"We ought soon to see the house."
The speaker bent forward, as the train, sweeping round a curve, emerged from some thick woods Into a space of open country. It was early September and a sleepy autumnal sunshine lay upon the fields. The Stubbles just reaped ran over the undulations of the land in silky purples and gold; the blue smoke from the cottages and farms hung poised in mid air; the eye could hardly perceive any movement in the clear stream beside the line, as it slipped noiselessly by over its sandy bed; it seemed a world where "it was always afternoon"; and the only breaks in its sunny silence came from the occasional coveys of partridges that rose whirring from the harvest-fields as the train passed.
Delia Blanchflower looked keenly at the English scene, so strange to her after many years of Colonial and foreign wandering. She thought, but did not say—"Those must be my fields—and my woods, that we have just passed through. Probably I rode about them with Grandpapa. I remember the pony—and the horrid groom I hated!" Quick the memory returned of a tiny child on a rearing pony, alone with a sulky groom, who, out of his master's sight, could not restrain his temper, and struck the pony savagely and repeatedly over the head, to an accompaniment of oaths; frightening out of her wits the little girl who sat clinging to the creature's neck. And next she saw herself marching in erect—a pale-faced thing of six, with a heart of fury,—to her grandfather, to demand justice on the offender. And grandpapa had done her bidding then as always; the groom was dismissed that day. It was only grandmamma who had ever tried to manage or thwart her; result, perpetual war, decided often for the time by the brute force at command of the elder, but ever renewed. Delia's face flamed again as she thought of the most humiliating incident of her childhood; when Grandmamma, unable, to do anything with her screaming and stamping self, had sent in despair for a stalwart young footman, and ordered him to "carry Miss Delia up to the nursery." Delia could still feel herself held, wriggling and shrieking face downwards, under the young man's strong arm, unable either to kick or to scratch, while Grandmamma half fearful, half laughing, watched the dire ascent from the bottom of the stairs.
"Male tyranny—my first taste of it!" thought Delia, smiling at herself. "It was fated then that I should be a militant."
She looked across at her friend and travelling companion, half inclined to tell the story; but the sight of Gertrude Marvell's attitude and expression checked the trivial reminiscence on her lips.
"Are you tired?" she said, laying her hand on the other's knee.
"Oh, no. Only thinking."
"Thinking of what?"—
"Of all there is to do."—
A kind of flash passed from one face to the other, Delia's eyes darkly answering. They looked at each other for a little, as though in silent conversation, and then Delia turned again to the landscape outside.
Yes, there was the house, its long, irregular line with the village behind it. She could not restrain a slight exclamation as she caught sight of it, and her friend opposite turned interrogatively.
"What did you say?"
"Nothing—only there's the Abbey. I don't suppose I've seen it since I was twelve."
The other lady put up an eye-glass and looked where Miss Blanchflower pointed; but languidly, as though it were an effort to shake herself free from pre-occupying ideas. She was a woman of about thirty-five, slenderly made, with a sallow, regular face, and good, though short-sighted eyes. The eyes were dark, so was the hair, the features delicate. Under the black shady hat, the hair was very closely and neatly coiled. The high collar of the white blouse, fitting tightly to the slender neck, the coat and skirt of blue serge without ornament of any kind, but well cut, emphasized the thinness, almost emaciation, of the form. Her attitude, dress, and expression conveyed the idea of something amazingly taut and ready—like a ship cleared for action. The body with its clothing seemed to have been simplified as much as possible, so as to become the mere instrument of the will which governed it. No superfluity whatever, whether of flesh on her small bones, or of a single unnecessary button, fold, or trimming on her dress, had Gertrude Marvell ever allowed herself for many years. The general effect was in some way formidable; though why the neat precision of the little lady should convey any notion of this sort, it would not at first sight have been easy to say.
"How old did you say it is?"—she asked, after examining the distant building, which could be now plainly seen from the train across a stretch of green park.
"Oh, the present building is nothing—a pseudo-Gothic monstrosity, built about 1830," laughed Delia; "but there are some old remains and foundations of the abbey. It is a big, rambling old place, and I should think dreadfully in want of doing up. My grandfather was a bit of a miser, and though he was quite rich, he never spent a penny he could help."
"All the better. He left the more for other people to spend." Miss Marvell smiled—a slight, and rather tired smile, which hardly altered the face.
"Yes, if they are allowed to spend it!" said Delia, with a shrug. "Oh well, anyway the house must be done up—painted and papered and that kind of thing. A trustee has got to see that things of that sort are kept in order, I suppose. But it won't have anything to do with me, except that for decency's sake, no doubt, he'll consult me. I shall be allowed to choose the wall-papers I suppose!"
"If you want to," said the other drily.
Delia's brows puckered.
"We shall have to spend some time here, you know, Gertrude! We may as well have something to do."
"Nothing that might entangle us, or take too much of our thoughts," said Miss Marvell, gently, but decidedly.
"I'm afraid I like furnishing," said Delia, not without a shade of defiance.
"And I object—because I know you do. After all—you understand as well as I do thatevery daynow is important. There are not so many of us, Delia! If you're going to do real work, you can't afford to spend your time or thoughts on doing up a shabby house."
There was silence a moment. Then Delia said abruptly—"I wonder when that man will turn up? What a fool he is to take it on!"
"The guardianship? Yes, he hardly knows what he's in for." A touch of grim amusement shewed itself for a moment in Miss Marvell's quiet face.
"Oh, I daresay he knows. Perhaps he relies on what everyone calls his 'influence.' Nasty, sloppy word—nasty sloppy thing! Whenever I'm 'influenced,' I'm degraded!" The young shoulders straightened themselves fiercely.
"I don't know. It has its uses," said the other tranquilly.
Delia laughed radiantly.
"O well—if one can make the kind of weapon of it you do. I don't mean of course that one shouldn't be rationally persuaded. But that's a different thing. 'Influence' makes me think of canting clergymen, and stout pompous women, who don't know what they're talking about, and can't argue—who think they've settled everything by a stale quotation—or an appeal to 'your better self'—or St. Paul. If Mr. Winnington tries it on with 'influence'—we'll have some fun."
Delia returned to her window. The look her companion bent upon her was not visible to her. It was curiously detached—perhaps slightly ironical.
"I'm wondering what part I shall play in the first interview!" saidMiss Marvell, after a pause. "I represent the first stone in Mr.Winnington's path. He will of course do his best to put me out of it."
"How can he?" cried Delia ardently. "What can he do? He can't send for the police and turn you out of the house. At least I suppose he could, but he certainly won't. The last thing a gentleman of his sort wants is to make a scandal. Every one says, after all, that he is a nice fellow!"—the tone was unconsciously patronising—"It isn't his fault if he's been placed in this false position. But the great question for me is—how are we going to manage him for the best?"
She leant forward, her chin on her hands, her sparkling eyes fixed on her friend's face.
"The awkward thing is"—mused Miss Marvell—"that there is so littletimein which to manage him. If the movement were going on at its old slow pace, one might lie low, try diplomacy, avoid alarming him, and so forth. But we've no time for that. It is a case of blow on blow—action on action—and the publicity is half the battle."
"Still, a little management there must be, to begin with!—because I—we—want money, and he holds the purse-strings. Hullo, here's the station!"
She jumped up and looked eagerly out of the window.
"They've sent a fly for us. And there's the station-master on the lookout. How it all comes back to me!"
Her flushed cheek showed a natural excitement. She was coming back as its mistress to a house where she had been happy as a child, which she had not seen for years. Thoughts of her father, as he had been in the old days before any trouble had arisen between them, came rushing through her mind—tender, regretful thoughts—as the train came slowly to a standstill.
But the entire indifference or passivity of her companion restrained her from any further expression. The train stopped, and she descended to the platform of a small country station, alive apparently with traffic and passengers.
"Miss Blanchflower?" said a smiling station-master, whose countenance seemed to be trying to preserve the due mean between welcome to the living and condolence for the dead, as, hat in hand, he approached the newcomers, and guided by her deep mourning addressed himself to Delia.
"Why, Mr. Stebbing, I remember you quite well," said Delia, holding out her hand. "There's my maid—and I hope there's a cart for the luggage. We've got a lot."
A fair-haired man in spectacles, who had also just left the train, turned abruptly and looked hard at the group as he passed them. He hesitated a moment, then passed on, with a curious swinging gait, a long and shabby over-coat floating behind him—to speak to the porter who was collecting tickets at the gate opening on the road beyond.
Meanwhile Delia had been accosted by another gentleman, who had been sitting reading hisMorning Poston the sunny platform, as the train drew up. He too had examined the new arrivals with interest, and while Delia was still talking to the station-master, he walked up to her.
"I think you are Miss Blanchflower: But you won't remember me." He lifted his hat, smiling.
Delia looked at him, puzzled.
"Don't you remember that Christmas dance at the Rectory, when you were ten, and I was home from Sandhurst?"
"Perfectly!—and I quarrelled with you because you wouldn't give me champagne, when I'd danced with you, instead of lemonade. You said what was good for big boys wasn't good for little girls—and I called you a bully—"
"You kicked me!—you had the sharpest little toes!"
"Did I?" said Delia composedly. "I was rather good at kicking. So you are Billy Andrews?"
"Right. I'm Captain now, and they've just made me adjutant down here for the Yeomanry. My mother keeps house for me. You're coming here to live? Please let me say how sorry I was to see your sad news." The condolence was a little clumsy but sincere.
"Thank you. I must go and see to the luggage. Let me introduce you toMiss Marvell—Captain Andrews—Miss Marvell."
That lady bowed coldly, as Delia departed. The tall, soldierly man, whose pleasant looks were somewhat spoilt by a slightly underhung mouth, and prominent chin, disguised, however, by a fine moustache, offered assistance with the luggage.
"There is no need, thank you," said Miss Marvell. "Miss Blanchflower and her maid will see to it."
And the Captain noticed that the speaker remained entirely passive while the luggage was being collected and piled into a fly by the porters, directed by Miss Blanchflower and her maid. She stood quietly on the platform, till all was ready, and Delia beckoned to her. In the intervals the soldier tried to make conversation, but with very small success. He dwelt upon some of the changes Miss Blanchflower would find on the estate; how the old head-keeper, who used to make a pet of her, was dead, and the new agent her father had put in was thought to be doing well, how the village had lost markedly in population in the last few years—this emigration to Canada was really getting beyond a joke!—and so forth. Miss Marvell made no replies. But she suddenly asked him a question.
"What's that house over there?"
She pointed to a grey façade on a wooded hill some two miles off.
"That's our show place—Monk Lawrence! We're awfully proud of it—Elizabethan, and that kind of thing. But of course you've heard of Monk Lawrence! It's one of the finest things in England."
"It belongs to Sir Wilfrid Lang?"
"Certainly. Do you know him? He's scarcely been there at all, since he became a Cabinet Minister; and yet he spent a lot of money in repairing it a few years ago. They say it's his wife's health—that it's too damp for her. Anyway it's quite shut up,—except that they let tourists see it once a month."
"Does anybody live in the house?"—
"Oh—a caretaker, of course,—one of the keepers. They let the shooting. Ah! there's Miss Blanchflower calling you."
Miss Marvell—as the gallant Captain afterwards remembered—took a long look at the distant house and then went to join Miss Blanchflower. The Captain accompanied her, and helped her to stow away the remaining bags into the fly, while a small concourse of rustics, sprung from nowhere, stolidly watched the doings of the heiress and her friend. Delia suddenly bent forward to him, as he was about to shut the door, with an animated look—"Can you tell me who that gentleman is who has just walked off towards the village?"—she pointed.
"His name is Lathrop. He lives in a place just the other side of yours. He's got some trout-hatching ponds—will stock anybody's stream for them. Rather a queer customer!"—the good-natured Captain dropped his voice. "Well, good-bye, my train's just coming. I hope I may come and see you soon?"
Delia nodded assent, and they drove off.
"By George, she's a beauty!" said the Captain to himself as he turned away. "Nothing wrong with her that I can see. But there are some strange tales going about. I wonder who that other woman is. Marvell—Gertrude Marvell?—I seem to have heard the name somewhere.—Hullo, Masham, how are you?" He greeted the leading local solicitor who had just entered the station, a man with a fine ascetic face, and singularly blue eyes. Masham looked like a starved poet or preacher, and was in reality one of the hardest and shrewdest men of business in the southern counties.
"Well, did you see Miss Blanchflower?" said the Captain, as Masham joined him on the platform, and they entered the up train together.
"I did. A handsome young lady! Have you heard the news?"
"No."
"Your neighbor, Mr. Winnington—Mark Winnington—is named as her guardian under her father's will—until she is twenty-five. He is also trustee, with absolute power over the property."
The Captain shewed a face of astonishment.
"Gracious! what had Winnington to do with Sir Robert Blanchflower!"
"An old friend, apparently. But it is a curious will."
The solicitor's abstracted look shewed a busy mind. The Captain had never felt a livelier desire for information.
"Isn't there something strange about the girl?"—he said, lowering his voice, although there was no one else in the railway carriage. "I never saw a more beautiful creature! But my mother came home from London the other day with some very queer stories, from a woman who had met them abroad. She said Miss Blanchflower was awfully clever, but as wild as a hawk—mad about women's rights and that kind of thing. In the hotel where she met them, people fought very shy of her."
"Oh, she's a militant suffragist," said the solicitor quietly—"though she's not had time yet since her father's death to do any mischief. That—in confidence—is the meaning of the will."
The adjutant whistled.
"Goodness!—Winnington will have his work cut out for him. But he needn't accept."
"He has accepted. I heard this morning from the London solicitor."
"Your firm does the estate business down here?"
"For many years. I hope to see Mr. Winnington to-morrow or next day. He is evidently hurrying home—because of this."
There was silence for a few minutes; then the Captain said bluntly:
"It's an awful pity, you know, that kind of thing cropping up down here. We've escaped it so far."
"With such a lot of wild women about, what can you expect?" said the solicitor briskly. "Like the measles—sure to come our way sooner or later."
"Do you think they'll get what they want?" "What—the vote? No—not unless the men are fools." The refined, apostolic face set like iron.
"None of the womanly women want it," said the Captain with conviction."You should hear my mother on it."
The solicitor did not reply. The adjutant's mother was not in his eyes a model of wisdom. Nor did his own opinion want any fortifying from outside.
Captain Andrews was not quite in the same position. He was conscious of a strong male instinct which disavowed Miss Blanchflower and all her kind; but at the same time he was exceedingly susceptible to female beauty, and it troubled his reasoning processes that anybody so wrong-headed should be so good-looking. His heart was soft, and his brain all that was wanted for his own purposes. But it did not enable him-it never had enabled him—to understand these extraordinary "goings-on," which the newspapers were every day reporting, on the part of well-to-do, educated women, who were ready—it seemed—to do anything outrageous—just for a vote! "Of course nobody would mind if the rich women—the tax-paying women—had a vote—help us Tories famously. But the women of the working-classes—why, Good Lord, look at them when there's any disturbance on—any big strike—look at Tonypandy!—a deal sight worse than the men! Give them the vote and they'd take us to the devil, even quicker than Lloyd George!"
Aloud he said—
"Do you know anything about that lady Miss Blanchflower had with her? She introduced me. Miss Marvell—I think that was the name. I thought I had heard it somewhere."
The solicitor lifted his eyebrows.
"I daresay. She was in the stone-throwing raid last August. Fined 20s. or a month, for damage in Pall Mall. She was in prison a week; then somebody paid her fine. She professed great annoyance, but one of the police told me it was privately paid by her own society. She's too important to them—they can't do without her. An extremely clever woman."
"Then what on earth does she come and bury herself down here for?" cried the Captain.
Masham shewed a meditative twist of the lip.
"Can't say, I'm sure. But they want money. And Miss Blanchflower is an important capture."
"I hope that girl will soon have the sense to shake them off!" said the Captain with energy. "She's a deal too beautiful for that kind of thing. I shall get my mother to come and talk to her."
The solicitor concealed his smile behind hisDaily Telegraph. He had a real liking and respect for the Captain, but the family affection of the Andrews household was a trifle too idyllic to convince a gentleman so well acquainted with the seamy side of life. What about that hunted-looking girl, the Captain's sister? He didn't believe, he never had believed that Mrs. Andrews was quite so much of an angel as she pretended to be.
Meanwhile, no sooner had the fly left the station than Delia turned to her companion—
"Gertrude!—did you see what that man was reading who passed us just now? Our paper!—theTocsin."
Gertrude Marvell lifted her eyebrows slightly.
"No doubt he bought it at Waterloo—out of curiosity."
"Why not out of sympathy? I thought he looked at us rather closely. Of course, if he reads theTocsinhe knows something about you! What fun it would be to discover a comrade and a brother down here!"
"It depends entirely upon what use we could make of him," said MissMarvell. Then she turned suddenly on her companion—"Tell me really,Delia—how long do you want to stay here?"
"Well, a couple of months at least," said Delia, with a rather perplexed expression. "After all, Gertrude, it's my property now, and all the people on it, I suppose, will expect to see one and make friends. I don't want them to think that because I'm a suffragist I'm going to shirk. It wouldn't be good policy, would it?"
"It's all a question of the relative importance of things," said the other quietly. "London is our head quarters, and things are moving very rapidly."
"I know. But, dear, you did promise! for a time"—pleaded Delia. "Though of course I know how dull it must be for you, when you are the life and soul of so many things in London. But you must remember that I haven't a penny at this moment but what Mr. Winnington chooses to allow me! We must come to some understanding with him, mustn't we, before we can do anything? It is all so difficult!"—the girl's voice took a deep, passionate note—"horribly difficult, when I long to be standing beside you—and the others—in the open—fighting—for all I'm worth. But how can I, just yet? I ought to have eight thousand a year, and Mr. Winnington can cut me down to anything he pleases. It's just as important that I should get hold of my money—at this particular moment—as that I should be joining raids in London,—more important, surely—because we want money badly!—you say so yourself. I don't want it for myself; I want it all—for the cause! But the question is, how to get it—with this will in our way. I—"
"Ah, there's that house again!" exclaimed Miss Marvell, but in the same low restrained tone that was habitual to her. She bent forward to look at the stately building, on the hill-side, which according to Captain Andrews' information, was the untenanted property of Sir Wilfrid Lang, whom a shuffle of offices had just admitted to the Cabinet.
"What house?"—said Delia, not without a vague smart under the sudden change of subject. She had a natural turn for declamation; a girlish liking to hear herself talk; and Gertrude, her tutor in the first place, and now her counsellor and friend, had a quiet way of snubbing such inclinations, except when they could be practically useful. "You have the gifts of a speaker—we shall want you to speak more and more," she would say. But in private she rarely failed to interrupt an harangue, even the first beginnings of one.
However, the smart soon passed, and Delia too turned her eyes towards the house among the trees. She gave a little cry of pleasure.
"Oh, that's Monk Lawrence!—such a lovely—lovely old place! I used often to go there as a child—I adored it. But I can't remember who lives there now."
Gertrude Marvell handed on the few facts learned from the Captain.
"I knew"—she added—"that Sir Wilfrid Lang lived somewhere near here.That they told me at the office."
"And the house is empty?" Delia, flushing suddenly and vividly, turned to her companion.
"Except for the caretaker—who no doubt lives some where on the ground-floor."
There was silence a moment. Then Delia laughed uncomfortably.
"Look here, Gertrude, we can't attempt anything of that kindthere: I remember now—it was Sir Wilfrid's brother who had the house, when I used to go there. He was a great friend of Father's; and his little girls and I were great chums. The house is just wonderful—full of treasures! I am sorry it belongs to Sir Wilfrid—but nobody could lift a finger against Monk Lawrence!"
Miss Marvell's eyes sparkled.
"He is the most formidable enemy we have," she said softly, between her closed lips. A tremor seemed to run through her slight frame.
Then she smiled, and her tone changed.
"Dear Delia, of course I shan't run you into any—avoidable—trouble, down here, apart from the things we have agreed on."
"What have we agreed on? Remind me!"
"In the first place, that we won't hide our opinions—or stop our propaganda—to please anybody."
"Certainly!" said Delia. "I shall have a drawing-room meeting as soon as possible. You seem to have fixed up a number of speaking engagements for us both. And we told the office to send us down tons of literature." Then her face broke into laughter—"Poor Mr. Winnington!"
* * * * *
"A rather nice old place, isn't it?" said Delia, an hour later, when the elderly housekeeper, who had received them with what had seemed to Delia's companion a quite unnecessary amount of fuss and family feeling, had at last left them alone in the drawing-room, after taking them over the house.
The girl spoke in a softened voice. She was standing thoughtfully by the open window looking out, her hands clasping a chair behind her. Her thin black dress, made short and plain, with a white frill at the open neck and sleeves, by its very meagreness emphasized the young beauty of the wearer,—a beauty full of significance, charged—over-charged—with character. The attitude should have been one of repose; it was on the contrary one of tension, suggesting a momentary balance only, of impetuous forces. Delia was indeed suffering the onset of a wave of feeling which had come upon her unexpectedly; for which she had not prepared herself. This rambling old house with its quiet garden and early Victorian furniture, had appealed to her in some profound and touching way. Her childhood stirred again in her, and deep inherited things. How well she remembered the low, spacious room, with its oak wainscotting, its book-cases and its pictures! That crayon over the writing-table of her grandmother in her white cap and shawl; her grandfather's chair, and the old Bible and Prayer-book, beside it, from which he used to read evening prayers; the stiff arm-chairs with their faded chintz covers; the writing-table with its presentation inkstand; the groups of silhouettes on the walls, her forbears of long ago; the needlework on the fire-screen, in which, at nine years old, she had been proud to embroider the white rose-bud still so lackadaisically prominent; the stool on which she used to sit and knit beside her grandmother; the place on the run where the old collie used to lie—she saw his ghost there still!—all these familiar and even ugly objects seemed to be putting out spiritual hands to her, playing on nerves once eagerly responsive. She had never stayed for long in the house; but she had always been happy there. The moral atmosphere of it came back to her, and with a sense of the old rest and protection. Her grandfather might have been miserly to others; he had always been kind to her. But it was her grandmother who had been supreme in that room. A woman of clear sense and high character; narrow and prejudiced in many respects, but sorely missed by many when her turn came to die; a Christian in more than name; sincerely devoted to her teasing little granddaughter. A woman who had ordered her household justly and kindly; a personality not soon forgotten.
"There is something of her in me still," thought Delia—"at least, I hope there is. And where—is the rest of me going?"
"I think I'll take off my things, dear," said Gertrude Marvell, breaking in on the girl's reverie. "Don't trouble. I know my room."
The door closed. Delia was now looking out into the garden, where on the old grass-slopes the September shadows lay—still and slumbrous. The peace of it, the breath of its old-world tradition, came upon her, relaxing the struggle of mind and soul in which she had been living for months, and that ceaseless memory which weighed upon her of her dying father,—his bitter and increasing recoil from all that, for a while, he had indulgently permitted—his final estrangement from her, her own obstinacy and suffering.
"Yes!"—she cried suddenly, out loud, to the rosebushes beyond the open window—"but it had a reason—ithada reason!" She clasped her hands fiercely to her breast. "And there is no birth without pain."
A few days after her arrival, Delia woke up in the early dawn in the large room that had been her grandmother's. She sat up in the broad white bed with its dimity curtains, her hands round her knees, peering into the half darkened room, where, however, she had thrown the windows wide open, behind the curtains, before going to sleep. On the opposite wall she saw an indifferent picture of her father as a boy of twelve on his pony; beside it a faded photograph of her mother, her beautiful mother, in her wedding dress. There had never been any real sympathy between her mother and her grandmother. Old Lady Blanchflower had resented her son's marriage with a foreign woman, with a Greek, in particular. The Greeks were not at that moment of much account in the political world, and Lady Blanchflower thought of them as a nation of shams, trading on a great past which did not belong to them. Her secret idea was that out of their own country they grew rich in disreputable ways, and while at home, where only the stupid ones stayed, they were a shabby, half-civilised people, mostly bankrupt. She could not imagine how a girl got any bringing up at Athens, and believed nothing that her son told her. So that when the young Mrs. Blanchflower arrived, there were jars in the household, and it was not long before the spoilt and handsome bride went to her husband in tears, and asked to be taken away. Delia was surprised and touched, therefore, to find her mother's portrait in her grandmother's room, where nothing clearly had been admitted that had not some connection with family affection or family pride. She wondered whether on her mother's death her grandmother had hung the picture there in dumb confession of, or penance for, her own unkindness.
The paper of the room was a dingy grey, and the furniture was heavily old-fashioned and in Delia's eyes inconvenient. "If I'm going to keep the room I shall make it all white," she thought, "with proper fitted wardrobes, and some low bookcases—a bath, too, of course, in the dressing-room. And they must put in electric light at once! How could they have done without it all this time! I believe with all its faults, this house could be made quite pretty!"
And she fell into a reverie,—eagerly constructive—wherein Maumsey became, at a stroke, a House Beautiful, at once modern and aesthetically right, a dim harmony in lovely purples, blues and greens, with the few fine things it possessed properly spaced and grouped, the old gardens showing through the latticed windows, and golden or silvery lights, like those in a Blanche interior, gleaming in its now dreary rooms.
Then at a bound she sprang out of bed, and stood upright in the autumn dawn.
"I hate myself!" she said fiercely—as she ran her hands through the mass of her dark hair, and threw it back upon her shoulders. Hurrying across the room in her night-gown, she threw back the curtains. A light autumnal mist, through which the sun was smiling, lay on the garden. Stately trees rose above it, and masses of flowers shewed vaguely bright; while through the blue distances beyond, the New Forest stretched to the sea.
But Delia was looking at herself, in a long pier-glass that represented almost the only concession to the typical feminine needs in the room. She was not admiring her own seemliness; far from it; she was rating and despising herself for a feather-brained waverer and good-for-nothing.
"Oh yes, you cantalk!" she said, to the figure in the glass—"you are good enough at that! But what are you going todo!—Spend your time at Maple's and Waring—matching chintzes and curtains?—when you'vepromised—you'vepromised! Gertrude's right. Thereareall sorts of disgusting cowardices and weaknesses in you! Oh! yes, you'd like to go fiddling and fussing down here—playing the heiress—patronising the poor people—putting yourself into beautiful clothes—and getting heaps of money out of Mr. Winnington to spend. It's in you—it's just in you—to throw everything over—to forget everything you've felt, and everything you've vowed—and justwallowin luxury and selfishness and snobbery! Gertrude's absolutely right. But you shan't do it! You shan't put a hand to it! Why did that man take the guardianship? Now it's his business. He may see to it! Butyou—you have something else to do!"
And she stood erect, the angry impulse in her stiffening all her young body. And through her memory there ran, swift-footed, fragments from a rhetoric of which she was already fatally mistress, the formulae too of those sincere and goading beliefs on which her youth had been fed ever since her first acquaintance with Gertrude Marvell. The mind renewed them like vows; clung to them, embraced them.
What was she before she knew Gertrude? She thought of that earlier Delia as of a creature almost too contemptible to blame. From the maturity of her twenty-one years she looked back upon herself at seventeen or eighteen with wonder. That Delia had read nothing—knew nothing—had neither thoughts or principles. She was her father's spoilt child and darling; delighting in the luxury that surrounded his West Indian Governorship; courted and flattered by the few English of the colonial capital, and by the members of her father's staff; with servants for every possible need or whim; living her life mostly in the open air, riding at her father's side, through the sub-tropical forests of the colony; teasing and tyrannising over the dear old German governess who had brought her up, and whose only contribution to her education—as Delia now counted education—had been the German tongue. Worth something!—but not all those years, "when I might have been learning so much else, things I shall never have time to learn now!—things that Gertrude has at her finger's end. Why wasn't I taught properly—decently—like any board school child! As Gertrude says, we women want everything we can get! Wemustknow the things that men know—that we may beat them at their own game. Why should every Balliol boy—years younger than me—have been taught his classics and mathematics,—and have everything brought to him—made easy for him—history, political economy, logic, philosophy, laid at his lordship's feet, if he will just please to learn!—while I, who have just as good a brain as he, have had to pick up a few scraps by the way, just because nobody who had charge of me ever thought it worth while to teach, a girl. But I have a mind!—an intelligence!—even if I am a woman; and there is all the world to know. Marriage? Yes!—but not at the sacrifice of everything else—of the rational, civilised self."
On the whole though, her youth had been happy enough, with recurrent intervals ofennuiand discontent. Intervals too of poetic enthusiasm, or ascetic religion. At eighteen she had been practically a Catholic, influenced by the charming wife of one of her father's aides-de-camp. And then—a few stray books or magazine articles had made a Darwinian and an agnostic of her; the one phase as futile as the other.
"I knew nothing—I had no mind!"—she repeated with energy,—"tillGertrude came."
And she thought with ardour of that intellectual awakening, under the strange influence of the apparently reserved and impassive woman, who had come to read history with her for six months, at the suggestion of a friend of her father's, a certain cultivated and clever Lady Tonbridge, "who saw how starved I was."
So, after enquiry, a lady who was a B.A. of London, and had taken first-class honour in history—Delia's ambition would accept nothing less—had been found, who wanted for health's sake a winter in a warm climate, and was willing to read history with Governor Blanch-flower's half-fledged daughter.
The friendship had begun, as often, with a little aversion. Delia was made to work, and having always resented being made to do anything, for about a month she disliked her tutor, and would have persuaded Sir Robert to send her away, had not England been so far off, and the agreement with Miss Marvell, whose terms were high, unusually stringent. But by the end of the month the girl of eighteen was conquered. She had recognised in Gertrude Marvell accomplishments that filled her with envy, together with an intensity of will, a bitter and fiery purpose, that astounded and subdued a young creature in whom inherited germs of southern energy and passion were only waiting the touch that starts the ferment. Gertrude Marvell had read an amazing amount of history, and all from one point of view; that of the woman stirred to a kind of madness by what she held to be the wrongs of her sex. The age-long monopoly of all the higher forces of civilisation by men; the cruel and insulting insistence upon the sexual and maternal functions of women, as covering the whole of her destiny; the hideous depreciation of her as an inferior and unclean creature, to which Christianity, poisoned by the story of Eve, and a score of barbarous beliefs and superstitions more primitive still, had largely contributed, while hypocritically professing to enfranchise and exalt her; the unfailing doom to "obey," and to bring forth, that has crushed her; the labours and shames heaped upon her by men in the pursuit of their own selfish devices; and the denial to her, also by men, of all the higher and spiritual activities, except those allowed by a man-made religion:—this feminist gospel, in some respects so bitterly true, in others so vindictively false, was gradually and unsparingly pressed upon Delia's quick intelligence. She caught its fire; she rose to its call; and there came a day when Gertrude Marvell breaking through the cold reserve she had hitherto interposed between herself and the pupil who had come to adore her, threw her arms round the girl, accepting from her what were practically the vows of a neophyte in a secret and revolutionary service.
Joyous, self-dedicating moment! But it had been followed by a tragedy; the tragedy of Delia's estrangement from her father. It was not long before Sir Robert Blanchflower, a proud self-indulgent man, with a keen critical sense, a wide acquaintance with men and affairs, and a number of miscellaneous acquirements of which he never made the smallest parade, had divined the spirit of irreconcilable revolt which animated the slight and generally taciturn woman, who had obtained such a hold upon his daughter. He, the god of his small world, was made to feel himself humiliated in her presence. She was, in fact, his intellectual superior, and the truth was conveyed to him in a score of subtle ways. She was in his house simply because she was poor, and wanted rest from excessive overwork, at someone else's expense. Otherwise her manner suggested—often quite unconsciously—that she would not have put up with his household and its regulations for a single day.
Then, suddenly, he perceived that he had lost his daughter, and the reason of it. The last year of his official life was thenceforward darkened by an ugly and undignified struggle with the woman who had stolen Delia from him. In the end he dismissed Gertrude Marvell. Delia shewed a passionate resentment, told him frankly that as soon as she was twenty-one she should take up "the Woman's movement" as her sole occupation, and should offer herself wherever Gertrude Marvell, and Gertrude's leaders, thought she could be useful. "The votemustbe got!"—she said, standing white and trembling, but resolute, before her father—"If not peaceably, then by violence. And when we get it, father, you men will be astonished to see what we shall do with it!"
Her twenty-first birthday was at hand, and would probably have seen Delia's flight from her father's house, but for Sir Robert's breakdown in health. He gave up his post, and it was evident he had not more than a year or two to live. Delia softened and submitted. She went abroad with him, and for a time he seemed to throw off the disease which had attacked him. It was during a brighter interval that, touched by her apparent concessions, he had consented to her giving the lecture in the Tyrolese hotel the fame of which had spread abroad, and had even taken a certain pleasure in her oratorical success.
But during the following winter—Sir Robert's last—which they spent at Meran, things had gone from bad to worse. For months Delia never mentioned Gertrude Marvell to her father. He flattered himself that the friendship was at an end. Then some accident revealed to him that it was as close as, or closer than ever; that they were in daily correspondence; that they had actually met, unknown to him, in the neighbourhood of Meran; and that Delia was sending all the money she could possibly spare from her very ample allowance to "The Daughters of Revolt," the far-spreading society in which Gertrude Marvell was now one of the leading officials.
Some of these dismal memories of Meran descended like birds of night upon Delia, as she stood with her arms above her head, in her long night-gown, looking intently but quite unconsciously into the depths of an old rosewood cheval glass. She felt that sultry night about her once more, when, after signing his will, her father opened his eyes upon her, coming back with an effort from the bound of death, and had said quite clearly though faintly in the silence—
"Give up that woman, Delia!—promise me to give her up." And Delia had cried bitterly, on her knees beside him—without a word—caressing his hand. And the cold fingers had been feebly withdrawn from hers as the eyes closed.
"Oh papa—papa!" The low murmur came from her, as she pressed her hands upon her eyes. If the Christian guesses were but true, and in some quiet Elysian state he might now understand, and cease to be angry with her! Was there ever a great cause won without setting kin against kin? "A man's foes shall be they of his own household." "It wasn't my fault—it wasn't my fault!"
No!—and moreover it was her duty not to waste her strength in vain emotion and regret. Her task wasdoing, not dreaming. She turned away, banished her thoughts and set steadily about the task of dressing.
* * * * *
"Please Miss Blanchflower, there are two or three people waiting to see you in the servants' hall."
So said the tall and gentle-voiced housekeeper, Mrs. Bird, whose emotions had been, in Miss Marvell's view, so unnecessarily exercised on the evening of Delia's home-coming. Being a sensitive person, Mrs. Bird had already learnt her lesson, and her manner had now become as mildly distant as could be desired, especially in the case of Miss Blanchflower's lady companion.
"People? What people?" asked Delia, looking round with a furrowed brow. She and Gertrude were sitting together on the sofa when the housekeeper entered, eagerly reading a large batch of letters which the London post had just brought, and discussing their contents in subdued tones.
"It's the cottages, Miss. Her Ladyship used always to decide who should have those as were vacant about this time of year, and two or three of these persons have been up several times to know when you'd be home."
"But I don't know anything about it"—said Delia, rising reluctantly."Why doesn't the agent—why doesn't Mr. Frost do it?"
"I suppose—they thought—you'd perhaps speak a word to Mr. Frost, Miss," suggested Mrs. Bird. "But I can send them away of course, if you wish."
"Oh no, I'll come"—said Delia. "But it's rather tiresome—just as"—she looked at Gertrude.
"Don't be long," said Miss Marvell, sharply, "I'll wait for you here." And she plunged back into the letters, her delicate face all alive, her eyes sparkling. Delia departed—evidently on a distasteful errand.
But twenty minutes later, she returned flushed and animated.
"Iamglad I went! Such tyranny—such monstrous tyranny!" She stood in front of Gertrude breathing fast, her hands on her hips.
"What's the matter?"
"My grandmother had a rule—can you imagine anything so cruel!—that no girl—who had gone wrong—was to be allowed in our cottages. If she couldn't be provided for in some Home or other, or if her family refused to give her up, then the family must go. An old man has been up to see me—a widower with two daughters—one in service. The one in service has come to grief—the son of the house!—the usual story!"—the speaker's face had turned fiercely pale—"and now our agent refuses to let the girl and her baby come home. And the old father says—'What am I to do, Miss? I can't turn her out—she's my own flesh and blood. I've got to stick to her—else there'll be worse happening. It's notjustice, Miss—and it's not Gospel.' Well!"—Delia seated herself with energy,—"I've told him to have her home at once—and I'll see to it."
Gertrude lifted her eyebrows, a gesture habitual with her, wheneverDelia wore—as now—her young prophetess look. Why feel these things somuch? Human nerves have only a certain limited stock of reactions.Avenge—and alter them!
But she merely said—
"And the others?"
"Oh, a poor mother with eight children, pleading for a cottage with three bedrooms instead of two! I told her she should have it if I had to build it!—And an old woman who has lived fifty-two years in her cottage, and lost all her belongings, begging that she mightn't be turned out—for a family—now that it's too big for her. She shan't be turned out! Of course I suppose it would be common sense"—the tension of the speaker's face broke up in laughter—"to put the old woman into the cottage of the eight children—and put the eight children into the old woman's. But human beings are not cattle! Sentiment's something! Why shouldn't a woman be allowed to die in her old home,—so long as she pays the rent? I hate all this interference with people's lives! And it's always the women who come worst off. 'Oh Mr. Frost, he never pays no attention to us women. He claps 'is 'ands to his ears when he sees one of us, and jest runs for it.' Well, I'll make Mr. Frost listen to a woman!"
"I'm afraid Mr. Winnington is his master," said Gertrude quietly.Delia, crimson again, shrugged her shoulders.
"We shall see!"
Gertrude Marvell looked up.
"Look here, Delia, if you're going to play the part of earthly Providence to this village and your property in general—as I've said to you before—you may as well tell the 'Daughters' you can't do anything for them. That's a profession in itself; and would take you all your time."
"Then of course, I shan't do it," said Delia, with decision. "But I only want to put in an appearance—to make friends with the people—just for a time, Gertrude! It doesn't do to betoounpopular. We're not exactly in good odour just now, are we?"
And sitting down on a stool beside the elder woman, Delia leant her head against her friend's knee caressingly.
Gertrude gave an absent touch to the girl's beautiful hair, and then said—
"So youwilltake these four meetings?"
"Certainly!" Delia sprang up. "What are they? One at Latchford, one atBrownmouth—Wanchester—and Frimpton. All right. I shall be pelted atBrownmouth. But rotten eggs don't matter so much when you're lookingout for them—except on your face—Ugh!"
"And the meeting here?"
"Of course. Can't I do what I like with my own house? We'll have the notices out next week."
Gertrude looked up—
"When did you say that man—Mr. Winnington—was coming?"
"His note this morning said 4:30."
"You'd better see him alone—for the first half hour anyway."
Delia made a face.
"I wish I knew what line to take up. You've been no use at all,Gertrude!"
Gertrude smiled.
"Wait till you see him," she said coolly. "Mother-wit will help you out."
"I wish I had anything to bargain with."
"So you have."
"Pray, what?"
"The meeting here. Youcouldgive that up. And he needn't know anything of the others yet awhile."
"What a charming opinion he will have of us both, by and bye," laughed Delia, quietly. "And by all accounts he himself is a simple paragon.—Heavens, how tiresome!"
Gertrude Marvell turned back to her letters.
"What does anyone know about aman?" she said, with slow deliberation.
The midday post at Maumsey brought letters just after luncheon. Delia turning hers over was astonished to see two or three with the local postmark.
"What can people fromherebe writing to me about?"
Gertrude absorbed in the new weekly number of theTocsintook no notice, till she was touched on the shoulder by Delia.
"Yes?"
"Gertrude!—it's too amazing!" The girl's tone was full of a joyous wonder. "You know they told us at head-quarters that this was one of the deadest places in England—a nest of Antis—nothing doing here at all. Well, what do you think?—here arethreeletters by one post, from the village—all greeting us—all knowing perfectly who you are—that you have been in prison, etcetera—all readers of theTocsin, and burning to be doing something—"
"Burning something?" interposed the other in her most ordinary voice.
Delia laughed, again with the note of constraint.
"Well, anyway, they want to come and see us."
"Who are they?"
"An assistant mistress at the little grammar-school—that's No. 1. No. 2—a farmer's daughter, who says she took part in one of the raids last summer, but nobody knows down here. Her father paid her fine. And No. 3. a consumptive dressmaker, who declares she hasn't much life left anyway, and she is quite willing to give it to the 'cause'! Isn't it wonderful how it spreads—it spreads!"
"Hm"—said Miss Marvell. "Well, we may as well inspect them. Tell them to come up some time next week after dusk."
As she spoke, the temporary parlour-maid threw open the door of the room which Delia had that morning chosen as her own sitting-room.
"Are you at home, Miss? Mrs. France would like to see you."
"Mrs. France?—Mrs. France? Oh, I know—the doctor's wife—Mrs. Bird was talking of him this morning. Well, I suppose I must go." Delia moved unwillingly. "I'm coming, Mary."
"Of course you must go," said Gertrude, a little peremptorily. "As we are here we may as well reconnoitre the whole ground—find out everything we can."
* * * * *
In the drawing-room, to which some flowers, and a litter of new books and magazines had already restored its inhabited look, Delia found a woman awaiting her, in whom the girl's first glance discerned a personality. She was dressed with an entire disregard of the fashion, in plain, serviceable clothes. A small black bonnet tied under the chin framed a face whose only beauty lay in the expression of the clear kind eyes, and quiet mouth. The eyes were a little prominent; the brow above them unusually smooth and untroubled, answering to the bands of brown hair touched with grey which defined it. But the rest of the face was marked by many deep lines—of experience, or suffering?—which showed clearly that its owner had long left physical youth behind. And yet perhaps youth—in some spiritual poetic sense—was what Mrs. France's aspect most sharply conveyed.
She rose as Delia entered, and greeted her warmly.
"It is nice to see you settled here! Dr. France and I were great friends of your old grandmother. He and she were regular cronies. We were very sorry to see the news of your poor father's death."
The voice was clear and soft, and absolutely sincere. Delia felt drawn to her. But it had become habitual to her to hold herself on the defensive with strangers, to suspect hostility and disapproval everywhere. So that her manner in reply, though polite enough, was rather chilly.
But—the girl's beauty! The fame of it had indeed reached Maumsey in advance of the heiress. Mrs. France, however, in its actual presence was inclined to say "I had not heard the half!" She remembered Delia's mother, and in the face before her she recognised again the Greek type, the old pure type, reappearing, as it constantly does, in the mixed modern race. But the daughter surpassed her mother. Delia's eyes, of a lovely grey blue, lidded, and fringed, and arched with an exquisite perfection; the curve of the slightly bronzed cheek, suggesting through all its delicacy the fulness of young, sensuous life; the mouth, perhaps a trifle too large, and the chin, perhaps a trifle too firm; the abundance of the glossy black hair, curling wherever it was allowed to curl, or wherever it could escape the tight coils in which it was bound—at the temples, and over the brow; the beauty of the uncovered neck, and of the amply-rounded form which revealed itself through the thin black stripe of the mourning dress:—none of these "items" in Delia's good looks escaped her admiring visitor.
"It's to be hoped Mr. Mark realises his responsibilities," she thought, with amusement.
Aloud, she said—
"I remember you as quite a little thing staying with your Grandmother—but you wouldn't remember me. Dr. France was grieved not to come, but it's his hospital day."
Delia thanked her, without effusion. Mrs. France presently began to feel conversation an effort, and to realise that the girl's wonderful eyes were very observant and very critical. Yet she chose the very obvious and appropriate topic of Lady Blanchflower, her strong character, her doings in the village, her relation to the labourers and their wives.
"When she died, they really missed her. They miss her still."
"Is it good for a village to depend so much on one person?" said Delia in a detached voice.
Mrs. France looked at her curiously. Jealousy of one's grandmother is not a common trait in the young. It struck her that Miss Blanchflower was already defending herself against examples and ideals she did not mean to follow. And again amusement—and concern!—on Mark Winnington's account made themselves felt. Mrs. France was quite aware of Delia's "militant" antecedents, and of the history of the lady she had brought down to live with her. But the confidence of the doctor's wife in Winnington's powers and charm was boundless. "He'll be a match for them!" she thought gaily.
Meanwhile in reply, she smilingly defended her old friend LadyBlanchflower from the implied charge of pauperising the village.
"Not at all! She never gave money recklessly—and the do-nothings kept clear of her. But she was the people's friend—and they knew it. They're very excited about your coming!"
"I daresay I shall change some things," said Delia decidedly. "I don't approve of all Mr. Frost has been doing."
"Well, you'll have your guardian to help you," said Mrs. France quietly.
Delia flushed, straightened her shoulders, and said nothing.
This time Mrs. France was fairly taken by surprise. She knew nothing more of Sir Robert Blanchflower's will than that he had made Mr. Mark Winnington his daughter's guardian, till she reached the age of twenty-five. But that any young woman—any motherless and fatherless girl—should not think herself the most lucky of mortals to have obtained Mark Winnington as guide and defender, with first claim on his time, his brains, his kindness, seemed incredible to Mark's old friend and neighbour, accustomed to the daily signs of his immense and deserved popularity. Then it flashed upon her—"Has she ever seen him?"
The doubt led to an immediate communication of the news that Winnington had arrived from town that morning. Dr. France had seen him in the village.
"You know him, of course, already?"
"Not at all," said Delia, indifferently. "He and I are perfect strangers." Mrs. France laughed.
"I rather envy you the pleasure of making friends with him! We are all devoted to him down here."
Delia lifted her eyebrows.
"What are his particular virtues? It's monotonous to possess themall." The slight note of insolence was hardly disguised.
"No two friends of his would give you the same answer. I should give you a different catalogue, for instance, from Lady Tonbridge—"
"Lady Tonbridge!" cried Delia, waking up at last. "You don't mean thatLady Tonbridge lives in this neighbourhood?"
"Certainly. You know her?"
"She came once to stay with us in the West Indies. My father knew her very well before she married. And I owe her—a great debt"—the last words were spoken with emphasis.
Mrs. France looked enquiring.
"—she recommended to us the lady who is now living with me here—my chaperon—Miss Marvell?"
There was silence for a moment. Then Mrs. France said, not without embarrassment—
"Your father desired she should live with you?"
Delia flushed again.
"No. My father did not understand her."
"He did not agree with her views?"
"Nor with mine. It was horrid—but even relations must agree to differ. Why is Lady Tonbridge here? And where is Sir Alfred? Papa had not heard of them for a long time."
"They separated last year"—said Mrs. France gravely. "But Mr. Winnington will tell you. He's a great friend of hers. She does a lot of work for him."
"Work?"
"Social work!" smiled Mrs. France—"poor-law—schools—that kind of thing. He ropes us all in."
"Oh!" said Delia, with her head in the air.
Mrs. France laughed outright.
"That seems to you so unimportant—compared to the vote."
"Itisunimportant!" said Delia, impetuously. "Nothing really matters but the vote. Aren't you a Suffragist, Mrs. France?"
Mrs. France smilingly shook her head.
"I don't want to meddle with the men's business. And we're a long way yet from catching up with our own. Oh, my husband has a lot of scientific objections. But that's mine." Then her face grew serious—"anyway, we can all agree, I hope, in hating violence. That can never settle it."
She looked a little sternly at her young companion.
"That depends," said Delia. "But we mustn't argue, Mrs. France. I should only make you angry. Ah!"
She sprang up and went to the window, just as steps could be heard on the gravel outside.
"Here's someone coming." She turned to Mrs. France. "Is it Mr.Winnington?"
"It is!" said her visitor, after putting on her glasses.
Delia surveyed him, standing behind the lace curtain, and Mrs. France was relieved to see that a young person of such very decided opinions could be still girlishly curious. She herself rose to go.
"Good-bye. I won't interrupt your talk with him."
"Good-looking?" said Delia, with mischief in her eyes, and a slight gesture towards the approaching visitor.
"Don't you know what an athlete he is—or was?"
"Another perfection? Heavens!—how does he endure it?" said the girl, laughing.
Mrs. France took her leave. She was a very motherly tender-hearted woman, and she would like to have taken her old friend's grandchild in her arms and kissed her. But she wisely refrained; and indeed the instinct to shake her was perhaps equally strong. "How long will she stand gossiping on the doormat with the paragon," said Delia savagely to herself, when she was left alone. "Oh, how I hate a 'charming man'!" She moved stormily to and fro, listening to the distant sounds of talk in the hall, and resenting them. Then suddenly she paused opposite one of the large mirrors in the room. A coil of hair had loosened itself; she put it right; and still stood motionless, interrogating herself in a proud concentration.
"Well?—I am quite ready for him."
But her heart beat uncomfortably fast as the door opened, and MarkWinnington entered.