"Zermatt.July22nd.
"Please come soon as possible. See Derwent.
"EVANS. Hotel Victoria."
I burst into tears, and went into the house.
I cannot truthfully say that sad thoughts were uppermost during the hours that followed. After all, it was my first trip to the Continent, and although I am thirty-six years old, and might be expected to have got over mere juvenile excitements, I confess to a feeling of cheerful anticipation. Of course the squire was always in the background of my thoughts, but I had no sense of apprehension such as sometimes oppresses one before an approaching calamity.
And it was so nice to have everything arranged for me, and to find myself in possession of time-tables and railway-coupons and a clear itinerary of the journey without the slightest effort or inconvenience on my part. Undoubtedly man has his uses, if he is a clear-headed, kind-hearted fellow like the Cynic.
When the whistle sounded and the boat express glided out of Charing Cross I waved my handkerchief from the window as long as I could see him, and then settled down into the luxurious cushions and gave myself up to reflection. How nice and brotherly he had been all the way to town, and since! I do not wonder that Rose enjoyed the journey. Rose! I might have let her know that I was leaving by the morning train, but then she would have had to ask for an hour off; and when she has just been away for ten days her chief might not have liked it. Besides, the Cynic had such a lot of minute instructions and emphatic warnings to which I was forced to listen attentively.
Then there was Mother Hubbard, who had been set upon accompanying me on the ground that I ought not to travel alone and unchaperoned; but the Cynic agreed with me that at my age chaperonage is unnecessary. I am not the sort that needs protection; and the little motherkin would merely have added to my anxieties.
No, though there was a sick and perhaps dying man at the other end, and though sorrow might soon compass me about, I determined to enjoy the present moment, and I did. I enjoyed the breeze upon the Channel, the glimpses of peasant life in France as the train rushed through the flat and rather tame country, the dinner in the Northern railway station at Paris, and the novel experience of the tiny bed which was reserved for my use on the night journey. I was travelling in luxury, of course, and am never likely to repeat the experience.
But my chief enjoyment was one which could be shared by any who had eyes to see, though they were sitting upright on the bare and narrow boards of the miserable third-class compartments which I caught sight of occasionally in the stations when morning came.
The glory of the dawn! of the sun rising behind the mountains, when a pink flush spread over the sky, dissolving quickly into rose and amber and azure, delicately pencilled in diverging rays which spread like a great fan to the zenith! The crags of a great hill caught the glow, and the mountain burned with fire. Below, the grass was gold and emerald; there were fruit-laden trees in the foreground, and in the distance, away beyond the belt of low-lying mist and the vague neutral tints which concealed their bases, were the snow mountains! I pushed down the window and gorged myself with the heavenly vision.
There was no time to see Geneva, but the ride along the banks of the lake and through the fertile Rhone valley was one long, delightful dream. Luncheon was provided at Visp, and then began the journey on the mountain railway which I can never forget.
As the train snorted and grunted up the steep incline I rejoiced to realise that it could not travel more quickly. Stream, mountain and forest; fertile valley, rushing waterfall and lofty precipice—all contributed to the charm of the experience. But the rush of the Visp, as it poured down the narrow gorge, and boiled and fretted in turbulent cascades which hurled their spray through the windows of the passing train is the one outstanding remembrance. It was glorious! Then the Matterhorn came in sight for a moment, and just afterwards the toy train drew up at the toy platform in Zermatt.
The concierge of the Hotel Victoria took my bag and pointed me out to a diminutive young lady who was standing near. She at once came forward and held out her hand, whilst a winning smile spread over her pleasant face.
"You are Miss Holden, are you not? I have stepped across to meet you, so that you might not feel so strange on your arrival. My husband is a doctor—Dr. Grey—and he has taken an interest in Mr. Evans, and continues to do so even though I have fallen in love with the old gentleman."
I liked the girl straight away. She is quite young—only just twenty-three, as she told me frankly, and ever such a little creature, though she carries herself with the dignity of a duchess—in fact, with much more dignity than some duchesses I have seen.
"Now that is 'real good' of you, as the Americans whose company I have just left would say," I replied; "and I think it was very nice of you to think of it. Tell me first, please, if Mr. Evans is worse."
"I really cannot say with certainty," she replied; "the Zermatt doctor thinks he is not going to recover, and my husband says that he will live for months. Now my husband, dear, is avery clever man indeed, though he is only young; and although the other man looks very formidable and wears spectacles I don't believe he is as clever as Ralph."
I smiled. "You have known the one doctor longer than the other," I said.
"Not much, as a doctor," she confided. "To let you into a secret which nobody here has discovered, Ralph and I are on our honeymoon, so that my experience of his medical abilities is limited, but I am sure he is very clever. But come! the hotel is only just across the way."
She accompanied me to my room and chatted incessantly whilst I was endeavouring to remove the grime and grit which the continental engines deposit so generously upon the traveller behind them.
"There!" she said, as I emptied the water for the third time, and sponged my face and neck preparatory to a brisk towelling; "you have emerged at last. But you will never be quite yourself until you have washed your hair. Do it to-night, dear. I know a splendid way of tying your head up in a towel so that you can sleep quite comfy."
The squire's face brightened when he saw me. He was sitting near the window in a great easy-chair which was almost a couch, and his hair was whiter than when he left England, and his face was—oh! so thin and grey; but what a gentleman he looked! He held out both hands, but I bent over and kissed him. If it was a bold thing to do I don't mind. My Inner Self bade me do it and I obeyed.
He held my face against his for a moment, and neither of us spoke. Then he said:
"Look at my view, Grace, and tell me if you like it."
I sat on the arm of his chair and looked through the open window. I saw before me a scene of peaceful loveliness—a valley, richly green, with here and there oblong patches of yellow framed in olive hedges: a narrow valley, girded with mountains whose sides rise steeply to tremendous heights, jagged, scarped, and streaked with snow: a wooded valley, too, where sombre trees of fir and pine climb the heights and spread out into thickets which end only with the rock. Quaint, brown-timbered structures, built on piles and with overhanging roofs, sometimes isolated, sometimes in little groups, were dotted about the landscape. A white road wound down the valley, and the yellow waters of the Visp rushed, torrent-like, along the bottom, to be lost to view where the land dipped abruptly to the left.
In the far distance mountains of snow lifted up their hoary heads into the luminous haze; and light clouds, rivalling their whiteness, gave the illusion of loftier heights still, and led the eye to the brilliant blue of high heaven.
The sun was behind us, and banks of clouds must have intercepted his rays from time to time, for the play of light and shade varied like a kaleidoscope, and the bare, stony flanks of the mountains in the middle distance shone green or grey or red as the sun caught them. A rude bridge crossed the stream away below, and I could just make out some tourists in Tyrolese caps and with knapsacks on their backs, leaning over the white rails.
The squire put his arm on mine. "I will tell you the names of these giants later. Meanwhile, tell me, have I chosen well?"
"It is heavenly," I replied. "I should be content to sit here for days."
"I am content," he said; "there is grander scenery than this around Zermatt—grander by far. At the other end of the valley you will see and you will glory in the towering masses of crag and snow which the Matterhorn and Breithorn present. You will see miles of glaciers and sparkling waterfalls and a thousand wonders of God's providing; but it was too cold and massive and hard to suit the mood of a dying man. I wanted Nature in a kindlier temper, so I sit by the window and commune with her, and she is always friendly."
There was a stool in the room, and I drew it up and sat at his feet with one arm upon his knee, as I used to sit for hours in the days of old, before my father's death left me solitary; and when the squire placed a caressing hand upon my shoulder I could have thought that, a chapter had been re-opened in the sealed pages of my life.
"Who is this Dr. Grey," I inquired, "whose charming little wife met me at the station, and told me you are not going to die for a long time?—for which I love her."
He smiled. "Grey is an optimist, my dear, and a downright good fellow, and he has picked up a prize in his wife. They are on their wedding-tour, as anyone quite unversed in that lore can see at a glance; and they ought to have left Zermatt a week ago or more but they have cheerfully stayed on to minister to the physical and mental necessities of an old man and a stranger. Not many would have done it, for they are sacrificing one of the most attractive programmes that Switzerland offers, for my sake."
"What a lot of good people there are in the world," I said. "I am going to like Dr. Grey as much as I like his wife. He is a big, strong, well-developed man, of course?"
"Why 'of course?'?" he asked.
"Husbands of tiny wives invariably are; the infinitely small seems to have a remarkable affinity for the infinitely great."
"Well, he is certainly a strapping fellow, and he is devoted to the wee woman he has made his wife. I believe, too, he will get on in his profession."
"His wife says he is a very clever man indeed," I remarked.
"Does she? An unbiassed opinion of that kind is valuable. All the same, he has done me good, not so much with physic—for I take the Zermatt man's concoctions—as with his cheery outlook. I believe he thinks I am a trickster."
"Do you know what I believe, sir?" I asked.
"No; tell me," he said.
"I believe you are going to get better, and I shall take you back to Windyridge and the moors."
He sighed then, and laid a hand fondly upon mine. "Grace, my child, I will say now what it may be more difficult to say later. You have caught me in a good hour, and my weary spirits have been refreshed by the sight of your face and the sound of your voice; but you must be prepared for darker experiences. Sometimes I suffer; often I am terribly weak and depressed. Gottlieb, I know, does not expect me to recover, and my Inner Self (that is your expression, child, and I often think of it) tells me he is right. You are too sensible to be unduly distressed before the time comes, and I want to tell you what I have planned, and to tell you quite calmly and without emotion. Death to me is only a curtain between one room and the next, so that it does not disturb me to explain to you what I wish to be done when it is raised for me to pass through.
"Midway in the village you will find some gardens opposite the Mont Cervin Hotel. Pass through them and you will reach a little English church, surrounded by a tiny graveyard. There lie the bones of men who have been killed on the mountains, and of others who have found death instead of life in these health-giving heights. There is one sunny spot where I want my body to rest, and the chaplain knows it. You can bear to hear me speak of these things, can you?"
Yes, I could bear it. He spoke so naturally and with such ease that I hardly realised what it meant: it was unreal, far-off, fallacious.
"At first," he continued, "the idea was repugnant. I longed to be laid side by side with my wife in the homeland, but that feeling passed. It was nothing more than sentiment, though it was a sentiment that nearly took me home, in spite of the doctors. But the more I have thought of it the more childish it has seemed. I am conscious of her presence here, always. Metaphysicians would explain that easily enough, no doubt, but to me it is an experience, and what can one want more? Why, then, should I run away to Windyridge and Fawkshill in order to find her, or be carried there for that purpose after death? No, no. Heaven is about me here, and our spirits will meet at once when the silver thread is loosed which binds me to earth. Am I right, Grace?"
I was crying a little now, but I could not contradict him.
"Gottlieb shakes his head, but Grey says I may last for months. Perhaps he is right, but I have no desire to live. Why should I? And where could I end my days more pleasantly than amidst these masterpieces of the great Architect?"
Mrs. Grey came for me when the dinner bell sounded, and we went down together. It has been arranged that I am to lunch with the squire in his own room, but to have dinner with the rest at a little table which I share with the Greys.
The doctor is just a great bouncing boy, with merry eyes and thick brown hair. He is on good terms with everybody—guests of high degree and low, waiters, porters, chambermaids—all the cosmopolitan crowd. He adores his little wife, and it is funny to see so big a man worshipping at so small a shrine.
I expressed my gratitude to them both as we sat at dinner, and he laughed—such a hearty, boisterous laugh.
"It's my wife. Dot wouldn't hear of leaving, and you cannot get a separation order in these wilds. She has spent so much time with the old gentleman that I have been madly jealous for hours at a stretch."
"Don't be untruthful, Ralph," said Mrs. Grey. "You know perfectly well that you have spoiled our honeymoon with the simple and sordid motive of gaining professional experience. Besides, you are nicest when you are jealous."
"Am I, by Jove!" he laughed. "Then 'niceness' will become habitual with me, for the way all the men look at you fans the flame of my jealousy. But this is poor stuff for Miss Holden, and I want to talk seriously to her."
"What is your candid opinion of Mr. Evans?" I asked.
"He is marked to fall, Miss Holden, but if he can be persuaded to make the effort to live he need not fall for months, perhaps even for years. The fact is, he has become indifferent to life, and that is against him."
"What is really the matter with him?"
"Now, there you corner me," he replied. "He has a weak heart, bronchial trouble, some diabetic tendencies and disordered nerves; but what is really the matter with him I have not discovered. Can you tell me?"
"I should have thought all these things were matter enough," I answered; "but what really ails him, I believe, is what is commonly termed a 'broken heart.' He is always mourning the loss of his wife and always dwelling upon reunion."
"He never told me that," replied the doctor thoughtfully; "I am glad to know it."
"Why should he remain abroad all this time?" I asked.
"Because he shouldn't!" he replied. "In my judgment he has been ill advised; but it is largely his own fault, too. I think he did well to leave England for the winter, but he ought to have gone home when the warm weather came. His medical advisers have always prescribed change of scene: told him to go anywhere he liked, and 'buck up' a bit, and he has gone. France, Spain, Egypt, Italy, and now Zermatt. And the old chap is dying of loneliness. Gottlieb shakes his mournful old head, and goes out to arrange with the English chaplain where to bury him. I'd bury them both! If you take my advice you'll pet him and make him think the world is a nice place to live in, and then we'll take him home, and let old Gottlieb find another tenant for his grave. If you will second me we'll have him out of this hole in a week's time."
I felt so cheered, and I will certainly follow his lead. I wrote a long, explanatory letter to the Cynic, an apologetic one to Rose, and a picture postcard, promising a longer communication, to Mother Hubbard, and then turned in and slept like a top.
The sensation of dazzling light and the sound of tinkling silvery bells woke me early, and I jumped up and looked out of the window. The bells belonged to a herd of goats which were being driven slowly to pasture. Stalwart guides, with stout alpenstocks in their hands, and apparently heavy cloth bags upon their backs, were standing near the hotel and on the station platform. Tourists of both sexes were getting ready to accompany the guides, and there was much loud questioning and emphatic gesticulation on both sides. A few mules stood near, presumably for the use of the ladies. It was all too provocative, and I flung myself into my clothes and went out.
If I were writing a guide book I could wax eloquent, I believe, in my descriptions of Zermatt; but I am not, and I therefore refrain.
The squire was delighted with my enthusiasm, and insisted upon my "doing" the place thoroughly. He did not rise until noon, so that my mornings were always free, and the Greys took me all the shorter excursions. One day we had quite a long trip to the top of the Gorner Grat, whence one gets an unrivalled view of snow peaks and glaciers; and from thence we walked to the Schwarz See, where the Matterhorn towers in front of you like an absolute monarch in loneliness and grandeur.
Oh, those ravines, where the glacier-fed streams rage furiously in their rapid descent! Oh, those gorges, in whose depths the pent-up waters leap onward between high walls of rock to which the precarious gangway clings where you stand in momentary fear of disaster! Oh, those woods, with the steep and stony footpaths, and the sudden revelation of unsuspected objects: of kine munching the green herbage; of the women who tend them, working industriously with wool and needle; of woodenchâletswith stone-protected roofs; of trickling cascades and roaring waterfalls!
Oh, those pastures, green as emerald, soft as velvet, where one might lie as on a couch of down and feast the eye on mountain and vale and sky, and never tire! Oh, those sunsets, and particularly the one which struck my imagination most, when the sky was not crimson, but topaz-tinted, and the huge cloud which hung suspended from the neck of the Matterhorn was changed in a second into beaten gold, as though touched by the rod of the alchemist; when the Breithorn flushed deep for a moment at the sun's caress, and the land lay flooded in a translucent yellow haze that spread like a vapour over the works of God and man, and turned mere stones and mortar into the fairy palaces of Eastern fable!
It seems now like a wonderful dream, but, thank God! it is something much less transient. For a memory is infinitely better than a dream: the memory of an experience such as this is a continual feast, whereas a dream too often excites hopes that may never be realised, and presents visions of delight which are as elusive as the grapes of Tantalus.
I stored up every detail for the squire's benefit. I cultivated my powers of observation more for his sake than my own, and reaped a double reward. All I saw is impressed still upon my brain with photographic sharpness, and it will be a long, long time before the image becomes faded or blurred. But what was better still, I saw the squire's eyes brighten and the "yonderly" look depart, as he came back to earth evening by evening and followed the story of my adventures.
I believe he would have been content to stay on indefinitely and give me as good a time as my heart could have desired, but that would not have been right. I had not gone out to enjoy a frolic, and at times I felt almost ashamed of myself for enjoying life so much. "Grace Holden," I said, "you are a very considerable fraud. Your special rôle just now is supposed to be that of the ministering angel, whereas you are flinging away your own time and somebody else's money like an irresponsible tripper."
Dr. Grey laughed when I told him that I had qualms of conscience on this score.
"Don't worry," he said; "Providence has her own notions of how angels can best minister, and I fancy you are carrying out her scheme pretty successfully, It's three days since the old gentleman spoke a word about dying, and I'm certain he is not nearly as anxious to be gone as he was before you came. But cannot you tempt him back to England by any means? My wife and I cannot remain here much longer, and I would like to help you to take him home."
I did my best, but I made little headway. The squire seemed to have lost all desire for home, and had quite made up his mind that his body would soon be laid to rest amid the eternal snows. He was constantly anticipating some further attack which would cut him down without warning, and Gottlieb seemed to find a mournful satisfaction in encouraging these forebodings, less perhaps by what he said than by what he left unsaid.
A tinge of annoyance began to mix with Dr. Grey's laugh, and he spoke to the squire with a touch of asperity. He had subjected him again to a thorough examination, and on its conclusion he broke out:
"Look here, Mr. Evans, I stake my professional reputation upon my verdict that you are not a dying man physically. If you die it's your own fault. There is no reason why we should not start for home to-morrow."
The squire took his hand and held it. "Grey," he said, "has science taught you that man has an inward voice that sometimes speaks more authoritatively and convincingly than doctor or parson, and that insists upon its dicta? Miss Holden knows it and calls it her 'Inner Self.'"
"No, sir," he replied, "science has taught me nothing of the kind. I am no psychologist, for my business is with the body rather than the soul. But science has taught me what the body is and is not able to accomplish, and whatever your 'Inner Self' may say I am convinced that your body is quite competent to take that perverse autocrat home if he will let it. But it cannot otherwise."
"Intuition is sometimes more powerful than logic," said the squire. "Grey, you are a good fellow and I owe you a debt of gratitude, but don't inconvenience yourself on my account. Go home, if you must, and believe me, I am sincerely thankful for all your goodness and attention."
The doctor tackled me again at dinner. "I'm not going home," he said, "and I'm not going to let him die without a struggle. But you'll have to make that Inner Self of his listen to reason. Now put your thinking cap on, and good luck to you."
"I cannot understand him," I replied; "he was always inclined to melancholy, but he was not morbid and listless as he now shows himself. He seems sometimes pitiably weak and childish, whereas ordinarily he is full of shrewd common sense."
"Of course he is," said the doctor, "and will be again. His Inner Self is sick just now, consequent upon his long seclusion from friends and home associations. It needs to be roused. If you can once make himwantto go home, his body will take him there hard enough. I can't do that: you must. Can't you tell him you have got to go back?"
I had thought of that. I had left my work at the busiest season of the year, and, after all, it was my living. And there was Mother Hubbard, who had learned to lean upon me, and had yielded me so willingly to the more pressing duty. I owed something to her. As I thought upon these things a feeling of homesickness stole over me, and I went in and sat at the squire's feet.
It was falling dusk, and the cool breath of evening fanned our cheeks as we sat by the open window and watched the lights twinkling in the celestial dome, and the mountains growing more black and mysterious with the advancing night.
"It is very lovely," murmured the squire.
"Yes," I said, "it is. But close your eyes and I will paint you a more attractive picture than this. You will not interrupt me, will you? and I will try to tell you what I saw not long ago, and what I am aching to see again."
"No, my child," he replied, pressing my hand fondly "I will be quite still and you shall paint your picture on my brain."
I hesitated a moment, and I think a wordless, formless prayer for help ascended to heaven. I endeavoured to visualise the scene in its fairest colours, and trembled lest my effort should be in vain. I closed my own eyes, too, for I feared distraction. Then I began:
"I am standing in a country lane, with ragged hedges on either hand. The hedges are brightly green, for they have been newly washed with the warm rain of summer, and they sparkle like gems in the bright sunshine of a glorious morning. There is a bank of grass, rank, luxurious grass, on one side of the roadway, and I clamber up to secure a wider view of the bounties nature has provided.
"There is a merry, frolicsome breeze—a rude one, in truth, for it winds my skirt about my limbs and blows my hair over my ears and eyes; and yet I love it, for it means no harm, and its crisp touch braces my body and gives me the taste of life.
"From my elevated standpoint I see the distant horizon, miles and miles away. Far off upon my right the clouds lie in long grey strata, like closely-piled packs of wool, but on my left the remoter sky is washed in silver, with here and there a rent revealing wonderfully delicate tints of blue.
"Overhead the wool-packs have been burst open by the wind which is tearing them apart and scattering their contents over the deep blue zenith. They are dazzlingly white, whether heaped together in massive bulk, or drawn out—as so many of them are—into transparent fluff which drifts in the rapid air current like down of thistles.
"The morning is cold and the air is keen, so that the sky-line is sharply defined and hints a threat of rain. But who cares about the evil of the hour after next when there are so many glories to delight the present sense? See, the sky-line of which I speak is dusky purple and reddish-brown, but broad, flat washes of verdigris stretch up to it, with here and there a yellow patch betokening fields of grain, and in the foreground meadows and pastures of brighter hue.
"In front of me is a clump of trees—fine, tall trees they are, with shining grey boles—standing erect and strong in spite of the fury of the gales. Sycamore and beech and elm, majestic, beautiful. I hear the cawing of the rooks from out the dark shadows.
"I climb over the wall a little farther on and walk fifty paces forward. I now see a grey Hall, a dear old place, stone-roofed and low, with tiny old-world window-panes around which the dark-hued ivy clings tenaciously. There are brightly coloured flower-beds in front, and a green lawn to one side, and a cluster of beeches stands sentinel before the closed door. For the door, alas! is closed, and as I look a thick thundercloud hangs over the house, and I turn away depressed and seek the sunshine on the other side.
"And now it is waste land upon which my delighted eyes rest, and the west wind brings to my nostrils the scent of the moors. Waste land! Who shall dare to call that russet-coloured hillside with the streaks of green upon it, waste? That stretch of country, bracken-covered, ending in the long expanse of heath which is now violet-purple in tint, but will soon be glowing and aflame when the heather bursts its bonds—can that be waste? Surely not!
"I see tiny cottages from whose chimneys the blue smoke is being twisted into fantastic forms by the wind's vagaries, and gardens gay with bloom, and a green-bordered street, and through an open door the dancing flame on a homely hearth. It is all very lovely and peaceful, and when I turn for a last look at the old Hall where the door is closed, lo! the thunder-cloud has gone, and the sky is blue over the smokeless stacks, and hope arises within my breast, and I go on my way with joy and peace in my heart. That is my picture!"
I stopped and opened my eyes. A tear was stealing down the squire's face, and the grasp on my hand had tightened.
"Have you finished, Grace?"
"Yes," I whispered.
"I think I should like to go home," he said. "I believe I could manage it, after all."
We left Zermatt on the following day. I must say that I entered the squire's room with some trepidation, but it was quite unnecessary. He smiled as I bent over to kiss him, and relieved my apprehension at once.
"It's all right, Grace," he said; "the heather pulls. You know, don't you?"
Dr. Grey was splendid. Motor cars are of no use in Zermatt, except to bring you there or take you away, so the smell of petrol does not often draw the tourist's attention from the sublime to the—nauseous; but it was characteristic of the almost impudent audacity of the man that he commandeered the only one there was at the Victoria.
"How have you managed it?" I asked, when I learned that we were all to travel as far as Lausanne in the Marquis d'Olsini's luxurious automobile.
"Oh, easily enough," he replied in his hearty way; "the marquis is no end of a decent sort, and when I explained matters, and pointed out that the car was rusting for want of use, he placed it at my disposal with the grace and courtliness that distinguish your true Italian nobleman."
It was a veritable little palace on tyres, and we reached Lausanne quickly and without inconvenience. The squire was not a bit worse for the effort, but the sight of old Gottlieb turning away from the door when he had bidden us good-bye, with a shrug of the shoulders that said as plainly as any words could have done that he washed his hands of all responsibility and was disgusted at the capriciousness of the mad English, afforded me much delight and remains with me still.
It took us four days to reach Folkestone, and we stayed there a couple of nights before we went on to London. Dr. and Mrs. Grey remained with us until we reached the St. Pancras hotel, where the Cynic was waiting to receive us. The squire will see a good deal of the Greys, as the doctor is a Manchester man and can easily run over. The Cynic took to them at once, and Mrs. Grey, or "Dot" as I have learned to call her, confided to me that my friend was a very nice fellow of whom she would be desperately afraid. Fancy any woman being afraid of the Cynic!
Mr. Derwent is, in his way, quite as good an organiser as the doctor, though he goes about his work so quietly that you hardly realise it. Instead of our having to change at Airlee he had arranged for a saloon to be attached to the Scotch express, so that we travelled with the utmost possible comfort. The squire was by this time so accustomed to travelling, and had borne the fatigue of the journey so well, that I should not have hesitated to accompany him alone, but it was very pleasant to have the Cynic's company and to feel that he shared the responsibility. He seemed pleased to see me, I thought, and congratulated me warmly on the success of my mission.
"You must thank Dr. Grey for all this," I said; "it was his persistence that brought Mr. Evans home."
"Nay, child," said the squire, "you and your word pictures sent me home."
Webster met us at Fawkshill with the pair of bays, and his eyes shone as he greeted the squire. It was good to observe the sympathy that exists between the two as they grasped hands at the station gate. One was master and the other servant, but they were just old friends reunited, and neither of them was ashamed of his emotion.
When we entered the lane the squire closed his eyes. "I will play at being a boy again, Grace. Tell me when we reach the brow of the hill, so that I may see it all at once."
I knew what he meant, and none of the three spoke a word until Webster pulled up his horses at my request. It was nearly five o'clock in the afternoon, and the warm August sun was well on his way to the west. A thin haze hung over the distant hills, but the moors were glorious in brown and purple, and there was here and there the glint of gorse.
"Now, sir," I said, "look and rejoice!"
He stood up in the carriage and looked around; and as he looked he filled his lungs with the sweet moorland air. Then he said, with deep emotion:
"Thank God for this!—Drive on, Webster, please."
I was anxious to see the motherkin, and leaving the squire to the companionship of Mr. Derwent I hastened to the cottage. It would be more correct to say that I did my best to hasten, but so many of the villagers stopped me to offer their greetings and inquire the news that my progress was considerably retarded.
When I was nearing the cottage I met Farmer Goodenough, whose hearty hand-grasp I accepted cautiously. After the usual preliminary questions had been asked and answered his voice became rather grave as he said:
"Miss 'Olden, I don't want to worry ye, knowing 'at you're an extra speshul hand at findin' trouble, but I don't altogether like the looks o' Mrs. Hubbard. She's gone a bit thin an' worn, in a manner o' speakin'. Ye'll excuse me saying ought, I know, but 'a stitch in time saves nine,' as t' Owd Book puts it."
I thanked him, and hurried home, feeling very troubled and uneasy, but when the dear old lady came tripping down to meet me my fears retired into the background. She was so bright and sweet and altogether dainty, and she looked so happy and so well, with the pink flush of pleasure on her cheeks, that I concluded the worthy farmer had for once deceived himself.
"Yes, love!" she exclaimed, flinging her arms around my neck as I stooped to kiss her; "but you are so brown, love, and you are really handsome. Do come in and have some tea."
She hovered about me all the time I was removing my hat and coat, anxious to render me service, and seizing every opportunity of stroking my hands and cheeks.
"You foolish old pussy-cat!" I said at length, as I forced her into her easy-chair and placed the hot toast before her. "Give over petting and spoiling me, and tell me all about yourself—the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth."
She evaded all my questions, however, and insisted that I should describe for her every incident of my journey.
When we had cleared away the things and drawn our chairs up to the fire I returned to the attack. Perhaps she was a little thin, after all, and there was a tired look about the eyes that I did not like.
"What have you been doing in my absence?" I asked; "not working yourself to death in the vain attempt to impart a brighter surface to everything polishable, eh?"
"No, love, I have taken things very easily, and have just kept the cottages and your studio tidy. I have spent a good deal of time at Reuben's, where they have been very kind to me; but I have missed you very much, love."
"Well, I am back now, and not likely to leave you again for a long time. We must have another full day's jaunt on the moors and see the heather in all its royal magnificence."
Her eyes brightened, but I noticed they fell again, and there was doubt in her voice as she replied:
"Yes, love. That will be nice. I think the heat has been very trying, and you may find it so, too. You must take care not to overtire yourself."
Then I knew that there was something wrong, and was glad that I had not consented to live at the Hall. It had been a disappointment to the squire, but he had not pressed the point when he saw that I was unwilling, and I had, of course, readily agreed to spend a good deal of time with him. I know he would have welcomed my old lady as a permanent guest for my sake, but she would never have consented to abandon her own little Hall of Memories, though she would have sought by every cunning artifice which love could devise to induce me to leave her, and would have suffered smilingly. I registered a mental vow that she should never know, if I could keep the secret from her, and that I would do all in my power to make her declining days happy.
"Why are you so weary, dear?" I asked.
"Oh, it is nothing, love," she replied. "It is just the heat. I shall be better when the days are cooler. Indeed, love, I am feeling better already."
I slept soundly enough, in spite of my new anxiety, but the morrow brought me no alleviation. The old lady's vigour was gone, and she moved about the house without energy. But her cheerfulness never failed her, and her patience was something to marvel at.
Dr. Trempest pulled up his horse at the gate and stopped to have a chat one day, and I took the opportunity of mentioning my uneasiness.
"I'll pop in and look at her," he said. "Why don't you give her the same magic physic you've poured down the throat of my old friend Evans? He's taken on a new lease of life. I tell you it's a miracle, and he says you did it, but he won't divulge the secret. Dear! dear! we old fogeys are no use at all in competition with the women! But come, let's have a look at the old girl."
He walked brusquely in and sat astride a chair, leaning his chin on the high back, and talked with her for ten minutes. Then he came out to me again.
"Can't say much without an examination, but appears to me the machinery's getting done. We can none of us last for ever, you know. Keep her still, if you can, and tell her she needn't be up every two minutes to flick the dust off the fireirons. Drive her out, now and then, and let her have exercise without exertion; and don't you pull a long face before her or get excited or boisterous."
I pulled a face athim, and he grinned as he mounted his horse. "I'll send her up a bottle," he said; "works wonders, does a bottle, if it's mixed with faith in them that take it;" and the caustic old man moved slowly away.
The bottle came, but so far it has wrought no miracle, and there has crept into my heart the unwelcome suggestion of loss. I have tried not to admit it, not to recognise it when admitted, but the attempt is vain. Dr. Trempest shakes his head and repeats his sagacious remark that we can't live for ever, and the squire presses my hand in sympathy, being too honest to attempt to comfort me with hollow hopes.
Only Mother Hubbard herself is cheerful, and as her physical strength decreases she appears to gain self-possession and mental vigour. When the squire suggested that she should be asked to accompany us on the drives which he so much enjoys I anticipated considerable opposition, and felt certain that she would yield most reluctantly, but to my surprise she consented without demur.
"This is very kind of Mr. Evans, love," she said, "and if you do not mind having an old woman with you I shall be glad to go."
She did not say much on these excursions, but when she was directly spoken to she answered without confusion, and was quite unconscious that she occasionally addressed the squire as "love." He never betrayed any consciousness of it, but I once noticed a repressed smile steal over Webster's face as he sat upon the box.
Now it was that I saw the full beauty of the moorland which had made so strong an appeal to my father's heart. I felt my own strangely stirred, and my two companions were also full of emotion. I believe it spoke to each of us with a different voice, and had not quite the same message for any two of us. I have hardly analysed my own feelings, but I think the rich and yet subdued colouring got hold of my imagination, and the wildness of the scene impressed me powerfully.
I had always known these moors—known them from my childhood; but only as one knows many things—the moon or the Mauritius, for instance—from the description of others. The picture painted for me had been true to life, but not living; yet it had been sufficiently lifelike to make the reality strangely familiar. And now I looked at it with double vision—through my own eyes and my father's; and the thought of what he would have felt quickened my perceptions and attuned them to the spirit of my ancestors. The moors were sheeted in purple, brightened by clumps of golden gorse, and I could easily have followed the example of Linnæus, who, when he first saw the yellow blossom, is said to have fallen on his knees and praised God for its beauty.
The squire had known the moors always. To him the scene speaks of home. I do not think the actual beauty of it impresses him greatly, perhaps because of its extreme familiarity, and it does not arouse in him the same sensation of pleasure or appeal to his artistic sense in the same degree as the grander scenery he has so lately left behind.
But thiscontentshim as nothing else does or could! It is as when one exchanges the gilded chairs of state for the old, familiar arm-chair which would appear shabby to some people, or the dress shoes of ceremony for the homely slippers on the hearth. He admits now that he is happier than he had ever been abroad, and that he is glad to spend the late evening of his days amid the friendly scenes of his youth and manhood.
As for Mother Hubbard, she is quite unconsciously a mixture of poet and prophet. Everything speaks to her of God.
"Yes, love," she said quite recently, "'He maketh everything beautiful in its season;'" and to her the country is always beautiful, because it is always as God made it. That is why she loves it so much, I am sure; and whether it glows and sparkles beneath the hot sun of August or lies dun and grey under the clouded skies of February it is always full of charm. To her, all God's paintings show the hand of the Master, whether done in monochrome or in the colours of the rainbow, and none of them fails to satisfy her.
And Nature preaches to her, but the sermons are always comforting to her soul, for her inward ear has never been trained to catch the gloomy messages which some of us hear so readily. But where she finds consolation I discover disquietude.
The horse had been pulled up at a point where the wide panorama stretched limitlessly before us, and for a time we had all been speechless. I had gathered a tiny bunch of heather and fastened it in my belt, and now stood, shading my eyes with my hand, as I looked across the billowy expanse. The squire had closed his eyes, but his face showed no trace of weariness, and I knew that he was happy.
Mother Hubbard broke the silence, as she sank back into her seat with a little sigh, and when I sat down Webster drove slowly on.
"It is nice to think, love, that though you have gathered and taken away a sprig of heather the landscape is still beautiful. And yet, you know, the little flowers you have plucked gave their share of beauty to the whole, and helped God to do His work. I think, love, that thought encourages me when I know that the Lord may soon stretch out His hand for me. Your little flowers have not lived in vain. Only their neighbours will miss them, but their little world would not have been quite as beautiful without them."
I think the squire was astonished, but he remained quite still, and I replied:
"That is very true, dear, but the heather has never thwarted its Maker's purpose, but has lived the life He designed, and so has perfectly fulfilled its mission. With man, alas! it is not so. He too often makes a sad bungle of life, and is so full of imperfections that he cannot add much to the beauty of the landscape."
Mother Hubbard shook her head and pointed to the moors. "Yetthatis very beautiful, love, isn't it?"
"It is perfect," I replied.
"Perfect, is it? Look at the little flowers at your waist. See, one little bell has been blighted in some way, and there are several which seem to have been eaten away in parts, and here and there some have fallen off. I wonder if you could find a sprig, love, where every bell and tiny leaf is perfect. Not many, I think. Yet you say the view is perfect, though the parts are full of imperfections."
The squire opened his eyes and bent them gravely upon her, but he did not speak, and she did not observe him.
"Ah, but, dear Mother Hubbard," I said, "the heather bells cannot help their imperfections. The blight and the insect, the claw of bird, the foot of beast, the hand and heel of man—-how can they resist these things? But again I say, with man it is not so. He is the master of his destiny. He has freedom of will, and when he fails and falls and spoils his life it is his own fault."
"Not always, love," the gentle voice replied; "perhaps not often entirely his own fault. I used to think like that, but God has given me clearer vision now. Here is poor Sar'-Ann, not daring to show her face outside the door; covered with shame for her own sin and Ginty's. Oh yes, love, she has spoiled her life. But think of how she has been brought up: in a little cottage where there was a big family and only two rooms; where the father was coarse and the boys—poor little fellows—imitated him; and the mother, though she has a kind heart, is vulgar and often thoughtless; where decency has been impossible and woman's frailty has been made a jest. It has not been Sar'-Ann's fault, love, that she has been placed there. She had no voice in the selection of her lot. She might have been in your home and you in hers. That little bunch of heather would have been safe yet if it had not been growing by the roadside where you stood."
"Then God is responsible for Sar'-Ann?" I asked.
"God is her Father, and He loves her very dearly," she replied simply. "There are lots of questions I cannot answer, love, but I am sure He will not throw Sar'-Ann away because she has been blighted and stained."
The squire broke in now, and there was just a little tremor in his voice as he spoke:
"'And when the vessel that he made of the clay was marred in the hands of the potter he made it again another vessel, as seemed good to the potter to make it.'"
Mother Hubbard's eyes lit up. "Yes, sir," she said, "and I do not think he grieved too much because the first design went wrong. He just made it again another vessel. Perhaps he meant at first to make a very beautiful and graceful vessel, but there were imperfections and flaws in the material, so he made it into a homely jug; and yet it was useful."
"Oh, Mother Hubbard!" I said, "there are all sorts of imperfections and flaws in your logic, and I know people who would shake it to pieces in a moment."
"Well, love, perhaps so; but they would not shake my faith:
"'To one fixed ground my spirit clings,I know that God is good.'"