The visits of Lady Mallowe and Captain Palliser had had their features.
Neither of the pair had come to one of the most imposing “places”
in Lancashire to live a life of hermit-like seclusion and dullness.
They had arrived with the intention of availing themselves of all
such opportunities for entertainment as could be guided in their
direction by the deftness of experience. As a result, there had been
hospitalities at Temple Barholm such as it had not beheld during the
last generation at least. T. Tembarom had looked on, an interested
spectator, as these festivities had been adroitly arranged and managed
for him. He had not, however, in the least resented acting as a sort of
figurehead in the position of sponsor and host.
“They think I don’t know I’m not doing it all myself,” was his easy
mental summing-up. “They’ve got the idea that I’m pleased because I
believe I’m It. But that’s all to the merry. It’s what I’ve set my mind
on having going on here, and I couldn’t have started it as well myself.
I shouldn’t have known how. They’re teaching me. All I hope is that
Ann’s grandmother is keeping tab.”
“Do you and Rose happen to know old Mrs. Hutchinson?” he had inquired
of Pearson the night before the talk with the duke.
“Well, not to say exactly _know_ her, sir, but everybody knows _of_
her,” said Pearson. “She is a most remarkable old person, sir--most
remarkable.” Then, after watching his face for a moment or so, he added
tentatively, “Would you perhaps _wish_ us to make her acquaintance
for--for any reason, sir?”
Tembarom thought the matter over speculatively. He had learned that
his first liking for Pearson had been founded upon a rock. He was
always to be trusted to understand, and also to apply a quite unusual
intelligence to such matters as he became aware of without having been
told about them.
“What I’d like would be for her to hear that there’s plenty doing at
Temple Barholm; that people are coming and going all the time; and that
there’s ladies to burn--and most of them lookers, at that,” was his
answer.
How Pearson had discovered the exotic subtleties of his master’s
situation and mental attitude toward it, only those of his class and
gifted with his occult powers could explain in detail. The fact exists
that Pearson did know an immense number of things his employer had
not mentioned to him, and held them locked in his bosom in honored
security, like a little gentleman. He made his reply with a polite
conviction which carried weight.
[Illustration]
“It would not be necessary for either Rose or me to make old Mrs.
Hutchinson’s acquaintance with a view to informing her of anything
which occurs on the estate or in the village, sir,” he remarked. “Mrs.
Hutchinson knows more of things than any one ever tells her. She sits
in her cottage there, and she just _knows_ things and sees through
people in a way that’d be almost unearthly, if she wasn’t a good old
person, and so respectable that there’s those that touches their hats
to her as if she belonged to the gentry. She’s got a blue eye, sir.”
“Has she?” exclaimed Tembarom.
“Yes, sir. As blue as a baby’s, sir, and as clear, though she’s past
eighty. Oh, sir! you can depend upon old Mrs. Hutchinson as to who’s
been here, and even what they’ve thought about it. The village just
flocks to her to tell her the news and get advice about things. She’d
know.”
It was as a result of this that on his return from Stone Hover he
dismissed the carriage at the gates and walked through them to make
a visit in the village. Old Mrs. Hutchinson, sitting knitting in
her chair behind the abnormally flourishing fuchsias, geraniums,
and campanula carpaticas in her cottage-window, looked between the
banked-up flower-pots to see that Mr. Temple Barholm had opened her
wicket-gate and was walking up the clean-brushed path to her front
door. When he knocked she called out in the broad Lancashire she had
always spoken, “Coom in!” When he entered he took off his hat and
looked at her, friendly but hesitant, and with the expression of a
young man who has not quite made up his mind as to what he is about to
encounter.
“I’m Temple Temple Barholm, Mrs. Hutchinson,” he announced.
“I know that,” she answered. “Not that tha looks loike the Temple
Barholms, but I’ve been watchin’ thee walk an’ drive past here ever
since tha coom to the place.”
She watched him steadily with an astonishingly limpid pair of old eyes.
They were old and young at the same time; old because they held deeps
of wisdom, young because they were so alive and full of question.
“I don’t know whether I ought to have come to see you or not,” he said.
“Well, tha’st coom,” she replied, going on with her knitting. “Sit thee
doun and have a bit of a chat.”
“Say!” he broke out. “Ain’t you going to shake hands with me?” He held
his hand out impetuously. He knew he was all right if she’d shake hands.
“Theer’s nowt agen that, surely,” she answered, with a shrewd bit of
a smile. She gave him her hand. “If I was na stiff in my legs, it’s
my place to get up an’ mak’ thee a curtsey, but th’ rheumatics has no
respect even for th’ lord o’ th’ manor.”
“If you got up and made me a curtsey,” Tembarom said, “I should throw a
fit. Say, Mrs. Hutchinson, I bet you know that as well as I do.”
The shrewd bit of smile lighted her eyes as well as twinkled about her
mouth.
“Sit thee doun,” she said again.
So he sat down and looked at her as straight as she looked at him.
“Tha’d give a good bit,” she said presently, over her flashing needles,
“to know how much Little Ann’s tow’d me about thee.”
“I’d give a lot to know how much it’d be square to ask you to tell me
about _her_,” he gave back to her, hesitating yet eager.
“What does tha mean by square?” she demanded.
“I mean ‘fair.’ Can I talk to you about her at all? I promised I’d
stick it out here and do as she said. She told me she wasn’t going to
write to me or let her father write. I’ve promised, and I’m not going
to fall down when I’ve said a thing. I’m going to be as good as I know
how.”
“So tha coom to see her grandmother?”
He reddened, but held his head up.
“I’m not going to ask her grandmother a thing she doesn’t want me to
be told. But I’ve been up against it pretty hard lately. I read some
things in the New York papers about her father and his invention, and
about her traveling round with him and helping him with his business.”
“In Germany they wur,” she put in, forgetting herself. “They’re havin’
big doin’s over th’ invention. What Joe’d do wi’out th’ lass I canna
tell. She’s doin’ every bit o’ th’ managin’ an’ contrivin’ wi’ them
furriners--but he’ll never know it.”
Her face flushed and she stopped herself sharply.
“I’m talkin’ about her to thee!” she said. “I would na ha’ believed it
o’ mysen.”
He got up from his chair.
“I guess I oughtn’t to have come,” he said restlessly. “But you haven’t
told me more than I got here and there in the papers. That was what
startled me. It was like watching her. I could hear her talking and
see the way she was doing things till it drove me half crazy. All of a
sudden I just got wild and made up my mind I’d come here. I’ve wanted
to do it many a time, but I’ve kept away.”
“Tha showed sense i’ doin’ that,” remarked Mrs. Hutchinson. “She’d not
ha’ thowt well o’ thee if tha’d coom runnin’ to her grandmother every
day or so. What she likes about thee is as she thinks tha’s got a
strong backbone o’ thy own.
“Happen a look at a lass’s grandmother--when tha canna get at th’ lass
hersen--is a bit o’ comfort,” she added. “But don’t tha go walkin’ by
here to look in at th’ window too often. She would na think well o’
that either.”
“Say! There’s one thing I’m going to get off my chest before I go,” he
announced, “just one thing. She can go where she likes and do what she
likes, but I’m going to marry her when she’s done it--unless something
knocks me on the head and finishes me. I’m going to marry her.”
“Tha art, art tha?” laconically.
“I’m keeping up my end here, and it’s no slouch of a job, but I’m not
forgetting what she promised for one minute! And I’m not forgetting
what her promise means,” he said, obstinately.
“Tha’d like me to tell her that?” she said.
“If she doesn’t know it, you telling her wouldn’t cut any ice,” was his
reply. “I’m saying it because I want you to know it, and because it
does me good to say it out loud. I’m going to marry her.”
“That’s for her and thee to settle,” she commented impersonally.
“It _is_ settled,” he answered. “There’s no way out of it. Will you
shake hands with me again before I go?”
“Aye,” she consented, “I will.”
When she took his hand she held it a minute. Her own was warm, and
there was no limpness about it. The secret which had seemed to conceal
itself behind her eyes had some difficulty in keeping itself wholly in
the background.
“She knows aw’ tha does,” she said coolly, as if she were not suddenly
revealing immensities. “She knows who cooms an’ who goes, an’ what they
think o’ thee, an’ how tha gets on wi’ ’em. Now get thee gone, lad, an’
dunnot tha coom back till her or me sends for thee.”
* * * * *
~Within~ an hour of this time the afternoon post brought to Lady
Mallowe a letter which she read with an expression in which her
daughter recognized relief. It was in fact a letter for which she had
waited with anxiety, and the invitation it contained was a tribute to
her social skill at its highest water-mark. In her less heroic moments,
she had felt doubts of receiving it, which had caused shudders to run
the entire length of her spine.
“I’m going to Broome Haughton,” she announced to Joan.
“When?” Joan inquired.
“At the end of the week. I am invited for a fortnight.”
“Am I going?” Joan asked.
“No. You will go to London to meet some friends who are coming over
from Paris.”
Joan knew that comment was unnecessary. Both she and her mother were
on intimate terms with these hypothetical friends who so frequently
turned up from Paris or elsewhere when it was necessary that she
should suddenly go back to London and live in squalid seclusion in the
unopened house, with a charwoman to provide her with underdone or burnt
chops, and eggs at eighteen a shilling, while the shutters of the front
rooms were closed, and dusty desolation reigned.
“If you had conducted yourself sensibly you need not have gone,”
continued her mother. “I could have made an excuse and left you here.
You would at least have been sure of good food and decent comforts.”
“After your visit, are we to return here?” was Lady Joan’s sole reply.
“I do not know what will happen when I leave Broome Haughton,” her
mother added, a note of rasped uncertainty in her voice.
In truth, the future was a hideous thing to contemplate if no rescue
at all was in sight. It would be worse for her than for Joan, because
Joan did not care what happened or did not happen, and she cared
desperately. She knew perfectly well that the girl had somehow found
out that Sir Moses Monaldini was to be at Broome Haughton, and that
when he left there he was going abroad. She knew also that she had not
been able to conceal that his indifference had of late given her some
ghastly hours, and that her play for this lagging invitation had been a
frantically bold one. That the most ingenious efforts and devices had
ended in success only after such delay made it all the more necessary
that no straw must remain unseized on.
“I can wear some of your things, with a little alteration,” she said.
“Rose will do it for me. Hats and gloves and ornaments do not require
altering. I shall need things you will not need in London. Where are
your keys?”
Lady Joan rose and got them for her. She even flushed slightly. They
were often obliged to borrow each other’s possessions, but for a moment
she felt herself moved by a sort of hard pity.
“We are like rats in a trap,” she remarked. “I hope you will get out.”
“If I do, you will be left inside. Get out yourself! Get out yourself!”
said Lady Mallowe in a fierce whisper.
Her regrets at the necessity of their leaving Temple Barholm were
expressed with fluent touchingness at the dinner-table. The visit had
been so delightful. Mr. Temple Barholm and Miss Alicia had been so
kind. The loveliness of the whole dear place had so embraced them that
they felt as if they were leaving a home instead of ending a delightful
visit. It was extraordinary what an effect the house had on one. It
was as if one had lived in it always--and always would. So few places
gave one the same feeling. They should both look forward--greedy as it
seemed--to being allowed some time to come again. She had decided from
the first that it was not necessary to go to any extreme of caution
or subtlety with her host and Miss Alicia. Her method of paving the
way for future visits was perhaps more than a shade too elaborate.
She felt, however, that it sufficed. For the most part, Lady Joan sat
with lids dropped over her burning eyes. She tried to force herself
not to listen. This was the kind of thing which made her sick with
humiliation. Howsoever rudimentary these people were, they could not
fail to comprehend that a foothold in the house was being bid for.
They should at least see that she did not join in the bidding. Her own
visit had been filled with feelings at war with one another. In the
long-past three months of happiness, Jem--_her_ Jem--had described the
house to her--the rooms, gardens, pleached walks, pictures, the very
furniture itself. She could enter no room, walk in no spot she did not
seem to know, and passionately love in spite of herself. She loved them
so much that there were times when she yearned to stay in the place at
any cost, and others when she could not endure the misery it woke in
her--the pure misery.
T. Tembarom thought he never had seen Lady Joan look as handsome as
she looked to-night. The color on her cheek burned, her eyes had a
driven loneliness in them. She had a wonderfully beautiful mouth, and
its curve drooped in a new way. He wished Ann could get her in a corner
and sit down and talk sense to her. He remembered what he had said to
the duke. Perhaps this was the time. If she was going away, and her
mother meant to drag her back again when she was ready, it would make
it easier for her to leave the place knowing she need not hate to come
back. But the duke wasn’t making any miss hit when he said it wouldn’t
be easy. She was not like Ann, who would feel some pity for the biggest
fool on earth if she had to throw him down hard. Lady Joan would feel
neither compunctions nor relentings. He knew the way she could look at
a fellow. If he couldn’t make her understand what he was aiming at,
they would both be worse off than they would be if he left things as
they were. But--the hard line showed itself about his mouth--he wasn’t
going to leave things as they were.
As they passed through the hall after dinner, Lady Mallowe glanced at
a side-table on which lay some letters arrived by the late post. An
imposing envelop was on the top of the rest. Joan saw her face light as
she took it up.
“I think this is from Broome Haughton,” she said. “If you will excuse
me, I will go into the library and read it. It may require answering at
once.”
She turned hot and cold, poor woman, and went away, so that she might
be free from the disaster of an audience if anything had gone wrong. It
would be better to be alone even if things had gone right. The letter
was from Sir Moses Monaldini.
The men had come into the drawing-room when she returned. As she
entered, Joan did not glance up from the book she was reading, but at
the first sound of her voice she knew what the letter meant.
“I was obliged to dash off a note to Broome Haughton so that it would
be ready for the early post,” Lady Mallowe said. She was at her best.
Palliser saw that some years had slipped from her shoulders. The moment
which relieves or even promises to relieve fears does astonishing
things. Tembarom wondered whether she had had good news. Her brilliant
air of social ease returned to her, and she began to talk fluently
of what was being done in London, and to touch lightly upon the
possibility of taking part in great functions. Persons whose fortunate
names had ceased to fall easily from her lips appeared again upon the
horizon. Miss Alicia was impressed anew with the feeling that she had
known every brilliant or important personage in the big world of social
London; that she had taken part in every dazzling event. Tembarom
somehow realized that she had been afraid of something or other, and
was for some reason not afraid any more. Such a change, whatsoever the
reason for it, ought to have had some effect on her daughter. Surely
she would share her luck, if luck had come to her.
But Lady Joan sat apart and kept her eyes upon her book. This was one
of the things she often chose to do, in spite of her mother’s indignant
protest.
“I came here because you brought me,” she would answer. “I did not come
to be entertaining or polite.”
She was not reading this evening. She heard every word of Lady
Mallowe’s agreeable and slightly excited conversation. She did not know
exactly what had happened; but she knew that it was something which had
buoyed her up with a hopefulness which exhilarated her and before her
own future Joan saw the blank wall of stone building itself higher and
higher. If Sir Moses had capitulated, she would be counted out. A cruel
little smile touched her lips, as she reviewed the number of things
she could _not_ do to earn her living. She could not take in sewing or
washing, and there was nothing she could teach. Starvation or marriage.
The wall built itself higher and yet higher. What a hideous thing it
was for a penniless girl to be brought up merely to be a beauty, and
in consequence supposably a great lady. And yet if she was born to a
certain rank and had height and figure, a lovely mouth, a delicate
nose, unusual eyes and lashes, to train her to be a dressmaker or a
housemaid would be a stupid investment of capital. If nothing tragic
interfered and the right man wanted such a girl, she had been trained
to please him. But tragic things had happened, and before her grew the
wall while she pretended to read her book.
T. Tembarom was coming toward her. She had heard Palliser suggest a
game of billiards.
“Will you come and play billiards with us?” Tembarom asked. “Palliser
says you play splendidly.”
“She plays brilliantly,” put in Lady Mallowe. “Come, Joan.”
“No, thank you,” she answered. “Let me stay here and read.”
Lady Mallowe protested. She tried an air of playful maternal reproach
because she was in good spirits. Joan saw Palliser smiling quietly, and
there was that in his smile which suggested to her that he was thinking
her an obstinate fool.
“You had better show Temple Barholm what you can do,” he remarked.
“This will be your last chance, as you leave so soon. Never ought you
let a last chance slip by. I never do.”
Tembarom stood still and looked down at her from his good height. He
did not know what Palliser’s speech meant, but an instinct made him
feel that it somehow held an ugly, quiet taunt.
“What I would like to do,” was the unspoken crudity which passed
through his mind, “would be to swat him on the mouth. He’s getting at
her just when she ought to be let alone.”
“Would you like it better to stay here and read?” he inquired.
“Much better, if you please,” was her reply.
“Then that goes,” he answered, and left her.
He swept the others out of the room with a good-natured promptness
which put an end to argument. When he said of anything “Then that
goes,” it usually did so.