The Essential W. Somerset Maugham Collection. W. Somerset Maugham

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ very strange that he should insist on this silence,' said Lady Kelsey. 'One would have thought if he had nothing to be ashamed of, he'd have nothing to hide.'

      'Do you believe that story, too?' asked Lucy.

      'I don't know what to believe. It's so extraordinary. Dick says he knows nothing about it. If the man's innocent, why on earth doesn't he speak?'

      'He knows I trust him,' said Lucy. 'He knows I'm proud to trust him. Do you think I would cause him the great pain of asking him questions?'

      'Are you afraid he couldn't answer them?' asked Boulger.

      'No, no, no.'

      'Well, just try. After all you owe as much as that to the memory of George. Try.'

      'But don't you see that if he won't say anything, it's because there are good reasons,' she cried distractedly. 'How do I know what interests are concerned in the matter, beside which the death of George is insignificant....'

      'Do you look upon it so lightly as that?'

      She turned away, bursting into tears. She was like a hunted beast. There seemed no escape from the taunting questions.

      'I must show my faith in him,' she sobbed.

      'I think you're a little nervous to go into the matter too closely.'

      'I believe in him implicitly. I believe in him with all the strength I've got.'

      'Then surely it can make no difference if you ask him. There can be no reason for him not to trust you.'

      'Oh, why don't you leave me alone?' she wailed.

      'I do think it's very unreasonable, Lucy,' said Lady Kelsey. 'He knows you're his friend. He can surely count on your discretion.'

      'If he refused to answer me it would mean nothing. You don't know him as I do. He's a man of extraordinary character. If he has made up his mind that for certain reasons which we don't know, he must preserve an entire silence, nothing whatever will move him. Why should he answer? I believe in him absolutely. I think he's the greatest and most honourable man I've ever known. I should feel happy and grateful to be allowed to wait on him.'

      'Lucy, what _do_ you mean?' cried Lady Kelsey.

      But now Lucy had cast off all reserve. She did not mind what she said.

      'I mean that I care more for his little finger than for the whole world. I love him with all my heart. And that's why he can't be guilty of this horrible thing, because I've loved him for years, and he's known it. And he loves me, and he's loved me always.'

      She sank exhausted into a chair, gasping for breath. Boulger looked at her for a moment, and he turned sick with anguish. What he had only suspected before, he knew now from her own lips; and it was harder than ever to bear. Now everything seemed ended.

      'Are you going to marry him?' he asked.

      'Yes.'

      'In spite of everything?'

      'In spite of everything,' she answered defiantly.

      Bobbie choked down the groan of despairing rage that forced its way to his throat. He watched her for a moment.

      'Good God,' he said at last, 'what is there in the man that he should have made you forget love and honour and common decency!'

      Lucy made no reply. But she buried her face in her hands and wept. She rocked to and fro with the violence of her tears.

      Without another word Bobbie turned round and left them. Lady Kelsey heard the door slam as he went out into the silent street.

      XVII

      Next day Alec was called up to Lancashire.

      When he went out in the morning, he saw on the placards of the evening papers that there had been a colliery explosion, but, his mind absorbed in other things, he paid no attention to it; and it was with a shock that, on opening a telegram which waited for him at his club, he found that the accident had occurred in his own mine. Thirty miners were entombed, and it was feared that they could not be saved. Immediately all thought of his own concerns fled from him, and sending for a time-table, he looked out a train. He found one that he could just catch. He took a couple of telegram forms in the cab with him, and on one scribbled instructions to his servant to follow him at once with clothes; the other he wrote to Lucy.

      He just caught the train and in the afternoon found himself at the mouth of the pit. There was a little crowd around it of weeping women. All efforts to save the wretched men appeared to be useless. Many had been injured, and the manager's house had been converted into a hospital. Alec found everyone stunned by the disaster, and the attempts at rescue had been carried on feebly. He set himself to work at once. He put heart into the despairing women. He brought up everyone who could be of the least use and inspired them with his own resourceful courage. The day was drawing to a close, but no time could be lost; and all night they toiled. Alec, in his shirt sleeves, laboured as heartily as the strongest miner; he seemed to want neither rest nor food. With clenched teeth, silently, he fought a battle with death, and the prize was thirty living men. In the morning he refreshed himself with a bath, paid a hurried visit to the injured, and returned to the pit mouth.

      He had no time to think of other things. He did not know that on this very morning another letter appeared in the _Daily Mail_, filling in the details of the case against him, adding one damning piece of evidence to another; he did not know that the papers, amazed and indignant at his silence, now were unanimous in their condemnation. It was made a party matter, and the radical organs used the scandal as a stick to beat the dying donkey which was then in power. A question was put down to be asked in the House.

      Alec waged his good fight and neither knew nor cared that the bubble of his glory was pricked. Still the miners lived in the tomb, and forty-eight hours passed. Hope was failing in the stout hearts of those who laboured by his side, but Alec urged them to greater endeavours. And now nothing was needed but a dogged perseverance. His tremendous strength stood him in good stead, and he was able to work twenty hours on end. He did not spare himself. And he seemed able to call prodigies of endurance out of those who helped him; with that example it seemed easier to endure. And still they toiled unrestingly. But their hope was growing faint. Behind that wall thirty men were lying, hopeless, starving; and some perhaps were dead already. And it was terrible to think of the horrors that assailed them, the horror of rising water, the horror of darkness, and the gnawing pangs of hunger. Among them was a boy of fourteen. Alec had spoken to him by chance on one of the days he had recently spent there, and had been amused by his cheeky brightness. He was a blue-eyed lad with a laughing mouth. It was pitiful to think that all that joy of life should have been crushed by a blind, stupid disaster. His father had been killed, and his body, charred and disfigured, lay in the mortuary. The boy was imprisoned with his brother, a man older than himself, married, and the father of children. With angry vehemence Alec set to again. He would not be beaten.

      At last they heard sounds, faint and muffled, but unmistakable. At all events some of them were still alive. The rescuers increased their efforts. Now it was only a question of hours. They were so near that it renewed their strength; all fatigue fell from them; it needed СКАЧАТЬ