I do not know that he is good enough for you.”
Violet Wayne smiled and then sat still, looking at him with a curious softness in her eyes. “He is in trouble,” she said simply, “and I am fond of him. That is why I have led you on.”
Appleby rose, and there was a suggestion of resolute alertness in his attitude, though his head was bent. “Don’t ask me for any help that I can give. Let me offer it,” he said. “I don’t know that I am expressing myself fittingly, but it is not only because you will be Tony’s wife that you can command whatever little I can do.”
The girl saw his lips set and the glint in his eyes, and knew he meant what he said. She also saw his chivalrous respect for herself, and, being a young woman of keen perceptions, also surmised that the son of the ranker possessed certain qualities which were lacking in the man she was to marry. She was, as she had admitted, fond of Tony, but most of those who knew and liked him guessed that he was unstable and weak as water. Violet Wayne had, however, in spite of occasional misgivings, not quite realized that fact yet.
“I want you to help him because you are his friend—and mine, but it would hurt him if you told him that I had asked you to; and I do not even know what the trouble is,” she said.
“I have pledged myself; but if you have failed to discover it how can I expect to succeed?”
Violet Wayne did not look at him this time. “There are some difficulties a man would rather tell his comrade than the woman who is to be his wife.”
“I think, if I understand you aright, that you are completely and wholly mistaken. If Tony is in any difficulty, it will be his usual one, the want of money.”
A tinge of color crept into the girl’s face. “Then you will lend it him and come to me. I have plenty.”
She rose as she spoke, and Appleby long afterwards remembered the picture she made as she stood amidst the tall ferns with the faint warmth in her face and the vague anxiety in her eyes. She was tall, and held herself well, and once more he bent his head a trifle.
“I will do what I can,” he said simply.
Violet Wayne left him, but she had seen his face, and felt that whatever it cost him the man would redeem his pledge; while Appleby, who went outside to smoke, paced thoughtfully up and down the terrace.
“If Tony has gone off the line in the usual direction he deserves to be shot,” he said.
He went in by and by, and watched his comrade in the billiard room. Tony was good at most games, but that night he bungled over some of the simplest cannons, though Appleby remembered that he had shot remarkably well during the afternoon. Still, he expected no opportunity of speaking to him alone until the morning, and when the rest took up their candles retired to his room. He lay in a big chair thinking, when Tony came in and flung himself into another. Appleby noticed that his face was almost haggard.
“Can you lend me ten pounds?” he said.
“No,” said Appleby dryly. “I had to venture an odd stake now and then, and do not play billiards well, while I am now in possession of about three sovereigns over my railway fare home to-morrow. What do you want the money for?”
“I only want it until the bank at Darsley opens to-morrow. This is my uncle’s house, of course, but I am, so to speak, running it for him, and I couldn’t well go round borrowing from the men I asked to stay with me.”
“It seems to me that you have not answered my question.”
Tony showed more than a trace of embarrassment. He was, though a personable man, somewhat youthful in appearance and manner, and a little color crept into his forehead. Appleby, who remembered his promise, saw his discomposure, and decided that as the bank would be open at ten on the morrow Tony wanted the money urgently that night.
“Is there any reason why I should?” said the latter.
Appleby nodded. “I think there is,” he said. “We have been friends a long while, and it seems to me quite reasonable that I should want to help you. You are in a hole, Tony.”
Palliser had not meant to make a confession, but he was afraid and weak, and Appleby was strong. “I am. It’s a devilishly deep one, and I can’t get out,” he said. “Well, I’ll tell you. I’m in that condemned Davidson the keeper’s hands, and he is squeezing the life out of me. You will remember his daughter Lucy, who lived at the lodge?”
“Blackmail!” said Appleby dryly. “Go on.”
Tony took out and played with a cigar. “She was pretty, and you know I was always a trifle soft. Now and then I stopped as I passed, and talked to her. I don’t think she disliked it. Well, I don’t remember exactly how it came about, but I made her a trifling wager, and, of course, I lost it; while some fiend put it into my head to send her a little brooch, with a note, instead of the forfeit agreed on—I think it was a box of chocolate. I was away for a week or two, and when I came back she told me she didn’t think she ought to take anything of that kind from me. There was nobody about the lodge—at least so I fancied—and I insisted upon putting the condemned thing on. I think I told you she was pretty.”
“I have seen it for myself,” said Appleby, whose face was a picture of disgust. “Go on!”
“Well,” said Tony, “why the devil are you looking like that at me? I wasn’t engaged to Violet then, and I kissed her—and went away immediately. It is necessary that you should know this, you see.”
Perhaps it was relief, for his comrade was more truthful than weak men usually are, but Appleby lapsed into a great burst of laughter. Tony, however, looked at him lugubriously.
“It really isn’t in the least amusing—to me,” he said. “It’s an especially risky business kissing that kind of young woman, especially when anybody sees you. Still, I’d seen something in the girl’s face that warned me, and on my word of honor the affair ended there; but in a week or two, when I didn’t answer the note she sent, Davidson came and worried me. Talked about his feelings and a motherless girl’s reputation, showed me the note I’d written her, and said a good deal about witnesses. Well—you know I’m careless—I gave him five pounds, a note, and then saw he had one of his men hanging about. ‘Go down to the “Black Bull,” and get this fiver Mr. Palliser has given me changed,’ he said.”
“Clever!” said Appleby. “I begin to understand the thing.”
“Well,” said Tony, “I never went near his place since then, and the girl went away, but soon after I was engaged to Violet, Davidson turned up again. This time it was a more serious tale—the usual one—but you have got to believe what I told you.”
“Yes,” said Appleby, “I think I can. You were often a fool, Tony, but that contented you.”
“I gave him twenty pounds. If I’d had any sense I would have knocked him down instead; but it was an unpleasant story, and I was engaged to Violet. Godfrey Palliser was bent on the match too, though it wasn’t that which influenced me. Then Davidson commenced to come for money regularly, and I can’t get out of the fact that I’ve been subsidizing him without perjury; while it’s evident that if I told the truth now nobody would believe me. I tell you, Bernard, the thing has been worrying the life out of me.”
This was apparent from his strained voice and the dejection in his face, but Appleby smiled reassuringly. “You should have gone to a lawyer long ago, Tony; but you can leave it to me,” he said. “Davidson expects you to give him money to-night?”
“Yes. He makes me come out at midnight and meet him to show he holds the whip over me. Thirty pounds—and I can only raise twenty—at half-past eleven by the fir spinny! Have you the slightest hope of doing anything with him?”
Appleby nodded as he took out his watch. “I shouldn’t wonder if I bring you good news to-morrow. Remember, you are to say nothing to anybody. Give me what money you have and then go to sleep. You look as if you needed it.”
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