She advanced and took his arm in a wifely grasp. Robert, feeling the chains imminent, resolved to play his last card. It was his sole remaining hope of freedom. Bruskly he freed his arm. Then with incredible agility he ran to the aeroplane and scrambled into the pilot's seat. "Now, then!" he said grimly; "you admit that _I_ am to be head, and I'll come down. Otherwise I'll start this infernal machine. I don't much care what happens."

"Robert!" screamed his wife, shaken out of her composure. "Oh, Robert!

come down!"

"Not till you promise!" he said, fumbling at unaccustomed levers. "Here, sir! how do you start it?"

"You fool!" shouted Billing, alarmed, as chance directed Robert to the object of his search. "Stand clear!" he screamed, fearing the propeller would start and hit the bystanders. He pulled Beatrice aside, and Tony did the same for Mrs. Hedderwick. "Stop it, you fool! No!--the other lever! The machine will be up in a minute."

"Promise!" screamed Robert, like one possessed. He was playing for life now, and was past caring.

"I--I promise!" wailed Mrs. Hedderwick, as the propeller began to move, and then at last Robert obeyed the frantic instructions of Billing and stopped the engine. He descended with all the honors of war.

"You will excuse us," he said with a pale smile, taking Mrs. Hedderwick by the arm. "We are stopping at The Happy Heart to-night. Perhaps, to-morrow...."

He retired at the right moment, his wife beneath his manly protecting arm. "There! there!" he whispered soothingly as they walked off; "it's all right now, my love! You mustn't be frightened."

"Oh, Robert!" said Mrs. Hedderwick. "How could you--how _could_ you do it! I--I didn't know you had it in you!"

Robert expanded a hero's chest.

"My dear, love is proverbially blind."

CHAPTER XXVI

THE USUAL THING

Beatrice and the three men watched the pa.s.sing of the Hedderwicks in amused silence. When they had disappeared from view Billing said, "Well, that's done ... and now, Miss Blair, I'm really going."

"Me, too," said Tony lightly. "I mean to have a shy for that seven-thirty train."

"Then you're determined?" said Beatrice to both men. Billing nodded with a smiling melancholy. Tony smiled more cheerfully. Though this interview with Miss Arkwright in the afternoon had opened his eyes, he was not so hard hit as the air-man: things had not had time to go so far.

"I'll just wait and see the machine start," he said. "Then ho! for the station and prosaic London once more!"

"If you like," said Billing, "I'll take you back to Brooklands with me.

This is a two-seater. Unless you've a bad head for heights."

"I've fallen from too many to mind," said Tony ruefully. "My biggest drop occurred this afternoon. Thanks very much. If you'll give me time to collar a coat and a rug, I'm your man."

He ran off, leaving them chatting, but he was back in a very short time bearing the necessary articles. "I bagged the first I could lay hands on," he explained, getting into the overcoat. "I hope n.o.body----"

"Er--the coat happens to be mine," said Lionel pointedly. He liked Tony very well, but could hardly stomach so unblushing a theft. "Sorry, old chap, but I may want----"

Tony put both hands on his shoulders and gazed deep into his eyes.

"Little man," he said calmly, "listen to your wise old uncle. You _won't_ want it. Take it from me that you _won't_ want it. I'll send it back to-morrow. That will be in heaps of time."

"Time for what?" said the puzzled Lionel, smiling out of sheer sympathy with the quizzical glance. "Oh, well--take it and be hanged to you!"

"Thanks," said Tony. Then he took off his cap and advanced to Beatrice.

"Good-by!" he said brightly. "Thanks a thousand times. I'll send you a picture post-card announcing my safe arrival."

"And another to say when you've started work!" said Beatrice, smiling a little mistily. "Don't forget that!"

"I start on Monday," he replied. "Don't know what it will be yet--perhaps aeroplanes, perhaps politics, possibly poultry farming. But it's going to materialize. Good-by, and--the very best!"

Billing, who had said good-by, was already in the pilot's seat. "Come on!" he grunted mournfully, knowing he was bidding farewell to hopes managerial as well as amatory. Tony climbed up behind him and tucked the rug well round. "Let her go!" he said cheerfully. In obedience to the order Lionel gave the propeller a swing, the engine started, and in a few seconds the aeroplane began to run swiftly over the ground.

Beatrice drew close to Lionel and put her arm through his. It seemed such a natural thing that he felt no surprise whatever, but only a tumultuous happiness. Together they stood watching the machine as it took the air and soared up in the magic of mechanical flight. They waved a final adieu, and Tony flourished his cap.

"What would you say," shouted Billing when they had risen a hundred feet, "if I let her drop suddenly?"

"Shouldn't have cared a week ago," shouted Tony in return; "you mustn't now."

Billing grunted unintelligibly and gave his undivided attention to the pilotage....

On the dull earth below Beatrice and Lionel were walking silently toward the house. They were still arm in arm, but no word was spoken till they had reached the shelter of the garden. Then Lionel stopped and took her by the hands. "Ah, Beatrice!" he said.

"Not yet! Not yet!" she breathed, holding back and inflaming his pa.s.sion the more. "Wait a little! You mustn't say anything yet! Let us approach it sensibly and in a rational balanced mood if we can." She broke from him and laughed merrily. "Let us go in and have dinner first. Afterward, we can talk in the garden."

"Tell me one thing," he said impetuously, "and I will be patient. Was there ever a Lukos?"

"I will tell you two things," she said, laughing a little wildly. "You ought to know them before you speak. With them you must be content for an hour. There was no Lukos, and Miss Arkwright and I are the same creature."

He had suspected it a hundred times, and a hundred times he had found fresh evidence to discredit the suspicion. He knew it must be true, though he could not grasp it yet. But he did not care. The fact that he had been hoodwinked and made a plaything did not trouble him in the least. All he was conscious of was that she was free. He laughed quietly, now completely master of himself.

"That will do to go on with," he said; "now let us be sensible, as you suggest, and have dinner."

The meal was a great success, despite the presence of Forbes, who hovered about them like a benignant and sympathetic b.u.t.terfly. Lionel could hardly help smiling at him, remembering his recent slip and the sudden recovery of speech. Forbes seemed entirely unconscious, handing the plates with an air that was almost fatherly; and Lionel regretted the obvious necessity of his dismissal in the roseate and fast-approaching millennium. He was not impatient now, perfectly disposed to laugh, eat, drink, be merry and take a fair share in the conversation that sparkled between them. It was a talk as of old, when they spoke freely and lightly of surface themes--the play, the latest book, the morning's news--the clash of wit and opinion sounding bravely through the room.

They smoked a cigarette each over their coffee, but still the talk was of mundane matters, though neither was ill at ease. There is a telepathy of souls that can send true messages beneath the cover of human speech.

At last Beatrice said, "Let us go into the garden," and he rose briskly at the command. She allowed him to help her with her cloak, and then said, laughing: "But Tony has your coat! What will you do?"

"I shan't need one," he replied. "It's a lovely night."

"You will," she insisted. "I can't have you catching cold. I'll tell Forbes----"

"No, really," he protested, and threw open the door. "See, what a glorious night it is! There's not the least need."

She did not press the point, for indeed it was a night for lovers. There was not a breath of wind in the air, no sound of the works of man to mar the stillness. From a distant field came the dim wheezing of a corn-crake; nearer at hand a nightingale was beginning his epithalamic welcome. A light dew was falling, but nothing to hurt a lover and his la.s.s, full of health and joyousness. The trees did not even sigh a greeting: the solemn hush made them imagine that nature herself was holding her breath in friendly expectation, waiting to hear the old tale in the newest words, ready to break out into a chorus of free congratulation. Already Lionel could hear the leaves whispering the gay tidings, every blade of gra.s.s pa.s.sing on the news, the gra.s.shoppers and glowworms waking their more sleepy fellows to tell them Beatrice was here and had said she loved him, the birds waiting happily in their nests till the first kiss sounded, and then tucking in their heads with a jolly "So _that's_ all right at last!" He wanted to say "Thank you" to the world of beasts and trees and flowers, and presently to the world of men and women.

"Smoke, do!" said Beatrice, as he dragged a couple of the chairs upon the gravel. "And don't interrupt more than you can help. I'll tell you the essential facts as shortly as I can. Details we can talk over later ... if there is to be a 'later.'"

He lighted a cigarette and was silent.