Mr. Wycherly was both disappointed and bewildered.
Something must have happened to Jane-Anne. Could she be ill? This tall,
angular person in spectacles, with what he secretly stigmatized as a
"bombazine manner," must be some elderly lady imported at the last
moment to play the part. That she played it uncommonly well did not
concern Mr. Wycherly; he was anxious about Jane-Anne.
What could have happened to the child?
The play was quite amusing. The lady with the bombazine manner raised a
laugh whenever she opened her lips, but Mr. Wycherly couldn't feel
interested. He was worried.
It must be some sudden and prostrating headache that had prevented her
appearance. Yet when did he ever remember Jane-Anne to have a headache
when theatricals were to the fore?
The little play soon came to an end amidst enthusiastic applause. Mr.
Wycherly thought it rather unfeeling of Curly to clap so vigorously. He
didn't seem a bit anxious about Jane-Anne.
The plaudits were so prolonged that the curtain was raised again and the
two ladies took their call. She of the spectacles and wispy grey hair
dragged into a tight knob at the back, bowed stiffly and ungraciously as
befitted her character, but just as she reached the wings she snatched
off her spectacles with one hand and with the other deliberately blew a
kiss to Mr. Wycherly.
There was no mistaking it. The kiss was for him and for no one else,
and the eyes hitherto discreetly hidden behind the spectacles were
exceeding dark and young and merry.
Then it was that Mr. Wycherly realised that she had not failed at the
last moment, this extraordinary Jane-Anne of his. She was the lady of
the bombazine manner.
When they reached the street he murmured to Curly in almost awe-struck
tones, "And I never recognised her at all till the curtain went up the
second time."
"So I saw," said Curly.
"She looked so old, so severe, so hard somehow and unlovely."
"For the time being, she was Mrs. Tallet, you see," Curly explained.
"It wasn't her appearance only, her whole atmosphere seemed so grasping
and grim."
"That," Curly remarked sententiously, "is acting."
* * * * *
It was gala day at the dancing-class, and Mr. Wycherly sat on the raised
dais reserved for parents and onlookers. He had come to watch Jane-Anne
as a pupil for the last time.
There were many "fancy dances" performed by fresh-faced girls who
manipulated their accordion-pleated skirts with a certain pretty pride
in their achievement--all but Jane-Anne.
She, slender and dark, with little oval face and shadowy heavy hair,
drawn back from her forehead, with the upward sweep of Botticelli's
angels--she danced!
She wore a plain little frock of black chiffon, caught in round her
slender waist by a narrow black cord.
Mrs. Methuen had chosen the dress, and it was full of distinction in its
dainty severity; such a plain little dress among its rainbow-hued,
fresh-millinered companions.
And how she danced!
Floating to and fro on the waves of sound like an autumn leaf blown by
the wind.
Suddenly, by one of those flashes of telepathy that on occasion lighten
across the path of all of us, Mr. Wycherly became acutely conscious that
his was not the only soul stirred by this perfect dancing. And the
knowledge that his enthusiastic appreciation was shared stirred in him
no feeling save that of uncomfortable foreboding.
He put on his eye-glasses and looked across the room. There, near the
door, he saw Curly accompanied by a small, fair man in a fur coat, a
clean-shaven man whose full blue eyes expressed both interest and
pleasure, pleasure keen as his own had been. And there was subtly
communicated to Mr. Wycherly a sense of impending change, and a
sensation of excited interrogation, so strong that he found himself
mentally demanding: "What will he do?"
And the ecstasy with which he had at first watched Jane-Anne was
interrupted and invaded by a host of alien doubts and speculations.
For he knew that the fates were busy weaving, and that the central
figure in their fabric was that of the slender girl in black who danced.
And nothing happened.
Curly and the man in the fur coat went away in a few minutes, and
neither of them had attempted to speak to Jane-Anne when her dance
ended.
But, all the same, the end was the end Mr. Wycherly had refused to face.
When it actually came to the point of granting or withholding his
permission, he bade her God speed and sent her forth. The flame in her
shone luminous and clear; there was no questioning it; and it seemed to
him the better part to feed the fire that burned so steadily on the
altar of her high endeavour.
Mrs. Dew neither approved nor opposed. For some years now she had felt
Jane-Anne was growing beyond her; always incomprehensible, she was now
on a plane that her good aunt could only touch by means of the steady
affection she had always felt. That way she could always reach
Jane-Anne. Since her niece was not to be a respectable servant in a
good family, it seemed to Mrs. Dew that all other careers were equally
chimerical and dangerous. The girl might try this play-acting. If it
failed--why, the master would have her back. Mrs. Dew was sure of that,
and was therefore less anxious than might have been expected.
With a diffidence she had never shown before, she followed Jane-Anne
into her bedroom the afternoon before she left Holywell, and stood at
the end of the bed watching the tall girl on her knees beside the new
trunk she herself had given her.
"Look here, Jane-Anne," she said suddenly, and because she was very much
in earnest she lapsed into the broad Gloucestershire of her youth. "I'm
not one as can talk religious--a good sharp scoldin's more in my
line--but I'd be glad that you should remember as you come of a most
respectable family. There's bin Burfords in Great Stanley for two
'undred year, and so far as we do know, never a light woman amongst
'em."
"Two hundred years," Jane-Anne echoed. "Why, then I must have ancestors,
after all."
"You can call 'em ancestors, if you do please," Mrs. Dew continued; "we
do call 'em forbears where I comes from. Well, as I was sayin', I'd
have you remember, an' if you feels carried away and giddy-like, just
think as there's a hold aunt down in Oxford as sets great store by
you----"
Mrs. Dew's voice broke; Jane-Anne rose hastily from her knees and ran to
her aunt, and took her in her arms.
"Aunt, dear," she said, "I will remember."
"I never 'eard," Mrs. Dew went on in a muffled tone, "anything to speak
of about your father's people. For all I know, he might 'ave come from
some of them 'eathen gods and goddesses, bad lots they were, and it's
that as makes we so worrited. Burford blood you can depend on--but I'm
sure as it's the Grecian comin' out as drives you to play-acting."
Very gently Jane-Anne withdrew her arms from about her aunt.
"I know I'm often silly," she said humbly, "but you mustn't blame my
father for that."
"You're as the Lard made you," Mrs. Dew remarked drily, "and you can but
try and make the best of a bad job. But remember this--if you feels
ill, or if you wants me any time for any reason, a telegram'll bring me
just every bit as quick as I can put foot to the ground and find
somebody to do for the master while I be away. You bear that in mind."
"You're very good to me, aunt," said Jane-Anne, and flung her arms round
Mrs. Dew's neck once more.
She and Mr. Wycherly went to evensong in the cathedral. It was the
fourth of January, and the "proper psalms" were the twenty-second and
the twenty-third. Jane-Anne shivered with a chilly sense of foreboding
as the wailing chant rang out, echoing eerily in the great arched roof.
"_I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint: my
heart also in the midst of my body is even like melting wax._"
Presently the minor changed to something infinitely serene and sweet and
comforting; and to Jane-Anne standing timidly on the threshold of her
new life, there was promise of help that could not fail her in the
assurance:
"_The Lord is my shepherd therefore can I lack nothing._" And at the
final verse: "_But Thy loving kindness and mercy shall follow me all the
days of my life..._" she thrust her little hand into that of her old
friend, and his closed over it with a firm and understanding clasp.
When the day, so charged with various emotions, came to an end, and she
went to bid him good-night, she found him standing on the hearth-rug in
the firelight. Montagu had gone for a few days to a school-friend
before he came up to New, and they were all alone.
Mr. Wycherly's lamp was turned out, but the room was full of warm, rosy
light, and Jane-Anne remembered how she had looked in and longed
wistfully to share in his kind glance, all those long years ago. They
had had many talks together, those two, over the coming change, and each
knew the other's hopes and fears. The old must realise that farewells
are their portion. Only a month or two before Mr. Wycherly had seen
Edmund set out on his first voyage, and now this other child was sailing
forth on the great sea of life, leaving him behind to dream and pray
that fortune and fair winds might enwheel them both.
She came and stood beside him, laying light, gentle hands upon his
shoulders, looking at him the while with the kind, faithful eyes he
loved so well.
"Dear," she said, "do you know at all how I feel?"
"My child," he answered, "you feel, I know, everything that is best and
most beautiful, but there is just one thing that I would like you to
write upon the tablets of your heart, and that is, the remembrance that
here, in Oxford, there is an old man who would give his life's blood to
serve you; to whom all that concerns you is absolutely vital. Will you
remember always that, whether you are glad or sorry, successful or
unfortunate, most of all if ever--which God forbid--you should be
unfortunate--your home is here."
"I will remember," said Jane-Anne, and kissed him.
No one went with her next day to London. She preferred to go alone.
Curly was to meet her, and she was to start that night with the rest of
the company for the town in the north where their first engagement was.
Gantry Bill wandered disconsolately about the house in Holywell all that
day. He could settle nowhere. His beautiful tranquillity was quite
broken up. He pattered to and fro, and whined faintly at intervals.
Mrs. Dew tempted him in vain with the choicest morsels in his special
bowl.
At last, after dinner, he sought Mr. Wycherly in his study, scratching
vigorously at the door until he was admitted. Once in, he walked about
sniffing dubiously; finally, going to Mr. Wycherly, and with his paws
across his knees, leant heavily upon him, and looked up in his face,
plainly asking, "Where is she?"
This was Gantry Bill's favourite attitude with Jane-Anne. He was too
big and heavy for her to nurse, but he loved to stand on his hind legs
and lean his body across her knees, while she, generally immersed in a
book, absently stroked his head.
"She's gone, Gantry Bill," Mr. Wycherly said, in answer to his look.
"She has gone away and left us, and we must just make the best of it."
Gantry Bill gave a sudden lurch and arranged his whole heavy person
across Mr. Wycherly's knees. He weighed forty-four pounds, but somehow
Mr. Wycherly had not the heart to drive him away.
Instead, he stroked him absently, and murmured:
"Say I'm weary, say I'm sad;
Say that health and wealth have missed me;
Say I'm growing old, but add--
Jenny kissed me."