There are two ways of taking a journey. I had come to the school with
expectations bright and rosy. I had been there for a little over two
months, and I was returning home close on the Easter holidays with very
different feelings. As I was whirled through the darkness by the
night-express which was to convey me to Calais I could not help thinking
of all that had occurred. I was a totally different girl from what I
had been when I started on that journey. I had seen a great deal of
fresh life; I had lived in a new atmosphere; I had made new friends; I
had found that the world was a larger place than even big London; that
there were all sorts of different experiences; and even so, that I
myself was only on the threshold of life. Could I ever regret the
narrow time when my principal friends were the Swan girls, when a
scolding from old Hannah was the worst thing that could occur to me,
after what I had lately lived through?
But then the occurrence of that very morning came over me with a flash
of intolerable shame. I was thinking more of my school than of my
father; but, of course, all the time he was in the background.
We arrived at Calais, and the passage across the Channel was without
incident of any sort, and we found ourselves at Victoria Station at an
early hour on the following morning. It was a dreary, cold, and foggy
day, and I shivered as I stood in my fur cloak on the platform while
Mademoiselle ran wildly about, collecting the luggage, and trying to
find a porter to convey it to the Customs. Mademoiselle evidently did
not appreciate England, and I felt that the air was more bitingly cold
than in Paris. We got into a cab and were driven as fast as possible
through the West End towards that dreary part of the town where the old
house stood.
Yes, the old house was there; I had almost expected to see that it too
had slipped away into the past with all the rest, that the shadowy house
as well as the shadowy times had vanished into illimitable space. But
it stood firm, and there on the steps was Charley. He had opened the
door as soon as ever he heard the sound of wheels drawing up on the
pavement, and now he rushed down to greet me. His face was red as
though he had been crying a great deal. He said:
"I thought you'd be coming about now. There's coffee in the
dining-room. Come along at once."
"But how is the good gentleman?" said Mademoiselle.
Charley started and turned crimson at the sound of her voice. I
introduced him as my brother, and Mademoiselle as Mademoiselle Wrex, a
French teacher at our school. Charley mumbled something. I think he
longed for Von Marlo's presence, for Von Marlo never lost his head on
any occasion whatever.
The next instant I did see his rather uncouth figure and kindly, plain
face advancing through the hall to meet me.
"Now, I said you'd come; I knew you'd come without delaying one minute.
How do you do. Miss Rachel?"
Mademoiselle looked at him and uttered a little cry.
"Why, Max!" she cried. "Max!"
Then she held out both her hands, and they were both engrossed with one
another; they were doubtless old friends. Charley dragged me into the
dining-room.
"How is father?" I said.
"Oh, he is rather bad; but there are plenty of doctors, and we hope to
pull him through."
"And my step-mother?"
"Rachel, she is a brick! She is about the best and dearest woman in all
the world. I never knew her like. She has been up with him all the
week, and never thinks of herself at all."
"But, oh, here comes Alex--dear Alex!"
Alex came up to me. In this moment of universal anxiety he was
delighted to see me again; he kissed me several times.
"Why, you have grown," he said, "and you look so--"
"She looks awfully nice," said Von Marlo.
He had come in dragging Mademoiselle with him.
"Mademoiselle Wrex is my mother's cousin," he said. "I am delighted to
see her."
Mademoiselle was also all enthusiasm.
"Why, the dear, dear boy," she said, "it is indeed a pleasure to see him
in this so desolate country. It is a joy of the inconceivable."
Her broken English made both Charley and Alex laugh; but then Alex
pulled the bell, and our neat parlour-maid brought in our breakfast. I
sat down to eat. I felt still as though in a dream. Was I in Paris, or
in the old house, or in altogether new surroundings? I rubbed my eyes.
"You're dead-tired," said Von Marlo.
"I am bewildered," I said.
"But I must catch the next train back," said Mademoiselle.
This roused the boys from any present thought of me. They were all
bustle and activity, seeing to Mademoiselle's wants. She had very
little time to spare. She would take the ten o'clock express from
Victoria, and be back in Paris in less than twenty-four hours after she
had left it.
As I bade her good-bye it seemed to me that I was slipping more and more
from the old landmarks.
"Give my love to Hermione and Augusta," I said.
"And to, perhaps, poor Riki?" said Mademoiselle.
"Yes, if she will have it," I answered.
"Things will go well with you now, and when you return there will be
rejoicing," said Mademoiselle.
But I did not think, somehow, that I should ever return; and
Mademoiselle got into the cab and was whirled away.
It was not until I saw my step-mother that I fully realised what the
real threshold of the place where I was standing really meant; for in
that house, with its comforts, its proprieties, its almost luxuries--
that house so well furnished, with such good servants, with every
comfort that life could give--there was, we knew, a visitor hourly and
momentarily expected: that grim and solemn visitor who goes by the name
of Death. Kindly Death he is to some, terrible to others; a gentle and
beloved friend to those who are worn-out with misery--a rest for the
weary. But there are times when Death is not longed for, and this was
one of those times. We children felt as we sat huddled together in the
parlour, now such a comfortable room, that we had never wanted the
Professor as we did then. He was a man in the prime of life, and great
were his attainments.
"It is wonderful what he is thought of," Alex kept repeating, and he
kept on telling me and telling me all about father and what people said
of him.
But, indeed, I was learning that myself for the first time that day, for
the carriages that drew softly up over the straw in the street to look
at the bulletin on the door might have told me what the great world
thought of him; and the boys who came up each moment to glance at the
solemn message might have told me what his scholars thought of him; and
many poor people whom he had helped were seen crossing the street to
glance at the writing. I stood fascinated behind the window-curtain,
where I could see without being seen, and it seemed to me that all these
people were repeating in a marvellous fashion the true meaning of my
father's life. To me he had hardly ever been a true father in any
sense; but these people had regarded him as a great light, as a teacher,
as one whom they must ever respect.
"He will be a loss to the world," said Alex--"a great, great loss to the
world!"
"There will be his life in all the papers," said Charley; and then the
two poor boys put their arms round each other and burst into sobs. I
sobbed with them, and wished for old Hannah. And hardly had the wish
come to me before she entered the room very quietly and stood beside us;
and when she saw us all crying she said, "Oh, you poor dears--you poor
dears!" and she sobbed and cried herself. Really it was quite dreadful.
I hardly knew how to bear my pain.
But when Mrs Grant came down just in the dusk of the evening, and
entered the room very quietly and sat down near us, I went up to her.
"May I see father?" I asked.
She looked at me, and then said:
"Dumps, if he gets worse, if the doctor on his next visit says there is
no hope, then you shall see him. The doctor is coming here at eight
o'clock with Dr Robinson, the very greatest authority in London. If he
gives no hope you must all see him to say good-bye; but not otherwise,
for any excitement is bad for him now."
"I don't think I should excite father," I said.
Perhaps there was reproach in my tones, but I did not mean it.
Then my step-mother went away.
"She will feel it awfully; she is just devoted to him," said Alex.