For a few days matters ran smoothly enough. The weather was lovely,
ideal May weather, in fact, and Raynier keenly appreciated the soft
beauty of this typical English landscape, seen at its best at the
loveliest time of the year--the fresh green of the foliage and the
yellow-spangled meadows; the cool lanes, shaded with hawthorn blossoms;
the snug farmhouses with their blaze of glowing flower-beds and the
background of picturesque ricks; the faint hum of the mill at the end of
the village, and the screech of swifts, skirring and wheeling round the
church tower, seen beyond the wall of the Vicarage garden. Such homely
sights and sounds appealed to him the more by contrast to the brassy
skies and baked aridity for which he would so soon be bound to exchange
them. For his furlough was drawing very near its end.
Strange that, under the circumstances, it should be almost entirely this
that constituted his regret. Cynthia seemed to forget her chronic
ill-temper, and became quite affectionate; yet the recollection of her
outbursts remained. Even when at her best Raynier could not for the
life of him rid his mind of such recollections. That sort of nature
does not change, he told himself, and the prospect of spending his days
with the life-long accompaniment of such was as a very weight. And his
was not one of those easy-going, quickly-forgiving dispositions; far
from it.
For one circumstance, as time went on, he felt devoutly thankful,
although at first he had reproached her with it, and that was that
Cynthia was not of a demonstrative temperament, and to this extent the
necessity of make-believe was spared him. He observed, too, in the
course of their conversations she seldom spoke of the future, or dwelt
upon their life together, and, observing it, he more than met her
half-way; and as they went about together, both in speech and demeanour
they were more like two people of very recent and ordinary acquaintance
than a betrothed couple whom a few days more were to separate by nearly
half the width of the globe.
At the actual state of things the Vicar, for his part, shrewdly guessed,
but being a sensible man forebode to interfere. Cynthia was quite old
enough to manage her own affairs, and so too was Raynier. Possibly,
when the thing was irrevocable they would hit it off together as well as
most people did under the circumstances, which, to be sure, was not
saying much. Cynthia, with her faults, had her good points, and of
Raynier he entertained a very high opinion. It would turn out right
enough, he decided, but if he had any misgiving, the Vicar was forced to
own to himself that it was not on behalf of his daughter.
"Curious thing that will of old Jervis Raynier's," he said one day, when
he and his son-in-law elect were walking up and down smoking their
pipes. "He left a good deal, and all to a girl who was hardly any
relation at all. You only come in after her."
"Which is tantamount to not at all. But the same holds good of myself
in the matter of relationship. I'm only a distant cousin--so distant as
hardly to count."
"You're a Raynier, at any rate. But she--By the way, do you ever think
about it, Herbert? My advice to you is not to. The chances are too
slight. The girl is young, they tell me, and attractive. She's bound
to marry, and then where do you come in?"
"Nowhere, unless I were to marry her myself," laughed Raynier. "But
that's scratched now. By the bye--who is she, Vicar--?"
"Herbert! Oh, there you are," shrilled the voice of Sylvia at this
juncture, followed by its owner, somewhat hot, and armed with two
trout-rods. "They told me you had gone on, and I got half-way down the
village before I found out you hadn't. Here's your rod. Come along.
We're losing the best part of the morning."
There was no gainsaying the crisp decisiveness of these orders, and with
an apology to the Vicar, he started off. He was forced to own to
himself that these expeditions with the younger girl constituted his
best times. It never occurred to Cynthia to be jealous of her sister,
not in the ordinary sense, although once or twice she was rather acid on
the subject of his preferring so much of the latter's society. The fact
was, Sylvia was lacking in feminine attractions, being plain and
somewhat angular. But she was always lively and good-natured, and to
that extent a positive relief from the other, albeit an effective foil
to her in looks.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Sunday had come round, and Cynthia had got up in a bad temper--we have
observed that upon some people the first day of the week has that
effect--consequently, when Raynier hinted at the possibility of his not
going to church it exploded. The idea of such a thing! Why, of course
he must go, staying at the Vicarage as he was. What would be said in
the parish?
"But it didn't matter what was said in the parish last Sunday. You
wouldn't let me come then because I was too ugly," he urged, with a
mischievous wink at Sylvia.
"Well, so you were, but your face is nearly all right again now,"
answered Cynthia, briskly, and with acerbity, for she had no sense of
fun.
"Not it. You'll see it'll keep all the choir boys staring, and they
can't warble with their heads cocked round at right angles to the rest
of them."
Sylvia spluttered.
"All the more reason why you should come, Herbert," she said. "I want
to see that. It'll be good sport."
"If you were a boy you'd be a typical parson's son, Silly," he laughed.
"Shut up. I'll throw something at you if you call me that."
"Do, and you'll keep up the part," he returned.
Worthingham Church was in close resemblance to a thousand or so other
village churches of its size and circumstance, in that it was old and
picturesque, and gave forth the same flavour of mould and damp stones.
There was the same rustic choir with newly-oiled heads and clattering
boots and skimpy surplices, singing the same hackneyed hymns, and the
Vicar's sermon was on the same level of prosiness, not that he could not
have done better, but he had long since ceased to think it worth while
taking the trouble. But Cynthia Daintree, seated in the front pew, well
gowned and tastefully hatted, and withal complacently conscious of the
same, was the presiding goddess, at whom the rustics aforesaid never
seemed tired of furtively staring--in awe, which somewhat outweighed
their admiration--therein well-nigh overlooking the discoloured
countenance of her _fiance_.
"Cynthia always looks as if she'd bought up the whole show," pronounced
Sylvia, subsequently and irreverently.
Raynier had answered one or two inquiries after his "bicycle accident"--
Cynthia having deftly contrived to let it be understood, though not in
so many words, that such was the nature of his mishap--and they were
re-entering the garden gate. Suddenly she said,--
"Where's your stick, Herbert? The malacca one. Why, you haven't used
it at all this time."
It was all up now, he thought. As a matter of fact his main reason for
endeavouring to avoid going to church that morning was that it would be
one opportunity the less for her to miss that unlucky article.
"No, I haven't. The fact is I've lost it."
"Lost it? Oh, Herbert!"
She looked so genuinely hurt that he felt almost guilty.
"Yes. I'm awfully sorry, Cynthia. I wouldn't have lost it for
anything, but even as it is I'm sure to get it back again. I'm having
inquiries made, and offering rewards, in short doing all I can do.
It'll turn up again. I'm certain of that."
"But--how did you lose it, and where?"
He told her how; that being a detail he had purposely omitted in
previous narration of the incident. It was but frowningly received.
"I didn't think you would attach so little value to anything _I_ had
given you, and yet I might have known you better."
What is there about the English Sunday atmosphere that is apt to render
contentious people more quarrelsome still, and those not naturally
contentious--well, a little prickly? Raynier felt his patience ebbing.
She was very unreasonable over the matter, and, really--she was quite
old enough to have more sense.
"I don't think you're altogether fair to me, Cynthia," he answered, his
own tone getting rather short. "The thing was unavoidable, you see.
Unless you mean you would rather the man's brains had been knocked out
by that bestial mob than that I should have given him some means of
defending himself. I value the stick immensely, and am doing all I can
to recover it, but I should have thought even you would hardly have
valued it at something beyond the price of a man's life."
"Only a blackamoor's," she retorted, now white and tremulous with anger.
"Sorry I can't agree with you," he answered shortly, for he was
thoroughly disgusted. "I have seen rather too much of that sort of
`blackamoor,' as you so elegantly term it, not to recognise that he,
like ourselves, has his place and use in his own part of the world. I
repeat, I am as sorry as you are the stick should have been lost, but I
should have thought that, under the circumstances, no woman--with the
feelings of a woman--would have held me to blame."
"That's right. Sneer at me; it's so manly," she retorted, having
reached the tremulous point of rage. "But why didn't you tell me of it
at first? Rather underhand, wasn't it?"
"Oh, no. I don't deal in that sort of ware, thanks. I did not tell
you, solely out of consideration for your feelings. I had hoped the
thing might have been recovered by this time--then I would have told
you. And look here, Cynthia. Would it surprise you to learn that I am
getting more than a little sick of this sort of thing. I am not
accustomed to being found fault with and hectored every minute of the
day. In fact, I'm too old for it, and much too old ever to grow used to
it. And since I've been down here this time there's hardly a moment you
haven't been setting me to rights and generally finding fault with me.
Well, if that's the order of the day now, what will it be if we are to
spend our lives together? Really, I think we'd better seriously
reconsider that programme."
She looked at him. Just her father's warning. But she was too angry
for prudent counsel to prevail.
"Do you mean that?" she said, breathing quickly.
"Certainly I do. It is not too late to warn you that mine is not the
temperament to submit to perpetual dictation."
"Very well, then. It is your doing, your choice, remember." And
turning from him she passed into the house.