"Why, how do you do, Sir Gerald?" and Hawkes went across quickly with outstretched hand.
"Hello, Hawkes," replied Jerry, too preoccupied to return the act of salutation. Instead, he nodded in the direction Peg had gone and questioned:
"What does she mean—going in a few minutes?"
"She is returning to America. Our term of guardianship is over."
"How's that?"
"She absolutely refuses to stay here any longer. My duties in regard to her, outside of the annual payment provided by her late uncle, end to-day," replied the lawyer.
"I think not, Hawkes."
"I beg your pardon?"
"As the Chief Executor of the late Mr. Kingsnorth's will,Imust be satisfied that its conditions are complied with in the SPIRIT as well as to the LETTER," said Jerry, authoritatively.
"Exactly," was the solicitor's reply. "And—?"
"Mr. Kingsnorth expressly stipulated that a year was to elapse before any definite conclusion was arrived at. So far only a month has passed."
"But she insists on returning to her father!" protested Mr. Hawkes.
"Have you told her the conditions of the will?"
"Certainly not. Mr. Kingsnorth distinctly stated she was not to know them."
"Except under exceptional circumstances. I consider the circumstances most exceptional."
"I am afraid I cannot agree with you, Sir Gerald."
"That is a pity. But it doesn't alter my intention."
"And may I ask what that intention is?"
"To carry out the spirit of Mr. Kingsnorth's bequest."
"And what do you consider the spirit?"
"I think we will best carry out Mr. Kingsnorth's last wishes by making known the conditions of his bequest to Miss O'Connell and then let her decide whether she wishes to abide by them or not."
"As the late Mr. Kingsnorth's legal adviser, I must strongly object to such a course," protested the indignant lawyer.
"All the same, Mr. Hawkes, I feel compelled to take it, and I must ask you to act under my instructions."
"Really," exclaimed Mr. Hawkes; "I should much prefer to resign from my executorship."
"Nonsense. In the interests of all parties, we must act together and endeavour to carry out the dead man's wishes."
The lawyer considered a moment and then in a somewhat mollified tone, said:
"Very well, Sir Gerald. If you think it is necessary, why then by all means, I shall concur in your views."
"Thank you," replied the Chief Executor.
Mrs. Chichester came into the room and went straight to Jerry. At the same time, Alaric burst in through the garden and greeted Jerry and Hawkes.
"I heard you were here—" began Mrs. Chichester.
Jerry interrupted her anxiously: "Mrs. Chichester, I was entirely to blame for last night's unfortunate business. Don't visit your displeasure on the poor little child. Please don't."
"I've tried to tell her that I'll overlook it. But she seems determined to go. Can you suggest anything that might make her stay? She seems to like you—and after all—as you so generously admit—it was—to a certain extent your fault."
Before Jerry could reply, Jarvis came down the stairs with a pained—not to say mortified—expression on his face. Underneath his left arm he held tightly a shabby little bag and a freshly wrapped up parcel: in his right hand, held far away from his body, was the melancholy and picturesque terrier—"Michael."
Mrs. Chichester looked at him in horror.
"Where are you going with those—THINGS?" she gasped.
"To put them in a cab, madam," answered the humiliated footman. "Your niece's orders."
"Put those articles in a travelling-bag—use one of my daughter's," ordered the old lady.
"Your niece objects, madam. She sez she'll take nothing away she didn't bring with her."
The grief-stricken woman turned away as Jarvis passed out. Alaric tried to comfort her. But the strain of the morning had been too great. Mrs. Chichester burst into tears.
"Don't weep, mater. Please don't. It can't be helped. We've all done our best. I knowIhave!" and Alaric put his mother carefully down on the lounge and sat beside her on the arm. He looked cheerfully at Jerry and smiled as he said:
"I even offered to marry her if she'd stay. Couldn't do more than that, could I?"
Hawkes listened intently.
Jerry returned Alaric's smile as he asked: "YOU offered to marry her?"
Alaric nodded:
"Poor little wretch. Still I'd have gone through with it."
"And what did she say?" queried Jerry.
"First of all she laughed in my face—right in my face—the little beggar!"
Hawkes frowned gloomily as though at some painful remembrance.
"And after she had concluded her cachinnatory outburst, she coolly told me she would rather have 'MICHAEL.' She is certainly a remarkable little person and outside of the inconvenience of having her here, we should all be delighted to go on taking care of her. And if dancing is the rock we are going to split on, let us get one up every week for her. Eh, Jerry? You'd come, wouldn't you?"
Down the stairs came Peg and Ethel. Peg was holding one of Ethel's hands tightly. There seemed to be a thorough understanding between them. Peg was dressed in the same little black suit she wore when she first entered the Chichester family and the same little hat.
They all looked at her in amazement, amusement, interrogation and disgust respectively.
When they reached the bottom of the stairs, Ethel stopped Peg and entreated:
"Don't go!"
"I must. There's nothin' in the wurrld 'ud kape me here now. Nothin'!"
"I'll drive with you to the station. May I?" asked Ethel.
"All right, dear." Peg crossed over to Mrs. Chichester:
"Good-bye, aunt. I'm sorry I've been such a throuble to ye."
The poor lady looked at Peg through misty eyes and said reproachfully:
"WHY that dress? Why not one of the dresses I gave you?"
"This is the way I left me father, an' this is the way I'm goin' back to him!" replied Peg sturdily. "Goodbye, Cousin Alaric," and she laughed good-naturedly at the odd little man. In spite of everything he did, he had a spice of originality about him that compelled Peg to overlook what might have seemed to others unpardonable priggishness.
"Good-bye—little devil!" cried Alaric, cheerfully taking the offered hand. "Good luck to ye. And take care of yerself," added Alaric, generously.
As Peg turned away from him, she came face to face with Jerry—or as she kept calling him in her brain by his new name—to her—Sir Gerald Adair. She dropped her eyes and timidly held out her hand:
"Good-bye!" was all she said.
"You're not going, Peg," said Jerry, quietly and positively.
"Who's goin' to stop me?"
"The Chief Executor of the late Mr. Kingsnorth's will."
"An' who is THAT?"
"'Mr. Jerry,' Peg!"
"YOU an executor?"
"I am. Sit down—here in our midst—and know why you have been here all the past month."
As he forced Peg gently into a chair, Mrs. Chichester and Alaric turned indignantly on him. Mr. Hawkes moved down to listen, and, if necessary, advise.
There was pleasure showing on one face only—on Ethel's.
She alone wanted Peg to understand her position in that house.
Since the previous night the real womanly note awakened in Ethel.
Her heart went out to Peg.
Peg looked up wonderingly from the chair.
"Me cab's at the door!" she said, warningly to Jerry.
"I am sorry to insist, but you must give me a few, moments," said the Chief Executor.
"MUST?" cried Peg.
"It is urgent," replied Jerry quietly.
"Well, then—hurry;" and Peg sat on the edge of the chair, nervously watching "Jerry."
"Have you ever wondered at the real reason you were brought here to this house and the extraordinary interest taken in you by relations who, until a month ago, had never even bothered about your existence?"
"I have, indeed," Peg answered. "But whenever I've asked any one, I've always been told it was me uncle's wish."
"And it was. Indeed, his keenest desire, just before his death, was to atone in some way for his unkindness to your mother."
"Nothin' could do that," and Peg's lips tightened.
"That was why he sent for you."
"Sendin' for me won't bring me poor mother back to life, will it?"
"At least we must respect his intentions. He desired that you should be given the advantages your mother had when she was a girl."
"'Ye've made yer bed; lie in it'! That was the message he sent me mother when she was starvin'. And why? Because she loved me father. Well, I love me father an' if he thought his money could separate us he might just as well have let me alone. No one will ever separate us."
"In justice to yourself," proceeded Jerry, "you must know that he set aside the sum of one thousand pounds a year to be paid to the lady who would undertake your training."
Mrs. Chichester covered her eyes to hide the tears of mortification that sprang readily into them.
Alaric looked at Jerry in absolute disgust.
Hawkes frowned his disapproval.
Peg sprang up and walked across to her aunt and looked down at her.
"A thousand pounds a year!" She turned to Jerry and asked: "Does she get a thousand a year for abusin' me?"
"For taking care of you," corrected Jerry.
"Well, what do ye think of that?" cried Peg, gazing curiously at Mrs. Chichester. "A thousand pounds a year for makin' me miserable, an' the poor dead man thinkin' he was doin' me a favour!"
"I tell you this," went on Jerry, "because I don't want you to feel that you have been living on charity. You have not."
Peg suddenly blazed up:
"Well, I've been made to feel it," and she glared passionately at her aunt. "Why wasn't I told this before? If I'd known it I'd never have stayed with ye a minnit Who are YOU, I'd like to know, to bring me up any betther than me father? He's just as much a gentleman as any of yez. He never hurt a poor girl's feelin's just because she was poor. Suppose he hasn't any money? Nor ME? What of it? Is it a crime? What has yer money an' yer breedin' done for you? It's dried up the very blood in yer veins, that's what it has! Yer frightened to show one real, human, kindly impulse. Ye don't know what happiness an' freedom mean. An' if that is what money does, I don't want it. Give me what I've been used to—POVERTY. At least I can laugh sometimes from me heart, an' get some pleasure out o' life without disgracin' people!"
Peg's anger gave place to just as sudden a twinge of regret as she caught sight of Ethel, white-faced, and staring at her compassionately. She went across to Ethel and buried her face on her shoulder and wept as she wailed.
"Why WASN'T I told! I'd never have stayed! Why wasn't I told?"
And Ethel comforted her:
"Don't cry, dear," she whispered. "Don't. The day you came here we were beggars. You have literally, fed and housed us for the last month."
Peg looked up at Ethel in astonishment.
She forgot her own sorrow.
"Ye were beggars?"
"Yes. We have nothing but the provision made for your training."
Poor Mrs. Chichester looked at her daughter reproachfully.
Alaric had never seen his sister even INTERESTED much less EXCITED before. He turned to his mother, shrugged his shoulders and said:
"I give it up! That's all I can say! I simply give it up!"
Peg grasped the full meaning of Ethel's words:
"And will ye have nothin' if I go away?"
Peg paused: Ethel did not speak.
Peg persisted: "Tell me—are ye ralely dependin' on ME? Spake to me. Because if ye are, I won't go. I'll stay with ye. I wouldn't see ye beggars for the wurrld. I've been brought up amongst them, an' I know what it is."
Suddenly she took Ethel by the shoulders and asked in a voice so low that none of the others heard her:
"Was that the reason ye were goin' last night?"
Ethel tried to stop her.
The truth illumined Ethel's face and Peg saw it and knew.
"Holy Mary!" she cried, "and it was I was drivin' ye to it. Ye felt the insult of it every time ye met me—as ye said last night. Sure, if I'd known, dear, I'd never have hurt ye, I wouldn't! Indade, I wouldn't!"
She turned to the others:
"There! It's all settled. I'll stay with ye, aunt, an' ye can tache me anythin' ye like. Will some one ask Jarvis to bring back me bundles an' 'Michael.' I'm goin' to stay!"
Jerry smiled approvingly at her. Then he said:
"That is just what I would have expected you to do. But, my dear Peg, there's no need for such a sacrifice."
"Sure, why not?" cried Peg, excitedly. "Let me, sacrifice meself. I feel like it this minnit."
"There is no occasion."
He walked over to Mrs. Chichester and addressed her:
"I came here this morning with some very good news for you. I happen to be one of the directors of Gifford's bank and I am happy to say that it will shortly reopen its doors and all the depositors' money will be available for them in a little while."
Mrs. Chichester gave a cry of joy as she looked proudly at her two children:
"Oh, Alaric!" she exclaimed: "My darling Ethel!"
"REOPEN its doors?" Alaric commented contemptuously. "So it jolly well ought to. What right had it to CLOSE 'em? That's whatIwant to know. What right?"
"A panic in American securities, in which we were heavily interested, caused the suspension of business," explained Jerry. "The panic is over. The securities are RISING every day. We'll soon be on easy street again."
"See here, mater," remarked Alaric firmly, "every ha'penny of ours goes out of Gifford's bank and into something that has a bottom to it. In future, I'LL manage the business of this family."
The Chichester family, reunited in prosperity, had apparently forgotten the forlorn little girl sitting on the chair, who a moment before had offered to take up the load of making things easier for them by making them harder for herself. All their backs were turned to her.
Jerry looked at her. She caught his eye and smiled, but it had a sad wistfulness behind it.
"Sure, they don't want me now. I'd better take me cab. Good day to yez." And she started quickly for the door.
Jerry stopped her.
"There is just one more condition of Mr. Kingsnorth's will that you must know. Should you go through your course of training satisfactorily to the age of twenty-one, you will inherit the sum of five thousand pounds a year."
"When I'm twenty-one, I get five thousand pounds year?" gasped Peg.
"If you carry out certain conditions."
"An' what are they?"
"Satisfy the executors that you are worthy of the legacy."
"Satisfy you?"
"And Mr. Hawkes."
Peg looked at the somewhat uncomfortable lawyer, who reddened and endeavoured to appear at ease.
"Mr. Hawkes! Oho! Indade!" She turned back to Jerry: "Did he know about the five thousand? When I'm twenty-one?"
"He drew the will at Mr. Kingsnorth's dictation," replied Jerry.
"Was that why ye wanted me to be engaged to ye until I was twenty-one?" she asked the unhappy lawyer.
Hawkes tried to laugh it off.
"Come, come, Miss O'Connell," he said, "what nonsense!"
"Did YOU propose to Miss Margaret?" queried Jerry.
"Well—" hesitated the embarrassed lawyer—"in a measure—yes."
"That's what it was," cried Peg, with a laugh. "It was very measured. No wondher the men were crazy to kape me here and to marry me."
She caught sight of Alaric and smiled at him. He creased his face into a sickly imitation of a smile and murmured:
"Well, of course, I mean to say!" with which clear and well-defined expression of opinion, he stopped.
"I could have forgiven you, Alaric," said Peg, "but Mr. Hawkes, I'm ashamed of ye."
"It was surely a little irregular, Hawkes," suggested Jerry.
"I hardly agree with you, Sir Gerald. There can be nothing irregular in a simple statement of affection."
"Affection is it?" cried Peg.
"Certainly. We are both alone in the world. Miss O'Connell seemed to be unhappy: the late Mr. Kingsnorth desired that she should be trained—it seemed to me be an admirable solution of the whole difficulty."
Peg laughed openly and turning to Jerry, said "He calls himself a 'solution.' Misther Hawkes—go on with ye—I am ashamed of ye."
"Well, there is no harm done," replied Mr. Hawkes, endeavouring to regain his lost dignity.
"No!" retorted Peg. "It didn't go through, did it?"
Hawkes smiled at that, and taking Peg's hand, protested:
"However—always your friend and well-wisher."
"But nivver me husband!" insisted Peg.
"Good-bye."
"Where are ye goin' without me?"
"You surely are not returning to America now?" said Hawkes, in surprise.
"Why, of course, I'm goin' to me father now. Where else would I go?"
Hawkes hastened to explain:
"If you return to America to your father, you will violate one of the most important clauses in the will."
"If I go back to me father?"
"Or if he visits you—until you are twenty-one," added Jerry.
"Is that so?" And the blood rushed up to Peg's temples. "Well, then, that settles it. No man is goin' to dictate to me about me father. No dead man—nor no livin' one nayther."
"It will make you a rich young lady in three years, remember. You will be secure from any possibility of poverty."
"I don't care. I wouldn't stay over here for three years with" she caught Mrs. Chichester's eyes fastened on her and she checked herself.
"I wouldn't stay away from me father for three years for all the money in the wurrld," she concluded, with marked finality.
"Very well," agreed Jerry. Then he spoke to the others: "Now, may I have a few moments alone with my ward?"
The family expressed surprise.
Hawkes suggested a feeling of strong displeasure.
"I shall wait to escort you down to the boat, Miss O'Connell."
Bowing to every one, the man of law left the room.
Peg stared at Jerry incredulously.
"WARD? Is that ME?"
"Yes, Peg. I am your legal guardian—appointed by Mr. Kingsnorth!"
"You're the director of a bank, the executor of an estate, an' now ye're me guardian. What do ye do with yer spare time?"
Jerry smiled and appealed to the others:
"Just a few seconds—alone."
Mrs. Chichester went to Peg and said coldly "Good-bye, Margaret. It is unlikely we'll meet again. I hope you have a safe and pleasant journey."
"I thank ye, Aunt Monica." Poor Peg longed for at least one little sign of affection from her aunt. She leaned forward to kiss her. The old lady either did not see the advance or did not reciprocate what it implied. She went on upstairs out of sight.
Mingled with her feeling of relief that she would never again be slighted and belittled by Mrs. Chichester, she was hurt to the heart by the attitude of cold indifference with which her aunt treated her.
She was indeed overjoyed to think now it was the last she would ever see of the old lady.
Alaric held out his hand frankly:
"Jolly decent of ye to offer to stay here—just to keep us goin'—awfully decent. You are certainly a little wonder. I'll miss you terribly—really I will."
Peg whispered:
"Did ye know about that five thousand pounds when I'm twenty-one?"
"'Course I did. That was why I proposed. To save the roof." Alaric was nothing if not honest.
"Ye'd have sacrificed yeself by marryin' ME?" quizzed Peg.
"Like a shot."
"There's somethin' of the hero about you, Alaric!"
"Oh, I mustn't boast," he replied modestly. "It's all in the family."
"Well, I'm glad ye didn't have to do it," Peg remarked positively.
"So am I. Jolly good of you to say 'No.' All the luck in the world to you. Drop me a line or a picture-card from New York. Look you up on my way to Canada—if I ever really go. 'Bye!" The young man walked over to the door calling over his shoulder to Jerry: "See ye lurchin' about somewhere, old dear!" and he too went out of Peg's life.
She looked at Ethel and half entreated, half commanded Jerry:
"Plaze look out of the window for a minnit. I want to spake to me cousin." Jerry sauntered over to the window and stood looking at the gathering storm.
"Is that all over?" whispered Peg.
"Yes," replied Ethel, in a low tone.
"Ye'll never see him again?"
"Never. I'll write him that. What must you think of me?"
"I thought of you all last night," said Peg eagerly. "Ye seem like some one who's been lookin' for happiness in the dark with yer eyes shut. Open them wide, dear, and look at the beautiful things in the daylight and then you'll be happy."
Ethel shook her head sadly:
"I feel to-day that I'll never know happiness again."
"Sure, I've felt like that many a time since I've been here. Ye know three meals a day, a soft bed to slape in an' everythin' ye want besides, makes ye mighty discontented. If ye'd go down among the poor once in a while an' see what they have to live on, an' thry and help them, ye might find comfort and peace in doin' it."
Ethel put both of her hands affectionately on Peg's shoulders.
"Last night you saved me from myself—and then; you shielded me from my family."
"Faith I'd do THAT for any poor girl, much less me own cousin."
"Don't think too hardly of me, Margaret. Please!" she entreated.
"I don't, dear. It wasn't yer fault. It was yer mother's."
"My mother's?"
"That's what I said. It's all in the way, we're brought up what we become aftherwards. Yer mother, raised ye in a hot house instead of thrustin' ye out into the cold winds of the wurrld when ye were young and gettin' ye used them. She taught ye to like soft silks and shining satins an' to look down on the poor, an' the shabby. That's no way to bring up anybody. Another thing ye learnt from her—to be sacret about things that are near yer heart instead of encouragin' ye to be outspoken an' honest. Of course I don't think badly of ye. Why should I? I had the advantage of ye all the time. It isn't ivery girl has the bringin' up such as I got from me father. So let yer mind be aisy, dear. I think only good of ye. God bless ye!" She took Ethel gently in her arms and kissed her.
"I'll drive down with you," said Ethel, brokenly, and hurried out.
Peg stood looking after her for a moment, then she turned and looked at Jerry, who was still looking out of the window.
"She's gone," said Peg, quietly.
Jerry walked down to her.
"Are you still determined to go?" he asked.
"I am."
"And you'll leave here without a regret?"
"I didn't say that sure."
"We've been good friends, haven't we?"
"I thought we were," she answered gently. "But friendship must be honest. Why didn't ye tell me ye were a gentleman? Sure, how was I to know? 'Jerry' might mean anybody. Why didn't ye tell me ye had a title?"
"I did nothing to get it. Just inherited it," he said simply. Then he added: "I'd drop it altogether if I could."
"Would ye?" she asked curiously.
"I would. And as for being a gentleman, why one of the finest I ever met drove a cab in Piccadilly. He was a GENTLE MAN—that is—one who never willingly hurts another. Strange in a cabman, eh?"
"Why did ye let me treat ye all the time as an equal?"
"Because you ARE—superior in many things. Generosity, for instance."
"Oh, don't thry the comther on me. I know ye now. Nothin' seems the same."
"Nothing?"
"Nothin'!"
"Are we never to play like children again?" he pleaded.
"No," she said firmly. "Ye'll have to come out to New York to do it. An' then I mightn't."
"Will nothing make you stay?"
"Nothing. I'm just achin' for me home."
"Such as this could never be home to you?"
"This? Never," she replied positively.
"I'm sorry. Will you ever think of me?" He waited. She averted her eyes and said nothing.
"Will you write to me?" he urged.
"What for?"
"I'd like to hear of you and from you. Will you?"
"Just to laugh at me spellin'?"
"Peg!" He drew near to her.
"Sir Gerald!" she corrected him and drew a little away. "Peg, my dear!" He took both of her hands in his and bent over her.
Just for a moment was Peg tempted to yield to the embrace.
Had she done so, the two lives would have changed in that moment. But the old rebellious spirit came uppermost, and she looked at him defiantly and cried:
"Are you goin' to propose to me, too?"
That was the one mistake that separated those two hearts. Sir Gerald drew back from her—hurt.
She was right—they were not equals.
She could not understand him, since he could never quite say all he felt, and she could never divine what was left unsaid.
She was indeed right.
Such as this could never be a home for her.
Jarvis came quietly in:
"Mr. Hawkes says, Miss, if you are going to catch the train—"
"I'll catch it," said Peg impatiently; and Jarvis went out.
Peg looked at Jerry's back turned eloquently toward her, as though in rebuke.
"Why in the wurrld did I say that to him?" she muttered. "It's me Irish tongue." She went to the door, and opened it noisily, rattling the handle loudly—hoping he would look around.
But he never moved.
She accepted the attitude as one of dismissal.
Under her breath she murmured:
"Good-bye, Misther Jerry—an' God bless ye—an' thank ye for bein' so nice to me." And she passed out.
In the hall Peg found Ethel and Hawkes waiting for her.
They put her between them in the cab and with "Michael" in her arms, she drove through the gates of Regal Villa never to return.
The gathering storm broke as she reached the station. In storm Jerry came into her life, in storm she was leaving his.
The threads of what might have been a fitting addition to the "LOVE STORIES OF THE WORLD" were broken.
Could the break ever be healed?
Many and conflicting were Peg's feelings as she went aboard the ship that was to carry her from England forever.
In that short MONTH she had experienced more contrasted feelings than in all the other YEARS she had lived.
It seemed as if she had left her girlhood, with all its keen hardships and sweet memories, behind her.
When the vessel swung around the dock in Liverpool and faced toward America Peg felt that not only was she going back to the New World, but she was about to begin a new existence. Nothing would ever be quite the same again. She had gone through the leavening process of emotional life and had come out of it with her courage still intact, her honesty unimpaired, but somehow with her FAITH abruptly shaken. She had believed and trusted, and she had been—she thought—entirely mistaken, and it hurt her deeply.
Exactly why Peg should have arrived at such a condition—bordering as it was on cynicism—was in one sense inexplicable, yet from another point of view easily understood. That Jerry had not told her all about himself when they first met, as she did about herself to him, did not necessarily imply deceit on his part. Had she asked any member or servant in the Chichester family who and what "Jerry" was they would readily have told her. But that was contrary to Peg's nature. If she liked anyone, she never asked questions about them. It suggested a doubt, and doubt to Peg meant disloyalty in friendship and affection. Everyone had referred to this young gentleman as "Jerry." He even introduced himself by that unromantic and undignified name. No one seemed to treat him with any particular deference, nor did anything in his manner seem to demand it. She had imagined that anyone with a title should not only be proud of it, but would naturally hasten to let everyone they met become immediately aware whom they were addressing.
She vividly remembered her father pointing out to her a certain north-of-Ireland barrister who—on the strength of securing more convictions under the "Crimes Act" than any other jurist in the whole of Ireland—was rewarded with the Royal and Governmental approval by having conferred on him the distinction and dignity of knighthood. It was the crowning-point of his career. It has steadily run through his life since as a thin flame of scarlet. He lives and breathes "knighthood." He thinks and speaks it. He DEMANDS recognition from his equals, even as he COMPELS it from his inferiors. Her father told Peg that all the servants were drilled carefully to call him—"Sir Edward."
His relations, unaccustomed through their drab lives to the usages of the great, found extreme difficulty in acquiring the habit of using the new appellation in the place of the nick-name of his youth—"Ted." It was only when it was made a condition of being permitted an audience with the gifted and honoured lawyer, that they allowed their lips to meekly form the servile "Sir!" when addressing their distinguished relation.
When he visited Dublin Castle to consult with his Chiefs, and any of his old-time associates hailed him familiarly as "Ted!" a grieved look would cross his semi-Scotch features, and he would hasten to correct in his broad, coarse brogue: "Sir Edward, me friend! Be the Grace of Her Majesty and the British Government—Sir Edward—if—ye plaze!"
THERE was one who took pride in the use of his title.
He desired and exacted the full tribute due the dignity it carried. Then why did not "Jerry" do the same?
She did not appreciate that to him the prefix having been handed down from generations, was as natural to him as it was unnatural to the aforementioned criminal lawyer. The one was born with it, consequently it became second nature to him. The other had it conferred on him for his zeal in procuring convictions of his own countrymen, and never having in his most enthusiastic dreams believed such a condition would come to pass—now that it was an accomplished fact, he naturally wanted all to know and respect it.
They were two distinct breeds of men.
Peg had occasionally met the type of the honoured lawyer. They sprang up as mushrooms over night during the pressure of the "Crimes Act," and were liberally rewarded by the government—some were even transferred to the English Bar. And they carried their blatant insistence even across the channel.
But the man of breeding who exacted nothing; of culture, who pretended not to have acquired it; of the real power and dignity of life, yet was simplicity itself in his manner to others—that kind of man was new to Peg.
She burned with shame as she thought of her leave-taking. What must Sir Gerald think of her?
Even to the end she was just the little "Irish nothin'," as she had justly, it seemed to her now, described herself to him. She had hurt and offended him. In that one rude, foolish, unnecessary question, "Are you goin' to propose too?" she had outraged common courtesy, and made it impossible for him to say even a friendly "Good bye" to her. She did not realise the full measure of the insult until afterwards. She had practically insinuated that he was following the somewhat sordid example of cousin Alaric and Montgomery Hawkes in proposing for her hand because, in a few years, she would benefit by her uncle's will. Such a suggestion was not only unworthy of her—it was an unforgivable thing to say to him. He had always treated her with the greatest courtesy and consideration, and because he did not flaunt his gentility before her, she had taken unwarranted umbrage and had said something that raised an impassable barrier between them.
All the way across the Atlantic poor lonely Peg had many opportunities of reviewing that brief glimpse of English life. She felt now how wrong her attitude had been to the whole of the Chichester family. She had judged them at first sight. She had resolved that they were just selfish, inconsiderate, characterless people. On reflection, she determined that they were not. And even if they had been, why should Peg have been their accuser? And after all, is there not an element of selfishness in every nature? Was Peg herself entirely immune?
And in a family with traditions to look back on and live up to, have they not a greater right to being self-centred than the plebeian with nothing to look back on or forward to? And, all things considered, is not selfishness a thoroughly human and entirely natural feeling? What right had she to condemn people wholesale for feeling and practising it?
These were the sum and substance of Peg's self-analysis during the first days of her voyage home.
Then the thought came to her,—were the Chichesters really selfish? Now that she had been told the situation, she knew that her aunt had undertaken her training to protect Ethel and Alaric from distress and humiliation. She realised how distasteful it must have been to a lady of Mrs. Chichester's nature and position to have occasion to receive into her house, amongst her own family, such a girl as Peg. And she had not made it easy for her aunt. She had regarded the family as being allied against her.
Was it not largely her own fault if they had been? Peg's sense of justice was asserting itself.
The thought of Alaric flashed through her mind, and with it came a little pang of regret for the many occasions she had made fun of him—and in his mother's presence. His proposal to her had its pathetic as well as its humorous side. To save his family he would have deliberately thrown away his own chance of happiness by marrying her. Yet he would have done it willingly and cheerfully and, from what she had seen of the little man, he would have lived up to his obligations honourably and without a murmur.
Alaric's sense of relief at her refusal of him suddenly passed before her, and she smiled broadly as she saw, in a mental picture, his eager and radiant little face as he thanked her profusely for being so generous as to refuse him. Looking back, Alaric was by no means as contemptible as he had appeared at first sight. He had been coddled too much. He needed the spur of adversity and the light of battle with his fellowmen. Experience and worldly wisdom could make him a useful and worthy citizen, since fundamentally there was nothing seriously wrong with him.
Peg's outlook on life was distinctly becoming clarifled.
Lastly, she thought of Ethel. Poor, unhappy, lonely Ethel! In her little narrow ignorance, Peg had taken an intense dislike to her cousin from the beginning. Once or twice she had made friendly overtures to Ethel, and had always been repulsed. She placed Ethel in the category of selfish English-snobdom that she had heard and read about and now, apparently, met face to face. Then came the vivid experience at night when Ethel laid bare her soul pitilessly and torrentially for Peg to see. With it came the realisation of the heart-ache and misery of this outwardly contented and entirely unemotional young lady. Beneath the veneer of repression and convention Peg saw the fires of passion blazing in Ethel, and the cry of revolt and hatred against her environment. But for Peg she would have thrown away her life on a creature such as Brent because there was no one near her to understand and to pity and to succour.
Peg shuddered as she thought of the rash act Ethel had been saved from—blackening her life in the company of that satyr.
How many thousands of girls were there in England today, well-educated, skilled in the masonry of society—to all outward seeming perfectly contented, awaiting their final summons to the marriage-market—the culmination of their brief, inglorious careers. Yet if one could penetrate beneath the apparent calm, one might find boiling in THEIR blood and beating in THEIR brains the same revolt that had driven Ethel to the verge of the Dead Sea of lost hopes and vain ambitions—the vortex of scandal.
When from time to time a girl of breeding and of family elopes with an under-servant or a chauffeur, the unfortunate incident is hushed up and the parents attribute the unhappy occurrence primarily to some mental or moral twist in the young lady. They should seek the fault in their own hearts and lives. It is the home life of England that is responsible for a large portion of the misery that drives the victims to open revolt. The children are not taught from the time they can first speak to be perfectly frank and honest about everything they think and feel. They are too often left in the care of servants at an age when parental influence has the greatest significance. On the rare occasions when they are permitted to enter the august presence of their parents, they are often treated with a combination of tolerant affection and imperial severity. Small wonder the little ones in their development to adolescence evade giving confidences that have neither been asked for nor encouraged. They have to learn the great secrets of life and of nature from either bitter experience or from the lips of strangers. Children and parents grow up apart. It often takes a convulsion of nature or a devastating scandal to awaken the latter to the full realisation of their responsibility.
During their talk the morning following that illuminating incident, Peg learned more of Ethel's real nature than she had done in all of the four weeks she had seen and listened to her daily.
She had opened her heart to Peg, and the two girls had mingled confidences. If they had only begun that way, what a different month it might have been for both! Peg resolved to watch Ethel's career from afar: to write to her constantly: and to keep fresh and green the memory of their mutual regard.
At times there would flash through Peg's mind—what would her future in America be—with her father? Would he be disappointed? He so much wanted her to be provided for that the outcome of her visit abroad would be, of a certainty, in the nature of a severe shock to him. What would be the outcome? How would he receive her? And what had all the days to come in store for her with memory searching back to the days that were? She had a longing now for education: to know the essential things that made daily intercourse possible between people of culture. She had been accustomed to look on it as affectation. Now she realised that it was as natural to those who had acquired the masonry of gentle people as her soft brogue and odd, blunt, outspoken ways were to her.
From, now on she would never more be satisfied with life as it was of old. She had passed through a period of awakening; a searchlight had been turned on her own shortcomings and lack of advantages. She had not been conscious of them before, since she had been law unto herself. But now a new note beat in on her. It was as though she had been colour-blind and suddenly had the power of colour-differentiation vouchsafed her and looked out on a world that dazzled by its new-found brilliancy. It was even as though she had been tone-deaf and, by a miracle, had the gift of sweet sounds given her, and found herself bathed in a flow of sweet music. She was bewildered. Her view of life had changed. She would have to rearrange her outlook by her experience if she hoped to find happiness.
And always as she brooded and argued with and criticised herself and found things to admire in what had hitherto been wrong to her—always the face of Jerry rose before her and the sound of his voice came pleasantly to her ears and the memory of his regard touched gently at her heart, and the thought of her final mistake burnt and throbbed in her brain.
And with each pulsation of the giant engines she was carried farther and farther away froze the scene of her first romance. One night she made her "farewell" to England and all it contained that had played a part in her life.
It was the night before she reached New York.
As she came nearer and nearer to America, the thought of one who was waiting for her—who had never shown anger or resentment toward her—whatever she did; who had never shown liking for any but her; who had always given her the love of his heart and the fruit of his brain; who had sheltered and taught and loved and suffered for her,—rose insistently before her and obliterated all other impressions and all other memories.
As she spoke her "farewell" to England, Peg turned her little body toward the quickly nearing shores of America and thanked God that waiting to greet her would be her father, and entreated Him that he would be spared to her, and that when either should die that she might be called first; that life without him would be barren and terrible! and above all, she pleaded that He would keep her little heart loyal always to her childhood hero, and that no other should ever supplant her father in her love and remembrance.
When she awoke nest day amid the bustle of the last morning on board, it seemed that her prayer had been answered.
Her farewell to England was indeed final.
She had only one thought uppermost—she was going to see her father.