Chapter XV.
Colonel Abinger Takes Command
One misty morning, about three weeks after the picnic, Dick found himself a prisoner in the quadrangle of Frobisher's Inn. He had risen to catch an early train, but the gates were locked, and the porter in charge had vanished from his box. Dick chafed, and tore round the Inn in search of him. It was barely six o'clock; which is three hours after midnight in London. The windows of the Inn had darkened one by one, until for hours the black building had slept heavily with only one eye open. Dick recognised the window, and saw Rob's shadow cast on its white blind. He was standing there, looking up a little uneasily, when the porter tramped into sight.
'Is Mr. Angus often as late as this?' Mary's brother paused to ask at the gate.
'Why, sir,' the porter answered, 'I am on duty until eight o'clock, and as likely as not he will still be sitting there when I go. His shadow up there has become a sort of companion to me in the long nights, but I sometimes wonder what has come over the gentleman of late.'
'He is busy, I suppose; that is all,' Dick said sharply.
The porter shook his head doubtfully, like one who knew the ways of literary hands. He probably wrote himself.
'Mr. Angus only came in from his office at three o'clock,' he said, 'and you would think he would have had enough of writing by that time. You can see his arm going on the blind though yet, and it won't be out of his common if he has another long walk before he goes to bed.'
'Does he walk so late as this?' asked Dick, to whom six in the morning was an hour of the night.
'I never knew such a gentleman for walking,' replied the porter, 'and when I open the gate to him he is off at six miles an hour. I can hear the echo of his feet two or three streets off. He doesn't look as if he did it for pleasure either.'
'What else would he do it for?'
'I can't say. He looks as if he wanted to run away from himself.'
Dick passed out, with a forced laugh. He knew that since saying good-bye to Mary at Sunbury Station, Rob had hardly dared to stop working and face the future. The only rest Rob got was when he was striding along the great thoroughfares, where every one's life seemed to have a purpose except his own. But it was only when he asked himself for what end he worked that he stopped working. There were moments when he could not believe that it was all over. He saw himself dead, and the world going on as usual. When he read what he had written the night before, he wondered how people could be interested in such matters. The editor of the Wire began to think of this stolid Scotsman every time there was a hitch in the office, but Rob scarcely noticed that he was making progress. It could only mean ten or twenty pounds more a month; and what was that to a man who had only himself to think of, and had gathered a library on twenty shillings a week? He bought some good cigars, however.
Dick, who was longing for his father's return from the Continent, so that the responsibility for this miserable business might be transferred to the colonel's shoulders, frequently went into Rob's rooms to comfort him, but did not know how to do it. They sat silently on opposite sides of the very hearthrug which Mary had once made a remark about—Rob had looked interestedly at the rug after she went away—and each thought that, but for the other's sake, he would rather be alone.
What Dick felt most keenly was Rob's increased regard for him. Rob never spoke of the Tawny Owl without an effort, but he showed that he appreciated Dick's unspoken sympathy. If affairs could have righted themselves in that way, Mary's brother would have preferred to be turned with contumely out of Rob's rooms, where, as it was, and despite his friendship for Rob, he seemed now to be only present on false pretences. Dick was formally engaged to Nell now, but he tried at times to have no patience with Rob. Perhaps he thought a little sadly in his own rooms that to be engaged is not all the world.
Dick had hoped that the misunderstanding which parted Rob and Mary at Sunbury would keep them apart without further intervention from him. That was not to be. The next time he went to Molesey he was asked why he had not brought Mr. Angus with him, and though it was not Mary who asked the question, she stopped short on her way out of the saloon to hear his answer.
'He did not seem to want to come,' Dick replied reluctantly.
'I know why Mr. Angus would not come with you,' Nell said to Dick when they were alone; 'he thinks Mary is engaged to Sir Clement.'
'Nonsense,' said Dick.
'I am sure of it,' said Nell; 'you know we all thought so that day we were up the river.'
'Then let him think so if he chooses,' Dick said harshly. 'It is no affair of his.'
'Oh, it is!' Nell exclaimed. 'But I suppose it would never do, Dick?'
'What you are thinking of is quite out of the question,' replied Dick, feeling that it was a cruel fate which compelled him to act a father's part to Mary; 'and besides, Mary does not care for him like that. She told me so herself.'
'Oh, but she does,' Nell replied, in a tone of conviction.
'Did she tell you so?'
'No, she said she didn't,' answered Nell, as if that made no difference.
'Well,' said Dick wearily, 'it is much better that Angus should not come here again.'
Nevertheless, when Dick returned to London he carried in his pocket an invitation to Rob to spend the following Saturday at the Tawny Owl. It was a very nice note in Mary Abinger's handwriting, and Dick would have liked to drop it over the Hungerfield Bridge. He gave it to Rob, however, and stood on the defensive.
The note began, 'Dear Mr. Angus, Mrs. Meredith would be very pleased if you could——'
The blood came to Rob's face as he saw the handwriting, but it went as quickly.
'They ask me down next Saturday,' Rob said bluntly to Dick, 'but you know why I can't go.'
'You had better come,' miserable Dick said, defying himself.
'She is to marry Dowton, is she not?' Rob asked, but with no life in his voice.
Dick turned away his head, to leave the rest to fate.
'So, of course I must not go,' Rob continued bravely.
Dick did not dare to look him in the face, but Rob put his hand on the shoulder of Mary's brother.
'I was a madman,' he said, 'to think that she could ever have cared for me, but this will not interfere with our friendship, Abinger?'
'Surely not,' said Dick, taking Rob's hand.
It was one of those awful moments in men's lives when they allow, face to face, that they like each other.
Rob concluded that Mrs. Meredith, knowing nothing of his attachment for Mary, saw no reason why he should not return to the house-boat, and that circumstances had compelled Mary to write the invitation. His blundering honesty would not let him concoct a polite excuse for declining it, and Mrs. Meredith took his answer amiss, while Nell dared not say what she thought for fear of Dick. Mary read his note over once, and then went for a solitary walk round the island. Rob saw her from the tow-path where he had been prowling about for hours in hopes of catching a last glimpse of her. Her face was shaded beneath her big straw hat, and no baby-yacht, such as the Thames sports, ever glided down the river more prettily than she tripped along the island path. Once her white frock caught in a dilapidated seat, and she had to stoop to loosen it. Rob's heart stopped beating for a moment just then. The way Mary extricated herself was another revelation. He remembered having thought it delightful that she seldom knew what day of the month it was, and having