A Fascinating Traitor

C >> Col. Richard Henry Savage >> A Fascinating Traitor

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There was a genuine alarm in Justine Delande's voice as she started
up, crying out, "You come to us to-day?"

"Precisely!" gravely said Major Hawke, as he tried a long shot.
"Both Captain Anstruther and myself have the gravest secret duties
in connection with Hugh Johnstone's future. He soon may be Sir Hugh,
you know. And I dare not divulge to him my own delicate functions
in this matter. Now you understand me at last," said Hawke, warmly
pressing Justine Delande's hand. "I feel that I must not lose you,
because I have my duty to perform, and I trust my honor to you. All
will be well if you will only favor me with your womanly kindness,
and trust to me as frankly as I to you. We must meet to-day at Hugh
Johnstone's as absolute strangers. We must also remain strangers
to all appearances for a time," he said at last. The Swiss spinster
gazed up at him piteously.

"May I not even tell Nadine?" she faltered.

"Ah!" carelessly said Alan Hawke, "she is a mere child; I shall
probably never see her. It is you alone that I would trust. Will
you not come here again? I dare not, for your own sake, detain you
longer now." The timid woman glanced hurriedly at her watch.

"I have been here already too long, and I must go! And there is so
much I would say to you!" She was almost handsome in her blushing
confusion.

"Then you will come again, here? Ram Lal is my old factotum!" the
young Major pleaded.

"I will come!" the half-subjugated woman whispered under her breath.
"But when?" Her eyes were meekly downcast and her faltering voice
trembled.

"The day after to-morrow, at the same time," said Alan Hawke, his
heart leaping up in a secret victory, "but no living soul must ever
know of it. I will be here in the pagoda, waiting for you. Ram Lal
will wait for you himself and admit you. Do you promise?" he said,
with a glance which set her pallid cheeks aflame.

"I promise! I promise! Let me go, now!" gasped the excited woman.
With stately courtesy, the Major then led her back into the jewel
merchant's luxurious lounging-room.

"Wait here for a single moment!" he whispered as he quickly poured
out a glass of cordial. And, then, returning in a few moments, he
clasped upon the woman's wrist a bracelet of old Indian gold, whose
flexible links glittered with the fire of a row of old Indian mine
stones. Justine Delande sat mute, as if dreaming.

"Our little secret is now all our own!" he pleasantly murmured.
"Remember! Should we meet at the marble house, you do not know me!
Can you trust yourself? You must--for my sake! This will help you
to remember our first meeting."

"You may depend upon me, whenever you may wish to call upon me,"
she whispered. "I will come!" and then she fled away, with soft,
gliding steps, to regain the safety of her own room before the
trying hour of tiffin.

Major Alan Hawke closed the door, and laughed softly as he threw
himself into a chair. "They are all the same!" he mused. "Not a
bad morning's work! For she will never tell our little secret! And
she will surely come again! She may be my salvation here! Madame
Louison, I now debit you just thirty pounds!" laughed Major Alan
Hawke, as he deftly blew a kiss in the direction of Allahabad. "You
shall pay for this bracelet, and much more! You shall pay for all!
And I'll set this soft-hearted Swiss woman on to watch you, and you
shall pay her well, too! Now, for my old friend, Hugh Johnstone!"
He waited in a most happy frame of mind till his carriage bore him
to the club for an elaborate Anglo-Indian toilet.

There was a crowd of eager gossips secretly tracking him who watched
him roll away in state to the marble house.

"By Jove! I believe that he is the coming man!" said old Captain
Verner. "I wonder if this handsome young beggar is really going in
for the Veiled Rose of Delhi. Just his damned luck!" And then the
loungers left the club window and drank deeply confusion to the
would-be wooer's stratagems.

All unconscious of their busy curiosity, the gallant Major Alan
Hawke calmly descended at the marble house, with a secret oath now
registered to ignore the very existence of Nadine Johnstone, "The
old man is always harping on his daughter," he mused. "I must throw
this old beggar off his guard thoroughly to-day, once and for all.
He must never think that I, too, am 'harping on his daughter.'

"But only let me get to the core of this old secret of the jewels,
and I will find a way to frighten the baronet-to-be until he opens his
miserly old heart." And so the wary guest sought his old friend's
presence. When Major Alan Hawke's neat trap drew up before the
marble house there was an officious crowd of Hindu underlings in
waiting to welcome the expected guest.

Casting his eyes around the wide hall gleaming with its superb
trophies of priceless arms, with a quick glance at the crowd of
sable retainers, Major Hawke realized in all the barren splendors
of the first story the absence of any womanly hand. As he followed
the obsequious house butler into a vast reception room, he murmured:

"A diplomatic tiffin, I will warrant! The old fox is sly." He wandered
idly about the Commissioner's sanctum, admiring the precious loot
of years, displayed with an artfully artless confusion. On the
walls, a series of beautiful Highland scenes recalled the Land o'
Lakes. Pausing before a sketch of a stern old Scottish keep of the
moyen age, Major Alan Hawke softly sneered: "Oatmeal Castle! The
family stronghold of the old line of the Sandy Johnstone's, nee
Fraser." And, picking up the last number of the Anglo-Indian Times,
he then affected a composure which he was far from feeling.

"Damn this sly Scotsman! Why does he not show up?" was the chafing
soliloquy of the Major, now anxious to seal his re-entree into
Delhi society with the open friendship of the most powerful European
civilian within the battered walls of the wicked city. He needed
all his nerve now, for Hugh Fraser Johnstone was a past master of
the arts of dissimulation.

In fact, the mauvais quart d'heure was really due to the innate
womanly weakness of Mademoiselle Justine Delande. This guileless
Swiss maiden had been carried off her feet by the romantic episode of
the morning. Her cool palm still tingled with the meaning pressure
of the handsome Major's hand! She had hastened away to her own
apartment, as a wounded tigress seeks its cave for a last stand!
The concealment of the diamond bracelet was a matter of necessity,
and, with a beating heart, she buried it deep under the poor harvest
of paltry Delhi trinkets which she had already gathered, with a
mere magpie acquisitiveness.

Alan Hawke had builded better than he knew, when he selected this
same bauble. He had been guided by a chance remark of Ram Lal's.
"Give her that," said the crafty old jeweler. "She has priced it a
dozen times since her first coming here." It was the Ultima Thule
of personal decoration to her. The Swiss governess reserved the
secret delight of donning the glittering ornament until she was
positive that no tell-tale spy had observed her innocent assignation
with her sister's chivalric friend. "He must be rich and powerful,"
she murmured as she fled from her room to play the safety game
of being found with the heiress when her Prince Charming should
arrive. Miss Nadine Johnstone failed not to observe the unusual
color mantling her sedate friend's cheeks.

"You look as if you had received some good news. Is the mail in?"
queried Miss Johnstone.

"Not yet. I hastened back, for I forgot to take my watch and was
belated. I fear I am late, even now, for tiffin," demurely replied
the Swiss maiden, dropping for the first time in her life into
the baleful arts of the other daughters of Eve. She had broken the
ice of propriety in which her past life had been congealed and an
insidious pleasure now thrilled her quickened veins, as she felt
herself possessed of a secret, one linking her to an attractive
member of the dangerous sex, and a hero of romance, a very Don Juan
in seductive softness. Her knees trembled at a sudden summons to
report to the Master of the marble house, forthwith.

Her bosom heaved with a vague alarm as she timidly descended
the grand stair, and was conducted to the private snuggery of the
Commissioner adjoining his own apartments. "Does he know aught of
the meeting?" she questioned herself, in the throes of a sudden
fright. She was somewhat reassured as she observed the carriage
drawn up in the compound and, by hazard, caught a glance of Alan
Hawke's graceful martial figure, as he stood regarding her intently
from the safe shelter of the darkened reception-room. Her heart
bounded with delight as her Prince Charming smilingly placed his
finger on his lip.

A sense of manly protection, never felt before, gave her the strength
of ten as she then glided along boldly to face her gray-headed
master. For now she knew that she had a champion at her side, a
man professionally brave, both resolute and charming. Her promise
to meet Alan Hawke again at the jeweler's now took on a roseate
hue.

"I must surely keep my plighted word at all risks," she murmured
to herself. For the sage reflection that she owed a sacred duty
to her sister's friend, now came to comfort her, in her heart of
hearts. It was almost a pious duty which lay before her now. And
so she became brave in the knowledge of the innocent secret shared
between herself and the handsome official visitor.

To her delight and relief she found it an easy task to face Hugh
Johnstone, after that one reassuring glance. Her stern employer
failed to pierce the muslin fortifications of her guilty bosom and
discern the moral turpitude lurking there. She stole a last anxious
glance at her still plump wrist where the diamond bracelet had
softly clasped her flesh, and then softly sighed in relief as the
master calmly said:

"Miss Justine, I have a gentleman of some distinction to entertain
to-day at tiffin. An official visitor. I would be thankful if you
would do the honors. Will you kindly join us in the reception room
in half an hour, and I will present Major Hawke, my old friend. He
has just returned from England."

"And Miss Nadine?" meekly demanded the happy woman. The old
Commissioner's brow darkened, as he shortly said: "My daughter will
be served in her rooms, as usual on such formal occasions. These
interlopers are no part of her life. We may soon leave for Europe,
and she is therefore better off to remain a stranger to these
merely local acquaintances. It is very unlikely that we shall ever
re-visit India! Will you see her and say that I purpose driving
out with her later?"

No woman in India was as happy, at that particular moment, as the
Genevese, who merely bowed in silence, and glided softly away,
having escaped the levin-bolt of Hugh Johnstone's wrath, ever
ready, lurking under his bushy, white eyebrows. It was the work of
a moment for her to fulfill her simple task as messenger, and this
done, she burned to hide herself in her own coign of vantage, for
certain new-born ideas of personal decoration were crystallizing
in her excited brain. For the first time in her life, she would be
fair to man's views; so as to justify the partner of her momentous
secret in the complimentary remarks which, even now, made her ears
tingle in delight.

"Do you know aught of this Major Hawke who comes to-day?" wearily,
said the listless girl. "Some one of these red-faced old relics of
my father's early life, I suppose!" The Rose of Delhi was gazing
wistfully out upon the wilderness of beauty in the tangled gardens,
sweeping far out to where the high stone wall shut off the glare
and flying dust of the Chandnee Chouk.

"Certainly not, Nadine!" softly said the governess. "This is only
a peopled wilderness to me!" Her heart smote her as the girl, with
a sudden lonely sinking of the heart, threw her arms around the
neck of her startled companion.

"I am so unhappy here--so wretched, this is but a gleaning white
stone prison, Justine! I stifle in this wretched land! Why did my
father bring me here to die by inches?" There was no pretense in
her stormy sobs.

"We are soon going home, Darling!" cried the affrighted Swiss. "Just
now your father told me that we were all to leave India forever,
and at once." And so, gently soothing the unhappy girl, orphaned in
her heart, Justine Delande escaped to the first essay of her life
in high decorative art. "There is some strange mystery of the past
in all this! He has a heart of flint, this old tyrant!" murmured
Justine, as with fingers trembling in haste she completed a toilet,
which later caused even old Hugh Johnstone to growl "By Gad! This
Swiss woman's not half bad looking!" A last pang, caused by the
keen secret sorrow of not daring to wear her diamond bracelet,
was effaced by the rising tide of indignation in Justine Delande's
awakened heart. There were strange emotional currents fitfully
thrilling through her usually placid veins as she stole a last glance
at herself in the mirror. "A tyrant to the daughter. I warrant that
in the old days he broke the mother's heart! He never mentions her!
Not a picture is here--nothing--not even a memento, not a reference
to the woman who gave him this lovely child! Her life, her death,
even her resting place, are all wrapped in the selfish and brutal
silence of a selfish tyrant! He should have been only a drill
sergeant to knock about the half-crazed brutes who stagger under
a soldier's pack over these burning plains!" It suddenly occurred
to her that in some mysterious way Major Alan Hawke's coming would
contribute to the rescue of the captive Princess.

Justine Delande really loved her beautiful charge with all the
fond attachment of a mature woman for the one rose blossoming in
her lonely heart. Their gray passionless lives had run on together
since Nadine's childhood, as brooks quietly mingle, seeking the
unknown sea! She now felt the wine of life stirring within her,
and, seizing upon another justification for her dangerous secret
association with Alan Hawke, she murmured: "I will tell him of all
this. He has high influence with the Home Government. This Captain
Anstruther on the Viceroy's staff is certainly his firm friend.
We must leave here and return to dear old Switzerland. Perhaps the
Major himself knows the secret of the family history!"

And there was a meaning light in her eyes as she stole back to
Nadine's room when the silver gong sounded, and throwing her arms
around the girl, whispered: "We are going home soon, darling! Be
brave and trust to me! I will find out the story of the past and
tell you all, my darling!" Justine Delande unwound the girl's arms
from round her neck, while honest tears trembled in her eyes.

The low cry: "My mother! My darling mother! He never even breathes
the name!" had loosened all the tide of repressed feeling long pent
up in Justine Delande's heart.

"Trust to me! You shall know all, dearest! I am sure that Euphrosyne
knows, and we shall see her soon!" So with an added reason for
their second meeting, Miss Justine descended the grand marble stair,
murmuring: "He shall tell me all he knows; he can search the past
here! He can help me, and he must--for Nadine's sake!"

And as he bowed low before her in courteous acknowledgment of the
master's presentation, Alan Hawke caught the lambent gleam of the
newly awakened fires in Justine Delande's eyes. "She is another
woman," he mused. With one silent glance of veiled recognition,
Alan Hawke returned to his diplomatic fence with the wary old nabob
who sat at the head of the glittering table. He was in no doubt
now as to the second meeting at Ram Lal Singh's shop, for Justine
Delande's eyes promised him more than even his habitual hardihood
would have dared to ask. "What the devil's up now?" he mused,
"Something about the girl, I warrant. I suppose that the old brute
has exiled her here for safety." And then and there, Alan Hawke
swore to reach the side of the Veiled Rose of Delhi, though the
cold gray eyes of the host never caught him off his guard a moment
in the two hours of the pompously drawn-out feast. Both the men
were keenly watching each other now.

It had been no mere accidental slip of the tongue which guided
Alan Hawke in his greeting of the old ex-Commissioner when Hugh
Johnstone entered the reception-room, a study in gray and white,
with only the three priceless pigeon-blood rubies lending a color
to his snowy linen. "Upon my word, Sir Hugh, you are looking younger
than I ever saw you," said the visitor gracefully advancing.

"You're a bit premature, are you not, Hawke?" dryly said the civilian,
opening a silver cheroot box, once the property of a Royal Prince
of Oude. Hugh Johnstone motioned his visitor to be seated, and
keenly watched the younger man.

"I am on the inside of the matter," soberly said Alan Hawke. "It
was an open secret when I left London, and I've heard more since.
A brief delay only,--a matter of a few months--no more."

"Take a weed! They serve in half an hour!" abruptly said Hugh
Johnstone, as if anxious to change the subject. The old man then
strode forward and closed the door. Then, turning sharply upon his
visitor, frankly demanded, "Now, tell me why you are here?"

"That depends partly upon your affairs," said Hawke, meeting his
questioner's gaze unflinchingly. "I may have something to say to
you about the Baronetcy, by and bye." He paused to notice the keen
old Scotchman wince under the thrust, "but, in the mean time, I am
merely waiting orders here, and I want you to post me about the
condition of affairs up there." He vaguely indicated with his thumb
the far-distant battlement of the Roof of the World. Hugh Johnstone
rang a silver bell, and muttered a few words in Hindostanee to an
attendant. "I must know more from Calcutta before I can explain
just where I stand," said the renegade soldier, with caution.

Before the silver tray loaded with ante-prandial beverages was
produced, Hugh Johnstone quietly turned to his guest. "Did you see
Anstruther in London?" he demanded, with a scarcely veiled eagerness.

"We were together some days," very neatly rejoined the now confident
Major. "In fact, I'm to operate partly under his personal directions.
We are old friends."

"I wonder when he will return?" dreamily said Johnstone, as if the
subject was growing annoying in its bold directness.

"I believe that he has a long leave--a furlough of a year," lightly
answered the Major. "In fact, I am to carry on some official matters
for him in his absence, but he is wary and non-committal."

"What is his English address?" abruptly said Johnstone, as they
bowed formally over their glasses.

"I do not know," frankly returned Hawke. "I am to send all reports
to headquarters in Calcutta."

"Are you going down there soon?" asked the old nabob, with a growing
uneasiness.

"Not unless I am sent for by the Viceroy," quietly said the Major,
with a listless air, gazing around admiringly on the magnificence
of the apartment.

"I will give you a letter to my nephew, Douglas Fraser, when you
do go," said Johnstone. "He is a fine youngster, and he will have
charge of all my Indian affairs, if I go home. He is in the P. and
O. office. I would like you to know him."

"I did not know that you had any family connection here," replied
the Major with a start of innocent surprise.

"Only this boy," hastily replied the incipient baronet, "and my
daughter. She is, however, a mere child--a mere child. I have seen
the leaves of the family tree wither and drop off one by one." The
host then stiffly rose, and formally said, "Let us go in!"

"You are good for a score of years yet," jovially remarked Major
Hawke, as he gazed at the well-preserved outer man of his uneasy
entertainer. "The harpoon is deeply fixed in the old whale," mused
Hawke, as he followed Hugh Johnstone. "He begins to flounder now."

Conscious of the mental alarm which Hugh Johnstone could not altogether
conceal, Major Hawke had simply bowed, in his grand manner, when
the host presented his guest to Mademoiselle Delande. "I will let
the old beggar lead out," mused Hawke. "This royal spread is an
excuse for any amount of silence." And the Anglo-Indian renegade
gazed admiringly at the thousand and one adjuncts of a blended
English comfort and Indian luxury.

"Ever been in Geneva?" suddenly demanded Hugh Johnstone, with a
glance at his two companions.

"He's an uneasy old devil. He is trying to trap me now," thought
Hawke, who innocently replied: "Long years ago, when I was a mere
lad. I'm told the town has been vastly improved by the Duke of
Brunswick's legacy. I've not seen it in later years."

"Miss Delande is a Genevese," remarked the host.

"I congratulate you, Mademoiselle," politely said the Major. "It
is a famous city to date from."

It was evident that the spinster was held in reverent awe of her
employer, for she guarded a judicious silence, as with a formal
bow she at last left the table at the graciously permitting nod
of Hugh Johnstone. There was a cold and brooding restraint, which
had seemed to cast a chill even over the sultry Indian midday, but
Justine's smile was bright and winning as she faintly acknowledged
with a blushing cheek Major Hawke's gallantry as he sprang up and
opened the door for the retiring lady. "She will come, she will
come," gayly throbbed the Major's happy heart.

Alan Hawke was now thoroughly on his guard. He had never lifted an
eyebrow at the mention of Miss Johnstone. He had dropped Justine
Delande like a plummet into the lake of forgetfulness, and watched
Hugh Johnstone's listless trifling with the dainties of the superb
collation. The raw-boned old Scotsman leaned heavily back in his
chair.

His bony hands were thin and claw-like, his bushy white beard
and eyebrows gave him a "service" aspect, while his cold blue eye
gleamed out pale and menacing as the Pole star on wintry arctic
seas. His broad chest was sunken, his tall form was bent, and a
visible air of dejection and unrest had replaced the sturdy vigor
of his early manhood. He was sipping a glass of pale ale in silence
when Hawke neatly applied the lance once more. "It must be a great
change for you to leave India, Johnstone, but you need rest, and a
general shaking up. You have a good deal to leave here. I suppose
your nephew--"

"He's a good lad, but a stranger to me, Hawke," broke in the host.
"The fact is, I am as yet undecided. I go home for my daughter's
sake; it's no place for her out here," he sternly said. "You know
what Indian life is?"

Hawke bowed, and mutely cried, "Peccavi." He had been a part of it.
"I'm waiting for the action of the Government. This Baronetcy. I
must talk with you about it. I might have had the Star of India.
You see, it's an empty honor. And I hate to break away for good,
after all. Do you know anything from Anstruther? He was up here,
you know."

"I have him now!" secretly exulted Hawke, as he said gravely, "You
know what duty is, I cannot speak as yet, but you can depend on me
as soon as my honor will permit--"

"Yes, yes, I know," said Hugh Johnstone, with a sigh, rising from
the table. "You must make yourself at home here. In fact, I am
thinking of sending my daughter back to Europe. Douglas Fraser can
have them well bestowed; that is, if I have to remain and fight out
this Baronetcy affair, then I could put you up here." Alan Hawke
bowed his thanks.

They had wandered back to the reception-room. With an affected surprise
the Major consulted his watch. "By Jove! I've got a heavy official
mail to prepare, and I'm to dine to-day with Harry Hardwicke, of
the Engineers. General Willoughby wants a private conference with
me, and Hardwicke is the only confidential man he has. He gets his
Majority soon, and Willoughby will lose him on promotion. A fine
fellow and a rising man."

"See here, Hawke! Come in to-morrow and dine with me at seven. I
want to have a long talk with you," said the uneasy host.

"You may absolutely depend on me, Sir Hugh," heartily answered the
visitor, with a fine forgetfulness as to the title. When he rode
away, Major Hawke caught sight of a womanly figure at a window above
him, watching his retreat in due state, and there was the flutter
of a handkerchief as his carriage drove around the oval. "I wonder
if Ram Lal knows about the jewels. I must buy him out and out,
or make Berthe Louison do it unconsciously for me," so mused the
victorious renegade. "He is afraid of me! Now to dispatch Ram Lal
to Allahabad. I must only see Berthe Louison, at night, in her own
bungalow, for my shy old bird would take the alarm were we seen
together. What the devil is her game? I know mine, and I swear
that I will soon know hers. I have him guessing now. I must hunt
up Hardwicke and call on old Willoughby to keep up the dumb show.
Johnstone may watch me--very likely he will. He is afraid of some
coup de theatre." He drove in a leisurely way back to the Club and
sported the oak after giving Ram Lal his last orders.

"I think I hear the jingle of gold 'in the near future,' as the
Yankees say; and, Miss Justine, you shall open the way to the veiled
Rose of Delhi for me, while Berthe Louison tortures this old vetch.
Place aux dames! Place aux dames!" he laughed.

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