Chapter V: How Will It End?

If Jerry Vane was not very contented in mind, his rooms, the windows of which overlooked a fashionable square, bore evidence that he was surrounded by every luxury, that he was behind the young fellows of his set in nothing; while the velvet and silk cases for cigars or vestas that littered the table and mantelpiece, even the slippers and smoking-cap he wore, all the work of feminine fingers, seemed to hint of the many fair ones who were ready to console him.

Possessed of means ample enough to indulge in every whim and fancy, the mantelpiece and the tables about him were littered by the 'hundred and one' objects with which a young man like Jerry is apt to surround himself.

There were pipes of all kinds, whips, spurs, fencing-foils, revolvers, Derringer pistols, Bohemian glass, and gold-mounted bottles full of essences, statuettes pell-mell with soiled kid gloves, soda-water bottles, pink notes, faded bouquets, and French novels in their yellow covers.

The hangings and furniture were elegant and luxurious, on the walls were some crayons of very fair girls in rather _décolleté_ dress, while on a marble console lay a gun-case, hunting-flasks, and many other things that were quite out of place in a drawing-room, and a Skye terrier and an enormous St. Bernard mastiff were gambolling together on a couple of great tiger-skins, the spoil of Trevor Chute's gun in some far Indian jungle.

The day was far advanced, yet Jerry had not long breakfasted, and lay, not fully dressed, in a luxurious dressing-robe, tasselled and braided, on the softest of sofas, enjoying the inevitable cigar, when Chute was ushered in, and he sprang up to receive him.

It may easily be supposed that Vane was most impatient to hear all the details of his friend's remarkable visit to the Collingwoods--remarkable, at least, under all circumstances--but he could not fail to listen with emotions of a somewhat mingled cast to the account of Ida's undoubted grief for his supplanter--an account which he certainly, with that love of self-torment peculiar to some men, wrung from Trevor Chute by dint of much industrious cross-questioning.

Could he blame her for it?

'This sadness, of which all are cognizant,' said Chute, 'is not unaccountable, you know, Jerry.'

'I suppose so.'

'It is natural grief for Jack Beverley.'

'Pleasant fact to thrust on me!' said Vane, grimly.

'Pardon me, old fellow, I did not thrust it on you. But take heart; a girl with such capacity for love and tenderness is worth the winning.'

'I won her, man alive!' said Jerry, savagely.

'Well, such a fortune is worth winning again.'

'This is barrack slang, Trevor.'

'Not at all,' said Chute, laughing at his friend's petulance. 'Be assured that she must love something; and your turn will deservedly come in due time.'

'If a cat or a monkey don't take my place.'

'Cynical again.'

'I can't help being so, Trevor, as well as being a simpleton.'

'Nay, don't say so, Jerry,' said the soldier, kindly; 'I think this unchanging love you have for a girl who used you so does honour to your heart, especially in this age of ours, when we are much more addicted to pence than to poetry; and, as some one says, the _sauce piquante_ of life is its glorious uncertainty.'

'And Clare--what were your thoughts and conclusions about _her_?

'My thoughts you know; my conclusions--I have none,' replied Chute, who, since he had again seen and talked with Clare Collingwood, had felt his heart too full of her to confide, even to his friend, as yet, what hope or fear he had.

'And you saw Violet, too?' asked Vane, to fill up a pause.

'Oh, yes,' replied Chute, with animation; 'Violet, whilom the pretty little girl--the child with a wealth of golden hair flowing below her waist, and no end of mischief and fun in her bright blue eyes; she seems the same now as then. She actually spoke of Desmond being an admirer of Clare.'

'Surely that was bad form in the girl, to _you_ especially.'

'She did so through pure inadvertence, Jerry; but I must own that, when coupled with your remarks, the circumstance stung me more than a week ago I could have anticipated. But I suppose such trials as those of ours,' he continued, helping himself to a bumper of sherry without waiting to be asked, 'are part and parcel of the ills that manhood has to encounter--"Manhood, with all its chances and changes, its wild revels and its dark regrets--its sparkling champagne-cup and its bitter aconite lying at the dregs."'

'Times there are when I blush at my own want of proper pride of heart in continuing to mourn after a girl who has quietly let me drop into the place of a mere friend.'

'Nay, depend upon it, Jerry, you must be much more than any mere friend can be to Ida Beverley; and now, as far as her grief goes, my visit to-day will prove, I think, the turning point.'

'And so Violet actually blundered out with some remark about Desmond.'

'Yes, and that which galled me more was to see him come lounging into the house to visit Clare just as I took my departure, so there _must_ be some truth in what the clubs say.'

Jerry Vane did not reply, and his silence seemed to give a marked assent to the surmise, as he had been in London, for some time past, and must, as Chute thought bitterly, know all the _on dits_ of the fashionable world, and he sat also silent, watching the ice in the sherry cobbler melt slowly away.

Though Trevor Chute had, with emotions of doubt, regret, and envy, seen Desmond lounging into the house of the Collingwoods on the eventful day of his visit thereto, it did not follow, he thought on reflection, that he visited there daily.

Nor was it so.

It was the height of a crowded and brilliant London season, and the Brigade had to undergo what that branch of the service deem 'hard work.'

There were guards of honour for Royal drawing-rooms; escort duty; heavy morning drills at Wormwood Scrubs; the daily ride in the Lady's Mile; polo at Lillie Bridge; perhaps a match with the Coldstreams at Lord's; a Bacchanalian water party and a nine o'clock dinner at Richmond with some of the pets of the Opera; midnight receptions and later waltzes; at homes, and so forth: thus the time of Desmond was pretty well filled up; and yet at many of these places he had ample opportunities for meeting Clare, and being somewhat of a privileged dangler, without committing himself so far as a special visit might imply.

All was over between Clare Collingwood and Trevor Chute; yet the interest of the latter in her and her future was irrepressible.

Two days passed, and he remained in great doubt what to do: whether to accept Ida's piteous and pressing invitation to call on _her_, heedless, of course, though not forgetting it, of Violet's proposal that he should escort her in the Park when Clare rode with Desmond.

And now he began to think that to remain in London, where there would be daily chances of seeing Clare, would be but to trifle with his own happiness and that peace of mind which he had been gradually attaining in India, and that he and Jerry Vane should betake themselves to Paris or Brussels, and kill thought as best they could; to this conclusion they came as they sat far into the hours of a sultry summer night over cigars and iced drinks, and resolved that the morrow should see them leave 'the silver streak' behind them.

And at that very time, when they were forming their plans, what was Clare about?

Could Trevor have seen her then, and known her secret thoughts, perhaps he might have been less decided in his views of foreign travel.

Returning wearily and long before the usual time from a brilliant rout, greatly to the surprise of Violet, and not a little to the vexation of that young lady, Clare was seated alone in her own room, lost in thought and unwilling to consult poor sad Ida, who was now fast asleep.

It was long past midnight; the throng of foot passengers was gone, but the rattle of carriages was incessant as if the time were mid-day.

She had unclasped her ornaments as if they oppressed her, and forgetful of her maid, who yawned fitfully and impatiently in an adjoining room, she sat with her rounded chin placed in the palm of a white hand, with her dark eyes fixed on vacancy.

The soft air of the summer night--or morning, rather--came gently through the lace curtains of an open window, bringing with it the delicious perfume of flowers from the jardinière in the balcony; and perhaps the fragrance of these blossoms, and the half-hushed hum of the streets without, 'stole through the portals of the senses,' and lured her into waking dreams of the past and of the future.

At the ball she had quitted so early, her father, who had been making himself appear somewhat absurd by his senile attentions to Desmond's rather _passée_ sister, Evelyn, had actually _spoken_ to her of Trevor Chute, and in unwonted friendly terms; and the flood of thought this episode had called up within her, conflicting with the half-decided addresses of Desmond, partly drew her home, to think and ponder over her future, if a future she had that was worth considering now.

So far as monetary matters were concerned, the same barriers existed still between her and poor Trevor Chute as when Sir Carnaby broke off the engagement as cruelly as he would have 'scratched' a horse; and then the settlements which the great, languid guardsman could make were known to be unexceptional.

These did not weigh much with gentle, yet proud, and unambitious Clare; but she knew that they had vast weight with her worldly-minded father, so why torment herself by thinking of Trevor Chute at all?

But thoughts came thick and fast in spite of reason and cool reflection, and the girl sank into a reverie that was far from being a pleasant one.

But what if Trevor Chute had learned to love another!

She bit her lovely nether lip, which was like a scarlet camellia bud, for an instant; her dark eyes flashed, then drooped, and she smiled softly, confidently, and perhaps triumphantly, as she said, half audibly:

'Ah, no--he loves me still; poor Trevor! I saw it in his eyes--I heard it in the cadence of his voice, and I never was mistaken! He loves me still--but to what purpose, _to what end_?'

Tears started to her eyes; but she crushed her emotion, and, with a quick, impatient little hand, rang for her waiting-maid.