Kitabı oku: «The Star-Gazers», sayfa 7
Volume One – Chapter Twelve.
The Professor in Company
Sir John went upstairs furiously, taking three steps at a time – twice. Then he finished that flight two at a time; walked fast up the first half of the second flight, one step at a time; slowly up the second half; paused on the landing, and then went deliberately along the corridor, with its row of painted ancestors watching him from one side, as if wondering when he was coming to join them there.
Sir John Day was a man who soon made up his mind, whether it was about turning an arable field into pasture, or the setting of a new kind of corn. He settled in five minutes to have steam upon the farm, and did not ponder upon Glynne’s engagement for more than ten; so that he was able to make his plans very well in the sixty feet that he had to traverse before he reached his brother’s door, upon whose panel he gave a tremendous thump, and then entered at once.
The major was in his shirt-sleeves, apparently turning himself into a jack-in-the-box, for he was standing in an old bullock trunk, one which had journeyed with him pretty well all over India; and as Sir John entered the room sharply, and closed the door behind him, the major started up, looking fiercely and angrily at the intruder.
“Oh, you’re packing, then?” said Sir John, in the most uncompromising tone.
“Yes, sir, I am packing,” said the major, getting out of the trunk, and slamming down the lid; “and I think, sir, that I might be permitted to do that in peace and quietness.”
“Peace? Yes, of course you may,” said Sir John, sharply, “only you will make it war.”
“I was not aware,” said the major, “that it was necessary for me to lock my door – I beg your pardon – your door. And now, may I ask the object of this intrusion? If it is to resume the quarrel, you may spare yourself the pains.”
“Indeed!” said Sir John shortly.
“Well,” continued the major, “why have you come?”
“You are going, then?”
“Of course I am, sir.”
“Well, I came to tell you I’m very glad of it,” cried Sir John, clapping his brother on the shoulder; and then – “I say, Jem, I wish I hadn’t such a peppery temper.”
“No, no, Jack, no, no,” cried the major, excitedly; “it was I who was to blame.”
“Wrong, Jem. I contradicted you – very offensively, too, and I am confoundedly in the wrong. I didn’t know it till Glynne came and pulled me up short. I say, it’s a great pity for us to quarrel, isn’t it?”
“Yes,” said the major, laying his hands upon his brother’s shoulders, “it is – it is, indeed, Jack, and I can’t help thinking that I shall be doing wisely in going back to my old chambers, for this projected wedding worries me. We’ll see one another more seldom, and we won’t have words together then. You see – no; stop a moment! Let me speak. You see, I feel my old wound now and then, and it makes me irritable, and then the climate has touched up my liver a bit. Yes, I had better go.”
“Don’t be a fool, Jem,” cried Sir John. “Go, indeed! Why, what the dickens do you suppose I should do without you here? Tchah! tush! you go! Absurd. There, get dressed, man, and come down to dinner. No: come along down with me first, and we’ll get a bottle or two out of the number six bin. There’ll just be time.”
The major shook his head, as he looked at the bullock trunk and a very much bruised and battered old portmanteau waiting to be filled.
“Now, Jem, old fellow, don’t let’s quarrel again,” cried Sir John, pathetically.
“No, no, certainly not, my dear Jack. No more quarrelling, but I think this time I’ll hold to my word.”
“Now, my dear old fellow,” cried Sir John, gripping his brother’s shoulders more tightly, and shaking him to and fro, “do be reasonable. Look here: I’ve asked little Lucy Alleyne to come sans façon, and – ”
“Is she coming?” cried the major, eagerly.
“Yes, and you can talk toadstools as long as you like.”
The major seemed to be hesitating, and he looked curiously at his brother.
“Is Alleyne coming?”
“I asked him, but he is very doubtful; perhaps he is glued to the end of his telescope for the next twelve hours. Here, have that confounded baggage put away.”
The major looked a little more thoughtful. He was hesitating, and thinking of Glynne, who just then tapped softly at the door.
“Come in,” roared Sir John; and she entered, looked quickly from one to the other, and then went up to her uncle, and kissed him affectionately.
“There,” cried Sir John, looking half-pleased, half-annoyed; “it’s enough to make a man wish you would go, Jem.”
“No, it isn’t,” said the major, drawing his niece closer to him. “There, there, my dear, you were quite right. I’m a terrible old capsicum, am I not?”
“No, uncle,” said Glynne, nestling to him; “but hadn’t we better forget all this?”
“Right, my dear, right,” cried Sir John. “There, come along, and let your uncle dress for dinner. Where’s Rob?”
“I think he went for a long walk, papa.”
“Humph! I hope he’ll be in training at last,” said Sir John, good-humouredly. “You’re a lucky girl, Glynne, to have a man wanting to make himself perfect before he marries you. You ought to go and do likewise.”
“Don’t try, Glynne, my dear,” said her uncle affectionately. “A perfect woman would be a horror. You are just right as you are.”
“Well, you are not, Jem,” said Sir John, laughing, “so make haste, and come down. Come along, Glynne.”
He led the way, and, as he passed through the door, Glynne turned to look back at her uncle, their eyes meeting in a peculiarly wistful, inquiring look, that seemed to suggest a mutual desire to know the other’s thoughts.
Then the door closed, and in the most matter-of-fact way, the major proceeded to dress for dinner as if he had never quarrelled with his brother in his life.
When he descended, it was to find Alleyne in the drawing-room with his sister. Glynne was entertaining them, for Sir John had, on leaving his brother, gone down into the cellar for the special bottle of port, and, after its selection, found so much satisfaction in the mildewy, sawdusty, damp-smelling place that he stopped for some twenty minutes, poking his bedroom candlestick into dark corners and archways where the bottoms of bottles could be seen resting as they had rested for many years past – each bin having a little history of its own, so full of recollections that the baronet had at last to drag himself away, and hurry up to dress.
Rolph was also late – so much so that he had encountered Sir John on the stairs, and the party in the drawing-room had a good quarter of an hour’s chat in the twilight, before the candles were lit.
“And you think it possible that it is caused by another planet?” Glynne was saying as the major entered the room; and he paused for a moment or two noting the change that had come over his niece. There was an eager look in her eyes; her face was more animated as she sat in the window catching the last reflections of the western glow, listening the while to Alleyne, who, with his back to the light, was talking in a low, deep voice of some problem in his favourite pursuit.
“Yes; just as happened over Neptune. That appears to be the only solution of the difficulty,” he replied.
“Then why not direct your glass exactly at the place where you feel this planet must be?”
Alleyne smiled as he spoke next.
“I did not explain to you,” he said, “that if such a planet does exist it must be, comparatively, very small, and so surrounded by the intense light of the sun that no glass we have yet made would render it visible.”
“How strange!” said Glynne, thoughtfully; and her eyes vaguely wandered over the evening sky, and then back to rest in a rapt, dreamy way upon the quiet, absorbed face of the visitor.
“I was looking at Jupiter last night,” she said, suddenly, “trying to see his moons.”
“Yes?”
“But our glass is not sufficiently powerful. I could only distinguish two.”
“Perhaps it was not the fault of your glass,” said Alleyne, smiling. “A glass of a very low power will show them. I have often watched them through a good binocular.”
“I’m afraid ours is a very bad one,” said Glynne.
“No, I should be more disposed to think it a good one, Miss Day. The reason you did not see them is this; one was eclipsed by the planet – in other words, behind it – while the others are passing across its body, whose brightness almost hides them – in fact, does hide them to such an extent that they would not be seen by you.”
There was a few minutes’ silence here, broken at last by Glynne, as she said in a low, thoughtful voice, —
“How much you know. How grand it must be.”
Alleyne laughed softly before replying.
“How much I know!” he said, in a voice full of regret. “My dear madam, I know just enough to see what a very little I have learned; how pitifully small in such a science as astronomy is all that a life devoted to its depths would be.”
“For shame, Moray,” cried Lucy, warmly. “You know that people say you are very clever indeed.”
“Yes,” he replied, “I know what they say; but that is only their judgment. I know how trifling are the things I have learned compared with what there is to acquire.”
“What a goose Glynne is,” said the major to himself, as he stood listening to the conversation. “Why, this man is worth a dozen Rolphs.”
“But, Mr Alleyne,” said Glynne, eagerly, “is it possible – could I – I mean, should you think I was asking too much if I expressed a wish to see something of these wonders of which you have been speaking?”
“Oh, no, Moray would show you everything he could. He’s the most unselfish, patient fellow in the world,” cried Lucy.
Glynne turned from her almost impatiently to Alleyne, who said, with a grave smile upon his face, —
“You have no brother, Miss Day. If you had, I hope you would not do all you could, by flattery and spoiling, to make him weak and conceited.”
“Indeed I don’t do anything of the kind, Moray,” said Lucy, indignantly; “and now, for that, I’ll tell the truth, Glynne; he’s a regular bat, an owl, a recluse, and we’re obliged to drag him out into the light of day, or he’d stop in his room till he grew mouldy, that he would. Why, he goes in spirit right away to the moon sometimes, and it only seems as if his body was left behind.”
“What, do you mean to say he’s moonstruck?” said the major, merrily, and looking half-surprised at the quick, indignant look darted at him by Glynne.
“I’m afraid that Lucy here is quite right,” said Alleyne, smiling as he took his sister’s hand in his and patted it. “I do get so intent upon my studies that all every-day life affairs are regularly forgotten. But I do not work half so hard now. They fetched a doctor to me, and it is forbidden. In fact, I have plenty of time now, and if Miss Day will pay my my poor observatory a visit, I will show her everything that lies in my power.”
“Oh, Mr Alleyne, I should be so glad,” cried Glynne eagerly, and to Lucy’s great delight. “I want to see Saturn’s rings, and the seas and continents in Mars, and the twin stars.”
“Well, you needn’t trouble Mr Alleyne,” said Rolph, who had just entered. “There’s a fellow at Hyde Park corner, with a big glass, lets people look through for a penny. He’d be glad enough to come down for a half-crown or two.”
“Why, how absurd, Robert,” said Glynne, turning upon him good-humouredly. “I want to see and learn about these things from someone who is an astronomer.”
“Oh,” said Rolph, “do you? Well, I see no reason why you shouldn’t go and have a peep or two through Mr Alleyne’s glass. I’ll come with you.”
“Here, I’m very sorry, Alleyne. Miss Alleyne, I don’t know what sort of a host you’ll think me for being so late,” cried Sir John, bustling in. “I hope Glynne has been playing my part well.”
“Admirably, Sir John,” replied Alleyne. “We have been talking upon my favourite topic, and the time soon glides by when one is engaged upon questions regarding the planets.”
“But I say, you know, Mr Alleyne,” said Rolph, who, with all the confidence of one in his own house and proprietary rights over the lady, came and seated himself upon the elbow of the easy-chair in which Glynne reclined, and laid his arm behind her on the back, “I want to know what’s the good of a fellow sacrificing his health, and shutting himself up from society, for the study of these abstruse scientific matters. ’Pon my word, I can’t see what difference it makes to us whether Jupiter has got one moon, or ten moons, or a hundred. He’s such a precious long way off.”
Glynne looked up at him with a good-humoured air of pain, but only to turn back and listen to Alleyne.
“It requires study, Captain Rolph,” he said thoughtfully, “and time to appreciate the value of the results achieved in astronomy. Perhaps we have nothing to show that is of direct utility to man, but everything in nature is so grand – there is so much to be learned, that, for my part, I wonder why everybody does not thirst for knowledge.”
“Yes,” said Glynne, thoughtfully, and below her breath.
“Oh, we all dabble in science, more or less,” said Rolph, glancing at Sir John with a look that seemed to say, “You see how I’ll trot him out.” “Here’s the major goes in for toadstools, and Sir John for big muttons and portly pigs.”
“And Captain Rolph for exhibitions of endurance, to prove that a man is stronger than a horse,” said the major, drily.
“Yes, and not a bad thing, either, eh, Sir John?”
“Oh, every man to his taste,” said the host; “but I believe in a man feeding himself up, and not starving himself down.”
“Oilcake and turnips, eh?”
“Yes, both good things in their way, but I like the chemical components to have taken other forms, Rob, my boy; good Highland Scots beef and Southdown mutton.”
“I hope you will be able to indulge in a good dinner, Rolph?” said the major, looking at the young officer as if he amused him.
“Trust me for that, major,” replied the young man loudly. “I’m not bad at table.”
“I thought, perhaps,” said the major sarcastically, “that you might be in training, and forbidden to eat anything but raw steak and dry biscuit.”
“Oh, dear, no,” said Rolph seriously. “Quite free now, major, quite free.”
“That’s a blessing,” muttered Sir John, who looked annoyed and fidgety. “Hah, dinner at last.”
“Walking makes me hungry and impatient, Miss Alleyne. Come along, you are my property. First lady.”
He held out his arm, and, as Lucy laid her little hand upon it, he went out of the drawing-room chatting merrily; and, as he did so, Rolph leaped from his seat, and drew himself upright as if to display the breadth of his chest and the size of his muscles.
“Glad of it,” he said. “I’m sharp set. Come along, Glynne.”
Alleyne gazed at them intently with a strange feeling of depression coming over his spirit, and so lost to other surroundings that he did not reply to the major, who came up to him, moved by a desire to be polite to a man whom he was beginning to esteem.
Then Major Day drew back and his keen eyes brightened, for Glynne said quietly, —
“You forget. Go on in with uncle.”
“Eh?” said the young officer, looking puzzled.
“Go on in with my uncle,” said Glynne quietly.
And she crossed to where Alleyne was standing, and, in the character of hostess, laid her hand upon his arm.
“There, you’re dismissed for to-night, Rolph,” said the major, who could hardly conceal his satisfaction at this trifling incident.
Then, thrusting his arm through that of the athlete, he marched him to the dining-room, the young man’s face growing dark and full of annoyance at having to give way in this case of ordinary etiquette.
“Confound the fellow! I wish they wouldn’t ask him here,” he muttered.
“Mind seems to be taking the lead over muscles to-day,” said the major to himself, as he walked beside the young officer to the dining-room, while Glynne came more slowly behind, her eyes growing deeper and very thoughtful as she listened to Alleyne’s words.
Volume One – Chapter Thirteen.
Mars Makes a Mistake
The dinner, with its pleasant surroundings of flowers and glittering plate and glass, with the finest and whitest of linen, was delightful to Lucy, though to her it was as if there was something wanting, in spite of her position as principal guest. This resulted in her receiving endless little attentions from Sir John; but more than once she felt quite irritated with her brother, who seemed to find no more pleasure in the carefully cooked viands than in the homely joints at The Firs. He ate a little of what was handed to him, almost mechanically, and drank sparingly of the baronet’s choice wines; but his mind was busy upon nothing else than the subject upon which Glynne was asking him questions.
The major had plenty to say to Lucy, but he kept noticing the increase of animation in Glynne. For she had been awakened from her ordinary, placid, dreamy state to an intense interest in the subject under discussion.
Major Day did not know why he did it, but three times as that dinner progressed, he laid down his knife and fork, thrust his hands beneath the table, and rubbed them softly.
“Muscles is out in the cold to-night,” he muttered. “He’ll have to go in training for exercising his patience. Bring him to his senses.”
Possibly it was very weak of the major, but he had fresh in his memory, several little pieces of bitter ridicule directed at him by the captain, respecting the botanical pursuit in which he engaged.
Now, it so happened that early in the day the major had been out for a long walk, and had come upon a magnificent cluster of a fungus that he had not yet tried for its edible qualities. It was the peculiar grey-brown, scaly-topped mushroom, called by botanists Amanita Rubescens, and said to be of admirable culinary value.
“We’ll have a dish of these to-night,” thought the major, picking a fair quantity of the choicest specimens, which he took home and gave to the butler, with instructions to hand them to the cook for a dish in the second course.
Morris, the butler, put the basket down upon the hall table, and went to see to the drawing down of a window blind; and no sooner had he gone than Rolph, who had heard the order, came from the billiard-room into the hall to get his hat and stick preparatory to starting for a walk.
He was passing the major’s basket where it stood upon the hall table, when an idea flashed across his brain, and he stopped, glanced round, grinned, and then, as no one was near, took up the creel, walked swiftly across the hall out into the garden, dived into the plantation, ran rapidly down the long walk out of sight of the house, and turned into the pheasant preserve. Here, throwing out the major’s fungi, he looked sharply about and soon collected an equal quantity of the first specimens he encountered, and then turned back.
“A sarcastic old humbug,” he muttered; “let him have a dish of these, and if any of them disagree with him, it will be a lesson for the old wretch. He experimented upon me once with his confounded boleti, as he called them; now, I’ll experimentalise upon him.”
As a rule such an act as this could not have been performed unseen, but fate favoured the captain upon this occasion, and he reached the hall without being noticed, replaced the creel upon the table from which he had taken it, and then went for a walk.
Now, it so happened that Morris, the butler, had crossed the hall since, but the creel not being where he had placed it, he did not recall his orders; but going to answer a bell half-an-hour afterwards, he caught sight of the basket, remembered what he had been told, and, on his return, took the fungi into the kitchen.
“Here, cook,” he said, “you’re to dress these for the second course.”
In due time cook, who was a very slow-moving, thoughtful woman, found herself by the basket which she opened, and then turned the fungi out upon a dish.
“Well,” she exclaimed, “of all the trash! Mrs Mason, do, for goodness’ sake, look at these.”
Glynne’s maid, who was performing some mystic kind of cooking on her own account, to wit, stirring up a saucepan full of thin blue starch with a tallow candle, turned and looked at the basket of fungi, and said, —
“Oh, the idea! What are they for?”
“To cook, because them star-gazing folks are coming. Morris says Miss Glynne’s always talking about finding the focus now.”
“But these things are poison.”
“Of course they are. I wouldn’t give them to a pig;” and with all the autocratic determination of a lady in her position, she took the dish, and threw its contents behind her big roasting fire. “There, that’s the place for them! Mary, go and tell Jones I want him.”
Jones was cook’s mortal enemy; and in the capacity of supplier of fruit and vegetables for kitchen use, he had daily skirmishes with the lady, whom he openly accused of spoiling his choice productions, and sending them to table unfit for use, while she retaliated by telling him often that he could not grow a bit of garden-stuff fit to be seen – that his potatoes were watery, his beetroot pink, his cauliflowers masses of caterpillars and slugs.
Under these circumstances, Jones tied the string of his blue serge apron a little more tightly, twisted the said serge into a tail, which he tucked round his waist, and leaving the forcing-house, where he was busy, set his teeth, pushed his hat down over his nose, and, quite prepared for a serious quarrel, walked heavily into the kitchen. But only to be disarmed, for there was a plate on the white table, containing a splendid wedge of raised pie, with a piece of bread, and a jug of ale beside a horn.
Jones looked at cook, and she nodded and smiled; she also condescended to put her lips first to the freshly-filled horn, and then folded her arms and leaned against the table, while the gardener ate his “snack,” feeling that after all, though she had her bit of temper, cook was really what he called “a good sort.”
“Ah,” he said at last, with a sigh, after a little current chat, “I must be off now. Let’s see; you’ve got in all you want for to-night?”
“Yes, everything,” said cook, smiling, “and I must get to work, too. You haven’t any mushrooms, I suppose?”
“Haven’t got any mushrooms?” said Jones, reproachfully. “Why, I’ve a bed just coming on.”
“Then I should like to make a dish to-day, and use a few in one of my sauces,” said cook; and half-an-hour later Jones returned with a basketful, which he deposited upon the table with a thrill of pride.
The presence of Moray Alleyne, and the way in which he was taken up, as the captain called it, by Glynne, so filled the mind of Rolph, that there was no room for anything else, and as the dinner went on, his annoyance so sharpened his appetite that he ate very heartily of the two entrées and the joint. It was not until the second course was in progress that a dish was handed round, to which, after a telegraphic glance between the major and Lucy, that young lady helped herself. Glynne took some mechanically, to the major’s great delight, and, like Lucy, went on eating. Then the dish was handed to Rolph, who fixed his glass in his eye, and started slightly as he suddenly recalled the trick he had played in the hall.
“What’s this?” he said in an undertone to the butler.
“Sham pinions ho nateral, sir.”
“Humph! no. Take the dish to Mr Alleyne.”
The man took the dish round to the guest, who, talking the while to Glynne, helped himself liberally, and went on eating.
“Won’t you have some, Rolph?” said the major, helping himself in turn.
“I! No. Don’t care for such dishes.”
“Seems to be very good,” said the major. “Smells delicious, and everyone’s eating it.”
“Not the ladies?” whispered Rolph.
“Yes; they’re revelling.”
“Good heavens!” muttered Rolph; and he turned cold and damp, the perspiration standing upon his brow.
“Nothing worse in this world than prejudice,” said the major, taking a mouthful of the delicate dish.
“Ah, yes: superb. Jack, old fellow, try some of these fungi.”
“Get out!” said Sir John, sipping his wine.
“But, my dear boy, they are simply magnificent,” cried the major. “Here, take the dish to your master.”
The mushrooms were handed, and Sir John tried a little, recalled the dish, and had some more, while Rolph sat perfectly still, not daring to speak, though he saw everyone at the table partaking of the stew.
“What are these?” said Sir John. “They’re very good.”
“Agaricus Rubescens, my boy. Tons of them rot every year, because there is no one to pick them but Miss Lucy Alleyne and your humble servant here.”
“Well, don’t let’s have any more go rotten,” cried Sir John. “They’re delicious, eh, Mr Alleyne?”
“I beg your pardon,” said the visitor, looking up.
“These fungi,” said the host, “uncommonly good.”
“Yes, admirable,” said Alleyne, who had finished his, and had not the most remote recollection of their quality.
“I don’t believe he tasted them,” said Sir John to himself.
“These are the fungi, Morris, that I gave you to-day to take into the kitchen?” said the major.
“Yes, sir,” said Morris, and the major finished his with great gusto.
“Uncommonly delicious!” he said.
“Capital, Jem,” cried Sir John; “but I hope they won’t poison us.”
“Trust me for that. They’ve been well tested, and are perfectly wholesome. Splendid dish.”
“They’ll all be in agonies before long,” thought Rolph. “I hope poor Glynne won’t be very bad. A bit of an attack would serve her right, though, for going on like that with the star-gazer. Phew! how hot the room is.”
“I give you credit, Jem,” cried the host. “What do you say, Miss Alleyne? It’s of no use to ask these people; they are off on comets or something else.”
“Oh, I’m growing a confirmed fungus-eater, Sir John,” said Lucy. “I am Major Day’s disciple. I think them delicious.”
“You’re a very charming little lassie, and I like you immensely,” thought Sir John, gazing at Lucy curiously and thoughtfully; “but I hope Jem has too much common sense to be making a fool of himself over you. He likes you, I know, but fungus-hunting is one thing and wife-hunting another. No, I won’t think it of you. You wouldn’t lead him on, and he’s too full of sound sense.”
“I shall have to leave the table,” said Rolph to himself. “I never felt so uncomfortable in my life. Ought I to go and get a doctor here? D – n the toadstools! I only meant the major to taste them. Who’d ever have thought that they’d all go in for them. Phew! how hot the room is. Champagne.”
The butler filled up his glass, and Rolph, in his excitement, tossed it off, with the result that the next time Morris went round, he filled the captain’s glass again.
“The thought of it all makes me feel ill,” said Rolph to himself.
“I’ve got a splendid pupil in Miss Alleyne,” said the major, sipping his wine. “I’ve given Glynne up. She can’t tell an agaric from one of the polypori. Mr Alleyne, if you’re trying to teach her star-names, you may give it up as a bad job.”
“Don’t interrupt, uncle,” said Glynne, shaking her finger at him, playfully.
“How pale the poor girl looks,” thought Rolph, who was now in an agony of apprehension. “Phew! this room is warm!” and he gulped down his glass of wine.
“Jack,” said the major, “I couldn’t have believed those fungi would be so delicious; cook has won the cordon bleu. Here, Morris, you are sure these are the same fungi?”
“Certain, sir,” replied the butler. “I took them into the kitchen myself.”
“And were they all used?”
“I think so, sir; part for the ontries in the first course.”
“What!” roared Rolph, who had been horribly guilty over that dish; and he turned white as he clutched the seat of his chair.
“Salmy of poulay ho sham pinions, sir,” said Morris, politely; and he picked a menu from the table and laid it before the captain, who refixed the glass in his eye and glared at the card.
“Do you mean to say that the hashed chicken and the other dish was made up with those con – those toadstools that were – were in that basket?”
“Yes, sir, the basket Major Day brought in, sir,” said Morris.
Sir John chuckled. The major burst into a regular roar.
“Are – are you sure, Morris?” gasped Rolph, turning a sickly yellow.
“Yes, sir; quite sure.”
“My dear fellow,” cried the major, wiping his eyes, “what is the matter?”
“I’ve – I’ve eaten a great many of them,” panted Rolph.
“Well, so we all have, and delicious they were. Why, hang it, man, they won’t poison you.”
“Don’t!” gasped Rolph, with a wild look in his eyes; and, clutching at the decanter, he poured a quantity of sherry into a tumbler and gulped it down.
“I say, Rob, are you ill?” said Sir John, kindly.
“Yes – no – I don’t know,” gasped the captain, gazing wildly from one to the other, in search of a fresh victim to the poison.
“Would you like to leave the table?” said Sir John. “Here, Morris, give Captain Rolph a liqueur of brandy.”
The butler hurriedly filled a wine glass, and the captain tossed it off as if it had been water, gazing dizzily round at the anxious faces at the table.
“Do you feel very bad, Robert?” said Glynne, rising and going round to his side to speak with great sympathy, as she softly laid her hand upon his broad shoulder.
“Horribly,” whispered the captain, who was fast losing his nerve. “Don’t you?”
“I? No. I am quite well.”
“It was those cursed toadstools,” cried Rolph, savagely.
“Nonsense, my dear sir,” said the major, firmly. “We have all eaten them, and they were delicious.”
“Give me your arm, some one,” groaned Rolph, rising from his chair; and the major caught him, and helped him from the room, Alleyne and Sir John following, after begging Lucy and Glynne to remain seated.
“Send for a doctor – quick – I’m poisoned,” said Rolph – “quick!”
“Here, send to the town,” cried Sir John. “Let a groom gallop over. No; there’s Mr Oldroyd in the village. Here, you, James, run across the park, you’ll be there in ten minutes.”
“Telegraph – physician,” gasped Rolph.
“Poor fellow! He seems bad.”
“I think,” said Alleyne, quietly, “that a good deal of it is nervous dread.”
Rolph looked daggers at him, and then closed his eyes and groaned, as he lay back on a sofa in the library.
“Have – have you telegraphed – sent a telegram?” said Rolph, after lying back with his eyes closed for a few minutes.
“I have sent for Mr Oldroyd,” said Sir John, “and we will go by his advice. It would take a man half an hour to gallop to the station. We shall have the doctor here long before that.”
