Meanwhile Elizabeth Bremerton was sitting pensive on a hill-side
about mid-way between Mannering and Chetworth. She had a bunch of
autumn berries in her hands. Her tweed skirt and country boots
showed traces of mud much deeper than anything on the high road; her
dress was covered with bits of bramble, dead leaves, and
thistledown; and her bright gold hair had been pulled here and there
out of its neat coils, as though she had been pushing through hedges
or groping through woods.
'It's perfectly _monstrous_!' she was thinking. 'It oughtn't to be
allowed. And when we're properly civilized, it won't be allowed. No
one ought to be free to ruin his land as he pleases! It concerns the
_State_. "Manage your land decently--produce a proper amount of
food--or out you go!" And I wouldn't have waited for war to say it!
Ugh! that place!'
And she thought with disgust of the choked and derelict fields, the
ruined gates and fences, the deserted buildings she had just been
wandering through. After the death of an old miser, who, according
to the tale she had heard in a neighbouring village, had lived there
for forty years, with a decrepit wife, both of them horribly
neglected and dirty, and making latterly no attempt to work the
farm, a new tenant had appeared who would have taken the place, if
the Squire would have rebuilt the house and steadings, and allowed a
reasonable sum for the cleansing and recovering of the land. But
the Squire would do nothing of the kind. He 'hadn't a farthing to
spend on expensive repairs,' and if the new tenant wouldn't take the
farm on the old terms, well, he might leave it alone.
The place had just been investigated by the County Committee, and a
peremptory order had been issued. What was the Squire going to do?
Elizabeth fell to thinking what _ought_ to be done with the Squire's
twelve thousand acres, if the Squire were a reasonable man. It was
exasperating to her practical sense to see a piece of business in
such a muddle. As a child and growing girl she had spent long
summers in the country with a Dorsetshire uncle who farmed his own
land, and there had sprung up in her an instinctive sympathy with
the rich old earth and its kindly powers, with the animals and the
crops, with the labourers and their rural arts, with all the
interwoven country life, and its deep rooting in the soil of history
and poetry.
Country life is, above all, steeped in common sense--the old,
ancestral, simple wisdom of primitive men. And Elizabeth, in spite
of her classical degree, and her passion for Greek pots, believed
herself to be, before everything, a person of common sense. She had
always managed her own family's affairs. She had also been the paid
secretary of an important learned society in her twenties not long
after she left college, and knew well that she had been a
conspicuous success. She had a great love, indeed, for any sort of
organizing, large and small, for putting things straight, and
running them. She was burning to put Mannering straight--and run it.
She knew she could. Organizing means not doing things yourself, but
finding the right people to do them. And she had always been good
at finding the right people--putting the round pegs into the round
holes.
All very well, however, to talk of running the Squire's estate! What
was to be done with the Squire?
Take the codicil business. First thing that morning he had sent her
to that very drawer to look for something, and there lay the
precious document--unsigned and unwitnessed--for any one to see. He
made no comment, nor of course did she. He would probably forget it
till the date of his son's marriage was announced, and then complete
it in a hurry.
Take the farms and the park. As to the farms there were two
summonses now pending against him with regard to 'farms in
hand'--Holme Wood and another--besides the action in the case of the
three incompetent men, Gregson at their head, who were being turned
out. With regard to ploughing up the park, all his attempts so far
to put legal difficulties in the way of the County Committee had
been quite futile. The steam plough was coming in a week. Meanwhile
the gates were to be locked, and two old park-keepers, who were
dithering in their shoes, had been told to defend them.
At bottom, Elizabeth was tolerably convinced that the Squire would
not land himself in gaol, cut off from his books and his bronzes,
and reduced to the company of people who had never heard of
Pausanias. But she was alarmed lest he should 'try it on' a little
too far, in these days when the needs of war and the revolutionary
currents abroad make the setting down of squires especially
agreeable to the plebeians who sit on juries or county committees.
Of course he must--he certainly would--climb down.
But somebody would have to go through the process of persuading
him! That was due to his silly dignity! She supposed that somebody
would be herself. How absurd! She, who had just been six weeks on
the scene! But neither of the married daughters had the smallest
influence with him; Sir Henry Chicksands had been sent about his
business; Major Mannering was out of favour, and Desmond and Pamela
were but babes.
Then a recollection flashed across the contriving mind of Elizabeth
which brought a decided flush to her fair skin--a flush which was
half amusement, half wrath. That morning a rather curious incident
had happened. After her talk with Major Mannering, and because the
morning was fine and the Squire was away, she had dragged a small
table out into the garden, in front of the library, and set to work
there on a part of the new catalogue of the collections, which she
and Mr. Levasseur were making. She did not, however, like Mr.
Levasseur. Something in her, indeed, disapproved of him strongly.
She had already managed to dislodge him a good deal from his former
intimacy with the Squire. Luckily she was a much better scholar than
he, though she admitted that his artistic judgment was worth having.
As a shelter from a rather cold north wind, she was sitting in full
sun under the protection of a yew hedge of ancient growth, which ran
out at right angles to the library, and made one side of a
quadrangular rose-garden, planted by Mrs. Mannering long ago, and
now, like everything else, in confusion and neglect.
Presently she heard voices on the other side of the hedge--Mrs.
Strang, no doubt, and Mrs. Gaddesden. She did not take much to
either lady. Mrs. Strang seemed to her full of good intentions, but
without practical ability to fit them. For Mrs. Gaddesden's type she
had an instinctive contempt, the contempt of the clever woman of
small means who has had to earn her own living, and to watch in
silence the poses and pretences of rich women playing at
philanthropy. But, all the same, she and the servants between them
had made Mrs. Gaddesden extremely comfortable, while at the same
time rationing her strictly. 'I really can be civil to anybody!'
thought Elizabeth complacently.
Suddenly, her own name, and a rush of remarks on the other side of
this impenetrable hedge, made her raise her head, startled, from her
work, eyes and mouth wide open.
It was Mrs. Gaddesden speaking.
'Yes, she's gone out. I went into the library just now to ask her to
look out a train for me. She's wonderfully good at Bradshaw. Oh, of
course, I admit she's a very clever woman! But she wasn't there.
Forest thinks she's gone over to Holme Wood, to get father some
information he wants. She asked Forest how to get this this morning.
My dear Margaret,' with great emphasis, 'there's no question about
it! If she chooses, she'll be mistress here before long. She's
steadily getting father into her hands. She was never engaged, was
she, to look after accounts and farms? and yet here she is, taking
everything on. He'll grow more and more dependent upon her, and
you'll see!--I believe he's been inclined for some time to marry
again. He wants somebody to look after Pamela, and set him free for
his hobbies. He'll very soon find out that this woman fills the
part, and that, if he marries her, he'll get a classical secretary
besides.'
Mrs. Strang's voice--a deep husky voice--interposed.
'Miss Bremerton's not a woman to be married against her will, that
you may be sure of, Alice.'
'No, but, my dear,' said the other impatiently, 'every woman over
thirty wants a home--and a husband. She'd get that here anyway,
however bad father's affairs may be. And, of course, a _position_.'
The voices passed on out of hearing. Elizabeth remained transfixed.
Then with a contemptuous shake of the head, and a bright colour, she
returned to her work.
But now, as she sat meditating on the hill-side, this absurd
conversation recurred to her. Absurd, and not absurd! 'Most women of
my sort can do what they have a mind to do,' she thought to herself,
with perfect _sang-froid_. 'If I thought it worth while to marry
this elderly lunatic--he's an interesting lunatic, though!--I
suppose I could do it. But it isn't worth while--not the least. I've
done with being a woman! What interests me is the bit of
_work_--national work! Men find that kind of thing enough--a great
many of them. I mean to find it enough. A fig for marrying!'
All the same, as she returned to her schemes both for regenerating
the estate and managing the Squire--schemes which were beginning to
fascinate her, both by their difficulty and their scale--she found
her thoughts oddly interfered with, first by recollections of the
past--bitter, ineffaceable memories--and then by reflections on the
recent course of her relations with the Squire.
He had greeted her that morning without a single reference to the
incidents of the night before, had seemed in excellent spirits, and
before going up to town had given her in twenty minutes, _à propos_
of some difficulty in her work, one of the most brilliant lectures
on certain points of Homeric archaeology she had ever heard--and she
was a connoisseur in lectures.
Intellectually, as a scholar, she both admired and looked upon
him--with reverence, even with enthusiasm. She was eager for his
praise, distressed by his censure. Practically and morally,
patriotically, above all, she despised him, thought him 'a worm and
no man'! There was the paradox of the situation and as full of
tingling challenge and entertainment as paradoxes generally are.
At this point she became aware of a group on the high road far to
her right. A pony-cart--a girl driving it--a man in khaki beside
her; with a second girl-figure and another khaki-clad warrior,
walking near.
She presently thought she recognized Pamela's pony and Pamela
herself. Desmond, who was going off that very evening to his
artillery camp, had told her that 'Pam' was driving Aubrey over to
Chetworth, and that he, Desmond, was 'jolly well going to see to it
that neither old Aubrey nor Beryl were bullied out of their lives by
father,' if he could help it. So no doubt the second girl-figure was
that of Beryl Chicksands, and the other gentleman in khaki was
probably Captain Chicksands, for whom Desmond seemed to cherish a
boyish hero-worship. They had been all lunching together at
Chetworth, she supposed.
She watched them coming, with a curious mingling of interest in them
and detachment from them. She was to them merely the Squire's paid
secretary. Were they anything to her? A puckish thought crossed her
mind, sending a flash of slightly cynical laughter through her quiet
eyes. If Mrs. Gaddesden's terrors--for she supposed they were
terrors--were suddenly translated into fact, why, all these people
would become in a moment related to her!--their lives would be mixed
up with hers--she and they would matter intimately to each other!
She sat smiling and dreaming a few more minutes, the dimples playing
about her firm mouth and chin. Then, as the sound of wheels drew
nearer, she rose and went towards the party.
* * * * *
The party from Chetworth soon perceived Elizabeth's approach. 'So
this is the learned lady?' said the Captain in Pamela's ear. She had
brought him in her pony-carriage so far, as he was not yet able for
much physical exertion, and he and Beryl were to walk back from
Holme Wood Hill.
He put up his eye-glass, and examined the figure as it came nearer.
'She's just come up, I suppose, from the farm,' said Pamela,
pointing to some red roofs among the trees, in the wide hollow below
the hill.
'"Athêne Ageleiê"!' murmured the Major, who had been proxime for the
Ireland, and a Balliol man. 'She holds herself well--beautiful
hair!'
'Beryl, this is Miss Bremerton,' said Aubrey Mannering, with a
cordial ring in his voice, as he introduced his fiancée to
Elizabeth. The two shook hands, and Elizabeth thought the girl's
manner a little stand-off, and wondered why.
The pony had soon been tied up, and the party spread themselves on
the grass of the hill-side; for Holme Wood Hill was a famous point
of view, and the sunny peace of the afternoon invited loitering.
For miles to the eastward spread an undulating chalk plain, its
pale grey or purplish soil showing in the arable fields where the
stubbles were just in process of ploughing, its monotony broken by a
vast wood of oak and beech into which the hill-side ran down--a wood
of historic fame, which had been there when Senlac was fought, had
furnished ship-timber for the Armada, and sheltered many a cavalier
fugitive of the Civil Wars.
The wood indeed, which belonged to the Squire, was a fragment of
things primeval. For generations the trees in it had sprung up,
flourished, and fallen as they pleased. There were corners of it
where the north-west wind sweeping over the bare down above it had
made pathways of death and ruin; sinister places where the fallen or
broken trunks of the great beech trees, as they had crashed
down-hill upon and against each other, had assumed all sorts of
grotesque and phantasmal attitudes, as in a trampled mêlée of
giants; there were other parts where slender plumed trees, rising
branchless to a great height above open spaces, took the shape from
a distance of Italian stone palms, and gave a touch of southern or
romantic grace to the English midland scene; while at their feet,
the tops of the more crowded sections of the wood lay in close,
billowy masses of leaf, the oaks vividly green, the beeches already
aflame.
'Who says there's a war?' said Captain Chicksands, sinking
luxuriously into a sunny bed of dry leaves, conveniently placed in
front of Elizabeth. 'Miss Bremerton, you and I were, I understand,
at the same University?'
Elizabeth assented.
'Is it your opinion that Universities are any good?--that after the
war there are going to be any Universities?'
'Only those that please the Labour Party!' put in Mannering.
'Oh, I'm not afraid of the Labour Party--awfully good fellows, many
of them. The sooner they make a Government the better. They've got
to learn their lessons like the rest of us. But I do want to know
whether Miss Bremerton thinks Oxford was any _use_--before the
war--and is going to be any use after the war? It's all right now,
of course, for the moment, with the Colleges full of cadets and
wounded men. But would you put the old Oxford back if you could?'
He lay on his elbows looking up at her. Elizabeth's eyes sparkled a
little. She realized that an able man was experimenting on her,
putting her through her paces. She asked what he meant by 'the old
Oxford,' and an amusing dialogue sprang up between them as to their
respective recollections of the great University--the dons, the
lectures, the games, the Eights, 'Commem.' and the like. The Captain
presently declared that Elizabeth had had a much nicer Oxford than
he, and he wished he had been a female student.
'Didn't you--didn't you,' he said, his keen eyes observing her, 'get
a prize once that somebody had given to the Women's Colleges for
some Greek iambics?'
'Oh,' cried Elizabeth, 'how did you hear of that?'
'I was rather a dab at them myself,' he said lazily, drawing his hat
over his eyes as he lay in the sun, 'and I perfectly remember
hearing of a young lady--yes, I believe it was you!--whose
translation of Browning's "Lost Leader" into Greek iambics was
better than mine. They set it in the Ireland. You admit it? Capital!
As to the superiority of yours, I was, of course, entirely
sceptical, though polite. Remind me, how did you translate "Just for
a ribbon to put on his coat"?'
With a laughing mouth, Elizabeth at once quoted the Greek.
The Captain made a wry face.
'It sounds plausible, I agree,' he said slowly, 'but I don't believe
a Greek would have understood a word of it. You remember that in the
dim Victorian ages, when one great Latin scholar gave, as he
thought, the neatest possible translation of "The path of glory
leads but to the grave," another great Latin scholar declared that
all a Roman could have understood by it would have been "The path of
a public office leads to the jaws of the hillock"?'
The old Oxford joke was new in the ears of this Georgian generation,
and when the laugh subsided, Elizabeth said mildly:
'Now, please, may I have yours?'
'What--my translation? Oh--horribly unfair!' said the Captain,
chewing a piece of grass. 'However, here it is!'
He gave it out--with unction.
Elizabeth fell upon it in a flash, dissected and quarrelled with
every word of it, turned it inside out in fact, while the Captain,
still chewing, followed her with eyes of growing enjoyment.
'Well, I'll take a vote when I get back to the front,' he said, when
she came to an end. 'Several firsts in Mods on our staff. I'll send
you the result.'
The talk dropped. The mention of the front reminded every one of the
war, and its bearing on their own personal lot. Desmond was going
into camp that evening. In a few months he would be a full-blown
gunner at the front. Beryl, watching Aubrey's thin face and nervous
frown, proved inwardly that the Aldershot appointment might go on.
And Elizabeth's thoughts had flown to her brother in Mesopotamia.
Pamela, sitting apart, and deeply shaded by a great beech with
drooping branches that rose behind the group, was sharply unhappy,
and filled with a burning jealousy of Elizabeth, who queened it
there in the middle of them--so self-possessed, agreeable, and
competent. How well Arthur had been getting on with her! What a
tiresome, tactless idiot she, Pamela, must seem in comparison! The
memory of her talk with him made her cheeks hot. So few chances of
seeing him!--and when they came, she threw them away. She felt for
the moment as though she hated Elizabeth. Why had her father saddled
her upon them? Life was difficult enough before. Passionately she
began to think of her threat to Arthur. It had been the merest 'idle
word.' But why shouldn't she realize it--why not 'run away'? There
was work to be done, and money to be earned, by any able-bodied
girl. And perhaps then, when she was on her own, and had proved that
she was not a child any longer, Arthur would respect her more, take
more interest in her.
'What do you prophesy?' said Elizabeth suddenly, addressing Arthur
Chicksands, who seemed to be asleep in the grass. 'Will it end--by
next summer?'
'What, the war?' he said, waking up. 'Oh dear, no. Next year will be
the worst of any--the test of us all--especially of you civilians at
home. If we stick it, we shall save ourselves and the world. If we
don't--'
He shrugged his shoulders. His voice was full and deep. It thrilled
the girl sitting in the shade--partly with fear. In three weeks or
so, the speaker would be back in the full inferno of the front, and
because of her father's behaviour she would probably not be able to
see him in the interval. Perhaps she might never see him again.
Perhaps this was the last time. And he would go away without giving
her a thought. Whereas, if she had played her cards differently,
this one last day, he might at least have asked her to write to him.
Many men did--even with girls they hardly knew at all.
Just then she noticed a movement of Beryl's, and saw her friend's
small bare hand creep out and slip itself into Aubrey Mannering's,
as he sat beside her on the grass. The man's hand enfolded the
girl's--he turned round to smile at her in silence. A pang of
passionate envy swept through Pamela. It was just so she wished to
be enfolded--to be loved.
It was Elizabeth--as the person who had business to do and hours to
keep--who gave the signal for the break-up of the party. She sprang
to her feet, with a light, decided movement, and all the others fell
into line. Arthur and Beryl still accompanied the Mannering
contingent a short distance, the Captain walking beside Elizabeth in
animated conversation. At last Beryl peremptorily recalled him to
the pony-carriage, and the group halted for good-byes.
Pamela stood rather stiffly apart. The Captain went up to her.
'Good-bye, Pamela. Do write to me sometimes! I shall be awfully
interested about the farms!'
With vexation she felt the colour rush to her cheeks.
'I shan't have much to say about them,' she said stiffly.
'I'm sure you will! You'll get keen! But write about anything. It's
awfully jolly to get letters at the front!'
His friendly, interrogating eyes were on her, as though she puzzled
him in this new phase, and he wanted to understand her. She said
hurriedly, 'If you like,' hating herself for the coolness in her
voice, and shook hands, only to hear him say, as he turned finally
to Elizabeth, 'Mind, you have promised me "The Battle of the
Plough"! I'm afraid you'll hardly have time to put it into iambics!'
So he had asked Miss Bremerton to write to him too! Pamela vowed
inwardly that in that case she would not write him a line. And it
seemed to her unseemly that her father's secretary should be making
mock of her father's proceedings with a man who was a complete
stranger to her. She walked impetuously ahead of Aubrey and
Elizabeth. Towards the west the beautiful day was dying, and the
light streamed on the girl's lithe young figure and caught her
golden-brown hair. Clouds of gnats rose in the mild air; and a light
seemed to come back from the bronzed and purple hedgerows, making a
gorgeous atmosphere, in which the quiet hill-top and the thinning
trees swam transfigured. A green woodpecker was pecking
industriously among some hedgerow oaks, and Pamela, who loved birds
and watched them, caught every now and then the glitter of his
flight. The world was dropping towards sleep. But she was burningly
awake and alive. Had she ever been really alive before?
Then--suddenly she remembered Desmond. He was to be home from some
farewell visits between five and six. She would be late; he might
want her for a hundred things. His last evening! Her heart smote
her. They had reached the park gates. Waving her hand to the two
behind, with the one word 'Desmond!' she began to run, and was soon
out of their sight.
* * * * *
Elizabeth and Aubrey were not long behind her. They found the house
indeed pervaded with Desmond, and Desmond's going. Aubrey also was
going up to town, but of him nobody took any notice. Pamela and
Forest were in attendance on the young warrior, who was himself in
the wildest spirits, shouting and whistling up and downstairs,
singing the newest and most shocking of camp songs, chaffing Forest,
and looking with mischievous eyes at the various knitted 'comforts'
to which his married sisters were hastily putting the last stitches.
'I say, Pam--do you see me in mittens?' he said to her in the hall,
thrusting out his two splendid hands with a grin. 'And as for that
jersey of Alice's--why, I should stew to death in it. Oh, I know--I
can give it to my batman. The fellows tell me you can always get rid
of things to your batman. It's like sending your wedding-presents to
the pawn-shop. But where is father?' The boy looked discontentedly
at his watch. 'He vowed he'd be here by five. I must be off by a few
minutes after eight.'
'The train's late. He'll be here directly,' said Pamela confidently;
'and I say--don't you hurt Alice's feelings, old man.'
'Don't you preach, Pam!' said the boy, laughing. And a few minutes
afterwards Pamela, passing the open door of the drawing-room, heard
him handsomely thanking his elder sisters. He ran into her as he
emerged with his arms full of scarves, mittens, and the famous
jersey which had taken Alice Gaddesden a year to knit.
'Stuff 'em in somewhere, Pam!' he said in her ear. 'They can go up
to London anyway.' And having shovelled them all off on to her, he
raced along the passage to the library in search of Elizabeth.
'I say, Miss Bremerton, I want a book or two.'
Elizabeth looked up smiling from her table. She was already of the
same mind as everybody outside and inside Mannering--that Desmond
did you a kindness when he asked you to do him one.
'What kind of a book?'
'Oh, I've got some novels, and some Nat Goulds, and Pamela's given
me some war-books. Don't know if I shall read 'em!--Well, I'd like a
small Horace, if you can find one. "My tutor" was an awfully good
hand at Horace. He really did make me like the old chap! And have
you got such a thing as a Greek Anthology that wouldn't take up much
room?'
Elizabeth went to the shelves to look. Desmond as the possessor of
literary tastes was a novelty to her. But, after all, she understood
that he had been a half in the Sixth at Eton, before his cadet
training began. She found him two small pocket editions, and the boy
thanked her gratefully. He began to turn over the Anthology, as
though searching for something.
'Can I help you to find anything?' she asked him.
'No--it's something I remember,' he said absently, and presently
hit upon it, with a look of pleasure.
'They did know a thing or two, didn't they? That's fine anyway?' He
handed her the book. 'But I forget some of the words. Do you mind
giving me a construe?' he said humbly.
Elizabeth translated, feeling rather choky.
'"On the Spartans at Thermopylæ.
'"Him--"'
'That's Xerxes, of course,' put in Desmond.
'"Him, who changed the paths of earth and sea, who sailed upon the
mainland, and walked upon the deep--him did Spartan valour hold
back, with just three hundred spears. Shame on you, mountains and
seas!"'
'Well, that's all right, isn't it?' said the boy simply, looking up.
'Couldn't put it better if you tried, could you?' Then he said,
hesitating a little as he turned down the leaf, and put the book in
his pocket, 'Five of the fellows who were in the Sixth with me this
time last year are dead by now. It makes you think a bit, doesn't
it?--Hullo, there is father!'
He turned joyously, his young figure finely caught in the light of
Elizabeth's lamp against the background of the Nikê.
'Well, father you have been a time! I thought you'd forgotten
altogether I was off to-night.'
'The train was abominably late. Travelling is becoming a perfect
nuisance! I gave the station-master a piece of my mind,' said the
Squire angrily.
'And I expect he said that you civilians jolly well have to wait for
the munition trains!'
'He muttered some nonsense of that sort. I didn't listen to him.'
The Squire threw himself down in an arm-chair. Desmond perched on
the corner of a table near. Elizabeth discreetly took up her work
and disappeared.
'How much time have you got?' asked the Squire abruptly.
'Oh, a few minutes. Aubrey and I are to have some supper before I
go. But Forest'll come and tell me.'
'Everything ready? Got money enough?'
'Rather! I shan't want anything for an age. Why, I shall be buying
war-loan out of my pay!'
He laughed happily. Then his face grew suddenly serious.
'Look here, father--I want awfully to say something. Do you mind?'
'If you want to say it, I suppose you will say it.'
The Squire was sitting hunched up, looking old and tired, his thick
white hair piled fantastically above his eyes.
Desmond straightened his shoulders with the air of one going over
the parapet.
'Well, it's this, father. I do wish you'd give up that row about the
park!'
The Squire sat up impatiently.
'That's not your business, Desmond. It can't matter to you.'
'Yes, but it _does_ matter to me!' said the boy with energy. 'It'll
be in all the papers--the fellows will gas about it at mess--it's
awfully hard lines on me. It makes me feel rotten!'
The Squire laughed. He was reminded of a Fourth of June years
before, when Desmond had gone through agonies of shame because
his father was not, in his eyes, properly 'got-up' for the
occasion--how he had disappeared in the High Street, and only
joined his people again in the crowd at the fireworks.
'I recommend you to stick it, Desmond. It won't last long. I've got
my part to play, and you've got yours. You fight because they make
you.'
'I _don't!_' said the boy passionately. 'I fight because--'
Then his words broke down. He descended from the table.
'Well, all right, father. I suppose it's no good talking. Only if
you think I shan't mind if you get yourself put in quad, you're
jolly well mistaken. Hullo, Forest! I'm coming!'
He hurried off, the Squire moving slowly after him. In the hour
before the boy departed he was the spoilt darling of his sisters and
the servants, who hung round him, and could not do enough for him.
He endured it, on the whole, patiently dashing out at the very end
to say good-bye to an old gardener, once a keeper, with whom he used
to go ferreting in the park. To his father alone his manner was not
quite as usual. It was the manner of one who had been hurt. The
Squire felt it.
As to his elder son, he and Aubrey parted without any outward sign
of discord, and on the way to London Aubrey, with the dry detachment
that was natural to him in speaking of himself, told the story of
the preceding twenty-four hours to the eager Desmond's sympathetic
ears. 'Well done, Broomie!' was the boy's exultant comment on the
tale of the codicil.
The house after Desmond's departure settled dreamily down. Pamela,
with red eyes, retreated to the schoolroom, and began to clear up
the debris left by the packing; Alice Gaddesden went to sleep in
the drawing-room; Mrs. Strang wrote urgent letters to registry
offices, who now seldom answered her; the Squire was in the library,
and Elizabeth retreated early to her own room. She spent a good deal
of time in writing up a locked diary, and finishing up a letter to
her mother. Then she saw to her astonishment that it was nearly one
o'clock, and began to feel sleepy.
The night was warm, and before undressing she put out her light, and
threw up her window. There was a moon nearly at the full outside,
and across the misty stretches of the park the owls were calling.
Suddenly she heard a distant footstep, and drew back from the
window. A man was pacing slowly up and down an avenue of pollarded
limes which divided the rose-garden from the park. His figure could
only be intermittently seen; but it was certainly the Squire.
She drew the curtains again without shutting the window; and for
long after she was in bed she still heard the footstep. It awakened
many trains of thought in her--of her own position in this household
where she seemed to have become already mistress and indispensable;
of Desmond's last words with her; of the relations between father
and son; of Captain Chicksands and his most agreeable company; of
Pamela's evident dislike of her, and what she could do to mend it.
As to Pamela, Elizabeth's thoughts went oddly astray. She was vexed
with the girl for what had seemed to the elder woman her young
rudeness to a gallant and distinguished man. Why, she had scarcely
spoken a word to him during the sitting on the hill! In some way,
Elizabeth supposed, Captain Chicksands had offended her--had not
made enough of her perhaps? But girls must learn now to accept
simpler and blunter manners from their men friends. She guessed that
Pamela was in that self-conscious, _exalté_ mood of first youth
which she remembered so well in herself--fretting too, no doubt,
poor child! over the parting from Desmond. Anyway she seemed to have
no particular interest in Arthur Chicksands, nor he in her, though
his tone in speaking to her had been, naturally, familiar and
intimate. But probably he was one of those able men who have little
to say to the young girl, and keep their real minds for the older
and experienced woman.
At any rate, Elizabeth dismissed from her mind whatever vague notion
or curiosity as to a possible love-affair for Pamela in that
direction might have been lurking in it. And that being so, she
promptly, and without _arrière pensée_ of any sort, allowed herself
the pleasant recollection of half an hour's conversation which had
put her intellectually on her mettle, and quickened those infant
ambitions of a practical and patriotic kind which were beginning to
rise in her.
But the Squire's coming escapade! How to stop it?--for Desmond's
sake chiefly.
Dear boy! It was on a tender, almost maternal thought of him that
she at last turned to sleep. But the footstep pursued her ear. What
was the meaning of this long nocturnal pacing? Had the Squire, after
all, a heart, or some fragment of one? Was it the parting from
Desmond that thus kept him from his bed? She would have liked to
think it--but did not quite succeed!