CHAPTER III

At eleven o'clock the next morning Miss Nevers had not arrived at Silverwood.

It was still raining hard, the brown Westchester fields, the leafless trees, hedges, paths, roads, were soaked; pools stood in hollows with the dead grass awash; ditches brimmed, river and brook ran amber riot, and alder swamps widened into lakes.

The chances were now that she would not come at all. Desboro had met both morning trains, but she was not visible, and all the passengers had departed leaving him wandering alone along the dripping platform.

For a while he stood moodily on the village bridge beyond, listening to the noisy racket of the swollen brook; and after a little it occurred to him that there was laughter in the noises of the water, like the mirth of the gods mocking him.

"Laugh on, high ones!" he said. "I begin to believe myself the ass that I appear to you."

Presently he wandered back to the station platform, where he idled about, playing with a stray and nondescript dog or two, and caressing the station-master's cat; then, when he had about decided to get into his car and go home, it suddenly occurred to him that he might telephone to New York for information. And he did so, and learned that Miss Nevers had departed that morning on business, for a destination unknown, and would not return before evening.

Also, the station-master informed him that the morning express now deposited passengers at Silverwood Station, on request – an innovation of which he had not before heard; and this put him into excellent spirits.

"Aha!" he said to himself, considerably elated. "Perhaps I'm not such an ass as I appear. Let the high gods laugh!"

So he lighted a cigarette, played with the wastrel dogs some more, flattered the cat till she nearly rubbed her head off against his legs, took a small and solemn child onto his knee and presented it with a silver dollar, while its overburdened German mother publicly nourished another.

"You are really a remarkable child," he gravely assured the infant on his knee. "You possess a most extraordinary mind!" – the child not having uttered a word or betrayed a vestige of human expression upon its slightly soiled features.

Presently the near whistle of the Connecticut Express brought him to his feet. He lifted the astonishingly gifted infant and walked out; and when the express rolled past and stopped, he set it on the day-coach platform beside its stolid parent, and waved to it an impressive adieu.

At the same moment, descending from the train, a tall young girl, in waterproofs, witnessed the proceedings, recognised Desboro, and smiled at the little ceremony taking place.

"Yours?" she inquired, as, hat off, hand extended, he came forward to welcome her – and the next moment blushed at her impulsive informality.

"Oh, all kids seem to be mine, somehow or other," he said. "I'm awfully glad you came. I was afraid you wouldn't."

"Why?"

"Because I didn't believe you really existed, for one thing. And then the weather – "

"Do you suppose mere weather could keep me from the Desboro collection? You have much to learn about me."

"I'll begin lessons at once," he said gaily, "if you don't mind giving them. Do you?"

She smiled non-committally, and looked around her at the departing vehicles.

"We have a limousine waiting for us behind the station," he said. "It's five muddy miles."

"I had been wondering all the way up in the train just how I was to get to Silverwood – "

"You didn't suppose I'd leave you to find your way, did you?"

"Business people don't expect limousines," she said, with an unmistakable accent that sounded priggish even to herself – so prim, indeed, that he laughed outright; and she finally laughed, too.

"This is very jolly, isn't it?" he remarked, as they sped away through the rain.

She conceded that it was.

"It's going to be a most delightful day," he predicted.

She thought it was likely to be a busy day.

"And delightful, too," he insisted politely.

"Why particularly delightful, Mr. Desboro?"

"I thought you were looking forward with keen pleasure to your work in the Desboro collection!"

She caught a latent glimmer of mischief in his eye, and remained silent, not yet quite certain that she liked this constant running fire of words that always seemed to conceal a hint of laughter at her expense.

Had they been longer acquainted, and on a different footing, she knew that whatever he said would have provoked a response in kind from her. But friendship is not usually born from a single business interview; nor is it born perfect, like a fairy ring, over night. And it was only last night, she made herself remember, that she first laid eyes on Desboro. Yet it seemed curious that whatever he said seemed to awaken in her its echo; and, though she knew it was an absurd idea, the idea persisted that she already began to understand this young man better than she had ever understood any other of his sex.

He was talking now at random, idly but agreeably, about nothing in particular. She, muffled in the fur robe, looked out through the limousine windows into the rain, and saw brown fields set with pools in every furrow, and squares of winter wheat, intensely green.

And now the silver birch woods, which had given the house its name, began to appear as outlying clumps across the hills; and in a few moments the car swung into a gateway under groves of solemnly-dripping Norway spruces, then up a wide avenue, lined with ranks of leafless, hardwood trees and thickets of laurel and rhododendron, and finally stopped before a house made of grayish-brown stone, in the rather inoffensive architecture of early eighteen hundred.

Mrs. Quant, in best bib and tucker, received them in the hallway, having been instructed by Desboro concerning her attitude toward the expected guest. But when she became aware of the slender youth of the girl, she forgot her sniffs and misgivings, and she waddled, and bobbed, and curtsied, overflowing with a desire to fondle, and cherish, and instruct, which only fear of Desboro choked off.

But as soon as Jacqueline had followed her to the room assigned, and had been divested of wet outer-clothing, and served with hot tea, Mrs. Quant became loquacious and confidential concerning her own personal ailments and sorrows, and the history and misfortunes of the Desboro family.

Jacqueline wished to decline the cup of tea, but Mrs. Quant insisted; and the girl yielded.

"Air you sure you feel well, Miss Nevers?" she asked anxiously.

"Why, of course."

"Don't be too sure," said Mrs. Quant ominously. "Sometimes them that feels bestest is sickest. I've seen a sight of sickness in my day, dearie – typod, mostly. You ain't never had typod, now, hev you?"

"Typhoid?"

"Yes'm, typod!"

"No, I never did."

"Then you take an old woman's advice, Miss Nevers, and don't you go and git it!"

Jacqueline promised gravely; but Mrs. Quant was now fairly launched on her favourite topic.

"I've been forty-two years in this place – and Quant – my man – he was head farmer here when he was took. Typod, it was, dearie – and you won't never git it if you'll listen to me – and Quant, a man that never quarreled with his vittles, but he was for going off without 'em that morning. Sez he, 'Cassie, I don't feel good this mornin'!' – and a piece of pie and a pork chop layin' there onto his plate. 'My vittles don't set right,' sez he; 'I ain't a mite peckish.' Sez I, 'Quant, you lay right down, and don't you stir a inch! You've gone and got a mild form of typod,' sez I, knowing about sickness as I allus had a gift, my father bein' a natural bone-setter. And those was my very words, dearie, 'a mild form of typod.' And I was right and he was took. And when folks ain't well, it's mostly that they've got a mild form of typod which some call malairy – "

There was no stopping her; Jacqueline tasted her hot tea and listened sympathetically to that woman of many sorrows. And, sipping her tea, she was obliged to assist at the obsequies of Quant, the nativity of young Desboro, the dissolution of his grandparents and parents, and many, many minor details, such as the freezing of water-pipes in 1907, the menace of the chestnut blight, mysterious maladies which had affected cattle and chickens on the farm – every variety of death, destruction, dissolution, and despondency that had been Mrs. Quant's portion to witness.

And how she gloried in detailing her dismal career; and presently pessimistic prophecies for the future became plainer as her undammed eloquence flowed on:

"And Mr. James, he ain't well, neither," she said in a hoarse whisper. "He don't know it, and he won't listen to me, dearie, but I know he's got a mild form of typod – he's that unwell the mornings when he's been out late in the city. Say what you're a mind to, typod is typod! And if you h'ain't got it you're likely to git it most any minute; but he won't swaller the teas and broths and suffusions I bring him, and he'll be took like everybody else one of these days, dearie – which he wouldn't if he'd listen to me – "

"Mrs. Quant," came Desboro's voice from the landing.

"Y – yes, sir," stammered that guilty and agitated Cassandra.

Jacqueline set aside her teacup and came to the stairs; their glances met in the suppressed amusement of mutual comprehension, and he conducted her to the hallway below, where a big log fire was blazing.

"What was it – death, destruction, and general woe, as usual?" he asked.

"And typod," she whispered. "It appears that you have it!"

"Poor old soul! She means all right; but imagine me here with her all day, dodging infusions and broths and red flannel! Warm your hands at the blaze, Miss Nevers, and I'll find the armoury keys. It will be a little colder in there."

She spread her hands to the flames, conscious of his subtle change of manner toward her, now that she was actually under his roof – and liked him for it – not in the least surprised that she was comprehending still another phase of this young man's most interesting personality.

For, without reasoning, her slight misgivings concerning him were vanishing; instinct told her she might even permit herself a friendlier manner, and she looked up smilingly when he came back swinging a bunch of keys.

"These belong to the Quant," he explained, " – honest old soul! Every gem and ivory and lump of jade in the collection is at her mercy, for here are the keys to every case. Now, Miss Nevers, what do you require? Pencil and pad?"

"I have my note-book, thanks – a new one in your honour."

He said he was flattered and led the way through a wide corridor to the eastern wing; unlocked a pair of massive doors, and swung them wide. And, beside him, she walked into the armoury of the famous Desboro collection.

Straight ahead of her, paved with black marble, lay a lane through a double rank of armed and mounted men in complete armour; and she could scarcely suppress a little cry of surprise and admiration.

"This is magnificent!" she exclaimed; and he saw her cheeks brighten, and her breath coming faster.

"It is fine," he said soberly.

"It is, indeed, Mr. Desboro! That is a noble array of armour. I feel like some legendary princess of long ago, passing her chivalry in review as I move between these double ranks. What a wonderful collection! All Spanish and Milanese mail, isn't it? Your grandfather specialised?"

"I believe he did. I don't know very much about the collection, technically."

"Don't you care for it?"

"Why, yes – more, perhaps, than I realised – now that you are actually here to take it away."

"But I'm not going to put it into a magic pocket and flee to New York with it!"

She spoke gaily, and his face, which had become a little grave, relaxed into its habitual expression of careless good humour.

They had slowly traversed the long lane, and now, turning, came back through groups of men-at-arms, pikemen, billmen, arquebussiers, crossbowmen, archers, halbardiers, slingers – all the multitudinous arms of a polyglot service, each apparently equipped with his proper weapon and properly accoutred for trouble.

Once or twice she glanced at the trophies aloft on the walls, every group bunched behind its shield and radiating from it under the drooping remnants of banners emblazoned with arms, crests, insignia, devices, and quarterings long since forgotten, except by such people as herself.

She moved gracefully, leisurely, pausing now and then before some panoplied manikin, Desboro sauntering beside her. Now and then she stopped to inspect an ancient piece of ordnance, wonderfully wrought and chased, now and then halted on tip-toe to lift some slitted visor and peer into the dusky cavern of the helmet, where a painted face stared back at her out of painted eyes.

"Who scours all this mail?" she asked.

"Our old armourer. My grandfather trained him. But he's very old and rheumatic now, and I don't let him exert himself. I think he sleeps all winter, like a woodchuck, and fishes all summer."

"You ought to have another armourer."

"I can't turn Michael out to starve, can I?"

She swung around swiftly: "I didn't mean that!" and saw he was laughing at her.

"I know you didn't," he said. "But I can't afford two armourers. That's the reason I'm disposing of these tin-clothed tenants of mine – to economise and cut expenses."

She moved on, evidently desiring to obtain a general impression of the task before her, now and then examining the glass-encased labels at the feet of the figures, and occasionally shaking her head. Already the errant lock curled across her cheek.

"What's the trouble?" he inquired. "Aren't these gentlemen correctly ticketed?"

"Some are not. That suit of gilded mail is not Spanish; it's German. It is not very difficult to make such a mistake sometimes."

Steam heat had been put in, but the vast hall was chilly except close to the long ranks of oxidised pipes lining the walls. They stood a moment, leaning against them and looking out across the place, all glittering with the mail-clad figures.