Читать книгу Blackthorn Farm - Arthur Applin - Страница 9

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There was a ring at the front door bell followed by a loud double knock. But Ruby Strode did not hear. She was still seated at the writing-table bending over the large pad of white blotting-paper, in the fingers of one hand a pen. She sat very still, scarcely seeming to breathe. It looked as though she were writing: not a sound disturbed the silence of the little room. The blinds were still drawn down.

Presently, outside, footsteps could be heard ascending the staircase. Somebody knocked on the door, which was instantly opened, and the landlady put her head into the room.

"A gentleman to see you, sir."

She stopped abruptly, as, gazing round the room, she saw only Ruby Strode bending over the writing-table.

"Beg pardon, I thought Mr. Dale was here. There's a gentleman to see him."

Ruby started and jumped to her feet. She laid her pen down. In her hand she held a slip of paper which she had just blotted. She folded it up with unsteady fingers.

"Mr. Dale went out just now—for a few minutes—he won't be long."

She spoke rapidly in jerks, and turning round faced the door, her hands clasped behind her back.

"Oh, it doesn't matter! I suppose I can wait." And the visitor entered the room. "That sounds like Miss Strode's voice."

Robert Despard crossed to Ruby's side and held out his hand. He was a dark, well-set-up man, some years Ruby's senior. He was faultlessly dressed in a brown lounge suit, a light-coloured bowler placed jauntily on the back of his head, a pair of race glasses slung across his shoulders, and he wore a pair of highly-polished tan boots.

"I thought I might find you here," he continued, looking at Ruby with a familiar smile and giving a nervous twirl to his black moustache when she did not take his hand. "I saw you both at the races, but I couldn't get near you for the crowd. Thought I would look in and see how Rupert had done. I bet he came a nasty cropper over that disqualification. Can't say you're looking exactly jolly."

Ruby stepped back and forced a smile to her lips.

"Oh, we're all right!" she said unsteadily, commencing to fold up the slip of paper she had been holding in her hand behind her back. "We won."

Despard raised his eyebrows and gave a dry laugh. "I don't think! Rupert told me he plunged, on Paulus. As a matter of fact, I came round to condole with him. I knew he was pretty hard hit and all that sort of thing."

"Well, you are wrong! He doesn't want your sympathy, as it happens."

Ruby spoke almost defiantly. The colour had returned to her cheeks now. They were scarlet and her eyes were bright. There was defiance in them, too.

Despard watched her closely, and the expression on his face gradually changed. A cynical smile still played about his lips.

"You're a loyal little devil!" he said between his teeth. "By gad! I admire you for it. But let me tell you that poor old Rupert Dale is ruined. Broke to the world, and he's failed in his final, too. I'm awfully sorry for him—and all that, but there you are."

"Yes, you sound as if you were sorry," Ruby replied sarcastically. She commenced to pull on one of her gloves, then slipped the strip of folded paper underneath the glove into the palm of her hand. Despard was watching her with his small, bright eyes.

"Is that your winnings you're hiding away?" he sneered.

He threw his hat on to the table and seated himself on the arm of a chair close to Ruby.

"I wanted to see you more than I did Rupert," he said, lowering his voice. "Of course, it's all over between you two now? You wouldn't be mad enough to marry a pauper, even if he were cad enough to want you to. So don't forget that I'm just as keen on you as ever." He stretched out his arm and pulled Ruby towards him. "I knew my turn would come if I waited long enough."

Quietly but firmly Ruby released her arm, and, moving away, stood with her back to the window so that her face was in shadow. Though she despised Robert Despard, she feared him.

"You call yourself Rupert's friend, and yet you choose the very moment when you believe he is ruined to make love to the woman to whom he was engaged to be married, and under his own roof, too."

"Dash it all, it's only a lodging house!" Despard replied brutally. "But, go on, I love you when you get angry. You look as if you were a leading lady earning a hundred pounds a week instead of a show girl walking on at a couple of guineas."

"A show girl has a heart and a conscience, which is more than you've got, anyway," Ruby replied fiercely; "and Mr. Dale shall know the kind of friend he's got in you."

Despard shrugged his shoulders and suppressed a yawn. "So that's all the thanks I get. Dash it all, isn't it proof that I love you, when, directly I know your man has got the kick, I hurry down to tell you I'll take his place—look after you, pay your bills—make you my wife, anything you like in the world! I loved you long before he ever met you. I told you I didn't mean to give you up. I told you no one else should take you from me. Rupert is all right, of course; I am fond of him, but he isn't the right man for you. Now that he's come a cropper and failed in his exam., he'll have to go back to his Devonshire bog and leave me to look after you."

Ruby tried to speak, but she could not trust herself for some seconds. Despard watched her with an amused smile. Suddenly she crossed the room and opened the sitting-room door.

"I'll go out and find Rupert. You had better say to his face what you've just said to me," she cried.

She hurried downstairs out into the street. She saw Rupert coming slowly towards her and she ran to meet him.

Meanwhile, Despard left alone in the sitting-room, lit a cigarette, and rising from his chair glanced casually at the evening newspaper lying on the writing-table. Ruby had left the letter Rupert had written to his father lying on the white sheet of blotting-paper. Almost unconsciously, Despard commenced to read it. Then he picked it up and glanced hurriedly towards the door; he read it through from beginning to end. He gave a long, low whistle of astonishment, and carefully replaced the letter.

He noticed the place where the first page had been blotted on the new sheet of white blotting-paper. And just below it his quick eyes saw one small word, underneath it a couple of naughts. There was nothing particularly strange or remarkable about this. He would probably never have noticed it if the blotting-paper had not been clean. But, gradually, as he stared at the one undecipherable word with the two naughts he began to feel as if there were significance about them. They stood out on the white sheet of blotting-paper.

There was a small mirror standing on the mantel-piece. He took it up and held it over the blotting-pad. And he read reflected the single word between the two naughts. It was "hundred." A little way beyond it he noticed a single letter "s."

Replacing the mirror he stood with his back to the fireplace, his hands deep in his trousers pockets, thinking.

"Hundred," "s," and two naughts. He had seen that the slip of paper which Ruby tucked into her glove was a cheque. He was quite sure that neither she nor Rupert Dale had a hundred pounds in the world. Indeed, he knew the state of the latter's finances better than the girl did. For only a few months ago, he had lent Rupert twenty-five pounds. He stroked his black moustache thoughtfully. Before he could solve the little problem Dale himself entered the room, followed a few minutes later by Ruby.

"I came to tell you how devilish sorry I was that you had backed a loser and got plucked," Despard said; "but, hang it all, you look cheerful enough!"

"So would you," Rupert cried, slapping him on the back, "if you had had a fiver on Ambuscade at a hundred to one."

The frown deepened on Robert Despard's forehead.

"Look here, is this a joke or what?"

"It's no joke," Rupert laughed hysterically. "Ask Ruby, she did it for me! I'll tell you what we'll do. We'll all go out and have a bit of dinner together and break a bottle of wine on the strength of it."

As Rupert spoke he caught sight of the letter to his father lying on the writing-table. Picking it up quickly he tore it into a dozen fragments and threw them into the waste-paper basket.

Despard watched him, and his frown deepened. "You mean to say you backed Ambuscade at a hundred to one and got paid!"

"We didn't know the result until we left the course," Rupert replied lightly. "Luckily, Ruby kept the ticket. We're going to draw the money to-morrow. By gad, she's saved my life! I've had a narrow squeak."

"Who did you do the bet with?" Despard asked.

"I forgot the man's name. I've got the ticket safely in my pocket. We shall get the money all right to-morrow."

Ruby spoke quickly. She could not conceal her nervousness and anxiety. She, who had been so calm a little while ago when Rupert, believing that ruin had overtaken him, had been on the point of committing suicide.

He noticed that she seemed flustered and ill at ease, but he put it down to the sudden reaction. For himself he had forgotten all his troubles. They no longer existed. Death had stood at his elbow less than an hour ago. Now life was beckoning him to join in her revels. Curiously enough, he did not seem to realise the debt he owed to Ruby Strode: yet he would never have thought of backing Ambuscade himself.

As a matter of fact, he was too excited to think of anything. He only knew that he could pay his debts, go down to Devonshire for his holidays and face his father with a light heart. In due time he would have another fling at the examination, pass it, obtain an appointment somewhere, and then he would be able to marry Ruby and they would live happily ever after.

But for the moment he just wanted to enjoy his good fortune; to dance, to sing, to feast, to love.

"Come on, if you're both ready to start!" he cried excitedly. "Where shall we dine? Trocadero, Café Royal, Savoy? We'll make a night of it."

"The Savoy's good enough for me," Despard laughed over his shoulder. "Do you mind if I wash my hands and make myself look a bit presentable in your room, Rupert?"

Ruby waited until the bedroom door had closed on Despard. Then she put her arms around Rupert's neck. "Do you mind very much if I don't come with you to-night?" she whispered. "I'm feeling so tired. I think the excitement has been too much for me."

Rupert looked at her with amazement. "Why, it will be no fun without you. I don't want Despard! Rather wish he hadn't come down to see me. You'll feel as fit as a fiddle when you've had a glass of wine."

But she shook her head, and held him tightly. He felt her arms trembling. He saw tears swimming in her eyes.

"My dear, my dear, what a selfish brute I've been!" he cried with a sudden revulsion of feeling. "Good heavens, you've saved my life—you've done more than that—and I've not even thanked you."

Ruby stepped back and put her fingers over his mouth. "Not another word," she whispered. "I'm so happy, really. It's just nerves. I want to be quite alone. I want to realise our good fortune."

"Of course, if you would really not come," Rupert said; "or shall I tell Despard we don't want him? I know you're not keen on him."

Ruby longed to tell Rupert what had taken place between them a few moments ago. But fear of the man she loved and wanted sealed her lips. She knew that the two men were friends. She knew that Despard had it in his power to injure her. He had some influence with the manager of the Ingenue Theatre, and there were other reasons. So she said nothing.

Despard rejoined them and they all went out together.

"We'll drive you home first," Rupert said to Ruby.

"I would rather you dropped me at the Tube," she replied. "I have nearly two hours before I need go to the theatre. I'm not on until the second act."

Despard pretended to be bitterly disappointed that Miss Strode was deserting them. Ruby surreptitiously handed Rupert the money she had in her purse and whispered to him that she would get their winnings in the morning and bring them round to his rooms. She had no reason for secrecy, and so he asked her to give him the ticket she had received from the bookmaker when she had backed Ambuscade.

"I don't like the idea of your going round to the bookmaker's offices. It's possible they'll dispute it, or make a fuss," he said.

Despard agreed and suggested that they should meet at ten o'clock in the morning and all go round in a body. But Ruby was obstinate and refused to give up the ticket.

"I backed the horse myself. I am going to get the money and bring it round to Rupert!"

She got quickly out of the cab as it stopped at the Piccadilly Tube Station and, blowing a kiss to Rupert, she disappeared in the crowd.

The two men drove to the grillroom of the Savoy.

"You are a lucky devil," Despard said, "if there's no mistake, and Miss Strode really backed Ambuscade."

"Why should there be a mistake?" Rupert asked curtly.

"Oh, I don't know!"—Despard shrugged his shoulders—"but she seemed rather mysterious about it. Perhaps that's a woman's way. They are queer cattle."

"Ruby is one in a thousand," Rupert said quietly. "Look here, I'm off to Devonshire to-morrow evening. I don't want the old man to hear I've been plucked. I must tell him myself. I shall have to find some reason, too, for my sudden wealth."

"One of the old-fashioned sort, eh?—don't approve of betting or pretty girls. Will you keep Miss Strode dark, too?"

Rupert frowned. He did not reply at once. "I thought you knew we were engaged to be married," he said at last. "I shan't tell the guv'nor until I've passed my final, so if you come down you needn't mention her."

Rupert suddenly found himself regretting the invitation he had given to Despard some time ago to spend his holidays at Blackthorn Farm. Too late, instinct warned him that he was not quite the sort of man he would like to introduce to his sister.

"So you're really coming?" he said.

"Rather! I want to throw a fly for those trout you've spoken about, and pot the rabbits. I'm a bit fed-up with town. If it's quite convenient I'll meet you at Paddington Station to-morrow afternoon."

Rupert nodded. "The train leaves at eight-thirty. I must wire in the morning and tell the guv'nor we're coming. I expect Marjorie will meet us at Moreton with the trap."

"How old is she?" Despard asked.

Rupert did not reply, and the cab drew up outside the Savoy.

Dawn was beginning to break over the City before he returned to his rooms. He switched on the electric lights. Curiously enough, he felt wide-awake and not in the least tired. Yet the day had been a long and eventful one, every hour filled with excitement.

Lighting a pipe, Rupert sat down at the writing-table, and went through the bills and letters that lay in a heap beneath the paper-weight. Including the money he had borrowed, he owed close on three hundred pounds. He felt a shudder run through his body. In the morning when he had gaily set out to the races he had not known it was as bad as that.

But for the inspiration which had made Ruby back Ambuscade where would he have been now? And again a shiver passed through his body.

He saw himself sitting in that very chair holding a revolver to his breast, his finger on the trigger. How near he had been to disgrace and death!

A photograph of his father stood in a little silver frame near a vase of flowers. He picked it up and looked at it, a mist rising before his eyes.

"He trusted you, he believed in you," his conscience whispered. "Trusted you to bear the old name bravely and proudly; trusted you to retrieve the fallen fortunes of the family. How nearly you failed him!"

A cold sweat broke out on his forehead. If Ruby had made a mistake? Supposing she had only told him she had backed Ambuscade in order to save him from taking his life? Or, if she had backed the horse, what guarantee had they that the bookmaker would pay up?

He rose to his feet, and walking to the windows opened them wide. A cold breeze swept his face. A peculiar light grey outlined the trees and houses. The street lamps glittered dimly before the coming dawn. London was very still, and almost silent. Rupert raised his eyes to the sky. It was grey and the stars had all disappeared; half unconsciously he prayed as he had done when he was a boy. And he swore that if his prayer were answered and he was able to discharge his debts, he would remember his responsibilities in the future, and live his life according to his father's wishes.

Switching off the lights he went to bed.

When he awoke the sun was high in the sky. It was past ten o'clock. Hurriedly dressing and without waiting for breakfast, he drove to the flat Ruby shared in Baker Street with another girl. But the housekeeper told him that she had gone out nearly an hour previously. In spite of the late night, Rupert felt strangely elated and excited. The sunshine of the new day made him optimistic. He knew she had gone down to the bookmakers to draw the money they had won. He waited a little while thinking she might return. Then he remembered she had told him that she would bring him the money to his rooms. He hurried back to Westminster.

But she was not there, and he felt a thrill of apprehension. He rang for a cup of tea; when his landlady brought it she again reminded him of his bill.

"I'm just waiting for some money to come from the bank," he said with exaggerated carelessness. "I'm leaving town to-night for a week or two, but I shall keep my rooms on. I'll pay for them in advance."

He swallowed his tea and smoked a cigarette. He could not eat. Ruby had had plenty of time to draw the money and reach his rooms! Perhaps the bookmaker was away, or refused to settle until Monday.

He heard Big Ben chime the hour—twelve o'clock. He lit another cigarette and stood on the balcony outside the window waiting.

At last he saw a taxi-cab draw up outside his front door and Ruby Strode alight. He ran down the staircase to meet her.

"Is it all right, have you got it?" he cried. His only thought was the money now. The money that meant salvation.

She did not reply, but brushed past him upstairs and he followed her. He heard her breath coming in quick, hard gasps, and following her into the sitting-room he locked the door.

"Tell me, is it all right, have you got it?"

Rupert stretched out his hands imploringly.