Prisoners and Captives

Evening Star, Issue 9807, 21 September 1895, Page 1 (Supplement)

Prisoners and Captives

By Henhy Seton Merriman (Author of ‘Young Mistley,’ ‘The Phantom Future,’ ‘Suspense’).

VOLUME 111,

CHAPTER V. EASTON TAKES COUNSEL,

At the risk of being accused of betraying the secrets of the sex, this opportunity is taken of recording an observation made respecting men. It is simply this : that we all turn sooner or later to some woman in our difficulties. And when a man has gone irretrievably to the dogs, his descent is explicable by the simple argument that he happened to turn to the wrong woman. Matthew Mark Easton had hitherto got along fairly well without femiuiuc interference, but this in no manner detracted from his respect for feminine astuteness. This respect now urged him to brush his hat very carefully one afternoon, purchase a new flower for his button-hole, .and drive to Miss Winter’s.

He found that lady at home and alone. “ I thought,” he said, as he entered the room and placed his hat caretfslily on the piano, “that I should find you at home this afternoon. It is so Euglish outside. Excuse ray apparent solicitude for my hat. It is a new one. Left its predecessor at the Epic.”

“ The weather does not usually affect my movements,” replied Miss Winter. “I am glad you came this afternoon, because I am not often to be found at home at this time.”

“ Oh !” he answered, coolly, as he accepted ■the chair she indicated. I should have gone •on coming right along till I found yoli in.” Easton's way of making remarks of this description sometimes made an answer ■superfluous, and Miss Winter took it in this light now. She laughed and said nothing, obviously waiting for him to start some new ■subject.

He sat quietly and looked with perfect self-possession, not at the carpet or the ceiling, as is usual on such occasions, but at her. At last it was borne in upon him that ihe had not called for this purpose, pleasant as the exercise of it might be ; so he spoke. “Then,” he said, conversationally, “you go out mostly in the afternoons?” “Yes; I am out a great deal. I have calls to make and shops to look at, and I often take tea with Helen.”

His little nod seemed to say “Yes; I know of that friendship.” “And,” he continued, with a vast display of the deepest interest, “ I surmise that you So in a close carriage, so that the weather oea not hinder you.”

“No; I only have an open carriage, a Victoria.” “Ah!” “It is a very convenient vehicle—so easy' of access.”

“ Yes; so I should surmise.” “ And it is light for the horse.” “Runs easily?” he inquired, almost «agerly. “Yes, it runs easily.”

Then they seemed to come to a full-stop again. She racked her brain for some subject of sufficient interest and not too far removed from the safe topic of weather. It was a ludicrous position for two persons ■of their experience and mi'oir-faire. At last Miss Winter gave way to a sudden impulse without waiting to thick to what cad the beginning might lead. “How is Mr Tyars?” she asked. “He is well,” was the answer, “thank you. His arm is knitting nicely.” There was a little pause, then he added with a marked drawl (an Americanism to which he rarely gave way): “Ho—w is Miss Grace?” Agnes Winter looked up sharply. They had got there already, and her loyalty to friend and sex was up iu arms. And yet she had foreseen it surely all along. She had known from the moment of his entering the room that this point was destined to be reached, Matthew Mark Easton met the gaze of those clever northern eyes with a half smile. His own quick glance was alert and mobile. His look seemed to flit from her eyes to her lips and from her lips to her hands with a sparkling, vitality impossible to follow. They seemed to be taking mental measure each of the other in friendly antagonism, like two fencers with buttoned foils. She gave a little short laugh, half pleased, half embarrassed, like the laugh of some fair masker when she finds herself forced to lay aside her mask. “ I wonder,” she said, “how much you know !” The strange, wrinkled face fell at once Into an expression of gravity which rendered ft somewhat wistful and almost ludicrous. “ Nothing—l guess !” “How much you surmise ” she amended, unconsciously using a word towards which he had a decided conversational penchant. “Everything. My mind is in a fevered state of surmise.” He sat leaning forward with his arms resting on his dapper knees, with a keen, expectant look upon his nervous face. Ho was just a little suggestive of a monkey waiting to catch a nut. The lady leant back in her chair meditating deeply. She was viewing her position, and perhaps remembering that her acquaintance with this man was but of three months’ growth. “Is there anything to be done?” she asked, after a lengthened pause. “ I counted,” he answered, “ that I would put that question to you.” She nodded her head gravely. •“I thought perhaps that as you had come to me, you wished me to help you in something.” He looked distressed, for her meaning was obvious.

“No I came to you because well, because you seemed the right person to come to.”

She shrugged her shoulders. “ That is a mistake.” “ Why ?” he asked. “ Don’t you see that I can do nothing, that I am powerless ?” Ho shook his head before replying tersely : “Can’t say I do, I do not know how these things are done in England, but ” She interrupted him with a short laugh in which there was a noticeable ring of annoyance. “It is not a question of how they are done in England. There can only be one way of doing it all the world over.” “ And who is to do it, Miss Winter?” “ You, Mr Easton.” “And,” he continued imperturbably, “ what am I to do ?”

“Well—l should go to Mr Tyars and say: ‘ Claud Tyars, you cannot go on this expedition—you have no right to sacrifice the happiness of—of another to the gratification of your own personal ambition.’ ” “ I can’t do that,” he said, deliberately. “ Won’t,” she corrected. “ Can’t,” he persisted, politely. “ Why ?” “I can’t tell you.” “ Won’t, again,” she commented. “ I do not see,” he argued, defending himself in anticipation, “ that anyone is to blame. It is an unforeseen accident; a misfortune.”

“It is a great misfortune.” “And yet,” he plcad&l, looking at her in a curious way, “ it could not have been foreseen. We are all of us liable to such misfortunes. I had no reason to suspect that Tyars was more liable than myself. It might have happened to me.” “ Yes,” she answered, more solely, without raising her eyes. “ Ves, it might.” He had uttered the words in such a manner as to render the thought infinitely ludicrous. She thought that such a thing might happen to him. And yet somehow she failed to laugh. Perhaps there was an undercurrent of pathos in the thin pleasant voice, into which her thoughts had drifted. “I cannot say,” she continued, “that I foresaw it, for that was impossible. There was no time. But—l think I knew it the moment I saw them together, when Oswin brought him to dine at Brook street. They had met before, some years ago, at Oxford, you know.” “Then,” he said, in a relieved tone, I surmise the matter is out of our hands.” “ It never was in our hands, Mr Easton, corrected the lady. He looked wistfully uneasy, as if caught in the act of enunciating high treasoq. “ No,” be said, meekly.

“ Such matters are rarely in the hands of outsiders, and in those rare cases only to a very small extent.” “ No—yes,” he conceded with additional meekness.

In bis airy way Matthew Mark Easton was a wise man. He held his peace and waited. In the expressive language of his native land, it may be said that he let the lady “have the floor.” The question was one upon which he eagerly allowed his companion to have the first and longest say. He was rather awed by the proportions ol it, treated generally^and by the intricacies of the individual illustration of which he formed an unwilling figure. “ I have done my best,” she said, “ to put a stop to this extremely foolish expedition. I notice you look surprised, Mr Easton; that is hardly complimentary, for it would insinuate that my efforts were so puny as to have been overlooked entirely.” He denied this with an expressive gesture of the hand.

“Of course,” she continued, “if men choose to risk their lives unnecessarily, I suppose there is no actual law to stop them. But they should first look round in their own home circle, and see that their lives are entirely their own to risk. Foolhardiness, entailing anxiety for others, is little short of a crime. Men lose sight of this fact very often in their desire to convince the world of their courage and enterprise. Claud Tyars ought never to have gone to Brook street.” “ But how was he to know

“ He knew,” said the lady, deliberately, “ that he loved Helen. He knew that he had loved her ever since he was a boy.”

“But,” argued Kiston, “the fact of his loving her could scarcely be looked upon as a crime so long as he kept it to himself. Tyars is deep. I do not often know what he is driving at myself. He never asked Miss Grace to reciprocate his feelings.” Miss Winter laughed in derision. “What have 1 done? I surmise I’ve made a joke,” said Easton. “ Excuse my laughter,” she said. “But you obviously know so little about it. Do you actually imagine that Helen Grace does not know, and has not known all along, that Claud Tyars looks upon her as the only woman in the world, so far as he is concerned ?”

“I have hitherto imagined that, Miss Winter.”

“ Then you have never been in love.” He looked at her with twinkling eyes, and seemed to be on the point of saying something which, however, he never did, and she continued rather hurriedly ; “ Let me Warn you,” she said, “against a very common error. Men, and especially young men, are in the habit of believing that women cVolvc a love for them out of their own inner consciousness. They go about the World with a pleased sense of uncertainty as to the number of maidens who have fixed, hopelessly and unsought, their wayward affections upon them.” Easton acknowledged the truth of this statement by a cjuiek nod of the head. “ Von may take it,” continued the lady, “ as a rule almost without exception that girls n.ar give their love toaman unsought. The man may not speak of his love, but he betrays it, and the result is the same. A girl may admire a man, she may be ready to love him, but the only thing that can attract her love is his. I know I am right in this, Mr Easton. It is the fashion to rant about the incomprehensibility of women, but we understand each other. If Mr Tyars had been indifferent to Helen she would never ” She stopped, arrested by a quick movement of his hand. “ Don’t I” ho said, with that peculiar deliberation which is a transatlantic demonstration of shyness; “don’t say any more on that point. There arc certain things which we men do not like discussing.” She gave a little laugh, and changed color like a girl. “ 1 admire your chivalry,” she said. “It is genuine, and consequently rare.” “1 did know,” he answered, simply, “ that it was chivalry. If it is, Miss Grace has taught it to me. It is her due. Site reminds me of an old picture I must have seen somewhere when I was a little chap. Such girls must have lived in England when we roamed in the backwoods. We have none like them in my country. Discuss Tyars as much as you like, but do not let us talk about Miss Grace.”

“ I believe,” said the lady, “ that you are half iu love with her yourself.” “ No,” be answered, gravely, “1 am not, because well, no matter that does not count.”

“I wish,” Agnes Winter went on to add, in that peculiarly hurried way previously noticed, “that wc knew what to do.” “1,” he raid, “can only tell you one thing—namely, that Gland Tyars will go on this expedition. Nothing will prevent that. Resides—he must go.” “ Why ?” pleaded the lady, using unscrupulously all her powers of fascination, all the persuasion of her eyes. “ I cannot tell you ” “ You are as determined a man as Claud Tyars himself.” “I am, I reckon —in some things.” “ Surely you can trust me, Mr Easton.” He moved uneasily in hia seat, and she, taking advantage of his hesitation, leant forward with her two hands held out in supplication; then he seemed to yield. “ Because,” he said, in an even, emotionless voice, “ Claud Tyars has bound himself to go, and I will not let him off his contract ! It is my expedition.” He hardly expected her to believe it, knowing Tyars and himself as she did. Rut he was quite aware that he laid himself open to a blow on the sorest spot in his heart. “ Then why do you not go yourself, Mr Easton ?”

He winched under it all the same, though he made no attempt to justify himself. She had touched his pride, and there is no prouder man on earth than a high-bred North American. He merely sat and endeavored to keep his lips still, as Tyars would have managed to do. In a second Miss Winter saw the result of the taunt, and her generous heart was softened. “ I beg your pardon,” she said ; “I know there must be some good reason.” She waited in order to give him an opportunity of setting forth his good reason, but he refused to take it, and she never had the satisfaction of hearing it from his own lips. At this moment the front-door bell gave a good old-fashioned peal in the basement, and Easton rose to his feet at once.

“I believe,” he said, “ that it would be inexpedient for me to be seen here by Miss Grace, or Oswin, or Tyars. They would know what we had been talking about.” Miss Winter saw the correctness of his judgment. “Yes,” she answered, “I expect it is Helen. Come into this second drawing room. When you hear this door opened, go out of the other and downstairs. Goodbye. Come and see mo again.” “ I will,” he said, vanishing into the inner room.

CHAPTER VI. KASTON .MARKS A STAND

There is one distinct drawback to the practice of making disinterested endeavors. This lies in the simple fact that no one (not even the best of friends) believes in the motive of such eudeavors. A disinterested man is like the sea serpent, inasmuch as those who have met him are so systematically pooh-poohed that they begin to disbelieve the evidence of their own senses. A disinterested woman is still rarer, though one might find such a creature if one took the trouble to search, and lived long enough to do so systematically. Rut the disinterested woman was a specimen of the human kind which had not yet come to classification in the mind of Matthew Mark Easton. He effected his retreat with masterly success, bub w'as unfortunate enough to carry away with him a wrong impression—namely, that Miss Winter had endeavored to frustrate his plans, not for Helen’s sake, but for her own. It was not Claud Tyars whom she wished to keep in England, bub Oswin Grace, and in the meantime it was very convenient to assign an impersonal reason to her antagonism. Easton thought no less of Miss Winter because she adopted this ruse. He had been reared in a keen competitive school, teaching somewhat vague scruples; and in matters of love it is well known that the line is very lightly drawn that separates the honorable from the dishonorable.

Easton was a keen analyst of the smaller factors of daily existence. He was an expert on the surface of the human niiqd.

Without making any great study of character, without looking very deep for motives, his knowledge of the superficial was exceedingly varied. Little conversational and social habits rarely escape I his notice. Had he been a novelist he would have recorded with infinite subtlety the small-beer of social intercourse from which' is distilled the drachm of spirit called Individuality. But beyond that his powers would have been unable to reach. He could not have drawn a character with any sequence, although the same might be hidden in the unclassified mass of his chronicles. And, after all, his method had its good points. He may have made mistakes ; but you may study human nature all your life, by any method whatsoever, and you will do the same. Many of us, you know, are devoid of character. The majority of us without doubt are in this position. We (the majority) are all superficies, and no depth, all small-beer and no spirit. And so the superficial method is probably the safest. One meets with more momentary motives than permanent purposes, although in many cases the former in their number tend directly or indirectly to the service of a single purpose. These cases, however, are generally women, and the gentle divergence of all small motives to one great purpose is not the force of the character, but the tendency of the soul. We may read character, but the soul is illegible. One can foretell the career of character, but no man can say whither the soul shall lead.

Easton had studied Miss Winter in his superficial way, and during the conversation just recorded he had not failed to observe the apparent care taken by her to avoid mentioning the name of Oswin Grace. Some astute readers may think that there was a reason for this keen-sightedness. Perhaps it was so, but that will be seen hereafter. And in anticipation of possible criticism it may be well to recognise now the probability that some may. think these people too subtle in their motives, too secret, too much given to concealment to be quite natural. Some may opine that there are too many cross purposes and crooked answers in this narration to be quite true to life. But it is this very truth that makes it so, for this is no flight of poesy, no idyll of the nineteenth century, but a plain record of such incidents as influenced the lives of certain people, some of whom will read this page, while others have learnt the meaning of it all, and, having received understanding, are aware of those flaws in mortal life which make existence what it is. And in selfdefence let me ask you if you have never played this same game of cross purposes and crooked answers. Let me ask if you and your friends are in the habit of boldly publishing the inward thoughts of your 1 hearts in order to save others from harboring error—if you have met a maiden willing to expose the inward secret of her soul in order to save others from mistakes. It is a fruitful topic, this one of mistakes, and some day I shall write an astounding essay upon it for an influential magazine, when requested to do so by its editor. Without mistakes the world would be a very different place from what it is. Looking at it from a political economical point of view this state of infallibility would be most disastrous, for the labor market would be overstocked even more than it is at present. In every bank, in all large offices, are there not a number of clerks whose sole duty is to seek for and correct the mistakes of others ? And contemplating it from a social standpoint, many of us would find time hanging very heavily on our hands had we not such fruitful employment in the correction of our own mistakes, the patching up of our own blunders, the elucidating of our own muddles. Matthew Mark Kiston was a quick thinker if not a deep one, and it is those who think quickly who give quickly. This man had something to give, something to tear away from his own heart and hold out with generous smiling eyes, and before bliss Winter’s door had closed behind him the sacrifice was made. He called a hansom cab and drove straight to Tyars’s club. He found his friend at work among his ship’s papers, folding and making up in packets his receipted bills. “ Morning,” said the Englishman. “ These papers are almost ready to be handed over to you. All my stores are on board!” “Ah!”

Tyara looked up sharply, and as sharply returned to his occupation. Easton was grave —an unusual occurrence, and Tyara knew that he had come with news of some sort. He Availed, however, for the American to begin, and continued to fold and arrange his papers.' “I have,” said Easton, sitting down and tapping the neat toe of his boot with his cane, “hit quite accidentally upon a discovery ”

“Poor chap!” muttered Tyars, abstractedly. “ Which will make a difference in your crew.”

“What?” exclaimed Tyars, pausing in the middle of a knot.

“ One rule,” continued Kaston, his queer little face twisting and twinkling with some emotion, which he was endeavoring to con* ceal, “ was that no sweethearts or wives were to be left behind.”

“ What are you driving at?” asked Tyars, curtly, in a singularly lifeless voice. Ho was studying a long ship-chandler’s bill with the keenness of an accountant.

‘‘ I surmise that my recollection of that rule is correct.”

“ 1 suppose so.” “Well ” Easton paused. “Well, old man,’ I have discovered a sweetheart.” “ Don’t be an ass !”

There was something in the tone of his voice that caused Easton to glance at him keenly and then drop entirely the semibantering manner and assume one of the utmost gravity. “I objected to Grace at first,” he said, “ because he had too many women-folk about him.”

Tyars threw the papers in a heap and rose suddenly from his seat. He walked to the mantel-piece and selected a cigarette from a tin box standing there. “Of course,” he said, striking a match, “your discovery can only relate to one person.” “ Yes ; you know whom I mean.” Tyars nodded his head in acquiescence and continued smoking. The little American sat looking in a curious way at this large, impassive, high-bred Englishman, as if gathering enjoyment and edification from the study of him. “ Well,” he drawled at length, “ you say nothing !” “ There is nothing to say.” “On the contrary,” returned Easton, “there is everything to say. That is one of the great mistakes made by you English people. I have noticed it since I have been in this country. You take too much for granted, You let things say themselves 100 much, and you think it very fine to be impassive and apparently indifferent. Hut it is not a line thing, it is silly and unbusi-ness-likc. Do you give up Oswin Grace ?” “Certainly; if you can get him to slay behind.”

“ Ya—as ; he is another Englishman. He will run his head against a wall if ho can. That is to say if there is a thick enough wall around.”

Tyars laughed, and turned to Hip hia cigarette ash into the lire. “I have tried,” he said, “to make him give it up.” Easton looked up in surprise. “Indeed ! upon what grounds?” “ Upon the grounds that he had ties at home which rendered him unfit for such service.”

“ Sister?” impaired the American. “ Yes ’’—slowly—“ sister.” There was a little pause, and then Easton said thoughtfully : “It is remarkable how much stronger an argument somebody else’s sister is in these cases.”

“ U —m,” opined Tyars, somewhat indifferently. He evidently did not know much about the matter.

“What did Grace say?” inquired the American, calmly. “ Oh, I dftn’t know. He turned very white about the cheeks, and was evidently in a desperate fright.” “ I suppose—he is a good man. The man you want ?” “ Yes ; he is the man I want.” Easton meditated for a few moments. “ And still you will give him up?” “ Yes ; there are plenty of men to be had.” “Tyars,. will you speak to him again,” said Easton, rising and taking up his hat, “ and use—that other argument ?” Tyars hesitated. “ J am not quite sure

that it is my business,” he -said/ f‘ I hate meddling In other pepple’s affairs, and after alii suppose, Grace knows best ivhab he is doing.” “Men rarely ; know what'they are doing under these circumstances,” observed Easton. He waited patiently, hat in hand, to hear what Tyars had to’, say. While he stood there,' Muggins, the bull-terrier, 1 .rose' fromthe hearthrug, stretched himself, and looked from one to the other in an inquiring and anticipatory manner. He took it to be a question of going for a walk, and apparently imagined that the easting vote was his. “All right,” aaiff. Tyars, suddenly, “I will speak to him again !” “ To-day,” pursued Easton, following up his advantage, “ or to-morrow at the,latest.” “Yes; to-morrow at the latest.” Then the American took his departure, and Muggins curled himself up on the hearthrug again with a yawn of disappoint? ment.

There are moments in the lives of most men when they Jeel themselves impelled by some vague instinct to seek advice. It does not bv any mhans follow that they are prepared to be guided by such advice, nor are these occasions invariably critical. Indeed most meu make the greater decisions of their lives quite alone, seeking the advice of none, following no example. But in the minor crises of existence, and more especially in regard to matters affecting others more than ourselves, the instinctive gregariousnoss of our nature asserts itself.

Claud Tyars admired Miss Winter more than he admired any, woman. The power of her clear practical intellect was full of fascination for him, and she was the woman he would have chosen to consult in suoh questions as men habitually consult women. In this case it happened that she was just the one person whose advice it was impossible to seek. Helen Grace could ’have counselled him wisely and sweetly, but for reasons of his own he set aside unhesitatingly the idea of questioning her, and ho knew that she would never proffer advice unasked. This man was, as he had told Helen Grace, quite alone in the world. Coming as he did from a solitude-loving stock, he was placed in that grade of life to which solitiide is most readily obtainable The upper middle class gentleman of England lives a larger portion of his life alone than almost any class of men on earth. Those above him are usually forced by their rank to occupy positions,of prominence in the world, are therefore public servants, and consequently at the public beck and call. Those beneath him are not rich enough to purchase solitude. /They live in small houses surrounded by wife and children, wichin call of the servants, aud nob beyond the smell of cooking. Since meeting Matthew Mark Easton, Tyars had withdrawn himself from society gently and persistently, with the view of furthering his Quixotic scheme, and in this project circumstances were again favorable to him. He ocoqpied that safe retreat between the haunt of the insupportable society journalist and the kind-parted curiosity of the bourgeois. In all large communities the art of “ doing without” is highly cultivated. It is only in very small circles and in Scotch song books that people arc missed for longer than a few days. It is a great pity that we have such difficulty in recognising our own unimportance. If we did so we should be much more independent and study our own inclinations before the consideration of feelings erroneously supposed to exist in the hearts of our friends and relations.. Claud Tyars was never missed, and to do him justice he was supremely indifferent on this point. It was only at odd moments on shore when he happened to be idle during some rare periods that he gave any thought to the loneliness of his life. And in one respect he was essentially British —namely, in the calm readiness with which he undertook to settle all questions for himself. When these questions affected hia fellowmen he rarely saw reason to hesitate, for most Englishmen learn as soon as they leave the nursery what is right and what is wrong ; what is gentlemanly and what the reverse. But this knowledge from its source can only serve as a guide to conduct in regard to men. At the period when it is really instilled—namely, during the first few years at school—woman occupies a remarkably obscure position in the youthful mind. At no time of man’s life is woman so unimportant, and therefore the boy learns and only cares to. learn behaviour towards his fellow-men ; moreover, that which he then learns will go with him through all —the fair weather and the foul, through all the storm, and through what little sunshine there may be, till the evening of bis life, and the glow o! it will linger over his memory as the hushed glow of sunset lingers over a fading landscape and gives it character. It 4s only later in life that we learn our manners, bur bows and smirks, our entrances upon and exits from the broader stage of existence. It is then that we awaken to the truth that while men may bo served with honesty, women must be treated with chivalry. At the same time we -find out that chivalry and honesty are not akin, nor near thereto. It is not always kind to be honest, and if any man hesitate in the choice, let him be chivalrous and he will scarcely rue it. Claud Tyars had not learnt chivalry at the best school, his mother’s knee, for he had never stood there, and it was therefore no subtle superficial acquirement, but the honest instinctive love of fair play between strong and weak that prompted him to accede to Easton’s request. ( To be continued.)