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"Come in and have a cup of tea," he said, when he had learnt her errand.AdrienneChapter II
"Getting on fine! Can you take Catkins? I mustn't stay long."
Dick Moray was in corduroy breeches and an old tweed coat, but nothing could conceal the fact that he was a gentleman by birth. He had a thin, rather worn face, with furrows across his brows between his eyes, and he stooped with a peculiar hunch of his shoulders, telling of chest delicacy. He had been badly gassed in the War and had not entirely—even now—got rid of its ill effects.
Adrienne handed over Catkins to his charge, and as he took him round to the stables, she made her way into the house.
There was a small entry, and a staircase going up from it. To the left was a door, and it was this that Adrienne opened. It led into a large comfortable farm kitchen, but it was furnished comfortably. The floor was tiled, and, under a window, and near the fire, were two good Indian rugs. The oak gate-table, drawn near the fire for tea, held a silver teapot and tray, and the china upon it was dainty, as was also the white cloth.
Phemie was in the act of making the tea, taking a kettle off the fire for that purpose. There was a plain glass bookcase on one side of the room, a writing-table in one of the casement window recesses. The rest of the furniture, the dresser, the well-scoured table, the store cupboard and the big open stove, all essentially belonged to a kitchen.
"Come along, Adrienne. How nice to see you! Sit down at the table, will you? How's the General?"
"Much better, but oh! We've had a time!"
"I'm sure you have. I said so to Mother the other day."
Adrienne always enjoyed her meals at the farm. Phemie's butter was beautiful; there was no lack of cream, and always home-made bread and plain currant cake.
To-day there were hot scones.
"Just as if we expected you," said Phemie, laughing, "but I made them for Dick as a treat. When Mother is out, we always have a good tea. There is no one to bustle us away from the table."
Dick here made his appearance, and sat down to enjoy both Adrienne and his tea.
The young people chatted gaily together.
"You don't know of my dissipation, do you?" said Phemie. "I actually was asked to dine at the Hall last week. To fill your place, of course. I hardly knew myself, but Sir Godfrey came round with an invitation from his mother, so I went. Mother was willing. I had an ancient black dress, but I chopped off a good foot of it in length, and I happened to have one good pair of evening-shoes. Mother lent me a pair of silk stockings, and Dick went off and brought me a huge bunch of violets from the florist in Lufton. Wasn't he a dear? The only part of me that disgraced me were my hands. I used to have such nice ones, too!"
A little sigh fell from her lips, as she spread out her reddened work-worn hands before her.
Adrienne smiled.
"Nobody would notice your hands. I'm sure you looked very nice. Uncle Derrick told me you were there. I made him go, but I could not leave Uncle Tom. Did you enjoy yourself?"
"I enjoyed the dinner," said Phemie honestly; "it's such a pleasure to eat when you do not cook. And Colonel Blake took me in and was very amusing. Some of them played Bridge and the rest of us talked. We had no music. Sir Godfrey insisted upon walking home with me; wasn't it good of him?"
"No, I don't think so. He always loves an evening stroll, and so does Tartar. I'm sure he accompanied you."
"Oh, yes. Do you see anything new in front of you?"
"That embossed brass jug on the chimney-piece."
"Yes, Sir Godfrey gave it to me. He picked it out of his collection in the smoking-room. I couldn't help admiring them. You know how I love brass! but I never dreamt of his doing such a thing. Mother was cross. It's always a bone of contention between us. I say that farmhouse kitchens are always renowned for their pewter, their copper and their brass, and that we ought to have some. We have a few pieces hidden away in the attics. Mother won't allow me to bring them down. She says they bring and make work, and she's not going to have to clean useless ornaments.
"I would willingly rise half an hour earlier or go to bed half an hour later, to keep them bright and shining; but it's no good. They're tabooed. So that's that!"
"Phemie would like to turn this into an art studio if she could," Dick said with a little chuckle. "The Mother doesn't see it, and I honestly don't think it would work."
"I should work much the better for having a few beautiful things to look at," said Phemie. "I should like a picture or two on the walls, but those again are banned by Mother."
"Well, you do as you like in your own room," said Adrienne; "for I've seen it, and that is where you want beauty most."
"I'm rather with the Mother that a kitchen ought to be a kitchen," said Dick; "but then I'm only a male, and have no artistic tendencies."
"You lose a lot of pleasure," said Phemie, looking at her brother with thoughtful eyes.
"I don't go into raptures over a baby calf as you do, or see pictures in rotten barn-doors and decaying roofs; but I do take pleasure in the earth, and all that comes out of it, barring the weeds!"
"Dick and Mother have things in common," said Phemie; then she tossed up her chin, and a light came into her eyes, making her look positively handsome; "and if my father had lived, he and I would have understood each other. As it is, I stand alone with my father's spirit in me, which cannot be beaten even if it is suppressed."
There was a moment's silence. Her words were true. Her father had loved art and was full of it to his fingers' tips, though he had never made a name for himself. He had died at an early age, leaving only half-finished, undeveloped paintings, and bits of sculpture behind him. And his widow having known penury and want, and being left almost penniless, felt bitterly towards the art that had proved so disastrous to her husband.
Adrienne changed the conversation. She felt that the topic was difficult, if not dangerous, so she began telling them of her invitation to her aunt.
Phemie was full of interest at once.
"But you will go to her when your uncle is better? Oh, you must. How delightful! An old country Château. It sounds so romantic. I should love to see the country life in France. And she is your aunt, isn't she? Oh, I wish, I wish I were in your shoes."
"Well," said Adrienne impulsively, "why should you not go instead of me? Will you? She only wants a bright young companion. I will tell her that I can send a substitute. She will welcome you. Will you do it?"
Phemie laughed, but there was bitterness in her laugh.
"My dear Adrienne, if the King himself wrote and offered me a position in Buckingham Palace, do you think I could go? Would the upheaval of a mountain move me a hair's-breadth out of my rut?"
"Don't be a rotter!" said her brother, turning upon her. "You speak as if you are a slave. You are of age. You could leave us to-morrow if you chose, and you know you could. If you choose to stay here, don't grouse!"
"Do I grouse?"
"No, I'll own you don't, unless Adrienne comes along."
"Then I'd better stay away," said Adrienne with her pretty laugh. "Oh, Phemie, you're a dear, and much too good and valuable to waste your life on a capricious old lady like Aunt Cecily. You're the light and sunshine of your home, you know you are. What would Dick do without you!"
Then they all laughed together, and the slight storm blew over.
The opening of the front door suddenly startled them. The next moment Mrs. Moray made her appearance. She was a tall good-looking woman with rather a weather-beaten face, and very dark eyes which dominated and held her auditors when she spoke. She was dressed in rough tweed coat and skirt and a plain grey felt hat.
"How do you do, Adrienne?" she said briskly, nodding to her as she deposited some parcels on a side-table.
"Dick, do you know that it's past milking-time, and Andrew won't be back from Lufton till six as I told you."
Dick was at the door in a moment.
"I was just going. Good-bye, Adrienne. My respects and sympathy to your invalid."
Adrienne rose from her seat, and took her departure.
Phemie was already being sent here, there, and everywhere.
There was always a stir and a bustle when Mrs. Moray made her appearance, and though her daughter implored her to sit down and have a cup of tea, there seemed endless small things to do first.
Adrienne's feeling, as she escaped, was thankfulness that she did not live in the same house as Mrs. Moray. She went to the stables and found her horse tied outside and ready for her. Dick appeared from the cow-sheds and helped her to mount.
"I always feel an idle drone when I see how you and Phemie work," she said; "do you never get fed up with it?"
Dick laughed.
"We have our discontented days, Phemie and I, but I love the land. Always have. The very smell of the earth is a tonic to me!"
"Yes, I understand that. When I go to town, the air has no life in it. Good-bye, Dick, and thank you."
She rode away. For one moment Dick's eyes rested on her light graceful figure in the saddle; then, with a short sigh, he went back to his milking.
GODFREY SPEAKS
IT was spring at last. The winter had been a cold and late one; now with a rush of warm bright weather every tree and bush was waking into life. Adrienne, with her hands full of daffodils, was filling great bowls upon the wide window-sills.
She was always down in the morning long before her uncles, and had been out in the garden rifling the beds beneath the windows of their golden treasures.
Softly singing to herself as she arranged the flowers to her liking, she did not hear the entrance of the General or of Drake with the postbag.
"Here, Adrienne, you take the cake! Five, as I'm a sinner, a budget of circulars for Derrick, and the usual execrable bills for me!"
General Chesterton was practically well again, but he had not been allowed to hunt in spite of his agonized entreaties. His doctor warned him that the slightest strain put upon his injured leg might mean weeks of confinement again to his room. So he made the best of it, and occupied himself by superintending the young gardener, and arranging with him the order in which the vegetable garden was to be sown.
Occasionally he would shout for Adrienne to come and help him over some knotty point. She never failed him.
Now, she held out her hands for her letters.
"I shall never get too old to love the post," she said. "It's the one thing that prevents monotony: one from Phemie—a recipe I wanted—one from my dressmaker, one from May Edginton who's in Venice, a bill from the library, and—"
She paused, holding a letter in her hand and scrutinizing it closely.
"Now I wonder," she went on, "who writes to me in such a small black dashing hand. Postmark—London. It's from a man, I'm sure."
"Women are the rummiest lot," observed the General, looking at her; "why waste wonder and time in turning a letter over and over before you open it?"
Adrienne did not hear him. She had slowly opened her letter, and was now deep in its contents. Then she looked up and sighed:
"It's very extraordinary. I felt something would happen to-day, something unexpected, and now this has come."
She handed her letter over to the General, who took it, and with a frowning brow read as follows:—
"DEAR MISS CHESTERTON,—"Your aunt, my stepmother, badly wants you. Why not give her the pleasure of your society if even for a few weeks? I expect by this time that the circumstances which prevented your going to her a month ago have changed."I shall be returning to France on the 18th of this month and we could travel over together."Perhaps I could run down and persuade you to do this kindness for an invalid relative. Could you put me up for a night if I did so?"Will this next Thursday suit you? I expect my stepmother's brothers will be glad to hear the latest account of her."Yours sincerely—"GUY DE BEAUDESSERT."
"Plague take the fellow," spluttered the General; "why has he thrust his finger into the pie? Cecily is determined to take you from us. Here, Derrick, I'll pass it on to you. For consummate cheek give me an American!"
"But he isn't that exactly," protested Adrienne. "He isn't French. His letter tells you that. He has lived in America more than in any other country."
The Admiral read the letter through, and then looked inquiringly at his niece.
"I shall have to go," she said quietly; "but only for a short visit. I shall make that quite clear."
"I think you will, my dear, and we must put up this young man. After all, he is a connection of ours. Thursday is the day after to-morrow. You had better write at once to him."
Adrienne laughed her happy ringing laugh.
"I don't like the feeling of coercion in this visit. He writes so dictatorially."
"He's a nasty, masterful fellow," said the General viciously. "I'll give him a piece of mind when I see him. I remember when he came over to us some years ago. He stood up to me and tried to batten me to the ground over some international question. I told him then that age and experience had some weight in the world, though he didn't appear to think so."
"I don't see how I can go off on the 18th. That is Thursday week," said Adrienne thoughtfully; "I have several engagements, and I've promised Lady Talbot to take the flower-stall at her Bazaar in Lufton on the 19th. Besides, if I go, I prefer to go alone to travelling with him. I might go on the 21st."
"It's utter rot your going at all," growled the General. "Cecily is an octopus! She'll lay hold of you and keep you. But we can wire for you to come back. Either Derrick or I will be alarmingly ill. Both sides can play that game."
"Oh, I shall come back right enough," said Adrienne reassuringly; and then she turned her attention to the breakfast table and purposely talked of other things.
"I promised Godfrey to walk out to Claphanger's Farm this morning," she said. "That dear old Mrs. Viner is very ill, and asked if I would come to see her."
"Take her a bottle of port," said the Admiral; "she mothered us when we were boys. She left us when we went to school, and brought up young Godfrey from his birth."
"Yes, he's devoted to her. I believe she is ninety this month."
An hour later Sir Godfrey appeared. He and Adrienne set off together, tramped through the village, then crossed three or four fields and finally climbed on to the moor. Both of them loved walking for walking's sake, and there was no lack of conversation between them.
Adrienne told him of the letter which she had received.
"I know you think I shall be right to go, don't you?"
"I think it's an opportunity."
"Oh, Godfrey, your opportunities! Do you ever lose yours, I wonder, as I do?"
"Often," he said, smiling. "And then I have regrets and remorse, accordingly."
"I'm perfectly certain you never go against your conscience. Sometimes I wish you were more human!"
He looked a little startled.
"But that's what I work to be," he said; "surely to fill up breaches and gaps, and lend a hand to any needing help, is not inhuman?"
"I'd like to see you do a really selfish thing for once in your life," said Adrienne impetuously.
"I'm doing one now," he responded quickly. "I have a big pile of correspondence on my writing-table waiting to be tackled, and I've let it go hang, because I wanted a walk with you."
Adrienne laughed lightly.
Then he asked, with some interest in his tone: "And does this fellow who's written to you live at the Château?"
"No, I think not. He comes and goes, and spends most of his time when there at a farm near. I don't know him at all. I have never seen him."
"Is he a married man?"
"I don't think so. He may be. I really don't know. He has made over the Château to my aunt. I know that. I believe he's a wanderer by nature. He loves travelling."
There was silence for a moment, then Godfrey said: "Adrienne, when will you let me speak to you seriously?"
"Oh, Godfrey, please—not yet—I don't like to say never, but I want nothing to spoil our pleasant friendship. I don't want you to break it into a thousand pieces!"
"I've been waiting about two years since I last spoke to you."
There was a hint of patient resignation in his tone. Adrienne laid her hand softly on his coat-sleeve. "I should so love to see you become engaged to some nice girl," she said. "You ought to marry and have a home of your own."
He shook his head, but did not speak.
For a few moments they walked on in silence, then Adrienne broke it:
"Look here, Godfrey. Let us have it out. It will be best. Do you know what I think about you? You like grooves. You think, because we have grown up together, that we're meant to spend our lives together. You're accustomed to go about with me, and we're good chums, and we confide in each other, and so you think you want me altogether; and in spite of what you say, and what you think you feel, I don't believe you've got the right sort of love in your heart for me, and I'm perfectly certain I have not got it for you."
Godfrey was so taken aback that he stood still and stared at her.
"What kind of love are you looking for?" he asked her a little breathlessly.
Adrienne looked a little shamefaced and confused; then she plucked up her courage, for she was nothing if she was not courageous.
"I'm going to probe deeply," she said; "and if I hurt you, it's only for your good. I know some girls are satisfied, as they may well be, by a good man's quiet unemotional affection—well—love, as you would say. But I'm not like that. I want to be carried off my feet, thrilled; I want to feel that I care for nothing and nobody in the wide world but the one who is beside me. That I would follow him to suffering or to death with the greatest possible joy. Now do I feel that for you, and do you truthfully feel that for me?"
"You're so intense!" said Godfrey, flushing under his tanned skin. "I'm not excitable by temperament; but I think my love would wear better and endure longer than those passionate heroics."
"I dare say they sound childish to you," said Adrienne quietly, "but I am made that way. I cannot help it. I must be intense. I must feel to the bottom of my heart, when realities come into my life. I'm afraid, Godfrey, I've a turbulent soul, and I welcome storms rather than stagnation."
"Would life with me be stagnation?" asked Godfrey. "I thought you were a contented soul. You enjoy your quiet life with your uncles."
"I do—I do—And that is why I would not exchange it for another similar one. Marriage means a big, mysterious thing to me."
"You put me in the same category as your good uncles. Do you know you are being rather cruel to me this morning?"
Adrienne sighed.
"I don't mean to be, but I feel I should like things to be quite settled between us, and not, I fear, as you wish. I want you as a friend, a good comrade; but I can give you nothing more than faithful friendship, Godfrey, and I am more certain of it now than two years ago, when you first spoke to me."
"Is this your final and determined decision?" Godfrey asked slowly and gravely.
"Yes, I am afraid it is."
And, to her annoyance, great tears rose to her eyes.
Godfrey gave her a fleeting glance. Then he braced himself.
"I am not going to make you sad upon such a lovely morning," he said. "I will accept your answer like a man, and won't bother you any more. Let us talk of other things. We won't let our friendship go; and if you want help at any time, you know that I'll do my utmost for you."
"You're too good for me, and that's the fact," said Adrienne ruefully; "but I do believe that the day will come when you will feel glad that my answer is what it is. And I'm sure there's another much nicer girl than I, who will make you happy."
He did not reply, and as they were now nearing the farm they began to talk of the nurse who had been with both the Chestertons and Sutherlands for the greater part of her life.
No one would have thought, as they sat a little later by the old woman's bed, that there had been such a momentous conversation between them.
Adrienne was always at her best when with the village folk. Godfrey's gaze was sombre, his eyes rarely left her face, but he showed no discomposure as he talked and even laughed with his old nurse.
And then suddenly she turned to him:
"Well, sir, when are you going to take yourself a wife? 'Tis what we all expect from you."
"You must wait a bit, Nannie; wives are not to be picked up so easily."
"You mean you're not so easily pleased?"
"We'll leave it at that."
He refused to be drawn, but Adrienne felt and looked very uncomfortable.
As they rose to go away, the old woman said:
"'Tis good of you to come and see me. It's the weary waitin' that tries me so sorely. If the Lord called me quickly, 'twould be so much easier; I know I've got to go; and every day brings it nearer, but I feel at times like David:
"'Oh, that I had wings like a dove! For then would I fly away, and be at rest.'"
"You are being called very gently, Nannie. Pillow your head on this: 'Underneath are the Everlasting Arms,' and rest down here as a foretaste of what is before you."
Her whole face brightened, and when they were walking home Adrienne said:
"Oh, you ought to have gone into the Church, Godfrey. What a delightful rector or vicar you would make! I wish I had your faith and outlook."
"I'm not an eloquent speaker," said Godfrey with a short laugh; "I fancy my sermons would be dry and dull, so I dare say I am best as I am. When do you think you will be off to France?"
"After Lady Talbot's Bazaar takes place. I think I shall go on the 21st."
"I'll look the General up as often as I can. He's the one who will miss you most. The Admiral is so content amongst his books."
"And—and—" hesitated Adrienne, "shall I write and tell you how I get on, or would you rather not hear from me?"
Godfrey looked straight ahead of him with compressed lips.
"We always have corresponded, haven't we? I don't want things altered, Adrienne—not until you do."
Adrienne was silent; but when he left her at her gate and held out his hand, she took it and held it tightly between her own for a moment.
"You're much, much too good for me, Godfrey. Forgive me for not wanting your all. It's shameful of me, but it's just something in me, which I can't control or get over. And I still have the unswerving conviction that there's someone in the world waiting for you, someone much nobler—much better than I."
He shook his head as he turned away, and his walk home, and the thoughts that accompanied it, brought him into his house with gloom in his eyes and deep depression in his soul.
His mother at luncheon watched him anxiously, but was too tactful to ask him any questions.
She knew he had been out with Adrienne, and was pretty certain that she had again refused him.
Lady Sutherland had known for a long time that her son's affections were set upon Adrienne. She also knew that the girl was strangely indifferent to him. And though she was well content that her son should not marry at present, she resented Adrienne's lack of appreciation of his love.
"She will never get a better husband, socially or morally," she thought to herself; "I really hope she will be made to suffer. If Godfrey is not good enough for her, who will be?"
* * * * *
And Adrienne was shedding some miserable tears in her room before she joined her uncles at lunch.
"Why can't I love him? He's so deep and true and steadfast. But I believe if he were less quiet and controlled, if he took me by storm as it were, and showed more heat and intensity, I should yield to him."
She could not afford much time over useless tears. Quickly she bathed her face and went downstairs.
The General thought what good form she was in as she chatted and laughed and joked with him through lunch, but the Admiral always surmised the truth when his niece was unusually animated and his quick eyes detected the signs of trouble in her face.
When lunch was over, the General went off to the smoking-room with his pipe.
Adrienne stood at the window for a moment or two, looking out upon the sunny garden, and the Admiral joined her and, laying a hand on her shoulder, said:
"You're not fretting over going to France, are you, my dear?"
Adrienne slipped her hand into his arm caressingly. "I'm trying not to think about it," she said; "why do you have such sharp eyes, Uncle Derrick?"
"I hate to see you worried," was his quick response.
"It's only—you know the old trouble—Godfrey has been coming to close quarters again, and it's no good—I can't give him what he wants. And I hate making him unhappy."
The Admiral did not speak.
"You want me to marry him, I know," she went on in a low breathless tone; "but I'm terrified of taking such an unalterable step, feeling as I do—or rather not feeling as he deserves I should. Sometimes I think I have no heart. It's cold and dead as far as he is concerned. I don't say I don't like him. I do very much—but I like him as a friend or brother, and nothing more."
"Well, my dear child, don't fret about it. You know your own business best. He's an out-and-out good sort; but if he doesn't appeal to you, don't for goodness' sake force yourself against your instinct. Perhaps it will be just as well for you to be away from him for a bit. Personally I think you see too much of each other."
"I think perhaps we do. But I have really made him understand to-day that I cannot give him the love he ought to have. He won't ask me again, I feel sure."
Then after a moment's silence she said:
"Don't say anything to Uncle Tom, will you? You and I have a few secrets together, and this must be one of them. Now I must go and write to this stepcousin of mine. But he is no relation really, is he? Don't you think his letter rather dictatorial?"
The Admiral smiled.
"He goes straight to the point and keeps to it. He's been very good to Cecily."
Adrienne went to her private sitting-room. It was upstairs next to her bedroom, and was very daintily furnished. Old-fashioned chintz curtains and chintz-covered couch and chairs brightened up the grey walls and the soft grey carpet underfoot. A canary in a cage was singing lustily as she entered the room. A bright fire was in the grate, and big blue and white china bowls of daffodils and narcissus stood on the writing-table and on the wide window-sills.
Adrienne went over to her writing-table by the window and wrote as follows:
"DEAR COUNT DE BEAUDESSERT,—"Thank you for your letter. We shall be very pleased to see you on Thursday for a few days, when we can do as you suggest—talk things over together. My uncles will be very glad to hear of my aunt. I trust she is fairly well. Will you let us know your train, so that we can send the car to meet you."Yours sincerely,"ADRIENNE CHESTERTON."
"There!" she said a little triumphantly. "That will leave you in doubt as to my intentions, which will be very good for you."
She posted her letter and tried to think of other things. But her anticipated visit to her aunt seemed to hang over her like a heavy cloud.
She always said that she was like a cat, and hated change of any sort, and she was so happy in her home life that she did not want to leave it.
THE COUNT'S ARRIVAL
THURSDAY came. A wire had been received saying that the guest would arrive at four, and the car had been sent for him.
Adrienne had seen that the spare room was ready and comfortable for him. She even put a blue jar of daffodils on the writing bureau, and wondered, as she did so, if he would notice or appreciate them.
Tea was brought into the drawing-room. The Admiral paced the room in expectation of the arrival. The General was out with the dogs.
"Don't want to see the fellow more than I can help," he said as he went off.
When the car arrived, the Admiral went out into the hall, and a moment later Adrienne was shaking hands with a tall, broad-shouldered man not in the very least like a Frenchman in voice or manner or look. He had a clean-shaven, tanned face, startlingly clear blue eyes, and a very determined mouth and chin.
"We've heard about each other, sure!" he said. "But it's very pleasant to see one another at last."
His grip was so hearty that Adrienne winced. She smiled at his slight Americanism.
"I was at school when you were over here before."
"Yes, and I was shown a photo of you in tennis costume, with long hair, and a smile that made me want to kiss you!"
"Will you have some tea?"
Adrienne's tone was cool and detached, but nothing quenched Guy de Beaudessert. He was alive to his finger-tips, and turned to the Admiral with a flood of talk about France and her difficulties.
Adrienne listened, and was surprised at the interest she felt in what he was saying.
"I'm not French, you know. I never would take my father's title. If you haven't a position in France, you're better without it. Indeed, you're not popular with the powers that be, if you keep up a state of 'Noblesse.' My stepmother won't understand this, but even she to the neighbours round is simply 'Madame.' And what is the good of a handle to your name when your house is in ruins, and your property nil?"
"I wonder," said Adrienne a little pointedly, "that you don't live with Aunt Cecily when you are over there. It would make her less lonely."
"I dine with her every night and spend the evening with her," he responded quickly, "but my visits are not long ones, and I confine my energies wholly and unreservedly to the farm which I took over ten years ago, and which bolsters up the estate."
"Are times still bad?" asked the Admiral.
"What can you expect after such a devastating War? And you know how the franc stands."
"I can't think why my sister persists in living out there. She would do much better to sell the Château and come to England."
Guy gave a little laugh and turned to Adrienne.
"You are young and enthusiastic, I am sure," he said; "you must use your powers of influence to induce her to leave her ruined castle."
"No," said Adrienne perversely; "if her heart is there, why should I try to tear her away from it?"
Guy made no reply, but turned to the Admiral.
"My stepmother is unfortunate in her adviser out there. He is a little village notary, and she turns to him for everything. He's fleecing her right and left, and she won't see it. Why don't you or the General pay her a visit sometimes? You could do more with her than the rest of us."
"Never!" laughed the Admiral. "Cecily has always managed us. We never could manage her. And we're both getting old now, and are neither of us good travellers. I should think a young and able man like yourself is more than sufficient for her."
They talked on for some time; and then, when tea was over, Guy strode to the window and stood looking out.
"An English garden," he said; "there's nothing like it in the world. Miss Chesterton, will you take me over it?"
"Certainly," Adrienne answered politely.
She led the way through the hall, taking down a straw hat from the hatstand and putting it on her head. Then they crossed the lawn together, and wandered down the paths between the herbaceous borders in the old walled garden.
"When are you coming over to us?" he said, turning to her quickly. "Can you manage to get away by the 18th?"
"No," said Adrienne, with a little hauteur in her tone; "that date does not suit me. I will come a few days later on. I have talked it over with my uncles and they are willing to spare me for a month—not longer, they say."
"I suppose, like most old people, they're inclined to be selfish," Guy remarked.
"They're neither old nor selfish," said Adrienne hotly.
Guy smiled to himself. He wanted to break the icy crust in Adrienne's voice, and he had succeeded.
"Excuse me, I think they are; here are two of them in a comfortable house, waited on by efficient servants, and everything to their hand. In France their sister lives alone, she has lost her daughter. The times have been hard. She has lost money, ergo, she has lost good servants, for she cannot afford to keep them. Now, as I go about the world, I see this, that half creation is overburdened, because the other half refuses to shoulder their portion. Here's your opportunity to put your shoulder to the wheel, leave the burdenless ones, and ease the big burden of loneliness and unhappiness which is bearing down your aunt. If your uncles are unselfish, they will be willing and anxious for you to do this."
"And where do I come in?" asked Adrienne, trying to speak lightly. "I seem to be but a pawn in the game."
"We're all pawns," said Guy, "and pawns are not to be despised, for their life is full of purpose and aim, and every step they take is a vital one. Remember that some pawns become queens."
Then Adrienne laughed.
She had a delicious laugh, soft and mellow and infectious.
"I am beset with preachers," she said; "are all young men so serious, I wonder? You needn't pile it on, for I'm going, and my uncles are willing that I should do so. They're such unselfish dears that they are sparing me. As you go about the world, do you preach to everyone as you have done to me?"
He surprised her by joining in her laughter.
"I always make a bee-line to my point," he said, "and you must allow that this is a selfish age. I suppose you're not an exception to the run of girls I've come across. 'To have a good time' is the whole aim of their existence."
"A moment ago it was the old who were selfish, now it is the young. What a censorious person you are!"
He did not answer her, but bent his head and buried his face in a mauve lilac bush, then he straightened himself.
"I'm not as bad as I sound," he said. "We must be friends, you and I."
"I never shall be friends with anyone who carps and cavils at the world in general. It is so easy to find fault with the times. Everyone does it. It is second nature—first the weather, then this modern world! And yet the poor old world goes on rolling, and men and women go on living. And history repeats itself. I'm not pessimistic, and I hope I never shall be. And I've lived with kind relatives and I've nice friends. And nothing is wrong with the world, it is only individuals."
Adrienne spoke hotly. There was a pink flush on her cheeks.
"I applaud your sentiments, and I hope you will instil them into your aunt's heart. Poor soul, she sadly needs more optimism in her outlook."
"And now, having finished judging us all, may we talk of other things?"
Again he laughed.
"Are you a gardener? Who supervises this delightful spot? I am sure brains have been at work in the choice of colours."
"My Uncle Tom and I do it between us, but it is our dear Barton who does the actual work. We potter round in the evenings, taking up a few weeds here and there. Is there a garden at the Château?"
"There used to be. I think something could be made of it now, but there is no one with a head to do it—or hands either, for the matter of that. You'll see your aunt's staff and will, I expect, marvel at their industry as I do. The country villages in the out-of-way provinces in France have still the feudal system of retainers who grow up round the Château and consider they are part and parcel of it. It is out of date and all wrong from the socialist point of view, but it's rather pathetic. We have nothing like it in America, and I guess it's fast vanishing out of England!"
"What do you call yourself? French or American?" asked Adrienne, standing still and regarding him with a flash of amusement in her pretty grey eyes.
"I'm a mongrel, nothing more or less. You'll be able to tell me in a few weeks' time which country I favour most."
"I think," said Adrienne rather slowly, "that I should do better if I were to time my visit to my aunt when yours ends. She can't need me so much when you are there as when she is quite alone."
"She mustn't ever be alone again," was his quick response. "It has been nearly disastrous for her nerves as it is—these months since her daughter has left her! You don't realize how imperative it is that she should have companionship."
"No, I don't," said Adrienne quietly; "there are so many widows who live their lives alone. I feel sorry for them, but they have had a good time, and if I were to like moralizing as you do, I should say that good and bad times are the lot of us all. Even the flowers require shade as well as sunshine. Aunt Cecily is no worse off than hundreds of other women. I know several widows in our neighbourhood, but they manage to exist, and love managing their husband's properties."
They had made their round of the garden by this time, and Adrienne led the way back to the house. She found it impossible to suppress or to silence Guy de Beaudessert. He talked again about loneliness and depression.
"I know what destructive forces they are. I have seen it out in the Bush and on ranches in the Rockies. I've experienced it myself, and if it can be eased or prevented in any way, for God's sake, I say it must be done."
He had quite silenced Adrienne by the time they had reached the house. She felt as if her aunt's circumstances must rule her life, and was unusually thoughtful for the rest of the day.
At dinner the guest was the chief speaker; he talked well, and his range of experience was wide. There seemed hardly a country which he had not visited.
"How can you hope to benefit any faction of the human race which is outside your own orbit, unless you have visited and lived in it until you understood the views and aims of the individuals therein? I take up the papers and read the rot that is talked in Parliament on Imperial interests. Every politician who seeks to benefit his country ought to travel round for at least five years. Then his sentiments and advice would be worth listening to. And, mind you, this delegate business is worse than useless. Let them go on their own, and rough it like our pioneers. Then they would get to the heart of things, not a scratch on the veneered surface whilst being regaled by sumptuous banquets, and driven in luxury to see the city from a Rolls-Royce."
"You sound rather like these infernal Socialists and Radicals," spluttered forth the General.
"Oh, no, Uncle Tom," said Adrienne; "it is they who go round in cars, and overeat themselves at banquets."
"The question of £ s. d. doesn't enter your head," said the General; "we would all like to travel and see the world, but it can't be done on nothing."
"Oh," laughed Guy; "go as a stowaway—a stoker—a steward—but go, and get your mind broadened, and don't think the world begins and ends with the Trinity of the British Isles."
"Rot, my dear fellow, rot!" exclaimed the General. "Britain is good enough for me. Rolling stones may roll round the globe, but they'll gather no moss; and will only fill themselves to repletion with self-glorification and—dashed cocksureness!"
Adrienne's laugh rang out merrily.
"You and Uncle Derrick have both been about on the other side of the globe, Uncle Tom, so don't pretend you haven't. I am the only stay at home. But if I visited every country in the world, I know I should come back and say that England was the brightest and best of them all."
"Well, well," said the peace-loving Admiral, "we will admit that some of our rulers would be the better for practical knowledge outside our Empire, but travellers are not infallible. Their outlook is sometimes biased by the company in which they have found themselves."
The General subsided, but he had a way of glaring at Guy that tickled Adrienne's sense of humour. After dinner she got hold of him.
"You're like a turkey-cock, my dear," she said to him; "you wait till the first word comes out of this young man's mouth, and then you try to gobble him up. And it isn't a bit of good wasting your ammunition on him. He's impervious to every insult you can offer him."
"Dash it all, I don't want to insult him. I think it's the other way about. But I won't swallow my country being blackened. And for consummate impudence give me an American, and that a young one."
"He doesn't seem young to me. He's done so much and seen so much. But I own I'd like to see him crushed by someone. I'm sure he never has been, and I am afraid never will be."
Yet shortly after, when Guy sat himself down to the piano and began to play, without music, some of the compositions of the old masters and then drifted into Chopin and Grieg, his exquisite touch and soulful rendering of some of the most beautiful passages brought tears to her eyes and a thrill to her heart.
Adrienne was very susceptible to music. She whispered to her Uncle Tom:
"He is an angel, after all! He has an angel's soul!"
And the General was rude enough to give a loud guffaw, which he stifled with a cough, and then left the room precipitately.
"Oh," cried Adrienne, when Guy rose from the piano, "I'd like to listen to you all night."
He smiled and gave her a little bow in French fashion. "Thank you, but your uncles have had too much of it. I like the organ best. There is one in the hall of the Château. Your aunt likes to listen sometimes. Don't you play yourself?"
"Not much."
"She sings," said the Admiral. "Sit down and sing, my child."
So Adrienne obeyed. She sang a song which Guy had never heard before; and if his music had thrilled her, her voice now thrilled him.
The joyous vibration in it, the sweetness of tone, and pathos, rang on in his ears for hours afterwards:
"Give as the morning that flows out of heaven:Give as the waves when their channel is riven;Give, as the free air and sunshine are given—Lavishly, utterly, carelessly give INot the faint sparks of thy hearth ever glowing,Not a pale bud from the June roses blowing;Give as He gave thee, who gave thee to live!Pour out thy love like the rush of a riverWasting its waters for ever and ever,Through the burnt sands that reward not the giver!Silent or songful, thou nearest the sea.Scatter thy life as the summer showers pouring!What if no bird through the pearl rain is soaring,What if no blossom looks upward adoring!Look to the life that was lavished for thee." ¹
¹ By R. T. Cooke.
There was silence for a few moments after her last note had died away, then the Admiral said:
"I like the sentiment of that song, my dear. Where did you get it?"
"Godfrey gave it to me, one day after he had been talking to me for my good!"
Here she stole a glance at Guy, and there was something mischievous in her glance.
"You haven't the monopoly of preaching," she said.
"Ah," he said, "if you can sing like that, you must feel like it, and I have no fears for the future."
Then he turned to the Admiral.
"Can I catch an early train back to town to-morrow morning?" he asked.
"Why, certainly. There is the ten o'clock express. But won't you stay with us another day?"
"I'm afraid not."
Then his clear bright eyes looked straight at Adrienne,—"into her soul," she told her uncle afterwards.
"My mission is fulfilled," he said, "and when I accomplish my purpose, I waste no time."
"Don't delude yourself," said Adrienne lightly; "nothing has been altered because of your visit. I had settled with my uncles that I should go over to my aunt. It was all arranged."
The Admiral looked at her reproachfully.
"My dear," he said, "be courteous. I feel deeply indebted to Count de Beaudessert for his interest in my sister, and for his loving thought and care of her. It is very good of him to have come down to us on her behalf."
"Please drop the Count!" said the young man. "But thank you, sir, for your kind words. I don't get many of them."
Adrienne looked a little ashamed of herself. For the rest of his stay she was sweetness itself.
When he shook hands with her the next morning, he kept her hand in his for the fraction of a moment:
"It is only 'au revoir,' and we part friends, do we not? I am forgiven for my audacious interference, for my dictatorial, dogmatic speeches?"
Adrienne smiled up into his face.
"If only you would not try to be so masterful, I think I should get to like you," she said.
He dropped her hand.
"If I was a genuine Frenchy," he said, "I would raise your hand to my lips. We are both, in spite of national prejudices, going to like each other very much."
And then he got into the car awaiting him, and the General, overhearing his words, ejaculated:
"Insufferable puppy!"
AT THE CHÂTEAU
IT was towards the end of a lovely afternoon in May that Adrienne arrived at her destination. Both her uncles had accompanied her to town, and seen her off in the boat express to Dover. She had a quick, smooth passage across the Channel, then a long train journey to Paris, where she stayed for the night at a comfortable English hotel recommended by friends. She did a little sight-seeing in the morning, and then took the train on to Orleans. Here a car was waiting for her. The chauffeur, who could speak broken English, explained matters:
"Monsieur, he mean to come hisself, but at last minute he called away—a terrible accident happen to Jean Lucien, he be the fermier—and Monsieur he drive him to hospital all quickly, and not return in time. And Madame he tell myself to come."
Adrienne stepped into the car, and as she drove along the smooth, straight roads with their rows of poplar trees on either side, and noted the small patches of cultivated land, with the peasants tilling their ground, and the women and children busy hoeing and weeding in the bright sunshine, she felt that England was already very far away. A spasm of home-sickness crept into her heart, and then she laughed at it.
"Why, I was breakfasting at home yesterday—it is too ridiculous of me. It takes no time to get here, and I can go back when I like."
She repeated these last words very emphatically, and found comfort in doing so. They rushed through villages, and climbed hills between woods of young, freshly planted trees. Finally they slowed down in a quaint little village with a green, and a big pump in the middle of it round which was a little group of idle men. There was a small church on a rising knoll outside the village, and then they came to some beautifully wrought iron gates between two tall grey stone pillars. The gates were open, and they glided up an avenue of chestnut trees now in full bloom.
At intervals there were great stone vases and blue wooden seats, then they rounded a curve and the Château was in sight. In the mellow afternoon sunshine Adrienne admired it. It was a grey stone building with a deep blue slated roof; long, narrow windows were on either side of a very handsome front door under a stone portico. A flat stone terrace ran along the whole length of the Château. A fountain was playing into a marble basin at one end of it. Statuettes of boys and nymphs adorned the low stone wall that edged the terrace. There was an untidy piece of park surrounding the Château, cows were grazing in it. The trees were few in number, but there was an old walled garden behind the house, and quite a long line of stables and outbuildings. There appeared to be no flowers, but some young orange and myrtle trees were in blue painted tubs just outside the front door.
Before Adrienne had had time to pull the heavy iron bell-handle, the door was opened, and an old white-haired butler appeared, bowing low before her.
"Is Madame at home?" Adrienne asked in her best French.
He led the way without a word across a dark polished parquetry floor, then up a broad shallow flight of stone steps along a wide corridor which contained some rather shabby settees ranged against the walls, one or two gilt tables, and some good oil paintings hanging from a highly decorated ceiling.
Pierre, the old manservant, threw open a beautifully carved mahogany door halfway down the corridor, and Adrienne was in the presence of her aunt.
She was a small slight woman with pale golden hair, and a pathetically sad-looking face. She was dressed in black, and had a black lace mantilla wound round her head and neck. Adrienne thought that she looked more youthful than ever, but she was well over sixty years of age. She carried herself well, and her face was rouged and powdered. She had very pretty, delicate hands and used them in talking, as a Frenchwoman would have done.
"At last!" she exclaimed, as she drew Adrienne forwards by both her hands, and imprinted two dainty kisses upon each cheek in turn.
"I thought I should never get you! How you have grown and—yes—improved. You were no beauty as a child, but you give promise of it now—a little too rosy perhaps for good breeding, but it is your outdoor country life. And how are the brothers? As inseparable as ever? Now come and sit down. Pierre, we will have tea; tell Louis and Gaston to take Mademoiselle's luggage to her room."
The last sentence was said in French. Adrienne glanced around her. It was a long, narrow salon furnished mainly in Louis Quatorze style; the floor was polished till it shone like a mirror, but dust lay on pictures and ornaments, and the decoration of the room was very shabby. There was a bright wood fire burning, and Adrienne was glad of it, for the room seemed to her damp and unused.
She discovered later that her aunt never sat in it when she was alone. The Countess motioned to her to sit down upon a faded blue satin couch; and if Adrienne's bright young eyes were taking in her environment, her aunt's sharp eyes were taking in her niece.
In her neat dark blue travelling suit, with her blue velvet hat pushed well down on her shapely little head, Adrienne would have passed muster in Paris.
Tired she was, but not so tired that she could not talk very pleasantly to her aunt till the tea arrived.
A small silver tray with a very big silver teapot and fragile china cups was placed on a little table in front of her aunt. A few sweet biscuits on a plate was the accompaniment to the tea, which Adrienne found weak and tasteless. But it was hot, and Pierre served it, as if it were the choicest champagne.
The Countess asked her numberless questions about herself and her uncles, and then suddenly she pushed away her cup of tea from her, and produced her handkerchief. Burying her face in it, she began to sob:
"Oh, I am miserable, lonely, forlorn! Since my child has left me so heartlessly, I have suffered terribly. No one in the neighbourhood to understand or comfort me. My brothers and you refusing to come to me! And this great big old house going to pieces, and the winter with the rain and snow and darkness, and poor little me sitting up waiting, waiting for life to smile on me again, and always waiting in vain."
"Poor Aunt Cecily," said Adrienne softly. "If I were you, I would sell this old Château, and come to England and be happy in a charming little English cottage near your friends and relations. Why should you live in a foreign country away from us all?"
The Countess put down her handkerchief, and her eyes sparkled with an angry light in them:
"English cottage! Me, at my age, in my position! You ignorant, foolish girl, do you think for a moment that I would leave my husband's home and property? Do you think, after forty years of French life and Parisian society, I could settle down in an English village, with its mud, and dull stolid unsociability?"
"But we live in the country, Aunt Cecily, and we have many nice friends round us, and our village looks as well cared for as this. And we are never dull or lonely."
"Oh, bah! I have seen your life and it is not mine, nor ever will be. You will like to go to your room. Pierre will take you. We dine at eight o'clock."
Adrienne felt that she had blundered, and was being dismissed.
Pierre was summoned, and took her up another flight of stone stairs. Adrienne felt already that the old Château with its scent of polish and wood fires, its mellow atmosphere, and dignified antiquity was beginning to fascinate and hold her.
Her room was large and comfortable, with an expanse of dark shining parquetry floor, some soft rugs, and a very large state bed. Faded green satin damask curtains and hangings, a very handsome couch and writing-table, and several easy-chairs completed its furnishing; her washstand with its accessories was in a little closet adjoining the room: four big French windows open to the floor, looked out upon the park, and some woods on a rising hill, not very far from the house.
She found her luggage already there, and a stout, middle-aged peasant woman appeared, asking her if she could help her. She soon discovered that the Château was run by one family of the name of Tricard. Pierre and his wife Fanchette ruled over all supreme. She was cook, their daughter Annette was general housemaid, her husband was gardener, their young daughter helped in the kitchen, and two sons waited at table, polished the floors, and helped their mother about the house.
"We have always served the De Beaudesserts for two generations," Annette told Adrienne, as she helped her to unpack her things; "but my mother remembers the time when the Château was full of great ladies and gentlemen, and there were five or six waiting men."
Then she insisted upon showing Adrienne the best state bedroom. She pulled off the coverings of the furniture, and smiled complacently when Adrienne expressed her admiration of it. The bed was a magnificent erection, gilt and blue paint and a gilded coronet over the head of it; it had blue satin hangings and curtains with gilt fringes. The sofas and easy-chairs and spindle-legged tables were all gilt and blue. Annette showed Adrienne a real lace coverlet which was laid over a blue satin one for the bed, and blue satin cushions with the same old lace upon them. The room was panelled in blue satin with gilt decorations. There were cabinets in it, but they were empty. The priceless china that used to be in them had all been sold, but there were some beautiful old paintings on the walls. Five large French windows looked out upon the old park.
"Royalty has slept in that bed," said Annette in an awed whisper. "Queen Marie Antoinette stayed here for three days once."
"How interesting!" said Adrienne enthusiastically.
She lingered in the room, trying to realize bits of the past, but Annette hurried her back to her own room.
"Madame is proud of her guest-chamber, but she will not show it to tourists. The Marquise in Château Divant is obliged by Government to let the public come through her Park and Château every Wednesday during the summer. But our Château is not so old as hers, nor so historic."
Adrienne returned to her room and went to the windows when she was left alone. There was sunshine streaming over the opposite hills, and lighting up the fresh green in the woods. The air was soft and sweet, and she drew in a long breath of it with content.
"It is very quiet, very sweet here," she thought. "I shall enjoy staying here for a time."
She slipped into a pale blue filmy dress, and then made her way downstairs. For a moment she hesitated as she came to the salon door, then she passed it, and made her way out into the garden at the back of the Château through an open door and down a flight of stone steps. Here she found herself in an old walled garden, with wisteria falling over the walls, pear and apple trees in full blossom, and two long untidy borders of spring flowers on either side of the vegetables. There were paths with box-hedge borders; in one shady corner was a clump of lilies of the valley. But she noticed that, though the vegetables looked well cared for, the flowers were utterly neglected, and she longed to get down on her knees and weed.
Then, as she came to a blue painted door at the bottom of the garden, she slipped the bolt, and found herself facing a grassy path between trees. It was an entrance into the wood. She wandered along it, rejoicing in the fresh green above and around her. Presently she came to a seat, and from here, looking back, she had a good view of the Château and village.
The quaint blue roofs, the grey wood of the houses, the scent of wood fires, and the tinkle of bells as the oxen passed along the lanes with their loads delighted her artistic soul. It was all so different from England! Dreamily she gazed around her, oblivious of time, and then horses' hoofs roused her. A rider was coming through the wood, and as she looked, she recognized Guy de Beaudessert.
He dismounted directly he saw her, and held out his hand.
"I thought it was a wood nymph. Have you found your way here already? Sorry I couldn't meet you, but business prevented me. I'm on my way to the stables. The farm isn't good enough for my Estelle. What do you think of her?"
Adrienne looked at the glossy chestnut with a smile, and noted her proud and spirited bearing.
"I think she's a darling!" she said enthusiastically. "And I'm fascinated with it all here. It's so—so romantic!"
He smiled, then took a sharp turn in the woods.
"Don't follow me," he said, "or you may be late for dinner, and that is displeasing to Madame. I shall be the culprit to-day. Ask her not to wait for me."
So Adrienne returned the same way as she had come, and, as she entered the house, Pierre was clanging a great bell in the hall.
Her aunt was waiting for her in the salon. She frowned when she received Guy's message.
"He is so oblivious of my wishes. He always has been. He knows, in my delicate state of health, that punctuality of meals is most essential. I expect he thinks that now you are here, he is no longer necessary to me. Come, my dear, we will go in at once."
She slipped her hand into Adrienne's arm, and leant upon her heavily. They entered the dining-room, a rather gloomy room with painted ceiling and walls. A long refectory table in the centre and chairs surrounding it were all that was in it. The many windows were draped heavily with faded rose damask hangings. A huge cut-glass chandelier hung from the ceiling, and in this, were a number of lighted candles.
The meal commenced. Pierre waited deftly, though his steps and movements were very slow. His old hands shook as he handled the dishes, and Adrienne felt a great pity for him, as she noticed how old and frail he was. Her aunt talked, but it was chiefly about her delicate state of health. Adrienne tried to interest her in her uncles' pursuits at home, but the Countess seemed to be purely indifferent to their existence. Soup, an omelette, and chicken with salad had already been served before Guy appeared.
Adrienne drew an inward breath of relief as she saw him.
He seemed so full of life and energy, that he changed the gloomy atmosphere at once.
"So sorry, ma mère? But you have heard of Jean's accident. I have been with him; his arm will be saved, the doctor hopes, so I took the good news to his wife. It was terribly mangled; he tripped and caught it in the mowing machine."
"Do not give us any terrible details," said the Countess quickly; "you know I cannot bear any horrors. Did you cash my cheque for me at the Bank?"
Guy looked across the table at his stepmother with a slight smile, then shook his head.
Adrienne saw a look of dismay in her aunt's eyes. But she said nothing.
Then he turned to her: "Do you ride? I expect you do."
"I love it," said Adrienne, with glowing eyes.
"Then we will have some rides together. I have two horses. Sultan is quiet, and not quite heavy enough for me. Have you a side-saddle on the place, ma mère?"
"No," said the Countess quickly, "you must not forget, Guy, that Adrienne came over here to be a companion to me."
He nodded at her reassuringly.
"None of us mean to forget that fact, but she must have exercise, and in the early morning before you are awake, she and I will have rides through the lanes. We want her to become enamoured with our country, do we not? I think she is smitten with it already."
"The novelty of it is pleasant," said Adrienne a little cautiously.
"But," said the Countess with rising colour, and a little frown between her brows, "you will not have the ordering of my niece's days, Guy; it is I, her aunt, who will do that. You are too fond of arranging and ordering and willing this or that."
Guy's face was perfectly imperturbable.
"Then you," he said with a little bow towards her, "will order your niece to ride in the early mornings for her good, and I will help her to carry out your wishes."
Adrienne's delicious little laugh rang out; she could not help it.
"I hope I shall be tractable under this discipline," she said. "I shan't forget that I have come here to cheer you up, Aunt Cecily. I am sure we shall not quarrel over that."
Her aunt's frown gradually disappeared.
Guy began giving Adrienne a description of the village and the neighbourhood round.
"We are just a small community here," he said, "who know all about each other's virtues and vices and discuss them lengthily when our days are dull and time hangs heavily on our hands.
"Madame ma mère, of course, is the centre, and the past glories of our Château and the present decay is a never-ending topic of conversation. The Curé comes next. He is a mild little man, very fond of his flock, very conscientious in his duties, very wide in his charity. I always feel a better man after I have had a talk with him."
"He wants too much," put in the Countess fretfully; "he seems to think I have bottomless gold chests from which I can give and give and give, whenever there is a birth or wedding or funeral."
"The next in importance," continued Guy, "is our notary, a very small man with a big head, and a bigger idea of his own importance than anyone round him has. He has a wife who is what we call in America a climber. She looks to end her days as mistress of a Château. I hope it won't be this one. By the way, ma mère, is it true that you have sold the fishing to him? I knew the shooting was his, that was done last autumn; but I was hoping to get some good trout here."
Adrienne could not help noticing the extreme uneasiness which the Countess showed during this speech. Her hands trembled visibly, as she peeled some fruit upon her plate.
"How else do you expect me to live?" she said in quavering tones. "It is a struggle to exist. My doctor's bills must be paid."
"Yes—yes—well—where was I? We'll dismiss the notary. He is clever; he lives by squeezing others; he is getting rich. The village folk regard him with awe. They love their Curé, they fear their notary. Who can I describe next? The doctor lives five miles away, he does not belong to the village. Ma mère will tell you all about him, she knows him better than any of us. Oh, I must tell you of little Agatha."
His voice softened, the rather amused curl of his lips disappeared.
"Agatha—I believe she will be calendered one day. To me she is amongst the saints already. You must go and see her, Cousin Adrienne. She lives with her cheery, hard-working sister in a little house at the top of a green knoll outside the village. I always wonder at such a suitable position being their home. But it was their home before Agatha was born. Her father was a chemist by profession, and also a scholar. You climb if you go to see Agatha, physically and mentally. She is a modern Joan of Arc, without her fiery enthusiasm, but she lives in the unseen, and has her visions."
"She sounds awfully interesting," said Adrienne.
The Countess shrugged her shoulders.
"The peasants are superstitious; they regard a sick girl as a seer and mystic. She fosters their credulity and poses as a saint."