"And did anything pass between you . . . about your marriage, I mean?"
I told him all that I had said to Martin, and all that Martin had said
to me.
"Because he has written a long letter to the Bishop denouncing it, and
calling on him to stop it."
"To stop it?"
"That's so. He says it is nothing but trade and barter, and if the
Church is willing to give its blessing to such rank commercialism, let
it bless the Stock Exchange, let it sanctify the slave market."
"Well?"
"The Bishop threatens to tell your father. 'Who is this young man,' he
says, 'who dares to . . .' But if I thought there was nothing more to
your marriage than . . . If I imagined that what occurred in the case of
your dear mother . . . But that's not all."
"Not all?"
"No. Martin has written to me too, saying worse--far worse."
"What does he say, Father Dan?"
"I don't really know if I ought to tell you, I really don't. Yet if it's
true . . . if there's anything in it . . ."
I was trembling, but I begged him to tell me what Martin had said. He
told me. It was about my intended husband--that he was a man of
irregular life, a notorious loose liver, who kept up a connection with
somebody in London, a kind of actress who was practically his wife
already, and therefore his marriage with me would be--so Martin had
said--nothing but "legalised and sanctified concubinage."
With many breaks and pauses my dear old priest told me this story, as if
it were something so infamous that his simple and innocent heart could
scarcely credit it.
"If I really thought it was true," he said, "that a man living such a
life could come here to marry my little . . . But no, God could not
suffer a thing like that. I must ask, though. I must make sure. We live
so far away in this little island that . . . But I must go back now. The
Bishop will be calling for me."
Still deeply agitated, Father Dan left me by the bridge, and at the gate
of our drive I found Tommy the Mate on a ladder, covering, with flowers
from the conservatory, a triumphal arch which the joiner had hammered up
the day before.
The old man hardly noticed me as I passed through, and this prompted me
to look up and speak to him.
"Tommy," I said, "do you know you are the only one who hasn't said a
good word to me about my marriage?"
"Am I, missy?" he answered, without looking down. "Then maybe that's
because I've had so many bad ones to say to other people."