OUT OF THE MOUTHS OF BABES
Miriam's manner toward him was the same as it had always been so long as
he could remember. He had once thought--indeed, he had made to her the
accusation--that she was always conscious of the social gulf existing
between them; that she always remembered that she was by birth and
breeding a lady, whereas he was the son of an obscure Frenchman who was
nothing but a clockmaker whose name could be read (and can to this day be
deciphered) on a hundred timepieces in remote East Anglian farms.
Since his change of fortune he had, as all men who rise to a great height
or sink to the depths will tell, noted a corresponding change in his
friends. Even Captain Clubbe had altered, and the affection which peeped
out at times almost against his puritanical will seemed to have suffered
a chill. The men of Farlingford, and even those who had sailed in "The
Last Hope" with him, seemed to hold him at a distance. They nodded to him
with a brief, friendly smile, but were shy of shaking hands. The hand
which they would have held out readily enough, had he needed assistance
in misfortune, slunk hastily into a pocket. For he who climbs will lose
more friends than the ne'er-do-well. Some may account this to human
nature for righteousness and others quite the contrary: for jealousy,
like love, lies hidden in unsuspected corners.
Juliette do Gemosac had been quite different to Loo since learning his
story. Miriam alone remained unchanged. He had accused her of failing to
rise superior to arbitrary social distinctions, and now, standing behind
her in the fire-lit dining-room of the rectory, he retracted that
accusation once and for all time in his own heart, though her
justification came from a contrary direction to that from which it might
have been expected.
Miriam alone remained a friend--and nothing else, he added, bitterly, in
his own heart. And she seemed to assume that their friendship, begun in
face of social distinctions, should never have to suffer from that
burthen.
"I should like to hear," she repeated, seeing that he was silent, "all
that has happened since you went away; all that you may care to tell me."
"My heritage, you mean?"
She moved in her seat but did not look round. She had laid aside her hat
on coming into the house, and as she sat, leaning forward with her hands
clasped together in her lap, gazing thoughtfully at the fire which glowed
blue and white for the salt water that was in the drift-wood, her hair,
loosened by the wind, half concealed her face.
"Yes," she answered, slowly.
"Do you know what it is--my heritage?" lapsing, as he often did when
hurried by some pressing thought, into a colloquialism half French.
She shook her head, but made no audible reply.
"Do you suspect what it is?" he insisted.
"I may have suspected, perhaps," she admitted, after a pause.
"When? How long?"
She paused again. Quick and clever as he was, she was no less so. She
weighed the question. Perhaps she found no answer to it, for she turned
toward the door that stood open and looked out into the hall. The light
of the lamp there fell for a moment across her face.
"I think I hear them returning," she said.
"No," he retorted, "for I should hear them before you did. I was brought
up at sea. Do not answer the question, however, if you would rather not.
You ask what has happened since I went away. A great many things have
happened which are of no importance. Such things always happen, do they
not? But one night, when we were quarrelling, Dormer Colville mentioned
your name. He was very much alarmed and very angry, so he perhaps spoke
the truth--by accident. He said that you had always known that I might be
the King of France. Many things happened, as I tell you, which are of no
importance, and which I have already forgotten, but that I remember and
always shall."
"I have always known," replied Miriam, "that Mr. Dormer Colville is a
liar. It is written on his face, for those who care to read."
A woman at bay is rarely merciful.
"And I thought for an instant," pursued Loo, "that such a knowledge might
have been in your mind that night, the last I was here, last summer, on
the river-wall. I had a vague idea that it might have influenced in some
way the reply you gave me then."
He had come a step nearer and was standing over her. She could hear his
hurried breathing.
"Oh, no," she replied, in a calm voice full of friendliness. "You are
quite wrong. The reason I gave you still holds good, and--and always
will."
In the brief silence that followed this clear statement of affairs, they
both heard the rattle of the iron gate by the seawall. Sep and his father
were coming. Loo turned to look toward the hall and the front door, dimly
visible in the shadow of the porch. While he did so Miriam passed her
hand quickly across her face. When Loo turned again and glanced down at
her, her attitude was unchanged.
"Will you look at me and say that again?" he asked, slowly.
"Certainly," she replied. And she rose from her chair. She turned and
faced him with the light of the hall-lamp full upon her. She was smiling
and self-confident.
"I thought," he said, looking at her closely, "as I stood behind you,
that there were tears in your eyes."
She went past him into the hall to meet Sep and his father, who were
already on the threshold.
"It must have been the firelight," she said to Barebone as she passed
him.
A minute later Septimus Marvin was shaking him by the hand with a vague
and uncertain but kindly grasp.
"Sep came running to tell me that you were home again," he said,
struggling out of his overcoat. "Yes--yes. Home again to the old place.
And little changed, I can see. Little changed, my boy. _Tempora
mutantur_, eh? and we _mutamur in illis_. But you are the same."
"Of course. Why should I change? It is too late to change for the better
now."
"Never! Never say that. But we do not want you to change. We looked for
you to come in a coach-and-four--did we not, Miriam? For I suppose you
have secured your heritage, since you are here again. It is a great thing
to possess riches--and a great responsibility. Come, let us have tea and
not think of such things. Yes--yes. Let us forget that such a thing as a
heritage ever came between us--eh, Miriam?"
And with a gesture of old-world politeness he stood aside for his niece
to pass first into the dining-room, whither a servant had preceded them
with a lamp.
"It will not be hard to do that," replied Miriam, steadily, "because he
tells me that he has not yet secured it."
"All in good time--all in good time," said Marvin, with that faith in
some occult power, seemingly the Government and Providence working in
conjunction, to which parsons and many women confide their worldly
affairs and sit with folded hands.
He asked many questions which were easy enough to answer; for he had no
worldly wisdom himself, and did not look for it in other people. And then
he related his own adventure--the great incident of his life--his visit
to Paris.
"A matter of business," he explained. "Some duplicates--one or two of my
prints which I had decided to part with. Miriam also wished me to see
into some small money matters of her own. Her guardian, John Turner,
you may remember, resides in Paris. A schoolfellow of my own, by the
way. But our ways diverged later in life. I found him unchanged--a kind
heart--always a kind heart. He attempts to conceal it, as many do, under
a flippant, almost a profane, manner of speech. _Brutum fulmen._ But I
saw through it--I saw through it."
And the rector beamed on Loo through his spectacles with an innocent
delight in a Christian charity which he mistook for cunning.
"You see," he went on, "we have spent a little money on the rectory.
To-morrow you will see that we have made good the roof of the church. One
could not ask the villagers to contribute, knowing that the children want
boots and scarcely know the taste of jam. Yes, John Turner was very kind
to me. He found me a buyer for one of my prints."
The rector broke off with a sharp sigh and drank his tea.
"We shall never miss it," he added, with the hopefulness of those who can
blind themselves to facts. "Come, tell me your impressions of France."
"I have been there before," replied Loo, with a curtness so unusual as to
make Miriam glance at him. "I have been there before, you know. It would
be more interesting to hear your own impressions, which must be fresher."
Miriam knew that he did not want to speak of France, and wondered why.
But Marvin, eager to talk of his favourite study, seized the suggestion
in all innocence. He had gone to Paris as he had wandered through life,
with the mind of a child, eager, receptive, open to impression. Such
minds pass by much that is of value, but to one or two conclusions they
bring a perceptive comprehension which is photographic in its accuracy.
"I have followed her history with unflagging interest since boyhood," he
said, "but never until now have I understood France. I walked through the
streets of Paris and I looked into the faces of the people, and I
realised that the astonishing history of France is true. One can see it
in those faces. The city is brilliant, beautiful, unreal. The reality is
in the faces of the people. Do you remember what Wellington said of them
half a century ago? 'They are ripe,' he said, 'for another Napoleon.' But
he could not see that Napoleon on the political horizon. And that is what
I saw in their faces. They are ripe for something--they know not what."
"Did John Turner tell you that?" asked Loo, in an eager voice. "He who
has lived in Paris all his life?"
And Miriam caught the thrill of excitement in the voice that put this
question. She glanced at Loo. His eyes were bright and his cheeks
colourless. She knew that she was in the presence of some feeling that
she did not understand. It was odd that an old scholar, knowing nothing
but history, could thus stir a listener whose touch had hitherto only
skimmed the surface of life.
"No," answered Marvin, with assurance. "I saw it myself in their faces.
Ah! if another such as Napoleon could only arise--such as he, but
different. Not an adventurer, but a King and the descendant of Kings--not
allied, as Napoleon was, with a hundred other adventurers."
"Yes," said Loo, in a muffled voice, looking away toward the fire.
"A King whose wife should be a Queen," pursued the dreamer.
"Yes," said Loo again, encouragingly.
"They could save France," concluded Marvin, taking off his spectacles and
polishing them with a silk handkerchief. Loo turned and looked at him,
for the action so characteristic of a mere onlooker indicated that the
momentary concentration of a mind so stored with knowledge that confusion
reigned there was passing away.
"From what?" asked Loo. "Save France from what?"
"From inevitable disaster, my boy," replied Marvin, gravely. "That is
what I saw in those gay streets."
Loo glanced at him sharply. He had himself seen the same all through
those provinces which must take their cue from Paris whether they will or
no.
"What a career!" murmured Marvin. "What a mission for a man to have in
life--to save France! One does not like to think of the world without a
France to lead it in nearly everything, or with a France, a mere ghost of
her former self, exploited, depleted by another Bonaparte. And we must
look in vain for that man as did the good Duke years ago."
"I should like to have a shot at it," put in Sep, who had just despatched
a large piece of cake.
"Heaven forbid!" exclaimed his father, only half in jest.
"Better sit all day under the lee of a boat and make nets, like Sea
Andrew," advised Loo, with a laugh.
"Do you think so?" said Miriam, without looking up.
"All the same, I'd like to have a shot at it," persisted Sep. "Pass the
cake, please."
Loo had risen and was looking at the clock. His face was drawn and tired
and his eyes grave.
"You will come in and see us as often as you can while you are
here?" said the kindly rector, as if vaguely conscious of a change in
this visitor. "You will always find a welcome whether you come in a
coach-and-four or on foot--you know that."
"Thank you--yes. I know that."
The rector peered at him through his spectacles. "I hope," he said, "that
you will soon be successful in getting your own. You are worried about
it, I fear. The responsibilities of wealth, perhaps. And yet many rich
people are able to do good in the world, and must therefore be happy."
"I do not suppose I shall ever be rich," said Loo, with a careless laugh.
"No, perhaps not. But let us hope that all will be for the best. You must
not attach too much importance to what I said about France, you know. I
may be wrong. Let us hope I am. For I understand that your heritage is
there."
"Yes," answered Loo, who was shaking hands with Sep and Miriam, "my
heritage is there."
"And you will go back to France?" inquired Marvin, holding out his hand.
"Yes," was the reply, with a side glance in the direction of Miriam. "I
shall go back to France."