Moira awoke late, long after Potter Osprey had departed for the city,
where he was to meet Roget and return with him in the car sometime that
night.
It was her last week in the cottage. A few days after the departure
of Rob Blaydon for the west, Elsie Jennings had paid her a visit
and talked. Miles Harlindew was living with a young woman in the
Village. There was a rumour of their going to Europe together....
Moira suppressed a twinge at this, in which at first there was more
of sardonic humour than of pain. The pain came sharply afterward,
but it did not remain long this time, and it left her at last aloof.
She no longer felt the vestige of an obstacle to following her own
inclinations, and she also had no further defence against Osprey’s
attentions.
The growth of understanding between them was almost wordless,
monosyllabic. It made her intensely happy to discover in his eyes how
much she was bringing to him. A long time would have to elapse before
she could give a worthy response to that emotion, but she felt that it
would come....
The troublesome details of her future were therefore on this morning a
matter of no concern to her at all. What filled her with delight was
the immediate present. Never had she seen such weather as that October
day, or if she had, never before had she been alive to its innumerable
aspects at once. After the dubiousness and suffering of the past few
weeks she felt both older and younger, both cleansed by experience and
ready for more to come. Her whole womanly being was gathering itself
for something new, and she meant to grasp it to the full. The ship’s
engines were throbbing in her blood and the open sea lay beyond, but
her hand was firm on the wheel....
It was a day to idle, one of those days when the children were
positively in the way and work impossible. It was a day of heady
egoism, of reveling in her securely felt advantages, and a certain
sense of having won the spurs of lawlessness. She would be restless
until to-morrow when the men came. What fine friends they were!
It was eleven o’clock, and, following her usual custom, she walked down
to the grey metal box in which both her own mail and that of the Osprey
house was deposited. She half expected to hear from Rob Blaydon who had
promised to write her from Thornhill.
She ran through the letters quickly. There were none for her, but she
went back to look again at a large envelope addressed to Osprey. She
supposed she had done this simply because it was larger than the others
and extended out around them while she held them in her hand. But
there had been another reason, as she discovered on second examination.
The handwriting was familiar....
She realized in fact that she was looking at the handwriting of
Mathilda Seymour. She could not have mistaken it, even with nothing
else to guide her, but there was the postmark of her city. She turned
the envelope over, only to find confirmation in the return address.
She caught herself almost in the gesture of tearing it open. Her
first thought had been that it was her letter, no matter whom it was
addressed to. But she stopped herself in time. She could not open
Potter Osprey’s letter. She wondered that she could have had the
impulse to do so. Yet, as if she feared the temptation would be too
strong, she kept repeating to herself, “I must not open it, I must
not open it....” The temptation passed and did not return, but her
disturbance and her curiosity were more stubborn.
It was almost uncanny that Mathilda should be writing to Potter
Osprey....
But was it? Now she remembered he had told her the place of his
birth--a mere conversational allusion, which she had passed over
quickly, not wishing to discuss the city. It had surprised her mildly;
then she had recalled in passing that years ago there had been some
people named Osprey whom she never knew. Could Mathilda have known
them? Could she have known the painter, perhaps in his youth? It was
unlikely; she had never mentioned the name in Moira’s hearing.
There was nothing to be gained on that tack, and soon she was off on
a more fruitful one. Rob Blaydon had told her about Mathilda’s new
hobbies, one of them helping young artists, another buying pictures
for the city museum. She had drifted out of social life and interested
herself in a little club, not very prosperous, where the artists of the
city met.
Here was a possible even a probable, explanation. Osprey was a native
painter, who had gained reputation elsewhere. He had been a struggling
boy at home, and what could be more natural than that Mathilda should
decide the city must be enriched by one of his works? Or if this was
not exactly the case, there were a dozen other reasons why, on behalf
of the club of which Rob had spoken, she might be communicating with
him.
The reason was enough for Moira, or at least she made it suffice. She
would find out the truth before long, and in any case it could not
concern herself. For it was incredible to her that Rob, in the face of
their definite understanding, had mentioned her at home. “At home!”
How naturally she used the phrase. Well, there was much to be cleared
up--both there and here. She troubled herself no more about the letter.
She laid it with the others on Osprey’s table, took the children up to
Nana to look after, and went off for a long walk. By ten o’clock that
night she was in bed asleep.
* * * * *
The two men drove up to the farmhouse, in accordance with their plan,
at about two o’clock in the morning in Roget’s car. They lingered in
the hall and studio for a few moments and went upstairs, the painter
taking his mail with him.
Some hours later the same sound woke not only Roget, but Moira, down
in the cottage. It was a sharp report, and her first clear thought was
that a passing automobile had back-fired, perhaps Emmet Roget’s, just
arriving. She sat up for a time listening and then prepared to sleep
again. Some one knocked on the outside door.
It was the producer, looking ominous as he stood in the half darkness,
in a long black dressing gown.
“Mrs. Harlindew, an accident has happened,” he said gravely. “I think,
perhaps, I had better ask you to step up to the house with me.”
She went with him up the steep bank, thoroughly unnerved. His hold on
her arm was firm and decidedly helpful on the rough path. They passed
through the lower part of the house and upstairs without a word.
She knew before she arrived what had happened and dared not ask the
question on her lips.
Osprey lay on his bed dressed, with a small, old-fashioned revolver in
his hand. He was not breathing. The round, bleeding wound was near one
temple. On the table beside him lay a photograph of herself, face up,
the face of a half-smiling girl of eighteen. Beside it was Mathilda’s
letter. Moira snatched the letter and read, at first rapidly, then very
attentively and slowly. “My dear Mr. Osprey,” it began:
You will not remember an old woman of your native city, but I used
to meet your father at the Round Robin Club long ago and admired his
wit and character. I was even introduced to you once, when you were a
very little boy. You had been left there one night to be taken home.
Since then, of course, I have followed, though at a distance, your
progress in the world as an artist. But it is not merely to presume
on this slender acquaintance that I write to you.
I have a strange story to tell. There has lived in this house for
thirty years, ostensibly as a servant but in fact more a companion
and friend to me, a woman named Ellen Sydney. She came to my house as
Mrs. Ellen Williams and brought with her a baby daughter, whom she
called Moira. I adopted this child and raised her and loved her as
though she had been my own. She believed she was my own until her
nineteenth year, when she discovered the truth. She proved to be as
high-spirited as she was adorable, for although her life here offered
every advantage, and was, I know, one long unclouded happiness, she
gave it up in a day on learning her true parentage. I can understand
that spirit and yet I have suffered cruelly because of her act. She
left without a word, effacing every trace of herself, and from that
day to this I have never been able to find her, though I have made
repeated efforts. I had little hope, it is true, of persuading her to
return even if I did so, knowing her nature and her capacity to carry
out her own decisions.
I am convinced she has spent a large part of her life in New York,
for at first, certain communications came from her there. Furthermore
she loved the study of art and could only have followed it to her
taste in that city. She may still be there. For that reason I write,
thinking it possible if you have not met her you will, and she will
then have a friend who has good reason to protect her. I am sending
the latest photograph I possess of her.
You will ask why I have never addressed you before. It is because I
have always hesitated to ask Ellen the name of her child’s father.
Moira, herself, is in ignorance of it. Only a month ago Ellen was
persuaded, by the arguments I have used above, to tell her story to
me in confidence, and now I write with her consent. To complete the
coincidence, my nephew, Robert Blaydon, having met you, has given me
your address.
You may be sure that should you ever meet with your daughter or be
able to send us word of her, two lonely old women will be grateful.
I have considered that you may not be the kind of man who will care
to receive this letter, but I do not believe that is possible. The
passage of time softens our errors and may even turn them into
blessings.
Yours very sincerely,
MATHILDA SEYMOUR.
Moira put down the letter and sank beside the bed. She threw her arms
over the figure that lay there.
“But, father,” she cried softly, “I could have loved you as my father,
too....”
The tall figure of Roget was standing beside her, with bent head, his
penetrating glance, full of profound compassion, searching the face of
his friend.
“Perhaps he could not, Mrs. Harlindew,” he said, as if thinking aloud.