Rosa Mundi by Ethel May Dell (e books free to read .TXT) 📖

them under the reading-room table.
"Don't make me jump, I say, doctor!" he said pathetically. "I'm quite upset enough as it is. That lazy lout, Soames, won't stir a finger. The other chaps are on duty. And Miss Eversley has proved faithless. Why can't you turn to and help?"
But Seddon was already striding to the door again in hot haste.
"That idiot of a girl must have crossed the Frontier!" he said, as he went. "There was a fellow shot on sentry-go last night. It's infernally dangerous, I tell you!"
Toby raced after him swearing inarticulately. A couple of subalterns just entering were nearly overwhelmed by their vigorous exit. They recovered themselves and followed to the tune of Toby's excited questioning. But none of the party got beyond the veranda steps, for there the sound of clattering hoofs arrested them, and a jaded horse bearing a dishevelled rider was pulled up short in front of the club.
"Miss Eversley herself!" cried Toby, making a dash forward.
A native servant slipped unobtrusively to the sweating horse's bridle. Averil was on the ground in a moment and turned to ascend the steps of the club-house.
"Is my brother-in-law here?" she said to Toby, accepting the hand he offered.
"Who? Raymond? No; he's in the North Camp somewhere. Do you want him? Anything wrong? By Jove, Miss Eversley, you've given us an awful fright!"
Averil went up the steps with so palpable an effort that Seddon hastily dragged forward a chair. Her lips, as she answered Toby, were quite colourless.
"I have had a fright myself," she said. Then she looked round at the other men with a shaky laugh. "I have been riding for my life," she said a little breathlessly. "I have never done that before. It--it's very exciting--almost more so than riding to hounds. I have often wondered how the fox felt. Now I know."
She ignored the chair Seddon placed for her, turning to the boy called Toby with great resolution.
"Those lamp-shades, Mr. Carey," she said. "I'm sorry I'm so late. You must have thought I was never coming. In fact"--the colour was returning to her face, and her smile became more natural--"I thought so myself a few minutes ago. Let us set to work at once!"
Toby burst into a rude whoop of admiration and flung a ball of string into the air.
"Miss Eversley, well done! Well done!" he gasped. "You--you deserve a V.C.!"
"Indeed I don't," she returned. "I have been running away hard."
"Tell us all about it, Miss Eversley!" urged one of her listeners. "You have been across the Frontier, now, haven't you? What happened? Someone tried to snipe you from afar?"
But Miss Eversley refused to be communicative. "I am much too busy," she said, "to discuss anything so unimportant. Come, Mr. Carey, the lamp-shades!"
Toby bore her off in triumph to inspect his works of art. There was a good deal of understanding in Toby's head despite its curls which he kept so resolutely cropped. He attended to business without a hint of surprise or inattention. And he was presently rewarded for his good behaviour.
Averil, raising her eyes for a moment from one of the shades which she was tacking together while he held it in shape, said presently:
"A very peculiar thing happened to me this morning, Mr. Carey."
"Yes?" he replied, trying to keep the note of expectancy out of his voice.
Averil nodded gravely. "I crossed the Frontier," she said, "and rode into the mountains. I thought I heard a child crying. I lost my way and fell among thieves."
"Yes?" said Toby again. He looked up, frankly interested this time.
"I was shot at," she resumed. "It was my own fault, of course. I shouldn't have gone. My brother-in-law warned me very seriously against going an inch beyond the Frontier only last night. Well, one buys one's experience. I certainly shall never go again, not for a hundred wailing babies."
"Probably a bird," remarked Toby practically.
"Probably," assented Averil, equally practical. "To continue: I didn't know what to do. I was horribly frightened. I had lost my bearings. And then out of the very midst of my enemies there came a friend."
"Ah!" said Toby quickly. "The right sort?"
"There is only one sort," she said, with a touch of dignity.
"And what did he do?" said Toby, with eager interest.
"He simply took my bridle and ran by my side till we were out of danger," Averil said, a sudden soft glow creeping up over her face.
Toby looked at her very seriously. "In native rig, I suppose?" he said.
"Yes," said Averil.
"Carlyon of the Frontier," said Toby, with abrupt decision.
She nodded. "I did not know he had left England," she said.
"He hasn't--officially speaking," said Toby. He was watching her steadily. "Do you know, Miss Eversley," he said, "I think I wouldn't mention your discovery to any one else?"
"I am not going to," she said.
"No? Then why did you tell me?" he asked, with a tinge of rude suspicion in his voice.
Averil looked him suddenly and steadily in the face. It was a very innocent face that Toby Carey presented to a serenely credulous world.
"Because," said Averil slowly, "he told me to tell you alone. 'Tell Toby Carey only,' he said, 'to watch when the beasts go down to drink.' They were his last words."
"Good!" said Toby unconcernedly. "Then he knew you recognized him?"
"Yes," Averil said; "he knew." She smiled faintly as she said it. "He told me he was in no danger," she added.
"Is he a friend of yours?" asked Toby sharply.
"Yes," said Averil, with pride.
"I'm sorry to hear it," said Toby bluntly.
"Why?" she asked, with a swift flash of anger.
"Why?" he echoed vehemently. "Ask your brother-in-law, ask Seddon, ask any one! The man is a fiend!"
Averil sprang to her feet in sudden fury.
"How dare you!" she cried passionately. "He is a king!"
Toby stared for a moment, then grew calm. "We are not talking about the same man, Miss Eversley," he said shortly. "The man I know is a fiend among fiends. The man you know is, no doubt--different."
But Averil swept from the club-room without a word. She was very angry with Toby Carey.


VII
THE REAL COLONEL CARLYON

Averil rode back to her brother-in-law's bungalow, vexed with herself, weary at heart, troubled. She had arrived at the station among the mountains on the Frontier two months before, and had spent a very happy time there with the sister whom she had not seen for years. The ladies of the station numbered a very scanty minority, but there was no lack of gaiety and merriment on that account.
That the hills beyond the Great Frontier were peopled by tribes in a seething state of discontent was a matter known, but little recked of, by the majority of the community. Officers went their several ways, fully awake to threatening rumours, but counting them of small importance. They went to their sport; to their polo, their racing, their gymkhanas, with light hearts and in perfect security. They lay down in the dread shadow of a mighty Empire and slept secure in the very jaws of danger.
The fierce and fanatical hatred that raged over the Frontier was less than nothing to most of them. The power that sheltered them was wholly sufficient for their confidence.
The toughness of the good northern breed is of a quality untearable, made to endure in all climates, under all conditions. Ordered to carry revolvers, they stuffed them unloaded into side-pockets, or left them in the hands of _syces_ to bear behind them.
Proof positive of their total failure to realize the danger that threatened from amidst the frowning, grey-cragged mountains was the fact that their womenkind were allowed to remain at the station, and even rode and drove forth unattended on the rocky, mountain roads.
True, they were warned against crossing the Frontier. A few officers, of whom Captain Raymond, who was Averil's brother-in-law, and Toby Carey, the innocent-faced subaltern, were two, saw the rising wave from afar; but they saw it vaguely as inevitable but not imminent. Captain Raymond planned to himself to send his wife and her sister to Simla before the monsoon broke up the fine weather.
And this was all he accomplished beyond administering a severe reprimand to his young sister-in-law for running into danger among the hills.
"There are always thieves waiting to bag anyone foolish enough to show his nose over the border," he said. "Isn't the Indian Empire large enough for you that you must needs go trespassing among savages?"
Averil heard him out with the patience of a slightly wandering attention. She had not recounted the whole of her experience for his benefit, nor did she intend to do so. She was still wondering what the mysterious message she had delivered to Toby Carey might be held to mean.
When Captain Raymond had exhausted himself she went away to her own room and sat for a long while gazing towards the great mountains, thinking, thinking.
Her sister presently joined her. Mrs. Raymond was a dark-eyed, merry-hearted little woman, the gay originator of many a frolic, and an immense favourite with men and women alike.
"Poor darling! I declare Harry has made you look quite miserable!" was her exclamation, as she ran lightly in and seated herself on the arm of Averil's chair.
"Harry!" echoed Averil, in a tone of such genuine scorn that Mrs. Raymond laughed aloud.
"You're very rude," she said. "Still, I'm glad Harry isn't the offender. Who is it, I wonder? But, never mind! I have a splendid piece of news for you, dear. Shut your eyes and guess!"
"Oh, I can't indeed!" protested Averil. "I am much too tired."
Mrs. Raymond looked at her with laughing eyes.
"There! She shan't be teased!" she cried gaily. "It's the loveliest surprise you ever had, darling; but I can't keep it a secret any longer. I wanted to see him now that he is grown up, and quite satisfy myself that he is really good enough for you. So, dear, I wrote to him and begged him to join us here. And the result is--now guess!"
Averil had turned sharply to look at her.
"Do you mean you have asked Dick to come here?" she said, in a quick, startled way.
"Exactly, dear; I actually have," said Mrs. Raymond. "More--we had a wire this morning. He will be here to dinner."
"Oh!" said Averil. She rose hastily, so hastily that her sister was left sitting on the arm of the bamboo chair, which instantly overturned on the top of her.
Averil extricated her with many laughing apologies, and, by the time Mrs. Raymond had recovered her equilibrium, the younger girl had lost her expression of astonishment and was looking as bright and eager as her sister could desire.
"Only Dick is such a madcap," she said. "How shall we keep him from getting up to mischief in No Man's Land precisely as I have done?"
Mrs. Raymond opined that Averil ought by then to have discovered the secret of managing the young man, and they went to _tiffin_ on the veranda in excellent spirits.
Dr. Seddon was there and young Steele, one of Raymond's subalterns. Averil found herself next to the doctor, who, rather to her surprise, forebore to twit her with her early morning adventure. He was, in fact, very grave, and she wondered why.
Steele, strolling by her side in the shady compound, by and bye volunteered information.
"Poor old Seddon is in a mortal funk," he said, "which accounts for his wretched appetite. He has been wasting steadily ever since Carlyon went away. He thinks Carlyon is the only fellow capable of taking care of him. No one else is monster enough."
"Is Colonel Carlyon expected