right I wouldn't like you to have to say no to Kathleen's father, boy, I
wouldn't like that--and it might hurt her, our--our little girl--eh, if
she knew."
"Our little girl," what a wealth of tenderness and love in those three
words! It was never "her ladyship" now, it was just that: "our little
girl." Allan felt something sting in his eyes for a moment, his hand
rested more heavily on his father's shoulder.
"No, I wouldn't like to hurt her in any way, even that way, Allan,
so--so if his lordship should--and it seems to me very likely that his
lordship may--why do you see, Allan, you can draw on me. Of course he
won't never pay back, that's not to be looked for nor expected and one
thing he wouldn't expect to get a wonderful lot out of you--so if he
does ask you must say Yes--up to five hundred, Allan, and then let me
know quietly, and there you are, there you are, my boy!"
"I wonder if there is another man in all the world like my father?"
Allan said.
"Bless you, heaps and heaps and a sight better. But there's one thing,
Allan, there's never a father in this world as knows and loves his son
as I know and love mine and so--so boy--out with it, out with it now and
here."
They had come to a shady place, under the tall yews. Here was an
inviting seat and on the seat Sir Josiah settled himself and drew Allan
down beside him.
"Out with it--with what, father?" Allan asked lamely.
"Why out with what's worrying you, my boy; do you think I didn't see it,
do you think when I saw you first thing this morning and took just one
look at you I didn't see it there--there in your face and eyes? Why
bless you, of course I did; it ain't money, Allan?"
"No, no!"
"I knew that, then what is it? Not--not trouble, nothing amiss
with--between you and her?"
"No, thank God!"
"Thank God!" the old man said. "And so--so it isn't that and therefore
it can't be anything bad--so I'm waiting, Allan, waiting, dear lad, tell
me."
"Father, if I did you could not understand."
"I'd try, Allan," the old man said simply.
"Then, by Heaven I will tell you, father, and you shall try and
understand, though--though if you do, you will be more clever than I,
for I cannot understand." Allan lifted his hand to his head for a
moment.
"Do you remember something that you told me once about--an ancestor of
ours--whose name was the same as mine--a labourer here--a gardener, who
married his mistress' serving maid?"
"And whose son went to London and took over the Green Gates in
Aldgate--why of course I do!"
"Well," said Allan quietly, "that's it----"
Sir Josiah looked at him. "God bless my soul!" he said, and if ever
there were mystification on a man's face, it was on his.
"Father, do you believe that the soul can outlast and outlive not one
earthly body, but many, ten, a hundred, a thousand, that when the body
perishes as all things earthly must perish, the soul can and does find
another dwelling place? Ah! I don't make myself clear." He broke off,
seeing the mystification deepen in the old man's face. "I am afraid I
never can. Think this out, father, a man dies, the body perishes, but
the soul, the ego, the spirit lives on. It finds another body, which it
animates for good or for evil, it completes another life, and then all
happens over again. Each time the body dies, the soul passes through
oblivion and returns to earth----"
"Here, here, Allan!" cried the old man. "Here, bless my soul, didn't
you ought to see someone?"
Allan smiled ruefully.
"Have you never heard of re-incarnation, the re-incarnation of the soul,
father?"
"No, I can't say as I ever have and I don't know as I ever want to.
I've only got one life and though I mayn't succeed in many little things
none too well, I'm trying to do the best I can with it. Looking back--"
the old man went on, "looking back, Allan, I can say and thank God as I
can say it that I can't remember ever having done a dirty act or ever
having played a mean trick on a man or a woman in my life. I accepted
my body like it was, a loan from God; I've used it and kept it clean and
when the time comes for me to hand it back to Him, why then I want to
feel as I can hand it back in good condition and good order--fair wear
and tear excepted, Allan, and that's how I look at things. I don't
pretend to know, there's some as does, yet they are only men, the same
as me and you, dear lad, and they don't know--no one knows--and it's as
well for us, maybe, we don't! It's a beautiful world and a wonderful
world and God lent it to us the same as He lent us our bodies to use
properly, to admire and to make the most of and enjoy. Beyond that, I
don't seek to know anything, but when my time comes, I want to be able
to think to myself a prayer, that goes somehow this way--'God, this is
the body You lent to me, I'm done with it and now I'm giving it back;
I've tried to keep it clean and honest, I've treated it as if it was
something belonging to You more than to me--and that I was in honour
bound obliged to deal with carefully. If there's a Heaven and You know
best, I hope you'll find a place in it for my soul, because in keeping
my body clean, oh Lord, I've kept my soul clean along with it!' That's
how I look at things, Allan, I ain't good at talk of this sort. Maybe
you'll think I've got funny ideas, so I have, but don't tell me nothing
about this re-incarnation of yours; I don't hold with it, boy, I don't
believe in it; if it's true, and it may be, mind you, it may be, it
isn't for us to know if it's true or not. If it was right, we should
know, then God would find some way of telling us."
"Perhaps He has!" Allan thought, but he said no more. No, he could not
tell his father, for his father would never understand!
*CHAPTER XXXI*
*"A VERY WORTHY MAN"*
Allan's conscience smote him sorely. He had misjudged and dealt hardly
with Abram Lestwick. He had thought, had honestly believed, that the
man had intended drawing a knife on him and in his fury and anger had
punished his victim unmercifully.
Later, when he had gone carefully over Lestwick's clothing and had found
no traces of weapons hidden there, he had known his suspicion had been
unjust. It weighed on his mind, he went over the incident again and
again. He wondered if he had seriously hurt the man. He felt anxious
and ill at ease, as must every just man when he is conscious of an
unintentional act of injustice.
It troubled him the more because he knew that he did not like Lestwick,
that to a certain extent he shared Betty's antipathy for the man.
Little Betty to spend all her days with Abram Lestwick! That could not
and should never be.
Yet in this Allan felt himself in the wrong and there was but one course
open to him. To seek Lestwick out, to admit frankly that he had erred,
to ask the man's forgiveness and to make amends, if amends were
possible.
And yet Allan decided that in a way the man deserved all that he had
got, he had pestered and worried Betty, he had waylaid her, to obtrude
his hateful love on the frightened, shrinking maid.
"Hang him!" Allan muttered between his teeth. "If he ever does it again
I--" he clenched his hands and felt very bitter for a moment towards
Abram Lestwick, then the bitterness was gone. He himself had done
wrong, had misjudged and therefore only one course was possible to Allan
Homewood.
Lord Gowerhurst having found another bedroom, where he was not likely to
be disturbed by sounds of bird life, had decided to stay on for a day or
two. The country would do him no harm, he would be all the better by
the change. His appetite was getting to be really quite satisfactory,
though even at the very worst of time, Lord Gowerhurst was no mean
performer with the knife and fork.
He had also made the discovery that Allan's butler, the staid,
deferential and respectable Mr. Howard, had at some time in his career
been a valet and could still shave with some dexterity and was moreover
a very polite and capable man, so his lordship took possession of Howard
and another room and declared his intention of staying till Tuesday or
Wednesday.
Sir Josiah and Mr. Coombe and the rest were not averse to one day more
of holiday. The newly installed telephone enabled them to get into
touch with their City offices, with the result that the little house
party would not definitely break up till Wednesday.
So Allan, with the weight of his injustice to Abram Lestwick on his
conscience, set out this Monday morning to do penance.
He knew that Lestwick was employed by Patcham at the Moat Farm. Betty
had told him. The Moat Farm formed part of the Homewood Estate and
Patcham was his tenant; what more natural than he should call on so
worthy a tenant and talk crops and soil and manures and such like with
him? And then how easily and naturally would slip out a word or two
about Abram Lestwick. Was he a good man? an honest worker? and if he
should prove to be these and deserving, Allan must see what he could do
for the man to make up for the injustice of his treatment of him.
Kathleen followed him out of the breakfast room this morning. Lord
Gowerhurst was not yet risen and Mr. Coombe had expanded under the
influence of His Lordship's absence. Mr. Coombe was telling stories of
high finance. That his stories were interminably long and without any
point and of no particular interest, did not matter. Coombe was a sound
man, Sir Josiah honoured him, Cutler and Jobson admired him. Sir Harold
Scarsdale took no notice of him, so was not bored by his stories.
Scarsdale was thinking naturally of Kathleen. He thought of little
else, her manner troubled him. He could not, frankly he could not
understand her. She was smilingly polite, courteous and considerate,
she was friendly and sweet to him, and it made him realise that he
represented nothing at all to her. But she was playing a part, and
playing it well, he argued with himself. A woman, and a woman like
Kathleen, could not apparently without effort or sense of loss tear out
an image that has been enshrined in her heart for ten long years. It
puzzled him, worried him, even angered him, but he told himself he must
be patient. His was now the waiting game, and he believed that he had
but to wait long enough and all that he desired on this earth would be
his.
So Kathleen followed Allan out into the wide hall and found his cap and
selected his stick for him and did just those little things that a
tender, thoughtful, loving woman always does and meanwhile she looked at
him with a strange wistfulness, a curious pleading in her eyes, eyes
that told of a hunger and longing in her soul. But he, man-like, was
blind to it, yet not insensible of her goodness and her thought for him.
To-day she felt a strange unwillingness to let him go, she did what she
had never done before. She slipped her hand through his arm and walked
with him down the wide pathway to the gate, the sunshine in her hair and
on her face. Sir Josiah, bored by Coombe's unending story, yet too
polite to shew it, watched them from the window, a smile on his face.
It was good to see them like this--such friends, such comrades!
She wanted to tell him--not of Scarsdale, for that had sunk into
insignificance now--now that there was something so much greater, so
much more wonderful for him to know. But not yet, not yet--not out here
in the sunshine with perhaps someone watching them from the window.
Presently--presently when they should be quite alone!
So at the gate she paused, she looked at him.
"And once I thought I loved--Harold!" she thought. "Once I thought so
and now I know--I love----"
"Don't you want me to go out this morning, dear?"
"Oh, yes, yes, you're going to old Custance to talk----"
"No, I'm going to the Moat Farm to see Patcham, it's time I called on
him. But if you would rather I stayed----
"No!" she said. "Go! Good-bye, Allan!" she added softly.
They would have parted with a touch of the hand as they always did.
They kissed on rising and on retiring, but at no other time of the day.
Yet to-day she clung to his hand for a moment, her heart was filled with
tenderness for him, longing and a desire to keep him that she was too
unselfish to pander to.
"Why dear----"
There was something about her that he could not understand to-day,
something in the tight hold of her hand, in the unwonted colour in her
cheeks, the wonderful brightness in her eyes.
"It is nothing, dear, go--good-bye!" she said, yet as she spoke she
lifted his hand and held it against her soft cheek, just for a moment
and then would have turned, yet before she did, he caught her
suddenly--why he did not know--it was a moment of passion irresistible,
something that came so swiftly that he could not question it, could not
understand it. He caught her and held her and kissed her and then
quickly let her go and without a word went striding forth, conscious of
a feeling of shame, as though he had offered her insult.
And she stood looking after him, her hands pressed against her breast,
her eyes wide. Not once did he turn; had he done so perhaps he might
have seen, might have understood the longing in her eyes, the hunger for
the love that he never dreamed she needed.
Allan walked on quickly. A woman in moments of mental stress can find
relief in tears, a man more usually in violent movement.
He was a little shaken, a little unnerved, greatly surprised at himself.
Why had he done that, why had his heart leaped suddenly at the touch of
her soft cheek on his hand, why had he--done what he had done? Yet,
having done it, regretted nothing. It seemed to him that from that
moment Kathleen held a new interest for him. He had regarded her as
friend and companion--from this moment on he knew that she meant more
than this to him.
Farmer John Patcham received him courteously, with a deference and
respect that had nothing whatever of servility about it.
"'Tis a fine marning," he said, "and I be just going to have my usual
lunch, Mr. Homewood, a very plain and simple lunch it be, just a glass
of ale and a plum-heavy, very partial I be to plum-heavies and there's
no one in all Sussex makes 'em better than my wife, so if you'll join
me----"
Allan did. They sat in the somewhat stuffy little parlour, the window
of which remained hermetically sealed, summer and winter, and drank good
brown beer and ate those Sussex cakes that for some reason have never
achieved the fame of the cakes of Banbury or the Buns of Bath.
And over their cakes and ale they talked and Allan surprised the farmer
somewhat by the depth and advancement of his knowledge.
"You been getting your head laid alongside old Custance now I'll be
bound," he said, "wunnerful advanced man Custance be, as sets great
store on book larning to be sure. But if so be you be minded to try hop
raising in this part of Sussex, Mr. Homewood, I say give it up! 'Tis
the soil, sir, 'tis the soil! Hops be all right for Kent and the
Midlands, but--" and so on and so on, from hops to manures, chemical and
otherwise, to tithes and land taxes, to red cows and brindled cows and
the swine of Berkshire and of Yorkshire, on all of which subjects Mr.
Patcham laid down the law and smote the rickety round table with a heavy
hand, to drive his points home.
"Flints," said Patcham, "flints be the cussedest things, wunnerful how
flints du crop up. Clean a field, pick it, hand-pick it of flints,
clear out every flint there du be and in three months what du 'ee find?
Flints, sir, bushels of 'em, tons of 'em! In some counties it du be
fuzz and Sussex has its share of fuzz, come to that, but flints--I were
but saying to Abram last Saturday--no, 'twere Friday----"
"Abram--that is Abram Lestwick, isn't it?" Allan asked. "He works for
you?"
"Aye, Abram be my right hand man, straight he be, straight as an arrer,
honest as the day be Abram, not a drinking man, quiet and respectable
like in his manners, never an angry word or a cross look do 'ee get from
Abram Lestwick. Lucky I be to have such a man!"
"Ah!" Allan said.
"No one ever did see Abram lose his temper----"
"I have," thought Allan, "but it was pardonable."
"Soft spoken and gentle, but a wunnerful hand with the men, reg'lar to
Church and walking in the fear of the Lord du be Abram Lestwick, and wi'
sheep never a man to compare wi' he--whether it be lambing time or
shearing, a born shepherd be Abram!"
"And a good reliable man?"
"There ain't one to come nigh nor near to him," said Farmer Patcham, "a
good wage du I pay he and worth it every penny he be--thirty-five
shillings and a cottage to hisself, no less. And what the maids be
about, beats I and the Missus too, a hard man to fault," went on
Patcham, "a very hard man to fault, sir, and you'll believe me. My
Missus and the maids here du complain a bit about they hands of his,
restless hands as you may have noticed, sir, but what's that, all said
and done? And now, maybe, you'll take a look round the farm?"
Allan took a look round the farm and saw a back view of Abram in the
rick yard, but Abram never turned and apparently did not notice the
visitor.
"A good man," Patcham said, "a reliable, trustworthy, honest, sober man,
likely to make his way in the world. No frequenter of the ale-house and
a regular churchgoer, a man with rare and wonderful knowledge of the
soil and of sheep. Hi, Abram, Abram, my lad, come 'ee here! Here be Mr.
Homewood a-hearing all about 'ee from me!"
Very slowly Abram turned his discoloured face, his attitude was of
intense humility, he seemed to cower, his furtive hands wandered up and
down the edge of his waistcoat, yet never once did he look into Allan's
face.
"Why, Abram lad, 'ee've been in the wars, surely!" cried Patcham. "What
hev come to your face, lad?"
"An accident," Abram mumbled, "a blundering fellow, I be in the dark,
Mister Patcham!"
Patcham smiled. "Had it been any other than 'ee, Abram, I would say it
were through fighting."
Allan looked at his victim, he felt a strange pity, mingled with an
invincible repugnance. The man looked so inoffensive, so humble, even
servile and yet--Allan's attention was directed to those strangely
restless hands; he found that they attracted and held his eyes. He
remembered how Betty had cried out in fear and horror of those same
hands. Poor little Betty, never, never, Allan resolved, should those
hands touch the child, if he could prevent it!
"I would like to speak to Lestwick, Mr. Patcham," he said, "if I have
your permission?"
"Oh, aye, of course, why not?" said the farmer, looking a little
surprised. "Do 'ee mean alone, sir?"
"Yes, alone!"
Patcham eyed Allan a little resentfully, a little suspiciously. "I
hope," he began, "I hope, Mr. Homewood, as 'ee've got no idea o' trying
to get Abram away from me? I've spoke out for he and spoken as I did
find, but----"
Allan smiled. "Have no fear, I want to speak to Lestwick on an entirely
different matter."
Patcham's face cleared as he walked away. "Now I du wonder what he can
have to say to Abram?" he thought.
And now the two were left together and Allan, looking at the abject,
servile creature before him, felt suddenly tongue-tied. He was
conscious of a feeling of hot shame. Those unsightly marks, those livid
bruises were his work, the work of his fists. How desperately he must
have punished the man in his rage.
"Lestwick--I have something to say to you, an apology to make, I wish to
ask your pardon."
The wandering eyes were lifted for a moment to Allan's face, then
dropped again, the hands were at their nervous work.
"I misjudged you and in my anger treated you roughly, for which I am
deeply sorry," said Allan, eager to make his amends and be done with it,
for he could not but be conscious of his great and growing repugnance
and repulsion for the man.
He waited, but Abram said nothing, he stood there mute, his eyes seeming
to search the ground about him.
"You misled me--when we--when you and I--on Saturday night, when we
fought, I mean--I say you misled me, I thought you had a knife and
thinking so I struck you hardly. I am sorry for it, I made a mistake
and I wish to ask your forgiveness for what I did."
And still the man did not answer; why did he not speak? What was he
waiting for, was it----?
A smile came into Allan's face, it was a smile of contempt. He might
have guessed it, there was only one plaster for such a wound as Abram's.
He took out his pocket-book and from it a five pound note.
"I hope you will accept this," he said, "and with it my apology."
Abram looked up, his eyes wandered from Allan's face to the outstretched
hand that held the note. He seemed to hesitate, a convulsion passed
across his features, then he stretched out his hand suddenly and took
the note. He did not snatch it, for Abram was ever a polite man, he
took it gently and looked at it and then--then he tore it, slowly across
and across and yet again, tore it into small strips that he flung to the
ground and stamped into the soft earth with his foot.
"I thank 'ee, Mr. Homewood," he said in his low, passionless voice, "I
du thank 'ee most politely, I du, sir, for your good intentions toward
I--I thank 'ee, sir, most politely!" And then he turned away and went
slowly to his work in the rick yard.
Allan stood lost in wonder, he watched the man go, he glanced down at
the ragged scraps of what had once been a valuable piece of paper,
trodden into the earth.
So be it! He had done all that he could do, the man had apparently
refused to accept his apology. Sudden anger came to him.
"Lestwick!" he called sharply. "Lestwick!"
Lestwick stopped, but did not turn.
"I have this to say to you, my man," Allan said hotly, "I injured you,
under a wrong impression, for which I have expressed regret, but I
believe, on my soul, that you really deserved all you got. You have
annoyed and terrorised a girl who has no feeling save of fear and
dislike of you. In future you will leave her alone; if I find you
hanging about my house, waiting to waylay Betty Hanson, then I'll deal
with you again, as I dealt with you on Saturday night. Remember that, my
man, it's no idle threat!"
Lestwick made no answer, he did not turn, he stood still, as though
waiting patiently for Allan to complete his remarks, and then when
silence fell, Lestwick went slowly on his way.
Allan made his way homeward, with a feeling of anger in his breast. He
had done all that a man might do, and he had been repulsed. No wonder
that Betty, poor little Betty, felt horror and loathing for the man.
"Is he sane, is he normal?" Allan questioned himself. "There is
something--about him--" he shuddered. "I can't understand it, I never
loathed a human being in my life, as I loathe that man, but Betty----"
What could he do about Betty, how unravel the tangle, how straighten out
that very winding path of the child's life? She loved him, had she not
said it a hundred times with tears and with pleading? Yet was it the
real love? The one passion of a life-time? He doubted it, for Allan
Homewood held himself in no high esteem and could not think of himself
as one for whom any woman would care deeply. No, it could not be that,
it must be the strange tie that united them, that lifting of the curtain
that had revealed to them both a glimpse into some strange past that was
not of this life.
What, did she want of him? What did she expect, ask of him? But
whatever it was, how impossible it all was!
To-day he had kissed Kathleen, his wife, as never before had he kissed
her and remembering this, a softer, more tender look came into his face.
What was Kathleen thinking now? Had he surprised, even frightened her,
was she hurt or angry, or could she understand and forgive that sudden
wave of passion that had come to him? Love and passion for her--his own
wife! His cheeks flushed a little, it seemed to him that all his little
world was in strange and dire confusion.
Mrs. Hanson, standing at her own gate, tall, erect, and brown of face,
beady of eyes, bobbed to him an exaggerated respectful curtsey.
Allan lifted his hat to her.
"Good morning!"
"And good morning to 'ee, sir," she said and treated him to another
curtsey.
"I hope my maid du be conducting herself in a seemly manner and giving
satisfaction to my lady, sir?"
"Yes!" Allan said; he felt confused before those keen bright eyes.
"A strange, wilful maid her be in many ways, sir, yet her heart be so
good as gold."
"She is wonderfully pretty, your granddaughter, Mrs. Hanson!"
"Beauty be but a snare and likewise is but skin deep. I set no stores
by such, 'tis the heart as tells, sir."
"But her heart is good, I am sure." He was talking for the mere sake of
talking, for an idea bad come into his brain, a little dim and vague as
yet, but yet an idea that possibly might mean a way to safety for them
all.
"Good-hearted her may be, but most terribul obstinate and stubborn, a
perilous obstinate maid, terribul contrairy and self willed her du be in
many ways----"
"In--in what ways?"
"In marrying," said Mrs. Hanson, "I hev chose for she a good honest man
as du walk upright in the sight of the Lord, a man as du keep hisself to
hisself and du keep holy the Sabbath day, reading in the Bible and not
with an eye to every maid, though there be many wishful of attracting
his attention. Wonderful partial he be to my Betty tu, wonderful
partial and keen and eager for she."
"And the man?"
"There bain't a better in all Sussex and yet that perilous obstinate
maid will hev none of he!"
"Because she may dislike the man!"
"Dis-like, what hev that to do with it, sir? Why should Betty dis-like
Abram Lestwick--a man earning his thirty-five shillings a week and with
a cottage to himself and all keen set as he be----?"
"I have seen the man and can understand her dislike for him. He lays in
wait for her, outside the gates; she is afraid to venture out of nights
because of this man, whom she fears and hates. And you, can you not
understand the child's aversion for such a man as Lestwick, Mrs.
Hanson?"
"That I cannot and will not! A proper man be Abram and rare grateful
and glad any maid should be attracting the like of he!"
"Betty is neither glad nor grateful, she goes in fear of him, hates him
and is terrified by the very thought of him--it would be death--do you
understand, death to the girl to force her into a marriage so shocking!
Why are you so keen for it? Why do you seek to drive her against her
own natural inclinations, why--why?" Allan cried hotly.
She eyed him with cold disfavour. What business was all this of his, of
young Mr. Homewood of Homewood Manor House? She would have looked on
him with some suspicion, yet there was something so open in his face,
his anger was so honest, that she could not, even if she would, suspect
him of an interest in pretty Betty, that reflected no credit on him.
"Abram hev thirty-five shillings a week and----"
"And for thirty-five shillings a week you would force this child to
marry a man she hates, you would wreck and ruin her life, you would
drive her perhaps--God knows--to death--to suicide! Can't you
understand that it is not mere dislike she feels for him, it is hate and
terror! Thirty-five shillings a week!" He laughed aloud in scorn, he
flung his head back, his face was flushed, his eyes bright, and Mrs.
Hanson stared at him in wonderment and with something of anger too.
"Listen to me," Allan said and his voice was more gentle and quiet, he
looked into the keen, hard, old face. "Listen to me, Mrs. Hanson, you
are Betty's grandmother. I believe you are her only living relative.
If you think so highly of thirty-five shillings a week and of a
cottage--I will make you an offer--" He paused, "I will undertake to
pay to you as Betty's guardian, a sum that will equal the amount of
Abram Lestwick's wages. I will find a cottage for you--not here--not
near here even--and you shall have it rent free, so that Betty may live
with you and that you shall not torment her further about this man
Lestwick. Do you understand? I will give to you and to Betty all that
Abram Lestwick could give, the money and the cottage! And you and the
girl shall go away from here--away for good. She is young and she is
beautiful, she will surely find many eager to marry her, and she shall
choose and pick among them for herself. Do you understand, do I make
myself plain?"
"Plain--aye, plain!" she said; under the black bodice the thin old
breast rose and fell, she gripped the rails of the gate and stared into
his face.
"And why--why are 'ee willing to do this, give this to Betty Hanson, Mr.
Homewood?"
"To save her from marriage with a man I dislike and distrust, as much as
she does--for that reason and that reason alone!"
"'Ee be mighty generous, Mr. Homewood!" Her hard voice quivered with
suspicion, and yet--yet she looked him full in the eyes and he looked
back at her and there was no shame, no confusion, nothing of the look of
one who has something on his conscience.
"I--I do not understand--" she said slowly, "I do not understand!"
"No, I do not suppose you do understand. Shall we leave it at that? My
offer holds good, accept it and make a happy home for the child--but not
here."
"'Ee du seem mighty set on it not being here!" she said thoughtfully.
"Mighty set 'ee du be. Does the maid know your intentions to she, sir?"
"No, I had no such intentions just now, the thought has only just come
into my mind."
She nodded slowly. He had said that she could not understand and he was
right. Whoever heard the like before? Thirty-five shillings a week and
a cottage and all--all for nothing! Whoever heard the like before?
Certainly not Mrs. Hanson.
"All bewildered I be," she said and said it aloud, though it was not
intended for his ears. "All bewildered and wonder struck I du be!"
"Do you agree, answer me, do you agree to this? Tell me, Mrs. Hanson?"
"But the maid--you du say, sir, she hev not heard?"
"She has not heard, but if you agree, you can tell her yourself, tell
her this evening and then you shall give me her and your answer."
"If the maid is willing," she said slowly, "though all the same I be
partial to Abram."
"Her terror of him should have some weight with you. Take her away from
this place to where she will never see him again, you will?"
She looked at him. "Send the maid to me to-night and I will talk of it
wi' she."
She stood at the gate, staring down the road after him.
"Thirty-five shillings a week and a cottage--far away from here for
Betty and for me and for nothing, for nothing! Very bewildered and
wonderstruck I be!"
And Allan, hurrying homeward, was thinking--if this might be the
solution, how easy it was after all, freedom for Betty from Abram
Lestwick--a new life for the little maid among new faces--where
soon--soon she would forget her dreams in the old garden and him.
And then, when all was done and Betty and her grandmother gone for good,
he would tell Kathleen; it would be easy to tell her then and Kathleen
would understand.
*CHAPTER XXXII*
*THE AWAKENING*
Bright eyes, the brightest he believed he had ever seen, greeted Allan.
Eyes so kind, so bright and so tender that he knew before ever a word
had been spoken that he had not offended, that Kathleen was not angry
with him, not hurt.
He felt a great wave of relief and then the feeling passed and gave
place to wonder, because in some subtle way Kathleen had changed. To
others she was still the Kathleen he knew and loved and respected, but
to him she had become another being, her eyes were misty and soft and
tender, for him, there was a rich, rare colour in her cheeks. He felt
his own heart respond. As they were passing into lunch he touched her
hand--why?
There was no reason for it, it was just the impulse of the moment, yet
he felt that he must do it, so he did and she turned and looked at him
and it seemed to him that the colour deepened in her cheeks and the look
in her eyes was more tender than ever.
And the touch of that little hand of hers made his heart leap. This was
no mere friendship, this was no mere liking, no symptom of respect. He
wondered at himself, wondered at its meaning and as a result he failed
to hear Lord Gowerhurst, who was addressing himself particularly to
Allan.
As a matter of fact Lord Gowerhurst, departing on the morrow, found
himself woefully short of money. He was not in the cue to approach Sir
Josiah and a timely loan of a comparatively small sum from Allan, a mere
fifty or even twenty-five, would be agreeable to his lordship. Later on
Sir Josiah's money bags must be properly besieged, with all due form and
with a regard to detail for which there was no time at the moment.
"If, therefore, you could give me ah--ten minutes--some time most
convenient to yourself, my dear Allan--" said his lordship with unwonted
humility.
"Of course, delighted!" Allan murmured, and was thinking of Kathleen all
the time.
Had he ever appreciated her properly? Had he ever realised the
exquisite beauty of her face, a beauty that was spiritual, was of
expression rather than of mere form and mould of feature. How sweetly
gracious she was, how charming, not even the loquacious and boresome
Coombe aroused irritability in her--how his old father worshipped
her--what a strange, yet perfect understanding there seemed to be
between them, the old City man of business, of plebeian origin and this
young and gracious well born lady. Yet they were so obviously and so
certainly friends, good, close, true friends, with a mutual
understanding and a mutual love for one another.
So Allan did not make the most agreeable of companions at that meal and
his lordship felt uneasy.
"I wonder if the fellow suspects I'm going to ask a small loan, a mere
trifle till I get back to town? Confound it, it's deuced unpleasant for
a man in my position to--er--place himself under an obligation to a mere
stripling like this! I can't ask Scarsdale, there's something deuced
standoffish about the fellow; I almost wish I hadn't taken Scarsdale up
again, I've got an idea that Scarsdale lets bygones rankle. By George,
though, I did give him a dressing down in those days, and by George he
deserved it--asked for it--begad, and got it too!"
Just for a moment Allan had an opportunity for a word with Kathleen when
lunch was over.
"You--you are not angry with me?"
"Angry?"
Was she a woman of twenty-nine almost, or only a maiden of nineteen that
suddenly her eyes dropped before his, that suddenly a deep rich colour
came flaming her face.
"Kathleen--Kathleen!" He caught her hand, he was suddenly in a strange
tremble, and then in on them burst Mr. Coombe.
"Wistaria, not westeria, Jobson, my boy, if you'd done the gardening
I've done at Tulse Hill--I--I beg pardon!" stammered Mr. Coombe, taken
aback.
Kathleen smiled. "You are quite right, Mr. Coombe, it is wistaria!" she
said.
"I've got one over my house at Tulse Hill," said Mr. Coombe, "with a
stem, if you'll believe me, as thick as my body!" Which was an
exaggeration, as Mr. Coombe's body was of no ordinary thickness.
Allan turned away.
"Oh, I forgot--" he said, and his eyes and Kathleen's met. "I saw Mrs.
Hanson at her gate as I passed and she says if you can spare her
granddaughter this evening, Kathleen, she would be glad."
"I will send Betty," Kathleen said, "though the old woman was not very
kind to her, still she is old and alone. Yes, I will see that Betty
goes!"
His lordship secured his quiet ten minutes with Allan.
"Most foolish and stupid of me, forgot to bring my cheque book, I can't
think what possessed me--I assure you, Allan, I was astounded at my
oversight. Of course one can draw a cheque on a sheet of note paper,
but my Bank don't like it--no, they don't like it, sir--and so--so----"
"I shall be only too pleased to be of service to you," said Allan
promptly, so promptly that his lordship was a little taken aback.
Yet Allan seemed so ready, so willing--it would be a shameful waste of
opportunity to make the amount so small as he had originally intended.
"If--if--er--a couple of hundred wouldn't put you to inconvenience----"
"With pleasure," Allan said. "I'll send Howard over to Stretton in the
car, he'll be able to get to the Bank just in time."
Never in the whole course of his experience, and it had been large, had
his lordship had such a request granted with such alacrity and
willingness.
"My dear Allan, 'pon my soul now, 'pon my soul, it is very good of
you--I take a pleasure, sir, a pleasure in being under an obligation to
you, even though it is only a temporary one. You're a good fellow,
Allan, a deuced generous, open-handed good fellow and--and I honour you,
sir, and your father too, and it's a pleasure and a relief to me, be
Gad, to think that my girl has entered your family--a family of--of
gentlemen, be gad!"
"Poor old chap!" Allan thought. "It must be hard for a man in his
position and of his rank to have to lower himself and demean himself to
borrow money--" He sighed, and then smiled in wonder at himself that he
should feel so kindly towards Lord Gowerhurst, for whom he had
previously felt nothing but aversion and contempt.
But then Lord Gowerhurst was Kathleen's father and for some reason
to-day that made just all the difference in the world to Allan. So,
having lent Lord Gowerhurst two hundred pounds, Allan resolved that he
would say nothing to his own father about it.
Custance claimed Allan that afternoon and when Custance had done with
him there was barely time to reach home and dress for dinner, so he did
not see Kathleen till they met at the dinner table. And to-night she
was looking her loveliest and her best. Even Coombe remarked her
heightened colour and tried to pay her a clumsy compliment on her looks
and meeting Lord Gowerhurst's cold stare when half way through his
speech, faltered and broke down and burst into profuse perspiration.
But Kathleen smiled on him and thanked him and told him in a little
confidential whisper, that highly pleased Coombe, that she was getting
to be an old, old woman. In less than eighteen months she would be
thirty years of age, and though she had not found a grey hair as yet, no
doubt she soon would.
"Old, my dear--" said Mr. Coombe, and then blushed crimson, "I beg your
pardon----"
"You have nothing to beg my pardon for--Sir Josiah's friends are
mine--and if one of them is kind enough to call me my dear, it only
proves that he likes me and I like to be liked, Mr. Coombe, by my
friends!"
"And so you are, so you are, and as for getting old, never, you'll never
be old, you'll be young to the last day of your life, if you live to be
eighty, and please God you will!" And Mr. Coombe turned deliberately
and stared Lord Gowerhurst full in the face with an expression that said
as plain as words--"If you don't like the way I am behaving and if you
don't like my paying compliments to your daughter--then you can go to
the deuce and go as soon as you like, my Lord, and be hanged to you!"
Among that company of gentlemen Harold Scarsdale was inconspicuous.
That he was better bred than Mr. Coombe and Mr. Jobson was obvious, that
he could talk a good deal better than any of them Allan at least knew,
but it pleased Scarsdale to hold his tongue and keep himself much in the
background. From that background he watched Kathleen and the more he
watched the less did he seem to understand her.
He remembered the passion of the old days, he remembered that scene by
the lake only two short days ago, how during those two days had she
changed. She greeted him with a friendly smile, she held out her hand
to him, she wished him good morning and good night and talked to him of
trivial, every day things, listening with interest to the few remarks he
made and that was all.
But she was a woman and he knew little of women, but had read much and
so had obtained a false impression. She was clever, she was hiding her
feelings and doing it successfully. When the time came, and it would
come, then she would fling all pretence to the winds, she would be his,
he would open his arms to her, the ten years of hunger would be ended.
To-night he sat in his corner and listened to everyone and said little,
but he was watchful and presently he saw Allan go out and, waiting for a
time, Scarsdale too rose and sauntered to the window and stepped out
into the garden.
Allan, however, had not gone to the garden. He remembered that Betty
was going to her grandmother's to-night.
She would be sure to leave the old woman's cottage by nine. He counted
on that. He wanted to see her, he wanted to see how she had taken what
her grandmother would say to her, he wanted to know that Betty would
realise how sensible the arrangement was and how it would be for her own
good and happiness in the long run. She was young, a mere child, in
some far away little village she would begin a new life, unmolested by
Abram Lestwick, the terror of his presence and his pretensions removed
for ever from her mind. And far away amid new surroundings, she would
surely forget in time--perhaps not at once--yet in time, all those
strange happenings and that strange tie that had drawn Betty and himself
so closely together.
Allan was not vain, he did not for one moment believe that it was his
own personality that had attracted Betty, or that he himself--the man he
was now, had ever awakened any feelings of tenderness and love in that
little heart.
It was the glamour, the strange mystery, the unsolvable mystery, those
visions that she--and he too--had seen, that dimly uncertain memory of
'something' that had been, in the buried and unknown past; it was that
that had appealed to her as of course it had appealed to him.
So Allan lighted his pipe and strolled away down the dusky road and
strangely enough had not gone ten paces before he was thinking of
Kathleen, rather than of her he had come to meet.
* * * * *
Mrs. Hanson sat upright on her stiff old chair, her hands were folded
primly on her narrow lap, her eyes were fixed in an unwavering stare on
the closed door.
She was expecting Betty, she had been expecting the girl for the past
hour. For an hour Mrs. Hanson had sat there listening for coming
footsteps but hearing only the steady persistent 'tick-tock' of the long
cased clock.
During that hour Mrs. Hanson had been thinking, she had been asking of
herself questions, and as the minutes passed the stern old face grew
graver and grimmer.
Why should he be willing to give to Betty and herself such a mort of
money. Why should he be wishful of sending Betty to some far off place.
Why should Mr. Allan Homewood interest himself in the very least with
the future of Betty Hanson at all?
Questions that Mrs. Hanson could not answer satisfactorily.
"A very pleasant and outspoken young gentleman he du seem--and yet----"
Mrs. Hanson shook her head. "And yet----"
But the long expected footsteps were sounding, there came a tapping on
the door. That in itself was unfamiliar. In the old days Betty lifted
the latch and came in.
Betty came to-night as a visitor, and Mrs. Hanson realised the
difference.
"Come in," she said, and rose stiffly to receive her visitor. Betty came
in nervously; she looked at her grandmother, hesitated and then came
forward and offered a soft cheek.
"You will hev had your tea?"
"Yes grandmother."
"Will you be seated?"
Betty sat down, her nervousness increasing.
Mrs. Hanson stared at the childish pretty face, it was the face of most
perfect innocence, yet Mrs. Hanson looked with eyes of suspicion.
"The weather be holding up," she remarked, she was a woman who never
came straight to the matter in hand, as Betty well knew.
"Grandmother 'ee sent for I?"
It was like carrying the war into the enemy's camp.
"True I did send for 'ee," Mrs. Hanson frowned.
"I hev had from young Mr. Allan Homewood an offer with which I be
greatly surprised."
"From--from----" the colour deepened in the pretty cheeks, a fact that
Mrs. Hanson's keen eyes did not miss.
"And why pray should 'ee blush at the mention of the gentleman's name."
"I bean't blushing, grandmother."
"And now 'ee be lying as well, Betty Hanson."
Betty hung her head.
"Very distrustful and uneasy I be in my mind, very distrustful. Betty
Hanson, look me in the eye and answer me this: what be there between 'ee
and Mr. Allan Homewood?"
"Oh! oh grandmother--there----" Betty was silent, she pressed her hands
against her breast. "Be-between I and Mr. Homewood grandmother,
what--what should there be?"
"There should be nothing Miss, but there be! there be, I see it. What
be he to thee?"
"Nothing, nothing, nothing. Oh grandmother, why do 'ee worry I so? I
wish--I wish--I hadn't come!"
"If so be as your mind were at rest and your conscience clear, Betty
Hanson, 'ee wouldn't hev said that! Now answer, answer me and speak the
truth for I be your dead father's mother and your only living relative I
be. What be Mr. Allan Homewood to 'ee?"
"Nothing," the girl whispered, "he bain't nothing to I--nothing, and if
anyone hev told 'ee contrairywise he be a liar!"
"The truth I will hev! nor shall 'ee leave this place----"
Mrs. Hanson rose, she crossed the room to the door and turned the
ponderous key. "The truth will I hev before I shall allow 'ee to
depart, what be Mr. Allan Homewood of Homewood Manor House, to 'ee,
Betty Hanson?"
Betty did not answer. She sat with bowed head, she wrung and twisted
her hands.
"I--I did see he--of nights of moonlight--nights in--in the old garden,"
she whispered.
Mrs. Hanson bristled, she sat upright: "'Ee did see him of nights in the
old garden! Oh! shame on 'ee shame----
"So this be the meaning of your perilous bad conduct, slipping away out
of the cottage of nights to--to meet--a man, a man! Terribul deceitful
and deceiving 'ee've been all this while, terribul and shameful and
perilous Betty Hanson."
"'Twasn't a man I went to see," Betty cried, "Grandmother 'twere no
man."
"No man and 'ee said with your own lips----"
"Grandmother, 'ee can never, never understand--it--were a--a ghost----"
Mrs. Hanson fell back on her chair, her black eyes blazed in
indignation.
"'Ee've said enough, either 'ee be daft or the greatest liar as I ever
did hear on, a Ghost! 'ee wicked deceitful maid, a ghost indeed!"
"Grandmother, 'ee could never, never understand. I'll try and make 'ee,
but I know----" Betty shook her head, "'ee never will. 'Twasn't
Allan----"
"Allan," Mrs. Hanson lifted her two hands.
"'Twasn't Allan, I did see in the old garden, but a ghost I see him and
others, fine ladies and gentlemen all in strange clothing, Grandmother,
and Allan he were for ever digging, he in his old brown suit wi' the
brass buckles to his shoes and----"
"Betty Hanson, stop, stop, this minit; not another word will I sit here
and listen to, I hev made up my mind.
"This day, this man, this Allan, as 'ee do so shamelessly call him, made
an offer to me. A fine offer that I did greatly mistrust. 'Tis
this--take the child--away he said, take her far away, don't worrit her
wi' Abram Lestwick, and I will allow 'ee and her tu, the thirty-five
shillings a week, the same as Abram's money and a cottage all for
nothin' so as 'ee du take she far away from Homewood."
"Oh! oh! he said that?"
"Aye he did, my maid, which du mean as he be tired of 'ee, tired, 'ee
hear me, tired as men du tire of women like 'ee."
Betty lifted her head slowly, she looked at the grandmother and her
pretty face blazed with sudden anger. She rose:
"Grandmother, 'ee be a wicked woman, a bad despiteful wicked woman.
What 'ee hev said, shames 'ee more, more than it does me, shames 'ee,
and--and----" she broke down suddenly, she sank back sobbing on to the
chair, she rocked to and fro. "'Ee could never, never understand
'twasn't Allan, yet 'twas Allan and I know he were something to I,
something very, very dear and precious he were to I. But oh! oh! 'ee
could never understand."
"I du understand this," Mrs. Hanson said, "I do understand that 'ee
shall marry Abram Lestwick. An honest and upright man, and 'ee shall
never take money from him as 'ee du most shamelessly call Allan, never,
nor I. Money taken from he would choke me, 'twould spring up like the
tares and choke me."
Mrs. Hanson pointed a bony finger at the girl.
"'Ee shall marry Abram Lestwick a good man and honest, 'ee shall become
his wife. I hev said it, and I say it again and I shall listen to no
more of this nonsense, and as for Mr. Allan Homewood for all he be a
frank and outspoken gentleman and lib'ral wi' his money, I would take
shame to myself to accept of anything from he, nor allow 'ee to do
likewise. Marry Abram Lestwick 'ee shall----"
"I never will," Betty leaped up, her face convulsed, "I never will, I
bain't your grand-darter any more, I bean't nothing to 'ee, I wunt
listen to 'ee! I wunt! I be free, free--and----" she turned and darted
to the door, she wrenched at the heavy old key and turned it, just as
Mrs. Hanson rose and came stiffly to prevent her.
But Betty, younger and more active succeeded, she tore the door open and
in the open doorway turned:
"I bain't your grand-darter anymore! I be free of 'ee, I wunt marry
Abram Lestwick, I--I'll be--damned if I du."
"Stop!" Mrs. Hanson said in a voice of thunder, but Betty did not, she
turned and fled into the night and the old woman unable to pursue stood
there shaking and quivering with honest indignation.
"De-fiant her be, perilous defiant and hev soiled her lips wi' foul and
unseemly words, her henceforth be no granddarter of mine. From this
moment I du renounce she."
Sobbing, panting, her little heart labouring, down the road sped Betty,
and then suddenly she saw him coming, slowly towards her, and to him she
ran with eager outstretched hands and a little cry of joy.
"O Allan, Allan be 'ee come to meet I? O Allan, I be all upset and put
about, I be----"
"Betty--why Betty child, what is it, what has--come," he added as she
clung to his hand sobbing like a broken hearted child.
"Be kind to me, be kind to me, for I be all broken hearted," she pressed
her tear-stained face against his sleeve.
"Allan, I be all broken hearted. Her be harsh and cruel wi' me, and
said--said things--things--Oh!" she pressed her face tightly to his
sleeve, to hide the hot flush of shame that came to her.
"Hush little girl, hush," he said, "don't cry, did your grandmother tell
you what I suggested about--about you and her going away----?"
"She told me--she told me, and she said she wouldn't hev it, she said
that I must marry Abram."
"You never shall, Betty, don't cry, I swear before Heaven you never
shall, trust me, rely on me in this, for rather than that, I would kill
the man, kill him with my two hands. Betty, you hear me?"
"Aye I hear 'ee; say it again Allan, say it over again, say as 'ee would
kill he, rather than I should marry he."
"I mean it, and it shall never be, and your grandmother then will not
agree to my plan. Well, it does not matter, you will be perhaps happier
without her, I shall find some place where neither your grandmother nor
Abram Lestwick will trouble you, with people who will be good and kind
to you and will make your life happy. Your future shall be protected,
too."
"Let me stay. Let me stay here, and bide with 'ee, don't, don't send me
away from 'ee Allan, don't 'ee send me away."
"Hush," he said. "Hush," he was bitterly disappointed, he had thought
all arranged, and now--but her pitiful crying wrung his heart, poor
little maid, poor dear little soul, he put his arm about her and tried
to soothe and quiet her.
"Betty, Betty, don't cry, don't cry, it hurts me to hear you cry and
child, try and understand how--how impossible it all is. There is no
other way, you yourself will see it and understand it presently."
"Don't send me away from 'ee for I shall die, I shall die if 'ee do."
She was nestling close to him, holding his hand in both her own,
pressing it against her wet cheek.
Supposing someone should happen down the road and what more likely--oh
no, this would never do.
"Come, Betty! Come, be brave, we must talk of this."
Not far away was the little green gate, and he drew her towards it and
in the deep shadows of the wall a man flattened himself against the
brickwork and held his breath as they passed him so closely, that he
might have stretched out his hand and touched them as they went, a man
who was shaking strangely with passion and whose eyes gleamed from the
dark shadows. And then the little green door opened and took them and
Abram Lestwick stepped into the roadway.
"Pleasant spoken," he said. "Aye, pleasant spoken he be. Pleasant
spoken!" He repeated the words a score of times, he went to the green
door and his hands worked with it. He fingered the heavy old nail heads
with which it was studded.
"Very, very pleasant spoken he be--robbing me of
she--robbing--robbing----." He scratched at the paint with his nails,
then muttering to himself, turned away and went down the road.
Allan led Betty into the garden, he led her along the path between the
tall yews and as they walked he spoke to her. It was difficult, yet it
must be done. His heart yearned to her in pity--the spell of her, the
fascination of her was on him, but he fought against it--her childlike
weeping set him longing to take her in his arms, to comfort her, hold
her, kiss her tears away, for the weeping of women and of children
always affected him greatly.
"Betty, don't cry, Betty listen to me. Be reasonable, be sensible my
dear, listen----."
"O Allan, oh sir, that you--that you of all should turn against thy
Betty."
His Betty--what memories the words awakened, memories of this same
garden, of a little maid in quaint mob cap, with pretty mittened hands
and eyes all ashine with love--for him--Thy Betty, that maid had said as
she, by his side, had said it but a moment ago--His Betty!
Perhaps the devil walked with them that night along the path under the
dark yews, perhaps he tapped Allan on the shoulder and whispered in his
ear.
Allan turned to her suddenly, he gripped her wrists, he tore her hands
away from her face, his voice was harsh, as unlike his own voice as
voice could be.
"Listen, you--you must--this--this cannot go on. What the past held,
God knows--yet whatever it held, it cannot and shall not influence the
future. I have a wife, I am bound in honour to her, in honour to you,
Betty. Hush, leave off crying, you hear me?"
She was frightened by the stern authority in his voice and left off her
whimpering.
"What I am doing, what I want to do is for your own sake, and for mine
because you are young and well nigh friendless and very beautiful,
because I too am young and--and afraid, yes afraid--Betty."
"Oh Allan, of--of me?"
"Yes of you, and for you Betty, I want you to be happy and, dear, I want
happiness myself. This old garden, the garden here about us has meant
so much to us both, better dear that you should go and never see it
again, for then in time you will forget, and the love you speak of is
not real, it cannot be real, it is born of dreams Betty and like a dream
it will pass."
"Why--why when I du love----"
"You know why, because I have a wife, because I love her and honour her
and would sooner cut off my hand than cause her one moment of shame, of
pain or unhappiness."
He bent nearer to her, he could see her face glimmering white so near to
his, so tempting, yet he was not tempted.
"It means her happiness, do you know why--because--and God knows that I
speak without vanity, but very humbly, because I believe that she loves
me--how could I hurt her through you, would you hurt her?"
"I would die for her!" She wrenched her hands free from his, she stood
before him.
"I--I will think of all as 'ee have said to I, sir, and I--I will try
and bring myself to thy way of thinking and I--I will try and bring
myself to--oh no, no! I can't, I can't!" She broke down, sobbing
wildly, then suddenly gained control of herself. "I will not--not
trouble thee any more, sir."
"Betty, listen," he put his hands on her shoulders and held her. "Take
time, take time, think this over, to-day is Monday, in three days, not
before three days, you will make up your mind, Betty, come to me--here
in this place--in three days--on Thursday night at this hour, come and
tell me then, child, that you will be wise and sensible."
"I--I will come to 'ee here in three days----" she said slowly, "and
then I will tell 'ee, sir, what I shall do,--in three days--good night!"
She turned away, standing there he heard her go and heard a strange
little moaning noise coming back to him from out the darkness as she
went.
So, after waiting a time, he too turned towards the house and passed
down the wide flagged pathway, and the man on the stone bench by the
sundial let him pass unchallenged.
*CHAPTER XXXIII*
*BY THE LAKE*
Lord Gowerhurst made an affecting little speech, for the time of parting
had come. Sir Josiah's big car, all spick and span, with the
respectable Bletsoe at the wheel, was waiting outside the hall door, so
too was Mr. Coombe's automobile, which seemed to require some of its
owner's attention at the last moment, for Mr. Coombe was only visible as
to his legs and feet, the rest of him being out of sight under his car.
"This visit, a trifling thing perhaps to you, my love, has been to me
like an oasis, a green and fragrant oasis be-gad, an the desert of my
life! I am leaving my dear, dear daughter----" his lordship turned his
fine eyes upwards and his voice shook with noble emotion. "I am leaving
my dear, dear daughter surrounded by love and happiness, I am leaving
her in her pretty little home----." He spoke of the place as though it
were a cottage, to impress Messrs. Cutler and Jobson with the idea of
his own magnificence--"and I----" he sighed, "I go back to my quiet
humdrum life, my poor chambers, my loneliness! Often and often as I sit
alone in my rooms, I shall picture you and this home of yours to myself.
I am an old man, an old man my dear, and my time--may not be long----."
He sighed deeply, there were tears in those fine eyes of his. Kathleen
was very patient, she knew her father's love for these tender,
meaningless speeches, she bore with them as she bore with him, with a
sweet untiring patience.
But he had done at last, he had taken his place in Sir Josiah's car, Sir
Josiah was seated beside him, Mr. Coombe's arrangements and
re-arrangements were complete, his oil-smeared countenance was beaming,
"All aboard!" he cried. "All aboard! You're coming with me this time,
Cutler, eh? We'll shew 'em the way, my boy!"
"Good-bye, Allan, my lad, good-bye and thank 'ee, thank 'ee for a very
happy time and good-bye, Lady Kathleen, and thank you too for a time as
I shan't forget in a hurry!"
Jobson tried to make a little speech, but broke down through
nervousness.
But Kathleen saved him all embarrassment. "It's been splendid having
you and when you are gone I shall miss you all terribly, terribly, and
you must all promise to come again soon, very soon, Mr. Jobson, and you
Mr. Coombe, and you Mr. Cutler!"
"Just ask me, my Lady, just give me the chance, that's all!" shouted Mr.
Coombe--"Don't forget my telephone number, City double three double five
one four----"
"I think, sir," said Bletsoe, "as we'd best let Mr. Coombe get away with
his little lot first, we won't want their dust all the time, nor yet
have him trying to pass us every two minutes."
"Quite right!" said Sir Josiah. "Yes, by all means allow Mr. Coombe to
get away!"
"I shall feel no personal grief if Mr. Coombe gets entirely away!" said
his lordship. He did not like motoring, but the lift that Sir Josiah
had offered him had been accepted. It meant that he would not have to
purchase a ticket to Town.
"Good-bye father, good-bye dear Sir Josiah!"
Kathleen had clambered on to the running board of the car like any young
girl for a last kiss. His lordship disapproved of exhibitions of
affection before menials, he waved a white hand.
"Good-bye, dear child!" But Sir Josiah was not to be deprived of his
kiss.
"It's all right, Bletsoe!" he said at last with a sigh, "I think Mr.
Coombe has got well away."
They had stayed late, would have stayed later, but for his lordship's
anxiety to be back in town. As it was, the sun was near its setting,
the sweet mellow glow of the evening was on the earth, and the distances
were purple against the red and yellow sky.
They stood in the roadway, waving, Allan and Kathleen and Scarsdale.
She could have wished that he had gone with them and mentally took
herself to task for her lack of hospitality.
And now the white dust whirled up by the stout tyres of Sir Josiah's
car, blotted it out. It was gone and Kathleen slipped her hand through
Allan's arm.
Scarsdale saw it. It was done so spontaneously, it seemed so natural
that it angered him, his face stiffened. She had married the fellow for
money, for nothing else, why did she find it necessary to make such
pretence with him? It was mere acting, he knew that, yet he felt she
over-acted the part and she fell a little in his estimation, though his
love for her and desire of her was no less than before.
A man with bent head trudged past them down the road, he lifted his hand
to his hat and touched it as he went, yet never gave them a glance. His
hand, having reached his hat, remained with it for some moments, his
fingers fumbling at the brim, then he was gone.
"Who was that?" Kathleen asked.
Allan hesitated for a moment.
"A man named Lestwick--he is----"
"Oh I know, so that is the man, Allan! I can understand that child's
feeling, I don't like him, I don't like him, there is something about
him----"
Kathleen's eyes followed the black figure down the road. "I don't know
why," she said, "it may be unjust and probably is, but I--I seemed to
feel a chill, a sense of dislike, of distaste as he passed us by!"
"Poor wretch, he is to be pitied since Kathleen dislikes him!" Scarsdale
said and a note of irony and sarcasm crept into his voice, which she
detected in a moment and her cheeks flushed a little.
"I am sorry," she said gently, "I may be mistaken, I hope I am, one is
often mistaken in one's likes and dislikes, it is not well to trust too
much to instinct!"
"What did she mean?" Scarsdale wondered, but he said nothing and they
went back into the house, the house that seemed strangely deserted and
silent.
When the friends, whose pleasant voices have sounded in the rooms, have
gone their ways, like them much or little as we may, there is always a
sense of loneliness and desertion about the place. Who can tell if the
hospitable door will ever open to them again? Noisy Mr. Coombe and
embarrassed Mr. Jobson--we have no great affection for them perhaps, yet
because they were here a while ago and the place seems empty without
them, we can spare them a passing regret, we can admit to ourselves that
we miss them just a little.
"You will find it a little dull now, I am afraid Harold," Kathleen said.
"I shall not find it dull here!"
"Dull----" when she was near, perhaps that was what his words meant to
convey, but Allan, who heard them, noticed no double meaning, no
particular tenderness underlying the words.
"Allan must neglect Mr. Custance a little now and give you more of his
time."
"If you say that then you will make me feel that I am not wanted. I
should hate to think that you regard me as a person who must be
entertained. If I thought that my presence here, Homewood, made the
very smallest difference to your arrangements, then I should want to
leave you at once!"
"And I hope that you won't think of leaving for a long while to come,"
said Allan heartily.
"But you must--must give him a little more time, Allan," Kathleen said
presently. "He is your guest----"
"But your old friend, dear, you and he have far more to talk about than
he and I could have! You have the past to dig in!" He smiled.
The past--how little he knew! Her heart smote her. She ought to have
told him and yet, after all, how little was there to tell? The man she
had loved had come back and she had discovered that she had lived in a
fool's paradise, that she had not loved the man, but rather had loved
her love for him, had idealised it and had made of it the sweetest,
holiest and best thing in her life. And now at last with eyes open and
clear, she could see that her gold had been tinsel after all, her
flowers so fresh and glorious and beautiful had been but poor
counterfeits of paper or coloured rag, the hero so noble, so brave, so
unselfish and splendid, whose image she had enshrined in her heart was
after all but a very ordinary man, very weak and selfish and lacking all
those fine qualities with which in her heart she had endowed her
childhood's knight.
And now the guests were gone, all but Harold Scarsdale--and how she
wished that he too had gone with the others--She and Allan were alone
and the time had come to tell him that wonderful news!
And because the time had come, there came to Kathleen a thousand fears.
There came too a strange sense of modesty, a shrinking that would not be
there if only he loved her. If only he loved her--would he be glad,
glad and proud, or would he be sorry and disappointed, worst of all
perhaps he would be indifferent! And that would be the hardest, the
cruelest thing of all to bear.
Yet she must tell him.
To-night, yes to-night, and yet when to-night came she--coward-like--put
it off.
"To-morrow," she said, "I will tell him in the sunshine in the garden,
so that I may watch his face and know--know without spoken words what
his thoughts and feelings are----"
So to-night she lay sleepless beside him, torturing herself with those
fears that come to a woman who loves, torturing herself till at last her
nerves were all unstrung and she could lie here no longer. So she rose
softly, not to waken him, and went to the window and stared out into the
glory of the brilliant night.
Somewhere far away was her father, probably playing cards in his Club or
billiards. How idle were those fine sentimental touching speeches of
his, how little she believed in them! She drew her thoughts away from
her father, they followed old Sir Josiah instead.
How fine and good and noble he was, how sincere and honest! And what he
was, she knew that Allan was too, generous and honourable, kind of
heart, true--true as steel! What wonder then that she should love him,
that her love for him should awaken--
Her thoughts were interrupted, from the dark shadows in the garden below
there came in the stillness of the night a little moaning, sobbing cry.
Kathleen was startled.
She was a woman and therefore not without superstition, what good,
honest, tender woman has not some trace of superstition in her mind?
Just for a moment Kathleen held her breath and listened intently. Again
she heard the sound and at the same time a light footfall and then,
watching, she saw a little figure come creeping from out the shadows
into the white path of the moon.
Betty--she knew the child in an instant--Betty out at this hour, Betty
in some sore trouble, crying to herself! She had a mind to call softly
to the girl, yet did not, for fear of waking him. So she sat for a
moment or so and watched the girl go slowly down the paved pathway and
then Kathleen made up her mind. She rose, she thrust her white feet
into slippers, she threw a dressing gown on and went creeping down the
silent stairs.
Softly she drew back a bolt and turned a key and opened a door that gave
on to the garden.
The radiant light of the moon flooded the place, all save under the tall
yews, where the shadows lay blackly. But of the girl she could see
nothing, yet had noted the way she had gone.
Like a ghost herself, a very lovely spirit all in white, her little
woollen slippers making never a sound on the old flagged pavement, she
sped on her way.
The moaning sobbing cry had awakened every sympathy in her heart, she
was filled with womanly tenderness and pity. "Poor child, poor pretty
child!" she thought and so hurried on, looking eagerly for the little
lonely figure. Then presently Kathleen paused, she stood still, she had
meant to call softly to Betty, yet did not, for she heard the moaning
and crying near at hand now.
"Afraid--oh afraid--terribul, terribul afraid I be!" the broken voice
whispered. "But I must. Oh, I must, I hev made up my mind to it and I
must!"
Half a dozen noiseless steps and Kathleen saw her. The girl stood on
the brink of the pool, her hands clasped over her breast.
"Afraid, oh terribul, terribul afraid I be!" she whispered and repeated
the words again and again. Then she thrust out one bare foot and
touched the inky water with it and drew back with a low cry of fear.
"But I must, I must, 'tis all there be left for I to du now! I must, for
he does not want me and I can't, oh I can't du what he wishes me, so I
must!--I--I be coming to 'ee my little stone maid, perhaps 'ee always
knowed as I would come to 'ee one day--I be coming now, I be coming now!
It seems as 'ee always meant something to me, little stone maid standing
there, seems to me now as 'ee always called to me to come and I be
coming now--now----" She stretched out her hands and suddenly uttered a
stifled shriek for she felt strong tender arms about her, felt herself
dragged back from the water's edge and then all in a moment she was
sobbing out her breaking heart on Kathleen's breast.
For many minutes Kathleen let the girl weep on unrestrainedly, for she
knew it for the better way. Let her shed her tears, since she could,
and when they were passed the little troubled heart would be all the
easier for them.
So with Kathleen's arms about her, Betty wept softly, clinging to the
other woman as to one to whom she looked for love and help and
protection and did not look in vain.
And then, little by little, Kathleen drew her away from the pool, drew
her presently to the stone bench beside the sundial and made her sit
beside her.
"Why Betty, why were you going to do that--that wicked thing?" Kathleen
whispered. "No, child, keep your face against my breast, tell me while
I hold you! You are safe with me, little Betty, you know that, child,
don't you?"
"Oh safe--safe wi' 'ee, safe wi' 'ee!" the girl moaned.
"Why did you wish to do that?"
"There were nothing left for I to du. Oh I didn't want to, for I were
afraid, most terribul afraid--I were, but--but it seemed I must, 'twas
as if the little stone maid were calling to I, just--just as she used to
call to I of moonlight nights when I were in my grandmother's cottage,
but--but 'twas different then--then I had not seen him, only--only in my
dreams!"
"Seen him?" Kathleen asked softly.
"Allan!" the girl said simply and for the moment seemed to forget that
it was Allan's wife who held her in her arms.
"Allan?"
"I did see him here, here in the old garden, long, long before he came
here to live, many times I saw him digging at they flower beds, him all
in brown wi' queer brass buckles to his shoes, and his hat all dragged
down over his face, strange that I scarce did ever see his face, and
yet--yet I knew him and when I came to him here in the garden while he
sat on this very bench I knew--oh my lady, what be I saying, what be I
saying?"
But Kathleen did not answer. It had come to her with a sudden shock, a
feeling of desolation, of hopelessness. Allan, her husband, and this
little maid, this Betty and the old garden! She remembered the dream of
which he had told her, that night in a London theatre. It was but a
dream then, a picture out of the past and nothing more and since then it
had become reality and yet he had not told her as he had promised!
"And I du love him so--so cruel!" the girl sobbed.
Never once while she listened to this confession did Kathleen's arms
relax their hold on the sobbing girl, yet Kathleen's heart was being
tortured and wounded by every word.
Allan, her husband, whom she had regarded as the soul of honour--could
it be--Allan into whose ears she had intended to pour this wonderful
secret, this secret of a little life yet to be, which belonged to him
and to her!
"Oh my lady, I be so terribul unhappy!" Betty whimpered, "So terribul
unhappy for I did think he loved me as I loved him!"
"And--did he not--love you?" Kathleen whispered and wondered at her own
voice, for it trembled so strangely, it was so filled with eagerness,
with fear and yet with hope.
"He was mine--mine!" the girl said passionately. "For 'twas he I saw
here in this old garden many, many times--and I knew him, my lady, and
yet--yet when I would have felt his kisses on my lips, he held away from
me--and oh I be all broken hearted, I be, and now he be set against me
and wishful of my going away for ever, but I can't, I can't, I would
sooner die! And that night here--here my lady, in the garden, he was
all stern and angry wi' I! He told me that I must go, that it would be
for my good and that I should be happy and--and he told me my lady as he
was afraid of I, afraid--they were his very words!"
"Thank God he was afraid!" Kathleen thought. "Thank God for his fears,
for they did him honour. Oh I was wrong, he is all I thought him, all I
believed him, even better, stronger, braver, thank God!"
"And he told me," Betty went on in her low sobbing voice, "that I were
to come to him here in the garden in three nights, 'twere Monday then
and to-morrow night I be to see him here and tell him what I will
do--if--if I will go far, far away and be wise and sensible--but I
can't--I can't 'twould break my heart!"
"It will not dear," Kathleen said. "It will not, Betty!" Her arm
tightened about the girl, she was such a child, did not her very
confession prove it? "It seems very hard to bear now Betty, but you
must be brave and good and sensible, it will be far, far better that you
do not see Allan, my husband, again, for it is not for your happiness to
see him. I do not understand, Betty, nor do I think that even you and
he understand, it is all so strange--so--so unusual! But I shall send
you away----" she paused. It was so easy to say "I will send you away,"
yet where could she send the child? For a moment she pondered and then
it came to her like a flash of inspiration.
"You shall go away Betty quietly and no one need know of your going and
to-morrow I will tell him that you are gone and that you and he will not
meet again. You will be happy, very happy with those to whom I shall
send you. Will you trust me, Betty?"
"Trust 'ee----." The girl caught her hand and kissed it passionately.
"And--and bain't I to see him again, never?"
"It will be better not, Betty!"
Betty leaned against her sobbing--"I du love him----" she sobbed, "and
it will be terribul to go and never see him again!"
"Had you thrown yourself into the water to-night you would never have
seen him again and you would have caused him grief and sorrow, Betty,
so--so dear it is better you should go quietly, and live and be happy,
for you will be happy, child and you will forget! You are only a child,
Betty, and--and I--I know what a child's love means, it is seldom the
real love--it will pass, for such love does pass, I know, Betty! And
then--then one day the real love, the love of all your life will come to
you and you will look back on these memories and smile at them and when
that day comes, Betty----" Kathleen's voice shook a little, "then--then,
child, go down on your knees and thank God that you gave your child's
love to a good and noble man, a man who respected it--and you--and--and
was afraid--dear!"
And Betty, if she did not understand, was comforted by the kind voice
and nestled closer to Kathleen. She dried her tears and presently had
forgotten them and was smiling, and the little tragedy was past.
*CHAPTER XXXIV*
*THE GOING OF BETTY*
"I want, dear Sir Josiah, to feel that the child is happy and well cared
for, her life here has not been a very happy one, her grandmother was
trying to force her into marriage with a man she hated, a man I myself
feel instinctive mistrust of. I send her to you because I know of no
one so kind, so good, so generous. I know that you will do all you can
for her. I do not wish her, and I do not think she herself wishes ever
to come back to Homewood again. She will be happier away from the place
and so, dear kind friend, to whom I seem to turn instinctively in any
moment of doubt and anxiety, I leave her in your hands, knowing that all
you may do for her will be right and for the child's own good."
Kathleen had written the letter to Sir Josiah, she herself had helped to
pack Betty's little box, she had taken the dependable and
uncommunicative Howard into her confidence.
"Your ladyship desires me to see the young woman and her box safe to Sir
Josiah's London house?"
"That is what I wish, Howard, and I wish her going to be kept secret, I
don't want others to know, it may be difficult, but----"
"It can quite easily be arranged, my lady, no difficulty at all. I'll
have the closed cab from the village and if your ladyship will be so
good as to inform the young person she is to walk quietly out of the
house and to take the Bursdon Road, I will direct the driver to take
that way, my lady, and pick her up and take her on to Bursdon station
and catch the three thirty-five for London. It will be right if the
young person was to start at say half past two. As for her box, my
lady, I'll manage it, so that no one sees it--anything else, my lady?"
"Nothing, Howard, and I thank you very much, you are very, very
helpful," Kathleen said.
Just before the half hour after two, Betty sobbing as though her heart
was breaking, was in Kathleen's room.
"Oh my lady, it be cruel hard to have to go and leave it all, when I du
love it so and----" she paused and sobbed aloud with many a catch of the
breath, as a child does.
Yet Kathleen felt as she kissed and comforted the girl that tears so
easily shed might be just as easily dried, and to prove that she was
right, in a little while Betty began to dry her eyes and shew interest
in her destination.
"To think that I be actually going to London, my lady, a terribul long
way it be and I always wishful of seeing it, though I never--never----"
and then a fresh torrent of tears and sighs and cries, tears which
Kathleen wiped away.
"You will be very happy, Betty, and life will be full of interest for
you. London is a wonderful place, you cannot think how marvellous the
shops are. Streets and streets of them, Betty--and the people and the
cars and carriages----"
Betty listened, wide eyed, forgetting her grief again.
"And there be theayters, my lady."
"Many of them and you shall go and see them, Betty."
The girl was actually smiling now and then suddenly, remembering her
sorrow, she began to cry again. But Kathleen felt no fears. The girl
was genuine and sincere enough, transparently honest, but she was not of
those who die of broken hearts.
"Now you will be a good brave girl, you know dear that you must go
because it will be kinder to--to him--to me and to yourself. You are
going to someone whom I love very much and who will be kind to you, not
only because I have asked him to be and for your own sake too, but
because he is kindness itself. You know, Betty, that you must go, don't
you? You know, child, that it is not possible that you could stay on
here, and--and Betty, you are going somewhere where you will never see
Abram Lestwick, you will be safe from him."
Betty nodded, she even smiled. "Terribul put about and angry will Abram
be when he finds I be gone and grandmother, her too."
There was mischief and even enjoyment in her smile and Kathleen's heart
felt eased and at peace. She wanted to play no hard and cruel part in
this little drama, she did not want the girl to go broken hearted and
unhappy.
"And now--now Betty, it is time," she said, "time, dear, for you to go,
you--you quite understand?"
"Oh--oh my lady!" And once more Betty was all tears, the tears rained
down her face and suddenly she rushed to Kathleen who held out her arms
to her.
"Good-bye, my dear, good-bye and God bless you and bring you to
happiness." Kathleen strained her in her arms, held her tightly for a
moment and then let her go and her own eyes were not dry.
Presently Betty, in her neat little black gown, opened the arched green
gate for the last time, and of habit peered up and down the road, half
fearfully, lest someone might be there waiting for her. But there was
no sign of Abram Lestwick. In the distance she could see the blue smoke
curling from the chimney of her grandmother's cottage and at the sight
the tears were gone and the pretty face grew a trifle hard, even a
little bitter.
"And now we shall see if I be going to marry Abram Lestwick,
grandmother," she thought, "terribul obstinate I be, yes and contrairy
and a perilous bad maid, but Abram will hev to look for someone
else--'Lizbeth Colley, who due bake such wonderful fine currant
biscuits."
She laughed softly a little laugh of triumph, mingled with grief and
then--then she stepped out into the white roadway and pulled the gate
after her. She looked along the high wall of old red brick, over which
she had clambered--bad, perilous bad maid that she was--many a time.
The wall was topped now with glittering glass and seeing it the tears
all came back with a rush and sobs broke from the labouring, childish
breast.
"Broken hearted I be----" she wailed, "broken hearted and wishful of
dying--oh--oh never never to see him again, never!" She looked back
along the road and could see her grandmother's cottage. She pictured to
herself her grandmother, that stern, unbending woman, sitting in her
stiff, high backed chair--waiting--waiting for her, waiting to have her
will with her.
And the thought of the old woman sitting there waiting and waiting all
in vain banished the tears from the bright eyes.
"She said that I was bad and that I must go and--and so I be going for
good--going to London. Powerful 'quisitive I be to see what London
looks like, bigger than Stretton it be, wi' streets of shops and
theayters and oh!" Her eyes shone, the grief was forgotten, she was
hurrying on her way down the road now. The red wall had ceased to be
and it seemed as though the enchantment of the old garden that it
protected was lifted, for the girl was smiling and her eyes were bright
with anticipation as she hastened on her way, and never once did she
look behind her now.
"A child's love!" Kathleen thought, "a child's love, very real, very
wonderful, with such power to bring grief or joy and yet after all only
a child's love--mine lasted for ten long years and--and then it
passed--Little Betty's, how long will hers last? Ten days, ten hours
perhaps--not longer--poor, pretty, shallow little Betty, yet so
lovable--and he, my darling, my Allan was afraid--afraid of her for a
time--yes thank God afraid--and told her so nobly and bravely." She
smiled at her thoughts and Scarsdale, looking at her, wondered what made
her smile.
"What are you thinking of Kathleen?" he said.
"Of my husband," she said gently.
Scarsdale turned away, he looked out into the garden. Should he stay,
was there still room for hope? Was she acting a part as he believed and
hoped, or did it mean that she had ceased to care, that what she had
told him there beside the pool was true, that her love for him had died?
Yet it might not be dead, only slumbering for a while, when she found,
as she would find, that Homewood was untrue to her, that of nights he
was meeting a girl, a servant maid in the garden, that he loved that
girl, what then? Would she not come back to him, eager for his love and
sympathy and protection? He hoped so and believed so.
"I will wait a while yet," he thought.
They missed the guests of the past few days, these three, as they sat
down to dinner in the dining room. They missed Sir Josiah, they missed
noisy genial Mr. Coombe, even they missed his lordship, for on these
three a silence had fallen and each was busy with his own thoughts.
To-night Betty would tell him, thought Allan, she would tell him that
she had decided to be, as he had said, sensible and wise.
"To-night," Kathleen thought, "to-night she would tell him all."
And Scarsdale's thoughts were the same. Would she come to him if she
might come in honour, if the dishonour fell on other shoulders? He
believed it and hoped it and would hope it till the last.
Kathleen watched Allan that evening, watched him and saw the worried
anxious look on his face. She knew that he was planning to meet Betty,
yet surely never a lover went to meet his love with such a look on his
face as Allan's wore this night? No, he did not love her, he was
anxious and troubled about her, about the girl herself and her future
and presently he should know that all was well, that Betty was gone and
would be happy and cared for.
So when the darkness had fallen completely, she rose and went up to her
own room and changed from the light dinner dress she had been wearing
into a plain dark frock.
"Will he be glad and proud, or will he be sorry?" she asked herself.
Glad and proud--please God he would be glad and proud! And if it
brought gladness and pride to him, what then? might it not bring love
also, the love she hungered for, the love her heart craved?
The moon was late rising to-night. There was no light save the dim
faint light of the stars. Somewhere among the tall trees an owl was
making its plaintive cry. Kathleen shivered a little at the sound, it
seemed almost like an ill omen. She knew where he would be waiting and
then presently in the deep dark shadows under the high old yew hedge she
found him.
He heard the light footfall, he heard the rustle of her dress and made
no doubt that it was Betty, for who else would come to him here in this
place?
"Betty!" he said.
She did not answer him, she stood still, then hesitatingly came forward
towards him. But he offered her no greeting, he did not hold out his
hands to her. He seemed even to turn away from her.
"Listen," he said, and did not even look towards her. "I have given you
time to think, to realise that what I hope to arrange for you is
all--all for your good. What I said to you that night was true--Betty
we do not and we should not know what the past held for us, that we do
know, something of it has only brought us unhappiness and heartache. But
the past is past, Betty, it belonged to another life, another generation
and we who stand here to-night have to deal only with the present and
even more with the future."
Kathleen stood listening, her hands pressed against her breast. Was she
wrong to listen to him, knowing that his words were meant for other
ears? If he but turned to her now he might see, dim though the light,
that it was not the little country girl that he was talking to.
Yet he did not look at her once, but rather at the ground, or away into
the blue black distance.
"You have told me that you loved me, you have asked me for my love,
forgetting or not knowing, dear, that I could not give you that love
with honour. Could I feel such love for you it would but dishonour you,
dishonour myself--and--and her, Betty, her." His voice shook for a
moment.
"Once you came to me in a strange vision, a vision out of the long
buried past. I was heartwhole then--and it seemed to me that some tie,
some link forged in another life, another existence held us together,
that vision was very wonderful and very sweet to me, it lived in my
memory for many and many a long day and then--then it faded, Betty, it
faded--and the link that was forged in the past was snapped and broken."
He was silent for a moment and then went on in a lower voice.
"It ended because something came into my life to end it, a greater love,
something that was not born of visions and fancies and fancied memories.
That love, Betty, is the most wonderful, the most beautiful thing that
has ever come to me. It meant my salvation, dear, and yours, it meant
protection for you and for me. For loving her, loving her----" his
voice rose, "loving my own wife with all my soul----."
"Allan, my Allan!"
He turned to her with a choking cry, he peered into her face through the
darkness, and then he took her hands and held them, drawing her closer
to him till he had clasped her hands against his breast, and all the
time he looked into the face that was uplifted to his.
"Kathleen!"
"Who needs you, even as you--you love her, Allan, who has come to tell
you, dear, that she knows all and honours you and respects you and loves
you with all her heart and soul and is--is proud of you--proud! I sent
her away, dear, not in anger, but in love. Poor child, I sent her away
all tears that--that I think will soon be dried and to-night I came here
to tell you this--to tell you this and--and----" She drew even closer to
him and he put his arms about her and held her tightly, "to tell you, my
husband----" and her voice was so soft, so low that he could hear, yet
only just hear--"to tell you that God is sending into our lives
something to make us happier and perhaps better, something that will
belong to us both, something for us to share and to love alike,
something that will draw us nearer, closer together and hold us together
all our lives. Allan, my husband, why don't you speak to me? Allan,
are you glad or sorry, dear? Oh Allan!"
For suddenly, even while he still held her in his arms, he slipped down
on his knees before her and tried to tell her of the pride, the joy and
the gladness that he felt and yet could tell her nothing, save that he
loved her.
Beautiful and wonderful, wonderful above all women, more angel than
woman to him, now as always.
"You are giving so much, so much, my Kathleen, but you cannot give me
all your heart, for I know that in the past there was someone----."
"Someone who came back," she said, "who came back, Allan, and when I saw
him and listened to him again, I knew, oh I knew that, my love was never
love at all--I think it was less love than a religion with me. Allan,
don't you understand? He is nothing to me--no more than any other
stranger, any guest who might sleep beneath our roof, for the love, the
great love of my life I give, my husband, to you--now and always!"
And then the pent up love and longing, the hunger of the time of waiting
found expression. She stooped to him, she put her arms about him, she
drew his head to her breast and held him closely, a radiant joy in her
heart, knowing him to be what he was, worthy, well worthy of all her
love, knowing him to be simple and brave, strong and tender, and even
though brave, still afraid, afraid of temptation and his man's weakness.
So she held him and blessed him and her heart was filled with a great
love and gratitude.
Faint though the starlight was, yet the watcher away among the shadows
could see them indistinctly and seeing them fell naturally into error.
For how should he dream that it was husband and wife he spied on? He
watched them presently move slowly away, the man with his arm about the
woman, she with her head against his shoulder, and the man waiting in
the darkness smiled, wondering how long would this last, how long before
Kathleen knew?
He watched them till they were gone, swallowed up in the soft darkness,
and then he moved, he turned slowly towards the house. The vigil was
over, but he frowned in thought. How should Kathleen know, how could she
be made aware of this? And then--he heard a sound, the soft pad of a
foot behind him and had no time to turn for even as he would have swung
round, something leaped upon him and clung to him. A hand gifted with a
curious strength sought for and found his throat, and finding it gripped
and gripped.
He fought, struggling madly, he tried to tear away that terrible hold,
yet it was like trying to unbend bars of steel. He fought at those
gripping, clinging fingers till his brain grew dazed, till the dark
night swam about him. He could feel on his neck the hot quick breathing
of his enemy.
A hoarse scream, a shriek that ended in a choking, gasping sob broke
from the strangling throat, a scream of agony and of terror. For he,
brave man though he was, felt a mad, horrible fear of the silent, the
unseen thing that was seeking to rob him of his life.
Kathleen threw up her head. "Allan, Allan darling, did you hear? Hush,
listen, what was that?"
"Only a screech owl beloved, and oh my Kathleen, to hear you call
me----" he paused and was silent, for there came a repetition of the
sound, but this time fainter, the strangling cry of a man in agony,
hoarse despairing, spent and gasping, ending in sudden silence, followed
by the sound of a fall.
"Kathleen go, run to the house, there is something wrong--send help!"
And then he turned and dashed into the darkness, in the direction whence
came the sound. Scarsdale was down, he lay face downward on the stone
paving and with his last strength, his last effort was seeking to unlock
those fingers from his throat, but his movements were weakening, the man
was done, as near to death as a man can be and yet still live, and on
his back there crouched a figure, the figure of a small mean man, whose
wondrous strength was all contained in those hooked fingers that were
choking the life out of the jerking, labouring body.
"Pleasant spoken 'ee be--aye wonderful pleasant spoken 'ee du be!" The
creature was chuckling, was laughing, his eyes seemed to burn with
strange fires.
"Wonderful pleasant spoken 'ee be--but never again, never again will 'ee
cheat a man of his maid, never again! Stole her from me, lied her away
from me!--Oh wonderful pleasant spoken 'ee be----"
It was death that was come on him now, and he knew it, the death he had
defied--for so long--in savage places. Strange that it should come to
him here at last in this peaceful old garden. Death--the world was
swimming about him--he seemed to see Kathleen's face, the fighting hands
were grown powerless and never for a moment did that grip on his throat
relax.
"Oh wonderful, powerful pleasant spoken 'ee be----" chuckled the voice.
And then the man was torn from his victim, dragged from him and flung
violently to the stone pavement. Kathleen had run screaming to the
house, the servants were alarmed, Howard, prompt and efficient, came
hurrying with lighted lamp; others followed, Kathleen with them.
"It's Scarsdale--been attacked--he's fainted--lift him, some of you,
carry him in--stop that man, stop him!"
For Abram Lestwick had risen, he stood there for a moment, then turned
to fly, but suddenly stood still, as the lamp-light stone for a moment
on Allan's face. Lestwick peered at him. His hands rose to his own
throat, fumbled with it, tore at his collar till they tore it loose.
"Bless I if it bain't Abram Lestwick!" said a voice, the voice belonged
to old Markabee, "Abram Lestwick it du be!"
"Aye, it be me!" Lestwick said, he spoke dully, still fumbling at his
throat, his eyes wandered from the figure of the man they were lifting,
to Allan's face clear in the lamp-light, eyes from which all the fire
and passion had died out.
He had made a mistake, his slow brain was grasping the fact--a
mistake--why should he have made a mistake? Surely it had been the right
man, had he not climbed the wall and waited and seen a man with a woman
and that woman Betty--who else could it have been? And then--then--
"A terribul strong intentioned man I be!" Abram muttered. "Terribul
passionate and quick----" His eyes roved round restlessly, he still
worked at his frayed and torn collar. "I must be going, time be getting
on, very late it be growing, I've stayed too long!" He would have
turned, but old Markabee faced him resolutely.
"Stir from here, 'ee don't, Abram Lestwick, after what 'ee hev done!"
One sweep of his arm would have felled Markabee and left the way clear
for him to depart, yet Abram Lestwick never thought of that--he stood
still, silent, submissive.
His dull brain refused to answer the question that he would have put to
it. A mistake--how had he come to make a mistake--another man--what
other man could it be? Had he not seen his enemy standing erect,
unhurt, the lamplight on his face?
"It be past, all past my understanding----" Abram Lestwick muttered.
"All misty and dizzy it du seem to I--all misty and dizzy!"
They had carried the victim into the house, now they came back for
Lestwick, they took him and bound his hands behind his back, those
terrible, those death dealing hands, and he submitted without a word,
without a struggle.
Sullenly and with bent head, he shambled along between his captors.
They took him into the house, into the light, he stood with bent head,
then slowly lifted it, his restless eyes roamed the room, they fell on
Kathleen's white face for a moment, then strayed away again.
The man was muttering to himself, they bent near to listen, yet could
make but little of it.
"Wonderful pleasant spoken he be----" he said, and said it again and yet
again, a score of times.
Old Markabee, tremulous, but staunch, gripping a Dutch hoe, stood on
guard. "I du remember," he said, "aye I du remember his mother, my
Lady, and it be the same wi' Abram as it were wi' she--strange she were
always, terribul strange and they du say aye I have heard it said as her
did die in the madhouse!"
Kathleen drew back, but the horror died out of her face and in its place
there came pity, a great pity for this stricken wretch, the dull eyes
rested for a moment on her face, then sank to the ground, his fingers
were picking at the rope that bound his wrists together, but not with
any intention of picking himself free, just for the sake of picking and
fraying and tearing the cords, that was all.
*CHAPTER XXXV*
*"I SHALL RETURN"*
"Kathleen--Kathleen----"
"Yes, Harold, here beside you." She touched his cheek with her fingers.
"You are easier now, better?"
"With you beside me, yes." He lifted his hand slowly to the bandaged
throat.
"It was--Homewood--Allan Homewood who--saved--who dragged that man off
me?"
"Yes, it was Allan, we heard your cry for help, he and I, we were
together in the garden and----"
"You--you and he--you and he in the garden?"
"We had been talking in the yew walk, we were returning to the house and
then we heard----"
He said nothing, his face twisted a little, as with pain, then it
passed.
"The man, Abram Lestwick was mad, quite mad, Harold. He made no effort
to get away, he was docile and quiet, dazed and stupid. They took him
before the magistrates the next day, but the doctors certified at once,
he will not have his liberty again, poor creature, they say he is a
homicidal maniac. Yet why--why should he have come creeping into the
garden that night, why should he have attacked you, Harold, you a
stranger to him?"
But it seemed that he was not listening, as though what she said had no
interest for him. He lay looking at her, thinking--It was she--she in
the garden with Homewood that night, she walking with Homewood, his arm
about her.
He saw it all again, in memory, as he had seen it that night in reality,
the man and the woman walking as lovers walk, the man's arm about the
woman, her head against his shoulder--and it was Homewood and Kathleen,
the husband and the wife--and he had thought--
"The doctor tells me that I shall mend soon, that I shall soon be my own
man again, Kathleen, and then," he smiled, "then I shall go back."
"Need you?"
He did not answer the question. "You know why I came, what hopes I had.
It was folly and the hopes are over and ended and dead--so I shall go
back alone as I came. There is nothing to remain for--nothing." His
hand sought hers and she put hers into it. He held it for a time and
then let it go.
"So I shall go back," he said again, and said it quietly and with a
fixity of purpose that she knew would never be changed.
Her eyes, filled with pity, looked down on him. Yet she knew, better
that he went back, better that in the years to come they should never
meet again.
Her heart ached for him, but not for herself. And then the door opened
and Allan came softly to the bedside and looked down at the invalid and
standing beside Kathleen his arm went round her and he never knew what
suffering it meant to the man lying there.
"Kathleen has told you about Lestwick, Scarsdale? The poor wretch is
hopelessly insane. There was no reason for his act, there could be
none. It has all been horrible, you can imagine what our feelings have
been that you, our guest, our friend----" very kind was Allan's smile as
he looked down on the man who would have been his enemy, "should have to
bear this. But thank God it is no worse than it is. You will be a well
man again soon, Scarsdale, and then you will stay on and rest here,
Kathleen will be your nurse----"
"You are good, but I shall leave you as soon as I may, for I am going
back to the place I came from, Homewood, going back soon."
"Going back? I remember that you told me once you hoped----"
Scarsdale smiled faintly. "I hoped--but that is over, I had hope, but
not now. There is nothing to hold me to England. I am a stranger in a
strange land, I shall be better out there among the people who know me."
"Are you sure--sure that there is no hope for you, Scarsdale?"
Again Scarsdale smiled. "There never was," he said. "Yet I did not
realise it, would not understand it--but there was never any hope for
me, so--so I shall go, thanking my good friends for their care of me,
thanking them and blessing them----" As he spoke he looked up at
Kathleen and Allan watching saw the yearning, the hunger, the love that
the lips could not utter, and then suddenly he understood that this was
the man!
Yet, even understanding, he stooped and touched the other's hand.
"Remember, if you will stay, my wife and I will be glad--we would have
you stay as long as you can--Scarsdale."
They turned away, went out of the room together, and then when the door
had closed on them, he turned to her.
"Kathleen, I remember that night you told me that you had met the man
again--it was he."
"He came back," she said, "he came back and I knew it meant nothing to
me. It was a dream, as yours was dear, and it passed, as yours did, my
Allan and so--so----" she held up her arms and put them about his neck
and lifted her face to his.
"I meant to tell you--at first and then--then I forgot, yes forgot,
Allan--because of something of which I wanted to tell you far, far
more."
"I know," he said, he put his arms about her and held her closely.
"Something that has made me the happiest and proudest man in all the
world, beloved."
* * * * *
A winter and a spring had passed and the garden at Homewood was blooming
with a loveliness that it had not been able to attain last summer. Old
Markabee, bearing the weight of yet one more year on his round
shoulders, was snipping at the ivy covered wall.
"A pernicious thing be ivy, sir," he said, "a terribul pernicious thing,
eating away the very wall as du support it, tearing it away bit by bit,
ruining it, sir, it du--with them terribul little clinging fingers it
hev got, workin' and workin' till the old wall be crumbled quite and
ready to fall, a most terribul pernicious thing ivy be."
"Yes, yes to be sure, but hush my good man, not--not so loudly if you
please----"
Markabee turned contritely, "I bain't gone and woke he wi' my chatter?"
he asked.
"No, no, he is still sound asleep."
Sir Josiah rose from the stone bench, he peered under the holland awning
over the perambulator.
His reign was but short and presently nurse would come and demand of
him, her charge. It was a great favour that she did him, leaving him
here in charge of the slumbering infant, there was no one else nurse
would trust, but she knew that she might Sir Josiah.
"You may look at him, Markabee, if you like, did you ever see a
healthier looking child?"
Markabee poked his brown face under the awning, holding his breath the
while. Not till he was safely away did he trust himself with speech.
"A wunnerful child he be," he said. "And so powerful strong he du
look."
"Would you say, Markabee?" Sir Josiah enquired anxiously, "is the child
like his mother or his father?"
"A bit like both," said Markabee. "And wi' a look, aye now I du see it
quite plain, a look of his grandfather tu, he hev got."
"You don't say so!" said Sir Josiah. "You don't say so--well bless my
heart!" His round red face beamed and Markabee, cunning old sinner,
chuckled behind his hand.
"That ought to be good enough for half a suvereign for I," he thought.
And now came nurse to take possession of her charge.
"He hasn't awakened, Sir Josiah, has he?" she said.
"Bless you my dear, no, not moved, he hasn't," Sir Josiah said.
She smiled. "I always feel I can trust you with him at any rate, Sir
Josiah."
"A good woman that, a sensible woman, couldn't have found a better," Sir
Josiah said as nurse wheeled the baby carriage away. "And you were
saying just now, Markabee?"
"I were saying a terribul pernicious thing is this ivy working with its
little fingers on they old walls as du support it, tearing and tearing,
wonderful like the fingers of Abram Lestwick's, I du remember."
"Ah poor fellow!" said Sir Josiah.
"Mad!" said Markabee, "like his mother were afore him--mad--and mad in
love moreover."
"Indeed!"
"Wi' the prettiest maid in these parts, old Mother Hanson's
grand-darter, sir."
"Little Betty Hanson?" said Sir Josiah--"whom my daughter-in-law Lady
Kathleen sent to me months and months ago, and to think that poor mad
fellow loved her. But she's married now, Markabee, and married
well--married to a young fellow who works for me, a lad named Cope! I'm
paying him six pounds a week, Markabee, and he's worth it, a hard
working honest lad. I had tea with them in their little house and a
prettier little hostess you never saw. But if you'll believe me,
Markabee, an arrant little flirt, with those pretty eyes of hers----"
"Her mother were the same," said Markabee. "All wimmen more or less be
the same--specially when they du have fine eyes as Betty had."
"Why I don't know that you aren't right Markabee, and yet not all, not
all women Markabee, there is one----"
Sir Josiah looked up and saw the one of whom he spoke. She was coming
slowly towards them along the flagged pathway, her husband's arm about
her, her head against his shoulder and as they came slowly in the
sunshine, they halted now and again, for not yet, had all her strength
come back to her, though thank God, it was coming. She was still a
little pale, still a little languid in her movements. But in her eyes
there was a great and wonderful happiness and a deep tenderness and
unutterable love. Love for this man beside her, this man to whom she
clung, this man, who was friend, lover, husband all in one. Was ever
woman so blessed as she?
Sir Josiah stood watching them, knowing that these two had found a
happiness that was almost beyond his understanding.
And then he would have turned and gone quietly away, but Kathleen called
to him.
"Won't you come here and sit with us in the sunshine dear? Don't go,
don't go!"
He came back with a happy pleased look on his old face.
"I didn't think you and Allan would want the old man," he said, "I
thought you two--together----"
"We want you always, when you are here our little world is all
complete," she said softly. "I have those whom I love and those who
love me," she lifted her hand and held it against his cheek.
And so on the sunwarmed old stone bench they sat, and there was no sound
save the steady 'clip clip' of old Markabee's shears and the rustle of
the falling glossy green leaves from the ivied wall.
About them, was the sunshine and the glory of the flowers in bloom, the
little pool lay shimmering like molten gold, and from its midst rose the
slim white figure of the stone maiden, for ever holding the broken
pitcher on her sun kissed shoulder.