It was all over--the fun, the gaiety, the good things of life, the
delights of fine living, the charm of being with rich friends. It is
true that Annie Brooke returned to England with a little private fund of
her own in her pocket; but John Saxon insisted on her returning him the
two five-pound notes he had enclosed to her. Out of these he paid for
her ticket back to England.
John Saxon was a very cold, silent, and unsympathetic fellow-traveller.
He sat moodily in a corner, wrapped in his greatcoat, the collar of
which he turned up; a travelling-cap came well down over his head, so
that Annie could see little or nothing of his face. He had done what he
could to make her comfortable, and had wrapped her round with warm
things. Then he had taken no further notice of her.
On the whole, Priscilla Weir had a far more interesting journey to
England than had that spoiled child of fortune Annie Brooke. Annie,
however, was glad to be left alone. She did not want to talk to that
odious man, Cousin John Saxon. But for him, life would not have been
suddenly spoiled for her. She would not have been found out. She was
far too clever not to be sure that Lady Lushington had found her out.
Not that Lady Lushington had discovered any serious crimes to lay at her
door, but then she had read her character aright, and that character was
of the sort which the great lady could not tolerate. Therefore Annie
was--and she knew it well--shut away from any further dealings with
Mabel Lushington.
Poor Mabel! How would she provide the money for Priscilla's two
remaining terms at school? How would she go through a stern catechism
with regard to the necklace when Annie was no longer by her side?
"Everything will be discovered," thought Annie Brooke. "There is no
help for it. What shall I do? And I'd managed so well and so--so
cleverly. There isn't a bit of good in being clever in this world. It
seems to me it's the stupid people that have the best times. Of course
that idiotic old Mabel will let out the whole story before many hours
are over. And then there'll be a frightful to-do, and perhaps Mabel
will be sent back to Mrs Lyttelton's school--that is, if Mrs Lyttelton
will receive her, which fact I very much doubt. As to me--oh, well,
I'll have to hide somewhere. I hope to goodness Mr Manchuri will never
tell anybody about the necklace; he faithfully promised he wouldn't and
he seemed an honourable sort of man. But then, ought I to expect any
one to be honourable in his dealings with me? I don't know; the world
seems coming to pieces. Horrid John Saxon! How I detest him! Oh, I
feel as though I could go mad!"
Annie started up impatiently. She went across the carriage and opened
one of the windows, putting her head out at the same time. She hoped
Saxon would take some notice. She wanted him to speak to her. His
silence, his apparent indifference to her, were just the sort of thing
to madden the girl in her present mood.
Saxon was seated facing the engine, and, in consequence, when Annie
opened the window wide he was exposed to a tremendous draught. He bore
it for a minute or two; then, rising, he said very quietly:
"Will you excuse me? I don't think the night air is good for you, and
it is certainly bad for me. I will, therefore, with your permission,
shut the window; it is cold."
"I am suffocating," said Annie.
"I will open it again in a few minutes so that you can have fresh air
from time to time."
"Oh!" said Annie, with a sudden burst of passion, beating one small hand
over the other, "why have you been so cruel to me?"
Saxon glanced at her. There was only one other occupant of the
carriage--an old gentleman, who was sound asleep and snoring loudly.
"Won't you speak?" said Annie. "Why do you sit so silent, so
indifferent, when you have spoiled my life?"
"We have different ideas on that point," he said. "You can do exactly
as you please with your life, as far as I am concerned, by-and-by. At
present you are under the care of your uncle, the Rev Maurice Brooke.
While he lives you have to do his wishes, to carry them out according to
his views. I am helping _him_ in this matter, not you. Afterwards, we
will discover by your uncle's will what he wishes to have done with you.
You are only seventeen; you must yield to the directions and the will
of those who are older than yourself and who are placed by God in
authority over you."
"Oh, how I hate you when you preach!"
"Then perhaps you will not speak to me. I am exceedingly tired; a
journey to Zermatt and back again without any rest makes a man inclined
for slumber. I will sleep, if you have no objection. In the morning
perhaps we shall both be in a better temper than we are at present."
"I wish," said Annie, speaking in sudden passion, "that I could fling
myself out of that window. You have destroyed every prospect I ever had
in life."
"You talk in an exceedingly silly way," said Saxon. "Now do try and be
quiet, if you please."
His absolute disregard of her threat to end her own miserable life made
Annie at once furious and also strangely subdued. She sat back in her
corner like a little wild creature caught in a trap. There was nothing
whatever to be done but to submit. To submit as she was now doing was
indeed new to Annie Brooke. Her head was in a whirl; but by-and-by, to
her own relief, she also slept, and so part of the miserable journey was
got through.
It was late on the following afternoon when Annie and John Saxon found
themselves driving in the gig to Rashleigh Rectory. They had to pass
through the little village, and Annie looked with a sort of terror at
Dawson's shop. She wondered if the matter of the cheque would ever be
brought up against her. So occupied was she with herself and with all
the dreadful things she had done that she could scarcely think of her
dying old uncle at all.
The memory of a text, too, which she had learned as a child began to be
present with her. Her head was aching, and the text, with its
well-known words, tormented her.
"`Be sure your sin will find you out. Be sure--your sin--will find you
out,'" murmured Annie in too low a tone for Saxon to hear.
They had been met at the railway station with the information that Mr
Brooke was still alive, and Saxon uttered a sigh of relief. Then his
journey had not been in vain. Then the old man would be gratified. The
greatest longing and wish of his life would be fulfilled. The darling
of his heart would be with him at the end.
John Saxon turned and looked at the girl. She was crouching up in the
gig. She felt cold, for the evenings were turning a little chill. She
had wrapped an old cloak, which Mrs Shelf had sent, around her slim
figure.
Her small, fair face peeped out from beneath the shelter of the cloak.
Her eyes had a terrified light in them. Saxon felt that, for Mr
Brooke's sake, Annie must not enter the Rectory in her present state of
wild revolt and rebellion.
He suddenly turned down a shady lane which did not lead direct to the
Rectory. His action awoke no sort of notice in Annie's mind. Her uncle
was alive; he probably was not so very bad after all. This was a plot
of John Saxon's--a plot to destroy her happiness. But for John, how
different would be her life now!
They drove down about a hundred yards of the lane, and then the young
man pulled the horse up and drew the gig towards the side of the road.
This fact woke Annie from the sort of trance into which she had sunk,
and she turned and looked at him.
"Why are you stopping?" she asked.
"Because I must speak to you, Annie," was her cousin's response.
"Have you anything fresh to say? Is there anything fresh to say?"
"There is something that must be said," replied John Saxon. "You
cannot, Annie, enter the Rectory and meet Mrs Shelf, and, above all
things, go into that chamber where your dear uncle is waiting for the
Angel of Death to fetch him away to God, looking as you are doing now.
You are, I well know, in a state of great mental misery. You have done
wrong--how wrong, it is not for me to decide. I know of some of your
shortcomings, but this is no hour for me to speak of them. All I can
say at the present moment is this: that you are very young, and you are
motherless, and--you are about, little Annie, to be fatherless. You are
on the very eve of losing the noblest and best father that girl ever
possessed. Your uncle has stood in the place of a father to you. You
never appreciated him; you never understood him. He was so high above
you that you could never even catch a glimpse of the goodness of his
soul. But I cannot believe in the possibility of any one being quite
without heart or quite without some sense of honour; and I should be
slow, very slow, to believe it of you.
"Now, there is one last thing which you have got to do for your uncle
Maurice, and I have brought you down here to tell you what that last
thing is."
Annie was silent. She shrank a little more into the shelter of the
rough old cloak, and moved farther from her cousin.
"You must do it Annie," he said, speaking in a decided voice; "you must
on no account whatever fail at this supreme juncture."
"Well?" said Annie when he paused.
"Your uncle is expecting you. God has kept him alive in order that he
may see your face again. To him your face is as that of an angel. To
him those blue eyes of yours are as innocent as those of a little child.
To him you are the spotless darling, undefiled, uninjured by the world,
whom he has nurtured and loved for your father's sake and for your own.
You must on no account, Annie, open his eyes to the truth with regard to
you now. It is your duty to keep up the illusion as far as he is
concerned. I have taken all this trouble to bring you to his bedside in
order that he may have his last wish gratified, and you must not fail
me. Perhaps your uncle's prayers may be answered; and God, who can do
all things, will change your heart.
"Now, remember, Annie, you have to forget yourself to-night and to think
only of the dying old man. Promise me, promise me that you will do so."
"You have spoken very strangely, Cousin John," said Annie after a very
long pause. "I--I will do--my--best I am very bad--but--I will do--my
best."
The next instant Annie's icy-cold little hand was clasped in that of
John Saxon.
"You have to believe two things," he said. "A great man who was as your
father, whom God is taking to Himself. That man loves you with all his
heart and soul and strength. When he dies, there is another man,
unworthy, unfit truly, to stand in his shoes, but nevertheless who will
not forsake you. Now let us get back to the Rectory."
There was a feeling of peace in the old house, a wonderful calm, a
strange sense of aloofness as though the ordinary things of life had
been put away and everyday matters were of no account. The fact was
this: that for several days now, for long days and long nights, the
beautiful Angel of Death had been brooding over the place; and the
people who lived in the old Rectory had recognised the fact and had
arranged their own lives accordingly.
Money did not matter at all in the shadow of that Presence; nor did
greatness--worldly greatness, that is--nor ambition, nor mere pleasure;
and, above all things, self-love was abhorrent in that little home of
peace, for the Angel of Death brooding there brought with him the very
essence of peace.
It was a curious fact that Annie Brooke, when she passed under the
threshold and entered on what she expected to be the most awful time of
her whole life, found that same peace immediately descend upon her. She
lost all sense of fear, and every scrap of regret at having left the
good and gay things of life at Zermatt.
She had not been five minutes in the house before she forgot Zermatt,
and Mabel, and Lady Lushington. It is true, she thought of Priscilla,
and Priscilla's eyes seemed to haunt her. But even they, with their
look of reproach, could not affect the queer peace that had fallen upon
her.
Mrs Shelf kissed her warmly, not uttering a word of reproach, and Annie
stepped with a light and fairy step, and crept to her own room and put
on one of her little home dresses--a blue gingham which she often wore
and which her uncle loved. She tripped downstairs again in a few
minutes, and entered the kitchen and said to Mrs Shelf:
"Now I am ready."
"Go in by yourself, darling," said Mrs Shelf. "I won't take you. He is
in the old room; there is, no one with him. He knows you are here; he
knew it the minute you stepped across the threshold. You couldn't
deceive him, bless you! Go to him all alone, dearie, and at once."
So Annie went. A minute later she was seated by the old man's bedside,
and silently her little hand was laid on his. He just turned his head
very slowly to look at her. They both felt themselves to be quite alone
together except for the presence of the Angel of Death, who, brooding
over the house, brooded more deeply over this sacred chamber, with wings
held open, ready to spread themselves at any instant, and arms half
extended to carry that saint of God to his home in the skies.
Mr Brooke had longed for Annie, had imagined her to be by his side in
hours of delirium, had awakened to his usual senses a day or two before
the end and had discovered her absence; had said no word of reproach
with regard to his little Annie, but had missed her with a great
heart-hunger. Now she was here. She was his own dear child. To the
rest of the world Annie was at that moment a wicked, designing,
double-faced, double-natured creature, but to Mr Brooke she was just his
wee pet lamb, his darling; the treasure whom God had given him.
"You are back, my love," he said when his very feeble voice could speak.
"I missed you, my little one."
"Yes, I am back," said Annie, and she did that which comforted him most;
she laid her head on the pillow beside him, and kissed his cheek,
already cold with the dews which precede the moment when the great Angel
of Death carries the soul he has released from its prison away.
"I am going to God," said Mr Brooke. "It is a wonderful happiness that
I am soon to be admitted into the presence of the King of Kings. There
is no saying, Annie, what marvels will be revealed to me and what
glories mine eyes shall look upon. I shall see in His good time the
Saviour of the world. When I am ready for that sight of all sights, it
will be given to me. But, my own little Annie, even in that moment of
satisfaction, when I wake up after His likeness, I shall carry you, my
child, in my heart of hearts. I shall look for you, my little one. You
will come to me--not yet, my darling, for you are very young, but some
day. Promise me, my dearest dear."
Annie's choked voice sounded low and faint.
"I cannot hear you, my sweetest. Say the word I want--say the word I
want to take away with me."
"What shall I say, Uncle Maurice?"
"Say `Yes'--one word, my darling, that I may carry it with me into the
great eternity of God."
"Yes--oh, yes!" said Annie.
"Lord, now lettest Thou Thy servant depart in peace," said the old man.
Then the Angel of Death did open wide his glorious wings, and two bright
spirits passed out of that room where one had come in.