“MARY, IT IS MY HUSBAND!”
Alice and Mary were to be found under the cedars, a very favourite
resort of theirs those August evenings. A round wicker table stood
between them, upon which were all the requirements of afternoon tea.
Alice, leaning back in a low garden-chair, was reading to Mary, who
was knitting, “A Princess of Thule.” How pretty she looked! The sun,
glancing through the sombre branches, fell in stray flecks on her hair
and dress--a white cambric trimmed with quantities of lace and knots
of pale-blue ribbon. She was twirling a carnation in her fingers as she
read. But there was a grave melancholy expression in her downcast face,
sad to see in one so young. Coming to the end of a chapter, she paused
and exclaimed, looking up:
“Well, I must confess, the Princess of Thule ran away from her husband
on very small provocation. Don’t you think so, Molly?”
Molly, instead of replying, said, as she gazed intently over Alice’s
head:
“Why, who is this young man coming over here with Miss Saville?”
“Young man?” echoed Alice indifferently, and without turning her head;
“oh, it must be the postmaster. Auntie promised him a quantity of
geranium and carnation cuttings.”
“Does the postmaster wear well-cut clothes and a dark moustache? Is
the postmaster a gentleman?”
“No, you ridiculous girl,” turning and looking over her shoulder. After
a minute’s dead silence, “Mary,” she gasped, “it is my husband!”
Her face was deadly pale as she raised it to her friend’s, and letting
the book slip from her knees, she rose and leant against the tree with
both her hands pressed to her heart. The cedar was between her and
the house, and she had time to recover herself a little before her
husband joined them. As he approached she looked at him keenly. Had he
borne the traces of his recent wounds and fever, and looked a war-worn
invalid, her woman’s heart would have melted instantly, but as he came
across the grass his step was as buoyant, his eyes as keen, and his
bearing as gallant as ever. A thousand thoughts seemed to crowd to her
brain, her heart beat as though it would choke her, she was trembling
from head to foot; as, with all the composure she could muster, and
without meeting his glance, she gave him her hand in silence.
Miss Saville promptly introduced Mary Ferrars.
“You and I ought to be friends, Miss Ferrars; I was your brother’s fag
at Eton, and many a thrashing he gave me. Don’t you think that that
constitutes a tie between us?”
He made the above speech in order to give Alice time to compose
herself; and self-possessed as he seemed, his heart was bounding wildly
too.
“I hope you are now quite strong, Alice,” he said, looking at her with
evident concern, for her face was as pale as ashes.
“Quite, thank you,” was her laconic reply as she seated herself. Her
knees were trembling so that she dared not, and could not, stand any
longer.
“Give us some tea, my dear,” said Miss Saville, who fortunately
appeared to grasp the situation, and tea was made; and as it was handed
about a certain amount of conversation began to circulate. London, and
Reginald’s visit to the Mayhews, his passage home, the latest news from
the East, formed in turn topics of discourse. Alice scarcely opened
her lips. Sir Reginald might have been a casual visitor, who had just
dropped in, for all the warmth, sympathy, or interest displayed by his
wife. A more uncomfortable quartette seldom took tea together. No one
would suppose that the pale haughty-looking girl and the dark bronzed
young man, so leisurely sipping his tea, were husband and wife, and
had only met within the last ten minutes after a separation of years.
Mary Ferrars gazed from one to the other in silent amazement. Although
outwardly calm, conflicting emotions were waging war in their bosoms.
_She_ was thinking: “If I don’t manage to get away I shall disgrace
myself--I shall burst out crying. This lump in my throat will choke
me.” _He_ was thinking: “Helen was dreaming. This notion of hers was
one of her most superb flights of imagination. I was a fool to listen
to her. She was dreaming,” he repeated, as he looked at his wife; and
certainly in that pale set face there was no sign of either welcome or
repentance.
These thoughts were interrupted by their merry bold-faced boy, who,
trotting past Sir Reginald, far ahead of his grave and stately nurse,
rushed up to Alice, saying: “I’ve come for cake.”
“Yes, yes, my darling!” replied his mother, stooping over his dark
curls. “Presently. Go over first and speak to that gentleman, and give
him a kiss.”
“Who is he, mother?” he asked, turning round and gazing at Sir Reginald
with the facsimile of his own eyes--in fact the child’s face was such a
striking reproduction of his own that he himself could not help seeing
the likeness. He was a splendid boy, of whom his father, were he a
king, might well be proud.
Leaning his upright little person against Alice, and throwing back
his head with a proud gesture very entertaining in one so young, he
repeated, as he looked at Sir Reginald unflinchingly:
“Who is he?”
“He is your father,” she faltered. “Go and speak to him, Maurice.”
She could not refrain a glance of motherly pride as she pushed her
boy with gentle force towards his other parent. But Maurice, who had
inherited all his father’s deliberation and decision of character,
calmly remarked:
“_He_ is not my father. My father,” with much pride, and hands stuck in
the belt of his blouse, “is a soldier, and rides a horse with a long
tail, and wears a sword and a red coat, and fights people. _You_,” said
he, nodding his head towards Sir Reginald, “are just like anybody else.”
“Come here, sir,” said his father, stretching out an arm; and, much to
everyone’s amazement, the boy went quietly over and stood at his knee.
“I am a soldier; but I have got a holiday. You don’t know what that is
yet, do you? I have done with soldiers for awhile, and have put away my
sword and my coat; but I’ll show them to you some day, if you like.”
“Will you?” said the child with awe-struck eyes; “and will you lend me
your sword to play with, for I’m going to be a soldier too some day?”
“Are you indeed? I’m afraid I can’t lend you _my_ sword; but perhaps I
might buy you a little one instead. Suppose you come and sit on my knee
and tell me all about yourself?”
So Master Maurice, nothing loath, climbed up; and Alice, with a beating
heart, saw her child in her husband’s arms for the first time. The
two faces were so alike, and yet so different; she could now compare
together, if she dared; but she shrank from meeting her husband’s eyes.
Maurice was completely fascinated by the strange gentleman, and
regarded him with mingled curiosity and delight.
“Are you my father?” he asked incredulously.
“Yes.”
“And why did you not come to see me before?”
Here was an embarrassing question.
“Because I have been in India,” was the evasive reply.
“And are you come to stay at home now?” Momentary pause. Without
waiting for a reply he pursued: “I’ve seen your picture often. Alice
keeps it in a locket; that one,” pointing a firm brown finger at his
unfortunate mother, and raising a scorching blush to her hitherto pale
face. “She says I am to love you very much--as much as her.”
“Do you love her?” continued this pitiless innocent; “do you love
Alice?”
Reginald, painfully embarrassed, cast about for a reply. In desperation
he answered:
“Of whom are you speaking, Maurice? It is not possible that you call
your mother Alice!”
“Yes, sometimes; and so do Aunt Mary and Miss Ferrars.”
“Well, you are not to do it any more, remember. Now tell me your name?”
said his father, catechising in his turn.
“Maurice Reg--nald Fairfax.”
So he had not been wholly forgotten.
“And how old are you?”
“Past two, long time. How old are you?”
“Past twenty this long time. Are you a good boy, do you think?”
“Alice knows,” he replied, nodding with easy confidence towards his
mother.
“Yes, Alice knows,” said she, rising quickly and stretching out her
hand; “Alice knows that it’s your bedtime, so say ‘Good-night’ and come
along.”
“No! no! no! not yet!” he cried, clinging tightly to Sir Reginald and
burrowing under his arm.
“Maurice, listen to me,” said his father gravely, setting him down.
“You told me just now that you intended to be a soldier, did you not?”
“Yes,” returned Maurice eagerly.
“Well, you will never do for a soldier if you go on like this; his
first duty is obedience. Now give me a kiss, and go with your mother at
once.”
Maurice, whose _forte_ was certainly not obedience, raised his eyes
and looked at his father. Seeing that he was perfectly in earnest,
he climbed once more on his knee, imprinted an experimental kiss on
his moustache, and reluctantly departed with many regretful backward
glances, Reginald watching the retreating pair till they were out of
sight. Were they really his wife and son? He could scarcely realise
it; for, after all, he had had a very few months of married life
and twenty-seven years of bachelor liberty. He felt much more like a
bachelor than a Benedict.
Miss Saville, following his eyes, said: “You may well look proud of
him. Is he not a splendid boy? But he wants a father’s hand over him
sadly. Alice is his slave, and has been so ever since he was born.
She gives up to him in every way, and he treats her more as his
playfellow--as you may see--than his mother.”
Alice, having deposited Maurice in the nursery, ran quickly down to her
own room, to be alone for a little time to think and to compose herself.
She leant her hot forehead against the frame of the open window and
gave way to a feeling of utter and undivided joy--joy that he was home,
alive, and well, and under the very same roof as herself--at least
within earshot. She paused as she heard Mary’s gay musical laugh. They
were all walking about the grounds; she could see them. He was standing
on the gravel path, telling them something very amusing evidently,
for as he concluded Miss Saville and Miss Ferrars both laughed
immoderately. With this laugh came a revulsion of feeling. “_He_ could
joke; he could be exceedingly entertaining. This meeting was nothing to
him. He had not shown the smallest signs of emotion or agitation. He
had merely come to see if she was sufficiently meek and humble to be
reinstated in his good graces. No, she was _not_,” she said to herself,
as she thought over the utter neglect with which he had treated her
for the last three years. “He thinks he has only to extend the top of
his sceptre and I shall be only too thankful to approach. But he is
mistaken; I shall be ‘_Vashti_’ to the end of the chapter. I shall
never humble myself again. Pleased as he is with Maurice now, he has
never taken any direct notice of him all these years.”
Alice dressed rapidly, hardening her heart with bitter recollections at
every moment. Just as she had completed her toilette, and was arranging
some flowers in her dress, the door opened and Mary hurried in.
“Oh you sly girl!” she exclaimed; “dressed already? I thought you were
doing something of this kind to ensure a nice long _tête-à-tête_ with
_him_. Oh Alice!” she cried, taking her in her arms and kissing her
warmly, “what a happy young woman you are! How very, very glad I am
for your sake! Why did you never tell me your husband was so perfectly
charming--so handsome, so distinguished-looking? How proud you must be
of him, my dear!” holding Alice at arm’s length and looking at her with
eager interrogation.
Alice, whose hair and costume were slightly disordered by her friend’s
enthusiastic hugging, drew back rather flushed and out of countenance.
“Mary,” she said, averting her face as she rearranged the roses in
her dress, “you are very good, and mean very kindly, but”--and she
paused--“but I must tell you something I never meant to tell you.
Reginald and I do not get on very well together. We--we--do not suit;
but do not take any notice, _please_,” she entreated as she looked at
her friend appealingly. “You will soon see”--and she stopped; then
continued: “Reginald is my guardian, you know; and he and I thought
the best thing to do was to marry. But he is far more devoted to his
profession than to me. His sword is his real wife, and I--I--get on
very well alone, as you have seen, and will see.”
“What shall I see?” asked Mary. “I see that you are the handsomest
couple I have ever come across, and I have no doubt you are equally
well matched in other respects.”
“Well, _qui vivra verra_,” replied Alice, as she opened the door and
disappeared, anxious to avoid her friend’s inquiries. Reginald, having
hurried his toilette, hastened down to the drawing-room in the hopes of
seeing Alice for at least a few minutes alone. Her greeting had been
cold and constrained; but she was taken by surprise. She was agitated,
and his lovely shy Alice was the last to offer or accept caresses in
public. It would be different when they met alone.
He stood for some time in the deep window, looking out into the
park. How still and green and cool it all looked after the bustle and
heat and glare in India! “There was no place like home after all,” he
thought as his eyes roved over the undulating sward and the clumps of
splendid timber, and he watched the rooks soaring nestwards and heard
the corncrake’s discordant yet familiar “Craik-craik.” The door, which
was ajar, was at this instant pushed open, and with a swish of long
trailing skirts Alice advanced into the room. At first she seemed to
hesitate, but on second thoughts approached the window.
“What a lovely evening it is, is it not?” she remarked, unfurling an
enormous black fan with a grace all her own.
“Lovely indeed!” replied her husband, turning his back to the landscape
and scanning her critically.
After a pause of thirty seconds (employed by his wife in steeling
herself with recollections of the past), “Alice,” he asked with a
gesture of appeal, “have you _nothing_ to say to me?”
“To say to you?” she repeated, with raised brows and an air of most
perfect indifference. “No, nothing particular; unless that I am afraid
you had a very warm journey here to-day. Early in the afternoon it was
absolutely broiling.”
“Well, yes, it _was_ warm--a good deal warmer than the welcome you gave
me. But you can make up for that _now_,” coming closer. “Alice, are you
not going to say you are glad to see me?”
“Yes, I am very glad to see you,” retreating two steps and making a
shield of her fan.
“And is that all?”
“I think so--what more do you expect? You are nothing but my
guardian,” she replied, avoiding his eyes.
“_Indeed!_” with an imperceptible start.
“Yes. You made the arrangement _yourself_; do not blame _me_ for
holding you to it,” she answered hurriedly.
“That arrangement, as you call it, was made under utterly different
circumstances, when you did not, and would not, believe that I was your
lawful husband. It is different now--you know better than that.”
“It may suit you to change _your mind_, but I do not alter mine.
You are my guardian, and nothing more; as husband and wife we are
strangers.”
“Is this your matured determination?” said Sir Reginald in a transport
of indignation.
“It is,” she replied firmly. “You have forgotten the existence of your
wife for the last three years: continue to forget her. Do you think I
have no pride?”
“Pride--_no_!” he exclaimed angrily. “I could not dignify it by such a
name. You are consumed by a senseless besotted obstinacy, that no doubt
you are pleased to consider as such.”
“You are, as usual, most flattering,” replied Alice, carelessly fanning
herself, considerably but inwardly agitated.
“I will take you at your word,” said Sir Reginald in a low but steady
voice. “I shall consider your decision _final_--as husband and wife we
are strangers. But I had hoped----” and he paused.
“What did you hope?” she asked sharply.
“Never mind; it is of no consequence _now_,” preparing to withdraw from
the window.
“Tell me,” she asked, detaining him with a movement of her fan, “did
you ever get the photograph of Maurice that I sent you?”
“I did,” he replied in an icy tone.
“You did!” she echoed. “You really did!”
“I did, as I have before remarked, and what then?” looking at her
sternly.
“Only that you must have also----” Here her answer was cut short by the
entrance of Miss Saville and Mary; and Sir Reginald, walking to the
other end of the room, remained aloof, looking out of the window till
dinner was announced. During this short interval he had time to recover
his composure and to collect his thoughts, and there was no trace of
anger or agitation in his countenance as he took his seat at the foot
of the dinner-table. No one could guess the enormous effort it had cost
him to attain such self-command. How strange it looked to see Alice
and her husband sitting opposite each other--host and hostess--master
and mistress! A man’s voice was an agreeable acquisition to the three
trebles, not that one of them was much heard. Sir Reginald had that
clear high-bred speech which is so expressively authoritative and yet
so musical; he spoke like a man who meant what he said. As to Alice,
indifferent and uninterested as she looked, each syllable of those dear
familiar tones thrilled her to the heart! Not once during dinner did he
directly address her--he did not even look at her so far as she knew.
“He is very, very angry with me,” she mused as she made a feint of
eating. “But it was better to let him know at once that I am _not_ ‘the
patient Griselda!’ When he cools down he will respect me all the more
for respecting myself! No doubt I was too hasty, abrupt, and perhaps
aggressive. I might have softened it more--but then I never can! I
have no tact!” Absorbed in her own reflections, she never observed the
signals Miss Saville was making to her; her eyes were steadily fixed on
her plate, and her thoughts apparently miles away.
“My dear, do you not think that we had better go into the drawing-room?”
“I beg your pardon, auntie,” she exclaimed with a start. “Of course.”
Sir Reginald accompanied the ladies, and spent a considerable time in
looking over photographs and talking to Miss Saville, Alice having
betaken herself to a distant arm-chair and Mary to the piano. After she
had played for some time, she went over to Alice, and in an audible
whisper said, as she stooped to arrange a tumbled chair-back:
“Come now, it is your turn; come and sing those two new songs you got
last week.”
“No, not to-night, Molly,” she replied, shaking her head very
decidedly. “Do not ask me, I could not sing a note!”
In the same way when Miss Saville challenged her to their usual game of
backgammon, as at night the old lady’s eyes were too weak for working
or reading.
“Not to-night, please, auntie,” she said plaintively, “I really feel
too stupid.”
“If you will accept me instead, Miss Saville, I will play with
pleasure; but I am afraid you will find me a most contemptible foe,”
remarked Sir Reginald, as he arranged the board all wrong.
The old lady accepted his offer with the greatest alacrity, and they
commenced to play without further delay.
Mary felt actually _ashamed_ of Alice, who, at some distance from her
relatives, lay back in her chair composedly knitting, pausing now and
then to count the stitches, and then resuming her occupation as if her
bread depended on it.
“Was this the way to welcome a husband? No wonder they did not ‘get on’
if Alice conducted herself in this fashion.”
As to her husband, as far as Mary could judge, there was nothing
outwardly amiss with his manners or appearance. She took the
opportunity of studying him whilst he was busily puzzling his brains
over the backgammon board.
About his good looks there could be but one opinion; but did not a
certain curve of the nostrils speak of pride? Was not firmness almost
too weak a word to convey the expression of his mouth and chin? Would
not a man with less patrician beauty and a more yielding disposition
be better calculated to make a woman happy?
As she thought all this with a contemplative gaze, she suddenly found a
pair of dark eyes fixed on herself with evident interest and amusement.
“Am I so fortunate as to remind you of anyone, Miss Ferrars?”
“No,” she replied hastily. “Please excuse my rudeness, I had no idea
that I was staring so hard; but you must remember that you are actually
the first Victoria Cross I have ever seen; and pardon me.”
“Surely you did not expect to see anything unusual in my appearance on
that account?” he asked with a smile. “I daresay you have seen many as
deserving of the distinction, if not more so. It is all a matter of
luck.”
“Is that the way you speak of your honours?” said Miss Saville,
pouncing down remorselessly on a blot. “I have no doubt you are very
proud of the cross all the same, and that you earned it _well_,” she
added with conviction.
A bald desultory conversation was kept up and solely supported between
Miss Saville and her nephew. Even Mary, from her opulent resources,
could find but little to say, for Alice’s demeanour paralysed all
efforts at sociability. Alice, leaning back in her chair with an air of
serene divine beatitude, enacted the part of a blanket of the heaviest
and wettest description.
A very dreary evening at last came to an end, and when the ladies had
departed Reginald strolled out into the pleasure-grounds to have a
smoke and a think.
As he paced moodily up and down, his reflections were anything but
agreeable--very much the reverse.
“What an infernal idiot I was to have come here! Fairfax, thy name
is _fool_,” he added with bitter emphasis. “Far from being inclined
for _peace_, Alice does all she can to _pose_ as the injured wife.
There is nothing like taking high ground,” he muttered to himself,
contemptuously kicking a fir-cone out of his way. “When the Mayhews
come I’ll go, and meanwhile I’ll meet Alice on her own terms. I
shall take her at her word once for all. No more halting between two
opinions; no womanish caprice; we shall be strangers. I am actually
talking to myself,” he exclaimed with a shrug of his shoulders; “an
infallible sign that my reason is beginning to totter. Well, if the
worst comes to the worst, I shan’t be the first Fairfax that has been
an out-and-out _fool_.”