He stood lost in thought a little longer by his writing-table. Then his hand felt slowly for a parcel in brown paper that lay there.
He drew it toward him and undid the wrappings. Inside it was a little volume of recent poems of which he had spoken to Mary Elsmere on their moonlit walk through the park. He had promised to lend her his copy, and he meant to have left it at the cottage that afternoon. Now he lingeringly removed the brown paper, and walking to the bookcase, he replaced the volume.
He sat down to write to Alice Puttenham, and to scribble a note to Lady Fox-Wilton asking her to see him as soon as possible. Then Anne forced some luncheon on him, and he had barely finished it when a step outside made itself heard. He looked up and saw Hugh Flaxman.
"Come in!" said the Rector, opening the front door himself. "You are very welcome."
Flaxman grasped—and pressed—the proffered hand, looking at Meynell the while with hesitating interrogation. He guessed from the Rector's face that the errand on which he came had been anticipated.
Meynell led him into the study and shut the door.
"I have just had Barron here," he said, turning abruptly, after he had pushed a chair toward his guest. "He told me he had shown one of these precious documents to you." He held up the anonymous letter.
Flaxman took it, glanced it over in silence and returned it.
"I can only forgive him for doing it when I reflect that I may thereby—perhaps—be enabled to be of some little use to you. Barron knows what I think of him, and of the business."
"Oh! for him it is a weapon—like any other. Though to do him justice he might not have used it, but for the other mysterious person in the case—the writer of these letters. You know—" he straightened himself vehemently—"that I can say nothing—except that the story is untrue?"
"And of course I shall ask you nothing. I have spent twenty-four hours in arguing with myself as to whether I should come to you at all. Finally I decided you might blame me if I did not. You may not be aware of the letter to my sister-in-law?"
Meynell's start was evident.
"To Mrs. Elsmere?"
"She brought it to us on Friday, before the party. It was, I think, identical with this letter"—he pointed to the Dawes envelope—"except for a few references to the part Mrs. Elsmere had played in helping the families of those poor fellows who were killed in the cage-accident."
"And Miss Elsmere?" said Meynell in a tone that wavered in spite of himself. He sat with his head bent and his eyes on the floor.
"Knows, of course, nothing whatever about it," said Flaxman hastily. "Now will you give us your orders? A strong denial of the truth of the story, and a refusal to discuss it at all—with any one—that I think is what you wish?"
Meynell assented.
"In the village, I shall deal with it at the Reform meeting on Thursday night." Then he rose. "Are you going to Forkéd Pond?"
"I was on my way there."
"I will go with you. If Mrs. Elsmere is free, I should like to have some conversation with her."
They started together through a dripping world on which the skies had but just ceased to rain. On his way through the park Meynell took off his hat and walked bareheaded through the mist, evidently feeling it a physical relief to let the chill, moist air beat freely on brow and temples. Flaxman could not help watching him occasionally—the forehead with its deep vertical furrow, the rugged face, stamped and lined everywhere by travail of mind and body, and the nobility of the large grizzled head. In the voluminous cloak—of an antiquity against which Anne protested in vain—which was his favourite garb on wet days, he might have been a friar of the early time, bound on a preaching tour. The spiritual, evangelic note in the personality became—so Flaxman thought—ever more conspicuous. And yet he walked to-day in very evident trouble, without, however, allowing to this trouble any spoken expression whatever.
As they neared the Forkéd Pond enclosure, Meynell suddenly paused.
"I had forgotten—I must go first to Sandford—where indeed I am expected."
"Sandford? I trust there is no fresh anxiety?"
"Thereisanxiety," said Meynell briefly.
Flaxman expressed an unfeigned sympathy.
"What is Miss Hester doing to-day?"
"Packing, I hope. She goes to-morrow."
"And you—are going to interview this fellow?" asked Flaxman reluctantly.
"I have done it already—and must now do it again. This time I am going to threaten."
"With anything to go upon?"
"Yes. I hope at last to be able to get some grip on him; though no doubt my chances are not improved since yesterday," said Meynell, with a grim shadow of a smile, "supposing that anybody from Upcote has been gossipping at Sandford. It does not exactly add to one's moral influence to be regarded as a Pharisaical humbug."
"I wish I could take the business off your shoulders!" said Flaxman, heartily.
Meynell gave him a slight, grateful look. They walked on briskly to the high road, Flaxman accompanying his friend so far. There they parted, and Hugh returned slowly to the cottage by the water, Meynell promising to join him there within an hour.
"Such was my mother's way, learnt from Thee in the school of the heart, where Thou art Master."
In the little drawing-room at Forkéd Pond Catharine and Mary Elsmere were sitting at work. Mary was embroidering a curtain in a flowing Venetian pattern—with a handful of withered leaves lying beside her to which she occasionally matched her silks. Catharine was knitting. Outside the rain was howling through the trees; the windows streamed with it. But within, the bright wood-fire threw a pleasant glow over the simple room, and the figures of the two ladies. Mary's trim jacket and skirt of prune-coloured serge, with its white blouse fitting daintily to throat and wrist, seemed by its neatness to emphasize the rebellious masses and the fare colour of her hair. She knew that her hair was beautiful, and it gave her a pleasure she could not help, though she belonged to that type of Englishwoman, not yet nearly so uncommon as modern newspapers and books would have us believe, who think as little as they can of personal adornment and their own appearance, in the interests of some hidden ideal that "haunts them like a passion; of which even the most innocent vanity seems to make them unworthy."
In these feelings and instincts she was, of course, her mother's daughter. Catharine Elsmere's black dress of some plain woollen stuff could not have been plainer, and she wore the straight collar and cuffs, and—on her nearly white hair—the simple cap of her widowhood. But the spiritual beauty which had always been hers was hers still. One might guess that she, too, knew it; that in her efforts to save persons in sin or suffering she must have known what it was worth to her; what the gift of lovely line and presence is worth to any human being. But if she had been made to feel this—passingly, involuntarily—she had certainly shrunk from feeling it.
Mary put her embroidery away, made up the fire, and sat down on a stool at her mother's feet.
"Darling, how many socks have you knitted since we came here? Enough to stock a shop?"
"On the contrary. I have been very idle," laughed Catharine, putting her knitting away. "How long is it? Four months?" she sighed.
"Ithasdone you good?—yes, it has!" Mary looked at her closely.
"Then why don't you let me go back to my work?—tyrant!" said Catharine, stroking the red-gold hair.
"Because the doctor said 'March'—and you sha'n't be allowed to put your feet in London a day earlier," said Mary, laying her head on Catharine's knee. "You needn't grumble. Next week you'll have your fells and your becks—as much Westmoreland as ever you want. Only ten days more here," and this time it was Mary who sighed, deeply, unconsciously.
The face above her changed—unseen by Mary.
"You've liked being here?"
"Yes—very much."
"It's a dear little house, and the woods are beautiful."
"Yes. And—I've made a new friend."
"You like Miss Puttenham so much?"
"More than anybody I have seen for years," said Mary, raising herself and speaking with energy; "but, oh dear, I wish I could do something for her!"
Catharine moved uneasily.
"Do what?"
"Comfort her—help her—make her tell me what's the matter."
"You think she's unhappy?"
Mary propped her chin on her hand, and looked into the fire.
"I wonder whether she's ever had any real joy—a week's—a day's—happiness—in her life?"
[Illustration: "'I wonder whether she's ever had any real joy—a week's—a day's—happiness—in her life?'"]
She said it musingly but intensely. Catharine did not know how to answer her. All the day long, and a good deal of the night, she had been debating with herself what to do—toward Mary. Mary was no longer a child. She was a woman, of nearly six and twenty, strong in character, and accustomed of late to go with her mother into many of the dark places of London life. The betrayal—which could not be hidden from her—of a young servant girl in their employ, the year before, and the fierce tenderness with which Mary had thrown herself into the saving of the girl and her child, had brought about—Catharine knew it—a great deepening and overshadowing of her youth. Catharine had in some ways regretted it bitterly; for she belonged to that older generation which believed—and were amply justified in believing—that it is well for the young to be ignorant, so long as they can be ignorant, of the ugly and tragic things of sex. It was not that her Mary seemed to her in the smallest degree besmirched by the experience she had passed through; that any bloom had been shaken from the flower. Far from it. It was rather that some touch of careless joy was gone forever from her child's life; and how that may hurt a mother, only those know who have wept in secret hours over the first ebbing of youth in a young face.
So that she received Mary's outburst in silence. For she said to herself that she could have no right to reveal Alice Puttenham's secret, even to Mary. That cruel tongues should at that moment be making free with it burnt like a constant smart in Catharine's mind. Was the poor thing herself aware of it?—could it be kept from her? If not, Mary must know—would know—sooner or later. "But for me to tell her without permission"—thought Catharine firmly—"would not be right—or just. Besides, I know nothing—directly."
As to the other and profounder difficulty involved, Catharine wavered perpetually between two different poles of feeling. The incidents of the preceding weeks had made it plain that her resistance to Meynell's influence with Mary had strangely and suddenly broken down. Owing to an experience of which she had not yet spoken to Mary, her inner will had given way. She saw with painful clearness what was coming; she was blind to none of the signs of advancing love; and she felt herself powerless. An intimation had been given her—so it seemed to her—to which she submitted. Her submission had cost her tears often, at night, when there was no one to see. And yet it had brought her also a strange happiness—like all such yieldings of soul.
But if she had yielded, if there was in her a reluctant practical certainty that Mary would some day be Meynell's wife, then her conscience, which was that of a woman who had passionately loved her husband, began to ask: "Ought she not to be standing by him in this trouble? If we keep it all from her, and he suffers and perhaps breaks down, when she might have sustained him, will she not reproach us? Should I not have bitterly reproached any one who had kept me from helping Robert in such a case?"
A state of mind, it will be seen, into which there entered not a trace of ordinary calculations. It did not occur to her that Mary might be injured in the world's eyes by publicly linking herself with a man under a cloud. Catharine, whose temptation to "scruple" in the religious sense was constant and tormenting, who recoiled in horror from what to others were the merest venial offences, in this connection asked one thing only. Where Barron had argued that an unbeliever must necessarily have a carnal mind, Catharine had simply assured herself at once by an unfailing instinct that the mind was noble and the temper pure. In those matters she was not to be deceived; she knew.
That being so, and if her own passionate objections to the marriage were to be put aside, then she could only judge for Mary as she would judge for herself.Notto love—notto comfort—could there be—for Love—any greater wound, any greater privation? She shrank, in a kind of terror, from inflicting it on Mary—Mary, unconscious and unknowing.
… The soft chatter of the fire, the plashing of the rain, filled the room with the atmosphere of reverie. Catharine's thoughts passed from her obligations toward Mary to grapple anxiously with those she might be under toward Meynell himself. The mere possession of the anonymous letter—and Flaxman had not given her leave to destroy it—weighed upon her conscience. It seemed to her she ought not to possess it; and she had been only half convinced by Flaxman's arguments for delay. She was rapidly coming to the belief that it should have been handed instantly to the Rector.
A step outside.
"Uncle Hugh!" said Mary, springing up. "I'll go and see if there are any scones for tea!" And she vanished into the kitchen, while Catharine admitted her brother-in-law.
"Meynell is to join me here in an hour or so," he said, as he followed her into the little sitting-room. Catharine closed the door, and looked at him anxiously. He lowered his voice.
"Barron called on him this morning—had only just gone when I arrived. Meynell has seen the letter to Dawes. I informed him of the letter to you, and I think he would like to have some talk with you."
Catharine's face showed her relief.
"Oh, I am glad—I amgladhe knows!"—she said, with emphasis. "We were wrong to delay."
"He told me nothing—and I asked nothing. But, of course, what the situation implies is unfortunately clear enough!—no need to talk of it. He won't and he can't vindicate himself, except by a simple denial. At any ordinary time that would be enough. But now—with all the hot feeling there is on the other subject—and the natural desire to discredit him—" Flaxman shrugged his shoulders despondently. "Rose's maid—you know the dear old thing she is—came to her last night, in utter distress about the talk in the village. There was a journalist here, a reporter from one of the papers that have been opposing Meynell most actively—"
"They are quite right to oppose him," interrupted Catharine quickly. Her face had stiffened.
"Perfectly! But you see the temptation?"
Catharine admitted it. She stood by the window looking out into the rain. And as she did so she became aware of a figure—the slight figure of a woman—walking fast toward the cottage along the narrow grass causeway that ran between the two ponds. On either side of the woman the autumn trees swayed and bent under the rising storm, and every now and then a mist of scudding leaves almost effaced her. She seemed to be breathlessly struggling with the wind as she sped onward, and in her whole aspect there was an indescribable forlornness and terror.
Catharine peered into the rain….
"Hugh!"—She turned swiftly to her brother-in-law—"There is some one coming to see me. Will you go?"—she pointed to the garden door on the farther side of the drawing-room—"and will you take Mary? Go round to the back. You know the old summer-house at the end of the wood-walk. We have often sheltered there from rain. Or there's the keeper's cottage a little farther on. I know Mary wanted to go there this afternoon. Please, dear Hugh!"
He looked at her in astonishment. Then through the large French window he too saw the advancing form. In an instant he had disappeared by the garden door. Catharine went into the hall, opened the door of the kitchen and beckoned to Mary, who was standing there with their little maid. "Don't come back just yet, darling!" she said in her ear—"Get your things on, and go with Uncle Hugh. I want to be alone."
Mary stepped back bewildered, and Catharine shut her in. Then she went back to the hall, just as a bell rang faintly.
"Is Mrs. Elsmere—"
Then as the visitor saw Catharine herself standing in the open doorway, she said with broken breath: "Can I come in—can I see you?"
Catharine drew her in.
* * * * *
"Dear Miss Puttenham!—how tired you are—and how wet! Let me take the cloak off."
And as she drew off the soaked waterproof, Catharine felt the trembling of the slight frame beneath.
"Come and sit by the fire," she said tenderly.
Alice sank into the chair that was offered her, her eyes fixed on Catharine. Every feature in the delicate oval face was pinched and drawn. The struggle with wild weather had drained the lips and the cheeks of colour, and her brown hair under her serge cap fell limply about her small ears and neck. She was an image not so much of grief as of some unendurable distress.
Catharine began to chafe her hands—but Alice stopped her—
"I am not cold—oh no, I'm not cold. Dear Mrs. Elsmere! You must think it so strange of me to come to you in this way. But I am in trouble—such great trouble—and I don't know what to do. Then I thought I'd come to you. You—you always seem to me so kind—you won't despise—or repulse me—I know you won't!"
Her voice sank to a whisper. Catharine took the two icy hands in her warm grasp.
"Tell me if there is anything I can do to help you."
"I—I want to tell you. You may be angry—because I've been Mary's friend—when I'd no right. I'm not what you think. I—I have a secret—or—I had. And now it's discovered—and I don't know what I shall do—it's so awful—so awful!"
Her head dropped on the chair behind her—and her eyes closed. Catharine, kneeling beside her, bent forward and kissed her.
"Won't you tell me?" she said, gently.
Alice was silent a moment. Then she suddenly opened her eyes—and spoke in a whisper.
"I—I was never married. But Hester Fox-Wilton's—my child!"
The tears came streaming from her eyes. They stood in Catharine's.
"You poor thing!" said Catharine brokenly, and raising one of the cold hands, she pressed it to her lips.
But Alice suddenly raised herself.
"You knew!"—she said—"You knew!" And her eyes, full of fear, stared into Catharine's. Then as Catharine did not speak immediately she went on with growing agitation, "You've heard—what everybody's saying? Oh! I don't know how I can face it. I often thought it would come—some time. And ever since that woman—since Judith—came home—it's been a nightmare. For I felt certain she'd come home because she was angry with us—and that she'd said something—before she died. Then nothing happened—and I've tried to think—lately—it was all right. But last night—"
She paused for self-control. Catharine was alarmed by her state—by its anguish, its excitement. It required an effort of her whole being before the sufferer could recover voice and breath, before she hurried on, holding Catharine's hands, and looking piteously into her face.
"Last night a woman came to see me—an old servant of mine who's nursed me sometimes—when I've been ill. She loves me—she's good to me. And she came to tell me what people were saying in the village—how there were letters going round, about me—and Hester—how everybody knew—and they were talking in the public-houses. She thought I ought to know—she cried—and wanted me to deny it. And of course I denied it—I was fierce to her—but it's true!"
She paused a moment, her pale lips moving soundlessly, unconsciously.
"I—I'll tell you about that presently. But the awful thing was—she said people were saying—that the Rector—that Mr. Meynell—was Hester's father—and Judith Sabin had told Mr. Barron so before her death. And they declared the Bishop would make him resign—and give up his living. It would be such a scandal, she said—it might even break up the League. And it would ruin Mr. Meynell, so people thought. Of course there were many people who were angry—who didn't believe a word—but this woman who told me was astonished that so manydidbelieve…. So then I thought all night—what I should do. And this morning I went to Edith, my sister, and told her. And she went into hysterics, and said she always knew I should bring disgrace on them in the end—and her life had been a burden to her for eighteen years—oh! that's what she says to me so often! But the strange thing was she wanted to make me promise I would say nothing—not a word. We were to go abroad, and the thing would die away. And then—"
She withdrew her hands from Catharine, and rising to her feet she pressed the damp hair back from her face, and began to pace the room—unconsciously—still talking.
"I asked her what was to happen about Richard—about the Rector. I said he must bring an action, and I would give evidence—it must all come out. And then she fell upon me—and said I was an ungrateful wretch. My sin had spoilt her life—and Ralph's. They had done all they could—and now the publicity—if I insisted—would disgrace them all—and ruin the girls' chances of marrying, and I don't know what besides. But if I held my tongue—we could go away for a time—it would be forgotten, and nobody out of Upcote need ever hear of it. People would never believe such a thing of Richard Meynell. Of course he would deny it—and of course his word would be taken. But to bring out the whole story in a law-court—"
She paused beside Catharine, wringing her hands, gathering up as it were her whole strength to pour it—slowly, deliberately—into the words that followed:
"But I—will run no risk of ruining Richard Meynell! As for me—what does it matter what happens to me! And darling Hester!—we could keep it from her—we would! She and I could live abroad. And I don't see how it could disgrace Edith and the girls—people would only say she and Ralph had been very good to me. But Richard Meynell!—with these trials coming on—and all the excitement about him—there'll be ever so many who would be wild to believe it! They won't care how absurd it is—they'll want tocrushhim! And he—he'llneversay a word for himself—to explain—never! Because he couldn't without telling all my story. And that—do you suppose Richard Meynell would ever dothat?—to any poor human soul that had trusted him?"
The colour had rushed back into her cheeks; she held herself erect, transfigured by the emotion that possessed her. Catharine looked at her in doubt—trouble—amazement. And then, her pure sense divined something—dimly—of what the full history of this soul had been; and her heart melted. She put out her hands and drew the speaker down again into the seat beside her.
"I think you'll have to let him decide that for you. He's a strong man—and a wise man. He'll judge what's right. And I ought to warn you that he'll be here probably—very soon. He wanted to see me."
Alice opened her startled eyes.
"About this? To see you? I don't understand."
"I had one of these letters—these wicked letters," said Catharine reluctantly.
Alice shrank and trembled. "It's terrible!"—her voice was scarcely to be heard. "Who is it hates me so?—or Richard?"
There was silence a moment. And in the pause the stress and tumult of nature without, the beating of the wind, and the plashing of the rain, seemed to be rushing headlong through the little room. But neither Catharine nor Alice was aware of it, except in so far as it played obscurely on Alice's tortured nerves, fevering and goading them the more. Catharine's gaze was bent on her companion; her mind was full of projects of help, which were also prayers; moments in that ceaseless dialogue with a Greater than itself, which makes the life of the Christian. And it was as though, by some secret influence, her prayers worked on Alice; for presently she turned in order that she might look straight into the face beside her.
"I'd like to tell you"—she said faintly—"oh—I'd like to tell you!"
"Tell me anything you will."
"It was when I was so young—just eighteen—like Hester. Oh! but you don't know about Neville—no one does now. People seem all to have forgotten him. But he came into his property here—the Abbey—the old Abbey—just when I was growing up. I saw him here first—but only once or twice. Then we met in Scotland. I was staying at a house near his shooting. And we fell in love. Oh, I knew he was married!—I can never say that I didn't know, even at the beginning. But his wife was so cruel to him—he was very, very unhappy. She couldn't understand him—or make allowances for him—she despised him, and wouldn't live with him. He was miserable—and so was I. My father and mother were dead! I had to live with Ralph and Edith; and they always made me feel that I was in their way. It wasn't their fault!—Iwasin the way. And then Neville came. He was so handsome, and so clever—so winning and dear—he could do everything. I was staying with some old cousins in Rossshire, who used to ask me now and then. There were no young people in the house. My cousins were quite kind to me, but I spent a great deal of time alone—and Neville and I got into a way of meeting—in lonely places—on the moors. No one found out. He taught me everything I ever knew, almost. He gave me books—and read to me. He was sorry for me—and at last—he loved me! And we never looked ahead. Then—in one week—everything happened together. I had to go home. He talked of going to Sandford, and implored me still to meet him. And I thought how Ralph and Edith would watch us, and spy upon us, and I implored him never to go to Sandford when I was at Upcote. We must meet at other places. And he agreed. Then the day came for me to go south. I travelled by myself—and he rode twenty miles to a junction station and joined me. Then we travelled all day together."
Her voice failed her. She pressed her thin hands together under the onset of memory, and that old conquered anguish which in spite of all the life that had been lived since still smouldered amid the roots of being.
"I may tell you?" she said at last, with a piteous look. Catharine bent over her.
"Anything that will help you. Only remember I don't ask or expect you to say anything."
"I ought"—said Alice miserably—"I ought—because of Mary."
Catharine was silent. She only pressed the hand she held. Alice resumed:
"It was a day that decided all my life. We were so wretched. We thought we could never meet again—it seemed as though we were both—with every station we passed—coming nearer to something like death—something worse than death. Then—before we got to Euston—I couldn't bear it—I—I gave way. We sent a telegram from Euston to Edith that I was going to stay with a school friend in Cornwall—and that night we crossed to Paris—"
She covered her face with her hands a moment; then went on more calmly:
"You'll guess all the rest. I was a fortnight with him in Paris. Then I went home. In a few weeks Edith guessed—and so did Judith Sabin, who was Edith's maid. Edith made me tell her everything. She and Ralph were nearly beside themselves. They were very strict in those days; Ralph was a great Evangelical, and used to speak at the May meetings. All his party looked up to him so—and consulted him. It was a fearful blow to him. But Edith thought of what to do—and she made him agree. We went abroad, she and I—with Judith. It was given out that Edith was delicate, and must have a year away. We stopped about in little mountain places—and Hester was born at Grenoble. And then for the last and only time, they let Neville come to see me—"
Her voice sank. She could only go on in a whisper.
"Three weeks later he was drowned on the Donegal coast. It was called an accident—but it wasn't. He had hoped and hoped to get his wife to divorce him—and make amends. And when Mrs. Flood's—his wife's—final letter came—she was a Catholic and nothing would induce her—he just took his boat out in a storm, and never came back—"
The story lost itself in a long sobbing sigh that came from the depths of life. When she spoke again it was with more strength:
"But he had written the night before to Richard—Richard Meynell. You know he was the Rector's uncle, though he was only seven years older? I had never seen Richard then. But I had often heard of him from Neville. Neville had taken a great fancy to him a year or two before, when Richard was still at college, and Neville was in the Guards. They used to talk of religion and philosophy. Neville was a great reader always—and they became great friends. So on his last night he wrote to Richard, telling him everything, and asking him to be kind to me—and Hester. And Richard—who had just been appointed to the living here—came out to the Riviera, and brought me the letter—and the little book that was in his pocket—when they found him. So you see …"
She spoke with fluttering colour and voice, as though to find words at all were a matter of infinite difficulty:
"You see that was how Richard came to take an interest in us—in Hester and me—how he came to be the friend too of Ralph and Edith. Poor Ralph!—Ralph was often hard to me, but he meant kindly—he would never have got through at all but for Richard. If Richard was away for a week, he used to fret. That was eighteen years ago—and I too should never have had any peace—any comfort in life again—but for Richard. He found somebody to live with me abroad for those first years, and then, when I came back to Upcote, he made Ralph and Edith consent to my living in that little house by myself—with my chaperon. He would have preferred—indeed he urged it—that I should go on living abroad. But there was Hester!—and I knew by that time that none of them had the least bit of love for her!—she was a burden to them all. I couldn't leave her to them—Icouldn't!… Oh! they were terrible, those years!" And again she caught Catharine's hands and held them tight. "You see, I was so young—not much over twenty—and nobody suspected anything. Nobody in the world knew anything—except Judith Sabin, who was in America, andshenever knew who Hester's father was—and my own people—and Richard! Richard taught me how to bear it—oh! not in words—for he never preached to me—but by his life. I couldn't have lived at all—but for him. And now you see—you see—how I am paying him back!"
And again, as the rush of emotion came upon her, she threw herself into a wild pleading, as though the gray-haired woman beside her were thwarting and opposing her.
"How can I let my story—my wretched story—ruin his life—and all his work? I can't—I can't! I came to you because you won't look at it as Edith does. You'll think of what's right—right to others. Last night I thought one must die of—misery. I suppose people would call it shame. It seemed to me I heard what they were all saying in the village—how they were gloating over it—after all these years. It seemed to strip one of all self-respect—all decency. And to-day I don't care about that! I care only that Richard shouldn't suffer because of what he did for me—and because of me. Oh! do help me, do advise me! Your look—your manner—have often made me want to come and tell you"—her voice was broken now with stifled sobs—"like a child—a child. Dear Mrs. Elsmere!—what ought I to do?"
And she raised imploring eyes to the face beside her, so finely worn with living and with human service.
"You must think first of Hester," said Catharine, with gentle steadiness, putting her arm round the bent shoulders. "I am sure the Rector would tell you that. She is your first—your sacredest duty."
Alice Puttenham shivered as though something in Catharine's tender voice reproached her.
"Oh, I know—my poor Hester! My life has set hers all wrong. Wouldn't it have been better to face it all from the beginning—to tell the truth—wouldn't it?" She asked it piteously.
"It might have been. But the other way was chosen; and now to undo it—publicly—affects not you only, but Hester. It mayn't be possible—it mayn't be right."
"I must!—I must!" said Alice impetuously, and rising to her feet she began to pace the room again with wild steps, her hands behind her, her slender form drawn tensely to its height.
At that moment Catharine became aware of some one standing in the porch just beyond the drawing-room of the tiny cottage.
"This may be Mr. Meynell." She rose to admit him.
Alice stood expectant. Her outward agitation disappeared. Some murmured conversation passed between the two persons in the little hall. Then Catharine came in again, followed by Meynell, who closed the door, and stood looking sadly at the pale woman confronting him.
"So they haven't spared even you?" he said at last, in a voice bitterly subdued. "But don't be too unhappy. It wants courage and wisdom on our part. But it will all pass away."
He quietly pushed a chair toward Alice, and then took off his dripping cloak, carried it into the passage outside, and returned.
"Don't go, Mrs. Elsmere," he said, as he perceived Catharine's uncertainty. "Stay and help us, if you will."
Catharine submitted. She took her accustomed seat by the fire; Alice, or the ghost of Alice, sat opposite to her, in Mary's chair, surrounded by Mary's embroidery things; and Meynell was between them.
He looked from one to the other, and there was something in his aspect which restrained Alice's agitation, and answered at once to some high expectation in Catharine.
"I know, Mrs. Elsmere, that you have received one of the anonymous letters that are being circulated in this neighbourhood, and I presume also—from what I see—that Miss Puttenham has given you her confidence. We must think calmly what is best to do. Now—the first person who must be in all our minds—is Hester."
He bent forward, looking into Alice's face, without visible emotion; rather with the air of peremptory common sense which had so often helped her through the difficulties of her life.
She sat drooping, her head on her hand, making no sign.
"Let us remember these facts," he resumed. "Hester is in a critical state of life and mind. She imagines herself to be in love with my cousin Philip Meryon, a worthless man, without an ounce of conscience where women are concerned, who, in my strong belief, is already married under the ambiguities of Scotch law, though his wife, if she is his wife, left him some years ago, detests him, and has never been acknowledged. I have convinced him at last—this morning—that I mean to bring this home to him. But that does not dispose of the thing—finally. Hester is in danger—in danger from herself. She is at war with her family—with the world. She believes nobody loves her—that she is and always has been a pariah at home—and with her temperament she is in a mood for desperate things. Tell her now that she is illegitimate—let your sister Edith go talking to her about 'disgrace'—and there is no saying what will happen. She will say—and think—that she has no responsibilities, and may do what she pleases. There is no saying what she might do. We might have a tragedy that none of us could prevent."
Alice lifted her head.
"I could go away with her," she said, imploringly. "I could watch over her day and night. But let me put this thing straight now publicly. Indeed—indeed, it is time."
"You mean you wish to bring an action? In that case you would have to return to give evidence."
"Yes—for a short time. But that could be managed. She should never see the English papers—I could promise that."
"And what is to prevent Philip Meryon telling her? At present he is entirely ignorant of her parentage. I have convinced myself of that this morning. He has no dealings with the people here, nor they with him. What has been happening here has not reached him. And he is really off to-night. We must, of course, always take the risk of his knowing, and of his telling her. A libel action would convert that risk into a certainty. Would it not simply forward whatever designs he may have on her—for I do not believe for a moment he will abandon them—it will be a duel, rather, between him and us—would it not actually forward his designs—to tell her?"
Alice did not reply. She sat wringing her delicate hands in a silent desperation; while Catharine opposite was lost in the bewilderment of the situation—the insistence of the woman, the refusal of the man.
"My advice is this"—continued Meynell, still addressing Alice—"that you should take her to Paris tomorrow in my stead, and should stay near her for some months. Lady Fox-Wilton—whom I have just seen—she overtook me driving on the Markborough road half an hour ago, and we had some conversation—talks of taking a house at Tours for a year—an excellent thing—for them all. We don't want her on the spot any longer—we don't want any of them!" said the Rector, dismissing the Fox-Wilton family with an emphatic gesture which probably represented what he had gone through in the interview with Edith. … "In that way the thing will soon die down. There will be nobody here—nobody within reach—for the scoundrel who is writing these letters to attack—except, of course, myself—and I shall know how to deal with it. He will probably tire of the amusement. Other people will be ashamed of having read the letters and believed them. I even dare to hope that Mr. Barron—in time—may be ashamed."
Alice looked at him in tremulous despair.
"Nobody to attack!" she said—"nobody to attack! And you,Richard—you?"
A dry smile flickered on his face.
"Leave that to me—I assure you you may leave it to me."
"Richard!" said Alice imploringly—"just think. I know what you say is very important—very true. But for me personally"—she looked round the room with wandering eyes; then found a sudden passionate gesture, pressing back the hair from her brow with both hands—"for me personally—to tell the truth—to face the truth—would be relief—infinite relief! It would kill the fear in which I have lived all these years—kill it forever. It would be better for all of us if we had told the truth—from the beginning. And as for Hester—she must know—you say yourself she must know before long—when she is of age—when she marries—"
Meynell's face took an unconscious hardness.
"Forgive me!—the matter must be left to me. The only person who could reasonably take legal action would be myself—and I shall not take it. I beg you, be advised by me." He bent forward again. "My dear friend!"—and now he spoke with emotion—"in your generous consideration for me you do not know what you are proposing—what an action in the courts would mean, especially at this moment. Think of the party spirit that would be brought into it—the venom—the prejudice—the base insinuations. No!—believe me—that is out of the question—for your sake—and Hester's."
"And your work—your influence?"
"If they suffer—they must suffer. But do not imagine that I shall not defend myself—and you—you above all—from calumny and lies. Of course I shall—in my own way."
There was silence—a dismal silence. At the end of it Meynell stretched out his hand to Alice with a smile. She placed her own in it, slowly, with a look which filled Catharine's eyes once more with tears.
"Trust me!" said Meynell, as he pressed the hand. "Indeed you may." Then he turned to Catharine Elsmere—
"I think Mrs. Elsmere is with me—that she approves?"
"With one reservation." The words came gravely, after a moment's doubt.
His eyes asked her to be frank.
"I think it would be possible—I think it would be just—if Miss Puttenham were to empower you to go to your Bishop. He too has rights!" said Catharine, her clear skin reddening.
Meynell paused: then spoke with hesitation.
"Yes—that I possibly might do—if you permit me?" He turned again toAlice.
"Go to him—go to him at once!" she said with a sob she could not repress.
Another silence. Then Meynell walked to the window and looked at the weather.
"It is not raining so fast," he said in his cheerful voice. "Oughtn't you to be going home—getting ready and arranging with Hester? It's an awful business going abroad."
Alice rose silently. Catharine went into the kitchen to fetch the waterproof which had been drying.
Alice and Meynell were left alone.
She looked up.
"It is so hard to be hated!" she said passionately—"to see you hated. It seems to burn one's heart—the coarse and horrible things that are being said—"
He frowned and fidgeted—till the thought within forced its way:
"Christ was hated. Yet directly the least touch of it comes to us, we rebel—we cry out against God."
"It is because we are so weak—we are not Christ!" She covered her face with her hands.
"No—but we are his followers—if the Life that was in him is in us too. 'Life that in me has rest—as I—Undying Life—have power in Thee!'" He fell—murmuring—into lines that had evidently been in his thoughts, smiling upon her.
Then Catharine returned. Alice was warmly wrapped up, and Catharine took her to the door, leaving Meynell in the sitting-room.
"We will come and help you this evening—Mary and I," she said tenderly, as they stood together in the little passage.
"Mary?" Alice looked at her in a trembling uncertainty.
"Mary—of course."
Alice thought a moment, and then said with a low intensity, a force to which Catharine had no clue—"I want you—to tell her—the whole story. Will you?"
Catharine kissed her cheek in silence, and they parted.
* * * * *
Catharine went slowly back to the little sitting-room. Meynell was standing abstracted before the fire, his hands clasped in front of him, his head bent. Catharine approached him—drawing quick breath.
"Mr. Meynell—what shall I do—what do you wish me to do or say—with regard to my daughter?"
He turned—pale with amazement.
And so began what one may call—perhaps—the most romantic action of a noble life!
When Catharine returned to the little sitting-room, in which the darkness of a rainy October evening was already declaring itself, she came shaken by many emotions in which only one thing was clear—that the man before her was a good man in distress, and that her daughter loved him.
If she had been of the true bigot stuff she would have seen in the threatened scandal a means of freeing Mary from an undesirable attachment. But just as in her married life, her heart had not been able to stand against her husband while her mind condemned him, so now. While in theory, and toward people with whom she never came in contact, she had grown even more bitter and intransigent since Robert's death than she had been in her youth, she had all the time been living the daily life of service and compassion which—unknown to herself—had been the real saving and determining force. Impulses of love, impulses of sacrifice toward the miserable, the vile, and the helpless—day by day she had felt them, day by day she had obeyed them. And thus all the arteries, so to speak, of the spiritual life had remained soft and pliant—that life itself in her was still young. It was there in truth that her Christianity lay; while she imagined it to lie in the assent to certain historical and dogmatic statements. And so strong was this inward and vital faith—so strengthened in fact by mere living—that when she was faced with this second crisis in her life, brought actually to close grips with it, that faith, against all that might have been expected, carried her through the difficult place with even greater sureness than at first. She suffered indeed. It seemed to her all through that she was endangering Mary, and condoning a betrayal of her Lord. And yet she could not act upon this belief. She must needs act—with pain often, and yet with mysterious moments of certainty and joy, on quite another faith, the faith which has expressed itself in the perennial cry of Christianity: "Little children, love one another!" And therein lay the difference between her and Barron.
It was therefore in this mixed—and yet single—mood that she came back to Meynell, and asked him—quietly—the strange question: "What shall I do—what do you wish me to do or say—with regard to my daughter?"
Meynell could not for a moment believe that he had heard aright. He stared at her in bewilderment, at first pale, and then in a sudden heat and vivacity of colour.
"I—I hardly understand you, Mrs. Elsmere."
They stood facing each other in silence.
"Surely we need not inform her," he said, at last, in a low voice.
"Only that a wicked and untrue story has been circulated—that you cannot, for good reasons, involving other persons, prosecute those responsible for it in the usual way. And if she comes across any signs of it, or its effects, she is to trust your wisdom in dealing with it—and not to be troubled—is not that what you would like me to say?"
"That is indeed what I should like you to say." He raised his eyes to her gravely.
"Or—will you say it yourself?"
He started.
"Mrs. Elsmere!"—he spoke with quick emotion—"You are wonderfully good to me." He scanned her with an unsteady face—then made an agitated step toward her. "It almost makes me think—you permit me—"
"No—no," said Catharine, hurriedly, drawing back. "But if you would like to speak to Mary—she will be here directly."
"No!"—he said, after a moment, recovering his composure—"I couldn't!But—will you?"
"If you wish it." Then she added, "She will of course never ask a question; it will be her business to know nothing of the matter—in itself. But she will be able to show you her confidence, and to feel that we have treated her as a woman—not a child."'
Meynell drew a deep breath. He took Catharine's hand and pressed it. She felt with a thrill—which was half bitterness—that it was already a son's look he turned upon her.
"You—you have guessed me?" he said, almost inaudibly.
"I see there is a great friendship between you."
"Friendship!" Then he restrained himself sharply. "But I ought not to speak of it—to intrude myself and my affairs on her notice at all at this moment…." He looked at his companion almost sternly. "Is it not clear that I ought not? I meant to have brought her a book to-day. I have not brought it. I have been even glad—thankful—to think you were going away, although—" But again he checked the personal note. "The truth is I could not endure that through me—through anything connected with me—she might be driven upon facts and sorrows—ugly facts that would distress her, and sorrows for which she is too young. It seemed to me indeed I might not be able to help it. But at the same time it was clear to me, to-day, that at such a time—feeling as I do—I ought not in the smallest degree to presume upon her—and your—kindness to me. Above all"—his voice shook—"I could not come forward—I could not speak to her—as at another time I might have spoken. I could not run the smallest risk—of her name being coupled with mine—when my character was being seriously called in question. It would not have been right for her; it would not have been seemly for myself. So what was there—but silence? And yet I felt—that through this silence—we should somehow trust each other!"
He paused a moment, looking down upon his companion. Catharine was sitting by the fire near a small table on which her elbow rested, her face propped on her hand. There was something in the ascetic refinement, the grave sweetness of her aspect, that played upon him with a tonic and consoling force. He remembered the frozen reception she had given him at their first meeting; and the melting of her heart toward him seemed a wonderful thing. And then came the delicious thought—"Would she so treat him, unless Mary—Mary!—"
But, at the same time, there was in him the mind of the practical man, which plainly and energetically disapproved her. And presently he tried, with much difficulty, to tell her so, to impress upon her—upon her, Mary's mother—that Mary must not be allowed to hold any communication with him, to show any kindness toward him, till this cloud had wholly cleared away, and the sky was clear again. He became almost angry as he urged this; so excited, indeed, and incoherent that a charming smile stole into Catharine's gray eyes.
"I understand quite what you feel," she said as she rose, "and why you feel it. But I am not bound to follow your advice—or to agree with you—am I?"
"Yes, I think you are," he said stoutly.
Then a shadow fell over her face.
"I suppose I am doing a strange thing"—her manner faltered a little—"but it seems to me right—I have beenled—else why was it so plain?"
She raised her clear eyes, and he understood that she spoke of those "hints" and "voices" of the soul that play so large a part in the more mystical Christian experience. She hurried on:
"When two people—two people like you and Mary—feel such a deep interest in each other—surely it is God's sign." Then, suddenly, the tears shone. "Oh, Mr. Meynell!—trial brings us nearer to our Saviour. Perhaps—through it—you and Mary—will find Him!"
He saw that she was trembling from head to foot; and his own emotion was great.
He took her hand again, and held it in both his own.
"Do you imagine," he said huskily "that you and I are very far apart?"
And again the tenderness of his manner was a son's tenderness.
She shook her head, but she could not speak. She gently withdrew her hand, and turned aside to gather up some letters on the table.
A sound of footsteps could be heard outside. Catharine moved to the window.
"It is Mary," she said quietly. "Will you wait a little while I meet her?" And without giving him time to reply, she left the room.
He walked up and down, not without some humorous bewilderment in spite of his emotion. The saints, it seemed, are persons of determination! But, after a minute, he thought of nothing, realized nothing, save that Mary was in the little house again, and that one of those low voices he could just hear, as a murmur in the distance, through the thin walls of the cottage, was hers.
The door opened softly, and she came in. Though she had taken off her hat, she still wore her blue cloak of Irish frieze, which fell round her slender figure in long folds. Her face was rosy with rain and wind; the same wind and rain which had stamped such a gray fatigue on Alice Puttenham's cheeks. Amid the dusk, the fire-light touched her hair and her ungloved hand. She was a vision of youth and soft life; and her composure, her slight, shy smile, would alone have made her beautiful.
Their hands met as she gently greeted him. But there was that in his look which disturbed her gentleness—which deepened her colour. She hurried to speak.
"I am so glad that mother made you stay—just that I might tell you." Then her breath began to hasten. "Mother says you are—or may be—unjustly attacked—that you don't think it right to defend yourself publicly—and those who follow you, and admire you, may be hurt and troubled. I wanted to say—and mother approves—that whoever is hurt and troubled, I can never be—except for you. Besides, I shall know and ask nothing. You may be sure of that. And people will not dare to speak to me."
She stood proudly erect.
Meynell was silent for a moment. Then, by a sudden movement, he stooped and kissed a fold of her cloak. She drew back with a little stifled cry, putting out her hands, which he caught. He kissed them both, dropped them, and walked away from her.
When he returned it was with another aspect.
"Don't let's make too much of this trouble. It may all die away—or it may be a hard fight. But whatever happens, you are going to Westmoreland immediately. That is my great comfort."
"Is it?" She laughed unsteadily.
He too smiled. There was intoxication he could not resist—in her presence—and in what it implied.
"It is the best possible thing that could be done. Then—whatever happens—I shall not be compromising my friends. For a while—there must be no communication between them and me."
"Oh, yes!" she said, involuntarily clasping her hands. "Friends may write."
"May they?" He thought it over, with a furrowed brow, then raised it, clear. "What shall they write about?"
An exquisite joyousness trembled in her look.
"Leave it to them!"
Then, as she once more perceived the anxiety and despondency in him, the brightness clouded; pity possessed her: "Tell me what you are preaching—and writing."
"IfI preach—ifI write. And what will you tell me?"
"'How the water comes down at Lodore,'" she said gayly. "What the mountains look like, and how many rainy days there are in a week."
"Excellent! I perceive you mean to libel the country I love!"
"You can always come and see!" she said, with a shy courage.
He shook his head.
"No. My Westmoreland holiday is given up."
"Because of the Movement?"
And sitting down by the fire, still with that same look of suppressed and tremulous joy, she began to question him about the meetings and engagements ahead. But he would not be drawn into any talk about them. It was no doubt quite possible—though not, he thought, probable—that he might soon be ostracized from them all. But upon this he would not dwell, and though her understanding of the whole position was far too vague to warn her from these questions, she soon perceived that he was unwilling to answer them as usual. Silence indeed fell between them; but it was a silence of emotion. She had thrown off her cloak, and sat looking down, in the light of the fire; she knew that he observed her, and the colour on her cheek was due to something more than the flame at her feet. As they realized each other's nearness indeed, in the quiet of the dim room, it was with a magic sense of transformation. Outside the autumn storm was still beating—symbol of the moral storm which threatened them. Yet within were trust and passionate gratitude and tender hope, intertwined, all of them, with the sacred impulse of the woman toward the man, and of the man toward the woman. Each moment as it passed built up one of those watersheds of life from which henceforward the rivers flow broadening to undreamt-of seas.
* * * * *
When Catharine returned, Meynell was hat in hand for departure. There was no more expression of feeling or reference to grave affairs. They stood a few moments chatting about ordinary things. Incidentally Hugh Flaxman's loss of the two gold coins was mentioned. Meynell inquired when they were first missed.
"That very evening," said Mary. "Rose always puts them away herself. She missed the two little cases at once. One was a coin of Velia, with a head of Athene—"
"I remember it perfectly," said Meynell. "It dropped on the floor when I was talking to Norham—and I picked it up—with another, if I remember right—a Hermes!"
Mary replied that the Hermes too was missing—that both were exceedingly rare; and that in the spring a buyer for the Louvre had offered Hugh four hundred pounds for the two.
"They feel most unhappy and uncomfortable about it. None of the servants seems to have gone into that room during the party. Rose put all the coins on the table herself. She remembers saying good-bye to Canon France and his sister in the drawing-room—and two or three others—and immediately afterward she went into the green drawing-room to lock up the coins. There were two missing."
"She doesn't remember who had been in the room?"
"She vaguely remembers seeing two or three people go in and out—theBishop!—Canon Dornal!"
They both laughed. Then Meynell's face set sharply. A sudden recollection shot through his mind. He beheld the figure of a sallow, dark-haired young man slipping—alone—through the doorway of the green drawing-room. And this image in the mind touched and fired others, like a spark running through dead leaves….
* * * * *
When he had gone, Catharine turned to Mary, and Mary, running, wound her arms close round her mother, and lay her head on Catharine's breast.
"You angel!—you darling!" she said, and raising her mother's hand she kissed it passionately.
Catharine's eyes filled with tears, and her heart with mingled joy and revolt. Then, quickly, she asked herself as she stood there in her child's embrace whether she should speak of a certain event—certain experience—which had, in truth, though Mary knew nothing of it, vitally affected both their lives.
But she could not bring herself to speak of it.
So that Mary never knew to what, in truth, she owed the painful breaking down of an opposition and a hostility which might in time have poisoned all their relations to each other.
But when Mary had gone away to change her damp clothes, the visionary experience of which Catharine could not tell came back upon her; and again she felt the thrill—the touch of bodiless ecstasy.
It had been in the early morning, when all such things befall. For then the mind is not yet recaptured by life and no longer held by sleep. There is in it a pure expectancy, open to strange influences: influences from memory and the under-soul. It visualizes easily, and dream and fact are one.
In this state Catharine woke on a September morning and felt beside her a presence that held her breathless. The half-remembered images and thoughts of sleep pursued her—became what we call "real."
"Robert!" she said, aloud—very low.
And without voice, it seemed to her that some one replied. A dialogue began into which she threw her soul. Of her body, she was not conscious; and yet the little room, its white ceiling, its open windows, and the dancing shadows of the autumn leaves were all present to her. She poured out the sorrow, the anxiety—about Mary—that pressed so heavy on her heart, and the tender voice answered, now consoling, now rebuking.
"And we forbade him, because he followed not us … Forbid him not—forbid him not!"—seemed to go echoing through the quiet air.
The words sank deep into her sense—she heard herself sobbing—and the unearthly presence came nearer—though still always remote, intangible—with the same baffling distance between itself and her….
The psychology of it was plain. It was the upthrust into consciousness of the mingled ideas and passions on which her life was founded, piercing through the intellectualism of her dogmatic belief. But though she would have patiently accepted any scientific explanation, she believed in her heart that Robert had spoken to her, bidding her renounce her repugnance to Mary's friendship with Meynell—to Mary's love for Meynell.
She came down the morning after with a strange, dull sense of change and disaster. But the currents of her mind and will had set firmly in a fresh direction. It was almost mechanically—under a strong sense of guidance—that she had made her hesitating proposal to Mary to go with her to the Upcote meeting. Mary's look of utter astonishment had sent new waves of disturbance and compunction through the mother's mind.
* * * * *
But if these things could not be told—even to Mary—there were other revelations to make.
When the lamp had been brought in, and the darkness outside shut out,Catharine laid her hand on Mary's, and told the story of Alice Puttenham.
Mary heard it in silence, growing very pale. Then, with another embrace of her mother, she went away upstairs, only pausing at the door of the sitting-room to ask when they should start for the cottage.
Upstairs Mary sat for long in the dark, thinking…. Through her uncurtained windows she watched the obscure dying away of the storm, the calming of the trees, and the gradual clearing of the night sky. Between the upfurling clouds the stars began to show; tumult passed into a great tranquillity; and a breath of frost began to steal through the woods, and over the water….
Catharine too passed an hour of reflection—and of yearning over the unhappy. Naturally, to Mary, her lips had been sealed on that deepest secret of all, which she had divined for a moment in Alice. She had clearly perceived what was or had been the weakness of the woman, together with the loyal unconsciousness and integrity of the man. And having perceived it, not only pity but the strain in Catharine of plain simplicity and common sense bade her bury and ignore it henceforward. It was what Alice's true mind must desire; and it was the only way to help her. She began however to understand what might be the full meaning of Alice's last injunction—and her eyes grew wet.
* * * * *
Mother and daughter started about eight o'clock for the cottage. They had a lantern with them, but they hardly needed it, for through the tranquillized air a new moon shone palely, and the frost made way. Catharine walked rejoicing apparently in renewed strength and recovered powers of exertion. Some mining, crippling influence seemed to have been removed from her since her dream. And yet, even at this time, she was not without premonitions—physical premonitions—as to the future—faint signal-voices that the obscure life of the body can often communicate to the spirit.
They found the cottage all in light and movement. Servants were flying about; boxes were in the hall; Hester had come over to spend the night at the cottage that she and "Aunt Alice" might start by an early train.
Alice came out to meet her visitors in the little hall. Catharine slipped into the drawing-room. Alice and Mary held each other enwrapped in one of those moments of life that have no outward expression but dimmed eyes and fluttering breath.
"Is it all done? Can't I help?" said Mary at last, scarcely knowing what she said, as Alice released her.
"No, dear, it's all done—except our books. Come up with me while I pack them."
And they vanished upstairs, hand in hand.
Meanwhile Hester in her most reckless mood was alternately flouting and caressing Catharine Elsmere. She was not in the least afraid of Catharine, and it was that perhaps which had originally drawn Catharine's heart to her. Elsmere's widow was accustomed to feel herself avoided by young people who discussed a wild literature, and appeared to be without awe toward God, or reverence toward man. Yet all the time, through her often bewildered reprobation of them, she hungered for their affection, and knew that she carried in herself treasures of love to give—though no doubt, on terms.
But Hester had always divined these treasures, and was, besides, as a rule, far too arrogant and self-centred to restrain herself in anything she wished to say or do for fear of hurting or shocking her elders.
At this moment she had declared herself tired out with packing, and was lounging in an armchair in the little drawing-room. A Japanese dressing-gown of some pale pink stuff sprayed with almond blossom floated about her, disclosing a skimpy silk petticoat and a slender foot from which she had kicked its shoe. Her pearly arms and neck were almost bare; her hair tumbled on her shoulders; her eyes shone with excitement provoked by a dozen hidden and conflicting thoughts. In her beauty, her ardent and provocative youth, she seemed to be bursting out of the little room, with its artistic restraint of colour and furnishing.
"Don't please do any more fussing," she said imploringly to Catharine. "It's all done—only Aunt Alice thinks it's never done. Do sit down and talk."