"It's much better than learning by heart," said Jeanie, with her tired little smile. "Somehow, you know, I can't learn by heart—at least not long things. Father says it is because my brain is deficient. But Mother says hers is just the same, so I don't mind so much."
"My dear, it will take you hours to read through all this," said Avery, surveying with dismay the task which the Vicar had set his small daughter.
"Yes," said Jeanie. "I am to devote three hours of every day to it. I had to promise I would." She gave a short sigh. "It's very good for me, you know," she said.
"Is it?" said Avery. She smoothed back the brown hair lovingly. "You mustn't overwork, Jeanie darling," she said.
"I can't help it," said Jeanie quietly. "You see, I promised."
That she would keep her promise, whatever the cost, was evidently a foregone conclusion; and Avery could say nothing against it.
She left the child to work therefore, and wandered down herself to the shore.
It was June. A soft breeze came over the sea, salt and pure, with the life-giving quality of the great spaces. She breathed it deeply, thankfully, conscious of returning strength.
She and Jeanie had arrived only the week before, and she was sure their visit was going to do wonders for them both. Her own convalescence had been a protracted one, but she told herself as she walked along the beach towards the smiling, evening sea that she was already stronger than her companion. The old lassitude was evidently very heavy upon Jeanie. The smallest exertion seemed to tax her energies to the utmost. She had never shaken off her cough, and it seemed to wear her out.
Avery had spoken to Lennox Tudor about her more than once, but he never discussed the subject willingly. He was never summoned to the Vicarage now, and, when they chanced to meet, the Vicar invariably reserved for him the iciest greeting that courtesy would permit. Tudor had defeated him once on his own ground, and he was not the man to forget it. So poor Jeanie's ailments were given none but home treatment to alleviate them, and it seemed to Avery that her strength had dwindled almost perceptibly of late.
She pondered the matter as she strolled along the shore, debating with herself if she would indeed take a step that she had been contemplating for some time, and, now that Jeanie was in her care, take her up to town and obtain Maxwell Wyndham's opinion with regard to her. It was a project she had mentioned to no one, and she hesitated a good deal over putting it into practice. That Mrs. Lorimer would readily countenance such an act she well knew, but she was also aware that it would be regarded as a piece of rank presumption by the child's father which might easily be punished by the final withdrawal of Jeanie from her care. That was a contingency which she hardly desired to risk. Jeanie had become so infinitely precious to her in those days.
Unconsciously her feet had turned towards their old haunt. She found herself halting by the low square rock on which Piers once had sat and cursed the sea-birds in bitterness of spirit. Often as she had visited the spot since, she had never done so without the memory of that spring morning flashing unbidden through her brain. It went through her now like a sharp dart of physical pain; the boyish figure, the ardent eyes, the black hair plastered wet on the wide, patrician brow. Her heart contracted. She seemed to hear again the eager, wooing words.
He never wrote to her now. She believed he was in town, probably amusing himself as he had amused himself at Monte Carlo, passing the time in a round of gaieties, careless flirtations, possibly deeper intrigues. Crowther had probably kept him straight through the winter, but she did not believe that Crowther's influence would be lasting. There was a sting in the very thought of Crowther. She was sure now that he had always known the bitter secret that Piers had kept from her. It had been the bond between them. Piers had obviously feared betrayal, but Crowther had not deemed it his business to betray him. He had suffered the deception to continue. She recognized that his position had been a difficult one; but it did not soften her heart towards him. Her heart had grown hard towards all men of late. She sometimes thought that but for Jeanie it would have atrophied altogether. There were so few things nowadays that seemed to touch her. She could not even regret her lost baby. But yet the memory of Piers sitting on that rock at her feet pierced her oddly; Piers, the passionate, the adoring, the hot-blooded; Piers the invincible; Piers the prince!
She turned from the spot with a wrung feeling of heart-break. She wished—how she wished—that she had died!
In that moment she realized that she was no longer alone. A man's figure, thick-set and lounging, was sauntering towards her along the sand. He seemed to move with extreme leisureliness, yet his approach was but a matter of seconds. His hands were in his pockets, his hat rammed down over his eyes.
There seemed to her to be something vaguely familiar about him, though wherein it lay she could not have told. She stood and awaited him with the certainty that he was coming with the express purpose of joining her. She knew him; she was sure she knew him, though who he was she had not the faintest idea.
He reached her, lifted his cap, and the sun glinted on a head of fiery red hair. "I thought I was not mistaken, Lady Evesham," he said.
She recognized him with an odd leap of the pulses, and in a moment held out her hand. "Dr. Wyndham!" she said. "How amazing!"
"Why amazing?" said Wyndham. He held her hand for a second while his green eyes scanned her face. When he dropped it she felt that he had made a full and exhaustive inspection, and she was strangely disconcerted, as if in some fashion he had gained an unfair advantage over her.
"Amazing that you should be here," she explained, with a flush of embarrassment.
"Oh, not in the least, I assure you," he said. "I am staying at Brethaven for a couple of days with my wife's people. It's only ten miles away, you know. And I bicycled over here on the chance of seeing you."
"But how did you know I was here?" she asked.
"From your husband. I told him I was coming in this direction, and he suggested that I should come over and look you up." Very casually he made reply, and he could not have been aware of the flood of colour his words sent to her face, for he continued in the same cool fashion as he strolled by her side. "I was afraid you might consider it an unpardonable liberty, but he assured me you wouldn't. So—" the green eyes smiled upon her imperturbably—"as I am naturally interested in your welfare, I took my courage in both hands and, at the risk of being considered unprofessional,—I came."
It was unexpected, but it was disarming. Avery found herself smiling in answer.
"I am very pleased to see you," she said. "But your coming just at this time is rather amazing all the same, for I was thinking of you, wishing I could see you, only a few minutes ago."
"What can I do for you?" said Maxwell Wyndham.
She hesitated a little before the direct question; then as simply as he had asked she answered, laying the matter before him without reservation.
He listened in his shrewd, comprehending way, asking one or two questions, but making no comments.
"There need be no difficulty about it," he said, when she ended. "You say the child is tractable. Keep her in bed to-morrow, and say a medical friend of yours is coming over to see if he can do anything for her cough! Then if you'll ask me to lunch—I'll do the rest."
He smiled as he ended, and thrust out his hand.
"I'll be going now. I left my bicycle in the village and hope to find it still there. Now remember, Lady Evesham, my visit to-morrow is to be of a strictly unprofessional character. You didn't send for me, so I shall assume the privilege of coming as a friend. Is that understood?"
He spoke with smiling assurance, and seeing that he meant to gain his point she yielded it.
Not till he was gone did she come to ponder the errand that had brought him thither.
She went back to Jeanie, and found her with aching eyes fixed resolutely on her book. Yes, she was a little tired, but she would rather go on, thank you. Oh no, she did not mind staying in bed to-morrow to please Avery, and she was sure she would like Avery's doctor though she didn't expect he would manage to stop the cough. She would have to do her task though all the same; dear Avery mustn't mind. You see, she had promised. But she would certainly stay in bed if Avery wished.
And then came the tired sigh, and then that racking, cruel cough that seemed to rend her whole frame. No, she would not finish for another hour yet. Really she must go on.
The brown head dropped on to the little bony hands, and Jeanie was immersed once more in her task.
More than once in the night Avery awoke to hear that tearing, breathless cough in the room next to hers. It was no new thing, but in view of the coming ordeal it filled her with misgiving.
When she rose herself in the morning she felt weighed down with anxious foreboding.
Yet, when Maxwell Wyndham arrived in his sauntering, informal fashion at about noon, she was able to meet him with courage. There was something electric about his personality that seemed almost unconsciously to impart strength to the downhearted. He had drawn her back from the very Door of Death, and her confidence in him was absolute.
They lunched alone together, and talked of many things. More than once, wholly incidentally, he mentioned her husband. She gathered that he did not know of their bitter estrangement. He talked of the polo-craze, with which it seemed Piers was badly bitten, and commented on his splendid horsemanship.
"Yes, he is a wonderful athlete," Avery said.
She wondered if he deemed her unresponsive, but decided that he set her coldness down to anxiety; for he finished his luncheon without lingering and declared himself ready for the business in hand.
He became in fact strictly business-like from that moment, and throughout the examination that followed she had not the faintest notion as to what was passing in his mind. To Jeanie he was curtly kind, but to herself he was as utterly uncommunicative as if he had been a total stranger.
The examination was a protracted one, and more painful than Avery had thought possible. It taxed poor Jeanie's powers of endurance to the uttermost, and long before it was finished she was weeping from sheer exhaustion. He was absolutely patient with her, but he insisted upon carrying the matter through, remaining when it was at last over until she had somewhat recovered from the ordeal.
To Avery the suspense was well-nigh unbearable; but she dared not show the impatience that consumed her. She had a feeling that in some fashion the great doctor was depending upon her self-control, her strength of mind; and she was determined that he should not find her wanting.
Yet, when she at length preceded him downstairs and into the little sitting-room she wondered if the hammering of her heart reached him, so tremendous were its strokes. They seemed to her to be beating out a death-knell in her soul.
"You will tell me the simple truth, I know," she said, and waited, straining to catch his words above the clamour.
He answered her instantly with the utmost quietness, the utmost kindness.
"Lady Evesham, your own heart has already told you the truth."
She put out a quick hand, and he took it and held it firmly, sustainingly, while he went on.
"There is nothing whatever to be done. Give her rest, that's all; absolute rest. She looks as if she has been worked beyond her strength. Is that so?"
Avery nodded mutely.
"It must stop," he said. "She is in a very precarious state, and any exertion, mental or physical, is bound to hasten the end—which cannot, in any case, be very far off."
He released Avery's hand and walked to the window, where he stood gazing out to sea with drawn brows.
"The disease is of a good many months' standing," he said. "It has taken very firm hold. Such a child as that should have been sheltered and cosseted, shielded from every hardship. Even then—very possibly—this would have developed. No one can say for certain."
"Can you advise—nothing?" said Avery in a voice that sounded oddly dull and emotionless even to herself.
"Nothing," said Maxwell Wyndham. "No medical science can help in a case like this. Give her everything she wants, and give her rest! That is all you can do for her now."
Avery came and stood beside him. The blow had fallen, but she had scarcely begun to feel its effects. There was so much to be thought of first.
"Please be quite open with me!" she said. "Tell me how long you think she will live!"
He turned slightly and looked at her. "I can tell you what I think, Lady Evesham," he said. "But, remember, that does not bring the end any nearer."
"I know," she said.
She looked straight back at him with eyes unflinching, and after a moment's thought he spoke.
"I think that—given every care—she may live through the summer, but I do not consider it likely."
Avery's face was very pale, but still she did not flinch. "Will she suffer?" she asked.
He raised his brows at the question. "My dear lady, she has suffered already far more than you have any idea of. One lung is practically gone, wholly useless. The other is rapidly going the same way. She has probably suffered for a year or more, first lassitude, then shortness of breath, and pretty often actual pain. Hasn't she complained of these things?"
"She is a child who never complains," Avery said. "But both her mother and I thought she was wasting."
"She is mere skin and bone," he said. "Now—about her people, LadyEvesham; who is going to tell them? You or I?"
She hesitated. "But I could hardly ask you to do that," she said.
"You may command me in any way," he answered. "If I may presume to advise, I should say that the best course would be for me to go to Rodding, see the doctor there, and get him to take me to the Vicarage."
"Oh, but they mustn't take her from me!" Avery said. "Let her mother come here! She can't—she mustn't—go back home!"
"Exactly what I was going to say," he returned, in his quiet practical fashion. "To take her back there would be madness. But look here, Lady Evesham, you must have a nurse."
"Oh, not yet!" said Avery. "I am quite strong now. I am used to nursing.I have—no other call upon me. Let me do this!"
"None?" he said.
His tone re-called her. She coloured burningly. "My husband—would understand," she said, with difficulty.
He passed the matter by. "Will you promise to send me a message if you find night-nursing a necessity?"
She hesitated.
He frowned. "Lady Evesham, you must promise me this in fairness to the child as well as to yourself. Also, you will give me your word that you will never under any circumstances sleep with her."
She saw that he would have his way, and she yielded both points rather than fight a battle which instinct warned her she could not win.
"Then I will be going," he said.
He turned back into the room, and again she was aware of his green eyes surveying her closely, critically. But he made no reference whatever to her health, and inwardly she blessed him for his forbearance.
She did not know that as he rode away, he grimly remarked to himself: "The best tonics generally taste the bitterest, and she'll drink this one to the dregs, poor girl! But it'll help her in the end."
"Give her everything she wants!" How often in the days that followed were those words in Avery's mind! She strove to fulfil them to the uttermost, but Jeanie seemed to want so little. The only trouble in her existence just then was her holiday-task, and that she steadily refused to relinquish unless her father gave her leave.
A few days after Maxwell Wyndham's departure there came an agonized letter from Mrs. Lorimer. Olive had just developed scarlet fever, and as they could not afford a nurse she was nursing her herself. She entreated Avery to send her daily news of Jeanie and to telegraph at once should she become worse. She added in a pathetic postscript that her husband found it difficult to believe that Jeanie could be as ill as the great doctor had represented, and she feared he was a little vexed that Maxwell Wyndham's opinion had been obtained.
It was exactly what Avery had expected of him. She wrote a soothing letter to Mrs. Lorimer, promising to keep her informed of Jeanie's condition, promising to lavish every care upon the child, and begging her to persuade Mr. Lorimer to remit the task which had become so heavy a burden.
The reply to this did not come at once, and Avery had repeated the request twice very urgently and was contemplating addressing a protest to the Reverend Stephen in person when another agitated epistle arrived from Mrs. Lorimer. Her husband had decided to run down to them for a night and judge of Jeanie's state for himself.
Avery received the news with dismay which, however, she was careful to conceal. Jeanie heard of the impending visit with as much perturbation as her tranquil nature would allow, and during the day that intervened before his arrival gave herself more sedulously than ever to her task. She had an unhappy premonition that he would desire to examine her upon what she had read, and she was guiltily aware that her memory had not retained very much of it.
So for the whole of one day she strove to study, till she was so completely tired out that Avery actually took the book from her at last and declared that she should not worry herself any more about it. Jeanie yielded submissively, but a wakeful night followed, and in the morning she looked so wan that Avery wanted to keep her in bed.
On this point, however, Jeanie was less docile than usual. "He will think I am shamming," she protested. "He never likes us to lie in bed unless we are really ill."
So, since she was evidently anxious to get up, Avery permitted it, though she marked her obvious languor with a sinking heart.
The Vicar arrived at about noon, and Avery saw at a glance that he was in no kindly mood.
"Dear me, what is all this fuss?" he said to Jeanie. "You look to me considerably rosier than I have seen you for a long time."
Jeanie was indeed flushed with nervous excitement, and Avery thought she had never seen her eyes so unnaturally bright. She endured her father's hand under her chin with evident discomfort, and the Vicar's face was somewhat severe when he finally released her.
"I am afraid you are getting a little fanciful, my child," he said gravely. "I know that our kind friend, Lady Evesham—" his eyes twinkled ironically and seemed to slip inwards—"has always been inclined to indulge your whims. Now how do you occupy your time?"
"I read," faltered Jeanie.
"And sew, I presume," said the Vicar, who prided himself upon bringing up his daughter to be useful.
"A little," said Jeanie.
He opened his eyes upon her again with that suggestion of severity in his regard which Jeanie so plainly dreaded. "But you have done none since you have been here? Jeanie, my child, I detect in you the seeds of idleness. If your time were more fully occupied, you would find your general health would considerably improve. Now, do you rise early and go for a bathe before breakfast?"
"No," said Jeanie, with a little shiver.
He shook his head at her. "Then let us institute the habit at once! I cannot have you becoming slack just because you are away from home. If this indolence continue, I shall be compelled to have you back under my own eye. I clearly see that the self-indulgent life you lead here is having disastrous results. You will bathe with me to-morrow at seven-thirty, after which we will have half an hour of physical exercise. Then after a wholesome breakfast you will feel renewed and ready for the day's work."
Avery, when this programme was laid before her, looked at him in incredulous amazement.
"But surely Dr. Wyndham explained to you the serious condition she is in!" she exclaimed.
Mr. Lorimer smiled his own superior smile. "He explained his point of view most thoroughly, my dear Lady Evesham." He always pronounced her name and title with satirical emphasis. "But that—very curious as it may appear to you—does not prevent my holding a very strong opinion of my own. And it chances to be in direct opposition to that expressed by Dr. Maxwell Wyndham. I know my own child,—her faults and her tendencies. She has been allowed to become extremely lax with regard to her daily duties, and this laxness is in my opinion the root of the evil. I shall therefore take my own measures to correct it, and if they are in any way resisted or neglected I shall at once remove the child from your care. I trust I have made myself quite explicit."
He had. But Avery's indignation could not be contained.
"You will kill her if you persist!" she said. "Even as it is—even as it is—her days are numbered."
"The days of all of us are numbered," said the Reverend Stephen. "And it behoves us to make the very utmost of each one of them. I cannot allow my child's character to be ruined on account of a physical weakness which a little judicious discipline will speedily overcome. The spirit must triumph over the flesh, Lady Evesham. A hard rule for worldlings, I grant you, but one which must be observed by all who would enter the Kingdom of Heaven."
Argument was futile. Avery realized it at the outset. He would have his way, whatever the cost, and no warning or entreaty would move him. For the rest of that day she had to stand by in impotent anguish, and watch Jeanie's martyrdom. During the afternoon he sat alone with her, conducting the intellectual examination which Jeanie had so dreaded, reprimanding, criticizing, scoffing at her ignorance. In the evening he took her for what he called a stroll upon which Avery was not allowed to accompany them. Mr. Lorimer playfully remarking that he wished to give his young daughter the benefit of his individual attention during the period of his brief sojourn with them.
They returned from their expedition at eight. Avery was walking to and fro by the gate in a ferment of anxiety. They came by the cliff-road, and she went eagerly to meet them.
Jeanie was hanging on her father's arm with a face of deathly whiteness, and looked on the verge of collapse.
The Reverend Stephen was serenely satisfied with himself, laughed gently at his child's dragging progress, and assured Avery that a little wholesome fatigue was a good thing at the end of the day.
Jeanie said nothing. She seemed to be speechless with exhaustion, almost incapable of standing alone.
Mr. Lorimer recommended a cold bath, a brisk rub-down, and supper.
"After which," he said impressively, "I shall hope to conduct a few prayers before we retire to rest."
"That will be impossible, I am afraid," Avery rejoined. "Jeanie is overtired and must go at once to bed."
She spoke with quiet decision, but inwardly she was quivering with fierce anger. She longed passionately to have the child to herself, to comfort and care for her and ease away the troubles of the day.
But Mr. Lorimer at once asserted his authority. "Jeanie will certainly join us at supper," he said. "Run along, my child, and prepare for the meal at once!"
Jeanie went up the stairs like an old woman, stumbling at every step.
Avery followed her, chafing but impotent.
At the top of the stairs Jeanie began to cough. She turned into her own room with blind, staggering movements and sank down beside the bed.
The coughing was spasmodic and convulsive. It shook her whole frame. In the end there came a dreadful tearing sound, and she caught her handkerchief to her mouth.
Avery knelt beside her, supporting her. She saw the white linen turn suddenly scarlet, and she called sharply to Mr. Lorimer to come to them.
He came, and between them they got her on to the bed.
"This is most unfortunate," said Mr. Lorimer. "Pray how did it happen?"
And then Avery's pent fury blazed suddenly forth upon him. "It is your doing!" she said. "You—and you alone—are responsible for this!"
He looked at her malignantly. "Pshaw, my dear Lady Evesham! You are hysterical!" he said.
Avery was bending over the bed. "Go!" she said, without looking up. "Go quickly, and fetch a doctor!"
And, very curiously, Mr. Lorimer obeyed her.
Jeanie rallied. As though to comfort Avery's distress, she came back for a little space; but no one—not even her father—could doubt any longer that the poor little mortal life had nearly run out.
"My intervention has come too late, alas!" said Mr. Lorimer.
Which remark was received by Avery in bitter silence.
She had no further fear of being deprived of the child. It was quite out of the question to think of moving her, and she knew that Jeanie was hers for as long as the frail cord of her earthly existence lasted.
She was thankful that the advent of a nurse made it impossible for theVicar to remain, and she parted from him with almost open relief.
"We must bow to the Supreme Will," he said, with his heavy sigh.
And again Avery was silent.
"I fear you are rebellious," he said with severity.
"Good-bye!" said Avery.
Her heart bled more for Mrs. Lorimer than for herself just then. She knew by instinct that she would not be allowed to come to her child.
The nurse was middle-aged and kindly, and both she and Jeanie liked her from the outset. She took the night duty, and the day was Avery's, a division that pleased them all.
Mr. Lorimer had demurred about having a nurse at all, but Avery had swept the objection aside. Jeanie was in her care, and she would provide all she needed. Mr. Lorimer had conceded the point as gracefully as possible, for it seemed that for once his will could not be regarded as paramount. Of course, as he openly reflected, Lady Evesham was very much in their debt, and it was but natural that she should welcome this opportunity to repay somewhat of their past kindness to her.
So, for the first time in her life, little Jeanie was surrounded with all that she could desire; and very slowly, like a broken flower coaxed back to life, she revived again.
It could scarcely be regarded in the light of an improvement. It was just a fluctuation that deceived neither Avery nor the nurse; but to the former those days were infinitely precious. She clung to them hour by hour, refusing to look ahead to the desolation that was surely coming, cherishing her darling with a passion of devotion that excluded all other griefs.
The long summer days slipped away. June passed like a dream. Jeanie lay in the tiny garden with her face to the sea, gazing forth with eyes that were often heavy and wistful but always ready to smile upon Avery. The holiday-task was put away, not because Mr. Lorimer had remitted it, but because Avery—with rare despotism—had insisted upon removing it from her patient's reach.
"Not till you are better, darling," she said. "That is your biggest duty now, just to get back all the strength you can."
And Jeanie had smiled her wistful, dreamy smile, and submitted.
Avery sometimes wondered if she knew of the great Change that was drawing so rapidly near. If so, it had no terrors for her; and she thanked God that the Vicar was not at hand to terrify the child. The journey from Rodding to Stanbury Cliffs was not an easy one by rail, and parish matters were fortunately claiming his attention very fully just then. As he himself had remarked more than once, he was not the man to permit mere personal matters to interfere with Duty, and many a weak soul depended upon his ministrations.
So Jeanie was left entirely to Avery's motherly care while the golden days slipped by.
With July came heat, intense, oppressive, airless; and Jeanie flagged again. A copper-coloured mist rose every morning over the sea, blotting out the sky-line, veiling the passing ships. Strange voices called through the fog, sirens hooted to one another persistently.
"They are like people who have lost each other," Jeanie said once, and the simile haunted Avery's imagination.
And then one sunny day a pleasure-steamer passed quite near the shore with a band on board. They were playingThe Little Grey Home in the West, and very oddly Jeanie's eyes filled with sudden tears.
Avery did not take any notice for a few moments, but as the strains died-away over the glassy water, she leaned towards the child.
"My darling, what is it?" she whispered tenderly.
Jeanie's hand found its way into hers. "Oh, don't you ever want Piers?" she murmured wistfully. "I do!"
It was the first time she had spoken his name to Avery since they had left him alone nearly a year before, and almost as soon as she had uttered it she made swift apology.
"Please forgive me, dear Avery! It just slipped out."
"My dear!" Avery said, and kissed her.
There fell a long silence between them. Avery's eyes were on the thick heat-haze that obscured the sky-line. In her brain there sounded again those words that Maxwell Wyndham had spoken so short a time before. "Give her everything she wants! It's all you can do for her now."
But behind those words was something that shrank and quivered like a frightened child. Could she give her this one thing? Could she? Could she?
It would mean the tearing open of a wound that was scarcely closed. It would mean a calling to life of a bitterness that was hardly past. It would mean—it would mean—
"Avery darling!" Softly Jeanie's voice broke through her agitated thoughts.
Avery turned and looked at her,—the frail, sweet face with its shining eyes of love.
"I didn't mean to hurt you," whispered Jeanie. "Don't think any more about it!"
"Do you want him so dreadfully?" Avery said.
Jeanie's eyes were full of tears again. She tried to answer, but her lips quivered. She turned her face aside, and was silent.
The day waxed hotter, became almost insupportable. In the afternoon Jeanie was attacked by breathlessness and coughing, both painful to witness. She could find no rest or comfort, and Avery was in momentary dread of a return of the hemorrhage.
It did not return, but when evening came at length and with it the blessed coolness of approaching night, Jeanie was so exhausted as to be unable to speak above a whisper. She lay white and still, scarcely conscious, only her difficult breathing testifying to the fluttering life that had ebbed so low.
The nurse's face was very grave as she came on duty, but after an interval of steady watching, during which the wind blew in with rising freshness from the sea, she turned to Avery, saying, "I think she will revive."
Avery nodded and slipped away.
There was not much time left. She ran all the way to the post-office and scribbled a message there with trembling fingers.
"Jeanie wants you. Will you come? Avery."
She sent the message to Rodding Abbey. She knew they would forward it from there.
Passing out again into the road, a sudden sense of sickness swept over her. What had she done? What uncontrolled force would that telegram unfetter? Would he come to her like a whirlwind and sweep her back into his own tempestuous life? Would he break her will once more to his? Would he drag her once more through the hell of his passion, kindle afresh for her the flame that had consumed her happiness?
She dared not face the possibility. She felt as if an iron hand had closed upon her, drawing her surely, irresistibly, back towards those gates of brass through which she had escaped into the desert. That fiery torture would be infinitely harder to bear now, and she knew that the fieriest point of it all would be the desperate, aching longing to know again the love that had shone and burnt itself out in the blast-furnace of his sin. He had loved her once; she was sure he had loved her. But that love had died with his boyhood, and it could never rise again. He had trodden it underfoot and her own throbbing heart with it. He had destroyed that which she had always believed to be indestructible.
She never wanted to see him again. She would have given all she had to have avoided the meeting. Her whole being recoiled from the thought of it. And yet—and yet—she saw again the black head laid against her knee, and heard the low, half-rueful words: "Oh, my dear, there is no other woman but you in all the world!"
The vision went with her all through the night. She could not escape it.
In the morning she rose with a sense of being haunted, and a terrible weariness that hung upon her like a chain.
The day was cooler. Jeanie was better. She had had a nice sleep, the nurse said. But there could be no question of allowing her to leave her bed that day.
"You are looking so tired," the nurse said, in her kind way to Avery. "I am not wanting to go off duty till this afternoon. So won't you go and sit down somewhere on the rocks? Please do!"
She was so anxious to gain her point that Avery yielded. She felt too feverishly restless to be a suitable companion for Jeanie just then. She went down to her favourite corner to watch the tide come in. But she could not be still. She paced the shore like a caged creature seeking a way of escape, dreading each turn lest it should bring her face to face with the man she had summoned.
The tide came in and drove her up the beach. She went back not unwillingly, for the suspense had become insupportable.
Had he come? But surely not! She was convinced he would have followed her to the shore if he had.
She entered the tiny hall. It was square, and served them as a sitting-room. Coming in from the glare without, she was momentarily dazzled. And then all suddenly her eyes lighted upon an unaccustomed object, and her heart ceased to beat. A man's tweed cap lay carelessly tossed upon the back of a chair!
She stood quite still, feeling her senses reel, knowing herself to be on the verge of fainting, and clinging with all her strength to her tottering self-control.
Gradually she recovered, felt her heart begin to beat again and the deadly faintness pass. There was a telegram on the table. She took it up, found it addressed to herself, opened it with fumbling fingers.
"Tell Jeanie I am coming to-day. Piers."
It had arrived an hour before, and she was conscious of a vague sense of thankfulness that she had been spared that hour of awful certainty.
A door opened at the top of the stairs. A voice spoke. "I'll come back, my queen. But I've got to pay my respects, you know, to the mistress of the establishment, or she'll be cross. Do you remember the Avery symphony? We'll have it presently."
A light step followed the voice. Already he was on the stairs. He came bounding down to her like an eager boy. For one wild moment she thought he was going to throw his arms about her. But he stopped himself before he reached her.
"I say, how ill you look!" he said.
That was all the greeting he uttered, and in the same moment she saw that the black hair above his forehead was powdered with white. It sent such a shock through her as no word or action of his could have caused.
She stood for a moment gazing at him in stiff inaction. Then, still stiffly, she held out her hand. But she could not utter a word. She felt as if she were going to burst into tears.
He took the hand. His dark eyes interrogated her, but they told her nothing. "It's all right," he said rapidly. "I'm Jeanie's visitor. I shan't forget it. It was decent of you to send. I say, you—you are not really ill, what?"
No, she was not ill. She heard herself telling him so in a voice she did not know. And all the while she felt as if her heart were bleeding, bleeding to death.
He let her hand go, and straightened himself with the old free arrogance of movement. "May I have something to eat?" he said. "Your message only got to me this morning. I was at breakfast, and I had to leave it to catch the train. So I've had practically nothing."
That moved her to activity. She led the way into the little parlour where luncheon had been laid. He sat down at the table, and she waited upon him, almost in silence, yet no longer with embarrassment.
"Aren't you going to join me?" he said.
She sat down also, and took a minute helping of cold chicken.
"I say, you're not going to eat all that!" ejaculated Piers.
She had to laugh a little, though still with that horrified sense of tragedy at her heart.
He laughed too his careless boyish laugh, and in a moment all the electricity of the past few moments had gone out of the atmosphere. He leaned forward unexpectedly and transferred a wing of chicken from his plate to hers.
"Look here, Avery! You must eat. It's absurd. So fire away like a sensible woman!"
There was no tenderness in his tone, but, oddly, she thrilled to its imperiousness, conscious of the old magnetism compelling her. She began to eat in silence.
Piers ate too in his usual quick fashion, glancing at her once or twice but making no further comment.
"Tell me about Jeanie!" he said, finally. "What has brought her to this?Can't we do anything—take her to Switzerland or somewhere?"
Avery shook her head. "Can't you see?" she said, in a low voice.
He frowned upon her abruptly. "I see lots," he said enigmatically. "It's quite hopeless, what? Wyndham told me as much. But—I don't believe in hopeless things."
Avery looked at him, mystified by his tone. "She is dying," she said.
"I don't believe in death either," said Piers, in the tone of one who challenged the world. "And now look here, Avery! Let's make the best of things for the kiddie's sake! She's had a rotten time all her days. Let's give her a decent send-off, what? Let's give her the time of her life before she goes!"
He got up suddenly from his chair and went to the open window.
Avery turned her head to watch him, but for some reason she could not speak.
He went on vehemently, his face turned from her. "In Heaven's name don't let's be sorry! It's such a big thing to go out happy. Let's play the game! I know you can; you were always plucky. Let's give her everything she wants and some over! What, Avery, what? I'm not asking for myself."
She did not know exactly what he was asking, but she did not dare to tell him so. She sat quite silent, feeling her heart quicken, striving desperately to be calm.
He flung round suddenly, and came to her. "Will you do it?" he said.
She raised her eyes to his. She was white to the lips.
He made one of his quick, half-foreign gestures. "Don't!" he said harshly. "You make me feel such a brute. Can't you trust me—can't you pretend to trust me—for Jeanie's sake?" His hand closed fiercely on the back of her chair. He bent towards her. "It's only a hollow bargain. You'll hate it of course. Do you suppose I shall enjoy it any better? Do you suppose I would ask it of you for any reason but this?"
Something in his face or voice pierced her. She felt again that dreadful pain at her heart, as if the blood were draining from it with every beat.
"I don't know what to say to you, Piers," she said at last.
He bit his lip in sheer impatience, but the next moment he controlled himself. "I'm asking a difficult thing of you," he said, forcing his voice to a quiet level. "It isn't particularly easy for me either; perhaps in a sense, it's even harder. But you must have known when you sent for me that something of the kind was inevitable. What you didn't know—possibly—was that Jeanie is grieving badly over our estrangement. She wants to draw us together again. Will you suffer it? Will you play the game with me? It won't be for long."
His eyes looked straight into hers, but they held only a great darkness in which no flicker of light burned. Avery felt as if the gulf between them had widened to a measureless abyss. Once she could have read him like an open book; but now she had not the vaguest clue to his feelings or his motives. He had as it were withdrawn beyond her ken.
"Is it to be only make-believe?" she asked at last.
"Just that," he said, but she thought his voice rang hard as he said it.
An odd little tremor went through her. She put her hand up to her throat."Piers, I don't know—I am afraid—" She broke off in agitation.
He leaned towards her. "Don't be afraid!" he said. "There is nothing so damning as fear. Shall we go up to her now? I promised I wouldn't be long."
She rose. He was still standing close to her, so close that she felt the warmth of his body, heard the sharp indrawing of his breath.
For one sick second she thought he would snatch her to him; but the second passed and he had not moved.
"Shall we go?" he said again. "And I say, can you put me up? I don't care where I sleep. Any sort of shakedown will do. That sofa—" he glanced towards the one by the window upon which Jeanie had been wont to lie.
"If you like," Avery said.
She felt that the power to refuse him had left her. He would do as he thought fit.
They went upstairs together, and she saw Jeanie's face light up as they entered. Piers was behind. Coming forward, he slipped a confident hand through Avery's arm. She felt his fingers close upon her warningly, checking her slight start; and she knew with an odd mixture of relief and dismay that this was the beginning of the game. She forced herself to smile in answer, and she knew that she succeeded; but it was one of the greatest efforts of her life.
For a week after Piers' arrival, Jeanie was better, so much better that she was able to be carried downstairs and into the garden where she loved to lie. There was a piano in the sitting-room, and Piers would sit at it by the hour together, playing anything she desired. She loved his music, would listen entranced for any length of time while he led her through a world of delight that she had never explored before. It soothed her restlessness, comforted her in weariness, made her forget her pain. And then the summer weather broke. There came a spell of rainy days that made the garden impossible, and immediately Jeanie's strength began to wane. It went from her very gradually. She suffered but little, save when her breathing or her cough troubled her. But it was evident to them all that her little craft was putting out to sea at last.
Piers went steadfastly on with therôlehe had assigned to himself. He never by word or look reminded Avery of the compact between them. He merely took her support for granted, and—probably in consequence of this—it never failed him.
The nurse declared him to be invaluable. He always had a salutary effect upon her patient. For even more than at the sight of Avery did Jeanie brighten at his coming, and she was always happy alone with him. It even occurred to Avery sometimes that her presence was scarcely needed, so completely were they at one in understanding and sympathy.
One evening, entering the room unexpectedly, she found Piers on his knees beside the bed. He rose instantly and made way for her in a fashion she could not ignore; but, though Jeanie greeted her with evident pleasure, it was obvious that for the moment she was not needed, and an odd little pang went through her with the knowledge.
Piers left the room almost immediately, and in a few moments they heard him at the piano downstairs.
"May I have the door open?" whispered Jeanie.
Avery opened it, and drawing up a chair sat down with her work at the bedside.
And then, slowly rolling forth, there came that wonderful music with which he had thrilled her soul at the very beginning of his courtship.
Wordless, magnificent, the great anthem swelled through the falling dusk, and like a vision the unutterable arose and possessed her soul. Her eyes began to behold the Land that is very far off.
And then, throbbing through the wonder of that vision, she heard the coming of the vast procession. It was like a dream, and yet it was wholly real. As yet lost in distance, veiled in mystery, she heard the tread of the coming host.
Her hands were fast gripped together; she forgot all beside. It was as if the eyes of her soul had been opened, and she looked upon the Infinite. A voice at her side began to speak, or was it the voice of her own heart? It was only a whisper, but every word of it pierced her consciousness. She listened with parted lips.
"I saw Heaven opened, and behold a white horse; and He that sat upon him was called Faithful and True … His Eyes were as a flame of fire and on His Head were many crowns…. And He was clothed with a vesture dipped in blood…. And the armies which were in Heaven followed Him upon white horses, clothed in fine linen, white and clean…. And He treadeth the wine-press…. He treadeth the wine-press…."
The voice paused. Avery was listening with bated breath for more. But it did not come at once. Only the Veil began to lift, so that she saw the Opening Gates and the Glory behind them.
Then, and not till then, the dream-voice spoke again. "Surely—surely He hath borne our griefs, and carried—our sorrows…. And the Lord hath laid on Him—the iniquity of us all." The music crashed into wonder-chords such as Avery had never heard before, swelled to a climax that reached the Divine, held her quivering as it were upon wings in a space that was more transcendent than the highest mountain-top;—then softly, strangely, died….
"That is Heaven," whispered the voice by her side. "Oh, Avery, won't it be nice when we are all there together?"
But Avery sat as one in a trance, rapt and still. She felt as if the spirit had been charmed out of her body, and she did not want to return.
A little thin hand slid into hers and clasped it close, recalling her."Wasn't it beautiful?" said Jeanie. "He said he would make me see theKingdom of Heaven. You saw it too, dear Avery, didn't you?"
Yes, Avery had seen it too. She still felt as if the earth were very far below them both.
Jeanie's voice had grown husky, but she still spoke in a tremulous whisper. "Did you see the Open Gates, dear Avery? He says they are never shut. And anyone who can reach them will be let in,—it doesn't matter who. Do you know, I think Piers is different from what he used to be? I think he is learning to love God."
Absolutely simple words! Why did they send such a rush of feeling—tumultuous, indescribable feeling—through Avery? Was this the explanation? Was this how it came to pass that he treated her with that aloof reverence day by day? Was he indeed learning the supreme lesson to worship God with love?
She sat for a while longer with Jeanie, till, finding her drowsy, she slipped downstairs.
Piers was sitting in the hall, deep in a newspaper. He rose at her coming with an abruptness suggestive of surprise, and stood waiting for her to speak.
But curiously the only words that she could utter were of a trivial nature. She had come to him indeed, drawn by a power irresistible, but the moment she found herself actually in his presence she felt tongue-tied, helpless.
"Don't you want a light?" she said nervously. "I am sure you can't see to read."
He stood silent for a moment, and the old tormenting doubt began to rise within her. Would he think she desired to make an overture? Would he take for granted that because his magnetism had drawn her he could do with her as he would?
And then very quietly he spoke, and she experienced an odd revulsion of feeling that was almost disappointment.
"Have you been reading the papers lately?"
She had not. Jeanie occupied all her waking thoughts.
He glanced down at the sheet he held. "There is going to be a bust-up on the Continent," he said, and there was that in his tone—a grim elation—which puzzled her at the moment. "The mightiest bust-up the world has ever known. We're in for it, Avery; in for the very deuce of a row." His voice vibrated suddenly. He stopped as though to check some headlong force that threatened to carry him away.
Avery stood still, feeling a sick horror of impending disaster at her heart. "What can you mean?" she said.
He leaned his hands upon the table facing her, and she saw in his eyes the primitive, savage joy of battle. "I mean war," he said. "Oh, it's horrible; yes, of course it's horrible. But it'll bring us to our senses. It'll make men of us yet."
She shrank from his look. "Piers! Not—not a European war!"
He straightened himself slowly. "Yes," he said. "It will be that. But there's nothing to be scared about. It'll be the salvation of the Empire."
"Piers!" she gasped again through white lips. "But modern warfare! Modern weapons! It's Germany of course?"
"Yes, Germany." He stretched up his arms with a wide gesture and let them fall. "Germany who is going to cut out all the rot of party politics and bind us together as one man! Germany who is going to avert civil war and teach us to love our neighbours! Nothing short of this would have saved us. We've been a mere horde of chattering monkeys lately. Now—all thanks to Germany!—we're going to be men!"
"Or murderers!" said Avery.
The word broke from her involuntarily, she scarcely knew that she had uttered it until she saw his face. Then in a flash she saw what she had done, for he had the sudden tragic look of a man who has received his death-wound.
He made her a curious stiff bow as if he bent himself with difficulty. His face at that moment was whiter than hers, but his eyes glowed red with a deep anger.
"I shall remember that," he said, "when I go to fight for my country."
With the words he turned to the door. But she cried after him, dismayed, incoherent.
"Oh Piers, you know—you know—I didn't mean that!"
He did not pause or look back. "Nevertheless you said it," he rejoined in a tone that made her feel as if he had flung an icy shower of water in her face; and the next moment she heard his quick tread on the garden path and realized that he was gone.
It was useless to attempt to follow him. Her knees were trembling under her. Moreover, she knew that she must return to Jeanie. White-lipped, quivering, she moved to the stairs.
He had utterly misunderstood her; she had but voiced the horrified thought that must have risen in the minds of thousands when first brought face to face with that world-wide tragedy. But he had read a personal meaning into her words. He had deemed her deliberately cruel, ungenerous, bitter. That he could thus misunderstand her set her heart bleeding afresh. Oh, they were better apart! How was it possible that there could ever be any confidence, any intimacy, between them again?
Tears, scalding, blinding tears ran suddenly down her face. She bowed her head in her hands, leaning upon the banisters….
A voice called to her from above, and she started. What was she doing, weeping here in selfish misery, when Jeanie—Swiftly she commanded herself and mounted the stairs. The nurse met her at the top.
"The little one isn't so well," she said. "I thought she was asleep, butI am afraid she is unconscious."
"Oh, nurse, and I left her!"
There was a sound of such heart-break in Avery's voice that the nurse's grave face softened in sympathy.
"My dear, you couldn't have done anything," she said. "It is just the weakness before the end, and we can do nothing to avert it. What about her mother? Can she come?"
Avery shook her head in despair. "Not for a week."
"Ah!" the nurse said; and that was all. But Avery knew in that moment that only a few hours more remained ere little Jeanie Lorimer passed through the Open Gates.
She would not go to bed that night though the child lay wholly unconscious of her. She knew that she could not sleep.
She did not see Piers again till late. The nurse slipped down to tell him of Jeanie's condition, and he came up, white and sternly composed, and stood for many minutes watching the slender, quick-breathing figure that lay propped among pillows, close to the open window.
Avery could not look at his face during those minutes; she dared not. But when he turned away at length he bent and spoke to her.
"Are you going to stay here?"
"Yes," she whispered.
He made no attempt to dissuade her. All he said was, "May I wait in your room? I shall be within call there."
"Of course," she answered.
"And you will call me if there is any change?"
"Of course," she said again.
He nodded briefly and left her.
Then began the long, long night-watch. It was raining, and the night was very dark. The slow, deep roar of the sea rose solemnly and filled the quiet room. The tide was coming in. They could hear the water shoaling along the beach.
How often Avery had listened to it and loved the sound! To-night it filled her soul with awe, as the Voice of Many Waters.
Slowly the night wore on, and ever that sound increased in volume, swelling, intensifying, like the coming of a mighty host as yet far off. The rain pattered awhile and ceased. The sea-breeze blew in, salt and pure. It stirred the brown tendrils of hair on Jeanie's forehead, and eddied softly through the room.
The nurse sat working beside a hooded lamp that threw her grave, strong face into high relief, but only accentuated the shadows in the rest of the room. Avery sat close to the bed, not praying, scarcely thinking, waiting only for the opening of the Gates. And in that hour she longed,—oh, how passionately!—that when they opened she also might be permitted to pass through.
It was in the darkest hour of the night that the tide began to turn. She looked almost instinctively for a change but none came. Jeanie stirred not, save when the nurse stooped over her to give her nourishment, and each time she took less and less.
The tide receded. The night began to pass. There came a faint greyness before the window. The breeze freshened.
And very suddenly the breathing to which Avery had listened all the night paused, ceased for a second or two, then broke into the sharp sigh of one awaking from sleep.
She rose quickly, and the nurse looked up. Jeanie's eyes dark, unearthly, unafraid, were opened wide.
She gazed at Avery for a moment as if slightly puzzled. Then, in a faint whisper: "Has Piers said good-night?" she asked.
"No, darling. But he is waiting to. I will call him," Avery said.
"Quickly!" whispered the nurse, as she passed her.
Swiftly, noiselessly, Avery went to her own room. But some premonition of her coming must have reached him; for he met her on the threshold.
His eyes questioned hers for a moment, and then together they turned back to Jeanie's room. No words passed between them. None were needed.
Jeanie's face was turned towards the door. Her eyes looked beyond Avery and smiled a welcome to Piers. He came to her, knelt beside her.
"Dear Sir Galahad!" she said.
He shook his head. "No, Jeanie, no!"
She was panting. He slipped his arm under the pillow to support her. She turned her face to his.
"Oh, Piers," she breathed, "I do—so—want you—to be happy."
"I am happy, sweetheart," he said.
But Jeanie's vision was stronger in that moment than it had ever been before, and she was not deceived. "You are not happy, dear Piers," she said. "Avery is not happy either."
Piers turned slightly. "Come here, Avery!" he said.
The old imperious note was in his voice, yet with a difference. He stretched his free hand up to her, drawing her down to his side, and as she knelt also he passed his arm about her, pressing her to him.
Jeanie's eyes were upon them both, dying eyes that shone with a mystic glory. They saw the steadfast resolution in Piers' face as he held his wife against his heart. They saw the quivering hesitation with which she yielded.
"You're not happy—yet," she whispered. "But you will be happy."
Thereafter she seemed to slip away from them for a space, losing touch as it were, yet still not beyond their reach. Once or twice she seemed to be trying to pray, but they could not catch her words.
The dawn-light grew stronger before the window. The sound of the waves had sunk to a low murmuring. From where she knelt Avery could see the far, dim line of sea. Piers' arm was still about her. She felt as though they two were kneeling apart before an Altar invisible, waiting to receive a blessing.
Jeanie's breathing was growing less hurried. She seemed already beyond all earthly suffering. Yet her eyes also watched that far dim sky-line as though they waited for a sign.
Slowly the light deepened, the shadows began to lift. Piers' eyes were fixed unswervingly upon the child's quiet face. The light of the coming Dawn was reflected there. The great Change was very near at hand.
Far away to the left there grew and spread a wondrous brightness. The sky seemed to recede, turned from grey to misty blue. A veil of cloud that had hidden the stars all through the night dissolved softly into shreds of gold, and across the sea with a diamond splendour there shot the first great ray of sunlight.
It was then that Jeanie seemed to awake, to rise as it were from the depths of reverie. Her eyes widened, grew intense; then suddenly they smiled.
She sought to raise herself, and never knew that it was by Piers' strength alone that she was lifted. She gave a gasp that was almost a cry, but it was gladness not pain that it expressed.
For a few panting moments she gazed out as one rapt in delight, gazing from a mountain-peak upon a wider view than earthly eyes could compass.
Then eagerly she turned to Piers. "I saw Heaven opened …" she said, and in her low voice there throbbed a rapture that could not be uttered in words.
She would have said more, but something stopped her. She made a gesture as though she would clasp him round the neck, failed, and sank down in his arms.
He held her closely to him, and so holding her, felt the last quivering breath slip from the little tired body….