GODFREY half rose from his chair, more than puzzled by the mutual recognition. “You said you didn’t know Mr. Burden,” he cried.
But neither heeded him. Baltazar made a stride forward and with one hand gripped Marcelle by the arm and with the other motioned in his imperious way to the open door. Still looking at him in wonderment, she allowed him to lead her quickly to the terrace at the head of the steps. Godfrey’s astonished gaze followed them till they disappeared. Outside, Baltazar released her.
“Marcelle! What in thunder are you doing here?”
She was too greatly overwhelmed to reply. She could only gasp a few broken and foolish words.
“You? John Baltazar? Alive?”
“Never been less dead. But you! You of all people. My God! although I lost you, I could never lose your face. It has been with me all the time. And there it is, the same as ever. But what are you doing here?”
She made a vague gesture over her costume.
“I’m a professional nurse. Sister-in-charge. I’ve been nursing all my life.”
“Not when I knew you,” said Baltazar.
“My life began after that.”
“Married?”
The colour came back into her white cheeks. “No,” she said.
“Neither am I.”
He put both hands on her shrinking shoulders and bent on her eyes which she could not meet.
“You at last, after all these years! Just the same. Just as beautiful. Much more.”
“This is rather public,” she managed to say, releasing herself. “There are lots of patients——”
He laughed and, indicating the parapet, invited her to sit.
“You must forgive me,” he said, seating himself by her side. “The sight of you blotted out the world. Don’t be frightened. I’m quite tame now. Look at me.”
She obeyed him as she had done in her early girlhood, dominated for the moment by his tone.
“How do you think I’m looking? Battered by time? A crock to be wrapped up in flannel and set in the chimney-corner to wheeze the rest of his life away?”
“You look very little older,” she said with a wan smile. “And you haven’t a grey hair in your head.”
“That’s good. I’m as young as ever I was. I can sweep away twenty years and begin where I left off.”
“You’re more fortunate than I am,” said Marcelle.
“Rubbish!” said Baltazar.
She glanced at him wistfully and then out over the trees.
“Nursing isn’t the road to perpetual youth,” she said. Then lest he should catch up her words, she continued swiftly: “But you must tell me where you have been, how you’ve come back to life. You disappeared utterly. You never wrote. If we all thought you dead, was it our fault? When Godfrey showed me your letter, I never dreamed who James Burden might be.”
“Godfrey?” Baltazar pounced on the name. “Do you call him Godfrey? Then you must be old friends. Hence the miracle of finding you together. Have you been mothering him all his life?”
She shook her head. “How you jump at conclusions! No. I met him for the first time when I came here—a month ago.”
“So it’s just Chance, Fate, Destiny, the three of us meeting like this? The hand of God? . . . Wait, though. I can’t see quite clearly. You learned he was my son?”
She smiled again:
“Do you think we call all young officers here by their Christian names?”
“Does he know that you knew me?”
“If he didn’t,” she replied, “he wouldn’t have consulted me about Mr. Burden’s letter. I wish I had been mothering him all his life,” she added after a pause; “but I’ve been doing my best for the last month. I can’t help loving him.”
“What does he know about you and me?”
“I’ve told him everything,” said Marcelle.
Baltazar started to his feet.
“Then when he saw us gaping at each other just now, he must have guessed, or he can’t have any Baltazar brains in his head.” He moved away a pace; then turned on her. “You gave me a good character?”
Her head was bowed. She did not see the rare laughter in his eyes, but took his question seriously.
“Can you doubt it?” She beckoned him nearer, and said in a low voice: “I may have been wrong, but I have given him to understand that it was entirely on my account—you know what I mean——”
“What other reason, in the name of God could I have had?” he exclaimed with a large gesture.
If there had lingered a doubt in her mind, the note of sincerity in the man’s cry would have driven it away for ever. It awoke a harmonic chord of gladness in her heart and her whole being vibrated. Although John Baltazar’s subsequent career was as yet dark and mysterious, her faith, at least, was justified. She said without looking at him:
“You’ll find that I’ve been loyal.”
He strode towards her and, disregarding the perils of publicity, again took her by the shoulders.
“What kind of a cynical beast do you think I’ve turned into?”
He swept away, leaving her physically conscious of the impress of his fingers in her flesh and her brain reeling.
Baltazar marched into the great hall to Godfrey, still sitting in his arm-chair, his maimed leg, as usual, supported on the outstretched crutch.
“No, don’t get up.”
He swung the chair which he had previously occupied dose to Godfrey’s and sat down.
“By this time you must have guessed who I am,” he said in his direct fashion.
“I suppose you’re my father,” said the young man.
“I am,” replied Baltazar. “My extraordinary meeting with Miss Baring gave me away. Didn’t it?”
“I suppose it did. Perhaps I ought to have suspected something when you mentioned China. But I didn’t.”
“The assumed name was the one I was known by for eighteen years—ever since I left England. I thought I’d take it up again for the sake of a reconnaissance, like the rich old uncle in the play, to see what kind of a man you were and how you looked upon your unknown father. Hence the questions you may have thought impertinent.”
“I quite see,” said Godfrey, pulling at his short-cropped moustache.
Baltazar threw himself back in his chair. “Well, there it is. We’re father and son. Miss Baring has told you, from her point of view, why I threw over everything and disappeared. Her conjecture is absolutely correct. I must, however, say one thing to you, once and for all. I hadn’t the remotest idea that you were coming into the world. If I had, I should have remained and done my duty. I only heard of your existence a week ago—at Cambridge.”
“Yes?” said Godfrey.
“Let us come straight to the point then. You either believe me or disbelieve me. If you don’t believe me, nothing I can ever say or do will make you. If you do believe me, we can go ahead. It’s the vital point in our future relations. Speak out straight. Which is it?”
Godfrey looked for a few seconds into the luminous grey eyes—his own were somewhat hard—and then he said very deliberately:
“I certainly believe you. My conversations with Sister Baring made me take that particular point for granted.”
Baltazar drew a long breath.
“That’s all right, then. I think I also ought to assure you that beyond giving Cambridge a nine days’ wonder, I have done nothing to discredit the name of Baltazar. In China I had a position which no European to my knowledge has attained since Marco Polo. I left on account of the warring between two ideals—the Old China and the New. I belonged to the Old. I found I couldn’t find orientation unless I came West for it. I returned to England two years ago.”
“And you only went up to Cambridge last week?”
“Precisely. The intervening time I spent in a remarkable manner, which I’ll tell you about on another occasion. In the meanwhile we’re face to face with the overwhelming fact that I’ve discovered an unsuspected son, and you a legendary father. I’m fairly well off. So, I presume, are you. If you’re not, my means are yours. It’s well to clear the air, from the very beginning of any possible sordid bogies.”
“I never dreamed of such a thing,” said Godfrey.
“All right. That’s settled. We come now to the main point. We’re father and s............