THINKING IT OUT
The Squire went home in the afternoon. When he reached the junction at
Ganton, where trains were changed for Kencote, he walked across the
platform to send a telegram. The station-master, with whom he always
exchanged a hearty word, touched his hat to him, and looked after him
with concern on his face. He had taken no notice of the salutation,
although he had seen it. He walked like an old and broken man.
Mrs. Clinton met him at Kencote with a brougham. He had wired for her
to do so. For the first time in all the over forty years of their
marriage he was not driving himself from the station. He stepped into
the carriage, without so much as a glance at his horses, and took her
hand. He had come home to her; not to his little kingdom.
He went straight up to bed. He had no spirit even for the unexacting
routine of his own home. He kissed Joan, who met him in the hall, but
without a word, and she went away, after a glance at his face. He
would not see Dick when he came.
He slept through the evening, awoke to take some food and drink, but
took very little, and slept again. If ever a man was ill, with whom no
doctor could have found anything the matter, he was ill.
Mrs. Clinton hoped that he would sleep through the night, but soon
after she laid herself down beside him, in the silence of the night, he
awoke. The heavy sleep that had drugged him into insensibility for a
time had also refreshed and strengthened him, and for succeeding hours
he cried aloud his despair.
"What have I done?" That was the burden of his cry. "Where have I
been wrong? Why am I so beaten down by punishment?"
But by and by, spent with beating against the bars, he began to speak
calmly and reasonably, as if he were discussing the case of someone
else, searching for the truth of things, impartially.
"When Humphrey came and asked me to do what I might very well have done
for Gotch on my own account, I refused. I was right there. When he
told me that Virginia had given him the money, what was I to do? It
was too late to get it back. I had no right to. I might have told
Virginia, perhaps, why the money had been wanted. No, I couldn't do
that. I had promised Humphrey. I do think he ought not to have asked
me for that promise. But it was given. What _could_ I have done,
Nina, at that stage? I knew about it, that devilish letter says. I
allowed money to be paid to keep it secret. Was I to publish it
abroad, directly Humphrey told me? Is there a man living who would
have done that under the circumstances? Would Cheviot have done it
himself? It might just as well have happened to him as to me. Nina,
was I bound, by any law of God or man, to do that?"
"Edward dear, you have done no wrong----"
"No, but answer my question. If it had been you instead of me--that
might _very_ well have happened. Would _you_ have said--after you had
been told under a promise of secrecy, mind--Susan must be shown up?
Even that wouldn't have been enough; Humphrey wouldn't have shown her
up. You would have had to do it yourself. And how could you have done
it? Can you really seriously say it was my duty, when Humphrey told me
that story, to go and give information to the police?"
"Oh no, no, Edward."
"But what's the alternative? Upon my soul, Nina, I can't see any
half-way house between that and what I did. I kept silence, they say.
That was Cheviot's charge, and because I couldn't deny it, I stood
condemned before him. I wish I could have put the question to _him_,
as to what he would have expected of me. Confound him, and his
supercilious way! Nina, you haven't answered me. What would _you_
have done?"
"Exactly what you did, Edward dear. I am not sure that I should even
have had the strength to refuse Humphrey's plea, as you so honourably
did, without counting the cost in any way. You were ready to take any
consequences, to yourself. Oh, you could not have done more."
"But then, why am I put in the wrong? Those are the charges against
me. Those, and that I offered Sedbergh the price of the
necklace--which he refused. Yes, he did refuse it, and made me feel,
too, that I ought not to have asked him to accept it. Why did I feel
that? It isn't that he was wrong. He was right, and I should have
acted as he did if I had been in his place. But why did I feel ashamed
of having offered it to him? What was the alternative? To say nothing
about it to him, when Susan had spent thousands of pounds belonging to
him, and I knew of it? Can anyone seriously say that that was a more
honourable course to take than the one I did take? Nina, help me.
Tell me where I was wrong. I _must_ have been wrong there, because I
felt ashamed."
"It is easy enough now to mark down little errors. In the main, Edward
dear, you were right all through--nobly right."
"Little errors! What error was there there? I either offered him the
money, or kept from him the fact that a member of my family had spent
it. There was no alternative. _Was_ there? Do tell me, Nina, if you
can see anything that I can't see."
"I think the better way would have been to tell Lord Sedbergh of what
had been done, and leave it to him to take steps if he wished to. He
would have taken none. You would have been justified. You could not
justify yourself any more by paying him back what had been stolen."
"Yes, that is what he said. He would not bear my burden. Why should
he have? Yes. I see that, Nina. I was wrong there. I think I was
very wrong there."
Oh, how it rent her heart to hear him, who had been so ready with his
dictatorial censure of all dependent on him, so impervious to every
shaft of censure that might have been attracted to himself, thus baring
his breast to blame, accepting it, welcoming it, if it would only help
to clear away his bewilderment.
"It came to the same thing, dear, in the end," she reminded him. "You
had told Lord Sedbergh."
"Ah, but it wasn't quite the same. I can see that now. If I had gone
to him as you said, I could have denied the statement that I kept
silence. I should have told the one man that perhaps it was right that
I should have told. I am beginning to see a little light, Nina.
Nothing more could have been expected of me than that. I should have
had a complete answer. Oh, why did I make that mistake? It looked to
me, afterwards, such a small one. Sedbergh set me right over
it--snubbed me really, though in the kindest possible way--and I
deserved it. But that didn't end it. That mistake put everything else
wrong. I am beginning to see it. But, oh, how difficult it all is!"
"Edward, you _had_ told Lord Sedbergh. You told him before you made
any suggestion as to payment. He had thought the matter was ended when
he had said you were right to tell him, and there was nothing more to
be done. You have told me that whenever you have gone over the
conversation you had with him."
He thought over this. His slow-moving mind was made preternaturally
acute by long dwelling on the one interminable subject. "Should I have
told him anything?" he asked, "if I hadn't wanted to get the debt off
my shoulders? No, I think not. Humphrey would not have consented for
one thing, and I had given him my word. I suppose I was wrong there
too. I ought never to have given him my word. Yet he would not have
told me if I had not."
"That is Humphrey's blame. He asked you to keep dishonourable silence.
You trusted him there. You would not have promised that."
"Then my silence was dishonourable?"
"You told Lord Sedbergh. I think you would have told him in any case.
I think that you would have seen that you must. You would have
insisted with Humphrey; and you must have had your way. You have acted
so honourably where you did see clearly, that I have no doubt you would
have seen clearly here. You had no time to think. You were under the
influence of the sudden shock. You went up to London to see Lord
Sedbergh the very next morning."
"It was pride," he said slowly. "The wrong pride. I have been very
blind to my faults, Nina. Pride of place, pride of wealth, pride of
birth! What are they in a crisis like this? I was humiliated to the
dust before that man this morning. Oh, I have seen myself in a wrong
light all my life. God has sent me this trial to show me how little
worth I was in His sight. My pride led me wrong. Why was I thinking
then about the money at all? Sedbergh was right. That woman was
right, there. It was a base thought, and I have been very heavily
punished for it."
She lay by his side, comforting him. She thought that he would now
cease his self-examination, since it had led him to a conclusion
damaging to himself, but healing too, if he saw a fault and repented of
it. But presently he returned to it again.
"Why did I feel beaten and ashamed before Cheviot? Why has he the
right to say those damning words to his nephew, 'I shall tell him that
I brought you a definite charge made against your honour, and you did
not deny it'?"
"Edward dear, you might have denied it, but for one thing. The charge
against you was not true."
"But it was true. I knew of Susan's guilt, and money was paid to keep
it secret--money that I knew had been paid."
"That you allowed to be paid," she corrected him. "You did not allow
it. It was not paid to keep the secret. Virginia paid it, on behalf
of Dick, and paid it with quite a different intention."
"Isn't that a mere quibble?"
"No, it is not. A quibble is a half-truth that obscures a whole one.
This is not like that. It is because the whole truth is so difficult
to disengage here that it looked like the half-truth. I say nothing of
Humphrey; but as regards you it is the whole truth. It is not true--it
is a lie--to say that you allowed money to be paid to conceal what you
knew. You refused to pay money yourself, because you knew it would
have the indirect effect of concealing the truth. It was not in your
power to stop the money being paid with an innocent object. And when
it is said that you knew of Susan's guilt, if that is in itself a
charge of keeping silence, the answer is that you did not keep silence.
You told Lord Sedbergh. That you offered him the money afterwards is
nothing--would, I mean, be considered nothing against you, as coming
afterwards. As it is put in that letter it is as untrue as the rest;
for it is intended there to look as if you had offered that money too
in order to buy silence."
"My dear," he said, "you have a very clever head. I wonder if you are
right. That would exonerate me of everything."
"You _are_ to be exonerated of everything," she said quietly, "except
the mistake of thinking it more important that Lord Sedbergh should be
told because of the debt that lay heavy on you than because it was
right that he should be told in any case. You did tell him, which is
all that anyone inclined to criticise you is concerned with, and _I_
know well enough that you would have told him if there were no question
of payment. My dear husband, you have been so cast down by the blows
you have received that you are inclined to blame yourself, knowing
everything, as others are inclined to blame you, knowing nothing."
This was sweet balm to him, and he lay comforting himself with it for
some time. But his doubts came back to him.
"Then why did I feel so ashamed before Cheviot?"
She was ready with her answer at once. "For a reason that does you
more honour than anything else. You took the sins of others upon you.
You took shame before him, not for your own faults, but for theirs. If
you could have told him everything, he would have seen what even you
couldn't see at the time--that the apparent truth in that letter was
not the truth. The only true thing in it was that Susan was guilty."
"And that I knew it."
"There was no shame in that, to you, unless you kept silence, which you
did not do."
"I can't see that quite straight yet, Nina, though I should like to.
Why are you so sure that I should have told Sedbergh in any case, or
insisted upon Humphrey telling him?"
"Because I see so plainly how your mind has worked all along. It never
did work on that point, because you took the right course at once--we
will say, if you like, for not quite the right reason--and it was never
a matter to be fought out with yourself. It had been done."
"You are very comforting to me, my dearest. I do believe you are
right. I say it in all humility; I think I should not have been
allowed to go wrong there."
"I am sure you would not; quite sure. Even with your pride to guide
you, as you say it did, you could not have consented long to hold back
the truth from Lord Sedbergh. Him, at least, you must have told--as
you did."
"Well, I give in, Nina. You give me great comfort."
"And I give you great honour too, Edward. You have taken the burden
and the shame on yourself when a word would have removed it."
"Not only on myself, Nina. You share it. We all share it; our poor
little Joan more heavily than any of us."
"I cannot but think that Joan will win her happiness in time. He would
not be what he is if he allowed this to keep him from her. The talk
will die down. No one will blame her--can blame her--even now, when it
is at its loudest. We must wait in patience for what will come. Dear
Joan will be all the happier when her trial is over, and the stronger.
She is bearing it bravely. I am proud of my girl."
The Squire lay for a long time silent. Then he said, "Well, we have
thought it out together, my dear. I can face what must come now. We
face it together. We live on quietly here, as we have always lived. I
ask no one, from now, to stand and deliver. I do my duty amongst my
neighbours, and those dependent on me, and they think of me what they
please. You who know me, love and trust me, and that shall be enough.
We have our quiet home, and our children, and their children, and the
friends who have stood by us. And we have our religion--our God, Who
has helped us, and will help us. We have our burden too, but He will
make it light for us. I feel at peace about it now, Nina--almost
happy. I think I shall sleep to-night. Good night, Nina. God bless
you. May God bless you, my dear wife!"