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  THE GOLDEN SILENCE

  BOOKS BY

  C. N. and A. M. WILLIAMSON

  THE MOTOR MAID LORD LOVELAND DISCOVERS AMERICA SET IN SILVER THE LIGHTNING CONDUCTOR THE PRINCESS PASSES MY FRIEND THE CHAUFFEUR LADY BETTY ACROSS THE WATER ROSEMARY IN SEARCH OF A FATHER THE PRINCESS VIRGINIA THE CAR OF DESTINY THE CHAPERON

  "'Allah sends thee a man--a strong man, whose brain and heart and arm are at thy service'"

  THE GOLDEN SILENCE

  by

  C.N. & A.M. WILLIAMSON

 

  Illustrated by GEORGE BREHM

  GARDEN CITY, NEW YORK DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY 1911

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED, INCLUDING THAT OF TRANSLATION INTO FOREIGN LANGUAGES, INCLUDING THE SCANDINAVIAN

  COPYRIGHT, 1910, BY C. N. & A. M. WILLIAMSON

  TO

  _Effendi_

  HIS BOOK

  THE GOLDEN SILENCE

  I

  Stephen Knight was very angry, though he meant to be kind and patientwith Margot. Perhaps, after all, she had not given the interview to thenewspaper reporter. It might be what she herself would call a "fake."But as for her coming to stop at a big, fashionable hotel like theCarlton, in the circumstances she could hardly have done anything inworse taste.

  He hated to think that she was capable of taking so false a step. Hehated to think that it was exactly like her to take it. He hated to beobliged to call on her in the hotel; and he hated himself for hating it.

  Knight was of the world that is inclined to regard servants as automata;but he was absurdly self-conscious as he saw his card on a silver tray,in the hand of an expressionless, liveried youth who probably had thefamous interview in his pocket. If not there, it was only because thepaper would not fit in. The footman had certainly read the interview,and followed the "Northmorland Case" with passionate interest, formonths, from the time it began with melodrama, and turned violently totragedy, up to the present moment when (as the journalists neatlycrammed the news into a nutshell) "it bade fair to end withmarriage-bells."

  Many servants and small tradespeople in London had taken shares, Stephenhad heard, as a speculative investment, in the scheme originated toprovide capital for the "other side," which was to return a hundred percent. in case of success. Probably the expressionless youth wasinwardly reviling the Northmorland family because he had lost his moneyand would be obliged to carry silver trays all the rest of his life,instead of starting a green grocery business. Stephen hoped that his ownface was as expressionless, as he waited to receive the unwelcomemessage that Miss Lorenzi was at home.

  It came very quickly, and in a worse form than Stephen had expected.Miss Lorenzi was in the Palm Court, and would Mr. Knight please come toher there?

  Of course he had to obey; but it was harder than ever to remainexpressionless.

  There were a good many people in the Palm Court, and they all looked atStephen Knight as he threaded his intricate way among chairs and littletables and palms, toward a corner where a young woman in black crape saton a pink sofa. Her hat was very large, and a palm with enormousfan-leaves drooped above it like a sympathetic weeping willow on amourning brooch. But under the hat was a splendidly beautiful dark face.

  "Looks as if he were on his way to be shot," a man who knew all aboutthe great case said to a woman who had lunched with him.

  "Looks more as if he were on his way to shoot," she laughed, as one doeslaugh at other people's troubles, which are apt to be ridiculous. "He'ssimply glaring."

  "Poor beggar!" Her companion found pleasure in pitying LordNorthmorland's brother, whom he had never succeeded in getting to know."Which is he, fool or hero?"

  "Both. A fool to have proposed to the girl. A hero to stick to her, nowhe has proposed. He must be awfully sick about the interview. I do thinkit's excuse enough to throw her over."

  "I don't know. It's the sort of business a man can't very well chuck,once he's let himself in for it. Every one blames him now for havinganything to do with Miss Lorenzi. They'd blame him a lot more forthrowing her over."

  "Women wouldn't."

  "No. Because he happens to be young and good-looking. But all hispopularity won't make the women who like him receive his wife. She isn'ta woman's woman."

  "I should think not, indeed! We're too clever to be taken in by thatsort, all eyes and melodrama. They say Lord Northmorland warned hisbrother against her, and prophesied she'd get hold of him, if he didn'tlet her alone. The Duchess of Amidon told Lady Peggy Lynch--whom I knowa little--that immediately after Lorenzi committed suicide, this Margotgirl wrote to Stephen Knight and implored him to help her. I can quitebelieve she would. Fancy the daughter of the unsuccessful claimant tohis brother's title writing begging letters to a young man like StephenKnight! It appeals to one's sense of humour."

  "What a pity Knight didn't see it in that light--what?"

  "Yet he has a sense of humour, I believe. It's supposed to be one of hischarms. But the sense of humour often fails where one's own affairs areconcerned. You know he's celebrated for his quaint ideas about life.They say he has socialistic views, or something rather like them. Hisbrother and he are as different from one another as light is fromdarkness. Stephen gives away a lot of money, and Lady Peggy says thatnobody ever asks him for anything in vain. He can't stand seeing peopleunhappy, if he can do anything to help. Probably, after he'd been kindto the Lorenzi girl, against his brother's advice, and gone to see her afew times, she grovelled at his feet and told him she was all alone inthe world, and would die if he didn't love her. He's just young enoughand romantic enough to be caught in that way!"

  "He's no boy. He must be nearly thirty."

  "All nice, normal men are boys until after thirty. Lady Peggy's new namefor this poor child is the Martyr Knight."

  "St. Stephen the Second is the last thing I heard. Stephen the First wasa martyr too, wasn't he? Stoned to death or something."

  "I believe so," hastily returned the lady, who was not learned inmartyrology. "He will be stoned, too, if he tries to force Miss Lorenzion his family, or even on his friends. He'll find that he'll have totake her abroad."

  "That might be a good working plan. Foreigners wouldn't shudder at heraccent. And she's certainly one of the most gorgeously beautifulcreatures I ever saw."

  "Yes, that's just the right expression. Gorgeous. And--a _creature_."

  They both laughed, and fell to talking again of the interview.

  Stephen Knight's ears were burning. He could not hear any of the thingspeople were saying; but he had a lively imagination, and, alwayssensitive, he had grown morbidly so since the beginning of theNorthmorland-Lorenzi case, when all the failings and eccentricities ofthe family had been reviewed before the public eye, like a succession ofcinematograph pictures. It did not occur to Stephen that he was anobject of pity, but he felt that through his own folly and that ofanother, he had become a kind of scarecrow, a figure of fun: and becauseuntil now the worl
d had laughed with instead of at him, he would ratherhave faced a shower of bullets than a ripple of ridicule.

  "How do you do?" he inquired stiffly, and shook Miss Lorenzi's hand asshe gave it without rising from the pink sofa. She gazed up at him withimmense, yellowish brown eyes, then fluttered her long black lashes in away she had, which was thrilling--the first time you saw it. But Stephenhad seen it often.

  "I am glad you've come, my White Knight!" she said in her contraltovoice, which would have been charming but for a crude accent. "I was soafraid you were cross."

  "I'm not cross, only extremely ang--vexed if you really did talk to thatjournalist fellow," Stephen answered, trying not to speak sharply, andkeeping his tone low. "Only, for Heaven's sake, Margot, don't callme--what you did call me--anywhere, but especially here, where we mightas well be on the stage of a theatre."

  "Nobody can hear us," she defended herself. "You ought to like that dearlittle name I made up because you came to my rescue, and saved me fromfollowing my father--came into my life as if you'd been a modern St.George. Calling you my 'White Knight' shows you how I feel--how Iappreciate you and everything. If you just _would_ realize that, youcouldn't scold me."

  "I'm not scolding you," he said desperately. "But couldn't you havestopped in your sitting-room--I suppose you have one--and let me see youthere? It's loathsome making a show of ourselves----"

  "I _haven't_ a private sitting-room. It would have been tooextravagant," returned Miss Lorenzi. "Please sit down--by me."

  Stephen sat down, biting his lip. He must not begin to lecture her, oreven to ask why she had exchanged her quiet lodgings for the CarltonHotel, because if he once began, he knew that he would be carried on tounsafe depths. Besides, he was foolish enough to hate hurting a woman'sfeelings, even when she most deserved to have them hurt.

  "Very well. It can't be helped now. Let us talk," said Stephen. "Thefirst thing is, what to do with this newspaper chap, if you didn't givehim the interview----"

  "Oh, I did give it--in a way," she admitted, looking rather frightened,and very beautiful. "You mustn't do anything to him. But--of course itwas only because I thought it would be better to tell him the truth.Surely it was?"

  "Surely it wasn't. You oughtn't to have received him."

  "Then do you mind so dreadfully having people know you've asked me tomarry you, and that I've said 'yes'?"

  Margot Lorenzi's expression of pathetic reproach was as effective as hereyelash play, when seen for the first time, as Stephen knew to hissorrow. But he had seen the one as often as the other.

  "You must know I didn't mean anything of the sort. Oh, Margot, if youdon't understand, I'm afraid you're hopeless."

  "If you speak like that to me, I shall simply end everything as myfather did," murmured the young woman, in a stifled, breaking voice. Buther eyes were blazing.

  It almost burst from Stephen to order her not to threaten him again, totell her that he was sick of melodrama, sick to the soul; but he keptsilence. She was a passionate woman, and perhaps in a moment of madnessshe might carry out her threat. He had done a great deal to save herlife--or, as he thought, to save it. After going so far he must not failnow in forbearance. And worse than having to live with beautiful,dramatic Margot, would it be to live without her if she killed herselfbecause of him.

  "Forgive me. I didn't mean to hurt you," he said when he could controlhis voice.

  She smiled. "No, of course you didn't. It was stupid of me to fly out. Iought to know that you're always good. But I _don't_ see what harm theinterview could do you, or me, or any one. It lets all the world knowhow gloriously you've made up to me for the loss of the case, and theloss of my father; and how you came into my life just in time to save mefrom killing myself, because I was utterly alone, defeated, withoutmoney or hope."

  She spoke with the curiously thrilling emphasis she knew how to give herwords sometimes, and Stephen could not help thinking she did credit toher training. She had been preparing for the stage in Canada, thecountry of the Lorenzis' adoption, before her father brought her toEngland, whither he came with a flourish of trumpets to contest LordNorthmorland's rights to the title.

  "The world knew too much about our affairs already," Stephen saidaloud. "And when you wished our engagement to be announced in _TheMorning Post_, I had it put in at once. Wasn't that enough?"

  "Every one in the world doesn't read _The Morning Post_. But I shouldthink every one in the world has read that interview, or will soon,"retorted Margot. "It appeared only yesterday morning, and was copied inall the evening papers; in this morning's ones too; and they say it'sbeen cabled word for word to the big Canadian and American dailies."

  Stephen had his gloves in his hand, and he tore a slit across the palmof one, without knowing it. But Margot saw. He was thinking of theheading in big black print at the top of the interview: "Romantic Climaxto the Northmorland-Lorenzi Case. Only Brother of Lord Northmorland toMarry the Daughter of Dead Canadian Claimant. Wedding Bells Relieve Noteof Tragedy."

  "We've nothing to be ashamed of--everything to be proud of," MissLorenzi went on. "You, of your own noble behaviour to me, which, as Isaid to the reporter, must be making my poor father happy in anotherworld. Me, because I have won You, _far_ more than because some day Ishall have gained all that father failed to win for me and himself. Hisheart was broken, and he took his own life. My heart would have beenbroken too, and but for you I----"

  "Don't, please," Stephen broke in. "We won't talk any more about theinterview. I'd like to forget it. I should have called here yesterday,as I wired in answer to your telegram saying you were at the Carlton,but being at my brother's place in Cumberland, I couldn't get backtill----"

  "Oh, I understand," Margot cut in. Then she laughed a sly little laugh."I think I understand too why you went to Cumberland. Now tell me.Confession's good for the soul. Didn't your brother wire for you theminute he saw that announcement in _The Morning Post_, day beforeyesterday?"

  "He did wire. Or rather the Duchess did, asking me to go at once toCumberland, on important business. I found your telegram, forwarded frommy flat, when I got to Northmorland Hall. If I'd known you were moving,I wouldn't have gone till to-day."

  "You mean, dear, you wouldn't have let me move? Now, do you thinkthere's any harm in a girl of my age being alone in a hotel? If you do,it's dreadfully old-fashioned of you. I'm twenty-four."

  During the progress of the case, it had been mentioned in court that theclaimant's daughter was twenty-nine (exactly Stephen Knight's age); butMargot ignored this unfortunate slip, and hoped that Stephen and othershad forgotten.

  "No actual harm. But in the circumstances, why be conspicuous? Weren'tyou comfortable with Mrs. Middleton? She seemed a miraculously nice oldbody for a lodging-house keeper, and fussed over you no end----"

  "It was for your sake that I wanted to be in a good hotel, now ourengagement has been announced," explained Miss Lorenzi. "I didn't thinkit suitable for the Honourable Stephen Knight's future wife to go onliving in stuffy lodgings. And as you've insisted on my accepting anincome of eighty pounds a month till we're married, I'm able to afford alittle luxury, dearest. I can tell you it's a pleasure, after all I'vesuffered!--and I felt I owed you something in return for yourgenerosity. I wanted your _fiancee_ to do you credit in the eyes of theworld."

  Stephen bit his lip. "I see," he said slowly.

  Yet what he saw most clearly was a very different picture. Margot as shehad seemed the day he met her first, in the despised South Kensingtonlodgings, whither he had been implored to come in haste, if he wished tosave a wretched, starving girl from following her father out of a cruelworld. Of course, he had seen her in court, and had reluctantlyencountered her photograph several times before he had given up lookingat illustrated papers for fear of what he might find in them. ButMargot's tragic beauty, as presented by photographers, or as seen froma distance, loyally seated at the claimant's side, was as nothing to thedark splendour of her despair when the claimant was in his new-madegrave. It
was the day after the burial that she had sent for Stephen;and her letter had arrived, as it happened, when he was thinking of thegirl, wondering whether she had friends who would stand by her, orwhether a member of his family might, without being guilty of bad taste,dare offer help.

  Her tear-blotted letter had settled that doubt, and it had been sodespairing, so suggestive of frenzy in its wording, that Stephen hadimpulsively rushed off to South Kensington at once, without stopping tothink whether it would not be better to send a representative combiningthe gentleness of the dove with the wisdom of the serpent, and armed foremergencies with a blank cheque.

  Margot's hair, so charmingly dressed now, folding in soft dark waves oneither side her face, almost hiding the pink-tipped ears, had beentumbled, that gloomy afternoon six weeks ago, with curls escaping hereand there; and in the course of their talk a great coil had fallen downover her shoulders. It was the sort of thing that happens to the heroineof a melodrama, if she has plenty of hair; but Stephen did not think ofthat then. He thought of nothing except his sympathy for a beautifulgirl brought, through no fault of her own, to the verge of starvationand despair, and of how he could best set about helping her.

  She had not even money enough to buy mourning. Lorenzi had left debtswhich she could not pay. She had no friends. She did not know what wasto become of her. She had not slept for many nights. She had made up hermind to die as her father had died, because it seemed the only thing todo, when suddenly the thought of Stephen had flashed into her mind, asif sent there by her guardian angel. She had heard that he was good andcharitable to everybody, and once she had seen him looking at herkindly, in court, as if he were sorry for her, and could read somethingof what was in her heart. She had imagined it perhaps. But would heforgive her for writing to him? Would he help her, and save her life?

  Any one who knew Stephen could have prophesied what his answer would be.He had hated it when she snatched his hand to kiss at the end of theirinterview; but he would scarcely have been a human young man if he hadnot felt a sudden tingle of the blood at the touch of such lips asMargot Lorenzi's. Never had she seemed so beautiful to him since thatfirst day; but he had called again and again, against his brother'surgent advice (when he had confessed the first visit); and the storythat the Duchess of Amidon was telling her friends, though foundedentirely on her own imagination of the scene which had brought aboutStephen's undoing, was not very far from the truth.

  Now, he saw a picture of Margot as he had seen her in the lodgings shehated; and he wished to heaven that he might think of her as he hadthought of her then.

  "I've got something important to say to you," the girl went on, when sherealized that Stephen intended to dismiss the subject of the hotel, ashe had dismissed the subject of the interview. "That's the reason Iwired. But I won't speak a word till you've told me what your brotherand the Duchess of Amidon think about you and me."

  "There's nothing to tell," Stephen answered almost sullenly. And indeedthere was no news of his Cumberland visit which it would be pleasant orwise to retail.

  Margot Lorenzi's complexion was not one of her greatest beauties. It wasslightly sallow, so she made artistic use of a white cosmetic, whichgave her skin the clearness of a camellia petal. But she had beenputting on rather more than usual since her father's death, because itwas suitable as well as becoming to be pale when one was in deepmourning. Consequently Margot could not turn perceptibly whiter, but shefelt the blood go ebbing away from her face back upon her heart.

  "Stephen! Don't they mean to receive me, when we're married?" shestammered.

  "I don't think they've much use for either of us," Stephen hedged, tosave her feelings. "Northmorland and I have never been great pals, youknow. He's twenty years older than I am; and since he married theDuchess of Amidon----"

  "And her money! Oh, it's no use beating about the bush. I hate themboth. Lord Northmorland has a fiendish, vindictive nature."

  "Come, you mustn't say that, Margot. He has nothing of the sort. He's acurious mixture. A man of the world, and a bit of a Puritan----"

  "So are you a Puritan, at heart," she broke in.

  Stephen laughed. "No one ever accused me of Puritanism before."

  "Maybe you've never shown any one else that side of you, as you show itto me. You're always being shocked at what I do and say."

  For that, it was hardly necessary to be a Puritan. But Stephen shruggedhis shoulders instead of answering.

  "Your brother is a cold-hearted tyrant, and his wife is a snob. If sheweren't, she wouldn't hang on to her duchess-hood after marrying again.It would be good enough for _me_ to call myself Lady Northmorland, and Ihope I shall some day."

  Stephen's sensitive nostrils quivered. He understood in that moment howa man might actually wish to strike a nagging virago of a woman, nomatter how beautiful. And he wondered with a sickening heaviness ofheart how he was to go on with the wretched business of his engagement.But he pushed the question out of his mind, fiercely. He was in for thisthing now. He _must_ go on.

  "Let all that alone, won't you?" he said, in a well-controlled tone.

  "I can't," Margot exclaimed. "I hate your brother. He killed myfather."

  "Because he defended the honour of our grandfather, and upheld his ownrights, when Mr. Lorenzi came to England to dispute them?"

  "Who knows if they _were_ his rights, or my father's? My father believedthey were his, or he wouldn't have crossed the ocean and spent all hismoney in the hope of stepping into your brother's shoes."

  There were those--and Lord Northmorland and the Duchess of Amidon wereamong them--who did not admit that Lorenzi had believed in his "rights."And as for the money he had spent in trying to establish a legal claimto the Northmorland title and estates, it had not been his own, but lenthim by people he had hypnotized with his plausible eloquence.

  "That question was decided in court----"

  "It would be harder for a foreigner to get an English nobleman's titleaway than for a camel to go through the eye of the tiniest needle in theworld. But never mind. All that's buried in his grave, and you're givingme everything father wanted me to have. I wish I could keep my horridtemper better in hand, and I'd never make you look so cross. But Iinherited my emotional nature from Margherita Lorenzi, I suppose. Whatcan you expect of a girl who had an Italian prima donna for agrandmother? And I oughtn't to quarrel with the fair Margherita forleaving me her temper, since she left me her face too, and I'm fairlywell satisfied with that. Everybody says I'm the image of mygrandmother. And you ought to know, after seeing her picture in dozensof illustrated papers, as well as in that pamphlet poor fatherpublished."

  "If you want me to tell you that you are one of the handsomest women whoever lived, I'll do so at once," said Stephen.

  Margot smiled. "You really mean it?"

  "There couldn't be two opinions on that subject."

  "Then, if you think I'm so beautiful, don't let your brother and hissnobbish Duchess spoil my life."

  "They can't spoil it."

  "Yes, they can. They can keep me from being a success in their set, yourset--the _only_ set."

  "Perhaps they can do that. But England isn't the only country, anyhow.I've been thinking that when--by and by--we might take a long trip roundthe world----"

  "_Hang_ the world! England's my world. I've always looked forward toEngland, ever since I was a little thing, before mamma died, and I usedto hear father repeating the romantic family story--how, if he couldonly find his mother's letters that she'd tried to tell him about whenshe was dying, perhaps he might make a legal claim to a title and afortune. He used to turn to me and say: 'Maybe you'll be a great ladywhen you grow up, Margot, and I shall be an English viscount.' Then,when he did find the letters, behind the secret partition ingrandmother's big old-fashioned sandal-wood fan-box, of which you'veheard so much----"

  "Too much, please, Margot."

  "I _beg_ your pardon! But anyway, you see why I want to live in England.My life and soul are bound up in my success here. An
d I could have asuccess. You know I could. I am beautiful. I haven't seen any womanwhose face I'd change for mine. I won't be cheated out of myhappiness----"

  "Very well, we'll live in England, then. That's settled," said Stephen,hastily. "And you shall have all the success, all the happiness, that Ican possibly give you. But we shall have to get on without any help frommy brother and sister-in-law, and perhaps without a good many otherpeople you might like to have for friends. It may seem hard, but youmust make up your mind to it, Margot. Luckily, there'll be enough moneyto do pleasant things with; and people don't matter so immensely, onceyou've got used to----"

  "They do, they do! The right people. I _shall_ know them."

  "You must have patience. Everybody is rather tired of our names justnow. Things may change some day. I'm ready to begin the experimentwhenever you are."

  "You are a dear," said Margot. And Stephen did not even shiver. "Thatbrings me to what I had to tell you. It's this: after all, we can't bemarried quite as soon as we expected."

  "Can't we?" he echoed the words blankly. Was this to be a reprieve? Buthe was not sure that he wanted a reprieve. He thought, the sooner theplunge was made, the better, maybe. Looking forward to it had becomealmost unbearable.

  "No, I _must_ run over to Canada first, Stephen. I've just begun to seethat. You might say, I could go there with you after we were married,but it wouldn't be the same thing at all. I ought to stay with some ofmy old friends while I'm still Margot Lorenzi. A lot of people wereawfully good to father, and I must show my gratitude. The sooner I sailthe better, now the news of our engagement has got ahead of me. Ineedn't stop away very long. Seven or eight weeks--or nine at most,going and coming."

  "Would you like to be married in Canada?" Stephen asked; perhaps partlyto please her, but probably more to disguise the fact that he had noimpatient objections to raise against her plan. "If you wished, I couldgo whenever----"

  "Oh no, no!" she exclaimed quickly. "I wouldn't have you come there foranything in the world. That is. I mean----" she corrected herself withan anxious, almost frightened side glance at him--"I must fight it outalone. No, I don't mean that either. What a stupid way of putting it!But it would bore you dreadfully to take such a journey, and it would benicer anyhow to be married in England--perhaps at St. George's. Thatused to be my dream, when I was a romantic little girl, and loved tostuff my head full of English novels. I should adore a wedding at St.George's. And oh, Stephen, you won't change your mind while I'm gone? Itwould kill me if you jilted me after all. I shouldn't live a single day,if you weren't true."

  "Don't talk nonsense, my dear girl. Of course I'm not going to changemy mind," said Stephen. "When do you want to sail?"

  "The end of this week. You're sure you won't let your brother and thatcruel Duchess talk you over? I----"

  "There's not the slightest chance of their talking to me at all,"Stephen answered sharply. "We've definitely quarrelled."