CHAPTER XVI

THE END OF ONE TOUR: THE BEGINNING OF ANOTHER

Cynthia found him lying in a darkened room. The nurse had just raised

some of the blinds; a dismal day was drawing to its close, and more

light was needed ere she could distinguish marked bottles, and doses,

and the rest of the appurtenances of dangerous illness.

An English nurse would have forbidden the presence of a stranger; this

French one acted with more discretion if less of strict science.

"Madam is his sister, perhaps?" she whispered.

"No."

"A relative, then?"

"No; a woman who loves him."

That heartbroken admission told the whole tale to the quick-witted

Frenchwoman. There had been a duel; one man was seriously injured; the

other, she had heard, was also receiving medical attention in another

hotel--the _temoins_, wistful to avoid the interrogation of the law,

had so arranged--and here was the woman who had caused the quarrel.

Well, such was the will of Providence! These things had been since man

and woman were expelled from Paradise--for the nurse, though a devout

Catholic, suspected that Genesis had suppressed certain details of the

first fratricide--and would continue, she supposed, until the

Millennium.

She nodded cheerfully.

"There is every reason to hope, but he must not be disturbed--not

excited, that is," she added, seeing the wan agony in Cynthia's face.

The girl tiptoed to the side of the bed. Medenham's eyes were closed,

but he was muttering something. She bent and kissed his forehead, and

a strange smile broke through the tense lines of pain. Even in his

semi-conscious state he felt the touch of those exquisite lips.

"My Lady Alice!" he said.

She choked back a sob. He was dreaming of "Comus"--standing with her

in the ruined banqueting hall of Ludlow Castle.

"Yes, your Lady Alice," she breathed.

A slight quiver shook him.

"Don't tell Cynthia," he said brokenly. "She must never know.... Ah,

if I hadn't slipped, I would have quieted his viperish tongue.... But

Cynthia must not know!"

"Oh, my dear, my dear, Cynthia does know! It is you who know not. Kind

Heaven, let him live! Grant that I may tell him all that I know!"

She could not help it; the words welled forth of their own accord; but

the nurse touched her arm gently.

"It is a little fever," she whispered with ready sympathy. "Soon it

will pass. He will sleep, and, when he awakes, it is perhaps

permissible that you should speak to him."

* * * * *

Well, it was permissible. The age of miracles had not passed for those

two. Even the experienced doctor marveled at the strength of a man who

at four o'clock in the morning could have a sword driven through the

tissues in perilous proximity to the right lung, and yet, at nine

o'clock on that same night, was able to announce an unalterable

resolution to get up and dress for breakfast next day. That, of

course, was a pleasing fiction intended for Cynthia's benefit. It

served its purpose admirably. The kindly nurse displayed an unexpected

firmness in leading her to her own room, there to eat and sleep.

For Cynthia had an ordeal to face. Many things had been said in the

car during that mad rush to Folkestone, and on board the steamer which

ferried Dale and herself to Boulogne she had wrung from the taciturn

chauffeur a full, true, and particular account of Medenham, his

family, and his doings throughout as much of his life as Dale either

knew or guessed. By the time they reached Boulogne she had made up her

mind with a characteristic decision. One long telegram to her father,

another to Lord Fairholme, caused heart-burning and dismay not alone

in certain apartments of the Savoy Hotel, but in the aristocratic

aloofness of Cavendish Square and Curzon Street. As a result, two

elderly men, a younger one, in the person of the Marquis of Scarland,

and two tearful women--Lady St. Maur and Mrs. Leland--met at Charing

Cross about one o'clock in the morning to travel by special train and

steamer. Another woman telegraphed from Shropshire saying that baby

was better, and that she would follow by the first steamer on Sunday.

Mrs. Devar did not await developments. She fled, dinnerless, to some

burrow in Bayswater.

These alarums and excursions were accompanied by the ringing of

telephones and the flight of carriages back and forth through muddy

London, and Cynthia was called on to deal with a whole sheaf of

telegrams which demanded replies either to Dover or to Scarland Towers

in Shropshire.

With a man like Vanrenen at one end, however, and a woman like his

daughter at the other, it might be fairly assumed that even the most

complex skein of circumstances might be resolved from its tangle.

As a matter of curious coincidence, the vessel which carried Marigny

to England passed in mid-Channel its sister ship conveying the

grief-stricken party of relatives to France. It happened, too, that

the clouds from the Atlantic elected to hover over Britain rather

than France, and when Cynthia stood on the quay to meet the incoming

steamer, a burst of sunshine from the east gave promise of a fine if

somewhat blustery day.

Five pairs of eyes sought her face anxiously while the vessel was

warping to the quay opposite the Gare Maritime. They looked there for

tidings, and they were not disappointed.

"That's all right," said Vanrenen with an unwonted huskiness in his

voice. "Cynthia wouldn't smile if she hadn't good news."

"Thank God for that!" muttered the Earl, bending his head to examine a

landing ticket, the clear type of which he was utterly unable to read.

"I never thought for a minute that any Frenchman could kill George,"

cried Scarland cheerfully.

But the two women said nothing, could see nothing, and the white-faced

but smiling Cynthia standing near the shoreward end of the gangway had

vanished in a sudden mist.

Of course, Marigny was right when he foresaw that Vanrenen could not

meet either Medenham or any of his relatives for five minutes without

his "poor little cobweb of intrigue" being dissipated once and

forever.

With the marvelous insight that every woman possesses when dealing

with the affairs of the man she loves, Cynthia combined the eloquence

of an orator with the practiced skill of a clever lawyer in revealing

each turn and twist of the toils which had enveloped her since that

day in Paris when her father happened to suggest in Marigny's hearing

that she might utilize his hired car for a tour in England, while he

concluded the business that was detaining him in the French Capital.

Nothing escaped her; she unraveled every knot; Medenham's few broken

words, supplemented by the letter to his brother-in-law which he told

her to obtain from Dale, threw light on all the dark places.

But the gloom had fled. It was a keenly interested, almost

light-hearted, little party that walked through the sunshine to the

Hotel de la Plage.

* * * * *

Dale, abashed, sheepish, yet oddly confident that all was for the best

in a queer world, met the Earl of Fairholme later in the day; his

lordship, who had been pining for someone to pitch into, addressed him

sternly.

"This is a nice game you've been playing," he said. "I always thought

you were a man of steady habits, a little given to horse-racing

perhaps, but otherwise a decent member of the community."

"So I was before I met Viscount Medenham, my lord," was the daring

answer. For Dale was no fool, and he had long since seen how certain

apparently hostile forces had adapted themselves to new conditions.

"Before you left him, you mean," growled the Earl. "What sort of sense

was there in letting him fight a duel?--it could have been stopped in

fifty different ways."

"Yes, my lord, but I never suspicioned a word of it till he went off

in the cab with them----"

The Earl held up a warning finger.

"Hush," he said, "this is France, remember, and _you_ are the

foreigner here. Where is my son's car?"

"In the garage at Folkestone, my lord."

"Well, you had better cross by an early boat to-morrow and bring it

here. You understand all the preliminaries, I suppose? Find out from

the Customs people what deposit is necessary, and come to me for the

money."

So it happened that when Medenham was able to take his first drive in

the open air, the Mercury awaited him and Cynthia at the door of the

hotel. It positively sparkled in the sunlight; never was car more

spick and span. The brasswork scintillated, each cylinder was

rhythmical, and a microscope would not have revealed one speck of dust

on body or upholstery.

* * * * *

On a day in July--for everybody agreed that not even a marriage should

be allowed to interfere with the Scottish festival of St. Grouse--that

same shining Mercury with the tonneau decorously cased in glass for

the hour, drew up at the edge of a red carpet laid down from curb

to stately porch of St. George's, Hanover Square, and Dale turned a

grinning face to the doorway when Viscount Medenham led his bride down

the steps through a shower of rice and good wishes.

Wedding breakfasts and receptions are all "much of a muchness," as the

Mad Hatter said to another Alice, and it was not until the Mercury was

speeding north by west to Scarland Towers, "lent to the happy pair

for the honeymoon" while Betty took the children to recuperate at the

seaside, that Cynthia felt she was really married.

"I have a bit of news for you," said her husband, taking a letter from

his pocket. "I received a letter by this morning's post. A heap of

others remain unopened till you and I have time to go through them;

but this one caught my attention, and I read it while I was dressing."

He had an excellent excuse for putting his arm round her waist while

he held the open sheet so that both might peruse it at the same time.

It ran:

MY DEAR VISCOUNT--Of course I meant to kill you, but fate

decided otherwise. Indeed, with my usual candor, which by

this time you may have learned to admire, I may add that

only the special kind of dog's luck which attaches itself to

members of my family, saved me from being killed by you. But

that is ancient history now.

I am glad to hear that your wound was not really serious.

There was no sense in merely crippling you--my only chance

lay in procuring your untimely demise. Having failed,

however, I want to tell you, with the utmost sincerity, that

I never had the slightest intention of carrying out my

abominable threat in regard to the fair lady who is now

Viscountess Medenham. Were you other than a heavy-witted and

thick-skinned Briton, you would have known that I was

goading you into issuing a challenge.

This piece of information is my wedding present; it is all I

can give, because, metaphorically speaking, I haven't a sou!

I am, as you see, domiciled in Brussels, where my car is

attached by an unsympathetic hotel proprietor. Still, I

am devoid of rancor, and mean to keep a sharp eye for a

well-favored and well-dowered wife; such a one, in fact, as

you managed to snap up under my very nose.

With a thousand compliments, I am,

Yours very sincerely,

EDOUARD MARIGNY.

P.S.--Devar went "steerage" to the United States when he

heard of our affair. He thought it was all up with you, and

with him.

"The wretch!" murmured Cynthia. "Can he really believe even yet that I

would have married him?"

"I don't care tuppence what he believes," said Medenham, giving her a

reassuring hug. "Indeed, I have a mind to write and ask him how much

he owes in that hotel. Don't you see, my dear, that if it hadn't been

for Marigny there was a chance that I might have left you at Bristol."

"Never!" cooed Cynthia.

"Well, now I have got you, I am beginning to imagine all sorts of

terrible possibilities which might have parted us. I remember

thinking, when my foot slipped...."

"Oh, don't!" she murmured. "I can't bear to hear of that. Sometimes,

in Calais, I awoke screaming, and then I knew I had seen it in my

dreams.... There, you have disarranged my hat!... But I don't think

much of _your_ budget, anyhow; mine is a great deal more to the point.

My father told me this morning that he is sure he will feel very

lonely now. He never meant, he said, to put anyone in my dear

mother's place, but he will miss me so greatly--that, perhaps, Mrs.

Leland----"

"By Jove," cried Medenham, "that will be splendid! I like Mrs.

Leland. At one time, do you know, I rather fancied she might

become my step-mother, now it seems I shall have to greet her as

a mother-in-law. She was bound to come into the family one way or

another. When is it to be?"

Cynthia laughed delightedly.

"Father looked _so_ confused when I asked him. Say, wouldn't it be a

joke if Simmonds brought them to Scarland Towers one day, and they

were announced by some solemn footman as 'Mr. and Mrs. Vanrenen'?"

"Cynthia, you _know_," he teased her.

"I don't know, but I am a good guesser," she said.

And she was.

THE END

A FEW

OF GROSSET & DUNLAP'S

Great Books at Little Prices

QUINCY ADAMS SAWYER. A Picture of New England Home Life. With

illustrations by C. W. Reed, and Scenes Reproduced from the Play.

One of the best New England stories ever written. It is full of homely

human interest ... there is a wealth of New England village character,

scenes and incidents ... forcibly, vividly and truthfully drawn. Few

books have enjoyed a greater sale and popularity. Dramatized, it made

the greatest rural play of recent times.

THE FURTHER ADVENTURES OF QUINCY ADAMS SAWYER. By Charles Felton

Pidgin. Illustrated by Henry Roth.

All who love honest sentiment, quaint and sunny humor, and homespun

philosophy will find these "Further Adventures" a book after their own

heart.

HALF A CHANCE. By Frederic S. Isham. Illustrated by Herman Pfeifer.

The thrill of excitement will keep the reader in a state of suspense,

and he will become personally concerned from the start, as to the

central character, a very real man who suffers, dares--and achieves!

VIRGINIA OF THE AIR LANES. By Herbert Quick. Illustrated by William R.

Leigh.

The author has seized the romantic moment for the airship novel, and

created the pretty story of "a lover and his lass" contending with an

elderly relative for the monopoly of the skies. An exciting tale of

adventure in midair.

THE GAME AND THE CANDLE. By Eleanor M. Ingram. Illustrated by P. D.

Johnson.

The hero is a young American, who, to save his family from poverty,

deliberately commits a felony. Then follow his capture and

imprisonment, and his rescue by a Russian Grand Duke. A stirring

story, rich in sentiment.

THE MUSIC MASTER. By Charles Klein. Illustrated by John Rae.

This marvelously vivid narrative turns upon the search of a German

musician in New York for his little daughter. Mr. Klein has well

portrayed his pathetic struggle with poverty, his varied experiences

in endeavoring to meet the demands of a public not trained to an

appreciation of the classic, and his final great hour when, in the

rapidly shifting events of a big city, his little daughter, now a

beautiful young woman, is brought to his very door. A superb bit of

fiction, palpitating with the life of the great metropolis. The play

in which David Warfield scored his highest success.

DR. LAVENDAR'S PEOPLE. By Margaret Deland. Illustrated by Lucius

Hitchcock.

Mrs. Deland won so many friends through Old Chester Tales that this

volume needs no introduction beyond its title. The lovable doctor is

more ripened in this later book, and the simple comedies and tragedies

of the old village are told with dramatic charm.

OLD CHESTER TALES. By Margaret Deland. Illustrated by Howard Pyle.

Stories portraying with delightful humor and pathos a quaint people in

a sleepy old town. Dr. Lavendar, a very human and lovable "preacher,"

is the connecting link between these dramatic stories from life.

HE FELL IN LOVE WITH HIS WIFE. By E. P. Roe. With frontispiece.

The hero is a farmer--a man with honest, sincere views of life. Bereft

of his wife, his home is cared for by a succession of domestics of

varying degrees of inefficiency until, from a most unpromising source,

comes a young woman who not only becomes his wife but commands his

respect and eventually wins his love. A bright and delicate romance,

revealing on both sides a love that surmounts all difficulties and

survives the censure of friends as well as the bitterness of enemies.

THE YOKE. By Elizabeth Miller.

Against the historical background of the days when the children of

Israel were delivered from the bondage of Egypt, the author has

sketched a romance of compelling charm. A biblical novel as great as

any since "Ben Hur."

SAUL OF TARSUS. By Elizabeth Miller. Illustrated by Andre Castaigne.

The scenes of this story are laid in Jerusalem, Alexandria, Rome and

Damascus. The Apostle Paul, the Martyr Stephen, Herod Agrippa and the

Emperors Tiberius and Caligula are among the mighty figures that move

through the pages. Wonderful descriptions, and a love story of the

purest and noblest type mark this most remarkable religious romance.

WHEN A MAN MARRIES. By Mary Roberts Rinehart. Illustrated by Harrison

Fisher and Mayo Bunker.

A young artist, whose wife had recently divorced him, finds that a

visit is due from his Aunt Selina, an elderly lady having ideas about

things quite apart from the Bohemian set in which her nephew is a

shining light. The way in which matters are temporarily adjusted forms

the motif of the story.

A farcical extravaganza, dramatized under the title of "Seven Days."

THE FASHIONABLE ADVENTURES OF JOSHUA CRAIG. By David Graham Phillips.

Illustrated.

A young westerner, uncouth and unconventional, appears in political

and social life in Washington. He attains power in politics, and a

young woman of the exclusive set becomes his wife, undertaking his

education in social amenities.

"DOC." GORDON. By Mary E. Wilkins-Freeman. Illustrated by Frank T.

Merrill.

Against the familiar background of American town life, the author

portrays a group of people strangely involved in a mystery. "Doc."

Gordon, the one physician of the place, Dr. Elliot, his assistant, a

beautiful woman and her altogether charming daughter are all involved

in the plot. A novel of great interest.

HOLY ORDERS. By Marie Corelli.

A dramatic story, in which is pictured a clergyman in touch with

society people, stage favorites, simple village folk, powerful

financiers and others, each presenting vital problems to this man "in

holy orders"--problems that we are now struggling with in America.

KATRINE. By Elinor Macartney Lane. With frontispiece.

Katrine, the heroine of this story, is a lovely Irish girl, of lowly

birth, but gifted with a beautiful voice.

The narrative is based on the facts of an actual singer's career, and

the viewpoint throughout is a most exalted one.

THE FORTUNES OF FIFI. By Molly Elliot Seawell. Illustrated by T. de

Thulstrup.

A story of life in France at the time of the first Napoleon. Fifi, a

glad, mad little actress of eighteen, is the star performer in a third

rate Parisian theatre. A story as dainty as a Watteau painting.

SHE THAT HESITATES. By Harris Dickson. Illustrated by C. W. Relyea.

The scene of this dashing romance shifts from Dresden to St.

Petersburg in the reign of Peter the Great, and then to New Orleans.

The hero is a French Soldier of Fortune, and the princess, who

hesitates--but you must read the story to know how she that hesitates

may be lost and yet saved.

HAPPY HAWKINS. By Robert Alexander Wason. Illustrated by Howard Giles.

A ranch and cowboy novel. Happy Hawkins tells his own story with such

a fine capacity for knowing how to do it and with so much humor that

the reader's interest is held in surprise, then admiration and at last

in positive affection.

COMRADES. By Thomas Dixon, Jr. Illustrated by C. D. Williams.

The locale of this story is in California, where a few socialists

establish a little community.

The author leads the little band along the path of disillusionment,

and gives some brilliant flashes of light on one side of an important

question.

TONO-BUNGAY. By Herbert George Wells.

The hero of this novel is a young man who, through hard work, earns a

scholarship and goes to London.

Written with a frankness verging on Rousseau's, Mr. Wells still uses

rare discrimination and the border line of propriety is never crossed.

An entertaining book with both a story and a moral, and without a dull

page--Mr. Wells's most notable achievement.

A HUSBAND BY PROXY. By Jack Steele.

A young criminologist, but recently arrived in New York city, is drawn

into a mystery, partly through financial need and partly through his

interest in a beautiful woman, who seems at times the simplest child

and again a perfect mistress of intrigue. A baffling detective story.

LIKE ANOTHER HELEN. By George Horton. Illustrated by C. M. Relyea.

Mr. Horton's powerful romance stands in a new field and brings an

almost unknown world in reality before the reader--the world of

conflict between Greek and Turk on the Island of Crete. The "Helen" of

the story is a Greek, beautiful, desolate, defiant--pure as snow.

There is a certain new force about the story, a kind of

master-craftsmanship and mental dominance that holds the reader.

THE MASTER OF APPLEBY. By Francis Lynde. Illustrated by T. de

Thulstrup.

A novel tale concerning itself in part with the great struggle in the

two Carolinas, but chiefly with the adventures therein of two

gentlemen who loved one and the same lady.

A strong, masculine and persuasive story.

A MODERN MADONNA. By Caroline Abbot Stanley.

A story of American life, founded on facts as they existed some years

ago in the District of Columbia. The theme is the maternal love and

splendid courage of a woman.

THE NOVELS OF GEORGE BARR McCUTCHEON

GRAUSTARK.

A story of love behind a throne, telling how a young American met a

lovely girl and followed her to a new and strange country. A

thrilling, dashing narrative.

BEVERLY OF GRAUSTARK.

Beverly is a bewitching American girl who has gone to that stirring

little principality--Graustark--to visit her friend the princess, and

there has a romantic affair of her own.

BREWSTER'S MILLIONS.

A young man is required to spend _one_ million dollars in one year in

order to inherit _seven_. How he does it forms the basis of a lively

story.

CASTLE CRANEYCROW.

The story revolves round the abduction of a young American woman, her

imprisonment in an old castle and the adventures created through her

rescue.

COWARDICE COURT.

An amusing social feud in the Adirondacks in which an English girl is

tempted into being a traitor by a romantic young American, forms the

plot.

THE DAUGHTER OF ANDERSON CROW.

The story centers about the adopted daughter of the town marshal in a

western village. Her parentage is shrouded in mystery, and the story

concerns the secret that deviously works to the surface.

THE MAN FROM BRODNEY'S.

The hero meets a princess in a far-away island among fanatically

hostile Musselmen. Romantic love making amid amusing situations and

exciting adventures.

NEDRA.

A young couple elope from Chicago to go to London traveling as brother

and sister. They are shipwrecked and a strange mix-up occurs on

account of it.

THE SHERRODS.

The scene is the Middle West and centers around a man who leads a

double life. A most enthralling novel.

TRUXTON KING.

A handsome good natured young fellow ranges on the earth looking for

romantic adventures and is finally enmeshed in most complicated

intrigues in Graustark.

KATE DOUGLAS WIGGIN'S STORIES OF PURE DELIGHT

Full of originality and humor, kindliness and cheer

=THE OLD PEABODY PEW.= Large Octavo. Decorative text pages, printed in

two colors. Illustrations by Alice Barber Stephens.

One of the prettiest romances that has ever come from this author's

pen is made to bloom on Christmas Eve in the sweet freshness of an old

New England meeting house.

=PENELOPE'S PROGRESS.= Attractive cover design in colors.

Scotland is the background for the merry doings of three very clever

and original American girls. Their adventures in adjusting themselves

to the Scot and his land are full of humor.

=PENELOPE'S IRISH EXPERIENCES.= Uniform in style with ="Penelope's

Progress"=.

The trio of clever girls who rambled over Scotland cross the border to

the Emerald Isle, and again they sharpen their wits against new

conditions, and revel in the land of laughter and wit.

=REBECCA OF SUNNYBROOK FARM.=

One of the most beautiful studies of childhood--Rebecca's artistic,

unusual and quaintly charming qualities stand out midst a circle of

austere New Englanders. The stage version is making a phenomenal

dramatic record.

=NEW CHRONICLES OF REBECCA.= With illustrations by F. C. Yohn.

Some more quaintly amusing chronicles that carry Rebecca through

various stages to her eighteenth birthday.

=ROSE O' THE RIVER.= With illustrations by George Wright.

The simple story of Rose, a country girl and Stephen a sturdy young

farmer. The girl's fancy for a city man interrupts their love and

merges the story into an emotional strain where the reader follows the

events with rapt attention.

GROSSET & DUNLAP, 526 WEST 26TH ST., NEW YORK

* * * * *

Transcriber's note:

1. Minor changes have been made to correct typesetters' errors;

otherwise, every effort has been made to remain true to the author's

words and intent.

2. In the advertising pages, book titles that were underlined have

been indicated by an equal sign (=) preceding and following the

underlined text.