MISSING
by
MRS. HUMPHRY WARD
Author of "Robert Elsmere," "Lady Rose's Daughter,"
"The Mating of Lydia," etc.
Frontispiece in Colour by C. Allan Gilbert
[Illustration: _Deeply regret to inform you your husband reported
wounded and missing_]
PART I
MISSING
CHAPTER I
'Shall I set the tea, Miss?'
Miss Cookson turned from the window.
'Yes--bring it up--except the tea of course--they ought to be here at
any time.'
'And Mrs. Weston wants to know what time supper's to be?'
The fair-haired girl speaking was clearly north-country. She pronounced
the 'u' in 'supper,' as though it were the German 'u' in _Suppe_.
Miss Cookson shrugged her shoulders.
'Well, they'll settle that.'
The tone was sharp and off-hand. And the maid-servant, as she went
downstairs, decided for the twentieth time that afternoon, that she
didn't like Miss Cookson, and she hoped her sister, Mrs. Sarratt, would
be nicer. Miss Cookson had been poking her nose into everything that
afternoon, fiddling with the rooms and furniture, and interfering with
Mrs. Weston. As if Mrs. Weston didn't know what to order for lodgers,
and how to make them comfortable! As if she hadn't had dozens of brides
and bridegrooms to look after before this!--and if she hadn't given
them all satisfaction, would they ever have sent her all them
picture-postcards which decorated her little parlour downstairs?
All the same, the house-parlourmaid, Milly by name, was a good deal
excited about this particular couple who were now expected. For Mrs.
Weston had told her it had been a 'war wedding,' and the bridegroom was
going off to the front in a week. Milly's own private affairs--in
connection with a good-looking fellow, formerly a gardener at Bowness,
now recently enlisted in one of the Border regiments--had caused her to
take a special interest in the information, and had perhaps led her to
put a bunch of monthly roses on Mrs. Sarratt's dressing-table. Miss
Cookson hadn't bothered herself about flowers. That she might have
done!--instead of fussing over things that didn't concern her--just for
the sake of ordering people about.
When the little red-haired maid had left the room, the lady she disliked
returned to the window, and stood there absorbed in reflections that
were not gay, to judge from the furrowed brow and pinched lips that
accompanied them. Bridget Cookson was about thirty; not precisely
handsome, but at the same time, not ill-looking. Her eyes were large and
striking, and she had masses of dark hair, tightly coiled about her head
as though its owner felt it troublesome and in the way. She was thin,
but rather largely built, and her movements were quick and decided. Her
tweed dress was fashionably cut, but severely without small ornament of
any kind.
She looked out upon a beautiful corner of English Lakeland. The house in
which she stood was built on the side of a little river, which, as she
saw it, came flashing and sparkling out of a lake beyond, lying in broad
strips of light and shade amid green surrounding fells. The sun was
slipping low, and would soon have kindled all the lake into a white
fire, in which its islands would have almost disappeared. But, for the
moment, everything was plain:--the sky, full of light, and filmy grey
cloud, the fells with their mingling of wood and purple crag, the
shallow reach of the river beyond the garden, with a little family of
wild duck floating upon it, and just below her a vivid splash of colour,
a mass of rhododendron in bloom, setting its rose-pink challenge against
the cool greys and greens of the fell.
But Bridget Cookson was not admiring the view. It was not new to her,
and moreover she was not in love with Westmorland at all; and why Nelly
should have chosen this particular spot, to live in, while George was at
the war, she did not understand. She believed there was some sentimental
reason. They had first seen him in the Lakes--just before the war--when
they two girls and their father were staying actually in this very
lodging-house. But sentimental reasons are nothing.
Well, the thing was done. Nelly was married, and in another week, George
would be at the front. Perhaps in a fortnight's time she would be a
widow. Such things have happened often. 'And then what shall I do with
her?' thought the sister, irritably,--recoiling from a sudden vision of
Nelly in sorrow, which seemed to threaten her own life with even greater
dislocation than had happened to it already. 'I must have my time to
myself!--freedom for what I want'--she thought to herself, impatiently,
'I can't be always looking after her.'
Yet of course the fact remained that there was no one else to look after
Nelly. They had been left alone in the world for a good while now. Their
father, a Manchester cotton-broker in a small way, had died some six
months before this date, leaving more debts than fortune. The two girls
had found themselves left with very small means, and had lived, of late,
mainly in lodgings--unfurnished rooms--with some of their old furniture
and household things round them. Their father, though unsuccessful in
business, had been ambitious in an old-fashioned way for his children,
and they had been brought up 'as gentlefolks'--that is to say without
any trade or profession.
But their poverty had pinched them disagreeably--especially Bridget, in
whom it had produced a kind of angry resentment. Their education had not
been serious enough, in these days of competition, to enable them to
make anything of teaching after their Father's death. Nelly's
water-colour drawing, for instance, though it was a passion with her,
was quite untrained, and its results unmarketable. Bridget had taken up
one subject after another, and generally in a spirit of antagonism to
her surroundings, who, according to her, were always 'interfering' with
what she wanted to do,--with her serious and important occupations. But
these occupations always ended by coming to nothing; so that, as Bridget
was irritably aware, even Nelly had ceased to be as much in awe of them
as she had once been.
But the elder sister had more solid cause than this for dissatisfaction
with the younger. Nelly had really behaved like a little fool! The one
family asset of which a great deal might have been made--should have
been made--was Nelly's prettiness. She was _very_ pretty--absurdly
pretty--and had been a great deal run after in Manchester already. There
had been actually two proposals from elderly men with money, who were
unaware of the child's engagement, during the past three months; and
though these particular suitors were perhaps unattractive, yet a little
time and patience, and the right man would have come along, both
acceptable in himself, and sufficiently supplied with money to make
everything easy for everybody.
But Nelly had just wilfully and stubbornly fallen in love with this
young man--and wilfully and stubbornly married him. It was unlike her to
be stubborn about anything. But in this there had been no moving her.
And now there was nothing before either of them but the same shabbiness
and penury as before. What if George had two hundred and fifty a year
of his own, besides his pay?--a fact that Nelly was always triumphantly
brandishing in her sister's eyes.
No doubt it was more than most young subalterns had--much more. But what
was two hundred and fifty a year? Nelly would want every penny of it for
herself--and her child--or children. For of course there would be a
child--Bridget Cookson fell into profound depths of thought, emerging
from them, now as often before, with the sore realisation of how much
Nelly might have done with her 'one talent,' both for herself and her
sister, and had not done.
The sun dropped lower; one side of the lake was now in shadow, and from
the green shore beneath the woods and rocks, the reflections of tree and
crag and grassy slope were dropping down and down, unearthly clear and
far, to that inverted heaven in the 'steady bosom' of the water. A
little breeze came wandering, bringing delicious scents of grass and
moss, and in the lake the fish were rising.
Miss Cookson moved away from the window. How late they were! She would
hardly get home in time for her own supper. They would probably ask her
to stay and sup with them. But she did not intend to stay. Honeymooners
were much better left to themselves. Nelly would be a dreadfully
sentimental bride; and then dreadfully upset when George went away. She
had asked her sister to join them in the Lakes, and it was taken for
granted that they would resume living together after George's departure.
But Bridget had fixed her own lodgings, for the present, a mile away,
and did not mean to see much of her sister till the bridegroom had gone.
There was the sound of a motor-car on the road, which ran along one side
of the garden, divided from it by a high wall. It could hardly be they;
for they were coming frugally by the coach. But Miss Cookson went across
to a side window looking on the road to investigate.
At the foot of the hill opposite stood a luxurious car, waiting
evidently for the party which was now descending the hill towards it.
Bridget had a clear view of them, herself unseen behind Mrs. Weston's
muslin blinds. A girl was in front, with a young man in khaki, a
convalescent officer, to judge from his frail look and hollow eyes. The
girl was exactly like the fashion-plate in the morning's paper. She wore
a very short skirt and Zouave jacket in grey cloth, high-heeled grey
boots, with black tips and gaiters, a preposterous little hat perched on
one side of a broad white forehead, across which the hair was parted
like a boy's, and an ostrich plume on the top of the hat, which nodded
and fluttered so extravagantly that the face beneath almost escaped the
spectator's notice. Yet it was on the whole a handsome face, audacious,
like its owner's costume, and with evident signs--for Bridget Cookson's
sharp eyes--of slight make-up.
Miss Cookson knew who she was. She had seen her in the neighbouring
town that morning, and had heard much gossip about her. She was Miss
Farrell, of Carton Hall, and that gentleman coming down the hill more
slowly behind her was no doubt her brother Sir William.
Lame? That of course was the reason why he was not in the army. It was
not very conspicuous, but still quite definite. A stiff knee, Miss
Cookson supposed--an accident perhaps--some time ago. Lucky for him!--on
any reasonable view. Bridget Cookson thought the war 'odious,' and gave
no more attention to it than she could help. It had lasted now nearly a
year, and she was heartily sick of it. It filled the papers with
monotonous news which tired her attention--which she did not really try
to understand. Now she supposed she would have to understand it. For
George, her new brother-in-law, was sure to talk a terrible amount of
shop.
Sir William was very tall certainly, and good-looking. He had a short
pointed beard, a ruddy, sunburnt complexion, blue eyes and broad
shoulders--the common points of the well-born and landowning
Englishman. Bridget looked at him with a mixture of respect and
hostility. To be rich was to be so far interesting; still all such
persons, belonging to a world of which she knew nothing, were in her
eyes 'swells,' and gave themselves airs; a procedure on their part,
which would be stopped when the middle and lower classes were powerful
enough to put them in their place. It was said, however, that this
particular man was rather a remarkable specimen of his kind--didn't
hunt--didn't preserve--had trained as an artist, and even exhibited. The
shopwoman in B---- from whom Miss Cookson derived her information about
the Farrells, had described Sir William as 'queer'--said everybody knew
he was 'queer.' Nobody could get him to do any county work. He hated
Committees, and never went near them. It was said he had been in love
and the lady had died. 'But if we all turned lazy for that kind of
thing!'--said the little shopwoman, shrugging her shoulders. Still the
Farrells were not unpopular. Sir William had a pleasant slow way of
talking, especially to the small folk; and he had just done something
very generous in giving up his house--the whole of his house--somewhere
Cockermouth way, to the War Office, as a hospital. As for his sister,
she seemed to like driving convalescent officers about, and throwing
away money on her clothes. There was no sign of 'war economy' about Miss
Farrell.
Here, however, the shopwoman's stream of gossip was arrested by the
arrival of a new customer. Bridget was not sorry. She had not been at
all interested in the Farrells' idiosyncrasies; and she only watched
their preparations for departure now, for lack of something to do. The
chauffeur was waiting beside the car, and Miss Farrell got in first,
taking the front seat. Then Sir William, who had been loitering on the
hill, hurried down to give a helping hand to the young officer, who was
evidently only in the early stages of convalescence. After settling his
guest comfortably, he turned to speak to his chauffeur, apparently about
their road home, as he took a map out of his pocket.
At this moment, a clatter of horses' hoofs and the rattle of a coach
were heard. Round the corner, swung the Windermere evening coach in fine
style, and drew up at the door of Mrs. Weston's lodgings, a little ahead
of the car.
'There they are!' said Miss Cookson, excited in spite of herself. 'Well,
I needn't go down. George will bring in the luggage.'
A young man and a young lady got up from their seats. A ladder was
brought for the lady to descend. But just as she was about to step on
it, a fidgeting horse in front made a movement, the ladder slipped, and
the lady was only just in time to withdraw her foot and save herself.
Sir William Farrell, who had seen the little incident, ran forward,
while the man who had been placing the ladder went to the horse, which
was capering and trying to rear in his eagerness to be off.
Sir William raised the ladder, and set it firmly against the coach.
'I think you might risk it now,' he said, raising his eyes pleasantly to
the young person above him.
'Thank you,' said a shy voice. Mrs. Sarratt turned round and descended.
Meanwhile the man holding the ladder saw an officer in khaki standing
on the top of the coach, and heard him address a word of laughing
encouragement to the lady. And no sooner had her feet touched the ground
than he was at her side in a trice.
'Thank you, Sir!' he said, saluting. 'My wife was very nearly thrown
off. That horse has been giving trouble all the way.'
'Must be content with what you can get, in war-time!' said the other
smiling, as he raised his hat to the young woman he had befriended, whom
he now saw plainly. 'And there are so few visitors at present in these
parts that what horses there are don't get enough to do.'
The face turned upon him was so exquisite in line and colour that Sir
William, suddenly struck, instead of retreating to his car, lingered
while the soldier husband--a lieutenant, to judge from the stripes on
his cuff,--collected a rather large amount of luggage from the top of
the coach.
'You must have had a lovely drive along Windermere,' said Sir William
politely. 'Let me carry that bag for you. You're stopping here?'
'Yes--' said Mrs. Sarratt, distractedly, watching to see that the
luggage was all right. 'Oh, George, _do_ take care of that parcel!'
'All right.'
But she had spoken too late. As her husband, having handed over two suit
cases to Mrs. Weston's fourteen-year old boy, came towards her with a
large brown paper parcel, the string of it slipped, Mrs. Sarratt gave a
little cry, and but for her prompt rush to his assistance, its contents
would have descended into the road. But through a gap in the paper
various tin and china objects were disclosed.
'That's your "cooker," Nelly,' said her husband laughing. 'I told you it
would bust the show!'
But her tiny, deft fingers rapidly repaired the damage, and re-tied the
string while he assisted her. The coach drove off, and Sir William
patiently held the bag. Then she insisted on carrying the parcel
herself, and the lieutenant relieved Sir William.
'Awfully obliged to you!' he said gratefully. 'Good evening! We're
stopping here for a bit' He pointed to the open door of the
lodging-house, where Mrs. Weston and the boy were grappling with the
luggage.
'May I ask--' Sir William's smile as he looked from one to the other
expressed that loosening of conventions in which we have all lived since
the war--'Are you home on leave, or--'
'I came home to be married,' said the young soldier, flushing slightly,
while his eyes crossed those of the young girl beside him. 'I've got a
week more.'
'You've been out some time?'
'Since last November. I got a scratch in the Ypres fight in April--oh,
nothing--a small flesh wound--but they gave me a month's leave, and my
medical board has only just passed me.'
'Lanchesters?' said Sir William, looking at his cap. The other nodded
pleasantly.
'Well, I am sure I hope you'll have good weather here,' said Sir
William, stepping back, and once more raising his hat to the bride.
'And--if there was Anything I could do to help your stay--'
'Oh, thank you, Sir, but--'
The pair smiled again at each other. Sir William understood, and smiled
too. A more engaging couple he thought he had never seen. The young man
was not exactly handsome, but he had a pair of charming hazel eyes, a
good-tempered mouth, and a really fine brow. He was tall too, and well
proportioned, and looked the pick of physical fitness. 'Just the kind of
splendid stuff we are sending out by the ship-load,' thought the elder
man, with a pang of envy--'And the girl's lovely!'
She was at that moment bowing to him, as she followed her husband across
the road. A thought occurred to Sir William, and he pursued her.
'I wonder--' he said diffidently--'if you care for boating--if you would
like to boat on the lake--'
'Oh, but it isn't allowed!' She turned on him a pair of astonished eyes.
'Not in general. Ah, I see you know these parts already. But I happen to
know the owner of the boathouse. Shall I get you leave?'
'Oh, that _would_ be delightful!' she said, her face kindling with a
child's joyousness. 'That _is_ kind of you! Our name is Sarratt--my
husband is Lieutenant Sarratt.'
--'Of the 21st Lanchesters? All right--I'll see to it!'
And he ran back to his car, while the young people disappeared into the
little entrance hall of the lodging-house, and the door shut upon them.
Miss Farrell received her brother with gibes. Trust William for finding
out a beauty! Who were they?
Farrell handed on his information as the car sped along the Keswick
road.
'Going back in a week, is he?' said the convalescent officer beside him.
Then, bitterly--'lucky dog!'
Farrell looked at the speaker kindly.
'What--with a wife to leave?'
The boy, for he was little more, shrugged his shoulders. At that moment
he knew no passion but the passion for the regiment and his men, to whom
he couldn't get back, because his 'beastly constitution' wouldn't let
him recover as quickly as other men did. What did women matter?--when
the 'push' might be on, any day.
Cicely Farrell continued to chaff her brother, who took it
placidly--fortified by a big cigar.
'And if she'd been plain, Willy, you'd never have so much as known she
was there! Did you tell her you haunted these parts?'
He shook his head.
* * * * *
Meanwhile the bride and bridegroom had been met on the lodging-house
stairs by the bride's sister, who allowed herself to be kissed by the
bridegroom, and hugged by the bride. Her lack of effusion, however, made
little impression on the newcomers. They were in that state of happiness
which transfigures everything round it; they were delighted with the
smallest things; with the little lodging-house sitting room, its windows
open to the lake and river; with its muslin curtains, very clean and
white, its duster-rose too, just outside the window; with Mrs. Weston,
who in her friendly flurry had greeted the bride as 'Miss Nelly,' and
was bustling to get the tea; even, indeed, with Bridget Cookson's few
casual attentions to them. Mrs. Sarratt thought it 'dear' of Bridget to
have come to meet them, and ordered tea for them, and put those
delicious roses in her room--
'I didn't!' said Bridget, drily. 'That was Milly. It didn't occur to
me.'
The bride looked a little checked. But then the tea came in, a real
Westmorland meal, with its toasted bun, its jam, and its 'twist' of new
bread; and Nelly Sarratt forgot everything but the pleasure of making
her husband eat, of filling his cup for him, of looking sometimes
through the window at that shining lake, beside which she and George
would soon be roaming--for six long days. Yes, and nights too. For there
was a moon rising, which would be at the full in two or three days.
Imagination flew forward, as she leant dreamily back in her chair when
the meal was over, her eyes on the landscape. They two alone--on that
warm summer lake--drifting in the moonlight--heart against heart, cheek
against cheek. A shiver ran through her, which was partly passion,
partly a dull fear. But she banished fear. Nothing--_nothing_ should
spoil their week together.
'Darling!' said her husband, who had been watching her--'You're not very
tired?' He slipped his hand round hers, and her fingers rested in his
clasp, delighted to feel themselves so small, and his so strong. He had
spoken to her in the low voice that was hers alone. She was jealous lest
Bridget should have overheard it. But Bridget was at the other end of
the room. How foolish it had been of her--just because she was so happy,
and wanted to be nice to everybody!--to have asked Bridget to stay with
them! She was always doing silly things like that--impulsive things. But
now she was married. She must think more. It was really very considerate
of Bridget to have got them all out of a difficulty and to have settled
herself a mile away from them; though at first it had seemed rather
unkind. Now they could see her always sometime in the day, but not so as
to interfere. She was afraid Bridget and George would never really get
on, though she--Nelly--wanted to forget all the unpleasantness there had
been,--to forget everything--everything but George. The fortnight's
honeymoon lay like a haze of sunlight between her and the past.
But Bridget had noticed the voice and the clasped hands,--with
irritation. Really, after a fortnight, they might have done with that
kind of demonstrativeness. All the same, Nelly was quite extraordinarily
pretty--prettier than ever. While the sister was slowly putting on her
hat before the only mirror the sitting-room possessed, she was keenly
conscious of the two figures near the window, of the man in khaki
sitting on the arm of Nelly's chair, holding her hand, and looking down
upon her, of Nelly's flushed cheek and bending head. What a baby she
looked!--scarcely seventeen. Yet she was really twenty-one--old enough,
by a long way, to have done better for herself than this! Oh, George, in
himself, was well enough. If he came back from the war, his new-made
sister-in-law supposed she would get used to him in time. Bridget
however did not find it easy to get on with men, especially young men,
of whom she knew very few. For eight or ten years now, she had looked
upon them chiefly as awkward and inconvenient facts in women's lives.
Before that time, she could remember a few silly feelings on her own
part, especially with regard to a young clerk of her father's, who had
made love to her up to the very day when he shamefacedly told her that
he was already engaged, and would soon be married. That event had been a
shock to her, and had made her cautious and suspicious towards men ever
since. Her life was now full of quite other interests--incoherent and
changeable, but strong while they lasted. Nelly's state of bliss awoke
no answering sympathy in her.
'Well, good-bye, Nelly,' she said, when she had put on her
things--advancing towards them, while the lieutenant rose to his feet.
'I expect Mrs. Weston will make you comfortable. I ordered in all the
things for to-morrow.'
'Everything's _charming_!' said Nelly, as she put her arms round her
sister. 'It was awfully good of you to see to it all. Will you come over
to lunch to-morrow? We might take you somewhere.'
'Oh, don't bother about me! You won't want me. I'll look in some time.
I've got a lot of work to do.'
Nelly withdrew her arms. George Sarratt surveyed his sister-in-law with
curiosity.
'Work?' he repeated, with his pleasant, rather puzzled smile.
'What are you doing now, Bridget?' said Nelly, softly, stroking the
sleeve of her sister's jacket, but really conscious only of the man
beside her.
'Reading some proof-sheets for a friend,' was the rather short reply, as
Bridget released herself.
'Something dreadfully difficult?' laughed Nelly.
'I don't know what you mean by difficult,' said Bridget ungraciously,
looking for her gloves. 'It's psychology--that's all. Lucy Fenn's
bringing out another volume of essays.'
'It sounds awful!' said George Sarratt, laughing. 'I wish I knew what
psychology was about. But can't you take a holiday?--just this week?'
He looked at her rather gravely. But Bridget shook her head, and again
said good-bye. George Sarratt took her downstairs, and saw her off on
her bicycle. Then he returned smiling, to his wife.
'I say, Bridget makes me feel a dunce! Is she really such a learned
party?'
Nelly's dark eyes danced a little. 'I suppose she is--but she doesn't
stick to anything. It's always something different. A few months ago, it
was geology; and we used to go out for walks with a hammer and a bag.
Last year it was _the_-ology! Our poor clergyman, Mr. Richardson, was no
match for Bridget at all. She could always bowl him over.'
'Somehow all the "ologies" seem very far away--don't they?' murmured
Sarratt, after they had laughed together. They were standing at the
window again, his arm close round her, her small dark head pressed
against him. There was ecstasy in their nearness to each other--in the
silver beauty of the lake--in the soft coming of the June evening; and
in that stern fact itself that in one short week, he would have left
her, would be facing death or mutilation, day after day, in the trenches
on the Ypres salient. While he held her, all sorts of images flitted
through his mind--of which he would not have told her for the
world--horrible facts of bloody war. In eight months he had seen plenty
of them. The signs of them were graven on his young face, on his eyes,
round which a slight permanent frown, as of perplexity, seemed to have
settled, and on his mouth which was no longer naif and boyish, but would
always drop with repose into a hard compressed line.
Nelly looked up.
'Everything's far away'--she whispered--'but this--and you!' He kissed
her upturned lips--and there was silence.
Then a robin singing outside in the evening hush, sent a message to
them. Nelly with an effort drew herself away.
'Shan't we go out? We'll tell Mrs. Weston to put supper on the table,
and we can come in when we like. But I'll just unpack a little first--in
our room.'
She disappeared through a door at the end of the sitting-room. Her last
words--softly spoken--produced a kind of shock of joy in Sarratt. He sat
motionless, hearing the echo of them, till she reappeared. When she came
back, she had taken off her serge travelling dress and was wearing a
little gown of some white cotton stuff, with a blue cloak, the evening
having turned chilly, and a hat with a blue ribbon. In this garb she was
a vision of innocent beauty; wherein refinement and a touch of
strangeness combined with the dark brilliance of eyes and hair, with the
pale, slightly sunburnt skin, the small features and tiny throat, to
rivet the spectator. And she probably knew it, for she flushed slightly
under her husband's eyes.
'Oh, what a paradise!' she said, under her breath, pointing to the scene
beyond the window. Then--lifting appealing hands to him--'Take me
there!'
CHAPTER II
The newly-married pair crossed a wooden bridge over the stream from the
Lake, and found themselves on its further shore, a shore as untouched
and unspoilt now as when Wordsworth knew it, a hundred years ago. The
sun had only just vanished out of sight behind the Grasmere fells, and
the long Westmorland after-glow would linger for nearly a couple of
hours yet. After much rain the skies were clear, and all the omens fair.
But the rain had left its laughing message behind; in the full river, in
the streams leaping down the fells, in the freshness of every living
thing--the new-leafed trees, the grass with its flowers, the rushes
spreading their light armies through the flooded margins of the lake,
and bending to the light wind, which had just, as though in mischief,
blotted out the dream-world in the water, and set it rippling eastwards
in one sheet of living silver, broken only by a cloud-shadow at its
further end. Fragrance was everywhere--from the trees, the young fern,
the grass; and from the shining west, the shadowed fells, the brilliant
water, there breathed a voice of triumphant beauty, of unconquered
peace, which presently affected George Sarratt strangely.
They had just passed through a little wood; and in its friendly gloom,
he had put his arm round his wife so that they had lingered a little,
loth to leave its shelter. But now they had emerged again upon the
radiance of the fell-side, and he had found a stone for Nelly to rest
on.
'That those places in France, and that sky--should be in the same
world!' he said, under his breath, pointing to the glow on the eastern
fells, as he threw himself down on the turf beside her.
Her face flushed with exercise and happiness suddenly darkened.
'Don't--don't talk of them to-night!'--she said passionately--'not
to-night--just to-night, George!'
And she stooped impetuously to lay her hand on his lips. He kissed the
hand, held it, and remained silent, his eyes fixed upon the lake. On
that day week he would probably just have rejoined his regiment. It was
somewhere in the neighbourhood of Bailleul. Hot work, he heard, was
expected. There was still a scandalous shortage of ammunition--and if
there was really to be a 'push,' the losses would be appalling. Man
after man that he knew had been killed within a week--two or three
days--twenty-four hours even!--of rejoining. Supposing that within a
fortnight Nelly sat here, looking at this lake, with the War Office
telegram in her hand--'Deeply regret to inform you, etc.' This was not a
subject on which he had ever allowed himself to dwell, more than in his
changed circumstances he was bound to dwell. Every soldier, normally,
expects to get through. But of course he had done everything that was
necessary for Nelly. His will was in the proper hands; and the night
before their wedding he had written a letter to her, to be given her if
he fell. Otherwise he had taken little account of possible death; nor
had it cost him any trouble to banish the thought of it.
But the beauty of the evening--of this old earth, which takes no account
of the perishing of men--and Nelly's warm life beside him, hanging upon
his, perhaps already containing within it the mysterious promise of
another life, had suddenly brought upon him a tremor of soul--an inward
shudder. Did he really believe in existence after death--in a meeting
again, in some dim other scene, if they were violently parted now? He
had been confirmed while at school. His parents were Church people of a
rather languid type, and it seemed the natural thing to do. Since then
he had occasionally taken the Communion, largely to please an elder
school-friend, who was ardently devout, and was now a Chaplain on the
Western front. But what did it really mean to him?--what would it mean
to _her_--if she were left alone? Images passed through his mind--the
sights of the trenches--shattered and dying bodies. What was the
_soul_?--had it really an independent life? _Something_ there was in
men--quite rough and common men--something revealed by war and the
sufferings of war--so splendid, so infinitely beyond anything he had
ever dreamed of in ordinary life, that to think of it roused in him a
passion of hidden feeling--perhaps adoration--but vague and
speechless--adoration of he knew not what. He did not speak easily of
his feeling, even to his young wife, to whom marriage had so closely, so
ineffably bound him. But as he lay on the grass looking up at
her--smiling--obeying her command of silence, his thoughts ranged
irrepressibly. Supposing he fell, and she lived on--years and years--to
be an old woman? Old! Nelly? Impossible! He put his hand gently on the
slender foot, and felt the pulsing life in it. 'Dearest!' she murmured
at his touch, and their eyes met tenderly.
'I should be content--' he thought--'if we could just live _this_ life
out! I don't believe I should want another life. But to go--and leave
her; to go--just at the beginning--before one knows anything--before one
has finished anything--'
And again his eyes wandered from her to the suffusion of light and
colour on the lake. 'How could anyone ever want anything better than
this earth--this life--at its best--if only one were allowed a full and
normal share of it!' And he thought again, almost with a leap of
exasperation, of those dead and mangled men--out there--in France. Who
was responsible--God?--or man? But man's will is--must be--something
dependent--something included in God's will. If God really existed, and
if He willed war, and sudden death--then there must be another life. Or
else the power that devised the world was not a good, but an evil--at
best, a blind one.
But while his young brain was racing through the old puzzles in the old
ways, Nelly was thinking of something quite different. Her delicate
small face kept breaking into little smiles with pensive intervals--till
at last she broke out--
'Do you remember how I caught you--turning back to look after us--just
here--just about here? You had passed that thorn tree--'
He came back to love-making with delight.
'"Caught me!" I like that! As if you weren't looking back too! How else
did you know anything about me?'
He had taken his seat beside her on the rock, and her curly black head
was nestling against his shoulder. There was no one on the mountain
path, no one on the lake. Occasionally from the main road on the
opposite shore there was a passing sound of wheels. Otherwise the world
was theirs--its abysses of shadow, its 'majesties of light.'
She laughed joyously, not attempting to contradict him. It was on this
very path, just two months before the war, that they had first seen each
other. She with her father and Bridget were staying at Mrs. Weston's
lodgings, because she, Nelly, had had influenza, and the doctor had sent
her away for a change. They knew the Lakes well already, as is the way
of Manchester folk. Their father, a hard-worked, and often melancholy
man, had delighted in them, summer and winter, and his two girls had
trudged about the fells with him year after year, and wanted nothing
different or better. At least, Nelly had always been content. Bridget
had grumbled often, and proposed Blackpool, or Llandudno, or Eastbourne
for a change. But their father did not like 'crowds.' They came to the
Lakes always before or after the regular season. Mr. Cookson hated the
concourse of motorists in August, and never would use one himself. Not
even when they went from Ambleside to Keswick. They must always walk, or
go by the horse-coach.
Nelly presently looked up, and gave a little pull to the corner of her
husband's moustache.
'Of course you know you behaved abominably that next day at Wythburn!
You kept that whole party waiting while you ran after us. And I hadn't
dropped that bag. You knew very well I hadn't dropped it!'
He chuckled.
'It did as well as anything else. I got five minutes' talk with you. I
found out where you lodged.'
'Poor papa!'--said Nelly reflectively--'he was so puzzled. "There's that
fellow we saw at Wythburn again! Why on earth does he come here to fish?
I never saw anybody catch a thing in this bit of the river." Poor papa!'
They were both silent a little. Mr. Cookson had not lived long enough to
see Nelly and George Sarratt engaged. The war had killed him. Financial
embarrassment was already closing on him when it broke out, and he
could not stand the shock and the general dislocation of the first
weeks, as sounder men could. The terror of ruin broke him down--and he
was dead before Christmas, nominally of bronchitis and heart failure.
Nelly had worn mourning for him up to her wedding day. She had been very
sorry for 'poor papa'--and very fond of him; whereas Bridget had been
rather hard on him always. For really he had done his best. After all he
had left them just enough to live upon. Nelly's conscience, grown
tenderer than of old under the touch of joy, pricked her as she thought
of her father. She knew he had loved her best of his two daughters. She
would always remember his last lingering hand-clasp, always be thankful
for his last few words--'God bless you, dear.' But had she cared for him
enough in return?--had she really tried to understand him? Some
vague sense of the pathos of age--of its isolation--its dumb
renouncements--gripped her. If he had only lived longer! He would have
been so proud of George.
She roused herself.
'You did really make up your mind--_then_?' she asked him, just for the
pleasure of hearing him confess it again.
'Of course I did! But what was the good?'
She knew that he meant it had been impossible to speak while his mother
was still alive, and he, her only child, was partly dependent upon her.
But his mother had died not long after Nelly's father, and her little
income had come to her son. So now what with Nelly's small portion, and
his mother's two hundred and fifty a year in addition to his pay, the
young subaltern thought himself almost rich--in comparison with so many
others. His father, who had died while he was still at school, had been
a master at Harrow, and he had been brought up in a refined home, with
high standards and ideals. A scholarship at Oxford at one of the smaller
colleges, a creditable degree, then an opening in the office of a
well-known firm of solicitors, friends of his father, and a temporary
commission, as soon as war broke out, on his record as a keen and
diligent member of the Harrow and Oxford O.T.C.'s:--these had been the
chief facts of his life up to August 1914;--that August which covered
the roads leading to the Aldershot headquarters, day by day, with the
ever-renewed columns of the army to be, with masses of marching men,
whose eager eyes said one thing only--'_Training_!--_training_!'
The war, and the causes of the war, had moved his nature, which was
sincere and upright, profoundly; all the more perhaps because of a
certain kindling and awakening of the whole man, which had come from his
first sight of Nelly Cookson in the previous June, and from his growing
friendship with her--which he must not yet call love. He had decided
however after three meetings with her that he would never marry anyone
else. Her softness, her yieldingness, her delicate beauty intoxicated
him. He rejoiced that she was no 'new woman,' but only a very girlish
and undeveloped creature, who would naturally want his protection as
well as his love. For it was his character to protect and serve. He had
protected and served his mother--faithfully and well. And as she was
dying, he had told her about Nelly--not before; only to find that she
knew it all, and that the only soreness he had ever caused her came from
the secrecy which he had tenderly thought her due.
But for all his sanity and sweet temper there was a hard tough strain in
him, which had made war so far, even through the horrors of it, a great
absorbing game to him, for which he knew himself fitted, in which he
meant to excel. Several times during the fighting that led up to Neuve
Chapelle he had drawn the attention of his superiors, both for bravery
and judgment; and after Neuve Chapelle, he had been mentioned in
despatches. He had never yet known fear in the field--never even such a
shudder at the unknown--which was yet the possible!--as he had just been
conscious of. His nerves had always been strong, his nature was in the
main simple. Yet for him, as well as for so many other 'fellows' he
knew, the war had meant a great deal of this new and puzzled
thinking--on problems of right and wrong, of 'whence' and 'whither,' of
the personal value of men--this man, or that man. By George, war brought
them out!--these personal values. And the general result for him, up to
now,--had he been specially lucky?--had been a vast increase of faith in
his fellow men, yes, and faith in himself, modest as he was. He was
proud to be an English soldier--proud to the roots of his being. His
quiet patriotism had become a passion; he knew now in what he had
believed.
Yes--England for ever! An English home after the war--and English
children. Oh, he hoped Nelly would have children! As he held her pressed
against him, he seemed to see her in the future--with the small things
round her. But he did not speak of it.
She meanwhile was thinking of quite other things, and presently she said
in a quick, troubled voice--
'George!--while you are away--you don't want me to do munitions?'
He laughed out.
'Munitions! I see you at a lathe! Dear--I don't think you'd earn your
keep!' And he lifted her delicate arm and tiny hand, and looked at them
with scientific curiosity. Her frail build was a constant wonder and
pleasure to him. But small as she was, there was something unusual, some
prophecy, perhaps, of developments to come, in the carriage of her head,
and in some of her looks. Her education had been extremely slight, many
of her ideas were still childish, and the circle from which she came had
been inferior in birth and breeding to his own. But he had soon realised
on their honeymoon, in spite of her simple talk, that she was very
quick--very intelligent.
'Because--' she went on, doubtfully--'there are so many other things I
could do--quite useful things. There's sphagnum moss! Everybody up here
is gathering sphagnum moss--you know--for bandages--upon the fells. I
daresay Bridget might help in that. She won't do any other sort of
war-work.'
'Why, I thought all women were doing some kind of war-work!'
'Bridget won't. She doesn't want to hear about the war at all. She's
bored with it.'
'Bored with it! Good heavens!' Sarratt's countenance clouded.
'Darling--that'll be rather hard on you, if you and she are going to
live together.'
Nelly lifted her head from his shoulder, and looked at him rather
gravely.
'I'm afraid you don't know much about Bridget, George. She's,--well,
she's--one of the--oddest women you ever met.'
'So it seems! But why is she bored with the war?'
'Well--you see--it doesn't matter to _her_ in any way--and she doesn't
want it to matter to her. There's nobody in it she cares about.'
'Thanks!' laughed Sarratt. But Nelly still grave, shook her head. 'Oh,
she's not the least like other people. She won't care about you, George,
just because you've married me. And--'
'And what? Is she still angry with me for not being rich?'
And his thoughts went back to his first interview with Bridget
Cookson--on the day when their engagement was announced. He could see
the tall sharp-featured woman now, standing with her back to the light
in the little sitting-room of the Manchester lodgings. She had not been
fierce or abusive at all. She had accepted it quietly--with only a few
bitter sentences.
'All right, Mr. Sarratt. I have nothing to say. Nelly must please
herself. But you've done her an injury! There are plenty of rich men
that would have married her. You're very poor--and so are we.'
When the words were spoken, Nelly had just accepted him; she was her own
mistress; he had not therefore taken her sister's disapproval much to
heart. Still the words had rankled.
'Darling!--when I made you marry me--_did_ I do you an injury?' he said
suddenly, as they were walking again hand in hand along the high green
path with the lake at their feet, and a vision of blue and rose before
them, in the shadowed western mountains, the lower grounds steeped in
fiery light, and the red reflections in the still water.
'What _do_ you mean?' said Nelly, turning upon him a face of wonder.
'Well, that was what Bridget said to me, when I told her that you had
accepted me. But I was a great fool to tell you, darling! I'm sorry I
did. It was only--'
'"Injury,"' repeated Nelly, not listening to him. 'Oh, yes, of course
that was money. Bridget says it's all nonsense talking about honour, or
love, or that kind of thing. Everything is really money. It was money
that began this war. The Germans wanted our trade and our money--and we
were determined they shouldn't have them--and that's all there is in it.
With money you can have everything you want and a jolly life--and
without money you can have nothing,--and are just nobody. When that rich
old horror wanted to marry me last year in Manchester, Bridget thought
me perfectly mad to refuse him. She didn't speak to me for a week. Of
course he would have provided for her too.'
Sarratt had flushed hotly; but he spoke good-naturedly.
'Well, that was a miss for her--I quite see that. But after all we can
help her a bit. We shall always feel that we must look after her. And
why shouldn't she herself marry?'
Nelly laughed.
'Never! She hates men.'
There was a silence a moment. And then Sarratt said, rather gravely--'I
say, darling, if she's going to make you miserable while I am away,
hadn't we better make some other arrangement? I thought of course she
would be good to you, and look after you! Naturally any sister would,
that was worth her salt!'
And he looked down indignantly on the little figure beside him. But it
roused Nelly's mirth that he should put it in that way.
'George,--you _are_ such a darling!--and--and, such a goose!' She rubbed
her cheek against his arm as though to take the edge off the epithet.
'The idea of Bridget's wanting to "look after" me! She'll want to
_manage_ me of course--and I'd much better let her do it. I don't mind!'
And the speaker gave a long, sudden sigh.
'But I won't have you troubled and worried, when I'm not there to
protect you!' cried Sarratt, fiercely. 'You could easily find a friend.'
But Nelly shook her head.
'Oh, no. That wouldn't do. Bridget and I always get on, George. We never
quarrelled--except when I stuck to marrying you. Generally--I always
give in. It doesn't matter. It answers perfectly.'
She spoke with a kind of languid softness which puzzled him.
'But now you can't always give in, dearest! You belong to me!' And his
grasp tightened on the hand he held.
'I can give in enough--to keep the peace,' said Nelly slowly. 'And if
you weren't here, it wouldn't be natural that I shouldn't live with
Bridget. I'm used to her. Only I want to make you understand her,
darling. She's not a bit like--well, like the people you admire, and its
no good expecting her to be.'
'I shall talk to her before I go!' he said, half laughing, half
resolved.
Nelly looked alarmed.
'No--please don't! She always gets the better of people who scold her.
Or if you were to get the better, then she'd visit it on me. And now
don't let's talk of her any more! What were we saying? Oh, I know--what
I was to do. Let's sit down again,--there's a rock, made for us.'
And on a natural seat under a sheltering rock canopied and hung with
fern, the two rested once more, wrapped in one cloak, close beside the
water, which was quiet again, and crossed by the magical lights and
splendid shadows of the dying sunset. Nelly had been full of plans when
they sat down, but the nearness of the man she loved, his arm round her,
his life beating as it were in one pulse with hers, intoxicated, and for
a time silenced her. She had taken off her hat, and she lay quietly
against him in the warm shelter of the cloak. He thought presently she
was asleep. How small and dear she was! He bent over her, watching as
closely as the now dim light allowed, the dark eyelashes lying on her
cheek, her closed mouth, and soft breathing. His very own!--the thought
was ecstasy--he forgot the war, and the few days left him.
But this very intensity of brooding love in which he held her, made her
restless after a little. She sat up, and smiled at him--
'We must go home!--Yes, we must. But look!--there is a boat!'
And only a few yards from them, emerging from the shadows, they saw a
boat rocking gently at anchor beside a tiny landing-stage. Nelly sprang
to her feet.
'George!--suppose you were just to row us out--there--into the light!'
But when they came to the boat they found it pad-locked to a post in the
little pier.
'Ah, well, never mind,' said Nelly--'I'm sure that man won't forget?'
'That man who spoke to us? Who was he?'
'Oh, I found out from Bridget, and Mrs. Weston. He's Sir William
Farrell, a great swell, tremendously rich. He has a big place somewhere,
out beyond Keswick, beyond Bassenthwaite. You saw he had a stiff knee?'
'Yes. Can't fight, I suppose--poor beggar! He was very much struck by
_you_, Mrs. George Sarratt!--that was plain.'
Nelly laughed--a happy childish laugh.
'Well, if he does get us leave to boat, you needn't mind, need you? What
else, I wonder, could he do for us?'
'Nothing!' The tone was decided. 'I don't like being beholden to great
folk. But that, I suppose, is the kind of man whom Bridget would have
liked you to marry, darling?'
'As if he would ever have looked at me!' said Nelly tranquilly. 'A man
like that may be as rich as rich, but he would never marry a poor wife.'
'Thank God, I don't believe money will matter nearly as much to people,
after the war!' said Sarratt, with energy. 'It's astonishing how now, in
the army--of course it wasn't the same before the war--you forget it
entirely. Who cares whether a man's rich, or who's son he is? In my
batch when I went up to Aldershot there were men of all sorts,
stock-brokers, landowners, city men, manufacturers, solicitors, some of
them awfully rich, and then clerks, and schoolmasters, and lots of poor
devils, like myself. We didn't care a rap, except whether a man took to
his drill, or didn't; whether he was going to keep the Company back or
help it on. And it's just the same in the field. Nothing counts but what
you _are_--it doesn't matter a brass hap'orth what you have. And as the
new armies come along that'll be so more and more. It's "Duke's son and
Cook's son," everywhere, and all the time. If it was that in the South
African war, it's twenty times that now. This war is bringing the nation
together as nothing ever has done, or could do. War is hellish!--but
there's a deal to be said for it!'
He spoke with ardour, as they strolled homeward, along the darkening
shore, she hanging on his arm. Nelly said nothing. Her little face
showed very white in the gathering shadows. He went on.
'There was a Second Lieutenant in our battalion, an awfully handsome
boy--heir to a peerage I think. But he couldn't get a commission quick
enough to please him when the war broke out, so he just enlisted--oh! of
course they've given him a commission long ago. But his great friend was
a young miner, who spoke broad Northumberland, a jolly chap. And these
two stuck together--we used to call them the Heavenly Twins. And in the
fighting round Hill 60, the miner got wounded, and lay out between the
lines, with the Boche shells making hell round him. And the other fellow
never rested till he'd crawled out to him, and taken him water, and tied
him up, and made a kind of shelter for him. The miner was a big fellow,
and the other was just a slip of a boy. So he couldn't drag in his
friend, but he got another man to go out with him, and between them they
did it right enough. And when I was in the clearing station next day, I
saw the two--the miner in bed, awfully smashed up, and the other sitting
by him. It made one feel choky. The boy could have put down a cool
hundred thousand, I suppose, if it could have done any good. But it
wouldn't. I can tell you, darling, this war knocks the nonsense out of a
man!'
'But Bridget is a woman!' said a dreamy voice beside him.
Sarratt laughed; but he was launched on recollections and could not stop
himself. Apparently everybody in his company was a hero, and had
deserved the Military Cross ten times over, except himself. He described
some incidents he had personally seen, and through the repressed fire
with which he spoke, the personality and ideals of the man revealed
themselves--normal, strong, self-forgetting. Had he even forgotten the
little creature beside him? Hardly, for instinctively he softened away
some of the terrible details of blood and pain. But he had forgotten
Nelly's prohibition. And when again they had entered the dark wood which
lay between them and the cottage on the river-bank, suddenly he heard a
trembling breath, and a sob.
He caught her in his arms.
'Nelly, darling! Oh, I was a brute to talk to you like this.'
'No,' she said, struggling with herself--'No! Wait a moment.' She lay
against him trembling through every limb, while he kissed and comforted
her.
'I'm--I'm not a coward, George!' she said at last, gasping,--'I'm not
indeed. Only--well, this morning I had about a hundred and seventy hours
left--I counted them. And now there are fifteen less. And all the time,
while we talk, they are slipping away, so quick--so quick--'
But she was regaining self-control, and soon released herself.
'I won't do it again!' she said piteously, in the tone of a penitent
child. 'I won't indeed. Let's go home. I'm all right.'
And home they sped, hand in hand, silently. The little room when they
re-entered it was bright with firelight, because kind Mrs. Weston had
thought the flight chilly, and the white table laid out for them--its
pretty china and simple fare--tempted and cheered them with its look of
home. But Nelly lay on the sofa afterwards very pale, though smiling and
talking as usual. And through the night she was haunted, sleeping and
waking, by the image of the solitary boat rocking gently on the moonlit
lake, the water lapping its sides. She saw herself and George adrift in
it--sailing into--disappearing in--that radiance of silver light.
Sleepily she hoped that Sir William Farrell would not forget his
promise.
CHAPTER III
May I come in?'
Nelly Sarratt, who was standing beside the table in the sitting-room,
packing a small luncheon-basket with sandwiches and cake, looked up in
astonishment. Then she went to the door which was slightly ajar, and
opened it.
She beheld a very tall man standing smiling on the threshold.
'I hope I'm not disturbing you, Mrs. Sarratt--but I was on my way for a
day's sketching, and as my car passed your house, I thought I would like
to bring you, myself, the permission which I spoke of on Saturday. I
wrote yesterday, my friend was away from home but I got a telegram this
morning.'
The visitor held out a telegram, which Nelly took in some bewilderment.
It fluttered her to be so much thought for by a stranger--and a stranger
moreover who seemed but to wave his wand and things were done. But she
thanked him heartily.
'Won't you come in, Sir William?' she asked him, shyly. 'My husband will
be here directly.'
It pleased him that she had found out who he was. He protested that he
mustn't stay a moment, but all the same he came in, and stood with his
hands in his pockets looking at the view. He seemed to Nelly to fill the
little sitting-room. Not that he was stout. There was not an ounce of
superfluous flesh on him anywhere. But he stood at least six foot four
in his boots; his shoulders were broad in proportion; and his head, with
its strong curly hair of a light golden brown, which was repeated in his
short beard, carried itself with the unconscious ease of one who has
never known anything but the upper seats of life. His features were
handsome, except for a broad irregular mouth, and his blue eyes were
kind and lazily humorous.
'There's nothing better than that lake,' he said, motioning towards it,
with his hand, as though he followed the outlines of the hills. 'But I
never try to draw it. I leave that to the fellows who think they can!
I'm afraid your permit's only for a week, Mrs. Sarratt. The boat, I
find, will be wanted after that.'
'Oh, but my husband will be gone in a week--less than a week. I couldn't
row myself!' said Nelly, smiling.
But Sir William thought the smile trembled a little, and he felt very
sorry for the small, pretty creature.
'You will be staying on here after your husband goes?'
'Oh yes. My sister will be with me. We know the Lakes very well.'
'Staying through the summer, I suppose?' 'I shan't want to move--if the
war goes on. We haven't any home of our own--yet.'
She had seated herself, and spoke with the self-possession which belongs
to those who know themselves fair to look upon. But there seemed to be
no coquetry about her--no consciousness of a male to be attracted. All
her ways were very gentle and childish, and in her white dress she made
the same impression on Farrell as she had on Bridget, of
extreme--absurd--youthfulness. He guessed her age about nineteen,
perhaps younger.
'I'm afraid the war will go on,' he said, kindly. 'We are only now just
finding out our deficiencies.'
Nelly sighed.
'I know--it's _awful_ how we want guns and shells! My husband says it
makes him savage to see how we lose men for want of them. _Why_ are we
so short? Whose fault is it?'
A spot of angry colour had risen in her cheek. It was the dove defending
her mate. The change was lovely, and Farrell, with his artist's eye,
watched it eagerly. But he shook his head.
'It's nobody's fault. It's all on such a scale--unheard of! Nobody could
have guessed before-hand--unless like Germany, we had been preparing for
years to rob and murder our neighbours. Well, Mrs. Sarratt, I must be
going on. But I wanted to say, that if we could do anything for
you--please command us. We live about twenty miles from here. My sister
hopes she may come and see you. And we have a big library at Carton. If
there are any books you want--'
'Oh, how _very_ kind of you!' said Nelly gratefully. She had risen and
was standing beside him, looking at him with her dark, frank eyes. 'But
indeed I shall get on very well. There's a war workroom in Manchester,
which will send me work. And I shall try and help with the sphagnum
moss. There's a notice up near here, asking people to help. 'And
perhaps'--she laughed and colored--'I shall try to sketch a little. I
can't do it a bit--but it amuses me.'
'Oh, you _draw_?' said Farrell, with a smile. Then, looking round him,
he noticed a portfolio on the table, with a paint box beside it. 'May I
look?'
With rather red cheeks, Nelly showed her performances. She knew very
well, being accustomed to follow such things in the newspapers, that Sir
William Farrell had exhibited both in London and Manchester, and was
much admired by some of the critics.
Farrell twisted his mouth over them a good deal, considering them
carefully.
'Yes, I see--I see exactly where you are. Not bad at all, some of them.
I could lend you some things which would help you I think. Ah, here is
your husband.'
George Sarratt entered, looking in some surprise at their very prompt
visitor, and a little inclined to stand on his guard against a patronage
that might be troublesome. But Farrell explained himself so
apologetically that the young man could only add his very hearty thanks
to his wife's.
'Well, I really _must_ be off,' said Farrell again, looking for his hat.
'And I see you are going out for the day.' He glanced at the lunch
preparations. 'Do you know Loughrigg Tarn?' He turned to Nelly.
'Oh, yes!' Her face glowed. 'Isn't it beautiful? But I don't think
George knows it.' She looked up at him. He smiled and shook his head.
'I have a cottage there,' said Farrell, addressing Sarratt. 'Wordsworth
said it was like Nemi. It isn't:--but it's beautiful all the same. I
wish you would bring your wife there to tea with me one day before you
go? There is an old woman who looks after me. This view is fine'--he
pointed to the window--'but I think mine is finer.'
'Thank you,' said Sarratt, rather formally--'but I am afraid our days
are getting pretty full.'
'Of course, of course!' said Sir William, smiling. 'I only meant, if you
happened to be walking in that direction and want a rest. I have a
number of drawings there--my own and other people's, which Mrs. Sarratt
might care to see--sometime. You go on Saturday?'
'Yes. I'm due to rejoin by Monday.'
Farrell's expression darkened.
'You see what keeps me?' he said, sharply, striking his left knee with
the flat of his hand. 'I had a bad fall, shooting in Scotland, years
ago--when I was quite a lad. Something went wrong in the knee-cap. The
doctors muffed it, and I have had a stiff knee ever since. I daresay
they'd give me work at the War Office--or the Admiralty. Lots of fellows
I know who can't serve are doing war-work of that kind. But I can't
stand office work--never could. It makes me ill, and in a week of it I
am fit to hang myself. I live out of doors. I've done some
recruiting--speaking for the Lord Lieutenant. But I can't speak worth a
cent--and I do no good. No fellow ever joined up because of my
eloquence!--couldn't if he tried. No--I've given up my house--it was the
best thing I could do. It's a jolly house, and I've got lots of jolly
things in it. But the War Office and I between us have turned it into a
capital hospital. We take men from the Border regiments mostly. I wonder
if I shall ever be able to live in it again! My sister and I are now in
the agent's house. I work at the hospital three or four days a week--and
then I come here and sketch. I don't see why I shouldn't.'
He straightened his shoulder as though defying somebody. Yet there was
something appealing, and, as it were, boyish, in the defiance. The man's
patriotic conscience could be felt struggling with his dilettantism.
Sarratt suddenly liked him.
'No, indeed,' he said heartily. 'Why shouldn't you?' 'It's when one
thinks of _your_ job, one feels a brute to be doing anything one likes.'
'Well, you'd be doing the same job if you could. That's all right!' said
Sarratt smiling.
It was curious how in a few minutes the young officer had come to seem
the older and more responsible of the two men. Yet Farrell was clearly
his senior by some ten or fifteen years. Instinctively Nelly moved
nearer to George. She liked to feel how easily he could hold his own
with great people, who made _her_ feel nervous. For she understood from
Mrs. Weston that the Farrells were very great people indeed, as to money
and county position, and that kind of thing.
Sarratt took his visitor downstairs, and returned, laughing to himself.
'Well, darling, I've promised we'll go to his cottage one day this week.
You've to let him know. He's an odd fellow! Reminds me of that story of
the young Don at Cambridge who spent all the time he could spare from
neglecting his duties in adorning his person. And yet that doesn't hit
it quite either. For I don't suppose he does spend much time in adorning
his person. He doesn't want it. He's such a splendid looking chap to
begin with. But I'm sure his duties have a poor time! Why, he told
me--me, an utter stranger!--as we went downstairs--that being a
landowner was the most boring trade in the world. He hated his tenants,
and turned all the bother of them over to his agents. "But they don't
hate me"--he said--"because I don't put the screw on. I'm rich enough
without." By Jove, he's a queer specimen!'
And Sarratt laughed out, remembering some further items of the
conversation on the stairs.
'Whom are you discussing?' said a cold voice in the background.
It was Bridget Cookson's voice, and the husband and wife turned to greet
her. The day was balmy--June at its best. But Bridget as she came in had
the look of someone rasped with east wind. Nelly noticed too that since
her marriage, Bridget had developed an odd habit of not looking her--or
George--straight in the face. She looked sideways, as though determined
to avoid the mere sight of their youth and happiness. 'Is she going to
make a quarrel of it all our lives?' thought Nelly impatiently. 'And
when George is so nice to her! How can she be so silly!'
'We were talking about our visitor who has just left,' said Sarratt,
clearing a chair for his sister-in-law. 'Ah, you came from the other
direction, you just missed him.'
'The man'--said Nelly--'who was so awfully polite to me on Saturday--Sir
William Farrell.'
Bridget's countenance lost its stiffness at once--became eager and
alert.
'What did he come for?'
'To bring us permission to use the boat for a week,' said Nelly.
'Wasn't it decent of him?--and to do it so quick!'
'Oh, that's the Farrell way--always was,' said Bridget complacently, as
though she had the family in her pocket. 'When they think of a thing
it's done. It's hit or miss. They never stop to think.'
Sarratt looked at his sister-in-law with a covert amusement. It was a
left-handed remark. But she went on--while Nelly finished the packing of
the luncheon-basket--pouring out a flood of gossip about the
Farrells's place near Cockermouth, their great relations, their wealth,
their pictures, and their china, while Sarratt walked up and down,
fidgeting with his mouth, and inwardly thanking his stars that his Nelly
was not the least like her sister, that she was as refined and
well-bred, as Bridget was beginning to seem to him vulgar and tiresome.
But he realised that there was a personality in the tall harsh woman;
that she might be formidable; and once or twice he found himself
watching the curious side-long action of her head and neck, and the play
of her eyes and mouth, with a mingling of close attention and strong
dislike. He kept his own counsel however; and presently he heard
Bridget, who had so far refused all their invitations to join their
walks or excursions, rather eagerly accepting Nelly's invitation to go
with them to Sir William's Loughrigg cottage. She knew all about it
apparently, and said it was 'a gem of a place!' Sir William kept an old
butler and his wife there--pensioned off--who looked after him when he
came. 'Everything's tiny,' said Bridget with emphasis--'but _perfect_!
Sir William has the most exquisite taste. But he never asks anybody to
go there. None of the neighbours know him. So of course they say its
"side," and he gives himself airs. Anyway, Nelly, you may think
yourselves highly honoured--'
'Darling, isn't that basket ready?' said Sarratt, coming to his wife's
aid. 'We're losing the best of the day--and if Bridget really won't go
with us--'
Bridget frowned and rose.
'How are the proofs getting on?' said Sarratt, smiling, as she bade him
a careless good-bye.
Bridget drew herself up.
'I never talk about my work.'
'I suppose that's a good rule,' he said doubtfully, 'especially now that
there's so much else to talk about. The Russian news to-day is pretty
bad!'
A dark look of anxiety crossed the young man's face. For it was the days
of the great Russian retreat in Galicia and Poland, and every soldier
looking on, knew with gnashing of teeth that the happenings in the East
meant a long postponement of our own advance.
'Oh, I never trouble about the war!' said Bridget, with a
half-contemptuous note in her voice that fairly set George Sarratt on
fire. He flushed violently, and Nelly looked at him in alarm. But he
said nothing. Nelly however with a merry side-glance at him, unseen by
Bridget, interposed to prevent him from escorting Bridget downstairs.
She went herself. Most sisters would have dispensed with or omitted this
small attention; but Nelly always treated Bridget with a certain
ceremony. When she returned, she threw her arms round George's neck,
half laughing, and half inclined to cry.
'Oh, George, I do wish I had a nicer sister to give you!' But George had
entirely recovered himself.
'We shall get on perfectly!' he declared, kissing the soft head that
leant against him. 'Give me a little time, darling. She's new to
me!--I'm new to her.'
Nelly sighed, and went to put on her hat. In her opinion it was no more
easy to like Bridget after three years than three hours. It was certain
that she and George would never suit each other. At the same time Nelly
was quite conscious that she owed Bridget a good deal. But for the fact
that Bridget did the housekeeping, that Bridget saw to the investment of
their small moneys, and had generally managed the business of their
joint life, Nelly would not have been able to dream, and sketch, and
read, as it was her delight to do. It might be, as she had said to
Sarratt, that Bridget managed because she liked managing. All the same
Nelly knew, not without some prickings of conscience as to her own
dependence, that when George was gone, she would never be able to get on
without Bridget.
Into what a world of delight the two plunged when they set forth! The
more it rains in the Westmorland country, the more heavenly are the days
when the clouds forget to rain! There were white flocks of them in the
June sky as the new-married pair crossed the wooden bridge beyond the
garden, leading to the further side of the lake, but they were sailing
serene and sunlit in the blue, as though their whole business were to
dapple the hills with blue and violet shadows, or sometimes to throw a
dazzling reflection down into the quiet water. There had been rain,
torrential rain, just before the Sarratts arrived, so that the river was
full and noisy, and all the little becks clattering down the fell, in
their haste to reach the lake, were boasting to the summer air, as
though in forty-eight hours of rainlessness they would not be as dry and
dumb as ever again. The air was fresh, in spite of the Midsummer sun,
and youth and health danced in the veins of the lovers. And yet not
without a touch of something feverish, something abnormal, because of
that day--that shrouded day--standing sentinel at the end of the week.
They never spoke of it, but they never forgot it. It entered into each
clinging grasp he gave her hand as he helped her up or down some steep
or rugged bit of path--into the lingering look of her brown eyes, which
thanked him, smiling--into the moments of silence, when they rested amid
the springing bracken, and the whole scene of mountain, cloud and water
spoke with that sudden tragic note of all supreme beauty, in a world of
'brittleness.' But they were not often silent. There was so much to
say. They were still exploring each other, after the hurry of their
marriage, and short engagement. For a time she chattered to him about
her own early life--their old red-brick house in a Manchester suburb,
with its good-sized rooms, its mahogany doors, its garden, in which her
father used to work--his only pleasure, after his wife's death, besides
'the concerts'--'You know we've awfully good music in Manchester!' As
for her own scattered and scanty education, she had begun to speak of it
almost with bitterness. George's talk and recollections betrayed quite
unconsciously the standards of the academic or highly-trained
professional class to which all his father's kindred belonged; and his
only sister, a remarkably gifted girl, who had died of pneumonia at
eighteen, just as she was going to Girton, seemed to Nelly, when he
occasionally described or referred to her, a miracle--a terrifying
miracle--of learning and accomplishment.
Once indeed, she broke out in distress:--'Oh, George, I don't know
anything! Why wasn't I sent to school! We had a wretched little
governess who taught us nothing. And then I'm lazy--I never was
ambitious--like Bridget. Do you mind that I'm so stupid--do you mind?'
And she laid her hands on his knee, as they sat together among the fern,
while her eyes searched his face in a real anxiety.
What joy it was to laugh at her--to tease her!
'_How_ stupid are you, darling? Tell me, exactly. It is of course a
terrible business. If I'd only known--'
But she would be serious.
'I don't know _any_ languages, George! Just a little French--but you'd
be ashamed if you heard me talking it. As to history--don't ask!' She
shrugged her shoulders despairingly. Then her face brightened. 'But
there's something! I do love poetry--I've read a lot of poetry.'
'That's all right--so have I,' he said, promptly.
'Isn't it strange--' her tone was thoughtful--'how people care for poetry
nowadays! A few years ago, one never heard of people--ordinary
people--_buying_ poetry, new poetry--or reading it. But I know a shop in
Manchester that's just full of poetry--new books and old books--and the
shop-man told me that people buy it almost more than anything. Isn't it
funny? What makes them do it? Is it the war?'
Sarratt considered it, while making a smooth path for a gorgeous green
beetle through the bit of turf beside him.
'I suppose it's the war,' he said at last. 'It does change fellows. It's
easy enough to go along bluffing and fooling in ordinary times. Most men
don't know what they think--or what they feel--or whether they feel
anything. But somehow--out there--when you see the things other fellows
are doing--when you know the things you may have to do yourself--well----'
'Yes, yes--go on!' she said eagerly, and he went on, but reluctantly,
for he had seen her shiver, and the white lids fall a moment over her
eyes.
'--It doesn't seem unnatural--or hypocritical--or canting--to talk and
feel--sometimes--as you couldn't talk or feel at home, with life going
on just as usual. I've had to censor letters, you see, darling--and the
letters some of the roughest and stupidest fellows write, you'd never
believe. And there's no pretence in it either. What would be the good of
pretending out there? No--it's just the pace life goes--and the
fire--and the strain of it. It's awful--and _horrible_--and yet you
wouldn't not be there for the world.'
His voice dropped a little; he looked out with veiled eyes upon the lake
chequered with the blue and white of its inverted sky. Nelly
guessed--trembling--at the procession of images that was passing through
them; and felt for a moment strangely separated from him--separated and
desolate.
'George, it's dreadful now--to be a woman!'
She spoke in a low appealing voice, pressing up against him, as though
she begged the soul in him that had been momentarily unconscious of her,
to come back to her.
He laughed, and the vision before his eyes broke up.
'Darling, it's adorable now--to be a woman! How I shall think of you,
when I'm out there!--away from all the grime and the horror--sitting by
this lake, and looking--as you do now.'
He drew a little further away from her, and lying on his elbows on the
grass, he began to read her, as it were, from top to toe, that he might
fix every detail in his mind.
'I like that little hat so much, Nelly!--and that blue cloak is just
ripping! And what's that you've got at your waist--a silver
buckle?--yes! I gave it you. Mind you wear it, when I'm away, and tell
me you're wearing it--then I can fancy it.'
'Will you ever have time--to think of me--George?'
She bent towards him.
He laughed.
'Well, not when I'm going over the parapet to attack the Boches.
Honestly, one thinks of nothing then but how one can get one's men
across. But you won't come off badly, my little Nell--for
thoughts--night or day. And you mustn't think of us too sentimentally.
It's quite true that men write wonderful letters--and wonderful verse
too--men of all ranks--things you'd never dream they could write. I've
got a little pocket-book full that I've collected. I've left it in
London, but I'll show you some day. But bless you, nobody _talks_ about
their feelings at the front. We're a pretty slangy lot in the trenches,
and when we're in billets, we read novels and rag each other--and
_sleep_--my word, we do sleep!'
He rolled on his back, and drew his hat over his eyes a moment, for
even in the fresh mountain air the June sun was fierce. Nelly sat still,
watching him, as he had watched her--all the young strength and
comeliness of the man to whom she had given herself.
And as she did so there came swooping down upon her, like the blinding
wings of a Fury, the remembrance of a battle picture she had seen that
morning: a bursting shell--limp figures on the ground. Oh not
George--not _George_--never! The agony ran through her, and her fingers
gripped the turf beside her. Then it passed, and she was silently proud
that she had been able to hide it. But it had left her pale and
restless. She sprang up, and they went along the high path leading to
Grasmere and Langdale.
Presently at the top of the little neck which separates Rydal from
Grasmere they came upon an odd cavalcade. In front walked an elderly
lady, with a huge open bag slung round her, in which she carried an
amazing load of the sphagnum moss that English and Scotch women were
gathering at that moment all over the English and Scotch mountains for
the surgical purposes of the war. Behind her came a pony, with a boy.
The pony was laden with the same moss, so was the boy. The lady's face
was purple with exertion, and in her best days she could never have been
other than plain; her figure was shapeless. She stopped the pony as she
neared the Sarratts, and addressed them--panting.
'I beg your pardon!--but have you by chance seen another lady carrying
a bag like mine? I brought a friend with me to help gather this
stuff--but we seem to have missed each other on the top of Silver
How--and I can't imagine what's happened to her.'
The voice was exceedingly musical and refined--but there was a touch of
power in it--a curious note of authority. She stood, recovering breath
and looking at the young people with clear and penetrating eyes,
suddenly observant.
The Sarratts could only say that they had not come across any other
moss-gatherer on the road.
The strange lady sighed--but with a half humorous, half philosophical
lifting of the eyebrows.
'It was very stupid of me to miss her--but you really can't come to
grief on these fells in broad daylight. However, if you do meet her--a
lady with a sailor hat, and a blue jersey--will you tell her that I've
gone on to Ambleside?'
Sarratt politely assured her that they would look out for her companion.
He had never yet seen a grey-haired Englishwoman, of that age, carry so
heavy a load, and he liked both her pluck and her voice. She reminded
him of the French peasant women in whose farms he often lodged behind
the lines. She meanwhile was scrutinising him--the badge on his cap, and
the two buttons on his khaki sleeve.
'I think I know who you are,' she said, with a sudden smile. 'Aren't
you Mr. and Mrs. Sarratt? Sir William Farrell told me about you.' Then
she turned to the boy--'Go on, Jim. I'll come soon.'
A conversation followed on the mountain path, in which their new
acquaintance gave her name as Miss Hester Martin, living in a cottage on
the outskirts of Ambleside, a cousin and old friend of Sir William
Farrell; an old friend indeed, it seemed, of all the local residents;
absorbed in war-work of different kinds, and somewhere near sixty years
of age; but evidently neither too old nor too busy to have lost the
natural interest of a kindly spinster in a bride and bridegroom,
especially when the bridegroom was in khaki, and under orders for the
front. She promised, at once, to come and see Mrs. Sarratt, and George,
beholding in her a possible motherly friend for Nelly when he should be
far away, insisted that she should fix a day for her call before his
departure. Nelly added her smiles to his. Then, with a pleasant nod,
Miss Martin left them, refusing all their offers to help her with her
load. '"My strength is as the strength of ten,"' she said with a flash
of fun in her eyes--'But I won't go on with the quotation. Good-bye.'
George and Nelly went on towards a spot above a wood in front of them to
which she had directed them, as a good point to rest and lunch. She,
meanwhile, pursued her way towards Ambleside, her thoughts much more
occupied with the young couple than with her lost companion. The little
thing was a beauty, certainly. Easy to see what had attracted William
Farrell! An uncommon type--and a very artistic type; none of your
milk-maids. She supposed before long William would be proposing to draw
her--hm!--with the husband away? It was to be hoped some watch-dog would
be left. William was a good fellow--no real malice in him--had never
_meant_ to injure anybody, that she knew of--but--
Miss Martin's cogitations however went no farther in exploring that
'but.' She was really very fond of her cousin William, who bore an
amount of discipline from her that no one else dared to apply to the
owner of Carton. Tragic, that he couldn't fight! That would have brought
out all there was in him.
CHAPTER IV
'Glorious!'
Nelly Sarratt stood lost in the beauty of the spectacle commanded by Sir
William Farrell's cottage. It was placed in a by-road on the western
side of Loughrigg, that smallest of real mountains, beloved of poets and
wanderers. The ground dropped sharply below it to a small lake or tarn,
its green banks fringed with wood, while on the further side the purple
crag and noble head of Wetherlam rose out of sunlit mist,--thereby
indefinitely heightened--into a pearl and azure sky. To the north also,
a splendid wilderness of fells, near and far; with the Pikes and Bowfell
leading the host. White mists--radiant mists--perpetually changing, made
a magic interweaving of fell with fell, of mountain with sky. Every tint
of blue and purple, of amethyst and sapphire lay melted in the chalice
carved out by the lake and its guardian mountains. Every line of that
chalice was harmonious as though each mountain and valley filled its
place consciously, in a living order; and in the grandeur of the whole
there was no terror, no hint of a world hostile and inaccessible to man,
as in the Alps and the Rockies.
'These mountains are one's friends,' said Farrell, smiling as he stood
beside Nelly, pointing out the various peaks by name. 'If you know them
only a little, you can trust yourself to them, at any hour of the day or
night. Whereas, in the Alps, I always feel myself "a worm and no man"!'
'I have never been abroad,' said Nelly shyly.
For once he found an _ingénue_ attractive.
'Then you have it to come--when the world is sane again. But some things
you will have missed for ever. For instance, you will never see
Rheims--as it was. I have spent months at Rheims in old days, drawing
and photographing. I must show you my things. They have a tragic value
now.'
And taking out a portfolio from a rack near him, he opened it and put it
on a stand before her.
Nelly, who had in her the real instincts of the artist, turned over some
very masterly drawings, in mingled delight and despair.
'If I could only do something like that!' she said, pointing to a study
of some of the famous windows at Rheims, with vague forms of saint and
king emerging from a conflagration of colour, kindled by the afternoon
sun, and dyeing the pavement below.
'Ah, that took me some time. It was difficult. But here are some
fragments you'll like--just bits from the façade and the monuments.'
The strength of the handling excited her. She looked at them in silence;
remembering with disgust all the pretty sentimental work she had been
used to copy. She began to envisage what this commonly practised art
may be; what a master can do with it. Standards leaped up. Alp on Alp
appeared. When George was gone she would _work_, yes, she would work
hard--to surprise him when he came back.
Sir William meanwhile was increasingly taken with his guest. She was
shy, very diffident, very young; but in the few things she said, he
discerned--or fancied--the stirrings of a real taste--real intelligence.
And she was prettier and more fetching than ever--with her small dark
head, and her lovely mouth. He would like to draw the free sensuous line
of it, the beautiful moulding of the chin. What a prize for the young
man! Was he aware of his own good fortune? Was he adequate?
'I say, how jolly!' said Sarratt, coming up to look. 'My wife, Sir
William--I think she told you--has got a turn for this kind of thing.
These will give her ideas.'
And while he looked at the drawings, he slipped a hand into his wife's
arm, smiling down upon her, and commenting on the sketches. There was
nothing in what he said. He only 'knew what he liked,' and an unfriendly
bystander would have been amused by his constant assumption that Nelly's
sketches were as good as anybody's. Entirely modest for himself, he was
inclined to be conceited for her, she checking him, with rather flushed
cheeks. But Farrell liked him all the better, both for the ignorance and
the pride. The two young people standing there together, so evidently
absorbed in each other, yet on the brink of no ordinary parting, touched
the romantic note in him. He was very sorry for them--especially for the
bride--and eagerly, impulsively wished to befriend them.
In the background, the stout lady whom the Sarratts had met on Loughrigg
Terrace, Miss Hester Martin, was talking to Miss Farrell, while Bridget
Cookson was carrying on conversation with a tall officer who carried his
arm in a sling, and was apparently yet another convalescent officer from
the Carton hospital, whom Cicely Farrell had brought over in her motor
to tea at her brother's cottage. His name seemed to be Captain
Marsworth, and he was doing his best with Bridget; but there were great
gaps in their conversation, and Bridget resentfully thought him dull.
Also she perceived--for she had extremely quick eyes in such
matters--that Captain Marsworth, while talking to her, seemed to be
really watching Miss Farrell, and she at once jumped to the conclusion
that there was something 'up' between him and Miss Farrell.
Cicely Farrell certainly took no notice of him. She was sitting perched
on the high end of a sofa smoking a cigarette and dangling her feet,
which were encased, as before, in high-heeled shoes and immaculate
gaiters. She was dressed in white serge with a cap and jersey of the
brightest possible green. Her very open bodice showed a string of fine
pearls and she wore pearl ear-rings. Seen in the same room with Nelly
Sarratt she could hardly be guessed at less than twenty-eight. She was
the mature woman in full possession of every feminine weapon,
experienced, subtle, conscious, a little hard, a little malicious. Nelly
Sarratt beside her looked a child. Miss Farrell had glanced at her with
curiosity, but had not addressed many words to her. She had concluded at
once that it was a type that did not interest her. It interested William
of course, because he was professionally on the look out for beauty. But
that was his affair. Miss Farrell had no use for anything so unfledged
and immature. And as for the sister, Miss Cookson, she had no points of
attraction whatever. The young man, the husband, was well
enough--apparently a gentleman; but Miss Farrell felt that she would
have forgotten his existence when the tea-party was over. So she had
fallen back on conversation with her cousin. That Cousin Hester--dear,
shapeless, Puritanical thing!--disapproved of her, her dress, her
smoking, her ways, and her opinions, Cicely well knew--but that only
gave zest to their meetings, which were not very frequent.
Meanwhile Bridget, in lieu of conversation and while tea was still
preparing, was making mental notes of the cottage. It consisted
apparently of two sitting-rooms, and a studio--in which they were to
have tea--with two or three bedrooms above. It had been developed out of
a Westmorland farm, but developed beyond recognition. The spacious rooms
panelled in plain oak, were furnished sparely, with few things, but
those of the most beautiful and costly kind. Old Persian rugs and
carpets, a few Renaissance mirrors, a few priceless 'pots,' a picture or
two, hangings and coverings of a dim purple--the whole, made by these
various items and objects, expressed a taste perhaps originally florid,
but tamed by long and fastidious practice of the arts of decoration.
In the study where tea had been laid, Nelly could not restrain her
wonder and delight. On one wall hung ten of the most miraculous
Turners--drawings from his best period, each of them irreplaceably
famous. Another wall showed a group of Boningtons--a third a similar
gathering of Whistlers. Sir William, charmed with the bride's pleasure,
took down drawing after drawing, carried them to the light for her, and
discoursed upon them.
'Would you like that to copy?'--he said, putting a Turner into her
lap--a marvel of blue mountain peaks, and winding river, and aerial
distance.
'Oh, I shouldn't dare--I should be afraid!' said Nelly, hardly liking to
take the treasure in her own hands. 'Aren't they--aren't they worth
immense sums?'
Sir William laughed.
'Well, of course, they're valuable--everybody wants them. But if you
would ever like that one to copy, you shall have it, and any other that
would help you. I know you wouldn't let it be hurt, if you could help
it--because you'd love it--as I do. You wouldn't let a Turner drawing
like that fade and blister in the sun--as I've seen happen again and
again in houses he painted them for. Brutes! Hanging's too good for
people who maltreat Turners. Let me relieve you of it now. I must get
you some tea. But the drawing will come to you next week. You won't be
able to think of it till then.'
He looked at her with the ardent sympathy which sprang easily from his
quick, emotional temperament, and made it possible for him to force his
way rapidly into intimacy, where he desired to be intimate. But Nelly
shrank into herself. She put the drawing away, and did not seem to care
to look at any more. Farrell wished he had left his remark unspoken, and
finding that he had somehow extinguished her smiles and her talk, he
relieved her of his company, and went away to talk to Sarratt and
Captain Marsworth. As soon as tea was over, Nelly beckoned to her
husband.
'Are you going so soon?' said Hester Martin, who had been unobtrusively
mothering her, since Farrell left her--'When may I come and see you?'
'To-morrow?' said Nelly vaguely, looking up. 'George hoped you would
come, before he goes. There are--there are only three days.'
'I will come to-morrow,' said Miss Martin, touching Nelly's hand softly.
The cold, small fingers moved, as though instinctively, towards her, and
took refuge in her warm capacious hand. Then Nelly whispered to
Bridget--appealingly--
'I want to go, Bridget.'
Bridget frowned with annoyance. Why should Nelly want to go so soon? The
beauty and luxury of the cottage--the mere tea-table with all its
perfect appointments of fine silver and china, the multitude of cakes,
the hot-house fruit, the well-trained butler--all the signs of wealth
that to Nelly were rather intimidating, and to Sarratt--in
war-time--incongruous and repellent, were to Bridget the satisfaction of
so many starved desires. This ease and lavishness; the best of
everything and no trouble to get it; the 'cottage' as perfect as the
palace;--it was so, she felt, that life should be lived, to be really
worth living. She envied the Farrells with an intensity of envy. Why
should some people have so much and others so little? And as she watched
Sir William's attentions to Nelly, she said to herself, for the
hundredth time, that but for Nelly's folly, she could easily have
captured wealth like this. Why not Sir William himself? It would not
have been at all unlikely that they should come across him on one of
their Westmorland holidays. The thought of their dingy Manchester rooms,
of the ceaseless care and economy that would be necessary for their
joint ménage when Sarratt was gone, filled her with disgust. Their
poverty was wholly unnecessary--it was Nelly's silly fault. She felt at
times as though she hated her brother-in-law, who had so selfishly
crossed their path, and ruined the hopes and dreams which had been
strengthening steadily in her mind during the last two years
especially, since Nelly's beauty had become more pronounced.
'It's not at all late!' she said, angrily, in her sister's ear.
'Oh, but George wants to take me to Easedale,' said Nelly under her
breath. 'It will be our last long walk.'
Bridget had to submit to be torn away. A little motor was waiting
outside. It had brought the Sarratts and Bridget from Rydal, and was to
take Bridget home, dropping the Sarratts at Grasmere for an evening
walk. Sir William tried indeed to persuade them to stay longer, till a
signal from his cousin Hester stopped him; 'Well, if you must go, you
must,' he said, regretfully. 'Cicely, you must arrange with Mrs.
Sarratt, when she will pay us a visit--and'--he looked uncertainly round
him, as though he had only just remembered Bridget's existence--'of
course your sister must come too.'
Cicely came forward, and with a little lisp, repeated her brother's
invitation--rather perfunctorily.
Sir William took his guests to their car, and bade a cordial farewell to
Sarratt.
'Good-bye--and good luck. What shall I wish you? The D.S.O., and a
respectable leave before the summer's over? You will be in for great
things.'
Sarratt shook his head.
'Not till we get more guns, and tons more shell!'
'Oh, the country's waking up!'
'It's about time!' said Sarratt, gravely, as he climbed into the car.
Sir William bent towards him.
'Anything that we can do to help your wife and her sister, during their
stay here, you may be sure we shall do.'
'It's very kind of you,' said the young officer gratefully, as he
grasped Farrell's hand. And Nelly sent a shy glance of thanks towards
the speaker, while Bridget sat erect and impassive.
Sir William watched them disappear, and then returned to the tea-room.
He was received with a burst of laughter from his sister.
'Well, Willy, so you're caught--fairly caught! What am I to do? When am
I to ask her? And the sister too?'
And lighting another cigarette, Cicely looked at her brother with
mocking eyes.
Farrell reddened a little, but kept his temper.
'In a week or two I should think, you might ask her, when she's got over
her husband's going away.'
'They get over it very soon--in general,' said Cicely coolly.
'Not that sort.'
The voice was Captain Marsworth's.
Cicely appeared to take no notice. But her eyelids flickered. Hester
Martin interposed.
'A dear, little, appealing thing,' she said, warmly--'and her husband
evidently a capital fellow. I didn't take to the sister--but who knows?
She may be an excellent creature, all the same. I'm glad I shall be so
near them. It will be a help to that poor child to find her something to
do.'
Cicely laughed.
'You think she'll hunt sphagnum--and make bandages? I don't.'
'Why this "thusness?"' said Miss Martin raising her eyebrows. 'What has
made you take a dislike to the poor little soul, Cicely? There never was
anyone more plainly in love--'
'Or more to be pitied,' said the low voice in the background--low but
emphatic.
It was now Cicely's turn to flush.
'Of course I know I'm a beast,' she said defiantly,--'but the fact is I
didn't like either of them!--the sisters, I mean.'
'What oh earth is there to dislike in Mrs. Sarratt!' cried Farrell.
'You're quite mad, Cicely.'
'She's too pretty,' said Miss Farrell obstinately--and too--too simple.
And nobody as pretty as that can be really simple. It's only pretence.'
As she spoke Cicely rose to her feet, and began to put on her veil in
front of one of the old mirrors. 'But of course, Will, I shall behave
nicely to your friends. Don't I always behave nicely to them?'
She turned lightly to her brother, who looked at her only half appeased.
'I shan't give you a testimonial to-day, Cicely.'
'Then I must do without it. Well, this day three weeks, a party at
Carton, for Mrs. Sarratt. Will that give her time to settle down?'
'Unless her husband is killed by then,' said Captain Marsworth, quietly.
'His regiment is close to Loos. He'll be in the thick of it directly.'
'Oh no,' said Cicely, twisting the ends of her veil lightly between a
finger and thumb. 'Just a "cushy" wound, that'll bring him home on a
three months' leave, and give her the bore of nursing him.'
'Cicely, you are a hard-hearted wretch!' said her brother, angrily. 'I
think Marsworth and I will go and stroll till the motor is ready.'
The two men disappeared, and Cicely let herself drop into an arm-chair.
Her eyes, as far as could be seen through her veil, were blazing; the
redness in her cheeks had improved upon the rouge with which they were
already touched; and the gesture with which she pulled on her gloves was
one of excitement.
'Cicely dear--what is the matter with you?' said Miss Martin in
distress. She was fond of Cicely, in spite of that young lady's
extravagances of dress and manner, and she divined something gone wrong.
'Nothing is the matter--nothing at all. It is only necessary, sometimes,
to shock people,' said Cicely, calming down. She threw her head back
against the chair and closed her eyes, while her lips still smiled
triumphantly.
'Were you trying to shock Captain Marsworth?'
'It's so easy--it's hardly worth doing,' said Cicely, sleepily. Then
after a pause--'Ah, isn't that the motor?'
* * * * *
Meanwhile the little hired motor from Ambleside had dropped the Sarratts
on the Easedale road, and carried Bridget away in an opposite direction,
to the silent but great relief of the newly-married pair. And soon the
husband and wife had passed the last farm in the valley, and were
walking up a rough climbing path towards Sour Milk Ghyll, and Easedale
Tarn. The stream was full, and its many channels ran white and foaming
down the steep rock face, where it makes its chief leap to the valley.
The summer weather held, and every tree and fell-side stood bathed in a
warm haze, suffused with the declining light. All round, encircling
fells in a purple shadow; to the north and east, great slopes
appearing--Helvellyn, Grisedale, Fairfield. They walked hand in hand
where the path admitted--almost silent--passionately conscious of each
other--and of the beauty round them. Sometimes they stopped to gather a
flower, or notice a bird; and then there would be a few words, with a
meaning only for themselves. And when they reached the tarn,--a magical
shadowed mirror of brown and purple water,--they sat for long beside it,
while the evening faded, and a breathless quiet came across the hills,
stilling all their voices, even, one might have fancied, the voice of
the hurrying stream itself. At the back of Nelly's mind there was always
the same inexorable counting of the hours; and in his a profound and
sometimes remorseful pity for this gentle creature who had given herself
to him, together with an immense gratitude.
The stars came out, and a light easterly wind sprang up, sending ripples
across the tarn, and stirring last year's leaves among the new grass. It
had grown chilly, and Sarratt took Nelly's blue cloak from his arm and
wrapped her in it--then in his arms, as she rested against him.
Presently he felt her hand drop languidly from his, and he knew
that--not the walk, but the rush of those half-spoken thoughts which
held them both, had brought exhaustion.
'Darling--we must go home!' He bent over her.
She rose feebly.
'Why am I so tired? It's absurd.'
'Let me carry you a little.'
'You couldn't!' She smiled at him.
But he lifted her with ease--she was so small and slight, while in him a
fresh wave of youth and strength had risen, with happiness, and the
reaction of convalescence. She made no resistance, and he carried her
down some way, through the broad mingled light. Her face was hidden on
his breast, and felt the beating of his life. She said to herself more
than once that to die so would be bliss. The marvel of love bewildered
her. 'What was I like before it?--what shall I be, when he is gone?'
When she made him set her down, she said gaily that she was all right,
and gave him a kiss of thanks, simply, like a child. The valley lay
before them with its scattered lights, and they pressed on through the
twilight--two dim and spectral figures--spirits it seemed, who had been
on the heights sharing ambrosial feasts with the Immortals, and had but
just descended to the common earth again.
* * * * *
Nelly spent the next three days, outside their walks and boatings on the
lake, in whatever wifely offices to her man still remained to
her--marking his new socks and khaki shirts, furnishing a small medicine
chest, and packing a tin of special delicacies, meat lozenges,
chocolate, various much advertised food tabloids, and his favourite
biscuits. Sarratt laughed over them, but had not the heart to dissuade
her. She grew paler every day, but was always gay and smiling so long as
his eyes were on her; and his sound young sleep knew nothing of her
quiet stifled weeping at those moments of the night, when the bodily and
nervous forces are at their lowest, and all the future blackens. Miss
Martin paid them several visits, bringing them books and flowers. Books
and flowers too arrived from Carton--with a lavish supply of cigarettes
for the departing soldier. Nelly had the piteous sense that everyone was
sorry for her--Mrs. Weston, the kind landlady, Milly, the little
housemaid. It seemed to her sometimes that the mere strangers she met in
the road knew that George was going, and looked at her compassionately.
The last day came, showery in the morning, and clearing to a glorious
evening, with all the new leaf and growing hayfields freshened by rain,
and all the streams brimming. Bridget came over in the afternoon, and as
she watched her sister's face, became almost kind, almost sympathetic.
George proposed to walk back part of the way to Ambleside with his
sister-in-law, and Nelly with a little frown of alarm watched them go.
But the tête-à-tête was not disagreeable to either. Bridget was taken
aback, to begin with, by some very liberal proposals of Sarratt's on the
subject of her and Nelly's joint expenses during his absence. She was to
be Nelly's guest--they both wished it--and he said kindly that he
quite understood Nelly's marriage had made a difference to her, and he
hoped she would let them make it up to her, as far and as soon as they
could. Bridget was surprised into amiability,--and Sarratt found a
chance of saying--
'And you'll let Nelly talk about the war--though it does bore you? She
won't be able to help it--poor child!'
Bridget supposed that now she too would have to talk about the war. He
needn't be afraid, she added drily. She would look after Nelly. And she
looked so masterful and vigorous as she said it, that Sarratt could only
believe her.
They shook hands in the road, better friends to all seeming than they
had been yet. And Nelly received George's account of the conversation
with a sigh of relief.
* * * * *
That night the midsummer moon would be at the full, and as the clouds
vanished from the sky, and the soft purple night came down, Nelly and
Sarratt leaving every piece of luggage behind them, packed, labelled,
locked, and piled in the hall, ready for the cart that was to call for
it in the early hours--took their way to the lake and the boathouse.
They had been out at night once before, but this was to be the crowning
last thing--the last joint memory.
It was eleven o'clock before the oars dipped into the water, and as they
neared the larger island, the moon, rearing its bright head over the
eastern fells, shot a silver pathway through the lake; and on either
side of the pathway, the mirrored woods and crags, more dim and ghostly
than by day, seemed to lead downward to that very threshold and entrance
of the underworld, through which the blinded Theban king vanished from
the eyes of men. Silver-bright the woods and fell-side, on the west;
while on the east the woods in shadow, lay sleeping, 'moon-charmed.' The
air was balmy; and one seemed to hear through it the steady soft beat of
the summer life, rising through the leaves and grass and flowers. Every
sound was enchantment--the drip of water from the oars, the hooting of
an owl on the island, even the occasional distant voices, and tapping of
horses' feet on the main road bordering the lake.
Sarratt let the oars drift, and the boat glided, as though of its own
will, past the island, and into the shadow beyond it. Now it was Silver
How, and all the Grasmere mountains, that caught the 'hallowing' light.
Nelly sat bare-headed, her elbows on her knees, and her face propped in
her hands. She was in white, with a white shawl round her, and the grace
of the slight form and dark head stirred anew in Sarratt that astonished
and exquisite sense of possession which had been one of the main
elements of consciousness, during their honeymoon. Of late indeed it had
been increasingly met and wrestled with by something harsher and
sterner; by the instinct of the soldier, of the fighting man, foreseeing
a danger to his own will, a weakening of the fibre on which his effort
and his power depend. There were moments when passionately as he loved
her, he was glad to be going; secretly glad that the days which were in
truth a greater test of endurance than the trenches were coming to an
end. He must be able to trust himself and his own nerve to the utmost.
Away from her, love would be only a strengthening power; here beside
her, soul and sense contended.
A low voice came out of the shadow.
'George--I'm not going with you to the station.'
'Best not, dearest--much best.'
A silence. Then the voice spoke again.
'How long will it take you, George, getting to the front?'
'About twenty-four hours from the base, perhaps more. It's a weary
business.'
'Will you be in action at once?'
'I think so. That part of the line's very short of men.'
'When shall I hear?'
He laughed.
'By every possible post, I should think, darling. You've given me
post-cards enough.'
And he tapped his breast-pocket, where lay the little writing-case she
had furnished for every imaginable need.
'George!'
'Yes, darling.'
'When you're tired, you're--you're not to write.'
He put out his long arms, and took her hands in his.
'I shan't be tired--and I shall write.'
She looked down upon the hands holding hers. In each of the little
fingers there was a small amusing deformity--a slight crook or
twist--which, as is the way of lovers, was especially dear to her. She
remembered once, before they were engaged, flaming out at Bridget, who
had made mock of it. She stooped now, and kissed the fingers. Then she
bowed her forehead upon them.
'George!'--he could only just hear her--'I know Miss Martin will be
kind to me--and I shall find plenty to do. You're never to worry about
me.'
'I won't--so long as you write to me--every day.'
There was again a silence. Then she lifted her head, and as the boat
swung out of the shadow, the moonlight caught her face.
'You'll take that Wordsworth I gave you, won't you, George? It'll remind
you--of this.' Her gesture showed the lake and the mountains.
'Of course, I shall take it. I shall read it whenever I can--perhaps
more for your sake--than Wordsworth's.'
'It'll make us remember the same things,' she murmured.
'As if we wanted anything to make us remember!'
'George!' her voice was almost a sob--'It's been almost too perfect.
Sometimes--just for that--I'm afraid.'
'Don't be, darling. The God we believe in _isn't_ a jealous God! That's
one of the notions one grows out of--over there.'
'Do you think He's our friend, George--that He really cares?'
The sweet appealing voice touched him unbearably.
'Yes, I do think it--' he said, firmly, after a pause. 'I do believe
it--with all my heart.'
'Then I'll believe it!' she said, with a long breath; and there was
silence again, till suddenly over the water came the sound of the Rydal
Chapel bell, striking midnight. Nelly withdrew her hands and sat up.
'George, we must go home. You must have a good night.'
He obeyed her, took up the oars, and pulled swiftly to the boathouse.
She sat in a kind of dream. It was all over, the heavenly time--all
done. She had had the very best of life--could it ever come again? In
her pain and her longing she was strangely conscious of growth and
change. The Nelly of three weeks back seemed to have nothing to do with
her present self, to be another human being altogether.
He made her go to bed, and remained in the sitting-room himself, under
pretence of some papers he must put in order. When the sounds in the
next room ceased, and he knew that she must be lying still, waiting for
him, he sat down, took pen and paper, and began to write to her--a
letter to be given to her if he fell. He had already written a letter of
business directions, which was at his lawyer's. This was of another
kind.
'My Darling,--this will be very short. It is only to tell you that if I
fall--if we never meet again, after to-morrow, you are to think first of
all--and always--that you have made a man so happy that if no more joy
can come to him on earth, he could die now--as far as he himself is
concerned--blessing God for his life. I never imagined that love could
be so perfect. You have taught me. God reward you--God watch over you.
If I die, you will be very sad--that will be the bitterness to me, if I
have time to know it. But this is my last prayer to you--to be comforted
by this remembrance--of what you have done for me--what you have been to
me. And in time, my precious one, comfort will come. There may be a
child--if so, you will love it for us both. But if not, you must still
take comfort. You must be willing, for my sake, to be comforted. And
remember:--don't be angry with me, darling--if in years to come, another
true love, and another home should be offered you, don't refuse
them--Nelly! You were born to be loved. And if my spirit lives, and
understands; what could it feel but joy that your sorrow was healed--my
best beloved!
'This will be given to you only if I die. With the deepest gratitude and
the tenderest love that a man can feel, I bid you good-bye--my precious
wife--good-bye!'
He put it up with a steady hand, and addressed it first to Nelly,
enclosing it in a larger envelope addressed to his oldest friend, a
school-fellow, who had been his best man at their marriage. Then he
stole downstairs, unlocked the front door, and crossing the road in the
moonlight, he put the letter into the wall post-box on the further side.
And before re-entering the house, he stood a minute or two in the road,
letting the fresh wind from the fells beat upon his face, and trying
the while to stamp on memory the little white house where Nelly lay, the
trees overhanging it, the mountain tops beyond the garden wall.
CHAPTER V
'Is Mrs. Sarratt in?' asked Miss Martin of Mrs. Weston's little maid,
Milly.
Milly wore a look of animation, as of one who has been finding the world
interesting.
'She's gone a walk--over the bridge, Miss.'
'Has she had news of Mr. Sarratt?'
'Yes, Miss,' said the girl eagerly. 'He's all right. Mrs. Sarratt got a
telegram just a couple of hours ago.'
'And you think I shall find her by the lake?'
Milly thought so. Then advancing a step, she said confidentially--
'She's been dreadfully upset this two days, Miss. Not that she'd say
anything. But she's looked------'
'I know. I saw her yesterday.'
'And it's been a job to get her to eat anything. Mrs. Weston's been
after her with lots of things--tasty you know, Miss--to try and tempt
her. But she wouldn't hardly look at them.'
'Thank you, Milly'--said Miss Martin, after a pause. 'Well, I'll find
her. Is Miss Cookson here?'
Milly's candid countenance changed at once. She frowned--it might have
been said she scowled.
'She came the day Mr. Sarratt went away, Miss. Well of course it's not
my place to speak, Miss--but _she_ don't do Mrs. Sarratt no good!' Miss
Martin couldn't help a smile--but she shook her head reprovingly all the
same, as she hastened away. Milly had been in her Sunday-school class,
and they were excellent friends.
Across the Rotha, she pursued a little footpath leading to the lakeside.
It was a cold day, with flying clouds and gleams on hill and water. The
bosom of Silver How held depths of purple shadow, but there were lights
like elves at play, chasing each other along the Easedale fells, and the
stony side of Nab Scar.
Beside the water, on a rock, sat Nelly Sarratt. An open telegram and a
bundle of letters lay on her lap, her hands loosely folded over them.
She was staring at the water and the hills, with absent eyes, and her
small face wore an expression--relaxed and sweet--like that of a
comforted child, which touched Miss Martin profoundly.
'So you've heard?--you poor thing!' said the elder woman smiling, as she
laid a friendly hand on the girl's shoulder.
Nelly looked up--and drew a long deep breath.
'He's all right, and the battalion's going to have three weeks'
rest--behind the lines.'
Her dark eyes shone. Hester Martin sat down on the turf beside her.
'Capital! When did you hear last?'
'Just the day before the "push." Of course he couldn't tell me
anything--but somehow I knew. And then the papers since--they're pretty
ghastly,' said Nelly, with a faint laugh and a shiver. 'The farm under
the hill there'--she pointed--'you know about them?'
'Yes. I saw them after the telegram,' said Miss Martin, sadly. 'Of
course it was the only son. These small families are too awful. Every
married woman ought to have six sons!'
Nelly dropped her face out of sight, shading it with her hands.
Presently she said, in a dreamy voice of content--
'I shall get a letter to-morrow.'
'How do you know?'
Nelly held out the telegram, which said--
'All safe. Posted letter last night. Love.'
'It _can't_ take more than forty-eight hours to come--can it?' Then she
lifted her eyes again to the distant farm, with its white front and its
dark patch of yews.
'I keep thinking of _their_ telegram--' she said, slowly--'and then of
mine. Oh, this war is too _horrible!'_ She threw up her hands with a
sudden wild gesture, and then let one of them drop into Hester Martin's
grasp. 'In George's last letter he told me he had to go with a message
across a bit of ground that was being shelled. He went with a
telephonist. He crossed first. The other man was to wait and follow him
after an interval. George got across, then the man with the telephone
wire started, and was shot--just as he reached George. He fell into
George's arms--and died. And it might have been George--it might have
been George just as well! It might be George any day!'
Miss Martin looked at her in perplexity. She had no ready-made
consolations--she never had. Perhaps it was that which made her kind
wrinkled face such a welcome sight to those in trouble. But at last she
said--'It is all we women can do--to be patient--and hope--not to let
our courage go down.'
Nelly shook her head.
'I am always saying that to myself--but! when the news comes--_if_ it
comes--what good will that be to me! Oh, I haven't been idle--indeed I
haven't,' she added piteously--'I've worked myself tired every day--just
not to think!'
'I know you have,' Miss Martin pressed the hand in hers. 'Well, now,
he'll be all safe for a fortnight------'
'Perhaps three weeks,' Nelly corrected her, eagerly. Then she looked
round at her new friend, a shy smile lighting up her face, and
bringing back its bloom.
'You know he writes to me nearly every day?'
'It's the way people have--war or no war--when they're in love,' said
Hester Martin drily. 'And you--how often?'
'_Every_ day. I haven't missed once. How could I?--when he wants me to
write--when I hear so often!' And her free hand closed possessively,
greedily, over the letters in her lap.
Hester Martin surveyed her thoughtfully.
'I wouldn't do war-work all day, if I were you,' she said at last. 'Why
don't you go on with your sketching?'
'I was going to try this very afternoon. Sir William said he would give
me a lesson,' was the listless reply.
'He's coming here?'
'He said he would be walking this way, if it was fine,' said Nelly,
indifferently.
Both relapsed into silence. Then Miss Martin enquired after Bridget. The
face beside her darkened a little.
'She's very well. She knows about the telegram. She thought I was a
great goose to be so anxious. She's making an index now--for the book!'
'The psychology book?'
'Yes!' A pause--then Nelly looked round, flushing.
'I can't talk to Bridget you see--about George--or the war. She just
thinks the world's mad--that it's six to one and half a dozen to the
other--that it doesn't matter at all who wins--so long of course as the
Germans don't come here. And as for me, if I was so foolish as to marry
a soldier in the middle of the war, why I must just take the
consequences--grin and bear it!'
Her tone and look showed that in her clinging way she had begun to
claim the woman beside her as a special friend, while Hester Martin's
manner towards her bore witness that the claim excited a warm
response--that intimacy and affection had advanced rapidly since George
Sarratt's departure.
'Why do you put up with it?' said Miss Martin, sharply. 'Couldn't you
get some cousin--some friend to stay with you?'
Nelly shook her head. 'George wanted me to. But I told him I couldn't.
It would mean a quarrel. I could never quarrel with Bridget.'
Miss Martin laughed indignantly. 'Why not--if she makes you miserable?'
'I don't know. I suppose I'm afraid of her. And besides'--the words
came reluctantly--: 'she does a lot for me. I _ought_ to be very
grateful!'
Yes, Hester Martin did know that, in a sense, Bridget did 'a lot' for
her younger sisters. It was not many weeks since she had made their
acquaintance, but there had been time for her to see how curiously
dependent young Mrs. Sarratt was on Miss Cookson. There was no real
sympathy between them; nor could Miss Martin believe that there was ever
much sense of kinship. But whenever there was anything to be done
involving any friction with the outside world, Bridget was ready to do
it, while Nelly invariably shrank from it.
For instance, some rather troublesome legal business connected with
Nelly's marriage, and the reinvestment of a small sum of money, had
descended on the young wife almost immediately after George's
departure. She could hardly bring herself to look at the letter. What
did it matter? Let their trustee settle it. To be worrying about it
seemed to be somehow taking her mind from George--to be breaking in on
that imaginative vision of him, and his life in the trenches, which
while it tortured her, yet filled the blank of his absence. So Bridget
did it all--corresponded peremptorily with their rather old and
incompetent trustee, got all the signatures necessary out of Nelly, and
carried the thing through. Again, on another and smaller occasion, Miss
Martin had seen the two sisters confronted with a scandalous overcharge
for the carriage of some heavy luggage from Manchester. Nelly was
aghast; but she would have paid the sum demanded like a lamb, if Bridget
had not stepped in--grappled with carter and railway company, while
Nelly looked on, helpless but relieved.
It was clear that Nelly's inborn wish to be liked, her quivering
responsiveness, together with a strong dose of natural indolence, made
her hate disagreement or friction of any kind. She was always
yielding--always ready to give in. But when Bridget in her harsh
aggravating way fought things out and won, Nelly was indeed often made
miserable, by the _ricochet_ of the wrath roused by Bridget's methods
upon herself; but she generally ended, all the same, by realising that
Bridget had done her a service which she could not have done for
herself.
Hester Martin frankly thought the sister odious, and pitied the bride
for having to live with her. All the same she often found herself
wondering how Nelly would ever manage the practical business of life
alone, supposing loneliness fell to her at any time. But why should it
fall to her?--unless indeed Sarratt were killed in action. If he
survived the war he would make her the best of guides and husbands; she
would have children; and her sweetness, her sensitiveness would stiffen
under the impact of life to a serviceable toughness. But meanwhile what
could she do--poor little Ariadne!--but 'live and be lovely'--sew and
knit, and gather sphagnum moss--dreaming half her time, and no doubt
crying half the night. What dark circles already round the beautiful
eyes! And how transparent were the girl's delicate hands! Miss Martin
felt that she was watching a creature on whom love had been acting with
a concentrated and stimulating energy, bringing the whole being suddenly
and rapidly into flower. And now, what had been only stimulus and warmth
had become strain, and, sometimes, anguish, or fear. The poor drooping
plant could with difficulty maintain itself.
For the moment however, Nelly, in her vast relief, was ready to talk and
think of quite ordinary matters.
'Bridget is in a good temper with me to-day!' she said presently,
looking with a smile at her companion--'because--since the telegram
came--I told her I would accept Miss Farrell's invitation to go and
spend a Sunday with them.'
'Well, it might distract you. But you needn't expect to get much out of
Cicely!'
The old face lit up with its tolerant, half-sarcastic smile.
'I shall be dreadfully afraid of her!' said Nelly.
'No need to be. William will keep her in order. She is a foolish woman,
Cicely, and her own worst enemy, but--somehow'--The speaker paused. She
was about to say--'somehow I am fond of her'--when she suddenly wondered
whether the remark would be true, and stopped herself.
'I think she's very--very good-looking'--said Nelly, heartily. 'Only,
why'--she hesitated, but her half-laughing look continued the sentence.
'Why does she blacken her eyebrows, and paint her lips, and powder her
cheeks? Is that what you mean?'
Nelly's look was apologetic. 'She doesn't really want it, does she?' she
said shyly, as though remembering that she was speaking to a kinswoman
of the person discussed. 'She could do so well without it.'
'No--to be quite candid, I don't think she _would_ look so well without
it. That's the worst of it. It seems to suit her to be made up!--though
everybody knows it _is_ make-up.'
'Of course, if George wanted me to "make up," I should do it at once,'
said Nelly, thoughtfully, propping her chin on her hands, and staring at
the lake. 'But he hates it. Is--is Miss Farrell--' she looked
round--'in love with anybody?'
Miss Martin laughed.
'I'll leave you to find out--when you go there. So if your husband liked
you to paint and powder, you would do it?'
The older woman looked curiously at her companion. As she sat there, on
a rock above the lake, in a grey nurse's dress with a nurse's bonnet
tied under her chin, Hester Martin conveyed an impression of rugged and
unconscious strength which seemed to fuse her with the crag behind her.
She had been gathering sphagnum moss on the fells almost from sunrise
that morning; and by tea-time she was expecting a dozen munition-workers
from Barrow, whom she was to house, feed and 'do for,' in her little
cottage over the week-end. In the interval, she had climbed the steep
path to that white farm where death had just entered, and having mourned
with them that mourn, she had come now, as naturally, to rejoice with
Nelly Sarratt.
Nelly considered her question, but not in any doubtfulness of mind.
'Indeed, I would,' she said, decidedly. 'Isn't it my duty to make George
happy?'
'What "George"? If Mr. Sarratt wanted you to paint and powder----'
'He wouldn't be the "George" I married? There's something in that!'
laughed Nelly. Then she lifted her hand to shade her eyes against the
westering sun--'Isn't that Sir William coming?'
She pointed doubtfully to a distant figure walking along the path that
skirts the western edge of the lake. Miss Martin put up her glasses.
'Certainly. Coming no doubt to give you a lesson. But where are your
sketching things?'
Nelly rose in a hurry.
'I forgot about them when I came out. The telegram--' She pressed her
hands to her eyes, with a long breath.
'I'll run back for them. Will you tell him?'
She departed, and Hester awaited her cousin. He came slowly along the
lake, his slight lameness just visible in his gait--otherwise a splendid
figure of a man, with a bare head, bearded and curled, like a Viking in
a drawing by William Morris. He carried various artist's gear slung
about him, and an alpenstock. His thoughts were apparently busy, for he
came within a few yards of Hester Martin, before he saw her.
'Hullo! Hester--you here? I came to get some news of Mrs. Sarratt and
her husband. Is he all right?'
Hester repeated the telegram, and added the information that seeing him
coming, Mrs. Sarratt had gone in search of her sketching things.
'Ah!--I thought if she'd got good news she might like to begin,' said
Farrell. 'Poor thing--she's lucky! Our casualties these last few days
have been awful, and the gain very small. Men or guns--that's our
choice just now. And it will be months before we get the guns. So
practically, there's no choice. Somebody ought to be hung!'
He sat down frowning. But his face soon cleared, and he began to study
the point of view.
'Nothing to be made of it but a picture post-card,' he declared.
'However I daresay she'll want to try it. They always do--the beginners.
The more ambitious and impossible the thing, the better.'
'Why don't you _teach_ her?' said Hester, severely.
Farrell laughed.
'Why I only want to amuse her, poor little soul!' he said, as he put his
easel together. 'Why should she take it seriously?'
'She's more intelligence than you think.'
'Has she? What a pity! There are so many intelligent people in the
world, and so few pretty ones,'
He spoke with a flippant self-confidence that annoyed his cousin. But
she knew very well that she was poorly off in the gifts that were
required to scourge him. And there already was the light form of Nelly,
on the footbridge over the river. Farrell looked up and saw her coming.
'Extraordinary--the grace of the little thing!' he said, half to
himself, half to Hester. 'And she knows nothing about it--or seems to.'
'Do you imagine that her husband hasn't told her?' Hester's tone was
mocking.
Farrell looked up in wonder. 'Sarratt? of course he has--so far as he
has eyes to see it. But he has no idea how remarkable it is.'
'What? His wife's beauty? Nonsense!'
'How could he? It wants a trained eye,' said Farrell, quite serious.
'Hush!--here she comes.'
Nelly came up breathlessly, laden with her own paraphernalia. Farrell at
once perceived that she was pale and hollow-eyed. But her expression was
radiant.
'How kind of you to come!' she said, looking up at him. 'You know I've
had good news--splendid news?'
'I do indeed. I came to ask,' he said gravely. 'He's out of it for a
bit?'
'Yes, for three weeks!'
'So you can take a rest from worrying?'
She nodded brightly, but she was not yet quite mistress of her nerves,
and her face quivered. He turned away, and began to set his palette,
while she seated herself.
Hester watched the lesson for half an hour, till it was time to go and
make ready for her munition-workers. And she watched it with increasing
pleasure, and increasing scorn of a certain recurrent uneasiness she had
not been able to get rid of. Nothing could have been better than
Farrell's manner to Ariadne. It was friendly, chivalrous,
respectful--all it should be--with a note of protection, of unspoken
sympathy, which, coming from a man nearly twenty years older than the
little lady herself, was both natural and attractive. He made an
excellent teacher besides, handling her efforts with a mixture of
criticism and praise, which presently roused Nelly's ambition, and
kindled her cheeks and eyes. Time flew and when Hester Martin rose to
leave them, Nelly cried out in protest--'It can't be five o'clock!'
'A quarter to--just time to get home before my girls arrive!'
'Oh, and I must go too,' said Nelly regretfully. 'I promised Bridget I
would be in for tea. But I _was_ getting on--wasn't I?' She turned to
Farrell.
'Swimmingly. But you've only just begun. Next time the sitting must be
longer.'
'Will you--will you come in to tea?'--she asked him shyly. 'My sister
would be very glad.'
'Many thanks--but I am afraid I can't. I shall be motoring back to
Carton to-night. To-morrow is one of my hospital days. I told you how I
divided my week, and salved my conscience.'
He smiled down upon her from his great height, his reddish gold hair and
beard blown by the wind, and she seemed to realise him as a great,
manly, favouring presence, who made her feel at ease.
Hester Martin had already vanished over the bridge, and Farrell and
Nelly strolled back more leisurely towards the lodgings, he carrying her
canvas sketching bag.
On the way she conveyed to him her own and Bridget's acceptance of the
Carton invitation.
'If Miss Farrell won't mind our clothes--or rather our lack of them! I
did mean to have my wedding dress altered into an evening
dress--but!----'
She lifted her hand and let it fall, in a sad significant gesture which
pleased his fastidious eye.
'You hadn't even the time of the heart for it? I should think not!' he
said warmly. 'Who cares about dress nowadays?'
'Your sister!' thought Nelly--but aloud she said--
'Well then we'll come--we'll be delighted to come. May I see the
hospital?'
'Of course. It's like any other hospital.'
'Is it very full now?' she asked him uneasily, her bright look clouding.
'Yes--but it ebbs and flows. Sometimes for a day or two all our men
depart. Then there is a great rush.'
'Are they bad cases?'
There was an unwilling insistence in her voice, as though her mind dealt
with images it would gladly have put away, but could not.
'A good many of them. They send them us as straight as they can from the
front. But the surgeons are wonderfully skilful. It's simply marvelous
what they can do.'
He seemed to see a shiver pass through her slight shoulders, and he
changed the subject at once. The Carton motor should come for her and
her sister, he said, whenever they liked, the following Saturday
afternoon. The run would take about an hour. Meanwhile--
'Do you want any more books or magazines?' he asked her smiling, with
the look of one only eager to be told how to serve her. They had paused
in the road outside the lodgings.
'Oh I how could we! You sent us such a bundle!' cried Nelly gratefully.
'We are always finding something new in it. It makes the evenings so
different. We will bring them back when we come.'
'Don't hurry. And go on with the drawing. I shall expect to see it a
great deal further on next time. It's all right so far.'
He went his way back, speedily, taking a short cut over Loughrigg to his
cottage. His thoughts, as he climbed, were very full of Mrs. Sarratt.
But they were the thoughts of an artist--of a man who had studied
beauty, and the European tradition of beauty, whether in form or
landscape, for many years; who had worked--_à contre coeur_--in a Paris
studio, and had copied Tintoret--fervently--in Venice; who had been a
collector of most things, from Tanagra figures to Delia Robbias. She
made an impression upon him in her lightness and grace, her small
proportions, her lissomness of outline, very like that of a Tanagra
figure. How had she come to spring from Manchester? What kindred had she
with the smoke and grime of a great business city? He fell into amused
speculation. Manchester has always possessed colonies of Greek
merchants. Somewhere in the past was there some strain of southern blood
which might account for her? He remembered a beautiful Greek girl at an
Oxford Commemoration, when he had last attended that function; the
daughter of a Greek financier settled in London, whose still lovely
mother had been drawn and painted interminably by the Burne Jones and
William Morris group of artists. _She_ was on a larger scale than Mrs.
Sarratt, but the colour of the flesh was the same--as though light shone
through alabaster--and the sweetness of the deep-set eyes. Moreover she
had produced much the same effect on the bystander, as of a child of
nature, a creature of impulse and passion--passion, clinging and
self-devoted, not fierce and possessive--through all the more
superficial suggestions of reticence and self-control. 'This little
creature is only at the beginning of her life'--he thought, with a kind
of pity for her very softness and exquisiteness. 'What the deuce will
she have made of it, by the end? Why should such beings grow old?'
His interest in her led him gradually to other thoughts--partly
disagreeable, partly philosophical. He had once--and only once--found
himself involved in a serious love-affair, which, as it had left him a
bachelor, had clearly come to no good. It was with a woman much older
than himself--gifted--more or less famous--a kind of modern Corinne whom
he had met for a month in Rome in his first youth. Corinne had laid
siege to him, and he had eagerly, whole-heartedly succumbed. He saw
himself, looking back, as the typically befooled and bamboozled mortal;
for Corinne, in the end, had thrown him over for a German professor, who
admired her books and had a villa on the Janiculum. During the eighteen
years which had elapsed since their adventure, he had quite made it up
with her, and had often called at the Janiculan villa, with its
antiques, its window to the view, and the great Judas tree between it
and Rome. His sense of escape--which grew upon him--was always tempered
by a keen respect for the lady's disinterestedness, and those high
ideals which must have led her--for what else could?--to prefer the
German professor, who had so soon become decrepit, to himself. But the
result of it all had been that the period of highest susceptibility and
effervescence had passed by, leaving him still unmarried. Since then he
had had many women-friends, following harmlessly a score of 'chance
desires'! But he had never wanted to marry anybody; and the idea of
surrendering the solitude and independence of his pleasant existence had
now become distasteful to him. Renan in some late book speaks of his
life as 'cette charmante promenade à travers la realité.' Farrell could
have adopted much the same words about his own--until the war. The war
had made him think a good deal, like Sarratt; though the thoughts of a
much travelled, epicurean man of the world were naturally very
different from those of the young soldier. At least 'the surge and
thunder' of the struggle had developed in Farrell a new sensitiveness, a
new unrest, as though youth had returned upon him. The easy, drifting
days of life before the catastrophe were gone. The 'promenade' was no
longer charming. But the jagged and broken landscape through which it
was now taking him, held him often--like so many others--breathless with
strange awes, strange questionings. And all the more, because, owing to
his physical infirmity, he must be perforce a watcher, a discontented
watcher, rather than an actor, in the great scene.
* * * * *
That night Nelly, sitting at her open window, with starlight on the
lake, and the cluster rose sending its heavy scent into the room--wrote
to her husband.
'My darling--it is just a little more than eight hours since I got your
telegram. Sometimes it seems like nothing--and then like _days_--days of
happiness. I was _very_ anxious. But I know I oughtn't to write about
that. You say it helps you if I keep cheerful, and always expect the
best and not the worst. Indeed, George, I do keep cheerful. Ask Miss
Martin--ask Bridget--'
At this point two splashes fell, luckily not on the letter, but on the
blotting paper beside it, and Nelly hastily lifted her handkerchief to
dry a pair of swimming eyes.
'But he can't see--he won't know!' she thought, apologising to herself;
yet wrestling at the same time with the sharp temptation to tell him
exactly how she had suffered, that he might comfort her. But she
repelled it. Her moral sense told her that she ought to be sustaining
and strengthening him--rather than be hanging upon him the burden of her
own fears and agonies.
She went on bravely--
'Of course, after the news in the paper this morning,--and yesterday--I
was worried till I heard. I knew--at any rate I guessed--you must have
been in it all. And now you are safe, my own own!--for three whole
blessed weeks. Oh, how well I shall sleep all that time--and how much
work I shall do! But it won't be all war-work. Sir William Farrell came
over to-day, and showed me how to begin a drawing of the lake. I shall
finish it for your birthday, darling. Of course you won't want to be
bothered with it out there. I shall keep it till you come. The lake is
so beautiful to-night, George. It is warmer again, and the stars are all
out. The mountains are so blue and quiet--the water so still. But for
the owls, everything seems asleep. But they call and call--and the echo
goes round the lake. I can just see the island, and the rocks round
which the boat drifted--that last night. How good you were to me--how I
loved to sit and look at you, with the light on your dear face--and the
oars hanging--and the shining water--
'And then I think of where you are--and what you have been seeing in
that awful fighting. But not for long. I try to put it away.
'George, darling!--you know what you said when you went away--what you
hoped might come--to make us both happy--and take my thoughts off the
war? But, dear, it isn't so--you mustn't hope it. I shall be dreadfully
sorry if you are disappointed. But you'll only find _me_--your own
Nelly--not changed a bit--when you come back.
'I want to hear everything when you write--how your men did--whether you
took any prisoners, whether there was ammunition enough, or whether you
were short again? I feel every day that I ought to go and make
munitions--but somehow--I can't. We are going to Carton on Saturday.
Bridget is extremely pleased. I rather dread it. But I shall be able to
write you a long letter about it on Sunday morning, instead of going to
church. There is Rydal chapel striking twelve! My darling--my
darling!--good-night.'
CHAPTER VI
The following Saturday afternoon, at three o'clock, the Carton motor
duly arrived at the Rydal cottage door. It was a hot summer day, the
mountains colourless and small under their haze of heat, the woods
darkening already towards the August monotony, the streams low and
shrunken. Lakeland was at the moment when the artists who haunt her
would rather not paint her, remembering the subtleties of spring, and
looking forward to the pageantry of autumn. But for the eye that loves
her she has beauties enough at any time, and no blanching heat and dust
can spoil the lovely or delicate things that lie waiting in the shade of
her climbing oak-woods or on her bare fells, or beside her still lakes.
Nelly took her seat in the landaulette, with Bridget beside her. Milly
and Mrs. Weston admiringly watched their departure from the doorway of
the lodgings, and they were soon speeding towards Grasmere and Dunmail
Raise. Nelly's fresh white dress, aided by the blue coat and shady hat
which George had thought so ravishing, became her well; and she was
girlishly and happily aware of it. Her spirits were high, for there in
the little handbag on her wrist lay George's last letter, received that
morning, short and hurried, written just to catch the post, on his
arrival at the rest camp, thirty miles behind the line. Heart-ache and
fear, if every now and then their black wings brushed her, and far
within, a nerve quivered, were mostly quite forgotten. Youth, the joy of
being loved, the joy of mere living, reclaimed her.
Bridget beside her, in a dark blue cotton, with a very fashionable hat,
looked more than her thirty years, and might almost have been taken for
Nelly's mother. She sat erect, her thin straight shoulders carrying her
powerful head and determined face; and she noticed many things that
quite escaped her sister: the luxury of the motor for instance; the
details of the Farrell livery worn by the two discharged soldiers who
sat in front as chauffeur and footman; and the evident fact that while
small folk must go without servants, the rich seemed to have no
difficulty in getting as many as they wanted.
'I wonder what this motor cost?' she said presently in a speculative
tone, as they sped past the turn to Grasmere church and began to ascend
the pass leading to Keswick.
'Well, we know--about--don't we?' said Nelly vaguely. And she guessed a
sum, at which Bridget looked contemptuous.
'More than _that_, my dear! However of course it doesn't matter to
them.'
'Don't you think people look at us sometimes, as though we were doing
something wrong?' said Nelly uneasily. They had just passed two old
labourers--fine patriarchal fellows who had paused a moment to gaze at
the motor and the two ladies. 'I suppose it's because--because we look
so smart.'
'Well, why shouldn't we?'
'Because it's war-time I suppose,' said Nelly slowly--'and perhaps
their sons are fighting--'
'We're not fighting!'
'No--but--.' With a slight frown, Nelly tried to express herself. 'It
looks as if we were just living as usual, while--Oh, you know, Bridget,
what people think!--how _everybody's_ trying not to spend money on
themselves.'
'Are they?' Bridget laughed aloud. 'Look at all the dress advertisements
in the papers. Why, yesterday, when I was having tea with those people
at Windermere, there was a man there telling lots of interesting things.
He said he knew some great merchants in the city, who had spent
thousands and thousands on furs--expensive furs--the summer before the
war. And they thought they'd all have been left on their hands, that
they'd have lost heavily. And instead of that they sold them all, and
made a real big profit!'
Bridget turned an almost triumphant look on her sister, as though the
_coup_ described had been her own.
'Well, it isn't right!' said Nelly, passionately. 'It isn't--it
_isn't_--Bridget! When the war's costing so much--and people are
suffering and dying--'
'Oh, I know!' said Bridget hastily. 'You needn't preach to me my dear
child. I only wanted you to look at _facts_. You're always so incurably
sentimental!'
'I'm not!' Nelly protested, helplessly. 'We _make_ the facts. If nobody
bought the furs, the facts would be different. George says it's wicked
to squander money, and live as if everything were just the same as it
used to be. And I agree with him!'
'Of course you do!' laughed Bridget. '_You_ don't squander money, my
dear!'
'Only because I haven't got it to spend, you mean?' said Nelly,
flushing.
'No--but you should look at things sensibly. The people who are making
money are spending it--oceans of it! And the people who have money, like
the Farrells, are spending it too. Wait till you see how they live!'
'But there's the hospital!' cried Nelly.
Bridget shrugged her shoulders.
'That's because they can afford to give the hospital, and have the
motor-cars too. If they had to choose between hospitals and motor-cars!'
'Lots of people do!'
'You think Sir William Farrell looks like doing without things?' said
Bridget, provokingly. Then she checked herself. 'Of course I like Sir
William very much. But then _I_ don't see why he shouldn't have
motor-cars or any other nice thing he wants.'
'That's because--you don't think enough--you never think enough--about
the war!' said Nelly, insistently.
Bridget's look darkened.
'I would stop the war to-morrow--I would make peace to-morrow--if I
could--you know I would. It will destroy us all--ruin us all. It's
sheer, stark lunacy. There, you know what I think!'
'I don't see what it's ever cost you, Bridget!' said Nelly, breathing
fast.
'Oh, well, it's very easy to say that--but it isn't argument.'
Bridget's deep-set penetrating eyes glittered as she turned them on her
sister. 'However, for goodness' sake, don't let's quarrel about it. It's
a lovely day, and we don't often have a motor like this to drive in!'
The speaker leant back, giving herself up to the sensuous pleasure of
the perfectly hung car, and the rapid movement through the summer air.
Wythburn and Thirlmere were soon passed; leaving them just time to
notice the wrack and ruin which Manchester has made of the once lovely
shore of Thirlmere, where hideous stretches of brown mud, and the ruins
of long submerged walls and dwellings, reappear with every dry summer to
fling reproach in the face of the destroyer.
Now they were on the high ground above Keswick; and to the west and
north rose a superb confusion of mountain-forms, peaked and rounded and
cragged, with water shining among them, and the silver cloud wreaths
looped and threaded through the valleys, leaving the blue or purple
tops suspended, high in air, unearthly and alone, to parley with the
setting sun. Not yet setting indeed--but already flooding the west with
a glory in which the further peaks had disappeared--burnt away; a
shining holocaust to the Gods of Light and Fire.
Then a sharp descent, a run through Keswick, another and a tamer lake, a
sinking of the mountain-forms, and they were nearing the woods of
Carton. Both sisters had been silent for some time. Nelly was wrapt in
thoughts of George. Would he get leave before Christmas? Suppose he were
wounded slightly--just a wound that would send him home, and let her
nurse him?--a wound from which he would be sure to get well--not too
quickly! She could not make up her mind to wish it--to pray for it--it
seemed like tempting Providence. But how she had envied a young couple
whom she sometimes met walking on the Ambleside road!--a young private
of one of the Border regiments, with a bandaged arm, and his sweetheart.
Once--with that new free-masonry which the war has brought about, she
had stopped to speak to them. The boy had been quite ready to talk about
his wound. It had seemed nothing at first--just a fragment of
shrapnel--he had scarcely known he was hit. But abscess after abscess
had formed--a leading nerve had been injured--it might be months before
he could use it again. And meanwhile the plain but bright-faced girl
beside him was watching over him; he lodged with her parents as his own
were dead; and they were to be married soon. No chance of his going out
again! The girl's father would give him work in his garage. They had the
air of persons escaped from shipwreck and ashamed almost of their own
secret happiness, while others were still battling with and sinking in
the waves.
* * * * *
A flowery lodge, a long drive through green stretches of park, with a
heather fell for background--and then the motor, leaving to one side a
huge domed pile with the Union Jack floating above it, ran through a
wood, and drew up in front of Carton Cottage, a low building on the
steps of which stood Sir William Farrell.
'Delighted to see you! Come in, and let Cicely give you some tea.
They'll see to your luggage!'
He led in Nelly, and Bridget followed, glancing from side to side, with
an eye shrewdly eager, an eye that took in and appraised all it saw. A
cottage indeed! It had been built by Sir William's father, for his only
sister, a maiden lady, to whom he was much attached. 'Aunt Sophy' had
insisted on a house to herself, being a person of some ruggedness and
eccentricity of character and averse to any sort of dependence on other
people's ways and habits. But she had allowed her brother to build and
furnish the cottage for her as lavishly as he pleased, and during his
long widowhood she had been of much help to him in the management of
the huge household at Carton Hall, and in the bringing up of his two
children. After her death, the house had remained empty for some time,
till, six months after the outbreak of war, Farrell had handed over the
Hall to the War Office, and he and his sister had migrated to the
smaller house.
Bridget was aware, as she followed her sister, of rooms small but
numerous opening out on many sides, of long corridors with glistening
teak floors, of windows open to a garden ablaze with roses. Sir William
led them to what seemed a buzz of voices, and opened a door.
Cicely Farrell rose languidly from a table surrounded by laughing young
men, and advanced to meet the newcomers. Nelly found herself shaking
hands with the Captain Marsworth she had seen at Loughrigg Tarn, and
being introduced by Sir William to various young officers, some in
khaki, visitants from a neighbouring camp, and some from the Hall, in
various forms of convalescent undress, grey flannel suits, khaki tunics
with flannel 'slacks,' or full khaki, as the wearers pleased. The little
lady in white had drawn all the male eyes upon her as she came in, and
those who rapidly resumed their talk with Miss Farrell or each other,
interrupted by the entrance of the newcomers, were no less aware of her
than those who, with Farrell, devoted themselves to supply the two
sisters with tea.
Nelly herself, extremely shy, but sustained somehow by the thought that
she must hold her own in this new world, was soon deep in conversation
with a charming youth, who owned a long, slightly lantern-jawed face and
fair hair, moved on crutches with a slung knee, and took everything
including his wound as 'funny.'
'Where is your husband?' he asked her. 'Sir William thinks he is
somewhere near Festubert? My hat, the Lanchesters have been having a hot
time there!--funny, isn't it? But they'll be moved to an easier job
soon. They're always in luck--the Lanchesters--funny, I call it?--what?
I wouldn't worry if I were you. Your husband's got through this all
right--mightn't have another such show for ages. These things are awful
chancey--funny, isn't it? Oh, my wound?--well, it was just when I was
getting over the parados to move back to billets--that the brute got me.
Funny, wasn't it? Hullo!--here's a swell! My hat!--it's General Torr!'
Nelly looked up bewildered to see a group of officers enter the room,
headed by a magnificent soldier, with light brown hair, handsome
features, and a broad be-ribboned chest. Miss Farrell greeted him and
his comrades with her best smiles; and Nelly observed her closely, as
she stood laughing and talking among them. Sir William's sister was in
uniform, if it could be called a uniform. She wore a nurse's cap and
apron over a pale blue dress of some soft crapey material. The cap was a
square of fine lawn, two corners of which were fastened under the chin
with a brooch consisting of one large pearl. The open throat showed a
single string of fine pearls, and diamonds sparkled in the small ears.
Edging the cap on the temples and cheeks were little curls--a la
Henrietta Maria--and the apron, also of the finest possible lawn, had a
delicately embroidered edge. The lips of the wearer had been
artificially reddened, her eyebrows and eyelids had been skilfully
pencilled, her cheeks rouged. A more extraordinary specimen of the
nursing sisterhood it would have been impossible to find. Nevertheless
the result was, beyond gainsaying, both amusing and picturesque. The lad
beside Nelly watched Miss Farrell with a broad grin. On the other hand,
a lady in a thin black dress and widow's veil, who was sitting near
Bridget, turned away after a few minutes' observation of the hostess,
and with a curling lip began to turn over a book lying on a table near
her. But whether the onlookers admired or disapproved, there could be no
question that Miss Farrell held the field.
'I am very glad to hear that Mrs. Sarratt has good news of her husband!'
said Captain Marsworth courteously to Bridget, hardly able to make
himself heard however amid the din and laughter of the central group. He
too had been watching Cicely Farrell--but with a wholly impassive
countenance. Bridget made some indifferent answer, and then eagerly
asked who the visitors were. She was told that they were officers from a
neighbouring camp, including the general commanding the camp. Sir
William, said Captain Marsworth, had built the whole camp at his own
expense, and on his own land, without waiting for any government
contractor.
'I suppose he is so enormously rich--he can do anything he wants!' said
Bridget, her face kindling. 'It must be grand never to think what you
spend.'
Captain Marsworth was a trifle taken aback by the remark, as Sir William
was barely a couple of yards away.
'Yes, I daresay it's convenient,' he said, lightly. 'And what do you
find to do with yourself at Rydal?'
Bridget informed him briefly that she was correcting some proof-sheets
for a friend, and would then have an index to make.
Captain Marsworth looked at her curiously.
'May one ask what the book is?'
'It's something new about psychology,' said Bridget, calmly. 'It's going
to be a great deal talked about. My friend's awfully clever.'
'Ah! Doesn't she find it a little difficult to think about psychology
just now?'
'Why should she? Somebody's got to think about psychology,' was the
sharp reply. 'You can't let everything go, because there's a war.'
'I see! You remind me of a man I know, who's translating Dante. He's
just over military age, and there he sits in a Devonshire valley, with a
pile of books. I happen to know a particular department in a public
office that's a bit hustled for want of men, and I suggested that he
should lend a hand. He said it was his business to keep culture going!'
'Well?' said Bridget.
The challenging obstinacy of her look daunted him. He laughed.
'You think it natural--and right--to take the war like that?'
'Well, I don't see who's got a right to interfere with you if you do,'
she said, stiffly. Then, however, it occurred even to her obtuse and
self-centred perception, that she was saying something unexpected and
distasteful to a man who was clearly a great friend of the Farrells, and
therefore a member of the world she envied. So she changed the subject.
'Does Miss Farrell ever do any real nursing?' she asked abruptly.
Captain Marsworth's look became, in a moment, reserved and cold. 'She's
always ready to do anything for any of us!'
Then the speaker rose. 'I see Sir William's preparing to take your
sister into the gardens. You certainly ought to see them. They're very
famous.'
* * * * *
The party streamed out into the paths leading through a wood, and past a
series of water-lily pools to the walled gardens. Sir William walked in
front with Nelly.
'My brother's new craze!' said Cicely in the ear of the General beside
her, who being of heroic proportions had to stoop some way to hear the
remark. He followed the direction of her eyes.
'What, that little woman? A vision! Is it only looks, or is there
something besides?'
Cicely shrugged her shoulders.
'I don't know. I haven't found out. The sister's plain, disagreeable,
stupid.'
'She looks rather clever.'
'Doesn't that show she's stupid? Nobody ought to look clever. Do you
admire Mrs. Sarratt?'
'Can one help it? Or are you going also to maintain,' laughed the
general, 'that no one can be beautiful who looks it?'
'One _could_ maintain it--easily. The best kind of beauty has always to
be discovered. What do you think, Captain Marsworth?'
She turned--provokingly--to the soldier on her left hand.
'About beauty?' He looked up listlessly. 'I've no idea. The day's too
hot.'
Cicely eyed him.
'You're tired!' she said peremptorily. 'You've been doing too much. You
ought to go and rest.'
He smiled, and standing back he let them pass him. Turning into a side
path he disappeared towards the hospital.
'Poor old fellow!--he still looks very delicate,' said the General. 'How
is he really getting on?'
'The arm's improving. He's having massage and electricity. Sometimes he
seems perfectly well,' said Cicely. An oddly defiant note had crept into
the last sentence.
'He looks down--out of spirits. Didn't he lose nearly all his friends at
Neuve Chapelle?'
'Yes, some of his best friends.'
'And half the battalion! He always cared enormously about his men. He
and I, you know, fought in South Africa together. Of course then he was
just a young subaltern. He's a splendid chap! I'm afraid he won't get to
the front again. But of course they'll find him something at home. He
ought to marry--get a wife to look after him. By the way, somebody told
me there was some talk about him and the daughter of the rector here. A
nice little girl. Do you know her?'
'Miss Stewart? Yes.'
'What do you think of her?'
'A little nincompoop. Quite harmless!'
The handsome hero smiled--unseen by his companion.
Meanwhile Farrell was walking with Nelly through the stately series of
walled gardens, which his grandfather had planned and carried out,
mainly it seemed for the boredom of the grandson.
'What do we want with all these things now?' he said, waving an
impatient hand, as he and Nelly stood at the top flight of steps looking
down upon the three gardens sloping to the south, with their fragments
of statuary, and old leaden statuettes, ranged along the central walks.
'They're all out of date. They were before the war; and the war has
given them the _coup de grâce_. No more big estates--no more huge
country houses! My grandfather built and built, for the sake of
building, and I pay for his folly. After the war!--what sort of a world
shall we tumble into!'
'I don't want these gardens destroyed!' said Nelly, looking up at him.
'No one ought to spoil them. They're far too beautiful!'
She was beginning to speak with more freedom, to be less afraid of him.
The gap between her small provincial experience and modes of thought,
and his, was narrowing. Each was beginning to discover the inner
personality of the other. And the more Farrell explored her the more
charmed he was. She was curiously ignorant, whether of books or life.
Even the busy commercial life amid which she had been brought up, as it
seemed to him, she had observed but little. When he asked her questions
about Manchester, she was generally vague or puzzled. He saw that she
was naturally romantic; and her passion for the absent Sarratt, together
with her gnawing anxiety about him which could not be concealed, made
her, again, very touching in the eyes of a man of imagination whose
feelings were quick and soft. He walked about with her for more than an
hour, discoursing ironically on the Grecian temples, the rustic bridges
and pools and fountains, now in imitation of the older Versailles and
now of the Trianon, with which his grandfather had burdened his
descendants; so that the glorious evening, as it descended, presently
became a merry duel between him and her, she defending and admiring his
own possessions, and he attacking them. Her eyes sparkled, and a bright
red--a natural red--came back into her pale cheeks. She spoke and moved
with an evident exhilaration, as though she realised her own developing
powers, and was astonished by her own readiness of speech, and the sheer
pleasure of talk. And something, no doubt, entered in of the new scene;
its scale and magnificence, so different from anything she had yet
known; its suggestion of a tradition reaching back through many
generations, and of a series of lives relieved from all vulgar
necessities, playing as they pleased with art and money, with water and
wood.
At the same time she was never merely dazzled; and never, for one
moment, covetous or envious. He was struck with her simple dignity and
independence; and he perfectly understood that a being so profoundly in
love, and so overshadowed by a great fear, could only lend, so to speak,
her outer mind to Carton or the persons in it. He gathered roses for
her, and did his utmost to please her. But she seemed to him all the
time like a little hovering elf--smiling and gay--but quite intangible.
* * * * *
Dinner in the 'cottage' was short, but in Bridget's eyes perfect.
Personally, she was not enjoying herself very much, for she had made up
her mind that she did not get on with military men, and that it was
their fault, not hers; so that she sat often silent, a fact however
unnoticed in the general clatter of the table. She took it quite calmly,
and was more than compensated for the lack of conversation by the whole
spectacle of the Farrell wealth; the flowers, the silver, the costly
accessories of all kinds, which even in war-time, and in a 'cottage,'
seemed to be indispensable. It would have been more amusing, no doubt,
if it had been the big house and not the cottage. Sometimes through the
open windows and the trees, she caught sight of the great lighted pile a
little way off, and found herself dreaming of what it would be to live
there, and to command all that these people commanded. She saw herself
sweeping through the magnificent rooms, giving orders, inviting guests,
entertaining royalty, driving about the country in splendid motors. It
was a waking dream, and though she never uttered a word, the animation
of her thoughts infused a similar animation into her aspect, and made
her almost unconscious of her neighbours. Captain Marsworth made several
attempts to win her attention before she heard him.
'Yes.'
She turned at last an absent glance upon him.
'Miss Farrell talks of our all going over to the hospital after dinner.
She and Sir William often spend the evening there,' said Captain
Marsworth, quite aware from Miss Farrell's frequent glances in his
direction that he was not in her opinion doing his duty with Miss
Cookson.
'Will it take us long?' said Bridget, the vivacity of her look dying
out.
'As long as you please to stay!' laughed the Captain, drily.
* * * * *
That passage after dinner through the convalescent wards of the finely
equipped hospital was to Nelly Sarratt an almost intolerable experience.
She went bravely through it, leaving, wherever she talked to a
convalescent, an impression of shy sweetness behind her, which made a
good many eyes follow her as Farrell led her through the rooms. But she
was thankful when it was over; and when, at last, she was alone in her
room for the night, she flew--for consolation--to the drawer in which
she had locked her writing-desk, and the letters she had received that
morning. The post had just arrived as they were leaving Rydal, and she
had hastily torn open a letter from George, and thrust the others into a
large empty envelope. And now she discovered among them to her delight a
second letter from George, unopened. What unexpected joy!
It too was dated--'Somewhere in France'--and had been written two days
after the letter she had opened in the morning.
'My darling--we're having a real jolly time here--in an old village,
far behind the line, and it is said we shall be here for three whole
weeks. Well, some of us really wanted it, for the battalion has been in
some very hot fighting lately, and has had a nasty bit of the line to
look after for a long time--with nothing very much to show for it. My
platoon has lost some of its best men, and I've been pretty badly hit,
as some of them were real chums of mine--the bravest and dearest
fellows. And I don't know why, but for the first time, I've been feeling
rather jumpy and run down. So I went to a doctor, and he told me I'd
better go off duty for a fortnight. But just then, luckily, the whole
battalion was ordered, as I told you a week ago, into what's called
"divisional rest," so here we are--for three weeks! Quite good
billets--an old French farm--with two good barns and lots of straw for
the men, and an actual bedroom for me--and a real bed--_with sheets!_
Think of that! I am as comfortable as possible. Just at first I'm going
to stay in bed for a couple of days to please the doctor--but then I
shall be all right, and shall probably take a course of gymnastics
they're starting here--odd, isn't it?--like putting us to school
again!--so that I may be quite fit before going back to the front.
'One might almost forget the war here, if it weren't for the rumble of
the guns which hardly ever ceases. They are about thirty-five miles
away. The whole country is quite peaceful, and the crops coming on
splendidly. The farm produces delicious brown eggs--and you should
see--and _taste_--the omelets the farmer's wife makes! Coffee
too--first-rate! How these French women work! Our men are always
helping them, and the children hang round our Tommies like flies.
'These two days in bed are a godsend, for I can read all your letters
through again. There they are--spread out on my sheet! By Jove, little
woman, you've treated me jolly well! And now I can pay you back a
little. But perhaps you won't mind, dearest, if I don't write anything
very long, for I expect I ought to take it easy--for a bit--I can't
think why I should have felt so slack. I never knew anything about
nerves before. But the doctor has been very nice and understanding--a
real, decent fellow. He declares I shall be as fit as a fiddle, long
before the three weeks are done.
'My bedroom door is open, and some jolly yellow chickens are wandering
in and out. And sometimes the farmer's youngest--a nice little chap of
eight--comes to look at me. I teach him English--or I try--but when I
say the English words, he just doubles up with laughing and runs away.
Nelly, my precious--if I shut my eyes--I can fancy your little head
there--just inside the door--and your eyes looking at me!...May the Lord
give us good luck--and may we all be home by Christmas!--Mind you finish
that sketch!'
She put the letter down with a rather tremulous hand. It had depressed
her, and made her anxious. She read in it that George had been through
horrible things--and had suffered.
Then all that she had seen in the hospital came back upon her, and
rising restlessly she threw herself, without undressing, face downwards
on her bed. That officer, blanched to the colour of white wax, who had
lost a leg after frightful haemorrhage; that other, the merest boy,
whose right eye had been excised--she could not get them out of her
mind, nor the stories they had told her of the actions in which they had
been wounded.
'George--George!' It was a moan of misery, stifled in the darkness.
Then, suddenly, she remembered she had not said good-night to Bridget.
She had forgotten Bridget. She had been unkind. She got up, and sped
along the passage to Bridget's room.
'Bridget!' She just opened the door. 'May I come in?'
'Come in.'
Bridget was already in bed. In her hands was a cup of steaming chocolate
which a maid had just brought her, and she was lingering over it with a
face of content.
Nelly opened her eyes in astonishment.
'Did you ask for it, Bridget?'
'I did--or rather the housemaid asked what I would have. She
said--"ladies have just what they like in their rooms." So I asked for
chocolate.'
Nelly sat down on the bed.
'Is it good?'
'Excellent,' said Bridget calmly. 'Whatever did you expect?'
'We seem to have been eating ever since we came!' said Nelly
frowning,--'and they call it economising!'
Bridget threw back her head with a quiet laugh.
'Didn't I tell you so?'
'I wondered how you got on at dinner?' said Nelly hesitating. 'Captain
Marsworth didn't seem to be taking much trouble?'
'It didn't matter to me,' said Bridget. 'That kind of man always behaves
like that,'
Nelly flushed.
'You mean soldiers behave like that?'
'Well, I don't like soldiers--brothers-in-law excepted, of course.' And
Bridget gave her short, rather harsh laugh.
Nelly got up.
'Well, I shall be ready to go as early as you like on Monday, Bridget.
It was awfully good of you to pack all my things so nicely!'
'Don't I always?' Bridget laughed.
'You do--you do indeed. Good-night.'
She touched Bridget's cheek with her lips and stole away.
Bridget was left to think. There was a dim light in the room showing the
fine inlaid furniture, the flowery paper, the chintz-covered arm-chairs
and sofa, and, through an open door, part of the tiled wall of the
bathroom.
Miss Cookson had never slept in such a room before, and every item in
it pleased a starved sense in her. Poverty was _hateful_! Could one
never escape it?
Then she closed her eyes, and seemed to be watching Sir William and
Nelly in the gardens, his protecting eager air--her face looking up. Of
_course_ she might have married him--with the greatest ease!--if only
George Sarratt had not been in the way.
But supposing--
All the talk that evening had been of a new 'push'--a new and steady
offensive, as soon as the shell supply was better. George would be in
that 'push.' Nobody expected it for another month. By that time he would
be back at the front. She lay and thought, her eyes closed, her harsh
face growing a little white and pinched under the electric lamp beside
her. Potentially, her thoughts were murderous. The _wish_ that George
might not return formed itself clearly, for the first time, in her mind.
Dreams followed, as to consequences both for Nelly and herself,
supposing he did not return. And in the midst of them she fell asleep.
CHAPTER VII
August came, the second August of the war. The heart of England was sad
and sick, torn by the losses at Gallipoli, by the great disaster of the
Russian retreat, by the shortage of munitions, by the endless small
fighting on the British front, which eat away the young life of our
race, week by week, and brought us no further. But the spirit of the
nation was rising--and its grim task was becoming nakedly visible at
last. _Guns--men!_ Nothing else to say--nothing else to do.
George Sarratt's battalion returned to the fighting line somewhere about
the middle of August. 'But we are only marking time,' he wrote to his
wife. 'Nothing doing here, though the casualties go on every day.
However we all know in our bones there will be plenty to do soon. As for
me I am--more or less--all right again.'
Indeed, as September wore on, expectation quickened on both sides of the
Channel. Nelly went in fear of she knew not what. The newspapers said
little, but through Carton and the Farrells, she heard a great deal of
military gossip. The shell supply was improving--the new Ministry of
Munitions beginning to tell--a great blow was impending.
Weeks of rain and storm died down into an autumnal gentleness. The
bracken was turning on the hills, the woods beginning to dress for the
pageant of October. The sketching lessons which the usual August deluge
had interrupted were to begin again, as soon as Farrell came home. He
had been in France for a fortnight, at Etaples, and in Paris, studying
new methods and appliances for the benefit of the hospital. But whether
he was at home or no, the benefactions of Carton never ceased. Almost
every other day a motor from the Hall drove up laden with fruit and
flowers, with books and magazines.
The fourth week of September opened. The rumours of coming events crept
more heavily and insistently than ever through a sudden spell of heat
that hung over the Lakes. Nelly Sarratt slept little, and wrote every
day to her George, letters of which long sections were often destroyed
when written, condemned for lack of cheerfulness.
She was much touched by Farrell's constant kindness, and grateful for
it; especially because it seemed to keep Bridget in a good temper. She
was grateful too for the visitors whom a hint from him would send on
fine afternoons to call on the ladies at Rydal--convalescent officers,
to whom the drive from Carton, and tea with 'the pretty Mrs. Sarratt'
were an attraction, while Nelly would hang breathless on their gossip of
the war, until suddenly, perhaps, she would turn white and silent, lying
back in her garden chair with the look which the men talking to
her--brave, kind-hearted fellows--soon learnt to understand. Marsworth
came occasionally, and Nelly grew to like him sincerely, and to be
vaguely sorry for him, she hardly knew why. Cicely Farrell apparently
forgot them entirely. And in August and the first part of September she
too, according to Captain Marsworth's information, had been away, paying
visits.
On the morning of September 26th, the Manchester papers which reached
the cottage with the post contained columns of telegrams describing the
British attack at Loos, and the French 'push' in Champagne. Among the
letters was a short word from Sarratt, dated the 24th. 'We shall
probably be in action to-morrow, dearest. I will wire as soon as I can,
but you must not be anxious if there is delay. As far as I can judge it
will be a big thing. You may be sure I shall take all the precautions
possible. God bless you, darling. Your letters are _everything_.'
Nelly read the letter and the newspaper, her hands trembling as she held
it. At breakfast, Bridget eyed her uncomfortably.
'He'll be all right!' she said with harsh decision. 'Don't fret.'
The day passed, with heavy heat mists over the Lake, the fells and the
woods blotted out. On pretence of sketching, Nelly spent the hours on
the side of Loughrigg, trying sometimes to draw or sew, but for the most
part, lying with shut eyes, hidden among the bracken. Her faculty for
dreaming awake--for a kind of visualisation sharper than most people
possess--had been much developed since George's departure. It partly
tormented, partly soothed her.
Night came without news. 'I _can't_ hear till to-morrow night,' she
thought, and lay still all night patient and sleepless, her little hands
crossed on her breast. The window was wide open and she could see the
stars peering over Loughrigg.
Next morning, fresh columns in the newspaper. The action was still going
on. She must wait. And somehow it was easier to wait this second day;
she felt more cheerful. Was there some secret voice telling her that if
he were dead, she would have heard?
After lunch she set out to take some of the Carton flowers to the
farmer's wife living in a fold of the fell, who had lost her only son in
the July fighting. Hester Martin had guided her there one day, and some
fellow-feeling had established itself rapidly between Nelly, and the
sad, dignified woman, whose duties went on as usual while all that gave
them zest had departed.
The distance was short, and she left exact word where she could be
found. As she climbed the narrow lane leading to the farm, she presently
heard a motor approaching. The walls enclosing the lane left barely room
to pass. She could only scramble hurriedly up a rock which had been
built into the wall, and hold on to a young tree growing from it. The
motor which was large and luxurious passed slowly, and in the car she
saw two young men, one pale and sickly-looking, wrapped in a great-coat
though the day was stuffily warm: the other, the driver, a tall and
stalwart fellow, who threw Nelly a cold, unfriendly look as they went
by. Who could they be? The road only led to the farm, and when Nelly had
last visited Mrs. Grayson, a week before, she and her old husband and a
granddaughter of fourteen had been its only inmates.
Mrs. Grayson received her with a smile.
'Aye, aye, Mrs. Sarratt, coom in. Yo're welcome.'
But as Nelly entered the flagged kitchen, with its joints of bacon and
its bunches of dried herbs, hanging from the low beamed ceiling, its
wide hob grate, its dresser, table and chairs of old Westmorland oak,
every article in it shining with elbow-grease,--she saw that Mrs.
Grayson looked particularly tired and pale.
'Yo mun ha' passed them in t' lane?' said the farmer's wife wearily,
when the flowers had been admired and put in water, and Nelly had been
established in the farmer's own chair by the fire, while his wife
insisted on getting an early cup of tea.
'Who were they, Mrs. Grayson?'
'Well, they're nobbut a queer soart, Mrs. Sarratt--and I'd be glad to
see t' back on 'em. They're "conscientious objectors"--that's what they
are--an my husband coom across them in Kendal toother day. He'd
finished wi t' market, and he strolled into the room at the Town Hall,
where the men were coomin' in--yo know--to sign on for the war. An' he
got talkin' wi' these two lads, who were lookin' on as he was. And they
said they was "conscientious objectors"--and wouldn't fight not for
nothing nor nobody. But they wouldn't mind doing their bit in other
ways, they said. So John he upped and said--would they coom and help him
with his second crop o' hay--you know we've lost nearly all our men,
Mrs. Sarratt--and they said they would--and that very evening he brought
'em along. And who do you think they are?'
Nelly could not guess; and Mrs. Grayson explained that the two young men
were the wealthy sons of a wealthy Liverpool tradesman and were starting
a branch of their father's business in Kendal. They had each of them a
motor, and apparently unlimited money. They had just begun to be useful
in the hay-making--'But they wouldn't _touch_ the stock--they wouldn't
kill anything--not a rat! They wouldn't even shoo the birds from the
oats! And last night one of them was took ill--and I must go and sit up
with him, while his brother fetched the big car from Kendal to take him
home. And there was he, groaning,--nobbut a bit of _colic_, Mrs.
Sarratt, that anybody might have!--and there I sat--thinking of our lads
in the trenches--thinking of _my boy_--that never grumbled at
anything--and would ha' been just ashamed to make such a fuss for such a
little. And this afternoon the brother's taken him away to be
molly-coddled at home. And, of course, they've left us, just when they
might ha' been o' soom real service. There's three fields still liggin
oot in t' wet--and nobody to lend a hand wi' them. But I doan't want
them back! I doan't hold wi' foak like that. I doan't want to see a mon
like that settin' where my boy used to set, when he came home. It goes
agin me. I can't soomhow put up wi' it.'
And as she sat there opposite Nelly, her gnarled and work-stained hands
resting on her knees, the tears suddenly ran over her cheeks. But she
quickly apologised for herself. 'The truth is I am run doon, Mrs.
Sarratt. I've done nothing but _cook_ and _cook_--since these young men
coom along. They wouldn't eat noa flesh--soa I must always be cookin'
summat--vegetables--or fish--or sweet things. I'm fair tired oot!'
Nelly exclaimed indignantly.
'Was it their _religion_ made them behave like that?'
'Religion!' Mrs. Grayson laughed. 'Well, they was only the yan Sunday
here--but they took no account o't, whativer. They went motorin' all
day; an niver set foot in church or chapel. They belong to soom Society
or other--I couldna tell what. But we'll not talk o' them ony more, Mrs.
Sarratt, if yo please. I'm just thankful they're gone ... An have ye
heard this day of Mr. Sarratt?'
The gentle ageing face bent forward tenderly. Nelly lifted her own
dark-rimmed eyes to it Her mouth quivered.
'No, not yet, Mrs. Grayson. But I shall soon. You'll have seen about
this fighting in the newspapers? There's been a great battle--I think
he'll have been in it. I shall hear to-night. I shall be sure to hear
to-night.'
'The Lord protect him!' said Mrs. Grayson softly. They both sat silent,
looking into the fire. Through the open door, the hens could be heard
pecking and clucking in the yard, and the rushing of a beck swollen by
the rain, on the fell-side. Presently the farmer's wife looked up--
'It's devil's work, is war!' she said, her eyes blazing. Nelly held out
her hand and Mrs. Grayson put hers into it. The two women looked at each
other,--the one who had lost, and the other who feared to lose.
'Yes, it's awful,' said Nelly, in a low voice. 'They want us to be
brave--but--'
Mrs. Grayson shook her head again.
'We can do it when they're settin' there--afore us,' she said, 'but not
when we're by our lone.'
Nelly nodded.
'It's the nights that are worst--' she murmured, under her
breath--'because it's then they're fighting--when we're in
bed--sleeping.'
'My boy was killed between one and two in the morning '--whispered Mrs.
Grayson. 'I heard from one of his friends this morning. He says it was
a lovely night, and the daylight just comin' up. I think of it when I'm
layin' awake and hearing the birds beginning.'
There was silence again, till Mrs. Grayson said, suddenly, with a
strange passion:--
'But I'd rather be Jim's mother, and be settin' here without him, than
I'd be the mother o'yan of them young fellows as is just gone!'
'Yes,' said Nelly slowly--'yes. If we think too much about keeping them
safe--just for ourselves--If; they despise--they _would_ despise us.
And if anyone hangs back, we despise them. It' a horrible puzzle.'
'We can pray for them,' said Mrs. Grayson simply. 'God can keep them
safe if it's His will.'
'Yes '--said Nelly again. But her tone was flat and hesitating. Her
ever-present fear was very little comforted by prayer. But she found
comfort in Mrs. Grayson. She liked to stay on in the old kitchen,
watching Mrs. Grayson's household ways, making friends with the stolid
tabby cat, or listening to stories of Jim as a child. Sometimes she
would read parts of George's letters to this new friend. Bridget never
cared to hear them; and she was more completely at ease with the
farmer's wife even than with Hester Martin.
But she could not linger this afternoon. Her news might come any time.
And Sir William had telephoned that morning to say that he and his
sister would call on their way from Windermere, and would ask for a cup
of tea. Marsworth would probably meet them at Rydal.
As she descended the lane, she scolded herself for ingratitude. She was
glad the Farrells were coming, because they would bring newspapers, and
perhaps information besides, of the kind that does not get into
newspapers. But otherwise--why had she so little pleasure now in the
prospect of a visit from Sir William Farrell? He had never forced
himself upon them. Neither his visits nor his lessons had been
oppressively frequent, while the kindnesses which he had showered upon
them, from a distance, had been unceasing. She could hardly have
explained her disinclination. Was it that his company had grown so
stimulating and interesting to her, that it made her think too much of
other things than the war?--and so it seemed to separate her from
George? Her own quiet occupations--the needlework and knitting that she
did for a neighbouring war workroom, the gathering and drying of the
sphagnum moss, the visiting of a few convalescent soldiers, a daily
portion of Wordsworth, and some books about him--these things were
within her compass George knew all about them, for she chronicled them
in her letters day by day. She had a happy peaceful sense of communion
with him while she was busy with them. But Farrell's restless mind and
wide culture at once tired and fascinated her. He would often bring a
volume of Shelley, or Pater, or Hardy, or some quite modern poet, in his
pocket, and propose to read to her and Bridget, when the sketching was
done. And as he read, he would digress into talk, the careless audacity
of which would sometimes distress or repel, and sometimes absorb her;
till suddenly, perhaps, she realised how far she was wandering from that
common ground where she and George had moved together, and would try and
find her way back to it. She was always learning some new thing; and she
hated to learn, unless George changed and learnt with her.
* * * * *
Meanwhile Captain Marsworth was walking along the road from Grasmere to
Rydal with a rather listless step. As a soldier he was by no means
satisfied with the news of the week. We ought to have been in Lille and
weren't. It seemed to him that was about what the Loos action came to;
and his spirits were low. In addition he was in one of those fits of
depression which attack an able man who has temporarily come to a
stand-still in life, when his physical state is not buoyant enough to
enable him to fight them off. He was beginning plainly to see that his
own part in the war was done. His shattered arm, together with the
neuralgic condition which had followed on the wound, were not going to
mend sufficiently within any reasonable time to let him return to the
fighting line, where, at the moment of his wound, he was doing
divisional staff work, and was in the way of early promotion. He was a
man of clear and vigorous mind, inclined always to take a pessimistic
view of himself and his surroundings, and very critical also of persons
in authority; a scientific soldier, besides, indulging a strong natural
contempt for the politicians and all their crew, only surpassed by a
similar scorn of newspapers and the press. He had never been popular as
a subaltern, but since he had conquered his place among the 'brains' of
the army, his fame had spread, and it was freely prophesied that his
rise would be rapid. So that his growing conviction that his active
military career was over had been the recent cause in him of much
bitterness of soul. It was a bitter realisation, and a recent one. He
had been wounded at Neuve Chapelle in March, and up to July he had been
confident of complete and rapid recovery.
Well, there was of course some compensation. A post in the War
Office--in the Intelligence Department--would, he understood, be offered
him; and by October he meant to be at work. Meanwhile an old school and
college friendship between himself and 'Bill Farrell,' together with the
special facilities at Carton for the treatment of neuralgia after
wounds, had made him an inmate for several months of the special wing
devoted to such cases in the splendid hospital; though lately by way of
a change of surroundings, he had been lodging with the old Rector of the
village of Carton, whose house was kept--and well kept--by a
sweet-looking and practical granddaughter, herself an orphan.
Marsworth had connections in high quarters, and possessed some
considerable means. He had been a frequenter of the Farrells since the
days when the old aunt was still in command, and Cicely was a young
thing going to her first dances. He and she had sparred and quarrelled
as boy and girl. Now that, after a long interval, they had again been
thrown into close contact, they sparred and quarrelled still. He was a
man of high and rather stern ideals, which had perhaps been
intensified--made a little grimmer and fiercer than before--by the
strain of the war; and the selfish frivolity of certain persons and
classes in face of the national ordeal was not the least atoned for in
his eyes by the heroism of others. The endless dress advertisements in
the daily papers affected him as they might have affected the prophet
Ezekiel, had the daughters of Judah added the purchase of fur coats,
priced from twenty guineas to two hundred to their other enormities. He
had always in his mind the agonies of the war, the sights of the
trenches, the holocaust of young life, the drain on the national
resources, the burden on the national future. So that the Farrell
motor-cars and men servants, the costly simplicity of the 'cottage,'
Cicely's extravagance in dress, her absurd and expensive uniform, her
make-up and her jewels, were so many daily provocations to a man thus
sombrely possessed.
And yet--he had not been able so far to tear himself away from Carton!
And he knew many things about Cicely Farrell that Nelly Sarratt had not
discovered; things that alternately softened and enraged him; things
that kept him now, as for some years past, provokingly, irrationally
interested in her. He had once proposed to her, and she had refused him.
That was known to a good many people. But what their relations were now
was a mystery to the friends on both sides.
Whatever they were, however, on this September afternoon Marsworth was
coming rapidly to the conclusion that he had better put an end to them.
His latent feelings of resentment and irritation had been much sharpened
of late by certain passages of arms between himself and Cicely--since
she returned from her visits--with regard to that perfectly gentle and
inoffensive little maiden, Miss Daisy Stewart, the Rector's
granddaughter. Miss Farrell had several times been unpardonably rude to
the poor child in his presence, and, as it seemed to him, with the
express object of showing him how little she cared to keep on friendly
terms with him.
Nevertheless--he found himself puzzling over certain other incidents in
his recent ken, of a different character. The hospital at Carton was
mainly for privates, with a certain amount of accommodation for
officers. He had done his best during the summer to be useful to some
poor fellows, especially of his own regiment, on the Tommies' side. And
he had lately come across some perplexing signs of a special
thoughtfulness on Miss Farrell's part for these particular men. He had
discovered also that she had taken pains to keep these small kindnesses
of hers from his knowledge.
'I wasn't to tell you, sir,'--said the boy who had lost an eye--'not
whatever. But when you come along with them things'--a set of draughts
and a book--'why it do seem as though I be gettin' more than my share!'
Well, she had always been incomprehensible--and he was weary of the
attempt to read her. But he wanted a home--he wanted to marry. He began
to think again--in leisurely fashion--of the Rector's granddaughter.
Was that Mrs. Sarratt descending the side-lane? The sight of her
recalled his thoughts instantly to the war, and to a letter he had
received that morning from a brother officer just arrived in London on
medical leave--the letter of a 'grouser' if ever there was one.
'They say that this week is to see another big push--the French probably
in Champagne, and we south of Bethune. I know nothing first-hand, but I
do know that it can only end in a few kilometres of ground, huge
casualties,--and, as you were! _We are not ready_--we can't be ready for
months. On the other hand we must keep moving--if only to kill a few
Germans, and keep our own people at home in heart. I passed some of the
Lanchesters on my way down--going up, as fresh as paint after three
weeks' rest--what's left of them. They're sure to be in it.'
The little figure in the mauve cotton had paused at the entrance to the
lane, perceiving him.
What about Sarratt? Had she heard? He hurried on to meet her, and put
his question.
'There can't be any telegram yet,' she said, her pale cheeks flushing.
'But it will come to-night. Shall we go back quickly?'
They walked on rapidly. He soon found she did not want to talk of the
news, and he was driven back on the weather.
'What a blessing to see the sun again I this west country damp
demoralises me.'
'I think I like it!'
He laughed.
'Do you only "say that to annoy "?'
'No, I _do_ like it! I like to see the rain shutting out everything, so
that one can't make any plans--or go anywhere.' She smiled, but he was
well aware of the fever in her look. He had not seen it there since the
weeks immediately following Sarratt's departure. His heart warmed to the
frail creature, tremulous as a leaf in the wind, yet making a show of
courage. He had often asked himself whether he would wish to be loved as
Mrs. Sarratt evidently loved her husband; whether he could possibly meet
such a claim upon his own sensibility. But to-day he thought he could
meet it; to-day he thought it would be agreeable.
Nelly had not told Marsworth however that one reason for which she
liked the rain was that it had temporarily put an end to the sketching
lessons. Nor could she have added that this new distaste in her, as
compared with the happy stir of fresh or quickened perception, which had
been the result of his early teaching, was connected, not only with Sir
William--but with Bridget--her sister Bridget.
But the truth was that something in Bridget's manner, very soon after
the Carton visit, had begun to perplex and worry the younger sister. Why
was Bridget always insisting on the lessons?--always ready to scold
Nelly if one was missed--and always practising airs and graces with Sir
William that she wasted on no one else? Why was she so frequently away
on the days when Sir William was expected? Nelly had only just begun to
notice it, and to fall back instinctively on Miss Martin's company
whenever it could be had. She hated her own vague annoyance with
Bridget's behaviour, just because she could not pour herself out to
George about it. It was really too silly and stupid to talk about. She
supposed--she dreaded--that Bridget might be going to ask Sir William
some favour; that she meant to make use of his kindness to her sister in
order to work upon him. How horrible that would be!--how it would spoil
everything! Nelly began sometimes to dream of moving, of going to
Borrowdale, or to the coast at Scascale. And then, partly her natural
indolence, and partly her clinging to every rock and field in this
beautiful place where she had been so happy, intervened; and she let
things slide.
Yet when Sir William and Cicely arrived, to find Bridget making tea, and
Nelly listening with a little frown of effort, while Marsworth, pencil
in hand, was drawing diagrams _à la Belloc_, to explain to her the
Russian retreat from Galicia, how impossible not to feel cheered by
Farrell's talk and company! The great _bon enfant_, towering in the
little room, and positively lighting it up by the red-gold of his-hair
and beard, so easily entertained, so overflowing with kind intentions,
so fastidious intellectually, and so indulgent morally:--as soon as he
appeared he filled the scene.
'No fresh news, dear Mrs. Sarratt, nothing whatever,' he said at once,
meeting her hungry eyes. 'And you?'
She shook her head.
'Don't worry. You'll get it soon. I've sent the motor back to Windermere
for the evening papers.'
Meanwhile Marsworth found himself reduced to watching Cicely, and
presently he found himself more angry and disgusted than he had ever yet
been. How could she? How dared she? On this day of all days, to be
snobbishly playing the great lady in Mrs. Sarratt's small sitting-room!
Whenever that was Cicely's mood she lisped; and as often as Marsworth,
who was sitting far away from her, talking to Bridget Cookson, caught
her voice, it seemed to him that she was lisping--affectedly--monstrously.
She was describing for instance a certain ducal household in which she
had just been spending the week-end, and Marsworth heard her say--
'Well at last, poor Evelyn' ('poor Evelyn' seemed to be a youthful
Duchess, conducting a war economy campaign through the villages of her
husband's estate), 'began to get threatening letters. She found out
afterwards they came from a nurse-maid she had sent away. "Madam, don't
you talk to us, but look at 'ome! examine your own nursewy, Madam, and
hold your tongue!" She did examine, and I found her cwying. "Oh,
Cicely, isn't it awful, I've just discovered that Nurse has been
spending _seven pounds a week_ on Baby's wibbons!" So she's given up war
economy!'
'Why not the "wibbons?"' said Hester Martin, who had just come in and
heard the tale.
'Because nobody gives up what they weally want to have,' said Cicely
promptly, with a more affected voice and accent than before.
Bridget pricked up her ears and nodded triumphantly towards Nelly.
'Don't talk nonsense, Cicely,' said Farrell. 'Why, the Duchess has
planted the whole rose-garden with potatoes, and sold all her Pekinese.'
'Only because she was tired of the Pekinese, and has so many flowers she
doesn't know what to do with them! On the other hand the _Duke_ wants
parlour-maids; and whenever he says so, Evelyn draws all the blinds
down and goes to bed. And that annoys him so much that he gives in!
Don't you talk, Willy. The Duchess always gets wound you!'
'I don't care twopence about her,' said Farrell, rather savagely. 'What
does she matter?' Then he moved towards Nelly, whose absent look and
drooping attitude he had been observing for some minutes.
'Shan't we go down to the Lake, Mrs. Sarratt? It seems really a fine
evening at last, and there won't be so many more. Let me carry some
shawls. Marsworth, lend a hand.'
Soon they were all scattered along the edge of the Lake. Hester Martin
had relieved Marsworth of Bridget; Farrell had found a dry rock, and
spread a shawl upon it for Nelly's benefit. Marsworth and Cicely had no
choice but to pair; and she, with a grey hat and plume half a yard high,
preposterously short skirts, and high-heeled boots buttoned to the knee,
condescended to stroll beside him, watching his grave embarrassed look
with an air of detachment as dramatically complete as she could make it.
* * * * *
'You look awfully tired!' said Farrell to his companion, eyeing her with
most sincere concern. 'I wonder what you've been doing to yourself.'
'I'm all right,' she said with emphasis. 'Indeed I'm all right. You said
you'd sent for the papers?'
'The motor will wait for them at Windermere. But I don't think there'll
be much more to hear. I'm afraid we've shot our bolt.'
She clasped her hands listlessly on her knee, and said nothing.
'Are you quite sure Sarratt has been in it?' he asked her.
'Oh, yes, I'm sure.'
There was a dull conviction in her voice. She began to pluck at the
grass beside her, while her dark contracted eyes swept the Lake in front
of her--seeing nothing.
'Good God!'--thought Farrell--'Are they all--all the women--suffering
like this?'
'You'll get a telegram from him to-morrow, I'm certain you will!' he
said, with eager kindness. 'Try and look forward to it. You know the
good chances are five to one.'
'Not for a lieutenant,' she said, under her breath. 'They have to lead
their men. They can't think of their own lives.'
There was silence a little. Then Farrell said--floundering, 'He'd want
you to bear up!'
'I am bearing up!' she said quickly, a little resentfully.
'Yes, indeed you are!' He touched her arm a moment caressingly, as
though in apology. It was natural to his emotional temperament to
express itself so--through physical gesture. But Nelly disliked the
touch.
'I only meant'--Farrell continued, anxiously--'that he would beg you
not to anticipate trouble--not to go to meet it.'
She summoned smiles, altering her position a little, and drawing a wrap
round her. The delicate arm was no longer within his reach.
And restlessly she began to talk of other things--the conscientious
objectors of the morning--Zeppelins--a recruiting meeting at Ambleside.
Farrell had the impression of a wounded creature that could not bear to
be touched; and it was something new to his prevailing sense of power in
life, to be made to realise that he could do nothing. His sympathy
seemed to alienate her; and he felt much distressed and rebuffed.
* * * * *
Meanwhile as the clouds cleared away from the September afternoon,
Marsworth and Cicely were strolling along the Lake, and sparring as
usual.
He had communicated to her his intention of leaving Carton within a week
or so, and trying some fresh treatment in London.
'You're tired of us?' she enquired, her head very much in air.
'Not at all. But I think I might do a bit of work.'
'The doctors don't think so.'
'Ah, well--when a man's got to my stage, he must make experiments on his
own. It won't be France--I know that. But there's lots else.'
'You'll break down in a week!' she said with energy. 'I had a talk
about you with Seaton yesterday.'
He looked at her with amusement. For the moment, she was no longer
Cicely Farrell, extravagantly dressed, but the shrewd hospital worker,
who although she would accept no responsibility that fettered her goings
and comings beyond a certain point, was yet, as he well knew,
invaluable, as a force in the background, to both the nursing and
medical staff of Carton.
'Well, what did Seaton say?'
'That you would have another bad relapse, if you attempted yet to go to
work.'
'I shall risk it.'
'That's so like you. You never take anyone's advice.'
'On the contrary, I am the meekest and most docile of men.' She shrugged
her shoulders.
'You were docile, I suppose, when Seaton begged you not to go off to the
Rectory, and give yourself all that extra walking backwards and forwards
to the hospital every day?'
'I wanted a change of scene. I like the old Rector--I even like family
prayers.'
'I am sure everything--and _everybody_--is perfect at the Rectory!'
'No--not perfect--but peaceable.'
He looked at her smiling. His grey eyes, under their strong black brows,
challenged her. She perceived in them a whole swarm of unspoken
charges. Her own colour rose.
'So peace is what you want?'
'Peace--and a little sympathy.'
'And we give you neither?'
He hesitated.
'Willy never fails one.'
'So it's my crimes that are driving you away? It's all to be laid on my
shoulders?'
He laughed--uncertainly.
'Don't you believe me when I say I want to do some work?'
'Not much. So I have offended you?'
His look changed, became grave--touched with compunction.
'Miss Farrell, I oughtn't to have been talking like this. You and Willy
have been awfully good to me.'
'And then you call me "Miss Farrell"!' she cried, passionately--'when
you know very well that you've called me Cicely for years.'
'Hush!' said Marsworth suddenly, 'what was that?'
He turned back towards Rydal. On the shore path, midway between them and
the little bay at the eastern end of the lake, where Farrell and Nelly
Sarratt had been sitting, were Hester Martin and Bridget. They too had
turned round, arrested in their walk. Beyond them, at the edge of the
water, Farrell could be seen beckoning. And a little way behind him on
the slope stood a boy with a bicycle.
'He is calling us,' said Marsworth, and began to run.
Hester Martin was already running--Bridget too.
But Hester and Marsworth outstripped the rest. Farrell came to meet
them.
'Hester, for God's sake, get her sister!'
'What is it?' gasped Hester. 'Is he killed?'
'No--"Wounded and missing!" Poor, poor child!'
'Where is she?'
'She's sitting there--dazed--with the telegram. She's hardly said
anything since it came.'
Hester ran on. There on a green edge of the bank sat Nelly staring at a
fluttering piece of paper.
Hester sank beside her, and put her arms round her.
'Dear Mrs. Sarratt!'
'What does it mean?' said Nelly turning her white face. 'Read it.'
'"Deeply regret to inform you your husband reported wounded and
missing!"'
'_Missing?_ That means--a prisoner. George is a prisoner--and wounded!
Can't I go to him?'
She looked piteously at Hester. Bridget had come up and was standing
near.
'If he's a prisoner, he's in a German hospital. Dear Mrs. Sarratt,
you'll soon hear of him!'
Nelly stood up. Her young beauty of an hour before seemed to have
dropped from her like the petals of a rose. She put her hand to her
forehead.
'But I shan't see him--again'--she said slowly--'till the end of the
war--_the end of the war_'--she repeated, pressing her hands on her
eyes. The note of utter desolation brought the tears to Hester's cheeks.
But before she could say anything, Nelly had turned sharply to her
sister.
'Bridget, I must go up to-night!'
'Must you?' said Bridget reluctantly. 'I don't see what you can do.'
'I can go to the War Office--and to that place where they make enquiries
for you. Of _course_, I must go to London!--and I must stay there. There
might be news of him any time.'
Bridget and Hester looked at each other. The same thought was in their
minds. But Nelly, restored to momentary calmness by her own suggestion,
went quickly to Farrell, who with his sister and Marsworth was standing
a little way off.
'I must go to London to-night, Sir William. Could you order something
for me?'
'I'll take you to Windermere, Mrs. Sarratt,' said Cicely before her
brother could reply. 'The motor's there now.'
'No, no, Cicely, I'll take Mrs. Sarratt,' said Farrell impatiently.
'I'll send back a car from Ambleside, for you and Marsworth.'
'You forget Sir George Whitehead,' said Cicely quietly. 'I'll do
everything.'
Sir George Whitehead of the A.M.S.C. was expected at Carton that
evening on a visit of inspection to the hospital. Farrell, as
Commandant, could not possibly be absent. He acknowledged the fact by a
gesture of annoyance. Cicely immediately took things in charge.
A whirl of packing and departure followed. By the time she and her
charges left for Windermere, Cicely's hat and high heels had been
entirely blotted out by a quite extraordinary display on her part of
both thoughtfulness and efficiency. Marsworth had seen the same
transformation before, but never so markedly. He tried several times to
make his peace with her; but she held aloof, giving him once or twice an
odd look out of her long almond-shaped eyes.
'Good-bye, and good luck!' said Farrell to Nelly, through the car
window; and as she held out her hand, he stooped and kissed it with a
gulp in his throat. Her deathly pallor and a grey veil thrown back and
tied under her small chin gave her a ghostly loveliness which stamped
itself on his recollection.
'I am going up to town myself to-morrow. I shall come and see if I can
do anything for you.'
'Thank you,' said Nelly mechanically. 'Oh yes, I shall have thought of
many things by then. Good-bye.'
Marsworth and Farrell were left to watch the disappearance of the car
along the moonlit road.
'Poor little soul!' said Farrell--'poor little soul!' He walked on
along the road, his eyes on the ground. Marsworth offered him a cigar,
and they smoked in silence.
'What'll the next message be?' said Farrell, after a little while.
'"Reported wounded and missing--now reported killed"? Most probable!'
Marsworth assented sadly.
CHAPTER VIII
It was a pale September day. In the country, among English woods and
heaths the sun was still strong, and trees and bracken, withered heath,
and reddening berries, burned and sparkled beneath it. But in the dingy
bedroom of a dingy Bloomsbury hotel, with a film of fog over everything
outside, there was no sun to be seen; the plane trees beyond the windows
were nearly leafless; and the dead leaves scudding and whirling along
the dusty, airless streets, under a light wind, gave the last dreary
touch to the scene that Nelly Sarratt was looking at. She was standing
at a window, listlessly staring at some houses opposite, and the
unlovely strip of garden which lay between her and the houses. Bridget
Cookson was sitting at a table a little way behind her, mending some
gloves.
The sisters had been four days in London. For Nelly, life was just
bearable up to five or six o'clock in the evening because of her morning
and afternoon visits to the Enquiry Office in D---- Street, where
everything that brains and pity could suggest was being done to trace
the 'missing'; where sat also that kind, tired woman, at the table which
Nelly by now knew so well, with her pitying eyes, and her soft voice,
which never grew perfunctory or careless. 'I'm _so_ sorry!--but there's
no fresh news.' That had been the evening message; and now the day's
hope was over, and the long night had to be got through.
That morning, however, there had been news--a letter from Sarratt's
Colonel, enclosing letters from two privates, who had seen Sarratt go
over the parapet in the great rush, and one of whom had passed
him--wounded--on the ground and tried to stay by him. But 'Lieutenant
Sarratt wouldn't allow it.' 'Never mind me, old chap'--one witness
reported him as saying. 'Get on. They'll pick me up presently.' And
there they had left him, and knew no more.
Several other men were named, who had also seen him fall, but they had
not yet been traced. They might be in hospital badly wounded, or if
Sarratt had been made prisoner, they had probably shared his fate. 'And
if your husband has been taken prisoner, as we all hope,' said the
gentle woman at the office--'it will be at least a fortnight before we
can trace him. Meanwhile we are going on with all other possible
enquiries.'
Nelly had those phrases by heart. The phrases too of that short
letter--those few lines--the last she had ever received from George,
written two days before the battle, which had reached her in Westmorland
before her departure.
That letter lay now on her bosom, just inside the folds of her blouse,
where her hand could rest upon it at any moment. How passionately she
had hoped for another, a fragment perhaps torn from his notebook in the
trenches, and sent back by some messenger at the last moment! She had
heard of that happening to so many others. Why not to her!--oh, why not
to her?
Her heart was dry with longing and grief; her eyes were red for want of
sleep. There were strange numb moments when she felt nothing, and could
hardly remember why she was in London. And then would come the sudden
smart of reviving consciousness--the terrible returns of an anguish,
under which her whole being trembled. And always, at the back of
everything, the dull thought--'I always knew it--I knew he would
die!'--recurring again and again; only to be dashed away by a protest no
less persistent--'No, no! He is _not dead!--not dead!_ In a
fortnight--she said so--there'll be news--they'll have found him. Then
he'll be recovering--and prisoners are allowed to write. Oh, my
George!--my George!'
It was with a leap of ecstasy that yet was pain, that she imagined to
herself the coming of the first word from him. Prisoners' letters came
regularly--no doubt of that. Why, the landlady at the hotel had a son
who was at Ruhleben, and she heard once a month. Nelly pictured the
moment when the letter would be in her hand, and she would be looking at
it. Oh, no doubt it wouldn't be addressed by him! By the nurse
perhaps--a German nurse--or another patient. He mightn't be well
enough. All the same, the dream filled her eyes with tears, that for a
moment eased the burning within.
Her life was now made up of such moments and dreams. On the whole, what
held her most was the fierce refusal to think of him as dead. That
morning, in dressing, among the clothes they had hurriedly brought with
them from Westmorland, she saw a thin black dress--a useful stand-by in
the grime of London--and lifted her hands to take it from the peg on
which it hung. Only to recoil from it with horror. _That_--never! And
she had dressed herself with care in a coat and skirt of rough blue
tweed that George had always liked; scrupulously putting on her little
ornaments, and taking pains with her hair. And at every step of the
process, she seemed to be repelling some attacking force; holding a door
with all her feeble strength against some horror that threatened to come
in.
The room in which she stood was small and cheerless; but it was all they
could afford. Bridget frankly hated the ugliness and bareness of it;
hated the dingy hotel, and the slatternly servants, hated the boredom of
the long waiting for news to which apparently she was to be committed,
if she stayed on with Nelly. She clearly saw that public opinion would
expect her to stay on. And indeed she was not without some natural pity
for her younger sister. There were moments when Nelly's state caused her
extreme discomfort--even something more. But when they occurred, she
banished them as soon as possible, and with a firm will, which grew the
firmer with exercise. It was everybody's duty to keep up their spirits
and not to be beaten down by this abominable war. And it was a special
duty for those who hated the war, and would stop it at once if they
could. Yet Bridget had entirely declined to join any 'Stop the War,' or
pacifist societies. She had no sympathy with 'that sort of people.' Her
real opinion about the war was that no cause could be worth such
wretched inconvenience as the war caused to everyone. She hated to feel
and know that probably the majority of decent people would say, if
asked,--as Captain Marsworth had practically said--that she, Bridget
Cookson, ought to be doing V.A.D. work, or relieving munition-workers at
week-ends, instead of fiddling with an index to a text-book on 'The New
Psychology.' The mere consciousness of that was already an attack on her
personal freedom to do what she liked, which she hotly resented. And as
to that conscription of women for war-work which was vaguely talked of,
Bridget passionately felt that she would go to prison rather than submit
to such a thing. For the war said nothing whatever to her heart or
conscience. All the great tragic side of it--the side of death and
wounds and tears--of high justice and ideal aims--she put away from her,
as she always had put away such things, in peace. They did not concern
her personally. Why _make_ trouble for oneself?
And yet here was a sister whose husband was 'wounded and
missing'--probably, as Bridget firmly believed, already dead. And the
meaning of that fact--that possibility--was writ so large on Nelly's
physical aspect, on Nelly's ways and plans, that there was really no
getting away from it. Also--there were other people to be considered.
Bridget did not at all want to offend or alienate Sir William
Farrell--now less than ever. And she was quite aware that he would think
badly of her, if he suspected she was not doing her best for Nelly.
The September light waned. The room grew so dark that Bridget turned on
an electric light beside her, and by the help of it stole a long look at
Nelly, who was still standing by the window. Would grieving--would the
loss of George--take Nelly's prettiness away? She had certainly lost
flesh during the preceding weeks and days. Her little chin was very
sharp, as Bridget saw it against the window, and her hair seemed to have
parted with its waves and curls, and to be hanging limp about her ears.
Bridget felt a pang of annoyance that anything should spoil Nelly's good
looks. It was altogether unnecessary and absurd.
Presently Nelly moved back towards her sister.
'I don't know how I shall get through the next fortnight,' she said in a
low voice. 'I wonder what we had better do?'
'Well, we can't stay here,' said Bridget sharply. 'It's too expensive,
though it is such a poky hole. We can find a lodging, I suppose, and
feed ourselves. Unless of course we went back to Westmorland. Why can't
you? They can always telegraph.'
Nelly flushed. Her hand lying on the back of Bridget's chair shook.
'And if George sent for me,' she said, in the same low, strained voice,
'it would take eight hours longer to get to him than it would from
here.'
Bridget said nothing. In her heart of hearts she felt perfectly certain
that George never would send. She rose and put down her needlework.
'I must go and post a letter downstairs. I'll ask the woman in the
office if she knows anything about lodgings.'
Nelly went back to her post by the window. Her mind was bruised between
two conflicting feelings--a dumb longing for someone to caress and
comfort her, someone who would meet her pain with a bearing less hard
and wooden than Bridget's--and at the same time, a passionate shrinking
from the bare idea of comfort and sympathy, as something not to be
endured. She had had a kind letter from Sir William Farrell that
morning. He had spoken of being soon in London. But she did not know
that she could bear to see him--unless he could help--get something
_done!_
Bridget descended to the ground floor, and had a conversation with the
young lady in the office, which threw no light at all on the question of
lodgings. The young lady in question seemed to be patting and pinning up
her back hair all the time, besides carrying on another conversation
with a second young lady in the background. Bridget was disgusted with
her and was just going upstairs again, when the very shabby and partly
deformed hall porter informed her that someone--a gentleman--was waiting
to see her in the drawing-room.
A gentleman? Bridget hastened to the small and stuffy drawing-room,
where the hall porter had just turned on the light, and there beheld a
tall bearded man pacing up and down, who turned abruptly as she entered.
'How is she? Is there any news?'
Sir William Farrell hurriedly shook her offered hand, frowning a little
at the sister who always seemed to him inadequate and ill-mannered.
'Thank you, Sir William; she is quite well. There is a little news--but
nothing of any consequence.'
She repeated the contents of the hospital letter, with the comments on
it of the lady they had seen at the office.
'We shan't hear anything more for a fortnight. They have written to
Geneva.'
'Then they think he's a prisoner?'
Bridget supposed so.
'At any rate they hope he is. Well, I'm thankful there's no worse news.
Poor thing--poor little thing! Is she bearing up--eating?--sleeping?'
He asked the questions peremptorily, yet with a real anxiety. Bridget
vaguely resented the peremptoriness, but she answered the questions. It
was very difficult to get Nelly to eat anything, and Bridget did not
believe she slept much.
Farrell shook his head impatiently, with various protesting noises,
while she spoke. Then drawing up suddenly, with his hands in his
pockets, he looked round the room in which they stood.
'But why are you staying here? It's a dreadful hole! That porter gave me
the creeps. And it's so far from everywhere.'
'There is a tube station close by. We stay here because it's cheap,'
said Bridget, grimly.
Sir William walked up the room again, poking his nose into the moribund
geranium that stood, flanked by some old railway guides, on the middle
table, surveyed the dirty and ill-kept writing-table, the uncomfortable
chairs, and finally went to look out of the window; after which he
suddenly and unaccountably brightened up and turned with a smile to
Bridget.
'Do you think you could persuade your sister to do something that would
please me very much?'
'I'm sure I don't know, Sir William.'
'Well, it's this. Cicely and I have a flat in St. James' Square. I'm
there very little just now, and she less. You know we're both awfully
busy at Carton. We've had a rush of wounded the last few weeks. I must
be up sometimes on business for the hospital, but I can always sleep at
my club. So what I want to persuade you to do, Miss Cookson, is to get
Mrs. Sarratt to accept the loan of our flat, for a few weeks while she's
kept in town. It would be a real pleasure to us. We're awfully sorry for
her!'
He beamed upon her, all his handsome face suffused with kindness and
concern.
Bridget was amazed, but cautious.
'It's awfully good of you--but--shouldn't we have to get a servant? I
couldn't do everything.'
Sir William laughed.
'Gracious--I should think not! There are always servants there--it's
kept ready for us. I put in a discharged soldier--an army cook and his
wife--a few months ago. They're capital people. I'm sure they'd look
after you. Well now, will you suggest that to Mrs. Sarratt? Could I see
her?'
Bridget hesitated. Some instinct told her that Nelly would not wish to
accept this proposal. She said slowly--
'I'm afraid she's very tired to-night.'
'Oh, don't bother her then! But just try and persuade her--won't
you--quietly? And send me a word to-night.'
He gave the address.
'If I hear that you'll come, I'll make all the arrangements to-morrow
morning before I leave for Westmorland. You can just take her round in a
taxi any time you like, and the servants will be quite ready for you.
You'll be close to D---- Street--close to everything. Now do!'
He stood with his hands on his side looking down eagerly and a little
sharply on the hard-featured woman before him.
'It's awfully good of you,' said Bridget again--'most awfully good. Of
course I'll tell Nelly what you say.'
'And drop me a line to-night?'
'Yes, I'll write.'
Sir William took up his stick.
'Well, I shall put everything in train. Tell her, please, what a
pleasure she'd give us. And she won't keep Cicely away. Cicely will be
up next week. But there's plenty of room. She and her maid wouldn't make
any difference to you. And please tell Mrs. Sarratt too, that if there's
anything I can do--_anything_--she has only to let me know.'
* * * * *
Bridget went back to the room upstairs. As she opened the door she saw
Nelly standing under the electric light--motionless. Something in her
attitude startled Bridget.
She called--
'Nelly!'
Nelly turned slowly, and Bridget saw that she had a letter in her hand.
Bridget ran up to her.
'Have you heard anything?'
'He _did_ write to me!--he did!--just the last minute--in the trench. I
knew he must. He gave it to an engineer officer who was going back to
Headquarters, to post. The officer was badly wounded as he went back.
They've sent it me from France. The waiter brought me the letter just
after you'd gone down.'
The words came in little panting gasps.
Then, suddenly, she slipped down beside the table at which Bridget had
been working, and hid her face. She was crying. But it was very
difficult weeping--with few tears. The slight frame shook from top to
toe.
Bridget stood by her, not knowing what to do. But she was conscious of a
certain annoyance that she couldn't begin at once on the subject of the
flat. She put her hand awkwardly on her sister's shoulder.
'Don't cry so. What does he say?'
Nelly did not answer for a little. At last she said, her face still
buried--
'It was only--to tell me--that he loved me--'
There was silence again. Then Nelly rose to her feet. She pressed her
hair back from her white face.
'I don't want any supper, Bridget. I think--I should like to go to bed.'
Bridget helped her to undress. It was now nearly dark and she drew down
the blinds. When she looked again at Nelly, she saw her lying white and
still, her wide eyes fixed on vacancy.
'I found a visitor downstairs,' she said, abruptly. 'It was Sir William
Farrell.'
Nelly shewed no surprise, or interest. But she seemed to find some words
mechanically.
'Why did he come?'
Bridget came to the bedside.
'He wants us to go and stay at his flat--their flat. He and his sister
have it together--in St. James' Square. He wants us to go to-morrow.
He's going back to Carton. There are two servants there. We shouldn't
have any trouble. And you'd be close to D---- Street. Any news they got
they could send round directly.'
Nelly closed her eyes.
'I don't care where we go,' she said, under her breath.
'He wanted a line to-night,' said Bridget--'I can't hear of any
lodgings. And the boarding-houses are all getting frightfully
expensive--because food's going up so.'
'Not a boarding-house!' murmured Nelly. A shiver of repulsion ran
through her. She was thinking of a boarding-house in one of the
Bloomsbury streets where she and Bridget had once stayed before her
marriage--the long tables full of strange faces--the drawing-room
crowded with middle-aged women, who stared so.
'Well, I can write to him to-night then, and say we'll go to-morrow? We
certainly can't stay here. The charges are abominable. If we go to their
flat, for a few days, we can look round us and find something cheap.'
'Where is it?' said Nelly faintly.
'In St. James' Square.'
The address conveyed very little to Nelly. She knew hardly anything of
London. Two visits--one to some cousins in West Kensington, another to
a friend at Hampstead--together with the fortnight three years ago in
the Bloomsbury boarding-house, when Bridget had had some grand scheme
with a publisher which never came off, and Nelly had mostly stayed
indoors with bad toothache:--her acquaintance with the great city had
gone no further. Of its fashionable quarters both she and Bridget were
entirely ignorant, though Bridget would not have admitted it.
Bridget got her writing-case out of her trunk and began to write to Sir
William. Nelly watched her. At last she said slowly, as though she were
becoming a little more conscious of the world around her:--
'It's awfully kind of them. But we needn't stay long.'
'Oh no, we needn't stay long.'
Bridget wrote the letter, and disappeared to post it. Nelly was left
alone in darkness. The air about her seemed to be ringing with the words
of her letter.
'MY OWN DARLING,--We are just going over. I have found a man going
back to D.H.Q. who will post this--and I just want you to know
that, whatever happens, you are my beloved, and our love can't die.
God bless you, my dear, dear wife.... We are all in good
spirits--everything ought to go well--and I will write the first
moment possible.
'GEORGE.'
She seemed to see him, tearing the leaf from the little block she had
given him, and standing in the trench, so slim and straight in his
khaki. And then, what happened after? when the rush came? Would she
never know? If he never came back to her, what was she going to do with
her life? Waves of lonely terror went through her--terror of the long
sorrow before her--terror of her own weakness.
And then again--reaction. She sat up in bed, angrily wrestling with her
own lapse from hope. Of course it was all coming right! She turned on
the light, with a small trembling hand, and tried to read a newspaper
Bridget had brought in. But the words swam before her; the paper dropped
from her grasp; and when Bridget came back, her face was hidden, she
seemed to be asleep.
* * * * *
'Is this it?' said Nelly, looking in alarm at the new and splendid house
before which the taxi had drawn up.
'Well, it's the right number!' And Bridget, rather flurried, looked at
the piece of paper on which Farrell had written the address for her, the
night before.
She jumped out of the taxi and ran up some marble steps towards a glass
door covered with a lattice metal-work, beyond which a hall, a marble
staircase and a lift shewed dimly. Inside, a porter in livery, at the
first sight of the taxi, put down the newspaper he was reading, and
hurried to the door.
'Is this Sir William Farrell's flat?' asked Bridget.
'It's all right, Miss. They're expecting you. Sir William went off this
morning. I was to tell you he had to go down to Aldershot to-day on
business, but he hoped to look in this evening, on his way to Euston, to
see that you had everything comfortable.'
Reluctantly, and with a feeble step, Nelly descended, helped by the
porter.
'Oh, Bridget, I wish we hadn't come!' She breathed it into her sister's
ear, as they stood together in the hall, waiting for the lift which had
been called. Bridget shut her lips tightly, and said nothing.
The lift carried them up to the third floor, and there at the top the
ex-army cook and his wife were waiting, a pair of stout and comfortable
people, all smiles and complaisance. The two small trunks were
shouldered by the man, and the woman led the way.
'Lunch will be ready directly, Ma'am,' she said to Nelly, who followed
her in bewilderment across a hall panelled in marble and carpeted with
something red and soft.
'Sir William thought you would like it about one o'clock. And this is
your room, please, Ma'am--unless you would like anything different. It's
Miss Farrell's room. She always likes the quiet side. And I've put Miss
Cookson next door. I thought you'd wish to be together?'
Nelly entered a room furnished in white and pale green, luxurious in
every detail, and hung with engravings after Watteau framed in white
wood. Through an open door shewed another room a little smaller, but
equally dainty and fresh in all its appointments. Bridget tripped
briskly through the open door, looked around her and deposited her bag
upon the bed. Nelly meanwhile was being shewn the green-tiled and
marble-floored bathroom attached to her room, Mrs. Simpson chattering on
the various improvements and subtleties, which 'Miss Cicely' had lately
commanded there.
'But I'm sure you'll be wanting your lunch, Ma'am,' said the woman at
last, venturing a compassionate glance at the pale young creature beside
her. 'It'll be ready in five minutes. I'll tell Simpson he can serve
it.'
She disappeared, and Nelly sank into a chair. Why had they come to this
place? Her whole nature was in revolt. The gaiety and luxury of the flat
seemed to rise up and reproach her. What was she doing in such
surroundings?--when George--Oh, it was hateful--hateful! She thought
with longing of the little bare room in the Rydal lodgings, where they
had been happy together.
'Well, are you ready?' said Bridget, bustling in. 'Do take off your
things. You look absolutely done up!'
Nelly rose slowly, but her face had flushed.
'I can't stay here, Bridget!' she said with energy--'I can't! I don't
know why we came.'
'Because we were asked,' said Bridget calmly. 'We can stay, I think,
for a couple of days, can't we, till we find something else? Where are
your brushes?'
And she began vigorously unpacking for her sister, helplessly watched by
Nelly. They had just come from D---- Street, where Nelly had been shewn
various letters and telegrams; but nothing which promised any real
further clue to George Sarratt's fate. He had been seen advancing--seen
wounded--by at least a dozen men of the regiment, and a couple of
officers, all of whom had now been communicated with. But the wave of
the counter-attack--temporarily successful--had rushed over the same
ground before the British gains had been finally consolidated, and from
that fierce and confused fighting there came no further word of George
Sarratt. It was supposed that in the final German retreat he had been
swept up as a German prisoner. He was not among the dead found and
buried by an English search party on the following day--so much had been
definitely ascertained.
The friendly volunteer in D---- Street--whose name appeared to be Miss
Eustace--had tried to insist with Nelly that on the whole, and so far,
the news collected was not discouraging. At least there was no
verification of death. And for the rest, there were always the letters
from Geneva to wait for. 'One must be patient,' Miss Eustace had said
finally. 'These things take so long! But everybody's doing their best.'
And she had grasped Nelly's cold hands in hers, long and pityingly. Her
own fine aquiline face seemed to have grown thinner and more strained
even since Nelly had known it. She often worked in the office, she said,
up to midnight.
All these recollections and passing visualisations of words and faces,
drawn from those busy rooms a few streets off, in which not only George
Sarratt's fate, but her own, as it often seemed to Nelly, were being
slowly and inexorably decided, passed endlessly through her brain, as
she mechanically took off her things, and brushed her hair.
Presently she was following Bridget across the hall to the drawing-room.
Bridget seemed already to know all about the flat. 'The dining-room
opens out of the drawing-room. It's all Japanese,' she said
complaisantly, turning back to her sister. 'Isn't it jolly? Miss Farrell
furnished it. Sir William let her have it all her own way.'
Nelly looked vaguely round the drawing-room, which had a blue Persian
carpet, pale purple walls, hung with Japanese colour prints, a few
chairs, one comfortable sofa, a couple of Japanese cabinets, and pots of
Japanese lilies in the corners. It was a room not meant for living in.
There was not a book in it anywhere. It looked exactly what it was--a
perching-place for rich people, who liked their own ways, and could not
be bored with hotels.
The dining-room was equally bare, costly, and effective. Its only
ornament was a Chinese Buddha, a great terra-cotta, marvellously alive,
which had been looted from some Royal tomb, and now sat serenely out of
place, looking over the dainty luncheon-table to the square outside, and
wrapt in dreams older than Christianity.
The flat was nominally lent to 'Mrs. Sarratt,' but Bridget was managing
everything, and had never felt so much in her element in her life. She
sat at the head of the table, helped Nelly, gave all the orders, and was
extraordinarily brisk and cheerful.
Nelly scarcely touched anything, and Mrs. Simpson who waited was much
concerned.
'Perhaps you'd tell Simpson anything you could fancy, Madam,' she said
anxiously in Nelly's ear, as she handed the fruit. Nelly must needs
smile when anyone spoke kindly to her. She smiled now, though very
wearily.
'Why, it's all beautiful, thank you. But I'm not hungry.'
'We'll have coffee in the drawing-room, please, Mrs. Simpson,' said
Bridget rising--a tall masterful figure, in a black silk dress, which
she kept for best occasions. 'Now Nelly, you must rest.'
Nelly let herself be put on the sofa in the drawing-room, and
Bridget--after praising the coffee, the softness of the chairs, the
beauty of the Japanese lilies, and much speculation on the value
of the Persian carpet which, she finally decided, was old and
priceless--announced that she was going for a walk.
'Why don't you come too, Nelly? Come and look at the shops. You
shouldn't mope all day long. If they do send for you to nurse George,
you won't have the strength of a cat.'
But Nelly had shrunk into herself. She said she would stay in and write
a letter to Hester Martin. Presently she was left alone. Mrs. Simpson
had cleared away, and shut all the doors between the sitting-rooms and
the kitchen. Inside the flat nothing was to be heard but the clock
ticking on the drawing-room mantelpiece. Outside, there were
intermittent noises and rattles from the traffic in the square, and
beyond that again the muffled insistent murmur which seemed to Nelly
this afternoon--in her utter loneliness--the most desolate sound she had
ever heard. The day had turned to rain and darkness, and the rapid
closing of the October afternoon prophesied winter. Nelly could not
rouse herself to write the letter to Miss Martin. She lay prone in a
corner of the sofa, dreaming, as she had done all her life; save that
the faculty--of setting in motion at will a stream of vivid and
connected images--which had always been one of her chief pleasures, was
now an obsession and a torment. How often, in her wakeful nights at
Rydal, had she lived over again every moment in the walk to Blea Tarn,
till at last, gathered once more on George's knees, and nestling to his
breast, she had fallen asleep--comforted.
She went through it all, once more, in this strange room, as the
darkness closed; only the vision ended now, not in a tender thrill--half
conscious, fading into sleep--of remembered joy, but in an anguish of
sobbing, the misery of the frail tormented creature, unable to bear its
life.
Nevertheless sleep came. For nights she had scarcely slept, and in the
silence immediately round her the distant sounds gradually lost their
dreary note, and became a rhythmical and soothing influence. She fell
into a deep unconsciousness.
* * * * *
An hour later, a tall man rang at the outer door of the flat. Mrs.
Simpson obeyed the summons, and found Sir William Farrell on the
threshold.
'Well, have they come?'
'Oh, yes, sir.' And Mrs. Simpson gave a rapid, _sotto voce_ account of
the visitors' arrival, their lunch, Mrs. Sarratt's sad looks--'poor
little lady!'--and much else.
Sir William stepped in.
'Are they at home?'
Mrs. Simpson shook her head.
'They went out after lunch, Sir William, and I have not heard them come
in.'
Which, of course, was a mistake on the part of Mrs. Simpson, who,
hearing the front door close half an hour after luncheon and no
subsequent movement in the flat, had supposed that the sisters had gone
out together.
'All right. I'll wait for them. I want to see Mrs. Sarratt before I
start. You may get me a cup of tea, if you like.'
Mrs. Simpson disappeared with alacrity, and Farrell crossed the hall to
the drawing-room. He turned on the light as he opened the door, and was
at once aware of Nelly's slight form on the sofa. She did not move, and
something in her attitude--some rigidity that he fancied--alarmed him.
He took a few steps, and then saw that there was no cause for alarm. She
was only asleep, poor child, profoundly, pathetically asleep. Her utter
unconsciousness, the delicate hand and arm lying over the edge of the
sofa, and the gleam of her white forehead under its muffling cloud of
hair, moved him strangely. He retreated as quietly as he could, and
almost ran into Mrs. Simpson bringing a tray. He beckoned her into a
small room which he used as his own den. But he had hardly explained the
situation, before there were sounds in the drawing-room, and Nelly
opened the door, which he had closed behind him. He had forgotten to
turn out the light, and its glare had awakened her.
'Oh, Sir William--' she said, in bewilderment--'Did you come in just
now?'
He explained his proceedings, retaining the hand she gave him, and
looking down upon her with an impulsive and affectionate pity.
'You were asleep. I disturbed you,' he said, remorsefully.
'Oh no, do come in.'
She led the way into the drawing-room.
'I wanted--specially--to tell you some things I heard at Aldershot
to-day, which I thought might cheer you,' said Farrell.
And sitting beside her, while Mrs. Simpson lit a fire and spread a white
tea-table, he repeated various stories of the safe return of 'missing'
men which he had collected for her that morning, including the narrative
of an escaped prisoner, who, although badly wounded, had managed to find
his way back, at night, from the neighbourhood of Brussels, through
various hairbreadth adventures and disguises, and after many weeks to
the British lines. He brought the tale to her, as an omen of hope,
together with his other gleanings; and under the influence of his
cheerful voice and manner, Nelly's aspect changed; the light came back
into her eyes, which hung upon him, as Farrell talked on, persuading
himself, as he persuaded her. So that presently, when tea came in, and
the kettle boiled, she was quite ready to pour out for him, to ask him
questions about his night journey, and thank him timidly for all his
kindness.
'But this--this is too grand for us!'--she said, looking round her. 'We
must find a lodging soon.'
He begged her earnestly to let the flat be of use to her, and she,
embarrassed and unwilling, but dreading to hurt his feelings, was
compelled at last to submit to a week's stay.
Then he got up to go; and she was very sorry to say good-bye to him. As
for him, in her wistful and gracious charm, she had never seemed to him
more lovely. How she became grief!--in her measure reserve!
He ran down the stairs of the mansion just as Bridget Cookson arrived
with the lift at the third floor. She recognised the disappearing
figure, and stood a moment at the door of the flat, looking after it, a
gleam of satisfaction in her eyes.
PART II