The Star-Gazers

Volume Three – Chapter Seven.

A Problem of Conjunction

Want of exercise and incessant study had placed their effects on Alleyne. The greyness was showing in streaks in his hair, and the lines seemed deeper in his forehead, as Lucy came gently into the observatory where her brother was apparently intent upon some tremendous problem.

Lucy, too, looked thinner than of old. There was a careworn aspect in her face, and her eyes told tales of tears more often shed than is the custom with young ladies as a rule.

As she entered the observatory and closed the door, she stood gazing at her brother with her hands clasped, thinking of the money that had been expended upon his scientific pursuits, keeping them all exceedingly poor, and, for result, helping to make Alleyne a worn and old-looking man.

What a thing it seemed, she thought; how changed their home and all their simple life had become, and all through their proximity to Brackley.

“I wish we had gone away from here months upon months ago,” she said to herself impatiently. “We might have been so happy anywhere else. And I thought, too, that everything was going to be so pleasant, with Glynne for my companion, only people seemed to have leagued themselves against us; and I’m sure there’s no harm in either poor Moray or myself, only we couldn’t help liking someone else. Heigho!”

“Who’s that?” cried Alleyne, starting, for Lucy’s sigh had been uttered aloud. “Oh, you, Lucy,” he said, dropping his eyes again.

“I’ve only come to see you, dear, for a little while, Moray, darling, how late you were last night.”

He started wildly, caught the hands she had laid caressingly upon his shoulders, and stared in her face.

“How did you know?” he cried hoarsely.

“Don’t, dear; you hurt me.”

He relaxed his grasp, and she felt him trembling.

“Don’t be angry with me, Moray,” she said, bursting into tears. “It was only because I loved you and suffered with you. I can’t bear to see my darling brother like this.”

“You – you were watching me?” he stammered.

“Don’t call it by that unkind title, dear,” she said. “I cannot bear it. I know how you grieve, and I have often sat at my window and seen you go out of a night, and waited till you came back. One night – don’t be angry with me, Moray,” she cried, throwing her arms about his neck – “I followed you to the Fir Mount, to see you were up there watching Glynne’s window.”

“Lucy! Last night?”

“No, no, dear,” she cried in alarm. “Don’t – don’t be so fierce with me. It was only once.”

He uttered a low, hoarse sigh as if of relief.

“It was one night when you had quite frightened me by being so despondent. I was afraid you meant to do yourself some mischief, and I stole out to see where you went. As soon as I understood why you had gone there, I came back.”

“Was it so strange a thing for an astronomer to go out to a high place where he could see some planet rise?”

Lucy was silent for a few moments.

“No, dear,” she said at last in a whisper, “nor for a man who loves to go and watch the house that holds all that is dear to him in life. But, Moray, dear, what is the matter with your hand?”

“Nothing,” he said, hastily thrusting his bandaged hand into his pocket. “Only a cut – from a knife – nothing more. There – that will do. Why did you come?”

“It is the twenty-fifth, Moray. I thought I’d come and remind you.”

“Twenty-fifth,” he said hurriedly; “twenty-fifth?”

“Yes, dear, Glynne Day’s wedding.”

She regretted speaking the next instant, as she saw her brother’s head go down upon his hand; but he looked up at her directly, and, to her surprise, with a peculiar smile.

“Thank you for reminding me, dear,” he said. “I hope she will be very happy.”

“I don’t,” cried Lucy petulantly, “and I’m sure she won’t be. Oh, how could she be so foolish as to engage herself to such a man as that!”

Alleyne did not reply, but sat gazing before him at a broad band of sunlight which cut right across the portion of the great room where he was seated. It seemed to him that Glynne was the bright bar of light that had been thrown across the dark, shadowy life that he had led; and to make the idea more real, the passing of a cloud cut the ray suddenly, and the great, chill room, with its uncouth instruments, its piles of scientific lumber, and its dust, was gloomy once again.

The bright ray had come and gone. It was but a memory now, and Alleyne uttered a sigh of relief, for he told himself that the past was dead, and he must divide it from his present existence by a broad, well-marked line.

“Have you nothing to say, Moray?” whispered Lucy at last. “Do you not understand? Are you not going to make one more effort to make her change her purpose.”

“My dear Lucy!” he said tenderly.

That was all, but he took her in his arms and kissed her, as if she were still the little child whom he used to pet and play with years before.

As soon as he released her she stood looking at him with her brows knit for a few moments, and then said, —

“Moray, should you mind very much if I were to go?”

“Go?” he said dreamily. “Go?”

“Yes; to see Glynne married.”

She saw a twitching of the nerves of his face as he realised her meaning, and was regretting her question, when he said softly, —

“No, my dear, no. Go if you wish it. Yes, go.”

He turned from her and resumed his work, making figures rapidly on a sheet of paper before him, and as he evidently wished to be alone, she stole softly out of the room.

Half-an-hour later Alleyne, who had left his work as soon as Lucy quitted him, and gone to a window which overlooked the road, saw his sister, very plainly dressed in white, go along the lane towards Brackley Church.

He did not stir, but stood watching till the white dress disappeared among the tall columnar fir trees.

Then came another figure going in the same direction, and in his moody, despairing state, Alleyne hardly noted for a few moments who it was, till the figure stopped short to turn and talk to a tall, gaunt-looking man, whom Alleyne recognised as Hayle, the man he had seen when Oldroyd was attending him, and it was the latter now speaking.

After a few minutes conversation, Alleyne saw Hayle shake his head, and go in one direction, while Oldroyd went in the other, that taken by Lucy, toward the church.

Then Alleyne turned from the window with a blank look of despair in his eyes, a strange vacant wildness of aspect in his drawn and haggard countenance. He walked to and fro. He threw himself into his great chair, but only to spring up again and pace the room with eager, hurried steps.

He sank helplessly down upon his chair once more, and rested his throbbing brow upon his hands, his misery so acute that he felt that he was going mad; but as the time went on, a dull feeling of lethargy came over him, and he sat there crouched together till Mrs Alleyne came into the room and touched him with her cold, thin hand, when he started.

“My boy!” she said tenderly, as she laid her hands upon his shoulders, “is it so hard to bear?”

“Hard? Yes, cruelly hard,” he said, with a sigh of misery.

“And in turn we have to bear these agonies,” she said softly. “I have known them, too, my boy, hours of despair when life all looked too black to be faced, and there seemed to be nothing to do but die.”

He looked at her inquiringly.

“Yes, my boy, these troubles have been mine at times, and I have thought like this – thought as you have thought since that woman came between us to blast our hearth.”

“Hush!” he cried, almost fiercely. “Not one disloyal word against her, mother. It was my ill-balanced nature led me wrong, and she never came between you and me.”

“Forgive me, my boy,” cried Mrs Alleyne, as he took her in his arms. “I know, I know. Always my own true loving son. But it seems so hard that she should have treated you as she did.”

“Hush, mother! Hush!” he replied. “She was not to blame.”

“Not to blame?” retorted Mrs Alleyne. “You defend her, but, had she not led you on by her soft words and wiles, you had never come to think of her like this. But she will repent: so sure as she marries that man, she will bitterly repent.”

“You are giving me cruel pain, mother,” said Alleyne sadly.

“My boy! my own brave boy!” cried Mrs Alleyne, clinging to him. “I will say no more! I will be silent, indeed. No word on the subject shall ever leave my lips again. There: forgive me.”

“Forgive you, mother!” he said softly, as he drew her more closely, and kissed her lips, “I have nothing to forgive. You felt what you thought to be a just indignation on my behalf. It is so easy to think those we love must be in the right, so hard to see when we alone are in the wrong. There, let us talk about it no more, for – Why, Lucy! what is the matter?”

Lucy hurried into the observatory, looking hot and excited, threw herself into a chair, sobbing hysterically, and for some time not a word could be obtained from her.

Mrs Alleyne was the first to get an answer, as she at last exclaimed, —

“Then someone has insulted you?”

“No, no!” she cried; and then more emphatically, “No! Glynne, Glynne!”

Then her sobs choked her utterance, and she hid her face in her hands, sobbing in the most violently hysterical manner, till, utterly exhausted, she lay back in the chair so still and reduced that Alleyne grew alarmed, and, hurrying out of the room, he set off for Oldroyd.

“Miss Alleyne? Taken ill?” cried the young doctor excitedly. “I’ll be with you directly. Has she heard of that terrible business?”

“Business? What business?” faltered Alleyne. “What! haven’t you heard?” cried Oldroyd in amazement. “Why, about Miss Day.”

Alleyne gazed at him enquiringly, and Oldroyd leaned forward and said a few words in Alleyne’s ear, making him sink back silent and ghastly into a chair.

Volume Three – Chapter Eight.

The Fallen Star

“There, I think everything is in train,” said Sir John, as he and his brother sat together over a final cigar before retiring for the night, for Glynne and the friends staying in the house had gone to their rooms, and the brothers were at last alone.

“Yes, Jack, all seems ready for action.”

“Except you, Jem.”

“I? – I’m ready.”

“No; you ought to have had a new suit, Jem.”

“No; I said I would not,” cried the major; “and I’ve kept to that, and that alone. I’ve given way in everything else. Let me alone there.”

“All right; all right. I say no more. Change the subject, Jem; we won’t have words to-night. Glynne looks lovely; doesn’t she?”

“Fit bride for a god,” said the major. “Bless her!”

“Amen. Calm, satisfied and happy in her choice.”

“H’m.”

The major coughed a little.

“She does, Jem,” cried Sir John hastily. “Everybody said so to-night. I should have liked that little lassie, Lucy Alleyne, to have been asked to be a bridesmaid though; but after what has passed it was as well not.”

“Yes,” said the major gruffly, “just as well not.”

“Pretty girl that Marjorie Emlin. Best looking bridesmaid we shall have.”

“Humph! yes. Can’t say I like her, Jack.”

“Prejudiced? old man.”

“Perhaps so; but those white-faced red-haired girls always have a foxey look to me. There, there, I’ve done, and I’ll play cavalier to her to-morrow if I get the chance.”

“That you will, Jem, I know. Trust you soldiers for that. Sad dogs. Why, Jem, old chap, I never said anything to you before,” chuckled Sir John, “but ’pon my soul, I thought once you were going to make play and get married before Glynne.”

The major moved uneasily in his chair, and suppressed a sigh.

“Nice little girl, Jem,” continued Sir John. “I liked her myself; but only a woman. There were rumours about her. You didn’t hear, I suppose?”

“Yes, I did,” said the major, biting hard at his cigar.

“Well, no wonder. It was enough to make the best girl in the world a little wild. Shut up in that dreary house by herself, for you can’t call it anything else.”

“Yes; dull life for a young girl,” assented the major, “Never heard – er – er – who it was?”

“I? Wouldn’t listen to the confounded scandal. Some damned chatter about her getting up at daylight to go and meet a man. Did you?”

“Hah!” said the major, drawing a deep breath; “I wouldn’t hear.”

“Right, Jem, right. By the way, I think we’ve got every one here who ought to come, and we’ll make the day go off with a swing, old fellow. Is there any fellow I ought to have asked on Miss Emlin’s account?”

“No,” said the major grimly; “you’ve got him for another purpose.”

“Eh? What do you mean?”

“She wanted Rolph herself.”

“Impossible! Why, the girl’s devotedly attached to Glynne, affectionate in the extreme. See what a beautiful diamond bracelet she has given her.”

“Yes, that kind of girl always is. It’s a way they have of showing their spite.”

“Nonsense! Who told you that rubbish?”

“The young lady’s aunt – Rob’s mother.”

“The deuce!”

“But she was quite right. She said such an union was better avoided, and that her niece had long ago acquiesced in the wisdom of the arrangement. There, my cigar’s nearly out, and I’m ready for bed.”

“Don’t hurry. I was thinking again of how well Glynne looked when she said good-night.”

“Lovely,” said the major, with a sigh.

“Rolph, too,” cried Sir John enthusiastically, and as if he had wound himself up to make the best of everything. “By George, what a specimen of a man and a soldier he looked when he went to-night. Isn’t he grand, Jem? Wouldn’t you have liked to have three or four hundred such fellows in the Indian war?”

“Yes; in the ranks,” said the major.

“Jem!”

“All right. He’s a grand specimen of humanity, and as he says hard as a brick.”

“Sorry to lose her, poor darling; but glad now when it’s over, and all this mob of company gone. Have another cigar?”

“No; past twelve, and I want to get a good night’s rest before this comes off. Good-night, Jack! God bless you, lad! Happiness for our darling shall be my prayer to-night.”

Sir John started from his seat, and caught his brother’s hands. His lips moved, but no words came for some moments, and a couple of tears trickled slowly down his cheeks.

“Thank you, Jem,” he said at last hoarsely, and the brothers separated without another word.

The butler came yawning into the little office-study to put out the lamp, and half-an-hour later the house, full as it was of relatives and wedding guests, was silent as the grave.

The clock over the stables chimed the quarters and struck the hours, while everyone slept soundly except Marjorie Emlin, who lay motionless, thinking of the coming day, and burnt up as if by a fever.

Only a few hours now and her last hope gone, and as she lay there a curious jangling sound as of the wedding bells being rung derisively by demons seemed to drive her mad.

A few hours before she had been hanging about Glynne, smiling and talking of the happy days to come, and of how dear and good and brave a fellow Rob was, and how they must both try now to wean him from his love of athletic sports, till Glynne grew weary and frowned a little, seeking her father’s society as much as attention to the friends staying in the house would allow.

Then came the good-night of all, and silence fell upon the house.

Major Day slept soundly enough, but his dreams were troubled. Lucy Alleyne had a good deal to do with them, and he lay confused, and fighting hard to go after her, and bring her back, for she was getting into a bad habit of eloping every morning at daybreak, a habit which he felt ought to be stopped, but it was impossible he felt to bring it to an end.

He was in the height of his trouble and perspiring freely when the object of Lucy’s affections seized him roughly by the shoulder and shook him.

“Jem, Jem, wake up, man; wake up!”

The major started up in bed, and the light confused him, but he made out that his brother was there half dressed holding a bell glass flat candlestick over him.

“What’s the matter?”

“Don’t know. Slip on your dressing-gown. Someone ill, I’m afraid.”

“Tut, tut, tut!” ejaculated the major, hurrying on trousers and dressing-gown in prompt military fashion, while his brother explained.

“I was fast asleep and awoke by a cry. A few moments after it came again, and I slipped on some things, got a light, and came out into the corridor.”

“Fancy.”

“No, I’m sure of it. Ready?”

“Nearly.”

“Let’s go and see then. I don’t like to be prowling about the house alone in the night.”

“Why?” said the major gruffly. “Because it’s your own?”

“Don’t banter. I feel sure that the cry came from Miss Emlin’s room.”

“Well, why not ring for the maids?”

“Because I consider it to be my duty to see if anything is the matter first. Ready?”

“Yes.”

“Come on.”

Sir John led the way out into the corridor, and the brothers listened with their shadows thrown grotesquely on the walls; but all was perfectly silent, and the major looked enquiringly at his brother.

“Well,” he said; “isn’t it a pity to disturb the house?”

“Come this way.”

Sir John led the way to one of the doors, stopped listening a few moments, and then knocked softly.

No answer, and he knocked again.

“Yes,” came in a quick musical voice; “who is there?”

“I, my dear,” said Sir John. “Don’t be alarmed. I thought I heard a cry come from your room. Are you quite well?”

“Oh, yes, thank you. I must have cried out in my sleep then. I’m afraid I do sometimes.”

“Thank you, my child. Sorry to have disturbed you. Good-night, my dear.”

“Good-night, Sir John.”

“Humph! Satisfied?” said the major gruffly.

“No, come along.”

Sir John tapped at another door, but the inmate of the room made no reply.

“Hang it all. Jack, don’t rouse up all the house,” whispered the major. “There’s nothing the matter, or someone else would have heard it.”

Just at that moment the deep baying of a dog was heard from the yard, followed by a long, low howl.

“There is something the matter,” cried Sir John, “or the dog wouldn’t make that noise. Here, let’s wake Glynne, and let her go round and see who’s ill.”

“No, no, don’t do that, man,” cried the major.

But his brother was already at his child’s door, where he knocked sharply.

“Glynne, Glynne, my dear.”

A low smothered cry, coming as if from a distance, was the response, and the dog’s baying recommenced.

Volume Three – Chapter Nine.

Torn from her Sphere

The act was simultaneous.

Moved as if by the same set of nerves, Sir John Day and his brother dashed themselves against the door again and again, but the panelling was strong, and it was evidently well fastened within, and, for the time being, the door refused to yield. Then, as the brothers literally hurled themselves against it in their rage of disappointment, the fastenings gave way, and the door flew back with a crash, while Sir John fell forward into the darkness upon his knees.

“Quick, Jem, the light,” he cried, as he gathered himself up; but the major had forestalled him, and stepped back to take the candlestick from where it had been set down.

He had just passed the threshold, casting the light before him into the chamber, when Sir John’s hand was clapped upon his shoulder, and the candlestick snatched from his hand.