Gabrielle left them and he prepared to hear her story. She was very
agitated, and found it difficult to express herself. For a little
time, in spite of Considine's encouragements, she beat about the bush.
She felt that her revelation would amount to a criticism of Considine's
management.
At last, realising that she was getting no further, she produced her
documents and handed them to him.
Considine examined them slowly and judicially without a flicker of
emotion. It seemed to Mrs. Payne a very solemn moment, full of awful
possibilities. She waited breathlessly for his verdict.
"Well?" he said at last, putting the papers aside.
"Arthur wrote them."
"Yes.... I recognised his writing."
"He is in love with some woman."
"Presumably ... yes. But I'm not so sure of that."
"What do you mean?" She gasped at the prospect of relief.
He explained to her at length. It was a very common thing for boys of
Arthur's age, he said, to write verse.
"Verses of that kind?"
Yes... even verses of that kind. To be perfectly candid he himself,
when a boy in his teens, had done very much the same sort of thing. It
was true perhaps that the verses which he had written had not been
quite so ... perhaps frank was the best word. On the other hand his
own development had followed more normal lines. He hadn't, in the
manner of Arthur, burst suddenly into blossom. All boys wrote verses.
Often they wrote verses of an amatory character, not particularly
because they happened to be in love, but because the bulk of English
lyrical poetry, to which they went for their models, was, regrettably,
of an amatory character. At this stage in a boy's development, even in
the development of the greatest poets (and Arthur, he noticed in
passing, did not show any signs of amazing genius) the verses were
usually imitative. It rather looked as if he had been reading Herrick,
or possibly the Shakespeare sonnets ... the dark lady, you know.
Seriously, he didn't think there was anything to worry about. He
folded the papers and handed them back to her.
For once in a way Considine didn't satisfy her. There were other
things, she said. Things that she hadn't attached any value to at the
time when they happened, but which now seemed significant. When she
came to think of it Arthur's whole behaviour during the holidays had
been that of a youth who was in love. With all deference to Dr.
Considine she felt that she couldn't pass the matter over. It was her
plain duty to enquire into it, and find, if possible, a more obvious
reason for this strange and sudden outburst.
Considine agreed that no harm could be done by a little quiet
investigation. At the same time he couldn't possibly see what
opportunities Arthur could have had for falling in love at Lapton.
"We're very isolated here," he said. "The Manor is a kingdom in
itself. It seems to me that circumstances would force him to invent an
ideal for the want of any living model."
She shook her head. There was no isolation, she said, into which love
could not enter; and this, in the face of classical precedent,
Considine was forced to admit. Could she, then, make any suggestions?
Mrs. Payne said, "Servants," and blushed.
Considine also blushed, but with irritation. The suggestion brought
the matter uncomfortably near home.
"I think you can put that out of your mind," he said. "I'll admit that
I did not consider this point when I engaged them, but I do not think
you'll find any one peculiarly attractive among them."
"They're women," said Mrs. Payne obstinately.
It seemed to her that Considine's incredulity was forcing them both
into a blind alley.
"If you don't mind," she said, "I think it would be better for me to
talk the matter over with your wife. A woman, if you'll allow me to
say so, is much more acutely sensitive to ... this kind of thing."
Again Considine blushed. The prospect of engaging Gabrielle in the
matter was altogether against his principles. He had always made it a
rule that her essential femininity should not be compromised by any
contact with the business of the school. He did not even like her to
take an intimate share in the management of the house. After all she
was a Hewish and a cousin of the august Halbertons. That was why he
had employed Mrs. Bemerton as housekeeper.
"I shall be obliged," he said, "if you don't mention a matter that may
possibly become unsavoury, to Mrs. Considine. She knows nothing of the
servants, and I prefer her to take no part in the affairs of my pupils."
Altogether the good woman felt that she had been snubbed for her pains.
She had expected a great deal from Considine, and even more from
Gabrielle. Still, if Considine objected to his wife being consulted,
she was prepared to accept his decision. The only course that remained
open to her was to make enquiries for herself, and determine, by
observation, what women were possibly available for the disposal of
Arthur's affections.
"Very well," she said with a sigh. "If you don't wish me to speak to
your wife, of course I won't."
"If you'll pardon my saying so, I think you're unduly anxious. After
all, the most obvious thing is to ask Arthur himself. Why not do that?"
She hesitated and then spoke the truth.
"I'm afraid he'd tell me a lie. I don't want him to do that ... now.
I'd much rather find out for myself. I wish I could believe you. I do
indeed."
She paused for a moment and then said, almost as if she were speaking
to herself, "There's no place where there aren't opportunities.
Farmer's daughters ... village girls. There are more women in the
world than there are men."
He couldn't help smiling at the mathematical accuracy of her remark,
but once more he shook his head.
"At any rate," she said, returning to the practical aspect of the case,
"I suppose you've no objection to my staying here for a day or two, and
keeping my eyes open. Failing anything else I will speak to Arthur
about it."
"Please consider the house your own," said Considine, who had now
recovered his usual politeness.
"Thank you," she said. "You're very kind. But you know how grateful I
am to you already."
Mrs. Considine returned, and a little later showed her to her room. In
the candle-light of the passage Mrs. Payne was assailed by an
overwhelming desire to break her promise and disclose her troubles to
Gabrielle. She felt that her quest was so lonely. Gabrielle seemed to
her sympathetic and she knew that it would be a great relief to her to
discuss the affair with another woman. As they paused at her bedroom
door, her old attraction towards Mrs. Considine that had once
culminated in an impulsive kiss took hold of her again. She wanted,
for some obscure reason, to kiss Gabrielle once more. Perhaps there
was something in the attraction of her opposite physical type that
accounted for this impulse as well as for Arthur's infatuation. For
the present she suppressed her inclination. After all Considine had
acted fairly enough with her, and she felt that she could not fail him
in a point of honour.
Alone in her room she read over Arthur's poems again. Now that she was
so near to him they impressed her less with a sense of fear and anxiety
than with one of pity and of love. He was her child, and therefore to
be protected and caressed. She found it difficult not to leave her
room in the night, and grope her way along the creaking corridors to
the room in which she knew he was sleeping. She wanted to kiss him and
hold him in her arms. She placed the poems on the table at her bedside
and blew out the candle. It was unfortunate for her bewilderment that
Arthur had not left in his notebook the rough copy of the verses that
he had sent to Gabrielle with the box of cowslips, the verses to which
she had not dared to reply.
Next morning at breakfast Arthur and his mother met. All through the
holidays she had been indefinitely conscious of an awkwardness between
them; now, with so much guilty knowledge in her mind, the relation
became definitely embarrassing. She wondered if he felt it as deeply
as she did. Certainly he showed no sign of any emotion but surprise at
her visit.
"But if you came last night, why on earth didn't you come along to my
room?" he said. "And why are you so mysterious? What's it all about?"
She put him off as well as she could. "I wanted to see you, that was
all," she said. "I thought you would be pleased by the surprise," and
then: "You don't seem very pleased."
"Of course I'm pleased," he said, blushing. "But I don't understand
it."
Whatever he said she knew in her heart that she wasn't wanted. It was
a bitter thing to realise, but it made her more than ever certain that
there was a secret to be disclosed.
After breakfast the Sunday morning routine of a country house began.
She and Arthur walked together over the fields to church. The whole
country breathed a lazy atmosphere of early summer. Its beauty and its
placidity mocked her. Before them went the Considines. He wore a long
cassock that swept the grass, as they went, while Gabrielle walked in
silence at his side. Never once in their journey did she look back.
It struck Mrs. Payne for the first time how young she was, how very
much younger and more supple than her husband. And yet they seemed to
be happy.
The service was the usual slow ceremony of a village church, Considine
moving with the dignity of his vestments from the lectern and the altar
to the organ seat which he also occupied. Arthur, standing or kneeling
at his mother's side, appeared to be properly engrossed in the service.
Singing the psalms beside him she became aware how much of a man he was
now, for his voice, that had been cracking for several years, had now
sunk to a deep and sonorous bass.
It was not until Considine ascended the pulpit and began to preach,
that Mrs. Payne became conscious of anything extraordinary. At first
she was held by the sermon, which was unusually well constructed, but
in the middle of it she became aware that Arthur was not listening. He
sat straight in the pew beside her as though he were intent on the
preacher, but all the time his eyes were wandering to the other side of
the aisle. Mrs. Payne tried to follow their direction. Here,
presumably, was a fairly representative collection of the female
inhabitants of the village. Here she might expect to find the farmer's
daughter, or, in the last emergency, the housemaid, on whom his
affections were centred. She heard no more of Considine, only watching
Arthur's eyes, and watching, she soon discovered that these were for
Mrs. Considine and her alone. She could not deny the fact that
Gabrielle, with her fine pale profile set against a pillar of grey
sandstone, was a creature of amazing beauty. She herself was
fascinated by this vision of refinement and grace to such a degree that
she almost shared in Arthur's rapture.
For a little while she could not be sure of it, for this was the last
possibility that had entered her mind: but at last it seemed that
Gabrielle became conscious of the gaze that she could not see.
Suddenly, without the least warning, she turned her head in Arthur's
direction. Their eyes met. She blushed faintly, and, at the same
moment, became aware of Mrs. Payne. The blush deepened, spreading into
the ivory whiteness of her neck; and Mrs. Payne had no need to look at
her any longer, for she knew.
Her mind leapt quickly to the whole situation. In the light of this
evidence she recalled a hundred things that had not even puzzled her
before. She saw the reason for the strange fate that had overtaken
their correspondence, she divined the secret of Gabrielle's sudden
reticence, and the break in Arthur's frank enthusiasms. She knew that
she had made a triumphant discovery, but in her elation realised that
it would be wiser to go gently. This was a secret that could not be
blurted out without disaster. The situation needed careful handling.
Once in possession of certain knowledge it was no longer difficult for
her to interpret Arthur's moods. In the afternoon when they sat out
under the trees on the lawn, she stumbled on a strange corroboration.
She had fallen into a doze in a lounge chair at his side, and when she
awoke she saw that he was reading poetry. He seemed to be reading one
poem over and over again, and a sudden curiosity made her ask what he
was reading. "Tennyson," he said, and closed the book. But he had
left a long grass for marker between the pages, and when they moved
towards the house at tea-time she picked up the book and opened it.
Her eyes fell upon a significant stanza from "Maud."
She came to the village church,
And sat by a pillar alone;
An angel watching an urn
Wept over her, carved in stone:
And once, but once, she lifted her eyes,
And suddenly, sweetly, strangely blushed,
To find they were met by my own ...
Mrs. Payne's heart beat faster as she read the verse. Later in the
day, to test him, she asked him what he had been reading. She half
expected him to tell her a lie, but, strangely enough, it was the truth
that he gave her.
"What do you like about 'Maud'?" she said.
"I like it all," he replied. "It's the kind of thing that anyone might
feel." He hesitated. "And there's one part of it in particular----"
She waited, with her heart in her mouth.
"What is that?" she said.
"Oh, right at the beginning. I don't suppose it would mean much to
you. I can't remember it exactly, but it starts like this:
I hate the dreadful hollow behind the little wood,
Its lips in the field above are dabbled with blood-red heath,
The red-ribbed ledges drip with a silent horror of blood ...