The Lair of the White Worm/Chapter 26

A LIVING BARBETTE

WHEN MR. SALTON had retired for the night, Adam and Sir Nathaniel with one accord moved to the study. Things went with great regularity at Lesser Hill, so they knew that there would be no interruption to their talk.
When their cigars were lighted, Sir Nathaniel said:
“I hope, Adam, that you do not think me either slack or changeable of purpose. I really am not so, and I mean to go through this business to the bitter end—whatever it may be. Be satisfied that my first care is, and shall be, the protection of Mimi Watford. To that I am pledged; my dear boy, we who are interested are all in some form of the same danger. That monster out of the pit hates and means to destroy us all—you and me certainly, and probably your uncle. We are just on the verge of stormy times for us all. I wanted especially to talk with you to-night, for I cannot help thinking that the time is fast coming—if it has not come already—when we must take your uncle into confidence. It was one thing when fancied evils threatened, but now he as well as the rest of us is probably marked for death; and it is only right that he should know all.”
“I am with you, sir. Things have changed since we agreed to keep him out of the trouble. Now we dare not; consideration for his feelings might cost him his life. It is a duty we have—and no light or pleasant one, either. I have not a shadow of doubt that he will want to be one with us in this. But remember, we are his guests, in his house; and his name, his honour have to be thought of as well as his safety.”
“I am still with you—to the death. Only, if there be any special danger to him, let me bear, or at any rate share it.”
“All shall be as you wish, Adam. We need say no more of that. We are at one. And now as to practicability. What we are to do? We cannot manifestly take and murder Lady Arabella off-hand. Therefore we shall have to put things in order for the killing, and in such a way that we may not be taxed with a base crime. That is why I suggested waiting till we have some definite and complete proof.”
Adam stood up, and his voice rang as he said heartily:
“You are quite right, sir, as usual. We must be at least as exact as if we were in a law court. I see that.”
Sir Nathaniel acquiesced in such a hearty way as to set his young companion’s mind at rest.
Adam sat down again and resumed the conversation, using an even, reflective tone which made the deliberation altogether useful:
“It seems to me, sir, that we are in an exceedingly tight place. Our first difficulty is to know where to begin. Our opponent has pretty well all the trumps. I never thought this fighting an antediluvian monster would be such a complicated job. This one is a woman, with all a woman’s wisdom and wit, combined with the heartlessness of a *cocotte* and the want of principle of a suffragette. She has the reserved strength and impregnability of a diplodocus. We may be sure that in the fight that is before us there will be no semblance of fair-play. Also that our unscrupulous opponent will not betray herself!”
Sir Nathaniel commented on this:
“That is so. But being of feminine species, she probably will over-reach herself. That is much more likely—more in woman’s way. Now, Adam, it strikes me that, as we have to protect ourselves and others against feminine nature, our strong game will be to play our masculine against her feminine. Men can wait better than women.”
He laughed a mirthless laugh that was all from the brain and had no heart at all, and went on:
“You must remember that this female has had thousands of years’ experience in waiting. As she stands, she will beat us at that game.”
For answer Adam began preparing his revolver, which was at half-cock:
“There is always a quick way of settling differences of that kind!” was all he said; but Sir Nathaniel understood and again uttered a warning:
“How are differences to be settled with a creature of that kind? We might as well fight with a barbette; she is invulnerable so far as physical harm at our hands is concerned.”
“Even barbettes get occasionally blown up!” said Adam.
“Ah! Barbettes aren’t alive all over and, so far as we know, self-recuperative. No! we must think out some plan to have ready if all else should fail. We had better sleep on it. She is a thing of the night; and the night may give us some ideas.”
So they both turned in.
Adam knocked at Sir Nathaniel’s door in the grey of the morning, and, on being bidden, came into the room. He had several letters unclosed in his hand. Sir Nathaniel sat up in bed.
“Well!”
“I should like to read you a few letters, but, of course, shall not send them unless you approve. In fact”—this with a smile and a blush—“there are several things which I want to do; but I hold my hand and my tongue till I have your approval.”
“Go on!” said the other kindly. “Tell me all, and count at any rate on my sympathy, and on my approval and help if I can see my way.”
Accordingly Adam proceeded:
“When I told you the conclusions I had arrived at, I put in the foreground that Mimi Watford should for the sake of her own safety be removed—to West Australia, I suggested,—and that the monster which had wrought all the harm should be destroyed.”
“Yes, I remember.”
“To carry this into practice, sir, one preliminary is required— unless harm of another kind is to be faced.”
Sir Nathaniel looked as if he had on his reflecting cap. Then he proceeded, taking up the other’s argument:
“Before she goes to West Australia, or indeed to anywhere else, Mimi should have some protector which all the world would recognise. The only form of this safety recognised by convention is marriage!”
“Yes, sir. I see you realise!”
Sir Nathaniel smiled in a fatherly way.
“To marry, a husband is required. And that husband should be you.”
“Yes, yes.”
“And the marriage should be immediate and secret—or, at least, not spoken of outside ourselves.… And now I must ask you a somewhat delicate question! Would the young lady be agreeable to that proceeding?”
“I do not know, sir!”
“You do not know? Then how are we to proceed?”
“I suppose we—or one of us—must ask her. That one must be myself—and I am ready.”
“Is this a sudden idea, Adam, a sudden resolution?”
“A sudden resolution, sir, but not a sudden idea. The resolution is sudden because the need is sudden and imperative. If I were to speak in hyperbole, I could say that the idea is as old as Fate, and that the resolution was waiting before the beginning of the world!”
“I am glad to hear it. I hope it will turn out that the coming of the White Worm has been a blessing in disguise. But now, if things have to be hurried on like this, what is to be the sequence of events?”
“First, that Mimi should be asked to marry me. If she agrees, all is well and good. The sequence is obvious.”
“And is to be kept a secret amongst ourselves?”
Adam answered at once:
“I want no secret, sir, except for Mimi’s good. For myself, I should like to go and shout it out on the house-tops! But I see that we must be discreet. Untimely knowledge to our enemy might work incalculable harm.”
“And how would you suggest, Adam, that we could combine the momentous question with secrecy?”
Here Adam grew red and moved uneasily. Then with a sudden rush he spoke:
“Someone must ask her—as soon as possible!”
“And that someone?”
“I have been thinking the matter over, sir, since we have been here. It requires expedition to achieve safety, and we shall all have to do as duty requires.”
“Certainly. And I trust that none of us shall shirk such a duty. But this is a concrete thing. We may consider and propose in the abstract, but the action is concrete—who, again, is to be the ‘someone’? Who is to ask her?”
“I thought that you, sir, would be so good!”
“God bless my soul! This is a new kind of duty to take on one—at my time of life. Adam, I hope you know that you can count on me to help in any way I can!”
“I have counted on you, sir, when I ventured to make such a suggestion. I can only ask, sir,” he added, “that you will be more than ever kind to me—to us, and look on the painful duty as a voluntary act of grace prompted by kindness and affection.”
Sir Nathaniel said in a meek but not a doubting voice:
“Painful duty!”
“Yes,” said Adam boldly. “Painful to you, though to me it would be all joyful.”
“Yes, I understand!” said the other kindly.
Then he went on: “It is a strange job for an early morning! Well, we all live and learn. I suppose the sooner I go the better. Remember, I am in your hands and shall do just what you wish, and shall try to do it just as you wish. Now you had better write a line for me to take with me. For, you see, this is to be a somewhat unusual transaction, and it may be embarrassing to the lady, even
to myself. So we ought to have some sort of warrant, something to show on after-thought, that we have been all along mindful of her feelings. It will not do to take acquiescence for granted—although we act for her good. You had better write the letter to have ready, and I had better not know what is in it—except the main purpose of the introducing the subject. I shall explain fully as we go along anything that she may wish.”
“Sir Nathaniel, you are a true friend; and I am right sure that both Mimi and I shall be grateful to you for all our lives—however long or however short they may be!”
So the two talked it over and agreed as to points to be borne in mind by the ambassador. It was striking six when Sir Nathaniel left the house, Adam seeing him quietly off.
As the young man followed him with wistful eyes—almost jealous of the privilege which his kind deed was about to bring him, he felt that his own heart was in his friend’s breast.