'NO, YOU HAVE NOT SPARED ME'
'Thy word unspoken thou canst any day
Speak; but thy spoken ne'er again unsay.'
_Eastern Proverb_--TRENCH.
Michael was still away. The business that detained him was not to be
settled as easily as he had expected; there were complications--a host
of minor difficulties. He was unwilling to return until things were
definitely arranged.
'I am too proud of my present position,' he wrote to Audrey; 'the mere
fact that I am of some use in the world, and that one human being feels
my advice helpful to him, quite reconciles me to my prolonged absence.
Of course I mean to keep Kester with me. He is perfectly happy, and
fairly revels in London sights. He and Fred are thick as thieves.
Abercrombie saw him the other day--you know who I mean: Donald
Abercrombie. He is a consulting physician now, and is making quite a
name for himself. He has good-naturedly promised to look into the case.
He says, from the little he has seen, he is sure the boy has been
neglected, and that care and medical skill could have done much for him
in the beginning. Abercrombie is just the fellow to interest himself
thoroughly in a case like Kester's, and I have great hopes of the
result. I have written to his brother, but perhaps you would be wise to
say as little as possible to Mrs. Blake. She is far too sanguine by
nature; and it would never do to excite hopes that might never be
gratified. Mr. Blake is of a different calibre; he will look at the
thing more sensibly.'
Audrey sighed as she laid aside Michael's letter. She seemed to miss him
more every day, and yet she was quite willing that his absence should be
prolonged. Michael would have noticed her want of spirits in a moment;
she would never have been free from his affectionate surveillance. At a
distance everything was so much easier; she could write cheerfully; she
could fill the sheets with small incidents and matters of local
interest, with pleasant inquiries about himself and Kester.
Nevertheless, Michael's face grew graver over each letter. He could not
have told himself what was lacking to his entire satisfaction, only some
strange subtle chord of sympathy, as delicate as it was unerring, warned
him that all was not right with the girl.
'She is not as bright as usual,' he thought. 'Audrey's letters are
generally overflowing with fun. There is a grave, almost a forced, tone
about this last one. And she so seldom mentions the Blakes.'
Audrey had certainly avoided the Gray Cottage during the last three
weeks; even Mollie's lessons were irksome to her. Mollie's tongue was
not easily silenced. In spite of all her efforts, her cheeks often burnt
at the girl's innocent loquacity. Mollie was for ever making awkward
speeches or asking questions that Audrey found difficult to answer; she
would chatter incessantly about her mother and Cyril.
'Mamma is so dreadfully worried about Cyril!' she said once. 'She wants
him to speak to Dr. Powell; she is quite sure that he is ill. He hardly
eats anything--at least, he has no appetite--and mamma says that is so
strange in a young man. And he walks about his room half the night;
Biddy hears him. You recollect that evening he dined at Woodcote? Well,
he never came home that night until past twelve, and Biddy declares that
his bed was not slept in at all; he must just have thrown himself down
on it for an hour or two. And he had such a bad headache the next
morning.'
Audrey walked to the piano and threw it open.
'I am very sorry your brother is not well,' she said in rather a forced
voice, as she flecked a little dust off the legs. 'Mollie, I think
Caroline has forgotten to dust the piano this morning. Will you hand me
that feather-brush, please? I want you to try this duet with me; it is
such a pretty one!' And after that Mollie's fingers were kept so hard at
work that she found no more opportunity for talking about Cyril.
Another time, as Audrey looked over her French exercise, she heard a
deep sigh, and glancing up from the book, found Mollie gazing at her
with round sorrowful eyes.
'Well, what now?' she asked a little sharply.
'Oh, I am so sorry, Miss Ross!' returned Mollie, faltering and turning
red; 'I am so dreadfully sorry, Miss Ross, that Cyril has offended you.
I thought you were such good friends, but now----' She stopped, somewhat
abashed at Audrey's displeased expression.
'My dear Mollie, I have never been really vexed with you before; but you
will annoy me excessively if you talk such nonsense. I am not in the
least offended with your brother--whatever made you say such a
thing?--and we are perfectly good friends.'
Audrey spoke with much dignity as she took up her pen again.
Poor Mollie looked very much frightened.
'Oh dear, Miss Ross,' she said penitently, 'you are not really cross
with me, are you? It was not my own idea; only mamma said last night
that she was sure you were offended about something, for you never come
to see us now, and your manner was so different when she spoke to you
after chapel on Sunday; and then she said perhaps Cyril had offended
you.'
'I tell you it is all nonsense, Mollie!'
'Yes, but I am sure there is something,' returned Mollie, half crying,
for Audrey had never been impatient with her before. 'Cyril will never
let me talk to him about you; he gets up and leaves the room when mamma
begins wondering why you never come. Cyril was quite cross when she
asked him to give you a message the other day. "It is more in Mollie's
line," he said; "I never can remember messages," and he walked away, and
mamma cried, and said she could not think what had happened to him--that
he had never been cross with her in his life before; but that now she
hardly dared open her lips to him, he took her up so.'
Audrey sighed wearily, then she gave Mollie a comforting little pat.
'Mollie, dear,' she said kindly, 'I did not mean to be cross with you;
but you do say such things, you know, and really you are old enough to
know better'--and as Mollie only looked at her wonderingly--'oh, go
away!--you are a dear little soul; but you talk as though you were a
baby; no one is offended. If your brother is not well, why cannot you
leave him in peace? I don't think you understand that men never like to
be questioned about their ailments; they are not like women. Cornwall
certainly did not agree with him.'
'Do you think it is only that? Oh, I won't say another word if you will
only not be cross with me;' and Mollie relieved her feelings by one of
her strangling hugs.
Mollie was quite used to people finding fault with her and telling her
she was a goose. When Audrey kissed her, she sat down and copied her
exercise in a humble and contrite spirit; it was Audrey who felt sad and
spiritless the rest of the day. 'It has gone deeper than I thought; it
has gone very deep,' she said with a sort of shiver, as she walked up to
Hillside that afternoon.
But a far worse ordeal was before Audrey--one that threw all Mollie's
girlish chatter into the shade. A few days afterwards she received a
little note from Mrs. Blake.
'MY DEAR MISS ROSS,' it began,
'I am nearly desperate. What have Mollie or I done that we should
be sent to Coventry after this fashion? At least, not Mollie--I am
wrong there: Mollie still basks in the light of your smiles, is
still allowed to converse with you; it is only I who seem to be
debarred from such privileges. Now, my dear creature, what can you
mean by keeping away from us like this? I was at Woodcote
yesterday, but you had flown. I had to sit and chat with Mrs. Ross
instead; she is delightful, but she is not her daughter; no one but
yourself can ever fill your place; no one can be Miss Ross. Now
will you make us amends for all this unfriendliness? If you will
only come to tea with me to-morrow I will promise you full
forgiveness and the warmest of welcomes.
'Yours affectionately but resentfully, M. BLAKE.'
Audrey wrote a pretty playful little answer to this. She was sorry to be
accused of unfriendliness, but nothing was farther from her thoughts;
she was very busy, very much engaged. Relays of parents had been
interviewing them at Woodcote; her sister had not been well, and all her
afternoons had been spent at Hillside. Mrs. Blake must be lenient; she
would come soon, very soon, and so on. Mrs. Blake was more formidable
than Mollie, and Audrey was determined to delay her visit as long as
possible. Just now she had a good excuse. Geraldine was a little
delicate and ailing, and either she or her mother went daily to
Hillside.
Audrey breathed more freely when she had sent off her note; she had
given it into Cyril's hand at luncheon--a sudden impulse made her choose
that mode of delivery.
'I wish you would give this to your mother,' she said, addressing him
suddenly as he sat beside her. 'She wants me to have tea with her
to-morrow; but it is impossible, I have so much to do just now.'
'I could have told her; there was no need for you to write or to
trouble yourself in any way. I am afraid my mother is rather exacting;
it is a Blake foible.' He smiled as he spoke, and there was no special
meaning in his tone; he seemed to take it as a matter of course that
Audrey's visits to the Cottage had ceased. 'It will be all right,' he
said, as he put the letter in his breast-pocket; and then he stopped and
called some boy to order. 'You will stay in after luncheon, Roberts,' he
said severely, and after that he did not speak again to Audrey.
But that letter, strange to say, brought things to a climax. The very
next morning Mollie gave Audrey a note.
'It is from mamma,' she said, rather timidly. 'Would you like me to
begin my piece, Miss Ross, while you read it?'
'Yes, certainly; but it does not seem a long letter.' And, indeed, it
only contained a few words:
'DEAR MISS ROSS,
'I must see you. If you will not come to me, will you tell Mollie
when I may call? But I must and will speak to you alone.'
Audrey twisted up the paper in her hand; then she stood behind Mollie
and beat time for a moment.
'Mollie,' she said hurriedly, as she turned over the page, 'will you
tell your mother that I will come to her this afternoon a little before
three? I shall not be able to stay, but just for half an hour;' and then
she sat down and quietly and patiently pointed out how an erring passage
ought to be played. But there was a tired look on her face long before
the lesson ended.
All her life long Audrey never forgot the strange chill sensation that
came over her as she read that note; it was as though some dim,
overmastering force were impelling her against her own will. As she
crushed the letter in her hand, she told herself that circumstances were
becoming too strong for her.
Her face was very grave that afternoon as she pushed open the green gate
and walked up to the open door. It seemed to her as though she were
someone else, as she crossed the threshold and stood for a moment in the
little hall. Biddy came out of the kitchen. The mistress was in the
drawing-room, she said, and Miss Mollie was out; and Audrey, still with
that strange weight at her heart, went upstairs slowly. Mrs. Blake was
sitting in her usual seat by the window. She rose without speaking and
took Audrey's hands, but there was no smile upon her face. She looked
very pale, and Audrey could see at once that she had been weeping.
'You have come,' she said quietly; 'I thought my letter would bring you.
Perhaps it was wrong of me to write; I ought to have come to you
instead. But how was I to speak to you alone? Last night I was almost
desperate, and then I was obliged to send for you.'
'If you wanted me so much, of course you were right to send for me.'
Audrey was conscious that her manner was cold, and that her voice was
hardly as sympathetic as usual. She was sure Mrs. Blake noticed it, for
her eyes filled with tears.
'Oh, how coldly you speak! My poor boy has indeed offended you deeply.
Oh, I know everything; he was too unhappy last night to hide it any
longer from his mother. Do you know what he said to me?--that with all
his strength he could not bear it, and that he must go away.'
'Go away--leave Rutherford?'
'Yes;' and now the tears were streaming down her face, and her voice was
almost choked with sobs. 'He said he must give it up, and that we must
all go away--that the effort is killing him, and that no man could bear
such an ordeal. Oh, Miss Ross'--as Audrey averted her face--'I know you
are sorry for him; but think what it was for his mother to stand by and
hear him say such things. My boy--my brave, noble-hearted boy, who has
never given me an hour's pain in his life!'
'And you have sent for me to tell me this?'
There was something proud, almost resentful, in Audrey's tone.
'Yes; but you must not be angry with me. I think that, if Cyril knew
that I was betraying him, he would never give me his confidence again.
Last night I heard him walking about his room, and I went up to him. He
wanted to send me away, but I would not go. I knelt down beside him and
put my arms round his neck, and told him that I had found out his
secret. It had come to me with a sudden flash as I sat beside him in
chapel last Sunday. You passed up the aisle, and I saw his face, and
then I knew what ailed him. And in the darkness I whispered in his ear,
"My poor boy, you love Audrey Ross!"'
Audrey put up one hand to shield her face, but she made no remark. She
must hear it all; she had brought this misery upon them, and she must
not refuse to share it.
'He owned it then. I will not tell you what he said; it must be sacred
between my boy and me. Oh, you do not know him! His nature is intense,
like mine; he takes nothing easily. When he says that it is killing him
by inches, and that we must go away, I know he is speaking the truth.
How is he to live here, seeing you every day, and knowing that there is
no love for him in your heart? How could any man drag out such a
hopeless existence?'
'Such things are done every day.' Audrey hardly knew what she was
saying. A dull pain seemed to contract her heart; he was going away.
Somehow, this thought had never occurred to her.
'Yes, but not by men of Cyril's nature. He is strong, but his very
strength seems to make him suffer more keenly. If he stayed here, people
would begin to talk; he would not always be able to hide what he felt.
He thinks he ought to go away for your sake. "I am giving her pain now,
and by and by it will be worse"--those were his very words.'
'I think it would be braver to stay on here. Will you tell him so, Mrs.
Blake?'
'No, Miss Ross, I will not tell him so; I will not consent to see him
slowly tortured. If he tells us we must go, I will not say a dissenting
word. What is my own comfort compared to his? I have had a hard life,
God knows! and now it will be harder still.'
'But you have other children to consider,' remonstrated Audrey faintly.
'If you leave here, Mollie and Kester will be sacrificed. Surely, you
have put this before him.'
'No, indeed, I have not; he has always been my first consideration. Of
course, I know how bad it will be for the poor children; but if it comes
to that--to choose between them and Cyril----' And a strange, passionate
look came into her eyes.
'Hush, hush! I do not like to hear you talk so,' replied Audrey. 'It is
wrong; no mother ought to make such a difference. You are not yourself,
or you would not say such things. It is all this trouble.'
'Perhaps you are right,' she returned drearily. 'I think it has half
crazed me to know we must go away. Oh, if you knew what my life has
been, and what a haven of rest this has seemed!' She looked round the
room, and a sort of spasm crossed her face. 'It is all so sweet and
homelike, and he has loved it so; and now to begin all afresh, and to go
amongst strangers--and then the loss----' She stopped as though
something seemed to choke her.
Audrey felt as though she could hear no more. 'It is all my fault,' she
burst out; 'how you must hate me!' But Mrs. Blake shook her head with a
sad smile.
'I don't seem to have the power of hating you,' she said, so gently that
Audrey's lip quivered. 'How can I hate what my boy loves?' and then she
paused and looked at Audrey, as though the sight of her suppressed
emotion stirred some dim hope within her: 'If I thought it would help
him, I would kneel at your feet like a beggar and pray you to have
compassion upon him; but I know what such pity would be worth--do you
think Cyril would accept any woman's pity?'
'No, no,' and then Audrey rose and put out her hands in a beseeching
way. 'Will you let me go? Indeed, indeed, I can bear no more----'
'Yes, you shall go,' returned Mrs. Blake in a stifled tone. 'I have not
been generous, I have spared you nothing, and yet it is not your fault.
You have not played with my boy's heart; you never tried to win his
heart. Cyril said so himself.'
'No, you have not spared me,' was Audrey's answer, and then the two
women parted without kissing each other--Audrey was too sore, too
bewildered, for any such caress. They stood holding each other's hands
for a moment, and then Mrs. Blake walked to the other end of the room
and threw herself down upon a couch. Audrey looked at her for an
instant, then she turned and went slowly down the stairs. But as she
closed the green gate after her, she told herself that she must be alone
for a little, and with a sudden impulse she turned into the courtyard
that led to the school-house and chapel. There was one spot where she
would be in perfect seclusion, and that was the school library; even if
some stray boy were to make his appearance in search of a book--a very
unlikely thing at this time in the afternoon--her presence there would
attract no notice: she had several times chosen it as a cool, quiet
retreat on a hot summer's afternoon. The sight of the big shabby room,
with its pillars and book recesses and sloping desks, gave her a
momentary sense of relief. The stillness soothed her, and the tumultuous
singing in her head and ears seemed to lull. She sat down in one of the
inner recesses and looked out on the row of ivy-covered studies and the
little gate that led down to the town. A tame jackdaw was hopping among
the stones, and a couple of fan-tail pigeons were strutting near him.
The mellow brightness of the October sunshine seemed to flood the whole
court. Oh, how peaceful it looked, how calm and still! and then Audrey
suddenly put down her face on her hands and cried like a baby. 'Oh, if
it were only not my fault!' she sobbed; 'but I cannot, cannot bear it,'
and for a time she could do nothing but weep.