Red Pottage | Page 4

Mary Cholmondeley
to speak
unconcernedly, as he followed his host to a back room on the ground
floor. Lord Newhaven was collecting arms for the hall of his
country-house.
"No; much simpler than those elaborate machines," said the older man,
turning on the electric light. Hugh went in, and Lord Newhaven closed
the door.
Over the mantel-shelf were hung a few old Japanese inlaid carbines,
and beneath them an array of pistols.
"Useless now," said Lord Newhaven, touching them affectionately.
"But," he added, with a shade more listlessness than before, "Society

has become accustomed to do without them, and does ill without them,
but we must conform to her." Hugh started slightly, and then remained
motionless. "You observe these two paper lighters, Scarlett? One is an
inch shorter than the other. They have been waiting on the mantel-shelf
for the last month, till I had an opportunity of drawing your attention to
them. I am sure we perfectly understand each other. No name need be
mentioned. All scandal is avoided. I feel confident you will not hesitate
to make me the only reparation one man can make another in the
somewhat hackneyed circumstances in which we find ourselves."
Lord Newhaven took the lighters out of the glass. He glanced suddenly
at Hugh's stunned face and went on:
"I am sorry the idea is not my own. I read it in a magazine. Though
comparatively modern, it promises soon to become as customary as the
much-to-be-regretted pistols for two and coffee for four. I hold the
lighters thus, and you draw. Whoever draws or keeps the short one is
pledged to leave this world within four months, or shall we say five, on
account of the pheasant shooting? Five be it. Is it agreed? Just so! Will
you draw?"
A swift spasm passed over Hugh's face, and a tiger glint leaped into
Lord Newhaven's eyes, fixed intently upon him.
There was a brief second in which Hugh's mind wavered, as the flame
of a candle wavers in a sudden draught. Lord Newhaven's eyes glittered.
He advanced the lighters an inch nearer.
If he had not advanced them that inch Hugh thought afterwards that he
would have refused to draw.
He backed against the mantel-piece, and then put out his hand suddenly
and drew. It seemed the only way of escape.
The two men measured the lighters on the table under the electric light.
Lord Newhaven laughed.

Hugh stood a moment, and then went out.
CHAPTER III
"Is it well with thee? Is it well with thy husband?"
When Lady Newhaven slipped out of the supper-room after her
husband and Hugh, and lingered at the door of the study, she did not
follow them with the deliberate intention of eavesdropping, but from a
vague impulse of suspicious anxiety. Yet she crouched in her white
satin gown against the door listening intently.
Neither man moved within, only one spoke. There was no other sound
to deaden her husband's distinct, low voice. The silence that followed
his last words, "Will you draw?" was broken by his laugh, and she had
barely time to throw herself back from the door into a dark recess under
the staircase before Hugh came out. He almost touched her as he passed.
He must have seen her, if he had been capable of seeing anything; but
he went straight on unheeding. And as she stole a few steps to gaze
after him, she saw him cross the hall and go out into the night without
his hat and coat, the amazed servants staring after him.
She drew back to go up-stairs, and met her husband coming slowly out
of the study. He looked steadily at her, as she clung trembling to the
banisters. There was no alteration in his glance, and she suddenly
perceived that what he knew now he had always known. She put her
hand to her head.
"You look tired," he said, in the level voice to which she was
accustomed. "You had better go to bed."
She stumbled swiftly up-stairs, catching at the banisters, and went into
her own room.
Her maid was waiting for her by the dressing-table with its shaded
electric lights. And she remembered that she had given a party, and that
she had on her diamonds.

It would take a long time to unfasten them. She pulled at the diamond
sun on her breast with a shaking hand. Her husband had given it to her
when her eldest son was born. Her maid took the tiara gently out of her
hair, and cut the threads that sewed the diamonds on her breast and
shoulders. Would it never end? The lace of her gown, cautiously
withdrawn through its hundred eyelet-holes, knotted itself.
"Cut it," she said, impatiently. "Cut it."
At last she was in her dressing-gown and
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