Brooding Clouds.
There was a shadow upon the Parsonage. The two little ladies looked at
each other with vague dismay, and asked wonderingly, “What is this that
has come upon us?”
At meal times Jack was nearly always gloomy and preoccupied, or if he
was gay his merriment was evidently forced. Between meals he went for
long, lonely tramps, and constantly those two perpendicular lines
wrinkled his forehead. Strangest of all, he seemed to avoid The Ghan
House, and Paddy was no longer his constant companion.
“Could we ask him, do you think, sister?” little Miss Mary suggested
timidly.
But Miss Jane shook her head mournfully. They were feeling rather as
the hen who has reared ducklings when they first take to water. This
docile, careless-hearted, affectionate boy they had reared, had
suddenly become a man, and in one stride passed beyond their tender,
watchful care. Illness and weakness alone could ever bring him back as
he had been. His troubles, his warfare, his striving, he would
henceforth wrestle with alone.
Moreover, there was Eileen’s white face and deeply shadowed eyes also.
Nothing was said—what was there to say? Only anxious, watchful nights
and yearning pain for another mother, whose fledgling was feeling the
first cold blast of Life’s sorrow.
Mrs Adair’s abundant hair, that had been turning grey of late, seemed
to go white suddenly in those weeks that followed the dance. She had
borne so much; from a very early age Life had held the cup of pain to
her lips, and she had tried to drink and ask no questions. But now, it
seemed to her that she had met the hardest blow of all. Eileen was all
the world to her. Long ago, when life was full of sadness in spite of
her good husband and beautiful home—for the sake of the man whose blood
had stained the ground on that far-off Afghan frontier, Eileen’s baby
face had come as her first real comforter, and been life and joy and
sweetness to her ever since. Perhaps it was a vague, inward
consciousness of this that made the father’s heart turn with equal
devotion to his high-spirited, boisterous second daughter; while never
swerving for a moment from his devotion to her mother.
But now Eileen’s cheeks grew white, and her beautiful eyes developed an
expression of quiet suffering that went to her mother’s heart as little
else could have done, and made Paddy rage inwardly.
Until Lawrence had gone away again, and the old routine recommenced,
she had not known how much she had thought of him during his three
years’ absence. All that time she had cared for him secretly, though
she had hardly admitted it to herself. Then when he came, and again
sought her before all others, and gave her of the best of his charm, it
was only as the match needed for the whole to burst into flame.
Vanishing once more, in silence and suddenness, he had left her with
all her dreams and hopes and happiness scattered broadcast at her feet.
There were moments when she could not understand, when even her
mountains and sky and sea could do nothing to soothe the whirlpool of
conflicting emotions in her heart.
“Why?—why?—why?”—she asked, and raised despairing eyes to the heavens
that only seemed to smile mockingly down.
She could not vent her feelings in anger like Paddy—least of all anger
with Lawrence—so in her misery she became a prey to those questionings
and reasonings which torment each soul confronted suddenly by some
strange enigma of existence. Questions of faith, questions of doubt,
all the boundless “why and wherefore” of daily being thronged round and
hammered unceasingly at her brain, stealing the delicate colour from
her cheeks, the light from her eyes, and the elasticity from her steps.
In those first troubled days it was curious how Jack and Eileen both
turned to the mountains, the one for their companionship, and the other
for air. Jack’s troubled horizon made him feel as if he could not
breathe—it was like something gripping at his throat; so he strode off
up the mountain, where he felt there was more air and a wider sense of
freedom. It was torture to him to see Eileen’s white face and flagging
health, and not be able to do anything; and ever since Paddy’s outburst
he had been ravaged by the thought that had he accepted a man’s
responsibilities sooner, instead of frittering away his life, he might
possibly have been in a position to oust Lawrence before matters had
grown serious.
Paddy watched the two of them, and the ache in her heart deepened also;
the ache for herself, the ache for Eileen, the ache for him. And with
it widened and deepened also her bitterness toward Lawrence.
Suddenly in the midst of their joyous life, it was as though a cloud of
darkest menace had descended, and she blamed him entirely. Hopeful by
nature, she still cherished the belief that things would come all right
by and by, and meanwhile she spent nearly all her time with the
General.
In some way he seemed ailing, and one or two spasms, like heart
seizures, had given them all a fright. Mrs Adair did not like him to go
about too much alone for fear of another attack, so, as she was not
strong enough to walk far herself, Paddy quickly fell into the habit of
going with him every day. Eileen would gladly have gone, but she could
not chatter like Paddy, and she knew, without feeling the smallest pang
of jealousy, which of them the father liked best for a companion. It
only seemed natural to her that it should be so, for she had such an
admiration for Paddy’s brightness that she felt everyone must in their
hearts prefer her.
So while sorrow drew Eileen and her mother closer together, failing
health did the same for Paddy and her father. Day after day, in any
weather, the pair might be seen pacing the road either to Carlingford
or Newry—the grey-haired, soldierly man, somewhat bent now, leaning on
Paddy’s arm, and the bright-eyed girl chattering briskly all the time
about anything or nothing.
Sometimes the General would tell her about his campaigns, of which she
never wearied, or he would go further back still and tell her of the
old days at Sandhurst and Aldershot and all the wild things he had done
then. Once he brought the quick tears to her eyes by saying:
“Ah, Paddy! they were grand times, and I’d have liked you to go through
them; yet where would I have been for a walking stick now? I expect the
Almighty knew best. I married too late in life to be trusted with a
son. Boys want a father who can be a boy with them, and not a crotchety
old man who needs caring for like a child. It’s hard, enough on the
girls—eh, Paddy!—a father who’s too old and decrepit to take them
anywhere or be anything but a burden!”
Paddy stood still suddenly. There were tears in her eyes, but she
frowned like some ferocious Medusa.
“How dare you!” she said sternly. “How dare you speak to me like that!
If you ever say anything of the kind again, you bad, wicked daddy, I
shall just march you back home and not speak to you for a week.”
The General smiled tenderly.
“Do you now, Paddy,” he said a little wistfully, “before you came, I
used sometimes to think I’d done the wrong thing in persuading your
mother to many me. You see, I loved her so; I was certain I could soon
make her forget and love again. But women’s hearts are wonderful
things. I’m thinking God didn’t make anything else quite as wonderful,
and it wasn’t her fault that she couldn’t forget. But she was always
just goodness itself to me, and there was no sacrifice she would not
have made willingly to please me; but after a time I found it wasn’t
any good, for I still felt she was mourning secretly. I couldn’t bear
her to be unhappy, you see, and feel I couldn’t help it. At first I
thought if she would only come to me, and let me have the right to take
care of her always, that in itself would be a world of happiness.
Afterward I found it wasn’t enough. I wanted more of her love. When
Eileen was born she was brighter and happier altogether, and at first I
was content. Then I began to feel a little jealous of the newcomer who
had succeeded where I had failed, and to feel a new sense of
loneliness.”
“Poor daddy,” Paddy said lovingly. “I expect God said to Himself, ‘I
must send him something now that won’t leave him time to think—the very
naughtiest, unmanageable child that can possibly live; and I’ll make it
a girl instead of a boy, so that she’ll be a good walking stick later
on.’ And behold! there was Paddy.”
“Yes, yes, that’s just it,” he exclaimed delightedly, “the naughtiest,
unmanageable child imaginable—that’s just what you were—and Lord! how I
revelled in it! The first time I saw your bright, blinking brown eyes,
and your ugly little face—for you were a very ugly baby, Paddy—my heart
just went straight out to you, for I felt you at least were absolutely
my own. Eileen was afraid of me; she wouldn’t leave her mother if she
could help it, but you seemed to like the old man the best from the
start. You would lie in my arms and stare up at me with the sauciest
expression, as much as to say, ‘Just wait till I’m a bit bigger, I’ll
lead you a dance.’ Then you would grab at my moustache and hang on like
grim death; or you would start kicking out of pure mischief, and land
out right and left like a little demon, till I was afraid I’d drop you.
When you could toddle I was little better than a nursemaid, for there
wasn’t a dangerous spot you wouldn’t immediately make for. The moment
anyone’s back was turned you were missing, and it was a dead certainty
you had found your way on to the quay, or taken a stroll along the
railway, or tumbled into the cucumber frame. I couldn’t bear to go far
for fear you would get into danger, and there’d be no one at hand to
save you, so I just hung round the grounds all the time; and ever since
then, Paddy, I’ve been as happy as a man need be, for somehow things
drew your mother and me closer together.”
“Then we’ve all been happy, daddy, and that’s good, isn’t it? The
aunties, and Jack, and you and mother, and Eileen and me, just the
jolliest family party in the world.”
The General was silent a few moments, then he said, with a little
tremor in his voice, “I’m thinking it can’t go on, Paddy.”
“Can’t go on!” with a sharp spasm of unknown dread. “Why not?—O why
not?”
The old man did not answer. Instead, after another pause, he continued:
“When anything happens to me, Paddy, you’ll try and look after your
mother just as if you were a son, won’t you? It will be hard on you,
but you’re so plucky. I know you’ll do your best. You’ll always
remember your old daddy worshipped her, and nothing’ll be too hard then
for a brave girl like you.”
“Daddy, you are not to talk like this,” laughing that she might not
cry. “We’ll be all together years and years yet.”
“I hope so, Paddy—I hope so, but I’m an old man and there’s no making
the old young again in this world. You’ll remember about being a good
son, eh!”
“Of course I will, daddy. I’ll just work like a slave to give her
everything she wants, but we won’t talk about it now,” and she cleverly
changed the subject.
That evening a third seizure took the General, and Jack was called in
hurriedly to help to get him upstairs to his bed.