HOPE AND A FRIEND.
_Alas, I have grieved so I am hard to love._
SONNETS FROM THE PORTUGUESE.
Gertrude was sitting by the window with Constance Devonshire one bleak
January afternoon.
Conny's face wore a softened look. The fierce, rebellious misery of her
heart had given place to a gentler grief, the natural human sorrow for
the dead.
This was a farewell visit. The next day she and her family were setting
out for the South of France.
"I tried to make Fred come with me to-day," Constance was saying; "but
he is dining with some kindred spirits at the Cafe Royal, and then going
on to the Gaiety. He said there would be no time."
Fred had been once to Baker Street since the unfortunate interview with
Lucy; had paid a brief visit of condolence, when he had been very much
on his dignity and very afraid of meeting Lucy's eye. The
re-establishment of the old relations was not more possible than it
usually is in such cases.
"How long do you expect to be at Cannes?" Gertrude said, after one of
the pauses which kept on stretching themselves baldly across the
conversation.
"Till the end of March, probably. Isn't Lucy coming up to say 'good-bye'
to a fellow?"
"She will be up soon. She is much distressed about the over-exposure of
some plates, and is trying to remedy the misfortune. Do you know, by the
by, that we are thinking of taking an apprentice? Mr. Russel has found a
girl--a lady--who will pay us a premium, and probably live with us."
"I think that is a good plan," said Conny, staring wistfully out of
window.
How strange it seemed, after all that had happened, to be sitting here
quietly, talking about over-exposed negatives, premiums, and
apprentices.
Looking out into the familiar street, with its teeming memories of a
vivid life now quenched for ever, she said to herself, as Gertrude had
often said: "It is not possible."
One day, surely, the door would open to give egress to the well-known
figure; one day they would hear his footstep on the stairs, his voice in
the little room. Even as the thought struck her, Constance was aware of
a sound as of some one ascending, and started with a sudden beating of
the heart.
The next moment Matilda flung open the door, and Lord Watergate came,
unannounced, into the room.
Gertrude rose gravely to meet him.
Since the accident, which had brought him into such intimate connection
with the Lorimers' affairs, his kindness had been as unremitting as it
had been unobtrusive.
Gertrude had several times reproached herself for taking it as a matter
of course; for being roused to no keener fervour of gratitude; yet
something in his attitude seemed to preclude all expression of
commonplaces.
It was no personal favour that he offered. To stretch out one's hand to
a drowning creature is no act of gallantry; it is but recognition of a
natural human obligation.
Lord Watergate took a seat between the two girls, and, after a few
remarks, Constance declared her intention of seeking Lucy in the studio.
"Tell Lucy to come up when she has soaked her plates to her
satisfaction," said Gertrude, a little vexed at this desertion.
To have passed through such experiences together as she and Lord
Watergate, makes the casual relations of life more difficult. These two
people, to all intents and purposes strangers, had been together in
those rare moments of life when the elaborate paraphernalia of everyday
intercourse is thrown aside; when soul looks straight to soul through no
intervening veil; when human voice answers human voice through no medium
of an actor's mask.
We lose with our youth the blushes, the hesitations, the distressing
outward marks of embarrassment; but, perhaps, with most of us, the
shyness, as it recedes from the surface, only sinks deeper into the
soul.
As the door closed on Constance, Lord Watergate turned to Gertrude.
"Miss Lorimer," he said, "I am afraid your powers of endurance have to
be further tried."
"What is it?" she said, while a listless incredulity that anything could
matter to her now stole over her, dispersing the momentary cloud of
self-consciousness.
Lord Watergate leaned forward, regarding her earnestly.
"There has been news," he said, slowly, "of poor young Jermyn."
Gertrude started.
"You mean," she said, "that they have found him--that there is no
doubt."
"On the contrary; there is every doubt."
She looked at him bewildered.
"Miss Lorimer, there is, I am afraid, much cruel suspense in store for
you, and possibly to no purpose. I came here to-day to prepare you for
what you will hear soon enough. I chanced to learn from official
quarters what will be in every paper in England to-morrow. There is a
rumour that Jermyn has been seen alive."
"Lord Watergate!" Gertrude sprang to her feet, trembling in every limb.
He rose also, and continued, his eyes resting on her face meanwhile:--
"Native messengers have arrived at head-quarters from the interior,
giving an account of two Englishmen, who, they say, are living as
prisoners in one of the hostile towns. The descriptions of these
prisoners correspond to those of Steele and Jermyn."
"Lucy!" came faintly from Gertrude's lips.
"It is chiefly for your sister's sake that I have come here. The rumour
will be all over the town to-morrow. Had you not better prepare her for
this, at the same time impressing on her the extreme probability of its
baselessness?"
"I wish it could be kept from her altogether."
"Perhaps even that might be managed until further confirmation arrives.
I cannot conceal from you that at present I attach little value to it.
It was in the nature of things that such a rumour should arise; neither
of the poor fellows having actually been seen dead."
"What steps will be taken?" asked Gertrude, after a pause. She had not
the slightest belief that Frank would ever be among them again; she and
Lucy had gone over for ever to the great majority of the unfortunate.
"A rescue-party is to be organised at once. The war being practically at
an end, it would probably resolve itself into a case of ransom, if there
were any truth in the whole thing. I may be in possession of further
news a little before the newspapers. Needless to say that I shall bring
it here at once."
He took up his hat and stood a moment looking down at her.
"Lord Watergate, we do not even attempt to thank you for your kindness."
"I have been able, unfortunately, to do so little for you. I wish to-day
that I had come to you as the bringer of good tidings; I am destined, it
seems, to be your bird of ill-omen."
He dropped his eyes suddenly, and Gertrude turned away her face. A pause
fell between them; then she said--
"Will it be long before news of any reliability can reach us?"
"I cannot tell; it may be a matter of days, of weeks, or even months."
"I fear it will be impossible to keep the rumour from my poor Lucy."
"I am afraid so. I trust to you to save her from false hopes."
"So I am to be Cassandra," thought Gertrude, a little wistfully. She was
always having some hideous _role_ or other thrust upon her.
Lord Watergate moved towards the door.
A sudden revulsion of feeling came over her.
"Perhaps," she said, "it is true."
He caught her mood. "Perhaps it is."
They stood smiling at one another like two children.
Constance Devonshire coming upstairs a few minutes later found Gertrude
standing alone in the middle of the room, a vague smile playing about
her face. A suspicion that was not new gathered force in Conny's mind.
Going up to her friend she said, with meaning--
"Gerty, what has Lord Watergate been saying to you?"
"Conny, Conny, can you keep a secret?"
And then Gertrude told her of the new hope, vague and sweet and
perilous, which Lord Watergate had brought with him.
"But it is true, Gerty; it really is," Conny said, while the tears
poured down her cheeks; "I have always known that the other thing was
not possible. Oh, Gerty, just to see him, just to know he is alive--will
not that be enough to last one all the days of one's life?"
But this mood of impersonal exaltation faded a little when Constance
went back to Queen's Gate, where everything was in a state of readiness
for the projected flitting. She lay awake sobbing with mingled feelings
half through the night.
"Even Gerty," she thought; "I am going to lose her too." For she
remembered the smile in Gertrude's eyes that afternoon when she had
found her standing alone after Lord Watergate's visit; a smile to which
she chose to attach meanings which concerned the happiness of neither
Frank nor Lucy.
[Illustration: Decoration]
[Illustration: Decoration]