Somebody hammered at the studio door.
"Come out and frolic, Dickie," said the Nilghai.
"I should like to, but I can't. I'm not feeling frolicsome."
"Then, I'll tell the boys and they'll drag you like a badger."
"Please not, old man. On my word, I'd sooner be left alone just now."
"Very good. Can we send anything in to you? Fizz, for instance. Cassavetti is beginning to sing songs of the Sunny South already."
For one minute Dick considered the proposition seriously.
"No, thanks, I've a headache already."
"Virtuous child. That's the effect of emotion on the young. All my congratulations, Dick. I also was concerned in the conspiracy for your welfare."
"Go to the devil—oh, send Binkie in here."
The little dog entered on elastic feet, riotous from having been made much of all the evening. He had helped to sing the choruses; but scarcely inside the studio he realised that this was no place for tail-wagging, and settled himself on Dick's lap till it was bedtime. Then he went to bed with Dick, who counted every hour as it struck, and rose in the morning with a painfully clear head to receive Torpenhow's more formal congratulations and a particular account of the last night's revels.
"You aren't looking very happy for a newly accepted man," said Torpenhow.
"Never mind that—it's my own affair, and I'm all right. Do you really go?"
"Yes. With the old Central Southern as usual. They wired, and I accepted on better terms than before."
"When do you start?"
"The day after tomorrow—for Brindisi."
"Thank God." Dick spoke from the bottom of his heart.
"Well, that's not a pretty way of saying you're glad to get rid of me. But men in your condition are allowed to be selfish."
"I didn't mean that. Will you get a hundred pounds cashed for me before you leave?"
"That's a slender amount for housekeeping, isn't it?"
"Oh, it's only for—marriage expenses."
Torpenhow brought him the money, counted it out in fives and tens, and carefully put it away in the writing table.
"Now I suppose I shall have to listen to his ravings about his girl until I go. Heaven send us patience with a man in love!" he said to himself.
But never a word did Dick say of Maisie or marriage. He hung in the doorway of Torpenhow's room when the latter was packing and asked innumerable questions about the coming campaign, till Torpenhow began to feel annoyed.
"You're a secretive animal, Dickie, and you consume your own smoke, don't you?" he said on the last evening.
"I—I suppose so. By the way, how long do you think this war will last?"
"Days, weeks, or months. One can never tell. It may go on for years."
"I wish I were going."
"Good Heavens! You're the most unaccountable creature! Hasn't it occurred to you that you're going to be married—thanks to me?"
"Of course, yes. I'm going to be married—so I am. Going to be married. I'm awfully grateful to you. Haven't I told you that?"
"You might be going to be hanged by the look of you," said Torpenhow.
And the next day Torpenhow bade him good-bye and left him to the loneliness he had so much desired.
Chapter XIV
Yet at the last, ere our spearmen had found him,
Yet at the last, ere a sword-thrust could save,
Yet at the last, with his masters around him,
He of the Faith spoke as master to slave;
Yet at the last, tho' the Kafirs had maimed him,
Broken by bondage and wrecked by the reiver,—
Yet at the last, tho' the darkness had claimed him,
He called upon Allah and died a believer.
—Kizzilbashi.
"Beg your pardon, Mr. Heldar, but—but isn't nothin' going to happen?" said Mr. Beeton.
"No!" Dick had just waked to another morning of blank despair and his temper was of the shortest.
"'Tain't my regular business, 'o course, sir; and what I say is, 'Mind your own business and let other people mind theirs;' but just before Mr. Torpenhow went away he give me to understand, like, that you might be moving into a house of your own, so to speak—a sort of house with rooms upstairs and downstairs where you'd be better attended to, though I try to act just by all our tenants. Don't I?"
"Ah! That must have been a mad-house. I shan't trouble you to take me there yet. Get me my breakfast, please, and leave me alone."
"I hope I haven't done anything wrong, sir, but you know I hope that as far as a man can I tries to do the proper thing by all the gentlemen in chambers—and more particular those whose lot is hard—such as you, for instance, Mr. Heldar. You likes soft-roe bloater, don't you? Soft-roe bloaters is scarcer than hard-roe, but what I says is, 'Never mind a little extra trouble so long as you give satisfaction to the tenants.'"
Mr. Beeton withdrew and left Dick to himself. Torpenhow had been long away; there was no more rioting in the chambers, and Dick had settled down to his new life, which he was weak enough to consider nothing better than death.
It is hard to live alone in the dark, confusing the day and night; dropping to sleep through sheer weariness at mid-day, and rising restless in the chill of the dawn. At first Dick, on his awakenings, would grope along the corridors of the chambers till he heard some one snore. Then he would know that the day had not yet come, and return wearily to his bedroom.
Later he learned not to stir till there was a noise and movement in the house and Mr. Beeton advised him to get up. Once dressed—and dressing, now that Torpenhow was away, was a lengthy business, because collars, ties, and the like hid themselves in far corners of the room, and search meant head-beating against chairs and trunks—once dressed, there was nothing whatever to do except to sit still and brood till the three daily meals came. Centuries separated breakfast from lunch and lunch from dinner, and though a man prayed for hundreds of years that his mind might be taken from him, God would never hear. Rather the mind was quickened and the revolving thoughts ground against each other as millstones grind when there is no corn between; and yet the brain would not wear out and give him rest. It continued to think, at length, with imagery and all manner of reminiscences. It recalled Maisie and past success, reckless travels by land and sea, the glory of doing work and feeling that it was good, and suggested all that might have happened had the eyes only been faithful to their duty. When thinking ceased through sheer weariness, there poured into Dick's soul tide on tide of overwhelming, purposeless fear—dread of starvation always, terror lest the unseen ceiling should crush down upon him, fear of fire in the chambers and a louse's death in red flame, and agonies of fiercer horror that had nothing to do with any fear of death. Then Dick bowed his head, and clutching the arms of his chair fought with his sweating self till the tinkle of plates told him that something to eat was being set before him.
Mr. Beeton would bring the meal when he had time to spare, and Dick learned to hang upon his speech, which dealt with badly fitted gas-plugs, waste-pipes