第55章 CHAPTER XIV(3)

His death will be deeply resented, and may set up fresh difficulties. It is monstrous vexatious." And abruptly he asked "What did they quarrel about?"

O'Moy trembled, and his glance avoided the other's gimlet eye.

"The only quarrel that I am aware of between them," he said, "was concerned with this very enactment of your lordship's. Samoval proclaimed it infamous, and Tremayne resented the term. Hot words passed between them, but the altercation was allowed to go no further at the time by myself and others who were present."

His lordship had raised his brows. "By gad, sir," he ejaculated, "there almost appears to be some justification for the captain.

He was one of your military secretaries, was he not?"

"He was."

"Ha! Pity! Pity!" His lordship was thoughtful for a moment.

Then he dismissed the matter. "But then orders are orders, and soldiers must learn to obey implicitly. British soldiers of all degrees seem to find the lesson difficult. We must inculcate it more sternly, that is all."

O'Moy's honest soul was in torturing revolt against the falsehoods he had implied - and to this man of all men, to this man whom he reverenced above all others, who stood to him for the very fount of military honour and lofty principle! He was in such a mood that one more question on the subject from Wellington and the whole ghastly truth must have come pouring from his lips. But no other question came. Instead his lordship turned on the threshold and held out his hand.

"Not a step farther, O'Moy. I've left you a mass of work, and you are short of a secretary. So don't waste any of your time on courtesies. I shall hope still to find the ladies in the garden so that I may take my leave without inconveniencing them."

And he was gone, stepping briskly with clicking spurs, leaving O'Moy hunched now in his chair, his body the very expression of the dejection that filled his soul.

In the garden his lordship came upon Miss Armytage alone, still seated by the table under the trellis, from which the cloth had by now been removed. She rose at his approach and in spite of gesture to her to remain seated.

"I was seeking Lady O'Moy," said he, "to take my leave of her. I may not have the pleasure of coming to Monsanto again."

"She is on the terrace, I think," said Miss Armytage. "I will find her for your lordship."

"Let us find her together," he said amiably, and so turned and went with her towards the archway. "You said your name is Armytage, I think?" he commented.

"Sir Terence said so."

His eyes twinkled. "You possess an exceptional virtue," said he.

"To be truthful is common; to be accurate rare. Well, then, Sir Terence said so. Once I had a great friend of the name of Armytage.

I have lost sight of him these many years. We were at school together in Brussels."

"At Monsieur Goubert's," she surprised him by saying. "That would be John Armytage, my uncle."

"God bless my soul, ma'am!" he ejaculated. "But I gathered you were Irish, and Jack Armytage came from Yorkshire."

"My mother is Irish, and we live in Ireland now. I was born there.

But father, none the less, was John Armytage's brother."

He looked at her with increased interest, marking the straight, supple lines of her, and the handsome, high-bred face. His lordship, remember, never lacked an appreciative eye for a fine woman. "So you're Jack Armytage's niece. Give me news of him, my dear."

She did so. Jack Armytage was well and prospering, had made a rich marriage and retired from the Blues many years ago to live at Northampton. He listened with interest, and thus out of his boyhood friendship for her uncle, which of late years he had had no opportunity to express, sprang there and then a kindness for the niece. Her own personal charms may have contributed to it, for the great soldier was intensely responsive to the appeal of beauty.

They reached the terrace. Lady O'Moy was nowhere in sight. But Lord Wellington was too much engrossed in his discovery to be troubled.

"My dear," he said, "if I can serve you at any timer both for Jack's sake and your own, I hope that you will let me know of it."

She looked at him a moment, and he saw her colour come and go, arguing a sudden agitation.

"You tempt me, sir," she said, with a wistful smile.

"Then yield to the temptation, child," he urged her kindly, those keen, penetrating eyes of his perceiving trouble here.

"It isn't for myself," she responded. "Yet there is something I would ask you if I dare - something I had intended to ask you in any case if I could find the opportunity. To be frank, that is why I was waiting there in the garden just now. It was to waylay you. I hoped for a word with you."

"Well, well," he encouraged her. "It should be the easier now, since in a sense we find that we are old friends."

He was so kind, so gentle, despite that stern, strong face of his, that she melted at once to his persuasion.

" It is about Lieutenant Richard Butler," she began.

"Ah," said he lightly, "I feared as much when you said it was not for yourself you had a favour to ask."

But, looking at him, she instantly perceived how he had misunderstood her.

"Mr. Butler," she said, "is the officer who was guilty of the affair at Tavora."

He knit his brow in thought. "Butler-Tavora?" he muttered questioningly. Suddenly his memory found what it was seeking.

"Oh yes, the violated nunnery." His thin lips tightened; the sternness of his ace increased. "Yes?" he inquired, but the tone was now forbidding.

Nevertheless she was not deterred. "Mr. Butler is Lady O'Moy's brother," she said.

He stared a moment, taken aback. "Good God! Ye don't say so, child! Her brother! O'Moy's brother-in-law! And O'Moy never said a word to me about it.

"What should he say? Sir Terence himself pledged his word to the Council of Regency that Mr. Butler would be shot when taken."

"Did he, egad!" He was still further surprised out of his sternness. "Something of a Roman this O'Moy in his conception of duty! Hum! The Council no doubt demanded this?"