THE LETTER
“MY DEAR MRS. BARRIMORE,” Colonel Lane’s letter began, “I may remain
here some time. Poor Henderson has rallied for the moment, but he
seems to find my companionship a comfort, so I shall stay. I know my
dear friends at Hawk’s Nest will look after Phyllis.
“To me it is indescribably sad to see a brave soldier on his back, in
a home such as this. He has nothing beyond his half-pay, and illness
is expensive. He has been an invalid for six years now, unable even
to walk without assistance at the best of times. He has two boys at
Dulwich College. Mrs. Henderson, poor soul! is a helpless sort of
woman, and can neither control the boys nor the house, though I am
sure she does her best, according to her lights. She goes to early
celebration every morning, wet or fine, but I think she would be
serving God better if she stayed at home, and saw that the awful
little maid-of-all-work did not burn poor Henderson’s toast.
“She worries poor Henderson by reading prayers to him in a voice
like a corncrake’s every morning and evening. Occasionally Henderson
rebels, using regrettable language.
“The house is one of a row, in a road called a ‘Grove,’ because a few
trees grow on each side of it. There is a patch of front garden, and a
larger patch behind. Henderson’s boys have laid his particular patch
waste--the one at the back, I mean--and unfortunately that is all
Henderson has to look at from his window. He has a kind of back-parlor
allotted to him. He sleeps there (when he does sleep!) and lies there
all day.
“Piano-organs run riot.
“Oh, if only I had known earlier, when it would have been possible to
remove my poor friend to my house for a change!
“They came here, it seems, to get the boys educated at Dulwich
College. But East Dulwich is one of the most depressing places I ever
saw.
“Henderson and I yarn about Army matters--that is, I yarn, and he puts
in something now and then. But he seems cheered, and forgets his pain
while we travel over old roads after this fashion.
“Really this house makes me ashamed of myself for being so
discontented with my own. I find mine luxurious by contrast. Mrs.
Ransom does keep it clean, too!
“Here the boys have played the deuce with everything. Even the
banister rails are broken. The handles are off most of the doors, and
the carpet in the ‘front parlor,’ where the boys take their meals and
do their ‘home-work,’ has large burns in it from their experiments
with fireworks.
“They are not bad boys by any means. They are a handsome pair, and
full of life and spirits. They are simply uncontrolled, that is all. I
confiscated a revolver from one of them to-day.
“Poor Mrs. Henderson remonstrates, and the boys laugh. She retires to
darn socks and sniff. (She has a habit of sniffing which irritates
Henderson.) Really to me it is infinitely sad to look at her, and to
remember what a pretty girl she was when Henderson married her. She
had such a bright pair of eyes in those days and roses in her cheeks.
Now she is plain--very plain. Her greying hair is thin, and her eyes
dull. Her face is sallow.
“As I write I think of another woman, who is not so much younger than
Mrs. Henderson, and yet is as fresh and flower-like as a girl, and I
think it would break my heart if I saw her fade and become what my
poor friend’s wife is. Life is a great mystery. Why should some suffer
so much more than others?
“This is a dismal letter, but you always let me talk to you of all in
my mind, don’t you? I hope that Phyllis does not give you any anxiety.
I told you that she had been writing to Captain Arbuthnot? I meant to
write to him myself, but it got put off. Perhaps I had best let it
alone for the present. Often it is best to do just nothing, isn’t it?
“Has Philip been over? Remember me to him when you see him, and tell
Robert I love him well!
“As for you! whatever is best in me is yours already!”
Mrs. Barrimore read this letter in her bedroom with the door locked.
She laughed and cried a little over it, and finally did what most women
do with epistles they greatly prize. She put it inside her bodice.
One little phrase in this letter came as balm to her troubled spirits
after Philip’s remarks.
To Philip she was “the mother”--a person of the last generation trying
to bloom out of due season; but to Colonel Lane she was still young and
adorable.
Would Philip ever know, ever begin even to understand the sacrifice his
mother had made for him?
Philip had heard from Dan’s open window his uncle’s remark about the
letter, and found in the fact of Colonel Lane’s writing to his mother
another cause for resentment.
“Why didn’t Colonel Lane write to you instead of to my mother?”
Philip asked his uncle, who was uncorking a bottle of claret in the
dining-room before the others came in.
“That is his business, I suppose,” snapped Uncle Robert.
“I rather think it is mine,” asserted Philip.
“Don’t you make an ass of yourself, Philip,” Uncle Robert said, raising
his voice.
Philip turned on his heel. He had more than half a mind to get Soda and
go back to the bungalow without lunching.
In the entrance hall he encountered Phyllis, who drew him into the
smoking-room.
“Philip!” she ejaculated tragically, “I am miserable!”
“Whatever about?” inquired the young man rather sourly. He was for the
moment miserable himself, and in no mood to hear Phyllis’s troubles.
“Oh, don’t look so cold and hard, Philip! You have always been my
friend. I have always come to you.”
Philip was still smarting under Uncle Robert’s snub, and was still
distinctly unsympathetic in manner.
“If the account of your misery is likely to be a long one, you had best
put it off till after luncheon. The gong will sound directly,” he said.
“Oh, if you don’t want to hear!” ejaculated Phyllis childishly.
“But I do, dear,” said Philip, more kindly. (After all, it was scarcely
manly to vent his ill-humor on this girl.) “You see, Phyllis, we
should be interrupted,” he added, showing her his watch--a gold one and
a gift from Uncle Robert.
“I almost wish I had never been born,” Phyllis asserted, not deigning
to look at the watch. She came close to Philip, clutching his arm and
peering up at him with childish, troubled eyes. “Philip, don’t let Mr.
Webster go to the White House,” she blurted out.
“Why?” he asked her in amazement.
“Oh, that has nothing to do with it,” she answered incoherently. “Stop
him from going. You can if you like. Do! do! dear Philip!”
The gong sounded and there came the flutter of silk skirts on the
staircase. Mrs. Barrimore, fresh and smiling, but with trouble in the
dear grey eyes for those who could read them, entered the dining-room.
Dan was already there with Uncle Robert, and presently Phyllis and
Philip came in.
Philip was so occupied about the puzzling remarks he had just been
hearing in the smoking-room that he forgot to resent his mother’s very
charming appearance. Love can take ten years off any woman’s looks, and
Mrs. Barrimore had a dear secret hidden under the dainty bodice.
“Well, Annie! What’s the old Colonel got to say?” Uncle Robert asked,
with a defiant glance at Philip, who did not see it.
“The letter is all about the Hendersons,” Mrs. Barrimore answered with
one of those lovely blushes of hers.
“They are most dreadfully poor,” she went on hurriedly, to cover her
confusion. “There are two boys at Dulwich College. I wonder what they
will do when they leave school!”
“They must go to Sandhurst,” affirmed Uncle Robert.
“But where is the money to come from?” she asked not unnaturally.
“Me!” shouted her brother. “M E--me!”
Everyone started, and Philip said: “Henderson is not a friend of
yours--I don’t see--”
“No, you don’t see, Philip. You very often don’t see. Those boys must
have a chance. It is the business of old bachelors who are well-off to
look to these things--also--_Bonum quo communices eo melius_--which
being interpreted for little Phyllis, means, ‘The good in which you let
others share becomes thereby the better.’ We will have a confab after
luncheon, Annie.”
Uncle Robert, who was never quite so happy as when confronted by
somebody’s difficulties which he thought he could remove, carried
his sister to his den as soon as luncheon was over to talk about the
Hendersons.
“Lane will do all he can, I know,” Uncle Robert began, when he had
carefully closed the door. “But you know, Annie, he ought to keep what
he has for little Phyll. What do you think of a hamper of game, and
a few dozens of good wine for a start off? The country ought to be
ashamed of the poor gratitude she shows to the men who have fought for
her and suffered for her. No proper provision is made for soldiers at
any time. Think of it, Annie! Many a good officer is lost to our Army
because he can’t afford the thing. An officer gets about enough to pay
his laundry bill, and when he is too old, or when he is no further use
to the nation, he can live in--East Dulwich! He can do as he can in
genteel poverty. ‘Soldier, rest! thy warfare o’er,’ sings Scott. A nice
bed a grateful country gives the soldier to rest on! But talk never
did anything. A hamper goes off this afternoon. Come, Annie, my love,
help me with your woman’s wit! The hamper must go to Lane, of course.”
Dan had gone off to the room where he worked, which was big and airy
and had a north light. The room had been empty until Uncle Robert had
it converted into a temporary studio for Dan.
Phyllis, left alone with Philip, remarked: “I suppose Mr. Webster is
safe out of the way. I heard Mr. Webster go to the studio--and Mrs.
Barrimore and Mr. Burns will be engaged for hours, so we can have our
talk.”
“Very well,” answered Philip, yawning. “The sooner it’s over the sooner
to rest--and good-bye to Miss Phyll and her moaning!”
“Don’t joke, Philip,” cried Phyllis, with an impatient shrug of her
shoulders. “I am serious, I tell you--really I am. I am miserable, and
you are very unkind to laugh at me.”
“I won’t laugh. Forge ahead! Look! my face is as long as a fiddle,”
said Philip, trying not to smile.
At that same moment Mrs. Barrimore, referring to Colonel Lane’s letter,
found a postscript which she had overlooked. It ran:
“I have just read over this letter, and find I have been a little
unjust to poor Mrs. Henderson. She really has her hands full with
her invalid husband, and the boys are of necessity left a lot to
themselves. Then the inadequate maid--the limited income! Some women
would have taken to drink or drugs! Mrs. Henderson has only taken to
religion! Under happier circumstances I believe she would be very
different.”