XXVI
Moiraawoke late, long after Potter Osprey had departed for the city, where he was to meet Roget and return with him in the car sometime that night.
It was her last week in the cottage. A few days after the departure of Rob Blaydon for the west, Elsie Jennings had paid her a visit and talked. Miles Harlindew was living with a young woman in the Village. There was a rumour of their going to Europe together.... Moira suppressed a twinge at this, in which at first there was more of sardonic humour than of pain. The pain came sharply afterward, but it did not remain long this time, and it left her at last aloof. She no longer felt the vestige of an obstacle to following her own inclinations, and she also had no further defence against Osprey’s attentions.
The growth of understanding between them was almost wordless, monosyllabic. It made her intensely happy to discover in his eyes how much she was bringing to him. A long time would have to elapse before she could give a worthy response to that emotion, but she felt that it would come....
The troublesome details of her future were therefore on this morning a matter of no concernto her at all. What filled her with delight was the immediate present. Never had she seen such weather as that October day, or if she had, never before had she been alive to its innumerable aspects at once. After the dubiousness and suffering of the past few weeks she felt both older and younger, both cleansed by experience and ready for more to come. Her whole womanly being was gathering itself for something new, and she meant to grasp it to the full. The ship’s engines were throbbing in her blood and the open sea lay beyond, but her hand was firm on the wheel....
It was a day to idle, one of those days when the children were positively in the way and work impossible. It was a day of heady egoism, of reveling in her securely felt advantages, and a certain sense of having won the spurs of lawlessness. She would be restless until to-morrow when the men came. What fine friends they were!
It was eleven o’clock, and, following her usual custom, she walked down to the grey metal box in which both her own mail and that of the Osprey house was deposited. She half expected to hear from Rob Blaydon who had promised to write her from Thornhill.
She ran through the letters quickly. There were none for her, but she went back to look again at a large envelope addressed to Osprey. She supposed she had done this simply because it was larger than the others and extended out aroundthem while she held them in her hand. But there had been another reason, as she discovered on second examination. The handwriting was familiar....
She realized in fact that she was looking at the handwriting of Mathilda Seymour. She could not have mistaken it, even with nothing else to guide her, but there was the postmark of her city. She turned the envelope over, only to find confirmation in the return address.
She caught herself almost in the gesture of tearing it open. Her first thought had been that it was her letter, no matter whom it was addressed to. But she stopped herself in time. She could not open Potter Osprey’s letter. She wondered that she could have had the impulse to do so. Yet, as if she feared the temptation would be too strong, she kept repeating to herself, “I must not open it, I must not open it....” The temptation passed and did not return, but her disturbance and her curiosity were more stubborn.
It was almost uncanny that Mathilda should be writing to Potter Osprey....
But was it? Now she remembered he had told her the place of his birth—a mere conversational allusion, which she had passed over quickly, not wishing to discuss the city. It had surprised her mildly; then she had recalled in passing that years ago there had been some people named Osprey whom she never knew. Could Mathilda haveknown them? Could she have known the painter, perhaps in his youth? It was unlikely; she had never mentioned the name in Moira’s hearing.
There was nothing to be gained on that tack, and soon she was off on a more fruitful one. Rob Blaydon had told her about Mathilda’s new hobbies, one of them helping young artists, another buying pictures for the city museum. She had drifted out of social life and interested herself in a little club, not very prosperous, where the artists of the city met.
Here was a possible even a probable, explanation. Osprey was a native painter, who had gained reputation elsewhere. He had been a struggling boy at home, and what could be more natural than that Mathilda should decide the city must be enriched by one of his works? Or if this was not exactly the case, there were a dozen other reasons why, on behalf of the club of which Rob had spoken, she might be communicating with him.
The reason was enough for Moira, or at least she made it suffice. She would find out the truth before long, and in any case it could not concern herself. For it was incredible to her that Rob, in the face of their definite understanding, had mentioned her at home. “At home!” How naturally she used the phrase. Well, there was much to be cleared up—both there and here. She troubled herself no more about the letter. She laid it withthe others on Osprey’s table, took the children up to Nana to look after, and went off for a long walk. By ten o’clock that night she was in bed asleep.
The two men drove up to the farmhouse, in accordance with their plan, at about two o’clock in the morning in Roget’s car. They lingered in the hall and studio for a few moments and went upstairs, the painter taking his mail with him.
Some hours later the same sound woke not only Roget, but Moira, down in the cottage. It was a sharp report, and her first clear thought was that a passing automobile had back-fired, perhaps Emmet Roget’s, just arriving. She sat up for a time listening and then prepared to sleep again. Some one knocked on the outside door.
It was the producer, looking ominous as he stood in the half darkness, in a long black dressing gown.
“Mrs. Harlindew, an accident has happened,” he said gravely. “I think, perhaps, I had better ask you to step up to the house with me.”
She went with him up the steep bank, thoroughly unnerved. His hold on her arm was firm and decidedly helpful on the rough path. They passed through the lower part of the house and upstairs without a word. She knew before she arrived what had happened and dared not ask the question on her lips.
Osprey lay on his bed dressed, with a small, old-fashioned revolver in his hand. He was not breathing. The round, bleeding wound was near one temple. On the table beside him lay a photograph of herself, face up, the face of a half-smiling girl of eighteen. Beside it was Mathilda’s letter. Moira snatched the letter and read, at first rapidly, then very attentively and slowly. “My dear Mr. Osprey,” it began:
You will not remember an old woman of your native city, but I used to meet your father at the Round Robin Club long ago and admired his wit and character. I was even introduced to you once, when you were a very little boy. You had been left there one night to be taken home. Since then, of course, I have followed, though at a distance, your progress in the world as an artist. But it is not merely to presume on this slender acquaintance that I write to you.I have a strange story to tell. There has lived in this house for thirty years, ostensibly as a servant but in fact more a companion and friend to me, a woman named Ellen Sydney. She came to my house as Mrs. Ellen Williams and brought with her a baby daughter, whom she called Moira. I adopted this child and raised her and loved her as though she had been my own. She believed she wasmy own until her nineteenth year, when she discovered the truth. She proved to be as high-spirited as she was adorable, for although her life here offered every advantage, and was, I know, one long unclouded happiness, she gave it up in a day on learning her true parentage. I can understand that spirit and yet I have suffered cruelly because of her act. She left without a word, effacing every trace of herself, and from that day to this I have never been able to find her, though I have made repeated efforts. I had little hope, it is true, of persuading her to return even if I did so, knowing her nature and her capacity to carry out her own decisions.I am convinced she has spent a large part of her life in New York, for at first, certain communications came from her there. Furthermore she loved the study of art and could only have followed it to her taste in that city. She may still be there. For that reason I write, thinking it possible if you have not met her you will, and she will then have a friend who has good reason to protect her. I am sending the latest photograph I possess of her.You will ask why I have never addressed you before. It is because I have always hesitated to ask Ellen the name of her child’s father. Moira, herself, is in ignorance of it.Only a month ago Ellen was persuaded, by the arguments I have used above, to tell her story to me in confidence, and now I write with her consent. To complete the coincidence, my nephew, Robert Blaydon, having met you, has given me your address.You may be sure that should you ever meet with your daughter or be able to send us word of her, two lonely old women will be grateful.I have considered that you may not be the kind of man who will care to receive this letter, but I do not believe that is possible. The passage of time softens our errors and may even turn them into blessings.Yours very sincerely,Mathilda Seymour.
You will not remember an old woman of your native city, but I used to meet your father at the Round Robin Club long ago and admired his wit and character. I was even introduced to you once, when you were a very little boy. You had been left there one night to be taken home. Since then, of course, I have followed, though at a distance, your progress in the world as an artist. But it is not merely to presume on this slender acquaintance that I write to you.
I have a strange story to tell. There has lived in this house for thirty years, ostensibly as a servant but in fact more a companion and friend to me, a woman named Ellen Sydney. She came to my house as Mrs. Ellen Williams and brought with her a baby daughter, whom she called Moira. I adopted this child and raised her and loved her as though she had been my own. She believed she wasmy own until her nineteenth year, when she discovered the truth. She proved to be as high-spirited as she was adorable, for although her life here offered every advantage, and was, I know, one long unclouded happiness, she gave it up in a day on learning her true parentage. I can understand that spirit and yet I have suffered cruelly because of her act. She left without a word, effacing every trace of herself, and from that day to this I have never been able to find her, though I have made repeated efforts. I had little hope, it is true, of persuading her to return even if I did so, knowing her nature and her capacity to carry out her own decisions.
I am convinced she has spent a large part of her life in New York, for at first, certain communications came from her there. Furthermore she loved the study of art and could only have followed it to her taste in that city. She may still be there. For that reason I write, thinking it possible if you have not met her you will, and she will then have a friend who has good reason to protect her. I am sending the latest photograph I possess of her.
You will ask why I have never addressed you before. It is because I have always hesitated to ask Ellen the name of her child’s father. Moira, herself, is in ignorance of it.Only a month ago Ellen was persuaded, by the arguments I have used above, to tell her story to me in confidence, and now I write with her consent. To complete the coincidence, my nephew, Robert Blaydon, having met you, has given me your address.
You may be sure that should you ever meet with your daughter or be able to send us word of her, two lonely old women will be grateful.
I have considered that you may not be the kind of man who will care to receive this letter, but I do not believe that is possible. The passage of time softens our errors and may even turn them into blessings.
Yours very sincerely,Mathilda Seymour.
Moira put down the letter and sank beside the bed. She threw her arms over the figure that lay there.
“But, father,” she cried softly, “I could have loved you as my father, too....”
The tall figure of Roget was standing beside her, with bent head, his penetrating glance, full of profound compassion, searching the face of his friend.
“Perhaps he could not, Mrs. Harlindew,” he said, as if thinking aloud.
THE END