The Guinea Stamp (6 page)

“They are too numerous to relate,” she said, dryly. “But let us begin with the fact that I observe you to have two forms of address.”

He raised his brows.

“When you first spoke to me,” she continued, watching his expression closely, “it was in the manner of a country yokel. Now your voice has altered slightly: the accents are very nearly those of a gentleman.”

He bowed, smiling ironically. “I always endeavour to conform to my company, madam.”

“I can believe that. Delightful as it is to converse with one of your undoubted powers, Mr.—”

She paused, and looked inquiringly at him. “I’m afraid you have the advantage of me in the matter of names.”

“Call me Captain Jackson,” he answered, carelessly.

“That is your name?”

“Is Miss Lodge yours?”

“Check!” she agreed, with a frosty smile. “As I was saying, Captain Jackson”—she gave the name a faint emphasis—“much as I enjoy your conversation, I feel that it is time to come to the point. Why were you lurking outside this window? And do not try to tell me again that you were seeking work, for I shall not believe you!”

“That is a pity,” he said, mockingly. “But I wish you will employ some other word than ‘lurking’. It imparts a sinister quality to my actions which I promise you is unjust. Very well”—as she showed signs of impatience at this preamble—“I am coming to the point, I assure you. If you must know, I entered the grounds of this house in order to escape the unwelcome attention of someone who appeared unduly anxious to meet me.”

“The parish constable, no doubt?”

He smiled, showing strong white teeth. “Not on this occasion.”

“Who, then?”

The smile faded, and a look of regret came over his face.

“There you have me, ma’am.”

“Is that all?” she asked scornfully. “You cannot suppose that such a trumpery explanation will satisfy me! Sir George Lodge is a magistrate—as I make no doubt you already know! and I feel sure that he will be able to extract a more convincing story from you.”

He regarded her thoughtfully for what seemed a long time.

“Well?” she demanded at last, impatiently. “What have you to say? It must be to the purpose, mind!”

“I can only ask you—beg you—not to disclose me to Sir George. This is not entirely for my own sake.”

“Then for whose? I suppose you will now tell me that you have a wife and six starving children?”

“I’m sorry to disappoint you: I am not married. In all seriousness, though—if you betray me, the harm you do will not be to myself alone, but to your country.”

“To my—”

She broke off, astounded. Then she laughed mirthlessly.

“Oh, now you surpass your previous efforts! Very well, then, I am ready to be entertained—what is your latest story?”

“I cannot blame you for being so incredulous, in view of the fact that, so far, I’ve been obliged to tell you a certain amount of untruths. But, if you reflect a little, you must see that I dare not trust anyone on so short an acquaintance. More particularly—”

He broke off, knitting his brows. There was something about this proud, cold young lady which attracted him, and the attraction went deeper than her obvious good looks. There was an appeal of the spirit: he felt that, making allowance for their differences in situation, they were the same kind of people. For one unguarded moment, he was tempted to unburden himself to her. He realized at once the danger of such a course, and attempted a compromise.

“More particularly—?” she queried, with a sideways mocking glance from her fine, expressive eyes.

“Look here, the fact is that I dare not tell you the whole truth,” he admitted, candidly. “There are issues involved—”

He broke off. “It would be too dangerous,” he finished, lamely.

“That I can well believe!” she mocked. “No doubt it would serve to put you behind bars!”

He made an impatient gesture. “My fate is of no account,” he said, speaking rapidly, “except in the bearing which it has on the fate of England. You cannot but be aware of the deadly peril in which the country stands at present.”

“With beacons piled high on every hill, ready to be lit, and feverish plans for retreat should the enemy invade our shores, it is scarcely possible to be unaware of it,” she agreed, laconically. “All the more reason, Mr.—er, Captain Jackson?—for my viewing your present activities with suspicion. You admit that you are anxious to evade Sir George—in fact, anyone in authority. Then, too, you have sustained what looks very like a bullet wound, and admit that you are running away from someone. For all I know, you could very well be—let us say—an enemy spy. One hears stories—”

“And if I were, do you suppose I should stay to parley with you in this way? To overpower you should not prove an impossible task, I believe.”

“Upon my word,” she said, impatiently, “you must think me a simpleton! You admit that you are already being pursued by one party. Is it likely that you would take action which might involve you with others? No, I can see perfectly that your only possible course is to persuade me to silence by telling some plausible tale that will take me in.”

“Then I am lost indeed!” he answered, with a wry smile and an expressive spreading of his hands. “I can easily see that yours is far from being a credulous disposition.”

“Quite so,” she answered. “Then perhaps I might now have the truth?”

He thought rapidly for a moment. The truth, even if he dared to tell it, would sound like an even more fantastic lie than any he had yet uttered. Yet this young woman must be won over in some way: how much dared he say?

“You would not believe me—”

He broke off suddenly. A knock had sounded on the door.

The two occupants of the room exchanged glances. The man’s was questioning, the girl’s faintly surprised. Her expression changed quickly, and she motioned silently to the curtains which concealed the long French windows. In a trice, he had slipped silently behind the sheltering folds of damask.

Miss Feniton remained where she was, but picked up a book which was lying close at hand.

“Come in,” she invited, in even tones.

A ruddy-cheeked abigail obeyed the summons. Miss Feniton looked up from her book abstractedly.

“M’lady’s compliments, ma’am, and would you be so very obliging as to slip up to the withdrawing room for a few moments, if you please?”

Miss Feniton nodded. “Thank you; I will follow you presently,” she said, in dismissal.

The girl withdrew. Miss Feniton waited a while, to be certain that she was out of earshot, then crossed to the window and moved the curtain aside. The man made as if to step out, but she shook her head.

“No doubt you heard what passed,” she said, in a rapid undertone. “I am called away, but will return here as soon as possible. Meanwhile, you would be well advised to wait where you are, I am quite determined to hear your story: should it satisfy me, it may be that I shall consent to remain silent about your activities of this evening. Should I find you gone when I return, I shall know what to think—and how to act.”

With this veiled threat, she was about to turn away, but he stayed her with a gesture of his unbandaged arm.

“One moment, only!” he whispered. “Tell me something, in your turn—what is your real name?”

She gave him a quizzical look. “May I remind you that I don’t yet know yours? Still, since you will have it, I see no harm in giving you the information. I am a friend of Miss Lodge’s—Joanna Feniton. And now I must go!”

She turned hurriedly away, thus missing the expression which crossed the man’s face—a look compounded of surprise, consternation and amusement.

When the door had closed behind her, he emitted a low whistle.

“Good God!” he muttered.

He thought rapidly for a moment, then pushed aside the curtain and went to the writing desk. He picked up the quill which Miss Feniton had been mending, and, dipping it in the standish, wrote a few lines rapidly on the paper which she had set out for her own use: he wrote in a curious, backhand scrawl, but it was evident that writing was no unfamiliar accomplishment with him.

When he had finished, he hesitated for a moment. There was a certain risk in leaving a note here, in full view of anyone who should chance to come into this room. No ready alternative occurred to him, however, and the wording of the note could convey little to anyone other than the person for whom it was intended. He shrugged, folded the letter, and directed it in clear, block capitals to Miss Feniton. He placed it in a prominent position on the writing desk.

Then he went over to the window, and softly opened one of the long glass doors. He stepped outside, and, leaning forward, arranged the curtains carefully across the window. This done to his satisfaction, he closed the door, though he was unable from his present position to latch it. He stepped out into the night.

The darkness soon hid him from view.

FOUR - Miss Feniton Takes Sides

When Miss Feniton reached the drawing room, she found two gentlemen in regimentals seated beside her host. They came to their feet as she entered the room. She recognized them instantly.

“How do you do, Colonel Kellaway? I trust your family is well?”

Captain Masterman watched while she greeted his senior officer. It was so easy to see why people judged Miss Feniton to be cold and proud: her calm manner was in marked contrast to the unrestrained warmth with which Miss Lodge had welcomed them a few moments since.

She next took Masterman’s hand, and asked him how he did. His feelings were somewhat disturbed, for Colonel Kellaway had hit upon the truth when he had remarked on his junior officer’s admiration of Miss Feniton, but he managed a polite reply to her formal inquiries after his sister.

She showed no disposition to linger in conversation with either of the officers, but looked questioningly at her hostess.

“I believe you sent for me, ma’am?”

“Oh, no!” protested Lady Lodge, hurriedly. “That is to say—”

“I sent for you,” explained Lady Feniton, firmly. “You will naturally not wish to be writing letters when there is company in the house.”

Joanna felt a pang of dismay, but managed to conceal it. “Of course not, Grandmama. Perhaps, however, I may be excused for a space while I tidy away the litter I have left in the parlour downstairs? It is not the kind of thing that I should wish the housemaids to deal with, being my private correspondence.”

She began to cross the room. Captain Masterman was at the door immediately, waiting to open it for her.

“Nonsense, child!” objected her grandmother. “It can wait until later. I particularly wish you to hear what these gentlemen have to tell us of the state of our National defences. It is a subject which must be of interest to every one of us.”

Miss Feniton saw that she could not make her escape for the moment without drawing down more attention upon herself than she altogether liked. She subsided, therefore, awaiting a suitable opportunity to find another excuse for quitting the room later on.

Colonel Kellaway was answering the dowager. “As to that, ma’am, you need be in no alarm. Devon is not thought to be a very likely spot for a landing. Give ‘em a warm reception, though, if they should chance this way, eh, Masterman?”

“I think it unlikely,” said Lady Feniton, coldly, “that you will ever find
me
in a state of alarm, Colonel.”

“Just so, m’lady,” he answered, hastily. “Of course not, wouldn’t think it for a moment! Simply a manner of speaking, y’know!”

“But indeed, Augusta,” protested Lady Lodge. “I am sure the Colonel may be excused for supposing you to be alarmed—I am very sure that I am! Why, I hear that they have a great fleet of boats waiting to cross the Channel—”

Guy Dorlais broke into a laugh. The other men glanced at him with an answering smile.

“Have you forgotten our Navy, ma’am?” he asked. “They squat like cats at a mousehole, only waiting a chance to pounce!”

“But—they sometimes leave their posts, do they not? Augusta, you have told me how they frequently lie up in Torbay, when the weather is bad in the Channel, or they have occasion to put in to port for some little thing or other,” finished Lady Lodge, uncertainly.

Lady Feniton nodded. “We have several times entertained the ship’s officers at Shalbeare House,” she said. “And the village of Tor Quay is as full as it can hold with their wives and families.”

“That’s so,” agreed the Colonel. “Of late years, the Fleet’s taken to lying up in Torbay in preference to Plymouth. The Sound’s a dangerous anchorage in bad weather—Torbay’s more sheltered.”

“I can vouch for that,” said Lady Feniton, pleased. “Shalbeare House is at all times and seasons sheltered from the worst of the winds; and I doubt if our climate can be excelled in the whole of England.”

“Though by some it is thought to be too relaxing,” murmured her husband.

He so rarely spoke, that everyone gave him full attention when he did so. Looking nervously around, he saw that he was the focus of every pair of eyes in the room. He fidgeted uneasily in his chair, coughed, and fingered his somewhat crumpled cravat. His wife eyed him severely.

“How should you know, Feniton, when you are seldom outside that library of yours?” she asked, scathingly. “What kind of judge of air can you set yourself up to be, I should like to know? If I do not find the air of Torbay relaxing, I am sure you could not!”

He made an apologetic murmur, and subsided.

“Grandpapa was not expressing his own views, however, but those of others,” interposed Joanna, quietly.

“I do not require you to tell me, Miss, what your grandfather means! I suppose he is very well able to explain himself, should he choose to do so. But we are interrupting your account, sir”—turning to Colonel Kellaway—“You do not believe, then, that there is any real danger of a landing being made hereabouts?”

“Hardly likely, milady. London must always be the main objective, and Devon is too far removed from the capital. Ireland is our real heel of Achilles in the West.”

“The last venture there could scarce encourage them to try again in that quarter,” interpolated Sir George.

“But what of this tunnel that they are said to be building under the Channel?” asked Lady Lodge, apprehensively. “Only the other evening, at the Winterbournes’, I heard a rumour that the French have engaged a mining expert on the venture, and that it should be completed by Christmas!”

Lady Feniton threw her friend a look of contempt. “Fiddlesticks, Letitia! It’s a mercy that everyone is not as credulous as you! Pray, how do you suppose that the workmen should manage to breathe under water, to begin with? You’ll be suggesting that men might fly, next, I suppose!”

This remark served to draw Sir Walter out of the abstraction which usually claimed him in his wife’s company.

“There is no saying to what limits man’s ingenuity may reach, Augusta. You appear very confident that men may not breathe under water: have you never chanced to hear of the Nautilus?”

Lady Feniton repeated the name, for once at a loss.

“It is a special kind of vessel, invented by an American,” explained Sir Walter, patiently. “It is capable of underwater travel, and men have been known to stay shut up in its interior while it was submerged for several hours without any ill effects.”

“Oh, yes!” exclaimed the Colonel. “Fulton—Robert Fulton—that’s the chap’s name! Bit of a gimcrack, though, ain’t he? Had it from a Naval officer of my acquaintance that they carried out some trials of another invention of his—sometime in September, if my memory serves me—whole thing was a wretched fiasco! Thought he could blow up half the French flotilla, seemingly; but his wretched ‘infernals’, as the Navy calls ‘em, just refused to go off.”

“I have heard nothing of this,” said Sir George, with interest.

“No, well, dare say it wasn’t noised abroad. This fellow Fulton sometimes works for the French, as well—he was granted a French passport three years ago to enable him to make experiments along the coast over there. Being a neutral, money’s the only thing that interests him—typical of these Yankees, I must say.”

“What exactly are these infernals, as you call them?” asked Lady Feniton, interestedly.

Joanna stirred uneasily in her seat. Her interest in the conversation was as great as her grandmother’s but she could not forget the man she had left in hiding. Her eyes wandered to Kitty and Guy. They, too, were listening intently, without making any comment. She found this odd in Mr. Dorlais, who would generally take an active part in any conversation of note. English by adoption though he was, she reflected, perhaps at times he might find a certain confusion of loyalties when the war with France was under discussion. She wondered anxiously what possible excuse she could contrive for quitting the room: she must go soon. It was too dangerous to leave the man Jackson concealed there for much longer. Someone might go in, and surprise him. Yet she did not wish to miss any of this most interesting conversation.

Colonel Kellaway was answering her grandmother’s question.

“I can best describe them as a sort of log of mahogany, ma’am, with wedge shaped ends. They contain enough ballast to keep their upper decks afloat, and are filled with gunpowder. A clockwork device is fitted to the gunpowder, and when a peg is removed on the outside of the machine, the whole thing explodes, five to ten minutes later.”

“Merciful Heavens!” exclaimed Lady Lodge, with a little gasp, “They must be almost as dangerous to those who use them as to the enemy, I imagine!”

“Something in that, ma’am,” acknowledged the Colonel. “I recollect that my friend did say they weren’t sorry to return the unused machines to Naval stores when the exercise was over. A broadside from the French while those things were aboard—”

He nodded significantly, leaving the sentence unfinished.

Lady Lodge turned pale; she was easily alarmed. Her husband looked at her, smiled reassuringly, and said. “Would you not like a little music, gentlemen? You must find it tedious to be talking of such matters after a day spent in military exercises.”

Colonel Kellaway voted himself very willing for the change; and as Captain Masterman’s chief concern seemed to be to fall in with his superior officer’s wishes, no objection was raised by him.

Miss Feniton was invited first to the pianoforte, as was only civil, considering that she was a guest in the house; but she declined in favour of Kitty.

“I will take my turn later,” she said. “I have left my scarf downstairs, and feel the need of it.”

Before her grandmother could intervene, she rose, and quickly left the room.

She almost ran down the staircase towards the parlour. Captain Jackson’s story should soon be in her possession now, or she would know the reason why! He had seemed to be on the point of confiding in her at last when they had been so unfortunately interrupted—though of course, she told herself, it was only too probable that what he had to confide would turn out to be the most complete fabrication, after all. But her curiosity was now thoroughly aroused, and she must hear what he had to say: judgment could come afterwards.

She reached the parlour, breathing quickly, and entered, closing the door firmly behind her.

“You may come out now,” she said, softly.

There was no answer: the curtains hung limp and lifeless.

With a startled exclamation, she darted across the room, and swept them aside.

No one was there. The man had vanished.

She pushed her hand against the glass doors: they gave at her touch, opening outwards.

She stood still for a moment, gazing out into the darkness of the shrubbery. Of course, she told herself impatiently, she ought to have expected this. Why should he wait there for her return? He had gained a start of her, even if she had raised the alarm almost immediately after he had left. No doubt by now he was far enough away for safety.

She felt an odd sense of disappointment, that was not all unsatisfied curiosity. Something about the man himself had attracted her interest: she would have liked to know him better.

Slowly, she turned away from the windows, and stood by the writing desk, deep in thought.

It was then that she saw the folded note.

At first, she did not take in the superscription, although it was written plainly, in large lettering. A second glance revealed her name. Eagerly, she snatched it from the table, and opened it with fingers which trembled slightly.

It bore only a few lines of writing, without any formal opening words.

I fear I can add nothing to the little I have already told. Perhaps someday I may be able to disclose the whole to you. Until that time, trust me if you can — keep my secret, if you do. Your devoted servant, madam, J.

She was reading this cryptic message for the third time, when she was startled by hearing the doorknob turning in someone’s grasp. Quickly, she swung round, the paper clutched in her hand.

Mr. Dorlais and Captain Masterman stood hesitantly on the threshold.

“May we come in?” called Guy Dorlais, cheerily, then, altering his tone as he saw her startled expression—“‘Pon my word, Miss Feniton, is anything wrong? You look as though you’d seen a ghost!”

“I—”

She stopped, struggling for composure.

“By all means come in,” she continued, after a barely perceptible pause. “I was just about to return to the drawing room, in any event.”

“Your grandmother dispatched us to help you find your scarf,” explained Guy, with a grin. “We didn’t dare refuse, eh, Masterman?”

The other man made no reply. His eyes were fixed upon Miss Feniton in a puzzled stare. His gaze switched from her face to the open curtains: he strode towards them.

“Why, these doors are unfastened!” he exclaimed, in surprise. “Did you find them like this, ma’am?”

“No,” replied Joanna, carefully folding the note which she held, and so avoiding his eye. “I opened them myself. I—felt a little faint, and wished for some air.”

Both gentlemen expressed concern at this statement, and Guy Dorlais offered to fetch Miss Lodge.