Sutton slowly up the steps, and spent an unnecessarily long time taking off his coat. He felt rather like a boy who had been looking forward intensely to his first party, and is stricken with shyness just as he enters the drawing-room.

"Come in, come in, my boy, and get warm." Mr. Sutton threw open a door. "Mary, my dear, who do you think I found in Lewes? Young Derek Vane--I've brought him along. . . ."

Vane followed him into the room as he was speaking, and only he noticed that Joan half rose from her chair, and then sank back again, while a wave of colour flooded her cheeks, and then receded, leaving them deathly white. With every pulse in his body hammering, but outwardly quite composed, Vane shook hands with Mrs. Sutton.

"So kind of your husband," he murmured. "He found me propping up the hotel smoking-room, and rescued me from such a dreadful operation. . . ."

Mrs. Sutton beamed on him. "But it's delightful, Captain Vane. I'm so glad you could come. Let me see--you know Miss Devereux, don't you?"

Vane turned to Joan, and for the moment their eyes met. "I think I have that pleasure," he said in a low voice. "I believe I have to congratulate you, Miss Devereux, on your approaching marriage."

He heard Joan give a gasp, and barely caught her whispered answer: "My G.o.d! why have you come?"

He turned round and saw that both the old people were occupied for a moment. "Why, just to congratulate you, dear lady . . . just to congratulate you." His eyes burned into hers, and his voice was shaking. "Why else, Joan, why else?"

Then Mrs. Sutton began to talk, and the conversation became general.

"It's about these German prisoners; they're giving a bit of trouble,"

Vane said in answer to her question. "And so we've formed a sort of board to investigate their food and general conditions . . . and--er--I am one of the board."

"How very interesting," said the old lady. "Have you been on it for long?"

"No--not long. In fact," said Vane looking fixedly at Joan, "I only got my orders last night. . . ." With the faintest flicker of a smile he watched the tell-tale colour come and go.

Then she turned on him, and her expression was a little baffling. "And have you any special qualification, Captain Vane, for dealing with such an intricate subject?"

"Intricate?" He raised his eyebrows. "I should have thought it was very simple. Just a matter of common sense, and making . . . er . . .

these men--well--get their sense of proportion."

"You mean making them get your sense of proportion?"

"In some cases there can be only one," said Vane gravely.

"And that one is your own. These--German prisoners you said, didn't you?--these German prisoners may think it their duty to disagree with your views. Doubtless from patriotic motives. . . ."

"That would be a great pity," said Vane. "It would then be up to me to make them see the error of their ways."

"And if you fail?" asked the girl.

"Somehow I don't think I shall," he answered slowly. "But if I do--the trouble of which I spoke will not diminish. It will increase. . . ."