Gwen remained at Pensham until the end of the week. Events occurred, no doubt, but, with one exception, they are outside the story. That exception was a visit to Chorlton, in order that Adrian should not remain a stranger to the interesting old twins. His interest would have been stronger no doubt could he have really seen them. Even as it was he was keenly alive to the way in which old Mrs. Prichard seemed to have fascinated Gwen, and was eager to make as much acquaintance with her as his limitations left possible to him.
Gwen contrived to arrange that she should receive every day from Chorlton not only a line from Ruth Thrale, but an official bulletin from Dr. Nash.
The first of these despatches arrived on the Tuesday afternoon, she having told her correspondents that that would be soon enough. It disappointed her. She had left the old lady so much revived by the small quantity of provisions that did duty for a Sunday dinner, that she had jumped to the conclusion that another day would see her sitting up before the fire as she had seen her in thecelebrated chair with cushions at Sapps Court. It was therefore rather a damper to be told by Dr. Nash that he had felt that absolute rest continued necessary, and that he had not been able to sanction any attempt to get Mrs. Prichard up for any length of time.
Gwen turned for consolation to Widow Thrale's letter. It was a model of reserve—would not say too much. "My mother" had talked a good deal with herself and "mother" till late, but had slept fairly well, and if she was tired this morning it was no more than Dr. Nash said we were to expect. She had had a "peaceful day" yesterday, talking constantly with "mother" of their childhood, but never referring to "my father" nor Australia. Dr. Nash had said the improvement would be slow. No reference was made to any possibility of getting her into her clothes and a return to normal life.
Gwen recognised the bearer of the letters, a young native of Chorlton, when she gave him the reply she had written, with a special letter she had ready for "dear old Mrs. Picture." "I know you," said she. "How's your Bull? I hope he won't kill Farmer Jones or anyone while you're not there to whistle to him." To which the youth answered:—"Who-ap not! Sarve they roi-ut, if they dwoan't let un bid in a's stall. A penned un in afower a coomed away." Gwen thought to herself that life at Jones's farm must be painfully volcanic, and despatched the Bull's guardian genius on his cob with the largest sum of money in his pocket that he had ever possessed in his life, after learning his name, which was Onesimus.
When Onesimus reappeared with a second despatch on the afternoon of the next day, Wednesday, Gwen opened it with a beating heart in a hurry for its contents. She did as one does with letters containing news, reading persistently through to the end and taking no notice at all of Irene's interrogatory "Well?" which of course was uttered long before the quickest reader could master the shortest letter's contents. When the end came, she said with evident relief:—"Oh yes,that'sallright! Now if we drive over to-morrow, she will probably be up."
"Is that what the letter says?" Adrian spoke, and Gwen, saying "He won't believe my report, you see! You read it!"—threw the letter over to Irene, who read it aloud to her brother, while Gwen looked at the other letter, from Widow Thrale.
What Irene read did not seem so very conclusive. Mrs. Prichard had had a better night, having slept six hours without a break. But the great weakness continued. If she could take a very littlestimulant it would be an assistance, as it might enable her to eat more. But she had an unconquerable aversion to wine and spirits in any form, and Dr. Nash was very reluctant to force her against her will.
So said Adrian:—"What she wants is real turtle soup and champagne.Iknow." Whereupon his father, who was behind theTimes—meaning, not the Age, but the "Jupiter" of our boyhood, looked over its title, and said:—"Champagne—champagne? There's plenty in the bin—end of the cellar—Tweedie knows. You'll find my keys on the desk there"—and went back to an absorbing leader, denouncing the defective Commissariat in the Crimea. A moment later, he remembered a thing he had forgotten—his son's blindness. "Stop a minute," he said. "I have to go, myself, later, and I may as well go now." And presently was heard discussing cellar-economics, afar, with Tweedie the butler.
The lady of the house wanted the carriage and pair next day to drive over to Foxbourne in the afternoon and wait to bring her back after the meeting. The story merely gives the bold wording used to notify the fact: it does not know what Foxbourne was, nor why there was a meeting. Its only reason for referring to them is that the party for Chorlton had to change its plans and go by the up-train from St. Everall's to Grantley Thorpe, and make it stop there specially. St. Everall's, you may remember, is the horrible new place about two miles from Pensham. The carriage could take them there and be back in plenty of time, and there was always a groggy old concern to be had at the Crown at Grantley that would run them over to Strides Cottage in half an hour. If it had been favourable weather, no doubt the long drive would have been much pleasanter; but with the chance of a heavy downfall of snow making the roads difficult, the short drives and short railway journey had advantages.
Therefore when the groggy old concern, which had seen better days—early Georgian days, probably—pulled up at Strides Cottage in the afternoon, with a black pall of cloud, whose white heralds were already coming thick and fast ahead of it, hanging over Chorlton Down, two at least of the travellers who alighted from it had misgivings that if their visit was a prolonged one, its grogginess and antiquity might stand in its way on a thick-snowed track in the dark, and might end in their being late for the down-train at six. The third of their number saw nothing, and only said:—"Hullo—snowing!" when on getting free of the concern one of the heralds aforesaid perished to convince him ofits veracity; gave up the ghost between his shirt-collar and his epidermis. "Yes," he continued, addressing the first inhabitant of the cottage who greeted him. "You are quite right. I am the owner of a dog, and you do perfectly right to inquire about him. His nose is singularly unlike yours. He will detect your flavour when I return, and I shall have to allay his jealousy. It is his fault. We are none of us perfect." The dog gave a short bark which might have meant that Adrian had better hold his tongue, as anything he said might be used against him.
"Now you are in the kitchen and sitting-room I've told you of, because it's both," said Gwen. "And here is Granny Marrable herself."
"Give me hold of your hand, Granny. Because I can't see you, more's the pity! I shall hope to see you some day—like people when they want you not to call. At present my looks don't flatter me. People think I'm humbugging when I say I can't see them. Ican't!"
"'Tis a small wonder, sir," said Granny Marrable, "people should be hard of belief. I would not have thought you could not, myself. But being your eyes are spared, by God's mercy, they be ready for the sight to return, when His will is."
"That's all, Granny. It's only the sight that's wanting. The eyes are as good as any in the kingdom, in themselves." This made Gwen feel dreadfully afraid Granny Marrable would think the gentleman was laughing at her. But Adrian had taken a better measure of the Granny's childlike simplicity and directness than hers. He ran on, as though it was all quite right. "Anyhow, don't run away from us to Kingdom Come just yet a while, Granny, and see if I don't come to see you and your sister—real eyesight, you know; not this make-believe! I hope she's picking up."
"She's better—because Dr. Nash says she's better. Only I wish it would come out so we might see it. But it may be I'm a bit impatient. 'Tis the time of life does it, no doubt."
Ruth Thrale returned from the inner room. "She would like her ladyship to go to her," said she. Gwen could not help noticing that somehow—Heaven knows how, but quite perceptibly—the next room seemed to claim for itself the status of an invalid chamber. She accompanied Widow Thrale, who closed the room-door behind her, apparently to secure unheard speech in the passage. "She isn't anyworse, you know," said Ruth, in a reassuring manner, which made her hearer look scared, and start. "Only when she gets away to thinking of beyond the seas—that place where she was—thatisbad for her, say how we may! Not that sheminds talking of my father, nor my brother that died, nor any tale of the land and the people; but 'tis the coming back to make it all fit."
Gwen quite understood this, and re-worded it, for elucidation. "Of course everything clashes, and the poor old dear can't make head or tail of it! Has there been any particular thing, lately?" The reply was:—"Yes—early this morning. She woke up talking about Mrs. Skillick, the name sounded like, and how kind she was to bring her the fresh lettuces. And then she found me by her and knew I was Ruth, but was all in a maze why! Then it all seemed to come on her again, and she was in a bad upset for a while. But I did not tell mother of that. I am glad you have come, my lady. It will make her better."
"Skillick wasn't Australia," said Gwen. "It was some person she lived with here in England—not so long ago. Somewhere near London. What did you do to quiet her?"
"I talked to her about Dave and Dolly. That is always good for her—it seems to steady her. Shall we go in, my lady? I think she heard you." Again Gwen had an impression that concession had been made to the inexorable, and that whereas four days ago it was taken for granted that old Mrs. Picture's collapse was only to be temporary, a permanency of invalidism was now accepted as a working hypothesis. Only a temporary permanency, of course, to last till further notice!
HOW GWEN INTRODUCED MR. TORRENS, AND MRS. PICTURE TOOK HOLD OF HIS HAND. OF MR. TORREN'S FIRM FAITH IN DEVILS, AND OLD MAISIE'S HAPPINESS THEREAT. THE DOCTOR'S MEMORY OF ADRIAN'S FIRST APPEARANCE AS A CORPSE. THE LAXITY OF GENERAL PRACTIOTIONERS. HIS WISH TO INTOXICATE MRS. PRICHARD. HOW GWEN SANG GLUCK TO ADRIAN, AND ONESIMUS BROUGHT HER A LETTER. QUITE A GOOD REPORT. HOW GWEN WASN'T ANXIOUS. OF ADRIAN'S INVISIBLE MOTHER. HER SELECTNESS, AND HIGH BREEDING. ADRIAN'S VIEWS ABOUT SUICIDES. SURVIVORS' SELFISHNESS TOWARDS THEM, HOW HE TALKED ABOUT THAT DEVIL, AND LET OUT THAT THE OLD LADY HAD FLASHED ACROSS HIS RETINA. HOW HE HAD CLOTHED EACH TWIN'S HEAD WITH THE OTHER'S HAIR
HOW GWEN INTRODUCED MR. TORRENS, AND MRS. PICTURE TOOK HOLD OF HIS HAND. OF MR. TORREN'S FIRM FAITH IN DEVILS, AND OLD MAISIE'S HAPPINESS THEREAT. THE DOCTOR'S MEMORY OF ADRIAN'S FIRST APPEARANCE AS A CORPSE. THE LAXITY OF GENERAL PRACTIOTIONERS. HIS WISH TO INTOXICATE MRS. PRICHARD. HOW GWEN SANG GLUCK TO ADRIAN, AND ONESIMUS BROUGHT HER A LETTER. QUITE A GOOD REPORT. HOW GWEN WASN'T ANXIOUS. OF ADRIAN'S INVISIBLE MOTHER. HER SELECTNESS, AND HIGH BREEDING. ADRIAN'S VIEWS ABOUT SUICIDES. SURVIVORS' SELFISHNESS TOWARDS THEM, HOW HE TALKED ABOUT THAT DEVIL, AND LET OUT THAT THE OLD LADY HAD FLASHED ACROSS HIS RETINA. HOW HE HAD CLOTHED EACH TWIN'S HEAD WITH THE OTHER'S HAIR
Has it not been the experience of all of us, many a time, that a few days' clear absence from an invalid has been needed, to distinguisha slow change, invisible to the watchers by the bedside? And all the while, have not the daily bulletins made out a case for indefinable slight improvements, negligible gains scarcely worth naming, whose total some mysterious flaw of calculation persistently calls loss?
There may have been very little actual change; there was room for so little. But Gwen had been building up hopes of an improvement. And now she had to see her house of cards tremble and portend collapse. She saved the structure—as one has done in real card-life—by gingerly removing a top storey, in terror of a cataclysm. She would not hope so much—indeed, indeed!—if Fate would only leave some of her structure standing. But she was at fault for a greeting, all but a disjointed word or two, when Ruth, falling back, left her to enter the bedroom alone.
It was a consolation to hear the old lady's voice. "My dear—my dear—I knew you would come. I woke in the night, and thought to myself—she will come, my lady. Then I rang, and my Ruth came. She comes so quick."
"And then that was just as good as me," said Gwen. "Wasn't it?"
"She is my child—my Ruth. And Phoebe is my Phoebe—years ago! But I have to think so much, to make it all fit. You are not like that.'
"What am I like?"
"You are the same all through. You came upstairs to me in my room—did you not?—where my little Dave and Dolly were...."
"Yes—I fetched Dolly."
"And then you put Dolly down? And I said for shame!—what a big girl to be carried!"
"Yes—and Dolly was carrying little dolly, with her eyes wide open. And when I put her down on the floor, she repeated what you said all over again, to little dolly:—'For same, what a bid dirl to be tallied!'"
A gleam came on old Maisie's face as she lay there letting the idea of Dolly soak into her heart. Presently she said, without opening her eyes:—"I wonder, if Dolly lives to be eighty, will she remember old Mrs. Picture. I should like her to. Only she is small."
"Dear Mrs. Picture, you are talking as if you were not to have Dolly again. Don't you remember what I told you on Sunday? I'm going to get both the children down here, and Aunt M'riar.Unless, when you are better, you like to go back to Sapps Court. You shall, you know!"
Another memory attacked old Maisie. "Oh dear," said she, "I thought our Court was all tumbled down. Was it not?"
"Yes—the day I came. And then I carried you off to Cavendish Square. Don't you remember?—where Miss Grahame was—Sister Nora." She went on to tell of the promptitude and efficiency with which the repairs had been carried out. For, strange to say, the power Mr. Bartlett possessed of impressing Europe with his integrity and professional ability had extended itself to Gwen, a perfect stranger, during that short visit to the Court, and she was mysteriously ready to vouch for his sobriety and good faith. Presently old Maisie grew curious about the voices in the next room.
"Is that a gentleman's voice, through the door, talking? It isn't Dr. Nash. Dr. Nash doesn't laugh like that."
"No—that is my blind man I have brought to see you. I told you about him, you know. But he must not tire you too much."
"Butcanhe see me?"
"I didn't meansee, that way. I meant see to talk to. Some day he willreallysee you—with his eyes. We are sure of it, now. He shall come and sit by you, and talk."
"Yes—and I may hold his hand. And may I speak to him about ... about....
"About his blindness and the accident? Oh dear yes!Youwon'tseethat he's blind, you know."
"His eyes look like eyes?"
"Like beautiful eyes. I shall go and fetch him." She knew she was straining facts in her prediction of their recovery of sight, but she liked the sound of her own voice as she said it, though she knew she would not have gone so far except to give her hearer pleasure.
Said old Maisie to Adrian, whom Gwen brought back to sit by her, giving him the chair she had occupied beside the bed:—"You, sir, are very happy! But oh, how I grieve for your eyes!"
"Is Lady Gwendolen here in the room still?" said Adrian.
"She has just gone away, to the other room," said old Maisie. For Gwen had withdrawn. One at a time was the rule.
"Very well, dear Mrs. Picture. Then I'll tell you. There never was a better bargain driven than mine. I would not have my eyesight back, to lose what I have got. No—not for fifty pairs of eyes." And he evidently meant it.
"May I hold your hand?"
"Do. Here it is. I am sure you are a dear old lady, and can see what she is. When I had eyes, I never saw anything worth looking at, till I saw Gwen."
"But is it a rule?"
Adrian was perplexed for a moment. "Oh, I see what you mean," said he. "No—of course not! I may have my eyesight back." Then he seemed to speak more to himself than to her. "Menhavebeen as fortunate, even as that, before now."
"But tell me—is that what the doctor says? Or only guessing?"
"It's what the doctor says, and guessing too. Doctors only guess. He's guessing."
"But don't they guess right, oftener than people?"
"A little oftener. If they didn't, what use would they be?"
"But you have seenher?"
"Yes—once! Only once. And now I know she is there, as I saw her.... But I want to know about you, Mrs. Picture dear. Because I'm so sorry for you."
"There is no need for sorrow for me, I am so happy to know my sister was not drowned. And my little girl I left behind when I went away over the great sea, and the wind blew, and I saw the stars change each night, till they were all new. And then I found my dear husband, and lived with him many, many happy years. God has been good to me, for I have had much happiness." There was nothing but contentment and rest in her voice; but then some of the tranquillity may have been due to exhaustion.
Adrian made the mistake of saying:—"And all the while you thought your sister dead."
He felt a thrill in her hand as it tightened on his, and heard it in her voice. "Oh, could it have been?" she said. "But I was told so—in a letter."
It was useless for Adrian to affect ignorance of the story; and, indeed, that would have made matters worse, for it would have put it on her to attempt the retelling of it.
Perhaps he did his best to say:—"Lady Gwendolen has told me the whole story. So I know. Don't think about it!... Well—that's nonsense! One can't help thinking. I mean—think as little as possible!" It did not mend matters much.
Her mind had got back to the letter, and could not leave it. "I have to think of it," she said, "because it was my husband that wrote that letter. I know why he wrote it. It was not himself. It was a devil. It came out of Roomoro the black witch-doctor and got a place inside my husband.Hedid not write thatletter to Phoebe.Itwrote it. For see how it had learned all the story when Roomoro sucked the little scorpion's poison out of Mary Ann Stennis's arm!"
To Adrian all this was half-feverish wandering; the limited delirium of extreme weakness. No doubt these were real persons—Roomoro and Mary Ann Stennis. It was their drama that was fictitious. He saw one thing plainly. It was to be humoured, not reasoned with. So whatever was the cause of a slight start and disconcertment of his manner when she stopped to ask suddenly:—"But you do not believe in devils, perhaps?"—it was not the one she had ascribed it to. In fact he was quite ready with a semi-conscientious affirmative. "Indeed I do. Tell me exactly how you suppose it happened, again. Roomoro was a native conjurer or medicine-man, I suppose?"
Then old Maisie recapitulated the tale her imagination had constructed to whitewash the husband who had ruined her whole life, adding some details, not without an interest for students of folklore, about the devil that had come from Roomoro. She connected it with the fact that Roomoro had eaten the flesh of the little black Dasyurus, christened the "Native Devil" by the first Tasmanian colonists, from the excessive shortness of its temper. The soul of this devil had been driven from the witch-doctor by the poison of the scorpion, and had made for the nearest human organisation. Adrian listened with as courteous a gravity as either of us would show to a Reincarnationist's extremest doctrines.
It was an immense consolation to old Maisie, evidently, to be taken in such good faith. Having made up his mind that his conscience should not stand between him and any fiction that would benefit this dear old lady, Adrian was not going to do the thing by halves. He launched out into reminiscences of his own experiences on the Essequibo and elsewhere, and was able without straining points to dwell on the remarkable similarities of the Magians of all primitive races. As he afterwards told Gwen, he was surprised at the way in which the actual facts smoothed the way for misrepresentation. He stuck at nothing in professions of belief in unseen agencies, good and bad; apologizing afterwards to Gwen for doing so by representing the ease of believing in them just for a short time, to square matters. Optional belief was no invention of his own, he said, but an ancient and honourable resource of priesthoods all the world over.
It was the only little contribution he was able to make towards the peace of mind without which it seemed almost impossible so old a constitution could rally against such a shock. And itwas of real value, for old Maisie sorely needed help against her most awful discovery of all, the hideous guilt of the man whom she had loved ungrudgingly throughout. Nor was it only this. It palliated her son's crimes. But then there was adifferencebetween the son and the father. The latter had apparently done nothing to arouse his wife's detestation. Forgery is a delinquency—not a diabolism!
They talked more—talked a good deal in fact—but only of what we know. Then Gwen came back, bringing Irene to make acquaintance. This young lady behaved very nicely, but admitted afterwards that she had once or twice been a little at a loss what to say.
As when for instance the old lady, with her tender, sad, grey eyes fixed on Miss Torrens, said:—"Come near, my dear, that I may see you close." And drew her old hand, tremulously, over the mass of rich black hair which the almost nominal bonnet of that day left uncovered, with the reticular arrangement that confined it, and went on speaking, dreamily:—"It is very beautiful, butmylady's hair is golden, and shines like the sun." Thereon Gwen to lubricate matters:—"Yes—look here! But I know which I like best." She managed to collate a handful of her own glory of gold and her friend's rich black, in one hand. "I know whichIlike best," said Irene. And Gwen laughed her musical laugh that filled the place. "No head of hair is a prophet in its own country," said she.
Old Maisie was trying to speak, but her voice had gone low with fatigue. "Phoebe and I," she was saying, "long ago, when we were girls.... It was a trick, you know, a game ... we would mix our hair like that, and make little Jacky Wetherall guess whose hair he had hold of. When he guessed right he had sugar. He was three. His mother used to lend him to us when she went out to scrub, and he never cried...." She went on like this, dwelling on scraps of her girlhood, for some time; then her voice went very faint to say:—"Phoebe was there then. Phoebe is back now—somehow—how is it?" Gwen saw she had talked enough, and took Irene away; and then Ruth Thrale went to sit with her mother.
Dr. Nash, who arrived during their absence, had been greeted by Adrian after his "first appearance as a corpse," last summer. He would have known the doctor's voice anywhere. "You neverwerea corpse," said that gentleman. To which Mr. Torrens replied:—"YouthoughtI was a corpse, doctor, you know you did!"
Dr. Nash, being unable to deny it, shifted the responsibility."Well," said he, "Sir Coupland thought so too. The fact is, we had quite given you up. When he came out and said to me:—'Come back. I want you to see something,' I said to him:—'Is that why the dog barked?' Because your dog had given a sudden queer sort of a bark. And he said to me:—'It isn't only the dog. It's Lady Gwen Rivers.'"
"What did he mean by that?" said Gwen.
"He meant that your ladyship's strong impression that the body.... Excuse my referring to you, Mr. Torrens, as...."
"As 'the body'? Not at all! I mean, don't apologize."
"The—a—subject, say, still retained vitality. No doubt wemighthave found out—probablyshould...."
"Stuff and nonsense!" said Gwen remorselessly. "You would have buried him alive if it hadn't been for me. You doctors are the most careless, casual creatures. It was me and the dog—so now Mr. Torrens knows what he has to be thankful for!"
"Well—as a matter of fact, it was the strong impression of your ladyship that did the job. We doctors are, as your ladyship says, an incautious, irresponsible lot. I hope you found Mrs. Prichard going on well."
Gwen hesitated. "I wish she looked a little—thicker," said she.
Dr. Nash looked serious. "We mustn't be in too great a hurry. Remember her age, and the fact that she is eating almost nothing. She won't take regular meals again—or what she calls regular meals—till the tension of this excitement subsides...."
Said Adrian:—"It's perfectly extraordinary to me, not seeing her, to hear her talk as she does. Because it doesn't give the impression of such weakness as that. Her hands feel very thin, of course."
Said the doctor:—"I wish I could get her to take some stimulant; then she would begin eating again. If she could only be slightly intoxicated! But she's very obdurate on that point—I told you?—and refuses even Sir Cropton Fuller's old tawny port. I talked about her to him, and he sent me half a dozen the same evening. A good-natured old chap!—wants to make everyone else as dyspeptic as himself...."
"That reminds me!" said Gwen. "We forgot the champagne."
"No, we didn't," said Irene. "It was put in the carriage, I know. In a basket. Two bottles lying down. And it was taken out, because I saw it."
"Butwasit put in the railway carriage?"
"I meant the railway carriage."
"I believe it's in the old Noah's Ark we came here in, all the while."
Granny Marrable said:—"I am sure there has nothing been brought into the Cottage. Because we should have seen. There is only the door through, to go in and out."
"You see, Dr. Nash," said Gwen, "when you said that in your letter, about her wanting stimulant, champagne immediately occurred to Sir Hamilton. So we brought a couple of bottles of the King of Prussia's favourite Clicquot, and a little screwy thing to milk the bottles with, like a cow, a glass at a time. Miss Torrens and I are quite agreed that very often one can get quite pleasantly and healthily drunk on champagne when other intoxicants only give one a headache and make one ill. Isn't it so, 'Re?" Miss Torrens and her brother both testified that this was their experience, and Dr. Nash assented, saying that there would at least be no harm in trying the experiment.
As for dear old Granny Marrable, her opinion was simply that whatever her ladyship from the Towers, and the young lady from Pensham and her brother, were agreed upon, was beyond question right; and even if medical sanction had not been forthcoming she would have supported them. "I am sure," said she, "my dear sister will drink some when she knows your ladyship brought it for her."
The reappearance of the Noah's Ark, when due, confirmed Gwen's view as to the whereabouts of the basket, and was followed by a hasty departure of the gentlefolks to catch the downtrain from London. As Granny Marrable watched it lurching away into the fast-increasing snow, it looked, she thought, as if it could not catch anything. But if old Pirbright, who had been on the road since last century, did not know, nobody did.
The day after this visit, when Gwen was singing to Adrian airs from Gluck's "Alceste," Irene and her father being both absent on Christmas business, social or charitable, the butler brought in a letter from Ruth Thrale in the very middle of asostenutonote,—for when did any servant, however intelligent, allow music to stop before proceeding to extremities?—and said, respectfully but firmly, that it was the same boy, and he would wait. He seemed to imply that the boy's quality of identity was a sort of guarantee of his waiting—a good previous character for permanency. Gwen left "Alceste" in C minor, and opened her letter, thanking Mr. Tweedie cordially, but not able to say he might go, because he was another family's butler. Adrian said:—"Is that from the oldlady?" And when Gwen said:—"Yes—it's Onesimus. I wonder he was able to get there, over the snow,"—he dismissed Mr. Tweedie with the instruction that he should see that Onesimus got plenty to eat. The butler ignored this instruction as superfluous, and died away.
Then Gwen spun round on the music-stool to read aloud. "'Honoured lady';—Oh dear, I wish she could say 'dear Gwen'; but I suppose it wouldn't do.—'I am thankful to be able to write a really good report of my mother'.... You'll see in a minute she'll have to speak of Granny Marrable and she'll call her 'mother' without the 'my.' See if she doesn't!... 'Dr. Nash said she might have some champagne, and we said she really must when you so kindly brought it. So she said indeed yes, and we gave it her up to the cuts.' That means," said Gwen, "the cuts of the wineglass." She glanced on in the letter, and when Adrian said:—"Well—that's not all!"—apologized with:—"I was looking on ahead, to see that she got some more later. It's all right. '... up to the cuts, and presently', as Dr. Nash said, was minded to eat something. So I got her the sweetbread she would not have for dinner, which warmed up well. Then we persuaded her to take a little more champagne, but Dr. Nash said be careful for fear of reaction. Then she was very chatty and cheerful, and would go back a great deal on old times with mother....' I told you she would," said Gwen, breaking off abruptly.
"Of course she will always go back on old times," said Adrian.
"I didn't mean that. I meant call her aunt 'mother' without the 'my.' Let me go on. Don't interrupt! '... old times with mother, and one thing in particular, their hair. Mother pleased her, because she could remember a little child Jacky they would puzzle to tell which hair was which, saying if she held them like that Jacky could tell, and have sugar. For their hair now is quite strong white and grey instead of both the same....' She was telling us about Jacky—me and Irene—yesterday, and I suppose that was what set her off.... 'She slept very sound and talked, and then slept well at night. So we are in good spirits about her, and thank God she may be better and get stronger. That is all I have to tell now and remain dutifully yours....' Isn't that delightful? Quite a good report!" Instructions followed to Onesimus not to bring any further news to Pensham, but to take his next instalment to the Towers.
These things occurred on the Friday, the day after the visit to Chorlton. Certainly that letter of Widow Thrale's justified Lady Gwendolen in feeling at ease about Mrs. Picture during the remainderof her visit to Pensham, and the blame she apportioned to herself for an imagined neglect afterwards was quite undeserved.
Adrian Torrens ought to have been in the seventh heaven during the remainder of an almost uninterrupted afternoon. Not that it was absolutely uninterrupted, because evidences of a chaperon in abeyance were not wanting. A mysterious voice, of unparalleled selectness, orbon-ton, or gentility, emanated from a neighbouring retreat with an accidentally open door, where the lady of the house was corresponding with philanthropists in spite of interruptions. It said:—"Whatisthat? I know itsowell," or, "That air is very familiar to me," or, "I cannot help thinking Catalani would have taken that slower." To all of which Gwen returned suitable replies, tending to encourage a belief in her questioner's mind that its early youth had been passed in a German principality with Kapellmeisters and Conservatoriums and a Court Opera Company. This excellent lady was in the habit of implying that she had been fostered in variousanciens régimes, and that the parentage of anything so outlandish and radical as her son and daughter was quite out of her line, and a freak of Fate at the suggestion of her husband.
Intermittent emanations from Superiority-in-the-Bush were small drawbacks to what might perhaps prove the last unalloyed interview of these two lovers before their six months' separation—that terrible Self-Denying Ordinance—to which they had assented with a true prevision of how very unwelcome it would be when the time came. It was impossible to go back on their consent now. Gwen might have hoisted a standard of revolt against her mother. But she could not look her father in the face and cry off from the fulfilment of a condition-precedent of his consent to the perfect freedom of association of which she and Adrian had availed themselves to the uttermost, always under the plea that the terms of the contract were going to be honourably observed. As for Adrian, he was even more strongly bound. That appeal from the Countess that his father had repeated and confirmed was made direct to his honour; and while he could say unanswerably:—"What would you have me do?" nothing in the world could justify his rebelling against so reasonable a condition as that their sentiments should continue reciprocal after six months of separation.
His own mind was made up. For his views about suicide, however much he spoke of them with levity, were perfectly serious. If he lost Gwen, he would be virtually non-existent already. The end would have come, and the thing left to put an end to wouldno longer be a Life. It would only be a sensibility to pain, with an ample supply of it. A bare bodkin would do the business, but did not recommend itself. The right proportion of Prussic Acid had much to say on its own behalf. It was cheap, clean, certain, and the taste of ratafia was far from unpleasant. But he had a lingering favourable impression of the Warroo medicine-man, whose faith in the efficacy and painlessness of his nostrum was evident, however much was uncertain in his version of itsprovenance.
As to any misgivings about awakening in another world, if any occurred to Adrian he had but one answer—he hadbeen dead, and had found death unattended with any sort of inconvenience. Resuscitation had certainly been painful, but he did not propose to leave any possibility of it, this time. His death,thattime, had been a sudden shock, followed instantly by the voice of Gwen herself, which he had recognised as the last his ears had heard. If Death could be so easily negotiated, why fuss? The only serious objection to suicide was its unpopularity with survivors. But were they not sometimes a little selfish? Was this selfishness not shown to demonstration by the gratitude—felt, beyond a doubt—to the suicide who weights his pockets when he jumps into mid-ocean, contrasted with the dissatisfaction, to say the least of it, which the proprietor of a respectable first-class hotel feels when a visitor poisons himself with the door locked, and engages the attention of the Coroner. There was Irene certainly—and others—but after all it would be a great gain to them, when the first grief was over, to have got rid of a terrible encumbrance.
Therefore Adrian was quite at his ease about the Self-Denying Ordinance; at least, if a clear resolve and a mind made up can give ease. He said not a word of his views and intentions beyond what the story has already recorded. What right had he to say anything to Gwen that would put pressure on her inclinations? Had he not really said too much already? At any rate, no more!
Nevertheless, the foregoing made up the background of his reflections as he listened to more "Alceste," resumed after a short note had been written for Onesimus to carry back over the frost-bound roads to Chorlton. And he was able to trace the revival in his mind of suicide by poison to Mrs. Picture's narration of the Dasyurus and the witch-doctor who had cooked and eaten its body. This fiction of her fever-ridden thoughts had set him a-thinking again of the Warroo conjurer. He had not repeated any of it to Gwen, lest she should be alarmed on old Maisie's behalf. For it had a very insane sound.
But after such a prosperous report of her condition, above all,of the magical effect of that champagne, it seemed overnice to be making a to-do about what was probably a mere effect of overheated fancy, such as the circumstances might have produced in many a younger and stronger person. So when Alceste had provided her last soprano song, and the singer was looking for "Ifigenia in Aulide," Adrian felt at liberty to say that old Mrs. Picture's ideas about possession were very funny and interesting.
"Isn't it curious?" said Gwen. "She really believes it all, you know, like Gospel. All that about the devil that had possession of her husband! And how when he died, he passed his devil on to his son, who was worse than himself."
"That's good, though," said Adrian. "Only she never told me about the son. I had it all about the witch-doctor whose devil came out because he couldn't fancy the little scorpion's flavour. And all about the original devil—a sort of opossum they call a devil...."
"She didn't tell me about him."
"They've got one at the Zoological Gardens. He's an ugly customer. The keeper said he was a limb, if ever there was one. The old lady evidently thought her idea that the doctor's devil was this little beggar's soul, eaten up with his flesh, was indisputable. I told her I thought it had every intrinsic possibility, and I'm sure she was pleased. But the horror of her face when she spoke of him was really...."
"Adrian!"
"What, dearest? Anything the matter?"
"Only the way you put it. It was so odd. 'The horror of her face'! Just as if you hadseenit!" Indeed, Gwen was looking quite disconcerted and taken aback.
"There now!" said Adrian. "See what a fool I am! I never meant to tell of that. Because I thought it threw a doubt on Scatcherd. I've been wanting to make the most of Scatcherd. I never thought much of Septimius Severus. Anyone might have said in my hearing that the bust was moved, and it was just as I was waking. But I'll swear no one said anything about Scatcherd. Why—therewasonly Irene!"
Gwen went and sat by him on the sofa. "Listen, darling!" said she. "I want to know what you are talking about. What was it happened, and why did it throw a doubt on Miss Scatcherd?"
"It wasn't anything, either way, you know."
"I know. But what was it, that wasn't anything, either way?"
"It was only an impression. You mustn't attach any weight to it."
"Are you going to tell what it was, ornot?"
"Going to. Plenty of time! It was when the old lady began telling me about the devil. Her tone of conviction gave me a strong impression what she was looking like, and made an image of her flash across my retina. By which I mean, flash across the hole I used to see through when I had a retina. It was almost as strong and life-like as real seeing. But I knew itwasn't."
"But how—how—how?" cried Gwen, excited. "Howdid you know that it wasn't?"
"Because of the very white hair. It was snow-white—the image's. I suppose I had forgotten which was which, of the two old ladies—had put the saddle on the wrong horse."
Gwen looked for a moment completely bewildered. "What on, earth, can, he, mean?" said she, addressing Space very slowly. Then, speaking as one who has to show patience with a stiff problem:—"Dearest man—dearest incoherency!—do try and explain. Which of the old ladies do you suppose has white hair, and which grey?"
"Old Granny Marrable, I thought."
"Yes—butwhich hair? Which? Which? Which?"
"White, I thought, not grey." Whereupon Gwen, seeing how much hung upon the impression her lover had been under hitherto about these two tints of hair, kept down a growing excitement to ask him quietly for an exact, undisjointed statement, and got this for answer:—"I have always thought of Granny Marrable's as snow-white, and the old Australian's as grey. Was that wrong?"
"Quite wrong! It's the other way round. The Granny's is grey and old Mrs. Picture's is silvery white."
Adrian gave a long whistle, for astonishment, and was silent. So was Gwen. For this was the third incident of the sort, and what might not happen? Presently he broke the silence, to say:—"At any rate, that leaves Scatcherd a chance. I thought if this was a make-up of my own, it smashedher."
"Foolish man! There is more in it than that. Yousawold Mrs. Picture. It was no make-up.... Well?" She paused for his reply.
It came after a studied silence, a dumbness of set purpose. "Oh why—why—is it always Mrs. Picture, or Scatcherd, or Septimius Severus? Why can it never be Gwen—Gwen—Gwen?"
The attenuatedchaperonageof the lady of the house may have been moved by a certain demonstrativeness of her son's at this point, to say from afar:—"Ihopewe are going to have some 'Ifigenia in Aulide.' Because Ishouldhave enjoyedthat." Whichcarried an implication that the musical world had been palming off an inferior article on a public deeply impressible by the higher aspects of Opera.
HOW THE EARL ASKED AFTER THE OLD TWINS. MERENESS. RECUPERATIVE POWER. HOW THE HOUSEHOLD HAD ITS ANNUAL DANCE. HOW THE COUNTESS HAD A CRACKED LIP. HOW WAS DR. TUXFORD SOMERS? SIR SPENCER DERRICK. GENERAL RAWNSLEY. HE AND GWEN'S INTENDED GREAT GRANDMOTHER-IN-LAW. GWEN HAD NEVER HAD TWINS BEFORE THE FRENCH REVOLUTION. THE GENERAL'S BROTHER PHILIP. SUPERANNUATED COCKS AND HENS. HOW GWEN HAD DREAMED SHE WAS TO MARRY A KETTLE-HOLDER. HOW MRS. LAMPREY HAD A LETTER FOR GWEN, WHICH TOOK GWEN OFF TO CHORLTON AT MIDNIGHT
HOW THE EARL ASKED AFTER THE OLD TWINS. MERENESS. RECUPERATIVE POWER. HOW THE HOUSEHOLD HAD ITS ANNUAL DANCE. HOW THE COUNTESS HAD A CRACKED LIP. HOW WAS DR. TUXFORD SOMERS? SIR SPENCER DERRICK. GENERAL RAWNSLEY. HE AND GWEN'S INTENDED GREAT GRANDMOTHER-IN-LAW. GWEN HAD NEVER HAD TWINS BEFORE THE FRENCH REVOLUTION. THE GENERAL'S BROTHER PHILIP. SUPERANNUATED COCKS AND HENS. HOW GWEN HAD DREAMED SHE WAS TO MARRY A KETTLE-HOLDER. HOW MRS. LAMPREY HAD A LETTER FOR GWEN, WHICH TOOK GWEN OFF TO CHORLTON AT MIDNIGHT
When the Earl of Ancester came back to the Towers next day he certainly did look a little boiled down; otherwise, cheerful and collected. "I am quite prepared to endure another Christmas," said he resignedly to Gwen. "But a little seclusion and meditation is good to prepare one for the ordeal, and Bath certainly deserves the character everybody gives it, that you never meet anybody else there. I suppose Coventry and Jericho have something in common with Bath. I wonder if outcasts can be identified in either. Nothing distinguishes them in Bath from the favourites of Fortune. How are the old ladies?"
This was in the study, where the Earl and his daughter got a quiet ten minutes to recapitulate the story of each during the other's absence. It was late in the afternoon, two hours after his arrival from London. He had been there a day or two to make a show of fulfilling his obligations towards politics; had sat through a debate or two, and had taken part in a division or two, much to the satisfaction of his conscience. "But," said he to Gwen, "if you ask me which I have felt most interest in, your old ladies or the Foreign Enlistment Act, I should certainly say the old ladies." So it was no wonder his inquiry about them came early in this recapitulation.
Gwen found herself, to her surprise, committed to an apologetic tone about old Mrs. Picture's health, and maintaining that she wasreallybetter intrinsically, although evidently some person or persons unnamed must have said she was worse. She started on her report with every good-will to make it a prosperous one, and gotentangled in some trivialities that told against her purpose. Perhaps her last letter to her father, written from Pensham on the night of her arrival there, had given too rose-coloured an account of her visit to Chorlton, and had caused the rather serious headshake which greeted her admission that old Maisie was still a quasi-invalid, on her back from the merest—quite the merest—weakness. The Earl admitted that, as a general rule, weakness might be mere enough to be negligible; but then it should be the weakness of young and strong people, possessed of that delightful property "recuperative power," which does such wonders when it comes to the scratch. Never be without it, if you can help.
The episode of the champagne was reassuring, and gave Hope a helping hand. Moreover, Gwen had just got another letter from Ruth Thrale, brought by Onesimus the bull-cajoler, which gave a very good account on the whole, though one phrase had a damping effect. We were not "to rely on the champagne," as it was "not nourishment, but stimulus." Shemustbe got to take food regularly, said Dr. Nash, however small the quantity. This seemed to suggest that she had fallen back on that vicious practice of starvation. But "my mother" was constantly talking with "mother" about old times, and it was giving "mother" pleasure.
"I wish," said Gwen, as her father went back to "Honoured Lady" for second reading, and possibly second impressions, "I wish that Dr. Nash had written separately. I want to know what he thinks, and I want to know what Ruth thinks. I can mix them up for myself."
The Earl read to the end, and suspended judgment, visibly. "Eighty-one!" said he. "And how did Granny Marrable take it? You never said in your letters."
"Because I did not see her. Dr. Nash told—at least, he tried to. But I told you about the little boy's letter. She knew it from that."
"I remember.... Well!—we must hope." And then they spoke of matters nearer home; the impending journey to Vienna; a perplexity created by a promise rashly given to Aunt Constance that she should be married from the Ancester town-residence—two things which clashed, for how could this wedding wait till the Countess's return?—and ultimately of Gwen's own prospects. Then she told her father the incident of Adrian's apparent vision of old Mrs. Picture, and both pretended that it was too slight to build upon; but both used it for a superstructure of private imaginings. Neither encouraged the other.
Adrian and his sister were to have returned with Gwen to the Towers to stay till Monday, which was Christmas Day, when their own plum-pudding and mistletoe would claim them at Pensham. This arrangement was not carried out, possibly in deference to the Countess, who was anxious to reduce to a minimum everything that tended to focus the public gaze on the lovers. Gwen was under a social obligation, inherited perhaps from Feudalism, to be present at the Servants' Ball, which would have been on Christmas Eve had that day not fallen on a Sunday. Hence the necessity for her return on the Saturday, and the interview with her father just recorded. The quiet ten minutes filled the half-hour between tea and dressing for a dinner which might prove a scratch meal in itself, but was distinguished by its sequel. A general adjournment was to follow to the great ball-room, which was given over without reserve on this occasion to the revellers and their friends from the environs; for at the Towers nothing was done by halves in those days. There the august heads of the household were expected to walk solemnly through a quadrille with the housekeeper and head butler. Mrs. Masham's and Mr. Norbury's sense of responsibility on these occasions can neither be imagined nor described. This great event made conscientious dressing for dinner more than usually necessary, however defective the excitement of the household might make the preparation and service thereof.
These exigencies were what limited Gwen's quiet ten minutes with her father within the narrow bounds of half an hour, leaving no margin at all for more than three words with her mother on her way to her own interview with Miss Lutwyche. She exceeded her estimate almost before her ladyship's dressing-room door had swung to behind her.
"Well, mamma dear, I hope you're satisfied."
"I am, my dear. At least, I am not dissatisfied.... Don't kiss me in front, please, because I have a little crack on the corner of my lip." The Countess accepted her daughter'saccoladeon an unsympathetic cheek-bone. "What are you referring to?"
"Why—Adrian not coming till to-morrow, of course. What did you suppose I meant?"
"I did not suppose. Some day you will live to acknowledge—I am convinced of it—that what your father and I thought best was dictated by simple common sense and prudence. I am sure Sir Hamilton will not misinterpret our motives. Nor Lady Torrens."
"He's a nice old Bart, the Bart. We are great friends. He likes it. He gets all the kissing for nothing.... What?"
The Countess may have contemplated some protest against thepronounced ratification implied of fatherdom-in-law. She gave it up, and said:—"I was not going to say anything. Go on!"
The way in which these two guessed each other's thoughts was phenomenal. Gwen knew all about it. "Come, mamma!" said she. "You know the Bart would not have liked it half so much if I had been a dowdy."
"I cannot pretend to have thought upon the subject." If her ladyship threw a greater severity into her manner than the occasion seemed to call for, it was not merely because she disapproved of her beautiful daughter's want ofretenue, or questionable style, or doubtful taste, or defective breeding. You must bear all the circumstances in mind as they presented themselves to her. Conceive what the "nice old Bart" had been to her over five-and-twenty years ago, when she herself was a dazzling young beauty of another generation! Think how strange it must have been, to hear the audacities of this new creature, undreamed of then, spoken so placidly through an amused smile, as she watched the firelight serenely from the arm-chair she had subsided on—an anchorage "three words" would never have warranted, even the most unbridled polysyllables. "Do you not think"—her dignified mamma continued—"you had better be getting ready for dinner? You are always longer than me."
"I'm going directly. Lutwyche is never ready. I suppose I ought to go, though.... You are not asking after my old lady, and I think you might."
"Oh yes," said her ladyship negligently. "I haven't seen you since you didn't go to church with me. Howisyour old lady?"
"You don't care, so it doesn't matter. How was Dr. Tuxford Somers?"
"My dear—don't be nonsensical! How can you expect me to gush over about an old person I have not so much as seen?" She added as an afterthought:—"However worthy she may be!"
"You could have seen her quite well, when she was here. Papa did. Besides, one can show a human interest, without gushing over."
"My dear, I hope I am never wanting in human interest. How is Mrs.... Mrs....?"
"Mrs. Prichard?"
"Yes—how is she? Is she coming back here?"
"Is it likely? Besides, she can't be moved."
"Oh—it's as bad as that!"
"My dear mamma, haven't I told you fifty times?" This wasnot exactly the case; but it passed, in conversation. "The darling old thing was all but killed by being told...."
"By being told?... Oh yes, I remember! They were sisters, in Van Diemen's Land.... But she's better again now?"
"Yes—better. Oh, here's Starfield, and there's papa in his room. I can hear him. I must go."
At dinner that evening nobody was in any way new or remarkable, unless indeed Sir Spencer and Lady Derrick, who had been in Canada, counted. There was one guest, not new, but of interest to Gwen. Do you happen to remember General Rawnsley, who was at the Towers in July, when Adrian had his gunshot accident? It was he who was nearly killed by a Mahratta, at Assaye, when he was a young lieutenant. Gwen had issued orders that he should take her in to dinner, when she heard on her arrival that he had accepted her mother's invitation for Christmas.
Consider dinner despatched—the word is suitable, for an approach to haste was countenanced or tolerated, in consideration of the household's festivity elsewhere—and so much talking going on that the old General could say to Gwen without fear of being overheard:—"Now tell me some more about your fellow.... Adrian, isn't he?... Heisyour fellow, isn't he?—no compliments necessary?"
"He's my fellow, General, to you and all mydearfriends. You saw him in July, I think?"
"Just saw him—just saw him! Hardly spoke to him—only a word or two. Your father took me in to see him, because I was in love with his great-grandmother, once upon a time."
"Hisgreat-grandmother, General? You must mean his grandmother."
"Not a bit of it, my dear! It's all quite right. I was a boy of eighteen. I'm eighty-four. Sixty-six years ago. If Mary Tracy was alive now, she'd make up to eighty-six. Nothing out of the way in that. She was a girl of twenty then."
"Was it serious, General?"
"God bless me, my dear, serious? I should rather think it was! Why—we ran away together, and went capering over the country looking for a parson to marry us! Serious? Rather! At least, it might have been."
"Oh, General, do tell me what came of it. Did you find the parson?"
"That was just it. We found the Rector of Threckingham—it was in Lincolnshire—and he promised to marry us in a week if he could find someone to give the bride away. He took possession ofthe young lady. Then a day or two after down comes Sir Marmaduke and Lady Tracy, black in the face with rage, and we were torn asunder, threatening suicide as soon as there was a chance. I was such a jolly innocent boy that I never suspected the Rector of treachery. Never guessed it at all! He told me thirty years after—a little more. Saw him when the Allied Sovereigns were in London—before Waterloo."
"And that young thing was Adrian'sgreat-grandmother!" said Gwen. Then she felt bound in honour to add:—"She was old enough to know better."
"She didn't," said the General. "What's so mighty funny to me now is to think that all that happened about the time of the Revolution in Paris. Rather before."
Gwen's imagination felt the vertigo of such a rough grapple with the Past. These things make brains reel. "When my old twins were two little girls in lilac frocks," said she.
"Yourwhat?" Perhaps it was no wonder—so Gwen said afterwards—that the General was a little taken aback. She would have been so very old to have had twins before the French Revolution. She was able to assign a reasonable meaning to her words, and the old boy became deeply interested in the story of the sisters. So much so that when the ladies rose to go, she said calmly to her mother:—"I'm not coming this time. You can all go, and I'll come when we have to start the dancing. I want to talk to General Rawnsley." And the Countess had to surrender, with an implication that it was the only course open in dealing with a lunatic. She could, however, palliate the position by a reference to the abnormal circumstances. "We are quite in a state of chaos to-day," said she to her chief lady-guest. And then to the Earl:—"Don't be more than five minutes.... Well!—no longer than you can help."
The moment the last lady had been carefully shut out by the young gentleman nearest the door, Gwen drove a nail in up to the head,more suo. Suppose General Rawnsley had lost a twin brother fifty years ago, and she, Gwen, had come to him and told him it had all been a mistake, and the brother was still living! What would that feel like? What would he have done?
"Asked for it all over again," said the General, after consideration. "Should have liked being told, you see! Shouldn't have cared so very much about the brother."
"No—do be serious! Try to think what it would have felt like. To oblige me!"
The General tried. But without much success. For he onlyshook his head over an undisclosed result. He could, however, be serious. "I suppose," said he, "the twinnery—twinship—whatever you call it...."
"Isn'tde rigueur?" Gwen struck in. "Of course it isn't! Any real fraternity would do as well. Now try!"
"That makes a difference. But I'm still in a fix. Your old ladies were grown up when one went off—and then she wrote letters?..."
"Can't you manage a grown-up brother?"
"Nothing over fourteen. Poor Phil was fourteen when he was drowned. Under the ice on the Serpentine. He had just been licking me for boning a strap of his skate. I was doing the best way I could without it ... to get mine on, you see ... when I heard a stop in the grinding noise—what goes on all day, you know—and a sort of clicky slooshing, and I looked up, and there were a hundred people under the ice, all at once. There was a f'ler who couldn't stop or turn, and I saw him follow the rest of 'em under. Bad sort of job altogether!" The General seemed to be enjoying his port, all the same.
Said Gwen:—"But he used to lick you, so you couldn't love him."
"Couldn't I? I was awfully fond of Phil. So was he of me. I expect Cain was very fond of Abel. They loved each other like brothers. Not like other people!"
"But Phil isn't a fair instance. Can't you do any better than Phil? Never mind Cain and Abel."
"H'm—no, I can't! Phil's not a bad instance. It's longer ago—but the same thing in principle. If I were to hear that Phil was really resuscitated, and some other boy was buried by mistake for him, I should ... I should...." The General hung fire.
"What should you do? That's what I want to know.... Come now, confess—it's not so easy to say, after all!"
"No—it's not easy. But it would depend on the way how. If it was like the Day of Judgement, and he rose from the grave, as we are taught in the Bible, just the same as he was buried.... Well—you know—it wouldn't be fair play!Ishould knowhim, though I expect I should think him jolly small."
"But he wouldn't know you?"
"No. He would be saying to himself, who the dooce is this superannuated old cock? And it would be no use my saying I was his little brother, or he was my big one."
"But suppose it wasn't like the Day of Judgement at all, butreal, like my old ladies. Suppose he was another superannuated old cock! My old ladies are superannuated old hens, I suppose."
"I suppose so. But I understand from what you tell me that theyhavecome to know one another again. They talk together and recall old times? Isn't that so?"
"Oh dear yes, and each knows the other quite well by now. Only I believe they are still quite bewildered about what has happened."
"Then I suppose it would be the same with me and my redivivus brother—on the superannuated-old-cock theory, not the Day of Judgement one."
"Yes—but I want you not to draw inferences fromthem, but to say what you would feel ... of yourself ... out of your own head."
The General wanted time to think. The question required thought, and he was taking it seriously. The Earl, seeing him thinking, and Gwen waiting for the outcome, came round from his end of the table, and took the seat the Countess had vacated. He ought to have been there before, but it seemed as though Gwen'sescapadehad thrown all formalities out of gear. He was just in time for the General's conclusion:—"Give it up! Heaven only knows what I should do! Or anyone else!"
Gwen restated the problem, for her father's benefit. "I am with you, General," said he. "I cannot speculate on what I should do. I am inclined to think that the twinship has had something to do with the comparative rapidity of the ... recohesion...."
"Very good word, papa! Quite suits the case."
"... recohesion of these two old ladies. When we consider how very early in life they took their meals together...." The General murmuredsotto voce:—"Before they were born." "... we must admit that their case is absolutely exceptional—absolutely!"
"You mean," said Gwen, "that if they had not been twins they would not have swallowed each other down, as they have done."
"Exactly," said the Earl.
"And yet," Gwen continued, "they never remember things as they happened. In fact, they are still in a sort of fog about whathashappened. But they are quite sure they are Maisie and Phoebe. I do think, though, there is only one thing about Maisie's Australian life that Granny Marrable believes, and that is the devil that got possession of the convict husband....Whydoes she? Because devils are in the Bible, of course." Here the devil story was retold for the benefit of the General, who did not know it.
The Earl did, so he did not listen. He employed himself thinkingover practicable answers to the question before the house, and was just in time to avert a polemic about the authenticity of the Bible, a subject on which the General held strong views. "What helps me to an idea of a possible attitude of mind before a resurrection of this sort," he said, "is what sometimes happens when you wake up from a dream years long, a dream as long as a lifetime. Just the first moment of all, you can hardly believe yourself free of the horrid entanglement you had got involved in...."
"I know," said Gwen. "The other night I dreamed I was going to be married to a young gentleman I had known from childhood. Only he was a kettle-holder with a parrot on it."
"Didn't I object?" said the Earl.
"You were upstairs. Don't ask explanations. That was all there was in the dream. You were upstairs. And the dream had been all my life. Don't fidget about particulars."
"I won't. That's the sort of dream I mean. It seems all perfectly right and sound until your waking life comes back, and then vanishes. You only regret your friends in the dream for a few seconds, and then—they are nobody!"
"Don't quite see the parallel, yet. These old ladies haven't waked from a dream, that I see." Thus the General, and Gwen told him he was a military martinet, and lacking in insight.
Her father continued:—"Each of them has dreamed the other was dead, for half a century.Nowthey are awake. But I suspect, from what Gwen says, that the discovery of the dream has thrown a doubt on all the rest of the fifty years."
"That's it," said Gwen. "If the whole story of the two deaths is false, why should Van Diemen's Land be true? Why should the convict and the forgery be true?"
"Husbands and families are hard nuts to crack," said the General. "Can't be forgotten or disbelieved in, try 'em any side up!"
At this point a remonstrance from the drawing-room at the delay of the appearance of the males caused a stampede and ended the discussion. Gwen rejoined her own sex unabashed, and the company adjourned to the scene of the household festivity. It is not certain that the presence of his lordship and his Countess, and the remainder of the partyin esseat the Towers really added to the hilarity of the occasion. But it was an ancient usage, and the sky might have fallen if it had been rashly discontinued. The compromise in use at this date under which the magnates, after walking through a quadrille, melted away imperceptibly to their normal quarters, was no doubt the result of a belief on their part that the household would begin to enjoy itself as soon as formalitieshad been complied with, and it was left to do so at its own free-will and pleasure. Nevertheless, a hint at abolition would have been blasphemy, and however eager the rank and file of the establishment may have been for the disappearance of the bigwigs, not one of them—and still more not one of their many invited neighbours—ever breathed a hint of it to another.
Shortly after ten Gwen and some of the younger members of the party wound up a fairly successful attempt to make the materials at their disposal dance the Lancers, and got away without advertising their departure. It was a great satisfaction to overhear the outbreak of unchecked roystering that followed. Said Gwen to Miss Dickenson and Mr. Pellew, who had entered into the spirit of the thing and co-operated with her efforts to the last:—"They will be at bear-garden point in half an hour. Poor respectable Masham!" To which Aunt Constance replied:—"I suppose they won't go on into Sunday?" The answer was:—"Oh no—not till Sunday! But Sunday is aday, after all, not a night." Mr. Pellew said:—"Sunrise at eight," and Gwen said:—"I think Masham will make it Sunday about two o'clock. We shan't have breakfast till eleven. You'll see!"
They were in the great gallery with the Van Dycks when Gwen stopped, as one stops who thinks suddenly of an omission, and said, as to herself, more than to her hearers:—"I wonder whether she meant me."
"Whether who meant you?" said both, sharing the question.
"Nothing.... Very likely I was mistaken.... No—it was this. You saw that ratherpiquante, dry young woman? You know which I mean?"
"Danced with that good-looking young groom?..."
"Yes—my Tom—Tom Kettering. It was what I heard her say to Lutwyche ... some time ago.... 'Remember she's not to have it till to-morrow morning.' It just crossed my mind, did she mean me? I dare say it was nothing."
"I heard that. It was a letter." Mr. Pellew said this.
"Had you any impression about it?"
"I thought it was some joke among the servants."
Gwen was disquieted, evidently. "I wish I hadn't heard it," said she, "if it isn't to be delivered till to-morrow. That young woman is Dr. Nash's housekeeper—Dr. Nash at Chorlton." She was speaking to ears that had heard all about the twin sisters. She interrupted any answer that meant to follow "Oh!" and "H'm!" by saying abruptly:—"I must see Lutwyche and find out."
They turned with her, and retraced their steps, remarking thatno doubt it was nothing, but these things made one uncomfortable. Much better to find out, and know!
A casual just entering to rejoin the revels stood aside to allow them to pass, but was captured and utilised. "Go in and tell Miss Lutwyche I want to speak to her out here." Gwen knew all about local class distinctions, and was aware her maid would not be "Lutwyche" to a village baker's daughter. The girl, awed into some qualification of mere assent, which might have been presumptuous, said:—"Yes, my lady, if you please."
Lutwyche was captured and came out. "What was it I was not to have till to-morrow morning, Lutwyche? You know quite well what I mean. What was the letter?"
The waiting-woman had a blank stare in preparation, to prevaricate with, but had to give up using it. "Oh yes—therewasanote," she said. "It was only a note. Mrs. Lamprey brought it from Dr. Nash. He wished your ladyship to have it to-morrow."
"I will have it at once, thank you! Have you got it there? Just get it, and bring it to me at once."
"I hope your ladyship does not blame me. I was only obeying orders."
"Get it, please, and don't talk." Her ladyship was rather incensed with the young woman, but not for obeying orders. It was because of the attempt to minimise the letter. It was just like Lutwyche. Nothing would make that womanreallytruthful!
Lutwyche caught up the party, which had not stopped for the finding of the letter, at the drawing-room door. Gwen opened it as she entered the room, saying, to anyone within hearing:—"Excuse my reading this." She dropped on a sofa at hand, close to a chandelier rich with wax lights in the lampless drawing-room. Percy Pellew and hisfiancéestood waiting to share the letter's contents, if permitted.
The world, engaged with its own affairs, took no notice. The Earl and the General were listening to tales of Canada from Sir Spencer Derrick. The Countess was pretending to listen to other versions of the same tales from that gentleman's wife. The others were talking about the war, or Louis Napoleon, or Florence Nightingale, or hoping the frost would continue, because nothing was more odious than a thaw in the country. One guest became very unpopular by maintaining that a thaw had already set in, alleging infallible instincts needing no confirmation from thermometers.
The Countess had said, speaking at her daughter across the room:—"I hope we are going to have some music;" and the Colonel had said:—"Ah, give us a song, Gwen;" without elicitingany notice from their beautiful hearer, before anyone but Miss Dickenson and Mr. Pellew noticed the effect this letter was producing. Then the Earl, glancing at the reader's face, saw, even from where he sat, how white it had become, and how tense was its expression. He caught Mr. Pellew's attention. "Do you know what it is, Percy?" said he. Mr. Pellew crossed the room quickly, to reply under his breath:—"I am afraid it is some bad news of her old lady at Chorlton.... Oh no—notthat"—for the Earl had made the syllabledeadwith his lips, inaudibly—"but an alarm of some sort. The doctor's housekeeper there brought the letter."