None Other Gods by Robert Hugh Benson (debian ebook reader txt) 📖

with before--the man, I mean?"

"No. I've left them for the present. But I shall probably join them again later."

"Join...!" began the other aghast.

"Certainly! This thing's only just begun," said Frank, with that same odd impassivity. "We've seen the worst of it, I fancy."

"But you don't mean you're going back! Why, it's ridiculous!"

Frank stopped. They were within sight of the house now and the lights shone pleasantly out.

"By the way, Jack, I quite forgot. You will kindly give me your promise to make no sort of effort to detain me when I want to go again, or I shan't come any further."

"But, my dear chap--"

"Kindly promise at once, please."

"Oh, well! I promise, but--"

"That's all right," said Frank, and moved on.

* * * * *


"I say," said Jack, as they came up to the hall door. "Will you talk now or will you change, or what?"

"I should like a hot bath first. By the way, have you anyone staying in the house?"

"Not a soul; and only two sisters at home. And my mother, of course."

"What about clothes?"

"I'll see about that. Come on round to the smoking-room window. Then I'll get in Jackson and explain to him. I suppose you don't mind your name being known? He'll probably recognize you, anyhow."

"Not in the least, so long as no one interferes."

Jack rang the bell as soon as they came into the smoking-room, and Frank sat down in a deep chair. Then the butler came. He cast one long look at the astonishing figure in the chair.

"Oh!--er--Jackson, this is Mr. Frank Guiseley. He's going to stay here. He'll want some clothes and things. I rather think there are some suits of mine that might do. I wish you'd look them out."

"I beg your pardon, sir?

"This is Mr. Frank Guiseley--of Merefield.... It is, really! But we don't want more people talking than are necessary. You understand? Please don't say anything about it, except that he's come on a walking-tour. And please tell the housekeeper to get the Blue Room ready, and let somebody turn on the hot water in the bath-room until further notice. That's all, Jackson ... and the clothes. You understand?"

"Yes, sir."

"And get the _eau de lubin_ from my dressing-room and put it in the bath-room. Oh, yes; and the wooden bowl of soap."

"These clothes of mine are not to be thrown away, please, Jackson," said Frank gravely from the chair. "I shall want them again."

"Yes, sir."

"That's all, then," said Jack.

Mr. Jackson turned stiffly and left the room.

"It's all right," said Jack. "You remember old Jackson. He won't say a word. Lucky no one saw us as we came up."

"It doesn't matter much, does it?" said Frank.

There was a pause.

"I say, Frank, when will you tell me--"

"I'll answer any questions after dinner to-night. I simply can't talk now."

Dinner was a little difficult that night.

Mrs. Kirkby had been subjected to a long lecture from her son during the half hour in which she ought to have been dressing, in order to have it firmly implanted in her mind that Frank--whom she had known from a boy--was simply and solely in the middle of a walking-tour all by himself. She understood the situation perfectly in a minute and a half--(she was a very shrewd woman who did not say much)--but Jack was not content. He hovered about her room, fingering photographs and silver-handled brushes, explaining over and over again how important it was that Frank should be made to feel at his case, and that Fanny and Jill--(who were just old enough to come to dinner in white high-necked frocks that came down to their very slender ankles, and thick pig-tails down their backs)--must not be allowed to bother him. Mrs. Kirkby said, "Yes, I understand," about a hundred and thirty times, and glanced at the clock. She stood with one finger on the electric button for at least five minutes before venturing to ring for her maid, and it was only that lady's discreet tap at one minute before eight that finally got Jack out of the room. He looked in on Frank in the middle of his dressing, found to his relief that an oldish suit of dress-clothes fitted him quite decently, and then went to put on his own. He came down to the drawing-room seven minutes after the gong with his ears very red and his hair in a plume, to find Frank talking to his mother, and eyed by his sisters who were pretending to look at photographs, with all the ease in the world.

But dinner itself was difficult. It was the obvious thing to talk about Frank's "walking-tour"; and yet this was exactly what Jack dared not do. The state of the moors, and the deplorable ravages made among the young grouse by the early rains, occupied them all to the end of fish; to the grouse succeeded the bullocks: to the bullocks, the sheep, and, by an obvious connection--obvious to all who knew that gentleman--from the sheep to the new curate.

But just before the chocolate _soufflee_ there came a pause, and Jill, the younger of the two sisters, hastened to fill the gap.

"Did you have a nice walking-tour, Mr. Guiseley?"

Frank turned to her politely.

"Yes, very nice, considering," he said.

"Have you been alone all the time?" pursued Jill, conscious of a social success.

"Well, no," said Frank. "I was traveling with a ... well, with a man who was an officer in the army. He was a major."

"And did you--"

"That's enough, Jill," said her mother decidedly. "Don't bother Mr. Guiseley. He's tired with his walk."

The two young men sat quiet for a minute or two after the ladies had left the room. Then Jack spoke.

"Well?" he said.

Frank looked up. There was an odd, patient kind of look in his eyes that touched Jack a good deal. Frank had not been distinguished for submissiveness hitherto.

"Oh! a bit later, if you don't mind," he said. "We can talk in the smoking-room."


(IV)

"Well, I'll tell you the whole thing as far as I understand it," began Frank, as the door closed behind Jackson, who had brought whisky and candles. "And then I'll answer any questions you want."

He settled himself back in his chair, stretching out his legs and clasping his hands behind his head. Jack had a good view of him and could take notice of his own impressions, though he found them hard to put into words afterwards. The words he finally chose were "subdued" and "patient" again, and there are hardly two words that would have been less applicable to Frank three months before. At the same time his virility was more noticeable than ever; he had about him, Jack said, something of the air of a very good groom--a hard-featured and sharp, yet not at all unkindly look, very capable and, at the same time, very much restrained. There was no sentimental nonsense about him at all--his sorrow had not taken that form.

"Well, I needn't talk much about Jenny's last letter and what happened after that. I was entirely unprepared, of course. I hadn't the faintest idea--Well, she was the one person about whom I had no doubts at all! I actually left the letter unread for a few minutes (the envelope was in your handwriting, you know)--because I had to think over what I had to do next. The police had got me turned away from a builder's yard--"

Jack emitted a small sound. He was staring at Frank with all his eyes.

"Yes; that's their way," said Frank. "Well, when I read it, I simply couldn't think any more at all for a time. The girl we were traveling with--she had picked up with the man I had got into trouble over, you know--the girl was calling me to dinner, she told me afterwards. I didn't hear a sound. She came and touched me at last, and I woke up. But I couldn't say anything. They don't even now know what's the matter. I came away that afternoon. I couldn't even wait for the Major--"

"Eh?"

"The Major.... Oh! that's what the chap calls himself. I don't think he's lying, either. I simply couldn't stand him another minute just then. But I sent them a postcard that night--I forget where from; and--There aren't any letters for me, are there?

"One or two bills."

"Oh! well, I shall hear soon, I expect. I must join them again in a day or two. They're somewhere in this direction, I know."

"And what did you do?"

Frank considered.

"I'm not quite sure. I know I walked a great deal. People were awfully good to me. One woman stopped her motor--and I hadn't begged, either--"

"You! Begged!"

"Lord, yes; lots of times.... Well, she gave me a quid, and I didn't even thank her. And that lasted me very well, and I did a little work too, here and there."

"But, good Lord! what did you do?"

"I walked. I couldn't bear towns or people or anything. I got somewhere outside of Ripon at last, and went out on to the moors. I found an old shepherd's hut for about a week or ten days--"

"And you--"

"Lived there? Yes. I mended the hut thoroughly before I came away. And then I thought I'd come on here."

"What were you doing on the bridge?"

"Waiting till dark. I was going to ask at the lodge then whether you were at home."

"And if I hadn't been?"

"Gone on somewhere else, I suppose."

Jack tried to help himself to a whisky and soda, but the soda flew out all over his shirt-front like a fountain, and he was forced to make a small remark. Then he made another.

"What about prison?"

Frank smiled.

"Oh! I've almost forgotten that. It was beastly at the time, though."

"And ... and the Major and the work! Lord! Frank, you do tell a story badly."

He smiled again much more completely.

"I'm too busy inside," he said. "Those things don't seem to matter much, somehow."

"Inside? What the deuce do you mean?"

Frank made a tiny deprecating gesture.

"Well, what it's all about, you know ... Jack."

"Yes."

"It's a frightfully priggish thing to say, but I'm extraordinarily interested as to what's going to happen next--inside, I mean. At least, sometimes; and then at other times I don't care a hang."

Jack looked bewildered, and said so tersely. Frank leaned forward a little.

"It's like this, you see. Something or other has taken me in hand: I'm blessed if I know what. All these things don't happen one on the top of the other just by a fluke. There's something going on, and I want to know what it is. And I suppose something's going to happen soon."

"For God's sake do say what you mean!"

"I can't more than that. I tell you I don't know. I only wish somebody could tell me."

"But what does it all amount to? What are you going to do next?"