CHAPTER XXIIICONFIDENCESWhatever it was that Lady Brent and Lady Avalon had plotted between them, it needed no adjustment of Lady Brent's statement to Wilbraham—that henceforth she should meddle no more in Harry's life—to help or hinder it. They had only to stand aside and perhaps to congratulate one another upon the way their desires were being fulfilled. Only Mrs. Brent went about with a downcast face and air, and but for the kindness Harry showed her might as well have been back in London. She also wrote to Wilbraham, and told him that Harry and Sidney seemed to be falling more and more in love with one another every day."Of course it's hard on me," she wrote. "But it's what mothers are made for, I suppose. You do everything for your children and sink yourself entirely, and then some girl steps in and takes it all from you. However, I'm not going to show her that I feel it. She's got the better of me once more. The girl doesn't take the slightest trouble about me—doesn't think I'm worth it, I suppose—and for myself I don't care about her. But she is the right sort of girl for Harry to marry, or at any rate to fall in love with. Whatever I am, I'm fair, and I can see that. I should hate anybody who would take him away from me, so it might just as well be her as anybody. They're happy together, and Harry is more like his old self. I'm sure they've not said anything to one another yet. They take Jane Grant with them whenever they can get hold of her, and they wouldn't want to do that if it had gone very far with them. The moment they want to go off by themselves I shall know what to expect, and I'll let you know, but I hope you'll be down here before then. We are very glad you are coming. Harry often talks about you. How I wish it was all like it used to be! But it never will be again."Harry and Sidney rode together, and Harry found a horse for Jane and taught her to ride. Lady Avalon had a car at Royd and sometimes they motored over to Poldaven, where everything was now ready for the reception of a family of distinction. But Lady Avalon had gone back to London, and Sidney stayed on at Royd. There was no talk of her going away.Jane could not be always with them. She had been let off afternoon lessons, by special request, but had to occupy herself with them in the mornings.One hot morning Harry and Sidney motored over to Poldaven Castle. It was an old stone house, not very big, which stood on a boldly jutting cliff with the sea on three sides of it. There was generally some wind hereabouts, and there was a strong fresh wind this morning, though among the woods of Royd it was close and still.They went down to a little sheltered garden below the house. It had been partly hollowed out of the rock, and was partly rock-strewn grass and gorse and fern tamed into some semblance of ordered ground, but not too much to take from the charm of its wildness. Steps cut in the rock led down to it from above, and steps had been made from it to the sea, which lay fifty or sixty feet below. They sat on a stone bench overlooking the heaving emerald mass of the sea, and the waves breaking in a high tide against the cliffs and the huge scattered rocks that littered the shore.They were very good friends now, these two. It was Jane who had brought them together, for she greatly admired both of them, and would not be content until they admired one another. So they laughed at her and affected a wondering awe at each other's perfections when they were in her presence; and when they were alone together they sometimes kept up the game, to prevent themselves falling into sadness over their private troubles.They were both a little sad now, as they sat on the sun-warmed rock and looked out on the surge of the waves. Nature was so bright and fresh and happy, and seemed to be inviting a mood to respond to her own. She could put on this air of perpetual laughing youthfulness, though age-old and subject to moods very different. It seemed ungracious not to laugh and be happy with her."It's lovely here," Sidney said. "If only things would go right! You're the most perfect person in the world, Harry. I ought to be quite happy being here with you, but I want somebody else. I'm wanting him rather badly just at present.""Well, you're everything you ought to be, but I want somebody else too," he said.He rose impulsively and leant against the wall of the little terrace with one arm resting on it, and looked down at her. "I've thought I'd tell you for some time," he said. "I want to tell somebody. I can't tell Jane; she's too young. But you're in the same boat as I am; you'll understand. And we're friends too, aren't we?—always have been."She had appeared startled at his announcement, but her face was soft as he finished. "Oh, yes, we're friends," she said. "I'm so glad you've told me, Harry. Do you know I've wondered sometimes whether there was somebody. You so often look—well, you look like I feel. You're enjoying yourself, but there's somebody you're thinking of all the time who isn't there. Do tell me about it."He told her about his meeting with Viola on the moor, and how they had seen one another constantly afterwards and loved one another. Sidney's eyes were kind as she listened, but there was a little frown of puzzlement on her face. It was to be supposed that she wanted to "place" this lovely girl who had come to Harry as a revelation when he had been only a boy, and whom he adored still. He had told her nothing about her so far, except that her father was an artist and they had been holiday-making at Royd. There were many questions she wanted to ask."Have you got a photograph of her, Harry?" was the first that she asked. She wanted to satisfy herself that he was not idealizing somebody not worthy of him.Half unwillingly he took his case out of his pocket, and Viola's photograph out of it. "It isn't as beautiful as she is," he said, "but it's like her in some ways."Sidney took the card and looked at it for a long time. It was of Viola as Harry had first known her, young and sweet and untroubled."She's very lovely," she said, slowly. Then she looked up at him with a smile. "I'm so glad, Harry. I shouldn't like to think of you in love with somebody who wasn't like that. But I think she'd have to be, for you to fall in love with her. Have you seen her since?"Yes, he had seen her two or three times before he had been sent abroad, and he had been with her since he had come back, before he had come to Royd. She was in London, working in a government office. He was going to London for a few days before his leave was up, and would see her again after that before he went to France.He spoke as if he was troubled about it, and she knew why. But there was a lot to learn about it yet. And there was something about the beginnings of this love affair that she could not quite reconcile with her knowledge of Harry."Of course you're both frightfully young," she said. "Noel and I are of an age to get married if they'd let us, but I suppose you could hardly expect them to think that you were. But mightn't they accept your engagement, and let her be here with you?"He came and sat on the seat beside her again. "Of course we shall be married some day," he said. "But we never thought about that, or about what you call an engagement—I mean we didn't think of it in the way that older people would. We were just happy loving each other.""Oh, I know," she said. "It's a lovely time that—perhaps the best of all. But afterwards you come down to the earth a little. I suppose it has been like that with you, hasn't it? There are one's people to be considered, and what they are likely to think about it. I suppose nobody knows—at Royd.""Wilbraham does—my tutor, you know. Nobody else does."She showed surprise at this. "Did he find out you were seeing her?" she asked.He stirred uneasily. He did not answer her question directly. "I don't suppose you'd realize quite how it was with me here, before I went away," he said. "They'd kept me shut up. I was happy enough, but I knew absolutely nothing about the world. From what I've learnt since, I know it must look as if we had met surreptitiously. Perhaps we did, and yet it wasn't like that either. It was the most natural thing in the world for us to be together as we were. At first I even thought of telling my mother about it. I don't know now when it first dawned upon me that they wouldn't have approved—or why. I shouldn't have cared much if they had known. But it was such a beautiful secret between Viola and me; I didn't want it to be spoiled by other—older people—coming in.""Mr. Wilbraham knew," she said."He'd seen her. He knew what she was like. He's a dear old thing—full of understanding and sympathy. I don't know why he didn't tell Granny. I didn't ask him not to. I wouldn't have done that; that would have looked as if I had done something I was ashamed of. I've had an idea since that he had some sort of feeling that we were two men together, and it wasn't for us to be directed in our affairs by a woman. Something like that. Granny has always been very much at the head of things here.""Yes, I see," she said. "But now you're older, Harry; and it has lasted? That sort of love, when you'reveryyoung, doesn'talwayslast, you know. Wouldn't Lady Brent accept it now? It would be so lovely if she could come here, and you could be happy with her as long as you're in England. You wouldn't have to go away to London to see her then."There was silence for a time, except for the noise of the waves on the rocks, and the plaintive cry of the gulls wheeling above them. Harry sat looking on the rocky floor, Sidney out to sea."I've had to decide such a lot of things for myself lately," he said. "I'd decided not to do that."She thought his tone sounded as if he were wavering about his decision. She did not look at him, but said: "With Noel and me it's a very ordinary sort of difficulty. He's not what they'd call a good match. But I suppose they won't hold out if we show that we mean to have our own way. If they do, well, I shall wait till I'm twenty-one and marry him—just like that. But, of course, it would make a lot of difference if they smiled on us now, instead of keeping us apart. The real reason why we've come down here is because if he comes home on leave I should see him, and they don't want me to; and partly, I suppose, because they think you and I might get to like each other, now we're both grown up. Why can't they let us be happy in our own way—the older people? They've done what they wanted, or if they haven't they're probably rather sorry for it now. I should be very glad if Noel were in the sort of position that my sisters' husbands are. But I shouldn't love him any better for it. It's love that counts.""Yes, of course," said Harry. "Well, both you and I are going to get what we want by and by. I suppose we shall have to wait about the same time for it. But you never know what's going to happen to you in these days. If I were to get killed, I should have missed something I ought to have had. You'd say it wouldn't make much difference to me, but I don't look at it like that; and anyhow it would make a difference to Viola, all her life."Her eyes had filled with tears. "It just doesn't do to think about that," she said, "or to talk about it."He looked at her quickly, and put his hand on hers as it lay on the stone between them. "I'm sorry," he said. "I didn't mean to be a brute. We take it like that, you know; it doesn't make any difference to us. Nobody worries about it. But, of course it's different for you."She dried her eyes. "It won't happen to Noel or you," she said. "We shall all four of us be happy by and by. But why shouldn't you be happy now, Harry? Is it necessary that you should keep it a secret still?"The troubled look returned to his face. "I'm different from other men," he said. "Everything was spared me when I was young. I've had to learn everything since I grew up, and it isn't a pleasant world to learn in now. But whatever I have to do I must do now on my own responsibility. I should have to ask for Viola to come here. I couldn't do that. When she comes here, she'll come of her own right—the right that I shall give her.""But if you were to tell them about her, Harry——""Yes, that's what I've thought of doing. But I can't do that either. They might accept her, but if they didn't—it's like it is with you. They want something else."She sighed. "I'm glad you've told me, at any rate," she said. "It putseverythingright now. You know about me and I know about you. I suppose Jane doesn't know?""No. And we mustn't tell her. I wish I could, but it wouldn't be fair on her. She'll be the first person I shall tell on that happy day when I can tell everybody."CHAPTER XXIVHOLIDAYWilbraham came down to Royd for a week-end visit. It was all he could spare from his arduous duties. He was thinner than he had been, but seemed to have flourished under the severe course of work to which he had submitted himself. He seemed harder and more self-reliant. Lady Brent saw at the first glance that his old temptation had not troubled him, or if it had troubled him that he had got the better of it.Harry drove a dogcart to the station to meet him. The greeting was warm between them. Wilbraham looked him up and down. "I can't say they've smartened you up," he said, "because you didn't want it. But they've turned you into a soldier. I hope you haven't forgotten all your classics."Harry laughed, but made no reply. When they had driven out of the little town and were on the long lonely country road, he said: "I wanted to see you first. Of course you'll be talking me over with Granny. There are some things I don't want said.""If you mean about Viola," said Wilbraham after a pause. "I've kept my own counsel—and yours—for nearly two years. I've never been quite sure that I was right to do it. I believe it might have been better for you if Lady Brent had known. But at any rate, I have kept silence, and it isn't my affair now. It's yours. I quite recognize that.""Have you seen her?""Viola? Since you came home, you mean. You know that I saw her occasionally before. Yes, I've seen her. Of course she wants you. You're going up next week, aren't you? Have you arranged that here?""Not yet. I told mother that I should be going to London, but I haven't said when yet.""They won't like it, I suppose. You won't give them any reason for going. They'll think you just want to get away from here to amuse yourself as other young men do who are home on leave.""I'm afraid they must think what they like. I hate all this secrecy—and deception. I won't deceive them more than I can help. They must let me go my own way, and not ask questions. But it's deception all the same. Why did you let me in for it?""Let you in for it?Ilet you in for it! What on earth do you mean, Harry?""Not you chiefly. But you were in it. You kept me knowing nothing. Supposing it hadn't been Viola I fell in love with! Oh, I've learnt a lot since you and I met last. I know what men are, and I'm not different from others at bottom, though there's miles between me and them in some ways. It's Viola I owe everything to—not Granny or mother or you. I don't know how I should have lived through it if it hadn't been for her. I should have lost everything that I was." He spoke more slowly. "Viola is everything in the world to me," he said, "everything in this world or the next. I want you to understand that. I loved her before, but I love her a thousand times more, now that I know. All this—Royd, and Granny and mother—everything that it all meant to me, is nothing to me now, apart from her. Whatever there is that's real in it—I can't explain it, but it's as if she'd have to give it back to me before I can make it anything again. If you can see that, then you may be able to help a little. Viola is to come first in everything, but until it's all straightened out I want Granny—and mother—to be as little troubled about me as possible. Make it look natural to them, my going to London; don't let them think that I'm tired of them, or of Royd. I'm not, only it's all very little to me beside Viola.""I think you're unjust to us," said Wilbraham. "Say we hadn't prepared you for what you've been through—what nobody could have foreseen.""Oh, it would have been just the same if I'd gone straight to Sandhurst—perhaps worse—if I hadn't known Viola.""Well, that's where you're unjust. It was only Viola—or somebody like her—that you could have fallen in love with, as you did. We'd done that for you."Harry thought this over. Wilbraham breathed more freely the longer his silence lasted. He recognized with gratitude that old sense of fairness and reasonableness which had never been absent in his dealings with Harry. "It's what you have to think of when you feel inclined to blame your grandmother," he said."I don't think I'm inclined to blame her," Harry answered to this. "I'm very sorry for her. That's why I want to let her down as easily as I can. Afterwards everything will be right for her, and she'll see—she's quite wise enough—that it was right that I should take my life into my own hands. That's what I'm going to do. I had to do it once before.""She accepted that, you know.""Yes, in a wonderful way, I think. And she'll accept Viola. But not now. I should have to ask her for Viola, and I'm not going to do that. Besides, she's got other ideas in her head for me.""Lady Sidney, I suppose you mean. From what your mother has written, you seem to want her to think that her wishes are being carried out.""Sidney and I understand one another. She knows about Viola. I'm very glad she's here. I couldn't have stayed here without her and little Jane. I suppose the beastly world would say that I'm just amusing myself with a pretty girl, as I can't be with the girl I love. They might even think there's some danger in it. But the world doesn't know love as I know it." He turned to Wilbraham with a smile. "What you did, my friend, you and Granny between you, was to unfit me for the society of men. After being with nobody but men for all this time, I'm glad enough to have two girls as my friends before I go back to it. As for Granny, she's arranged all that for me, as she's used to arrange everything, and if she's disappointed with the outcome of it, I'm afraid it can't be helped. It's just that arranging that I have to make my stand against, with as little bother about it as possible.""I've said already, and I'll say it again, that you're hard on Lady Brent. I fully believe that if you were to tell her about Viola—now—she'd accept it. Then all the secrecy you say you hate would be over.""I think it's quite possible that she might. I don't think my mother would. In any case, there'd be questions and difficulties. Viola would be discussed and reckoned up in a way I can't bear to think of. When the time comes I shall bring Viola here and say: 'This is the girl I love, and she loves me, though I'm not worth anything beside her.' Then there'll be no questions and no difficulties, and Viola will take her place here, and we shall be happy for the rest of our lives.""You mean that she'll take Lady Brent's place here, I suppose. It's no good blinking matters."Harry laughed at him. "You always were a persistent old thing," he said, "but I'm very glad to see you again. Tell me about Viola, and what she said to you."Wilbraham found himself, somewhat to his surprise in spite of the preparation he had had, in an atmosphere of serenity, and almost of gaiety. There had been nothing like it in all the years he had lived at Royd Castle. He told himself that unless he had known how it was with Harry he would certainly have thought that the pleasure he obviously took in Sidney's society was leading to something else. The Grants were there when he arrived. It was a little intimate friendly happy party of which no single member seemed to have a care upon his or her shoulders. Only Mrs. Brent seemed rather out of the stream. Wilbraham saw that he would be invited on the first opportunity to listen to the tale of Mrs. Brent's dissatisfaction.It was Grant, however, to whom he first talked alone, walking in the garden. Grant could see nothing on the horizon but a prospective marriage between Sir Harry Brent and Lady Sidney Pawle, which appeared to him eminently as one that should give satisfaction to all parties concerned."Of course they won't want to be married yet awhile," he said, "but we're expecting an engagement any day. I must say that it has all turned out in a most extraordinarily satisfactory way. Supposing the boy had done what his father did! He'd seen nobody here; he might very well have got taken in by somebody who wouldn't have been the right sort of person for him to marry when he cut himself loose. And there was just the chance of this one girl being here when he came home. One is inclined to think of Lady Brent managing everything, but she didn't actually manage that. It just came about."Wilbraham listened to all this, his own thoughts running all the time. Sidney and Jane and Harry were in another part of the garden, out of sight, but not out of hearing. A burst of laughter punctuated the close of the Vicar's speech. "Wouldn't they want to get away by themselves if it's as you think?" Wilbraham asked."Ah, my boy, you don't recognize the march of the great passion," said Grant. "I've loved watching those three together, because it is all going as I should have expected.""Copy in it," suggested Wilbraham."Well, that's your way of putting it. But of course one takes in everything that passes before one's eyes, and if it doesn't come out exactly like it, it's——""Near enough to look like it. Well, I suppose you've made a study of it, and all the old women who read your immortal works will shiver down their spines and say, 'It was just like that with me.' But I'd rather take Jane's opinion about it than yours.""Would you? Well, Jane's having the time of her life. They're awfully nice to her. Of course they're just in the state when it's gratifying to have somebody like Jane with them, who thinks there never was anybody like either of them. They flatter each other through her.""Oh, that's how it's going to be worked out, is it? The old women will love that. It's a new touch, and they'll wish they'd thought of it for themselves, in time. Did Jane tell you it was like that, or was it your own mighty brain?""You're jealous of my success, Wilbraham. But I don't mind your jibes. I don't write for the highbrows like you, and I do touch the hearts of thousands. Jane talks to her mother. I shouldn't expect her to talk to me about it.""Well, what does Mrs. Grant say? She's got some sense.""She keeps rather quiet about it. I think she's just thankful that Harry has somebody to keep him bright and cheerful while he's at home. You made a mistake, you know, before, in not letting him have young people to play with.""He had your two.""As it happened, yes. But they were only children. Jane is older now, but not old enough, fortunately, to have the danger of complications. Apart altogether from the question of a love affair with Lady Sidney, I believe it's the best thing that could happen for him to have those two with him while he's here. It's an awful welter of blood and horror out there, you know, Wilbraham. None of the young fellows who come home talk much about it, but it doesn't need much imagination to see what a healing process it is for anybody like Harry to spend a few weeks with people like those two girls as his chief companions, in a quiet lovely place like this.""Now you're talking sense yourself for a change. Here's Mrs. Brent coming. Don't leave me alone with her. It's an awful welter of red tape and incompetence where I've just come from, but I don't want her as a healing process till I feel a little stronger."But the Grants had to be going very shortly, and Mrs. Brent was not to be denied.Her first address to Wilbraham, however, was not on the subject of her grievances. "Oh, I forgot to tell you when I wrote," she said. "You know that artist—Bastian—who came down here two summers ago?""Yes," said Wilbraham, with his heart in his mouth."Well, I've found out that he married a great friend of mine—oh, years ago, but I hadn't forgotten her. She died, poor girl, but of course the daughter who was with Mr. Bastian here was hers. I wish I'd known. I'd have gone to see them.""You wouldn't have wanted to bring that time up, would you?" said Wilbraham, scarcely knowing what to say.She was all bristles at once. "I think I was very badly treated about all that," she said. "I'd nothing whatever to be ashamed of in what I came from, and all the time it was made to look as if I had. I half believed it myself, but now I know better. Every one of my family is doing well. They're not in the position I'm in, of course, but there's no need to be ashamed of any of them. In fact, I've made up my mind to introduce Harry to his relations on my side of the family. I'm going to ask him to take me up to London before he goes back. Then he'll see for himself.""Do you think you're wise?" said Wilbraham, relieved at having got away from the subject of the Bastians."What do you mean?" she asked. "What's the objection?""Well, you say they're not equal to you. They may be very good sort of people; I dare say they are; but what's the sense of dragging them in at this time of the day—after twenty years—to mark the difference?""What difference?""Well, the difference between them and Lady Brent.""Lady Brent! How can you talk like that? It's just that I'm so mad with Lady Brent that I——""I know it is. All you can think of is to score off her. You're not thinking of Harry; you're not even thinking of yourself. What are you going to get, out of going back on everything you've stood for for the last twenty years? Harry thinks of you as belonging to Royd, in the same sort of way as Lady Brent does. Why should he have ever thought of you as anything different? Now you're proposing to show him the difference. You say yourself theyaredifferent. You're going to show him the difference between Lady Brent and them. Which is likely to come out of it best? I don't know; I'm asking you.""Oh, you're just trying to aggravate me," she said. "You always were like that. I don't know why I talk to you at all.""Well, if you've finished, I think I'll go in. I want a peaceful time as long as I'm here. You're the only person who doesn't seem to be comfortable and happy. I'd rather be with those of them who are.""I'm not at all happy. I'm just miserable. Harry doesn't love me any more, and I don't know what to do about it."They had come to the bowling alley where Wilbraham had thought out his difficulties two summers before. She sank down on to the seat and cried.Wilbraham felt very sorry for her, but determined to prevent her from making mischief if he could. "Look here," he said, "I don't think it really much matters whether you introduce Harry to your people or not. He's grown up now, and all that idea of keeping things from him is over. Do what you like about it. Lady Brent won't try to stop you; I'm pretty certain of that. She has given up trying to direct his life. Why can't you?"Her sobs increased. "I'm his mother," she said. "I've had so little of him. I can't give him up now.""You had him during the whole of his childhood, more than most mothers have their sons. Lady Brent may have been a bit jealous of you; I dare say she was; she's got her weaknesses like all the rest of us. But she didn't try to get him away from you. I was here most of the time, and I could see that plainly enough. You know it too. You'll be much happier about things if you try to be fair to her, as she's tried to be fair to you.""Oh, of course it's her you're thinking of all the time. I don't come in at all.""Yes, you do come in. I'm trying to help you to get things straight. The fact is your nose has been put out of joint by this girl who's here. It isn't Lady Brent at all, though you heap it all back on her. You can't expect a boy of Harry's age to go about tied to his mother's apron strings, when there's somebody young for him to play with. You like the girl all right, don't you?"She had dried her eyes and sat leaning forward in an attitude of picturesque misery. "It doesn't seem to matter whether I like her or not," she said. "Harry won't talk to me about her. If he told me he was in love with her I should do my best to sympathize with him. I want to be everything to my son.""Of course you do; and of course you can't be. If he hasn't told you he's in love with her, it's because he isn't. For goodness' sake let him be happy while he's here, and in his own way. He'll be going back soon enough, and you won't want him to think of his holiday spoiled by your complaints. You're selfish, you know. It's yourself you're thinking of all the time, not him. You used not to be like that.""Oh, well," she said, rising, "I suppose I must put up with it. It's the common lot of mothers. I shan't talk about it any more, to you or anybody.""That's right," said Wilbraham, as they strolled towards the house. "And don't make complaints to Harry, either. It's not the way to get what you want from him. Of course you know that really, as well as I do. Only it's difficult, isn't it?""Oh, I don't know," she said. With the end of her emotion she seemed to have entered a mood almost of indifference. "If I've stood what I have all these years, and kept myself under as I have, I suppose I can go on doing it. It's coming down here that has upset me. I've been happy enough in London. Of course I've wanted to hear about Harry, but he's promised me now that he'll write to me regularly. I shall be better off, in a way, than I've ever been. I'msomebodythere, you see. Here I'm nobody. I shan't stay here a moment longer than Harry does. I hate the place now. Why have you never been to see me in London?""I don't know that you've ever asked me. Where do you live?"She told him. She was sharing a flat with an old friend, a woman who had been on the stage with her, had had an unhappy married life, but had got on in her profession."Margaret Creedy?" said Wilbraham. "I've seen her act. She's very good.""Yes, you wouldn't have thought she began in the chorus, would you? She never had much voice, which was perhaps just as well for her, or she'd have been in musical comedy still. She doesn't like it remembered, and of course I don't want it known either; but we often talk over old times. It was from her, by the by, that I heard about Mrs. Bastian. She married a gentleman, like I did; but he'd come down in the world. Bastian isn't his real name, you know."."What is his real name?""I don't know. I meant to find out about him, and go and see what the girl is like. You never told me much about her, but if she's like her mother she ought to be very pretty.""She is very pretty, but——""Oh, you mean I ought not to let them know who I was, as they've been here. Perhaps I shan't. I don't want to giveherany handles against me.""ByherI suppose you mean Lady Brent. Everything comes back to her. You'll think better of all that some day. I wish you'd think better of it now. Royd would be a less prickly house to live in.""Oh, I shall behave myself, never you fear," she said as she left him.He thought it probable that she would. He had made an impression on her, though she was not of the sort that would acknowledge it. She was evidently making her own life, and even if she had dropped all pretence of war work, for which she had gone to London, it was not a life that would let the name of Brent down, as he had rather feared. Margaret Creedy was an actress of some distinction, and would be very careful not to jeopardize the social position she had won for herself. And Mrs. Brent, for all her independent talk, was guided by a sense of her own importance in the world. Probably the joint establishment was as rigidly respectable as any in London.As for possible complications with the Bastians, Wilbraham could do nothing. If the revelation came in that way, it must come, and for himself he didn't care when it came. He was tired of all the secrecy, and thought too that Harry was wrong in keeping his secret; or, at any rate, right or wrong in being unwilling to disclose it himself, that it would be better for him if it were known.He was inclined to dread the talk that he saw coming with Lady Brent. He badly wanted a recreative rest himself, and hated the idea of exercising his brain in steering clear of admissions to her, hated also the idea of deceiving her by doing so, when all the time he was in sympathy with her in her doubts and disappointments. What was done was done. Harry was what he was, and if she had made any mistake in his upbringing, which he did not admit, it would do no good now to dwell on it with regret. Harry was working it all out for himself, and as far as Wilbraham could see, was not making such a bad job of it. He would tell her that, when she began to discuss him, and cut the conversation as short as he conveniently could. Then he would be free to enjoy himself, in the company of the people he liked best in the world, and in the place which seemed to him, coming back to it, a haven of peace and beauty.But apparently that was all that Lady Brent wanted of him. She told him that Harry seemed much more his old self now that he had been home a week or more, and that she was glad that there was young companionship for him, and beyond that she did not discuss him at all.So Wilbraham enjoyed his two days at Royd, and went back to his work greatly refreshed, and with most of his doubts about Harry set at rest. He might be longing for Viola all the time, as he had said he was, but he managed to hide it effectually and seemed to be enjoying his holiday as much as anybody.CHAPTER XXVMRS. BRENT KNOWSRoyd Castle was empty, except for the servants, for the first time for twenty years. Everybody had gone away, including Lady Brent, who, however, was not very far off, for she was only visiting Lady Avalon for a few days at Poldaven.To the Grants, left to themselves, after the unusual amount of society they had lately enjoyed, there was a sense of emptiness, though their own summer life was in full swing, and the Vicar had a bright new idea for a novel, which was keeping his thoughts happily employed. There were to be a young man and two girls, and nobody was to know which of the girls the young man was really in love with until the last chapter."Of course I got the idea from those three," he told his wife, "although it couldn't be exactly like them. Harry and Sidney might be, but the second girl would have to be older than Jane, but still rather young. She would be a sort of confidante of the other two, who would be inclined to fall in love with one another. Then she would gradually find that she was in love with the young man herself. I should make it rather pathetic, but not overdo it, of course. She would keep her feelings to herself, out of loyalty to her friend. I haven't quite worked it out yet, but the reality would come in a flash. The young man would find that it was she he was in love with. I shouldn't be able to leave the other girl in the air. There might be somebody else for her. It will come all right, now my brain has begun to work on it. I should have to make her very charming, so that it would seem as if the manmustbe in love with her.""You mustn't make it too like Harry and Sidney," said Mrs. Grant."Oh, I should be careful about that, though their way with each other has been very attractive to watch. They're so frank, and so completely friendly—a very delightful pair of young people I call them. It would be much more effective to have young lovers behaving like that to one another than the usual sort of love affair that one meets with in fiction. The odd thing about it, though, is that they have parted now and nothing has come of it all."Mrs. Grant laughed. "Perhaps it's because they weren't lovers after all," she said, "and were so frank and friendly with each other because they weren't. You must be careful about that, David."But he would not admit that Harry and Sidney weren't in love with one another. It was clear for everybody to see. Of course Harry was rather an exceptional young man. That was plain from the way he had come back to Royd as if he were master there already. There was tremendous strength of character in him, and even Lady Brent recognized it, and did not seek to direct him in any way. It was very likely that he had made up his mind that it would not be right to engage himself to Sidney until the war was over. But it was also likely that they had an understanding between themselves. It could hardly be otherwise."He has certainly altered," said Mrs. Grant. "He goes his own way as one would hardly have expected of him in some respects. I don't know why he should have wanted to be with Mr. Wilbraham for a week before he went to France. Poor Mrs. Brent was rather sad about it, especially when he wrote to say that he was not coming down again.""And now she's gone posting up to London to get hold of him. I've no patience with Mrs. Brent. She has greatly deteriorated. Well, I must be getting on with my work. I shall very soon be ready to make a start on the first chapter."Jane had been very subdued in demeanour since Sidney and Harry had both departed, and frequently sought her mother's company. She came to her this morning, when her lessons were done, and sat with her in the garden as she worked."Did father say that there was going to be a great attack on the Germans soon?" she asked, after a little desultory conversation."It has been expected for some time. I suppose it can't be long before it comes now.""I suppose that's why Harry's leave has been cut short. Will there be a great many of our people killed, mother?""I'm afraid so, dear.""Harry might be," said Jane. "He's very brave.""You mustn't let yourself dwell on that, darling. He has been spared so far.""Did you know he had been wounded?"Mrs. Grant looked at her in surprise. "Not seriously," she said."Sidney and I both think he was, though he wouldn't tell us, and said we weren't to talk about it. Have you noticed he always keeps his sleeve buttoned when he's playing tennis?"Mrs. Grant hadn't noticed particularly, but said that she remembered now that he did."Well, he's got an awful great scar in his arm. We saw it once by accident. A Turk did it with a bayonet. When we found out, he did tell us a little, and about the time he was in hospital. He told us about an orderly who had been frightfully good to him, and said he saved his life when he was very ill, by nursing him all the time. He liked to talk about him; his name was Tom Weller. Sidney thought he couldn't have been so ill just from a wound in the arm, and then he said he'd had a little shell wound in the body, but he wouldn't tell us any more. We think it must have been a serious one. We found out afterwards that he didn't go to hospital for his bayonet wound at all."Mrs. Grant was conscious of a feeling of surprise and some discomfort. She knew that Harry was not likely to fail in any of a young man's courageous work, and yet she had thought of him as having got off lightly, except in the hardships of a trooper's life. And that he had never mentioned even the actions in which he had been wounded seemed so to accentuate the division that he had made between himself and those who loved him. He might have died and they would have known nothing. Apparently he had been very near to death. She wondered whether Jane had any theory to account for his unusual reticence about himself."I'm very glad Lady Brent will hear about him now," she said. "It's dreadful to think what might have happened when they couldn't have got to him.""Well, they couldn't, anyhow, when he was in Egypt. He says it was much better that they shouldn't have been anxious about him, and as it turned out there was no need to have been anxious. I must say I'm rather glad we didn't know, though it's horrid to think of our enjoying ourselves at home when Harry was nearly dying. Sidney and I both told him that we wanted to know everything about him now, and he promised to.""To write to you?""Yes; or to let us have a message. You see we're real friends, mother dear. We've had a lovely time together and enjoyed ourselves frightfully; but it hasn't been quite all enjoying ourselves. Sidney and I both know that Harry dreads things. I don't mean being wounded, or anything like that. But everything is so different for him. What we both got to know was that he wanted it to be like it used to be here as much as ever it could be. That's why he won't talk about the war. We could make him forget it; so we were sometimes more lively than we really felt. I'm sure I don't feel at all lively now."Her mother stole a glance at her, as she sat with a calm face looking out in front of her."Well, darling," she said, "you'll have Harry home on leave again. I'm sure both you and Sidney have done a lot for him since he's been home this time. There was a sort of strain on him at first which wasn't there afterwards.""Did you notice that? I'm very glad. Of course Sidney did more than I did. She was with him more, and she's older. But they were both very sweet to me. I think I did help. I love them both. I love Sidney. I wish——"She broke off abruptly. "I think I can guess what Sidney's secret is," said her mother, after a pause. "I think she meant me to, you know, when she told you you could tell me that there was a secret."Jane looked at her eagerly. "I don't suppose she really meant me not to tell you," she said."If I've found it out for myself, she wouldn't mind you talking about it. I shouldn't mention it to anybody else. I thought, when you told me, that perhaps she was in love with somebody, and that was why you and she and Harry could all be friends together so happily."Jane breathed a sigh of relief. "Yes, that's it exactly," she said. "How clever you are, mother! I'm glad you knew. His name is Noel Chancellor. I've seen his photograph. He is very good-looking, but of course not so good-looking as Harry. I can't help thinking that if she'd never seen him she would be in love with Harry.""Perhaps. But it doesn't always come like that. And he's not in love with her, you see, though there's nobody else, for him.""No, he isn't." Jane spoke very decisively. "She's such a dear that I did think once that he might have been a little, although he knew about Noel, without being able to help it. But he's not the least little bit. I don't know how I know that, but I do.""I suppose you know that they think he is, at the Castle.""Oh, yes. And Lady Avalon will be annoyed when she finds out. But we can't help that."Mrs. Grant smiled. She loved that "we" that came into Jane's speech. "What about Lady Brent?" she said. "You were such friends with Lady Brent before Harry came home.""I am still. Of course she wouldn't say anything to me about that. I'm not quite sure that she does expect it. At any rate, I know she was glad for me to be with them. She knew all right that we were helping Harry. Lady Brent sees a lot, though she doesn't talk much."Mrs. Grant found food for thought in this, and shared it later with Miss Minster. Neither of them had ever been able to make up their minds finally about Lady Brent."Supposing she doesn't really expect anything to come of it!" she said. "I'm inclined to trust Jane when she thinks that she doesn't.""I've liked her much better since she took Jane into her confidence," said Miss Minster. "I'm sorry for her now. I think she lays her plans deeply and then has to sit and do nothing while she sees them fail. But it needs a lot of self-restraint to sit and do nothing. Yes, I'm sorry for her.""You think Jane is right then?""I don't know. Lady Brent would look farther than most people. She wouldn't need to look much farther than I do in this. What I think is that Harry isn't ready for it yet, and won't be till the war is over. When that oppression is removed from him I think he's quite likely to fall in love with Lady Sidney. That's what I think, and I shouldn't wonder if Lady Brent thought the same. Then it wouldn't make her quite so superhuman as she appears. She'd just be waiting."This view could not be combated without disclosures. As far as it affected Lady Brent it seemed to be the best explanation of her attitude. "Anyhow she's a wonderful woman," said Mrs. Grant, "and I also like her better than I did, although I never disliked her.""The person I don't like so well," said Miss Minster, "is Mrs. Brent. I hope we've seen the last of her here for the present."But they had not, for almost immediately she had spoken a telegram was brought in from Mrs. Brent, announcing her arrival that afternoon, and asking Mrs. Grant to take her in, as there was nobody at the Castle. She also asked Mrs. Grant to meet her at Burport, which seemed to indicate that she had something of importance to disclose to her.She looked scared and unhappy as she greeted her friend on the platform. "I hope you didn't mind my asking you to put me up," she said. "I believe she's coming back to-morrow, and I wanted to have a long talk with you first."By "she" Mrs. Grant understood her to refer to Lady Brent, whom she seldom referred to in any other way. "I'm very glad to have you," she said. "I hope nothing is wrong. Have you seen Harry?""I'll tell you when we get into the carriage."When they were settled and driving away, she said: "Have I seen Harry? I think you'll be surprised when I tell you how and where I've seen him. I've never had such a shock in my life. I don't know what to do about it. I had to come straight down to see her. She must deal with it. I can't; it's beyond me. I only hope it won't be beyond her. I must tell you all from the beginning."She entered into a long explanation of how she had written to Harry at Wilbraham's flat where he was staying. He had come to see her, and had been kind but had seemed annoyed with her for coming up to London when he had not expected it. He had told her that he was very much engaged, and could not see much of her before he went abroad. He had not vouchsafed any account of how he was engaged, but had come to see her once again, in the morning, but had refused to stay to lunch or to make any engagement for the evening. She spoke with some resentment, and not as she had ever spoken about Harry before. It was as if she felt more annoyed at being neglected than sorry at not having him with her.Mrs. Grant sat silent, and she entered on another long explanation about the Bastians, and her early friendship with Bastian's wife. Then Mrs. Grant began to be extremely interested."What possessed me to find out all about them just at this time, and go to see the girl, I can't think," she said. "I think it was Providence leading me. I'd forgotten all about Mrs. Clark, the woman they lodge with, being Mrs. Ivimey's sister, and fortunately—or unfortunately—she didn't open the door to me. The maid said she was in, but had a young gentleman with her. She looked rather knowing as she said it, and I thought it would be amusing to see what the young gentleman was like. You can imagine what I felt when she showed me into the room and I found Harry there."She looked as if she expected an exclamation of surprise at this climax; but Mrs. Grant had already been prepared for it by her rigmarole. "That explains a great deal," she said. "I suppose they had met here.""Yes, two years ago, when Harry was a boy—hardly more than a child. Could you believe it of him, and keeping it secret all that time, and ever since?""What happened?" asked Mrs. Grant, adjusting her thoughts to many things."They were sitting side by side on the sofa. I never had such a shock in my life. I could only stand there and stare. She jumped up, of course. I hadn't given my name, and she didn't even know who I was. Harry looked very black, and stood up too. It was as if a sword was piercing my heart to see my son look at me like that."She paused for a moment. It occurred to Mrs. Grant that she had rehearsed her tale beforehand, and that phrase had come to her as an effective one. It did not seem to represent what she was actually feeling, though it may have represented what she thought she ought to feel."I could only gasp out, 'Harry! You here!' He said, 'Yes, mother!' Then he took hold of the girl's hand, and said, 'This is Viola. We have loved each other for a long time.' That was absolutely all he said, and she said nothing, but just looked at me, as if she was frightened, as I dare say she was.""Oh, I hope you——"She did not continue. Mrs. Brent would tell her what she had done.She did not tell her at once, and Mrs. Grant's heart sank as she expatiated further on what she had felt. "The very thing," she said, "that we'd all sacrificed ourselves to prevent, during the whole of Harry's boyhood. I was absolutelystunned. There they stood hand in hand in front of me, and waited for me to say something. And whatcouldI say? Harry—my boy! And a girl like that! Oh, I shall never get over it. And I can't think whatshe'llsay, though there's one thing—she can't blame me for it."Mrs. Grant had been thinking rapidly. She had heard about Viola from Mrs. Ivimey. Her impression of her had been of a very young and beautiful girl, of whom nice things were said naturally. It needed some little effort of imagination to connect her with Harry, and certainly it was rather surprising that Harry, of all people, should have cherished that kind of secret. But the picture of the pair of them standing there hand in hand waiting for the speech which she dreaded to be told had not come rose before her. "Oh, he couldn't have gone on loving her for two whole years unless she was sweet and good," she said.Mrs. Brent bridled in offence. "That didn't come in whenIwas married," she said. "She's no better than I was. Her mother wasn't brought up as I had been, though there was nothing against her. It simply can't be allowed.Ican't do anything. Harry won't listen to me. This girl has taken him away from me. Of course it's all explained now—why he was so different to me when he came home—oh, and why he didn't write, and everything. He wrote to her. Heisdifferent. She's made him so. He isn't like my son any more. I'm only thankful that it didn't happen, or at least I didn't know about it, while I was living down here."It seemed probable that she was congratulating herself that the whole of her interests in life were no longer bound up in Harry. This was no very comforting thought to Mrs. Grant. "I wish you'd tell me how it ended," she said."It ended in Harry being very unkind to me," she said, with the first signs of real emotion. "He said that if I had taken the girl as my daughter—as if I could have done that!—all the difficulties would have been ended. As it was he would not see me again before he went to France. Young people are very cruel. I'm his mother who have been everything to him, and now I'm nothing. I came away and left him there. It's all over for me. I've lost my son, and this girl who isn't fit for him has got him. But I don't think she'll be allowed to keep him. I shall see her to-morrow. She won't be pleased at the end of all her plotting and scheming. But I shall be surprised if she doesn't think ofsomethingthat will put an end to it."
CHAPTER XXIII
CONFIDENCES
Whatever it was that Lady Brent and Lady Avalon had plotted between them, it needed no adjustment of Lady Brent's statement to Wilbraham—that henceforth she should meddle no more in Harry's life—to help or hinder it. They had only to stand aside and perhaps to congratulate one another upon the way their desires were being fulfilled. Only Mrs. Brent went about with a downcast face and air, and but for the kindness Harry showed her might as well have been back in London. She also wrote to Wilbraham, and told him that Harry and Sidney seemed to be falling more and more in love with one another every day.
"Of course it's hard on me," she wrote. "But it's what mothers are made for, I suppose. You do everything for your children and sink yourself entirely, and then some girl steps in and takes it all from you. However, I'm not going to show her that I feel it. She's got the better of me once more. The girl doesn't take the slightest trouble about me—doesn't think I'm worth it, I suppose—and for myself I don't care about her. But she is the right sort of girl for Harry to marry, or at any rate to fall in love with. Whatever I am, I'm fair, and I can see that. I should hate anybody who would take him away from me, so it might just as well be her as anybody. They're happy together, and Harry is more like his old self. I'm sure they've not said anything to one another yet. They take Jane Grant with them whenever they can get hold of her, and they wouldn't want to do that if it had gone very far with them. The moment they want to go off by themselves I shall know what to expect, and I'll let you know, but I hope you'll be down here before then. We are very glad you are coming. Harry often talks about you. How I wish it was all like it used to be! But it never will be again."
Harry and Sidney rode together, and Harry found a horse for Jane and taught her to ride. Lady Avalon had a car at Royd and sometimes they motored over to Poldaven, where everything was now ready for the reception of a family of distinction. But Lady Avalon had gone back to London, and Sidney stayed on at Royd. There was no talk of her going away.
Jane could not be always with them. She had been let off afternoon lessons, by special request, but had to occupy herself with them in the mornings.
One hot morning Harry and Sidney motored over to Poldaven Castle. It was an old stone house, not very big, which stood on a boldly jutting cliff with the sea on three sides of it. There was generally some wind hereabouts, and there was a strong fresh wind this morning, though among the woods of Royd it was close and still.
They went down to a little sheltered garden below the house. It had been partly hollowed out of the rock, and was partly rock-strewn grass and gorse and fern tamed into some semblance of ordered ground, but not too much to take from the charm of its wildness. Steps cut in the rock led down to it from above, and steps had been made from it to the sea, which lay fifty or sixty feet below. They sat on a stone bench overlooking the heaving emerald mass of the sea, and the waves breaking in a high tide against the cliffs and the huge scattered rocks that littered the shore.
They were very good friends now, these two. It was Jane who had brought them together, for she greatly admired both of them, and would not be content until they admired one another. So they laughed at her and affected a wondering awe at each other's perfections when they were in her presence; and when they were alone together they sometimes kept up the game, to prevent themselves falling into sadness over their private troubles.
They were both a little sad now, as they sat on the sun-warmed rock and looked out on the surge of the waves. Nature was so bright and fresh and happy, and seemed to be inviting a mood to respond to her own. She could put on this air of perpetual laughing youthfulness, though age-old and subject to moods very different. It seemed ungracious not to laugh and be happy with her.
"It's lovely here," Sidney said. "If only things would go right! You're the most perfect person in the world, Harry. I ought to be quite happy being here with you, but I want somebody else. I'm wanting him rather badly just at present."
"Well, you're everything you ought to be, but I want somebody else too," he said.
He rose impulsively and leant against the wall of the little terrace with one arm resting on it, and looked down at her. "I've thought I'd tell you for some time," he said. "I want to tell somebody. I can't tell Jane; she's too young. But you're in the same boat as I am; you'll understand. And we're friends too, aren't we?—always have been."
She had appeared startled at his announcement, but her face was soft as he finished. "Oh, yes, we're friends," she said. "I'm so glad you've told me, Harry. Do you know I've wondered sometimes whether there was somebody. You so often look—well, you look like I feel. You're enjoying yourself, but there's somebody you're thinking of all the time who isn't there. Do tell me about it."
He told her about his meeting with Viola on the moor, and how they had seen one another constantly afterwards and loved one another. Sidney's eyes were kind as she listened, but there was a little frown of puzzlement on her face. It was to be supposed that she wanted to "place" this lovely girl who had come to Harry as a revelation when he had been only a boy, and whom he adored still. He had told her nothing about her so far, except that her father was an artist and they had been holiday-making at Royd. There were many questions she wanted to ask.
"Have you got a photograph of her, Harry?" was the first that she asked. She wanted to satisfy herself that he was not idealizing somebody not worthy of him.
Half unwillingly he took his case out of his pocket, and Viola's photograph out of it. "It isn't as beautiful as she is," he said, "but it's like her in some ways."
Sidney took the card and looked at it for a long time. It was of Viola as Harry had first known her, young and sweet and untroubled.
"She's very lovely," she said, slowly. Then she looked up at him with a smile. "I'm so glad, Harry. I shouldn't like to think of you in love with somebody who wasn't like that. But I think she'd have to be, for you to fall in love with her. Have you seen her since?"
Yes, he had seen her two or three times before he had been sent abroad, and he had been with her since he had come back, before he had come to Royd. She was in London, working in a government office. He was going to London for a few days before his leave was up, and would see her again after that before he went to France.
He spoke as if he was troubled about it, and she knew why. But there was a lot to learn about it yet. And there was something about the beginnings of this love affair that she could not quite reconcile with her knowledge of Harry.
"Of course you're both frightfully young," she said. "Noel and I are of an age to get married if they'd let us, but I suppose you could hardly expect them to think that you were. But mightn't they accept your engagement, and let her be here with you?"
He came and sat on the seat beside her again. "Of course we shall be married some day," he said. "But we never thought about that, or about what you call an engagement—I mean we didn't think of it in the way that older people would. We were just happy loving each other."
"Oh, I know," she said. "It's a lovely time that—perhaps the best of all. But afterwards you come down to the earth a little. I suppose it has been like that with you, hasn't it? There are one's people to be considered, and what they are likely to think about it. I suppose nobody knows—at Royd."
"Wilbraham does—my tutor, you know. Nobody else does."
She showed surprise at this. "Did he find out you were seeing her?" she asked.
He stirred uneasily. He did not answer her question directly. "I don't suppose you'd realize quite how it was with me here, before I went away," he said. "They'd kept me shut up. I was happy enough, but I knew absolutely nothing about the world. From what I've learnt since, I know it must look as if we had met surreptitiously. Perhaps we did, and yet it wasn't like that either. It was the most natural thing in the world for us to be together as we were. At first I even thought of telling my mother about it. I don't know now when it first dawned upon me that they wouldn't have approved—or why. I shouldn't have cared much if they had known. But it was such a beautiful secret between Viola and me; I didn't want it to be spoiled by other—older people—coming in."
"Mr. Wilbraham knew," she said.
"He'd seen her. He knew what she was like. He's a dear old thing—full of understanding and sympathy. I don't know why he didn't tell Granny. I didn't ask him not to. I wouldn't have done that; that would have looked as if I had done something I was ashamed of. I've had an idea since that he had some sort of feeling that we were two men together, and it wasn't for us to be directed in our affairs by a woman. Something like that. Granny has always been very much at the head of things here."
"Yes, I see," she said. "But now you're older, Harry; and it has lasted? That sort of love, when you'reveryyoung, doesn'talwayslast, you know. Wouldn't Lady Brent accept it now? It would be so lovely if she could come here, and you could be happy with her as long as you're in England. You wouldn't have to go away to London to see her then."
There was silence for a time, except for the noise of the waves on the rocks, and the plaintive cry of the gulls wheeling above them. Harry sat looking on the rocky floor, Sidney out to sea.
"I've had to decide such a lot of things for myself lately," he said. "I'd decided not to do that."
She thought his tone sounded as if he were wavering about his decision. She did not look at him, but said: "With Noel and me it's a very ordinary sort of difficulty. He's not what they'd call a good match. But I suppose they won't hold out if we show that we mean to have our own way. If they do, well, I shall wait till I'm twenty-one and marry him—just like that. But, of course, it would make a lot of difference if they smiled on us now, instead of keeping us apart. The real reason why we've come down here is because if he comes home on leave I should see him, and they don't want me to; and partly, I suppose, because they think you and I might get to like each other, now we're both grown up. Why can't they let us be happy in our own way—the older people? They've done what they wanted, or if they haven't they're probably rather sorry for it now. I should be very glad if Noel were in the sort of position that my sisters' husbands are. But I shouldn't love him any better for it. It's love that counts."
"Yes, of course," said Harry. "Well, both you and I are going to get what we want by and by. I suppose we shall have to wait about the same time for it. But you never know what's going to happen to you in these days. If I were to get killed, I should have missed something I ought to have had. You'd say it wouldn't make much difference to me, but I don't look at it like that; and anyhow it would make a difference to Viola, all her life."
Her eyes had filled with tears. "It just doesn't do to think about that," she said, "or to talk about it."
He looked at her quickly, and put his hand on hers as it lay on the stone between them. "I'm sorry," he said. "I didn't mean to be a brute. We take it like that, you know; it doesn't make any difference to us. Nobody worries about it. But, of course it's different for you."
She dried her eyes. "It won't happen to Noel or you," she said. "We shall all four of us be happy by and by. But why shouldn't you be happy now, Harry? Is it necessary that you should keep it a secret still?"
The troubled look returned to his face. "I'm different from other men," he said. "Everything was spared me when I was young. I've had to learn everything since I grew up, and it isn't a pleasant world to learn in now. But whatever I have to do I must do now on my own responsibility. I should have to ask for Viola to come here. I couldn't do that. When she comes here, she'll come of her own right—the right that I shall give her."
"But if you were to tell them about her, Harry——"
"Yes, that's what I've thought of doing. But I can't do that either. They might accept her, but if they didn't—it's like it is with you. They want something else."
She sighed. "I'm glad you've told me, at any rate," she said. "It putseverythingright now. You know about me and I know about you. I suppose Jane doesn't know?"
"No. And we mustn't tell her. I wish I could, but it wouldn't be fair on her. She'll be the first person I shall tell on that happy day when I can tell everybody."
CHAPTER XXIV
HOLIDAY
Wilbraham came down to Royd for a week-end visit. It was all he could spare from his arduous duties. He was thinner than he had been, but seemed to have flourished under the severe course of work to which he had submitted himself. He seemed harder and more self-reliant. Lady Brent saw at the first glance that his old temptation had not troubled him, or if it had troubled him that he had got the better of it.
Harry drove a dogcart to the station to meet him. The greeting was warm between them. Wilbraham looked him up and down. "I can't say they've smartened you up," he said, "because you didn't want it. But they've turned you into a soldier. I hope you haven't forgotten all your classics."
Harry laughed, but made no reply. When they had driven out of the little town and were on the long lonely country road, he said: "I wanted to see you first. Of course you'll be talking me over with Granny. There are some things I don't want said."
"If you mean about Viola," said Wilbraham after a pause. "I've kept my own counsel—and yours—for nearly two years. I've never been quite sure that I was right to do it. I believe it might have been better for you if Lady Brent had known. But at any rate, I have kept silence, and it isn't my affair now. It's yours. I quite recognize that."
"Have you seen her?"
"Viola? Since you came home, you mean. You know that I saw her occasionally before. Yes, I've seen her. Of course she wants you. You're going up next week, aren't you? Have you arranged that here?"
"Not yet. I told mother that I should be going to London, but I haven't said when yet."
"They won't like it, I suppose. You won't give them any reason for going. They'll think you just want to get away from here to amuse yourself as other young men do who are home on leave."
"I'm afraid they must think what they like. I hate all this secrecy—and deception. I won't deceive them more than I can help. They must let me go my own way, and not ask questions. But it's deception all the same. Why did you let me in for it?"
"Let you in for it?Ilet you in for it! What on earth do you mean, Harry?"
"Not you chiefly. But you were in it. You kept me knowing nothing. Supposing it hadn't been Viola I fell in love with! Oh, I've learnt a lot since you and I met last. I know what men are, and I'm not different from others at bottom, though there's miles between me and them in some ways. It's Viola I owe everything to—not Granny or mother or you. I don't know how I should have lived through it if it hadn't been for her. I should have lost everything that I was." He spoke more slowly. "Viola is everything in the world to me," he said, "everything in this world or the next. I want you to understand that. I loved her before, but I love her a thousand times more, now that I know. All this—Royd, and Granny and mother—everything that it all meant to me, is nothing to me now, apart from her. Whatever there is that's real in it—I can't explain it, but it's as if she'd have to give it back to me before I can make it anything again. If you can see that, then you may be able to help a little. Viola is to come first in everything, but until it's all straightened out I want Granny—and mother—to be as little troubled about me as possible. Make it look natural to them, my going to London; don't let them think that I'm tired of them, or of Royd. I'm not, only it's all very little to me beside Viola."
"I think you're unjust to us," said Wilbraham. "Say we hadn't prepared you for what you've been through—what nobody could have foreseen."
"Oh, it would have been just the same if I'd gone straight to Sandhurst—perhaps worse—if I hadn't known Viola."
"Well, that's where you're unjust. It was only Viola—or somebody like her—that you could have fallen in love with, as you did. We'd done that for you."
Harry thought this over. Wilbraham breathed more freely the longer his silence lasted. He recognized with gratitude that old sense of fairness and reasonableness which had never been absent in his dealings with Harry. "It's what you have to think of when you feel inclined to blame your grandmother," he said.
"I don't think I'm inclined to blame her," Harry answered to this. "I'm very sorry for her. That's why I want to let her down as easily as I can. Afterwards everything will be right for her, and she'll see—she's quite wise enough—that it was right that I should take my life into my own hands. That's what I'm going to do. I had to do it once before."
"She accepted that, you know."
"Yes, in a wonderful way, I think. And she'll accept Viola. But not now. I should have to ask her for Viola, and I'm not going to do that. Besides, she's got other ideas in her head for me."
"Lady Sidney, I suppose you mean. From what your mother has written, you seem to want her to think that her wishes are being carried out."
"Sidney and I understand one another. She knows about Viola. I'm very glad she's here. I couldn't have stayed here without her and little Jane. I suppose the beastly world would say that I'm just amusing myself with a pretty girl, as I can't be with the girl I love. They might even think there's some danger in it. But the world doesn't know love as I know it." He turned to Wilbraham with a smile. "What you did, my friend, you and Granny between you, was to unfit me for the society of men. After being with nobody but men for all this time, I'm glad enough to have two girls as my friends before I go back to it. As for Granny, she's arranged all that for me, as she's used to arrange everything, and if she's disappointed with the outcome of it, I'm afraid it can't be helped. It's just that arranging that I have to make my stand against, with as little bother about it as possible."
"I've said already, and I'll say it again, that you're hard on Lady Brent. I fully believe that if you were to tell her about Viola—now—she'd accept it. Then all the secrecy you say you hate would be over."
"I think it's quite possible that she might. I don't think my mother would. In any case, there'd be questions and difficulties. Viola would be discussed and reckoned up in a way I can't bear to think of. When the time comes I shall bring Viola here and say: 'This is the girl I love, and she loves me, though I'm not worth anything beside her.' Then there'll be no questions and no difficulties, and Viola will take her place here, and we shall be happy for the rest of our lives."
"You mean that she'll take Lady Brent's place here, I suppose. It's no good blinking matters."
Harry laughed at him. "You always were a persistent old thing," he said, "but I'm very glad to see you again. Tell me about Viola, and what she said to you."
Wilbraham found himself, somewhat to his surprise in spite of the preparation he had had, in an atmosphere of serenity, and almost of gaiety. There had been nothing like it in all the years he had lived at Royd Castle. He told himself that unless he had known how it was with Harry he would certainly have thought that the pleasure he obviously took in Sidney's society was leading to something else. The Grants were there when he arrived. It was a little intimate friendly happy party of which no single member seemed to have a care upon his or her shoulders. Only Mrs. Brent seemed rather out of the stream. Wilbraham saw that he would be invited on the first opportunity to listen to the tale of Mrs. Brent's dissatisfaction.
It was Grant, however, to whom he first talked alone, walking in the garden. Grant could see nothing on the horizon but a prospective marriage between Sir Harry Brent and Lady Sidney Pawle, which appeared to him eminently as one that should give satisfaction to all parties concerned.
"Of course they won't want to be married yet awhile," he said, "but we're expecting an engagement any day. I must say that it has all turned out in a most extraordinarily satisfactory way. Supposing the boy had done what his father did! He'd seen nobody here; he might very well have got taken in by somebody who wouldn't have been the right sort of person for him to marry when he cut himself loose. And there was just the chance of this one girl being here when he came home. One is inclined to think of Lady Brent managing everything, but she didn't actually manage that. It just came about."
Wilbraham listened to all this, his own thoughts running all the time. Sidney and Jane and Harry were in another part of the garden, out of sight, but not out of hearing. A burst of laughter punctuated the close of the Vicar's speech. "Wouldn't they want to get away by themselves if it's as you think?" Wilbraham asked.
"Ah, my boy, you don't recognize the march of the great passion," said Grant. "I've loved watching those three together, because it is all going as I should have expected."
"Copy in it," suggested Wilbraham.
"Well, that's your way of putting it. But of course one takes in everything that passes before one's eyes, and if it doesn't come out exactly like it, it's——"
"Near enough to look like it. Well, I suppose you've made a study of it, and all the old women who read your immortal works will shiver down their spines and say, 'It was just like that with me.' But I'd rather take Jane's opinion about it than yours."
"Would you? Well, Jane's having the time of her life. They're awfully nice to her. Of course they're just in the state when it's gratifying to have somebody like Jane with them, who thinks there never was anybody like either of them. They flatter each other through her."
"Oh, that's how it's going to be worked out, is it? The old women will love that. It's a new touch, and they'll wish they'd thought of it for themselves, in time. Did Jane tell you it was like that, or was it your own mighty brain?"
"You're jealous of my success, Wilbraham. But I don't mind your jibes. I don't write for the highbrows like you, and I do touch the hearts of thousands. Jane talks to her mother. I shouldn't expect her to talk to me about it."
"Well, what does Mrs. Grant say? She's got some sense."
"She keeps rather quiet about it. I think she's just thankful that Harry has somebody to keep him bright and cheerful while he's at home. You made a mistake, you know, before, in not letting him have young people to play with."
"He had your two."
"As it happened, yes. But they were only children. Jane is older now, but not old enough, fortunately, to have the danger of complications. Apart altogether from the question of a love affair with Lady Sidney, I believe it's the best thing that could happen for him to have those two with him while he's here. It's an awful welter of blood and horror out there, you know, Wilbraham. None of the young fellows who come home talk much about it, but it doesn't need much imagination to see what a healing process it is for anybody like Harry to spend a few weeks with people like those two girls as his chief companions, in a quiet lovely place like this."
"Now you're talking sense yourself for a change. Here's Mrs. Brent coming. Don't leave me alone with her. It's an awful welter of red tape and incompetence where I've just come from, but I don't want her as a healing process till I feel a little stronger."
But the Grants had to be going very shortly, and Mrs. Brent was not to be denied.
Her first address to Wilbraham, however, was not on the subject of her grievances. "Oh, I forgot to tell you when I wrote," she said. "You know that artist—Bastian—who came down here two summers ago?"
"Yes," said Wilbraham, with his heart in his mouth.
"Well, I've found out that he married a great friend of mine—oh, years ago, but I hadn't forgotten her. She died, poor girl, but of course the daughter who was with Mr. Bastian here was hers. I wish I'd known. I'd have gone to see them."
"You wouldn't have wanted to bring that time up, would you?" said Wilbraham, scarcely knowing what to say.
She was all bristles at once. "I think I was very badly treated about all that," she said. "I'd nothing whatever to be ashamed of in what I came from, and all the time it was made to look as if I had. I half believed it myself, but now I know better. Every one of my family is doing well. They're not in the position I'm in, of course, but there's no need to be ashamed of any of them. In fact, I've made up my mind to introduce Harry to his relations on my side of the family. I'm going to ask him to take me up to London before he goes back. Then he'll see for himself."
"Do you think you're wise?" said Wilbraham, relieved at having got away from the subject of the Bastians.
"What do you mean?" she asked. "What's the objection?"
"Well, you say they're not equal to you. They may be very good sort of people; I dare say they are; but what's the sense of dragging them in at this time of the day—after twenty years—to mark the difference?"
"What difference?"
"Well, the difference between them and Lady Brent."
"Lady Brent! How can you talk like that? It's just that I'm so mad with Lady Brent that I——"
"I know it is. All you can think of is to score off her. You're not thinking of Harry; you're not even thinking of yourself. What are you going to get, out of going back on everything you've stood for for the last twenty years? Harry thinks of you as belonging to Royd, in the same sort of way as Lady Brent does. Why should he have ever thought of you as anything different? Now you're proposing to show him the difference. You say yourself theyaredifferent. You're going to show him the difference between Lady Brent and them. Which is likely to come out of it best? I don't know; I'm asking you."
"Oh, you're just trying to aggravate me," she said. "You always were like that. I don't know why I talk to you at all."
"Well, if you've finished, I think I'll go in. I want a peaceful time as long as I'm here. You're the only person who doesn't seem to be comfortable and happy. I'd rather be with those of them who are."
"I'm not at all happy. I'm just miserable. Harry doesn't love me any more, and I don't know what to do about it."
They had come to the bowling alley where Wilbraham had thought out his difficulties two summers before. She sank down on to the seat and cried.
Wilbraham felt very sorry for her, but determined to prevent her from making mischief if he could. "Look here," he said, "I don't think it really much matters whether you introduce Harry to your people or not. He's grown up now, and all that idea of keeping things from him is over. Do what you like about it. Lady Brent won't try to stop you; I'm pretty certain of that. She has given up trying to direct his life. Why can't you?"
Her sobs increased. "I'm his mother," she said. "I've had so little of him. I can't give him up now."
"You had him during the whole of his childhood, more than most mothers have their sons. Lady Brent may have been a bit jealous of you; I dare say she was; she's got her weaknesses like all the rest of us. But she didn't try to get him away from you. I was here most of the time, and I could see that plainly enough. You know it too. You'll be much happier about things if you try to be fair to her, as she's tried to be fair to you."
"Oh, of course it's her you're thinking of all the time. I don't come in at all."
"Yes, you do come in. I'm trying to help you to get things straight. The fact is your nose has been put out of joint by this girl who's here. It isn't Lady Brent at all, though you heap it all back on her. You can't expect a boy of Harry's age to go about tied to his mother's apron strings, when there's somebody young for him to play with. You like the girl all right, don't you?"
She had dried her eyes and sat leaning forward in an attitude of picturesque misery. "It doesn't seem to matter whether I like her or not," she said. "Harry won't talk to me about her. If he told me he was in love with her I should do my best to sympathize with him. I want to be everything to my son."
"Of course you do; and of course you can't be. If he hasn't told you he's in love with her, it's because he isn't. For goodness' sake let him be happy while he's here, and in his own way. He'll be going back soon enough, and you won't want him to think of his holiday spoiled by your complaints. You're selfish, you know. It's yourself you're thinking of all the time, not him. You used not to be like that."
"Oh, well," she said, rising, "I suppose I must put up with it. It's the common lot of mothers. I shan't talk about it any more, to you or anybody."
"That's right," said Wilbraham, as they strolled towards the house. "And don't make complaints to Harry, either. It's not the way to get what you want from him. Of course you know that really, as well as I do. Only it's difficult, isn't it?"
"Oh, I don't know," she said. With the end of her emotion she seemed to have entered a mood almost of indifference. "If I've stood what I have all these years, and kept myself under as I have, I suppose I can go on doing it. It's coming down here that has upset me. I've been happy enough in London. Of course I've wanted to hear about Harry, but he's promised me now that he'll write to me regularly. I shall be better off, in a way, than I've ever been. I'msomebodythere, you see. Here I'm nobody. I shan't stay here a moment longer than Harry does. I hate the place now. Why have you never been to see me in London?"
"I don't know that you've ever asked me. Where do you live?"
She told him. She was sharing a flat with an old friend, a woman who had been on the stage with her, had had an unhappy married life, but had got on in her profession.
"Margaret Creedy?" said Wilbraham. "I've seen her act. She's very good."
"Yes, you wouldn't have thought she began in the chorus, would you? She never had much voice, which was perhaps just as well for her, or she'd have been in musical comedy still. She doesn't like it remembered, and of course I don't want it known either; but we often talk over old times. It was from her, by the by, that I heard about Mrs. Bastian. She married a gentleman, like I did; but he'd come down in the world. Bastian isn't his real name, you know.".
"What is his real name?"
"I don't know. I meant to find out about him, and go and see what the girl is like. You never told me much about her, but if she's like her mother she ought to be very pretty."
"She is very pretty, but——"
"Oh, you mean I ought not to let them know who I was, as they've been here. Perhaps I shan't. I don't want to giveherany handles against me."
"ByherI suppose you mean Lady Brent. Everything comes back to her. You'll think better of all that some day. I wish you'd think better of it now. Royd would be a less prickly house to live in."
"Oh, I shall behave myself, never you fear," she said as she left him.
He thought it probable that she would. He had made an impression on her, though she was not of the sort that would acknowledge it. She was evidently making her own life, and even if she had dropped all pretence of war work, for which she had gone to London, it was not a life that would let the name of Brent down, as he had rather feared. Margaret Creedy was an actress of some distinction, and would be very careful not to jeopardize the social position she had won for herself. And Mrs. Brent, for all her independent talk, was guided by a sense of her own importance in the world. Probably the joint establishment was as rigidly respectable as any in London.
As for possible complications with the Bastians, Wilbraham could do nothing. If the revelation came in that way, it must come, and for himself he didn't care when it came. He was tired of all the secrecy, and thought too that Harry was wrong in keeping his secret; or, at any rate, right or wrong in being unwilling to disclose it himself, that it would be better for him if it were known.
He was inclined to dread the talk that he saw coming with Lady Brent. He badly wanted a recreative rest himself, and hated the idea of exercising his brain in steering clear of admissions to her, hated also the idea of deceiving her by doing so, when all the time he was in sympathy with her in her doubts and disappointments. What was done was done. Harry was what he was, and if she had made any mistake in his upbringing, which he did not admit, it would do no good now to dwell on it with regret. Harry was working it all out for himself, and as far as Wilbraham could see, was not making such a bad job of it. He would tell her that, when she began to discuss him, and cut the conversation as short as he conveniently could. Then he would be free to enjoy himself, in the company of the people he liked best in the world, and in the place which seemed to him, coming back to it, a haven of peace and beauty.
But apparently that was all that Lady Brent wanted of him. She told him that Harry seemed much more his old self now that he had been home a week or more, and that she was glad that there was young companionship for him, and beyond that she did not discuss him at all.
So Wilbraham enjoyed his two days at Royd, and went back to his work greatly refreshed, and with most of his doubts about Harry set at rest. He might be longing for Viola all the time, as he had said he was, but he managed to hide it effectually and seemed to be enjoying his holiday as much as anybody.
CHAPTER XXV
MRS. BRENT KNOWS
Royd Castle was empty, except for the servants, for the first time for twenty years. Everybody had gone away, including Lady Brent, who, however, was not very far off, for she was only visiting Lady Avalon for a few days at Poldaven.
To the Grants, left to themselves, after the unusual amount of society they had lately enjoyed, there was a sense of emptiness, though their own summer life was in full swing, and the Vicar had a bright new idea for a novel, which was keeping his thoughts happily employed. There were to be a young man and two girls, and nobody was to know which of the girls the young man was really in love with until the last chapter.
"Of course I got the idea from those three," he told his wife, "although it couldn't be exactly like them. Harry and Sidney might be, but the second girl would have to be older than Jane, but still rather young. She would be a sort of confidante of the other two, who would be inclined to fall in love with one another. Then she would gradually find that she was in love with the young man herself. I should make it rather pathetic, but not overdo it, of course. She would keep her feelings to herself, out of loyalty to her friend. I haven't quite worked it out yet, but the reality would come in a flash. The young man would find that it was she he was in love with. I shouldn't be able to leave the other girl in the air. There might be somebody else for her. It will come all right, now my brain has begun to work on it. I should have to make her very charming, so that it would seem as if the manmustbe in love with her."
"You mustn't make it too like Harry and Sidney," said Mrs. Grant.
"Oh, I should be careful about that, though their way with each other has been very attractive to watch. They're so frank, and so completely friendly—a very delightful pair of young people I call them. It would be much more effective to have young lovers behaving like that to one another than the usual sort of love affair that one meets with in fiction. The odd thing about it, though, is that they have parted now and nothing has come of it all."
Mrs. Grant laughed. "Perhaps it's because they weren't lovers after all," she said, "and were so frank and friendly with each other because they weren't. You must be careful about that, David."
But he would not admit that Harry and Sidney weren't in love with one another. It was clear for everybody to see. Of course Harry was rather an exceptional young man. That was plain from the way he had come back to Royd as if he were master there already. There was tremendous strength of character in him, and even Lady Brent recognized it, and did not seek to direct him in any way. It was very likely that he had made up his mind that it would not be right to engage himself to Sidney until the war was over. But it was also likely that they had an understanding between themselves. It could hardly be otherwise.
"He has certainly altered," said Mrs. Grant. "He goes his own way as one would hardly have expected of him in some respects. I don't know why he should have wanted to be with Mr. Wilbraham for a week before he went to France. Poor Mrs. Brent was rather sad about it, especially when he wrote to say that he was not coming down again."
"And now she's gone posting up to London to get hold of him. I've no patience with Mrs. Brent. She has greatly deteriorated. Well, I must be getting on with my work. I shall very soon be ready to make a start on the first chapter."
Jane had been very subdued in demeanour since Sidney and Harry had both departed, and frequently sought her mother's company. She came to her this morning, when her lessons were done, and sat with her in the garden as she worked.
"Did father say that there was going to be a great attack on the Germans soon?" she asked, after a little desultory conversation.
"It has been expected for some time. I suppose it can't be long before it comes now."
"I suppose that's why Harry's leave has been cut short. Will there be a great many of our people killed, mother?"
"I'm afraid so, dear."
"Harry might be," said Jane. "He's very brave."
"You mustn't let yourself dwell on that, darling. He has been spared so far."
"Did you know he had been wounded?"
Mrs. Grant looked at her in surprise. "Not seriously," she said.
"Sidney and I both think he was, though he wouldn't tell us, and said we weren't to talk about it. Have you noticed he always keeps his sleeve buttoned when he's playing tennis?"
Mrs. Grant hadn't noticed particularly, but said that she remembered now that he did.
"Well, he's got an awful great scar in his arm. We saw it once by accident. A Turk did it with a bayonet. When we found out, he did tell us a little, and about the time he was in hospital. He told us about an orderly who had been frightfully good to him, and said he saved his life when he was very ill, by nursing him all the time. He liked to talk about him; his name was Tom Weller. Sidney thought he couldn't have been so ill just from a wound in the arm, and then he said he'd had a little shell wound in the body, but he wouldn't tell us any more. We think it must have been a serious one. We found out afterwards that he didn't go to hospital for his bayonet wound at all."
Mrs. Grant was conscious of a feeling of surprise and some discomfort. She knew that Harry was not likely to fail in any of a young man's courageous work, and yet she had thought of him as having got off lightly, except in the hardships of a trooper's life. And that he had never mentioned even the actions in which he had been wounded seemed so to accentuate the division that he had made between himself and those who loved him. He might have died and they would have known nothing. Apparently he had been very near to death. She wondered whether Jane had any theory to account for his unusual reticence about himself.
"I'm very glad Lady Brent will hear about him now," she said. "It's dreadful to think what might have happened when they couldn't have got to him."
"Well, they couldn't, anyhow, when he was in Egypt. He says it was much better that they shouldn't have been anxious about him, and as it turned out there was no need to have been anxious. I must say I'm rather glad we didn't know, though it's horrid to think of our enjoying ourselves at home when Harry was nearly dying. Sidney and I both told him that we wanted to know everything about him now, and he promised to."
"To write to you?"
"Yes; or to let us have a message. You see we're real friends, mother dear. We've had a lovely time together and enjoyed ourselves frightfully; but it hasn't been quite all enjoying ourselves. Sidney and I both know that Harry dreads things. I don't mean being wounded, or anything like that. But everything is so different for him. What we both got to know was that he wanted it to be like it used to be here as much as ever it could be. That's why he won't talk about the war. We could make him forget it; so we were sometimes more lively than we really felt. I'm sure I don't feel at all lively now."
Her mother stole a glance at her, as she sat with a calm face looking out in front of her.
"Well, darling," she said, "you'll have Harry home on leave again. I'm sure both you and Sidney have done a lot for him since he's been home this time. There was a sort of strain on him at first which wasn't there afterwards."
"Did you notice that? I'm very glad. Of course Sidney did more than I did. She was with him more, and she's older. But they were both very sweet to me. I think I did help. I love them both. I love Sidney. I wish——"
She broke off abruptly. "I think I can guess what Sidney's secret is," said her mother, after a pause. "I think she meant me to, you know, when she told you you could tell me that there was a secret."
Jane looked at her eagerly. "I don't suppose she really meant me not to tell you," she said.
"If I've found it out for myself, she wouldn't mind you talking about it. I shouldn't mention it to anybody else. I thought, when you told me, that perhaps she was in love with somebody, and that was why you and she and Harry could all be friends together so happily."
Jane breathed a sigh of relief. "Yes, that's it exactly," she said. "How clever you are, mother! I'm glad you knew. His name is Noel Chancellor. I've seen his photograph. He is very good-looking, but of course not so good-looking as Harry. I can't help thinking that if she'd never seen him she would be in love with Harry."
"Perhaps. But it doesn't always come like that. And he's not in love with her, you see, though there's nobody else, for him."
"No, he isn't." Jane spoke very decisively. "She's such a dear that I did think once that he might have been a little, although he knew about Noel, without being able to help it. But he's not the least little bit. I don't know how I know that, but I do."
"I suppose you know that they think he is, at the Castle."
"Oh, yes. And Lady Avalon will be annoyed when she finds out. But we can't help that."
Mrs. Grant smiled. She loved that "we" that came into Jane's speech. "What about Lady Brent?" she said. "You were such friends with Lady Brent before Harry came home."
"I am still. Of course she wouldn't say anything to me about that. I'm not quite sure that she does expect it. At any rate, I know she was glad for me to be with them. She knew all right that we were helping Harry. Lady Brent sees a lot, though she doesn't talk much."
Mrs. Grant found food for thought in this, and shared it later with Miss Minster. Neither of them had ever been able to make up their minds finally about Lady Brent.
"Supposing she doesn't really expect anything to come of it!" she said. "I'm inclined to trust Jane when she thinks that she doesn't."
"I've liked her much better since she took Jane into her confidence," said Miss Minster. "I'm sorry for her now. I think she lays her plans deeply and then has to sit and do nothing while she sees them fail. But it needs a lot of self-restraint to sit and do nothing. Yes, I'm sorry for her."
"You think Jane is right then?"
"I don't know. Lady Brent would look farther than most people. She wouldn't need to look much farther than I do in this. What I think is that Harry isn't ready for it yet, and won't be till the war is over. When that oppression is removed from him I think he's quite likely to fall in love with Lady Sidney. That's what I think, and I shouldn't wonder if Lady Brent thought the same. Then it wouldn't make her quite so superhuman as she appears. She'd just be waiting."
This view could not be combated without disclosures. As far as it affected Lady Brent it seemed to be the best explanation of her attitude. "Anyhow she's a wonderful woman," said Mrs. Grant, "and I also like her better than I did, although I never disliked her."
"The person I don't like so well," said Miss Minster, "is Mrs. Brent. I hope we've seen the last of her here for the present."
But they had not, for almost immediately she had spoken a telegram was brought in from Mrs. Brent, announcing her arrival that afternoon, and asking Mrs. Grant to take her in, as there was nobody at the Castle. She also asked Mrs. Grant to meet her at Burport, which seemed to indicate that she had something of importance to disclose to her.
She looked scared and unhappy as she greeted her friend on the platform. "I hope you didn't mind my asking you to put me up," she said. "I believe she's coming back to-morrow, and I wanted to have a long talk with you first."
By "she" Mrs. Grant understood her to refer to Lady Brent, whom she seldom referred to in any other way. "I'm very glad to have you," she said. "I hope nothing is wrong. Have you seen Harry?"
"I'll tell you when we get into the carriage."
When they were settled and driving away, she said: "Have I seen Harry? I think you'll be surprised when I tell you how and where I've seen him. I've never had such a shock in my life. I don't know what to do about it. I had to come straight down to see her. She must deal with it. I can't; it's beyond me. I only hope it won't be beyond her. I must tell you all from the beginning."
She entered into a long explanation of how she had written to Harry at Wilbraham's flat where he was staying. He had come to see her, and had been kind but had seemed annoyed with her for coming up to London when he had not expected it. He had told her that he was very much engaged, and could not see much of her before he went abroad. He had not vouchsafed any account of how he was engaged, but had come to see her once again, in the morning, but had refused to stay to lunch or to make any engagement for the evening. She spoke with some resentment, and not as she had ever spoken about Harry before. It was as if she felt more annoyed at being neglected than sorry at not having him with her.
Mrs. Grant sat silent, and she entered on another long explanation about the Bastians, and her early friendship with Bastian's wife. Then Mrs. Grant began to be extremely interested.
"What possessed me to find out all about them just at this time, and go to see the girl, I can't think," she said. "I think it was Providence leading me. I'd forgotten all about Mrs. Clark, the woman they lodge with, being Mrs. Ivimey's sister, and fortunately—or unfortunately—she didn't open the door to me. The maid said she was in, but had a young gentleman with her. She looked rather knowing as she said it, and I thought it would be amusing to see what the young gentleman was like. You can imagine what I felt when she showed me into the room and I found Harry there."
She looked as if she expected an exclamation of surprise at this climax; but Mrs. Grant had already been prepared for it by her rigmarole. "That explains a great deal," she said. "I suppose they had met here."
"Yes, two years ago, when Harry was a boy—hardly more than a child. Could you believe it of him, and keeping it secret all that time, and ever since?"
"What happened?" asked Mrs. Grant, adjusting her thoughts to many things.
"They were sitting side by side on the sofa. I never had such a shock in my life. I could only stand there and stare. She jumped up, of course. I hadn't given my name, and she didn't even know who I was. Harry looked very black, and stood up too. It was as if a sword was piercing my heart to see my son look at me like that."
She paused for a moment. It occurred to Mrs. Grant that she had rehearsed her tale beforehand, and that phrase had come to her as an effective one. It did not seem to represent what she was actually feeling, though it may have represented what she thought she ought to feel.
"I could only gasp out, 'Harry! You here!' He said, 'Yes, mother!' Then he took hold of the girl's hand, and said, 'This is Viola. We have loved each other for a long time.' That was absolutely all he said, and she said nothing, but just looked at me, as if she was frightened, as I dare say she was."
"Oh, I hope you——"
She did not continue. Mrs. Brent would tell her what she had done.
She did not tell her at once, and Mrs. Grant's heart sank as she expatiated further on what she had felt. "The very thing," she said, "that we'd all sacrificed ourselves to prevent, during the whole of Harry's boyhood. I was absolutelystunned. There they stood hand in hand in front of me, and waited for me to say something. And whatcouldI say? Harry—my boy! And a girl like that! Oh, I shall never get over it. And I can't think whatshe'llsay, though there's one thing—she can't blame me for it."
Mrs. Grant had been thinking rapidly. She had heard about Viola from Mrs. Ivimey. Her impression of her had been of a very young and beautiful girl, of whom nice things were said naturally. It needed some little effort of imagination to connect her with Harry, and certainly it was rather surprising that Harry, of all people, should have cherished that kind of secret. But the picture of the pair of them standing there hand in hand waiting for the speech which she dreaded to be told had not come rose before her. "Oh, he couldn't have gone on loving her for two whole years unless she was sweet and good," she said.
Mrs. Brent bridled in offence. "That didn't come in whenIwas married," she said. "She's no better than I was. Her mother wasn't brought up as I had been, though there was nothing against her. It simply can't be allowed.Ican't do anything. Harry won't listen to me. This girl has taken him away from me. Of course it's all explained now—why he was so different to me when he came home—oh, and why he didn't write, and everything. He wrote to her. Heisdifferent. She's made him so. He isn't like my son any more. I'm only thankful that it didn't happen, or at least I didn't know about it, while I was living down here."
It seemed probable that she was congratulating herself that the whole of her interests in life were no longer bound up in Harry. This was no very comforting thought to Mrs. Grant. "I wish you'd tell me how it ended," she said.
"It ended in Harry being very unkind to me," she said, with the first signs of real emotion. "He said that if I had taken the girl as my daughter—as if I could have done that!—all the difficulties would have been ended. As it was he would not see me again before he went to France. Young people are very cruel. I'm his mother who have been everything to him, and now I'm nothing. I came away and left him there. It's all over for me. I've lost my son, and this girl who isn't fit for him has got him. But I don't think she'll be allowed to keep him. I shall see her to-morrow. She won't be pleased at the end of all her plotting and scheming. But I shall be surprised if she doesn't think ofsomethingthat will put an end to it."