Julie went to the child's bed, put down her candle, and stooped to kiss
her.
The child's thin hand caressed her cheek.
"Ah, it will be good--to be in Bruges--with mademoiselle."
Julie drew herself away.
"I sha'n't be there to-morrow, dear."
"Not there! Oh, mademoiselle!"
The child's voice was pitiful.
"I shall join you there. But I find I must go to Paris first. I--I have
some business there."
"But maman said--"
"Yes, I have only just made up my mind. I shall tell maman to-morrow
morning,"
"You go alone, mademoiselle?"
"Why not, dear goose?"
"Vous êtes fatiguée. I would like to come with you, and carry your cloak
and the umbrellas."
"You, indeed!" said Julie. "It would end, wouldn't it, in my carrying
you--besides the cloak and the umbrellas?"
Then she knelt down beside the child and took her in her arms.
"Do you love me, Thérèse?"
The child drew a long breath. With her little, twisted hands she stroked
the beautiful hair so close to her.
"Do you, Thérèse?"
A kiss fell on Julie's cheek.
"Ce soir, j'ai beaucoup prié la Sainte Vierge pour vous!" she said, in a
timid and hurried whisper.
Julie made no immediate reply. She rose from her knees, her hand still
clasped in that of the crippled girl.
"Did you put those pictures on my mantel-piece, Thérèse?"
"Yes."
"Why?"
The child hesitated.
"It does one good to look at them--n'est-ce pas?--when one is sad?"
"Why do you suppose I am sad?"
Thérèse was silent a moment; then she flung her little skeleton arms
round Julie, and Julie felt her crying.
"Well, I won't be sad any more," said Julie, comforting her. "When we're
all in Bruges together, you'll see."
And smiling at the child, she tucked her into her white bed and left
her.
Then from this exquisite and innocent affection she passed back into the
tumult of her own thoughts and plans. Through the restless night her
parents were often in her mind. She was the child of revolt, and as she
thought of the meeting before her she seemed to be but entering upon a
heritage inevitable from the beginning. A sense of enfranchisement, of
passionate enlargement, upheld her, as of a life coming to its fruit.
* * * * *
"Creil!"
A flashing vision of a station and its lights, and the Paris train
rushed on through cold showers of sleet and driving wind, a return of
winter in the heart of spring.
On they sped through the half-hour which still divided them from the
Gare du Nord. Julie, in her thick veil, sat motionless in her corner.
She was not conscious of any particular agitation. Her mind was strained
not to forget any of Warkworth's directions. She was to drive across
immediately to the Gare de Sceaux, in the Place Denfert-Rochereau, where
he would meet her. They were to dine at an obscure inn near the station,
and go down by the last train to the little town in the wooded valley of
the Bièvre, where they were to stay.
She had her luggage with her in the carriage. There would be no
custom-house delays.
Ah, the lights of Paris beginning! She peered into the rain, conscious
of a sort of home-coming joy. She loved the French world and the French
sights and sounds--these tall, dingy houses of the _banlieue_, the dregs
of a great architecture; the advertisements; the look of the streets.
The train slackened into the Nord Station. The blue-frocked porters
crowded into the carriages.
"C'est tout, madame? Vous n'avez pas de grands bagages?"
"No, nothing. Find me a cab at once."
There was a great crowd outside. She hurried on as quickly as she could,
revolving what was to be said if any acquaintance were to accost her. By
great good luck, and by travelling second class both in the train and on
the boat, she had avoided meeting anybody she knew. But the Nord Station
was crowded with English people, and she pushed her way through in a
nervous terror.
"Miss Le Breton!"
She turned abruptly. In the white glare of the electric lights she did
not at first recognize the man who had spoken to her. Then she drew
back. Her heart beat wildly. For she had distinguished the face of Jacob
Delafield.
He came forward to meet her as she passed the barrier at the end of the
platform, his aspect full of what seemed to her an extraordinary
animation, significance, as though she were expected.
"Miss Le Breton! What an astonishing, what a fortunate meeting! I have a
message for you from Evelyn."
"From Evelyn?" She echoed the words mechanically as she shook hands.
"Wait a moment," he said, leading her aside towards the waiting-room,
while the crowd that was going to the _douane_ passed them by. Then he
turned to Julie's porter.
"Attendez un instant."
The man sulkily shook his head, dropped Julie's bag at their feet, and
hurried off in search of a more lucrative job.
"I am going back to-night," added Delafield, hurriedly. "How strange
that I should have met you, for I have very sad news for you! Lord
Lackington had an attack this morning, from which he cannot recover. The
doctors give him perhaps forty-eight hours. He has asked for
you--urgently. The Duchess tells me so in a long telegram I had from her
to-day. But she supposed you to be in Bruges. She has wired there. You
will go back, will you not?"
"Go back?" said Julie, staring at him helplessly. "Go back to-night?"
"The evening train starts in little more than an hour. You would be just
in time, I think, to see the old man alive."
She still looked at him in bewilderment, at the blue eyes under the
heavily moulded brows, and the mouth with its imperative, and yet
eager--or tremulous?--expression. She perceived that he hung upon
her answer.
She drew her hand piteously across her eyes as though to shut out the
crowds, the station, and the urgency of this personality beside her.
Despair was in her heart. How to consent? How to refuse?
"But my friends," she stammered--"the friends with whom I was going to
stay--they will be alarmed."
"Could you not telegraph to them? They would understand, surely. The
office is close by."
She let herself be hurried along, not knowing what to do. Delafield
walked beside her. If she had been able to observe him, she must have
been struck afresh by the pale intensity, the controlled agitation
of his face.
"Is it really so serious?" she asked, pausing a moment, as though in
resistance.
"It is the end. Of that there can be no question. You have touched his
heart very deeply. He longs to see her, Evelyn says. And his daughter
and granddaughter are still abroad--Miss Moffatt, indeed, is ill at
Florence with a touch of diphtheria. He is alone with his two sons.
You will go?"
Even in her confusion, the strangeness of it all was borne in upon
her--his insistence, the extraordinary chance of their meeting, his
grave, commanding manner.
"How could you know I was here?" she said, in bewilderment.
"I didn't know," he said, slowly. "But, thank God, I have met you. I
dread to think of your fatigue, but you will be glad just to see him
again--just to give him his last wish--won't you?" he said, pleadingly.
"Here is the telegraph-office. Shall I do it for you?"
"No, thank you. I--I must think how to word it. Please wait."
She went in alone. As she took the pencil into her hands a low groan
burst from her lips. The man writing in the next compartment turned
round in astonishment. She controlled herself and began to write. There
was no escape. She must submit; and all was over.
She telegraphed to Warkworth, care of the Chef de Gare, at the Sceaux
Station, and also to the country inn.
"Have met Mr. Delafield by chance at Nord Station. Lord Lackington
dying. Must return to-night. Where shall I write? Good-bye."
When it was done she could hardly totter out of the office. Delafield
made her take his arm.
"You must have some food. Then I will go and get a sleeping-car for you
to Calais. There will be no crowd to-night. At Calais I will look after
you if you will allow me."
"You are crossing to-night?" she said, vaguely. Her lips framed the
words with difficulty.
"Yes. I came over with my cousins yesterday."
She asked nothing more. It did not occur to her to notice that he had no
luggage, no bag, no rug, none of the paraphernalia of travel. In her
despairing fatigue and misery she let him guide her as he would.
He made her take some soup, then some coffee, all that she could make
herself swallow. There was a dismal period of waiting, during which she
was hardly conscious of where she was or of what was going on round her.
Then she found herself in the sleeping-car, in a reserved compartment,
alone. Once more the train moved through the night. The miles flew
by--the miles that forever parted her from Warkworth.