meant more than it seemed to. She loved those speeches of his,
springing from something in him to which she could give all her faith
and all her devotion. They helped her to plumb the depths in him, and
she had never found anything there that did not make her glad and proud
of loving him.
This time her pride brought the tears close to her eyes. There was more
than the sweetness of young love in this--to be loved as something in
full alliance with all the biggest things that a man might be called
upon to do in the world, and to which he must bring all that he was and
all that he had, even his life itself if it should be required of him.
"I shouldn't want you not to, Harry," she said.
He did not tell her of his conviction that the war would claim him. She
was his to be protected, and some things she must be spared. When the
time came, she would somehow be concerned in it, because she would be
concerned in everything that he did, and whatever he should want of her
then she would give him. He had as much confidence in her as she in
him.
"The war is like a great shadow over everything," he said. "We're in
the sunshine just now, you and I--the most glorious sunshine. I don't
think that we need fear the shadow for ourselves. But for others--for
some it's very deep."
The shadow seemed to creep closer and touch her heart as he spoke. They
were silent for a time, her hand resting in his. The contact
strengthened them both, and the shadow passed away from her. For the
rest of their time together that morning they made love and built their
airy rainbow castles, almost as unsubstantial as those of children. In
fact they played with the idea of having Jane and Pobbles to live with
them. It hardly seemed fair to be using the cabin in which they had a
proprietary share and leave them out of it. They would pass suddenly
from grave to gay in this way, and there were many times when the
children could have taken a full part in their conversation without
being at all in the way.
At about six o'clock that evening Wilbraham was walking along the
woodland path that led from the cottage to the Castle. He walked slowly
with his eyes on the ground all the time, and his face was very
thoughtful. He started violently as he looked up to see Harry standing
in the path in front of him.
For a moment they stood there looking at one another.
"Well?" said Harry.
Wilbraham's eyes dropped, and he walked on, Harry with him. "You've
been meeting here," he said.
"Yes."
Another pause. Then from Wilbraham: "You've been making love."
"Making love? I don't like the expression. We love each other--yes."
Wilbraham said nothing, and they walked on together. Presently they came
to a fallen tree by the side of the path. "Let's sit down here and have
it out," said Wilbraham.
Harry spoke first. "I'm glad you know," he said. "I'd like all the
world to know; you can tell why, now you've seen her. But I suppose it
wouldn't do for mother and Granny to know--not just yet."
Wilbraham seemed to pull his determination together. "My dear boy," he
said, "you mustn't take it for granted that they're not to know. It has
come as a complete surprise to me; I don't know what to do about it
yet."
Harry laughed. The situation seemed to contain no awkwardness for him,
whatever doubts it might have brought to Wilbraham. "Before you settle
that," he said, "tell me what you think of her."
"She's a very beautiful child," said Wilbraham, thoughtfully. He laid
no stress on the word "child," to belittle Harry's confession of love.
It was as she had struck him.
He had gone into the little parlour to find Bastian there, dressed more
in accordance with what he had seemed to be than on the day before. A
faint smell of his strong tobacco hung about the room, but it had been
tidied, and freshened up with flowers, and tea was laid on the table,
with signs of ceremony and care. Then Viola came in, and he had the
impression of Bastian triumphantly watching him as he introduced her.
He did indeed open his eyes at first sight of her, as her father had
foretold. He would not have been so surprised at the vision of her,
fresh and delicate, very simply dressed in her white frock, with all the
air about her of breeding and refinement, if it had not been for the
memory of Bastian the day before, with his deteriorated tastes, and his
talk of downfall. A flower, he had said of her, growing out of the
mire; but who had tended her growing?
Mrs. Ivimey came in with the tea, and was voluble with Wilbraham about
her ladyship and Sir Harry. Wilbraham's eyes were on Viola the whole
time, and he saw the colour rise on her soft cheeks as Harry's name was
mentioned, but made nothing of it at the time.
Nothing more was said about the Castle when Mrs. Ivimey had left the
room. Wilbraham had not given the invitation that might have been
expected of him. He recognized with a sense of gratitude that no hints
towards it need be feared. Bastian showed up much more as a gentleman
than on the afternoon before; his clothes were old enough but no longer
disreputable, and he was obviously entirely free from the influence of
drink. The difference in his speech and bearing seemed to exaggerate
his state of the afternoon before into one of actual drunkenness.
They talked chiefly about books, and more particularly about poetry.
Viola talked very little, but her father sometimes referred to her, as
if to show with pride what she was. Her enthusiasms showed here and
there. Wilbraham's wonder grew at her.
Harry came to his mind again. He brought his name in deliberately.
"Harry, my pupil, used to shout that out when he first read it. He
loves poetry, and it takes him like that."
Viola made no reply, but the flush dyed the rose-petal of her cheeks
again. "It's the youth in him," her father said. "Poetry brings you
real joy when you're young, doesn't it, Viola?"
She had to look up at last, and Wilbraham saw her eyes. She made a
brave effort to speak evenly, but her voice trembled a little as she
said, "Yes, all the beautiful things in the world make you glad."
Then Wilbraham knew, and a wave of sympathy and tenderness flowed over
him, but was brought up short against the wall that all the aims of the
past years had built up around Harry, and dashed back on him to
overwhelm him. He emerged gasping, but with the instinct strong in him
to keep his knowledge from being seen. In the rest of the time he
stayed at the cottage nothing was said to cause Viola to betray herself
further, but he was observing her all the time, and his bewilderment
grew.
She seemed to have divined that the danger was over, and came out of her
shell and smiled and prattled delightfully. Her happiness was too
strong in her to be kept under, and she would not have been human, or
feminine, if she had not wished to make a pleasant impression upon
Wilbraham, who was so near to Harry. It was the impression of delicious
sparkling youth that came to him most strongly. It was as if the
confession was drawn out of him reluctantly when in his answer to
Harry's question he said slowly: "She's a very beautiful child."
"Why didn't you teach me what a beautiful thing love is?" asked Harry.
"We've read a lot about it together, but I never had an idea of it until
now. I don't think anybody in the world has ever been so happy as I
am."
Wilbraham was torn in two again. His appreciations were not all
bookish, and he loved Harry. He saw that in a nature such as his love
would come as a very beautiful thing, and his searching observation of
Viola had revealed nothing in her that could make it less so. And
yet--!
"How long have you known her?" he asked.
"What does it matter?" said Harry. "I've known her all my life. If I
look back to any time in it, she was there, though I'd never seen her.
We've been meeting every day, if that's what you mean."
It was what Wilbraham had meant, and he felt discomfort at having asked
the question. It was the discomfort that must come from probing into
this situation, with the fear before him of saying something that would
smirch the bright purity of Harry's mind. Anything that brought his
actions to the test must do that, if he came to understand what tests
were applicable to his meetings with Viola.
"Why didn't you tell us?" seemed to be the safest thing to say, and he
said it with a half hope that the answer would give him some handle,
though without mental acknowledgment of the hope.
"Well, I felt somehow that you'd try to stop me," said the boy. "At
least mother and Granny would. I did nearly tell mother, the first time
I'd seen Viola, but something warned me not to. I've been glad since
that I didn't. It has just been she and I--Viola and I. Oh, how I love
her! I'm glad _you've_ seen her. But you must keep it to yourself. We
haven't much longer together. I can't have our time spoilt."
He spoke almost with authority. With every moment Wilbraham felt some
new little emotion of change and development too quick for him to
master. Harry had been the most docile of pupils. Never once since his
first dealings with him as a young child had he had to exercise
authority against desires or inclinations of his. True, he had held the
reins lightly, and never given him a rebuke or a direction that had mood
instead of reason behind it; but it had sometimes crossed his mind that
the boy was too docile, and that his sense of responsibility and
self-mastery might be sapped if he was brought up to give unquestioning
obedience to the directions of his elders. He had mentioned this fear
to Lady Brent, and her answer to it had been of the kind that he had
received once or twice before in his consultations with her, from which
his confidence in her ultimate wisdom had been so firmly fixed. The
same doubt, it seemed, had crossed her own mind. It was to be met by
allowing Harry the fullest possible trust and freedom. If at any time he
overstepped the freedom it was not to be treated as a fault. He was to
be told why it was not advisable for him to do this or that, and the
decision left to him. Once or twice this had happened, and once he had
stuck out for his own will. It was when his nocturnal rambles had been
discovered by chance, shortly after that night upon which Grant had seen
him out in the park. Lady Brent, with calm and admirable
self-restraint, had said: "Very well, Harry. After all, I don't know
that there's any harm in it. If I had known of it a year ago I might
have stopped it; but now you're old enough to do as you like in that
sort of way."
No one observing the boy, Wilbraham had thought, could say that he was
molly-coddled into submission. Few boys of his age had such freedom
granted to them, or carried a more gallant air before the world; and the
Grants, of whom he had taken counsel, as representing the views of the
world more closely than he in his retirement could do, had supported
him.
And yet, there had been the feeling that Harry was extraordinarily easy
to manage--too amiably submissive, almost, to the guidance of his
elders, and Wilbraham himself particularly.
But now--! Wilbraham mentally shook himself. Was he receiving
instructions from Harry--and almost inclined to accept them
submissively?
The little spurt to his pride took him a trifle farther than he had
wished to go. "I don't think it's a matter for me to decide on, apart
from your grandmother," he said.
Harry turned a surprised face on him. "No, it's for me to decide on,"
he said. "By and by I shall tell Granny--of course. But I don't in the
least know when it will be. There's nothing to show yet."
The phrase struck Wilbraham oddly. Harry had used it once or twice to
him before. "One has to decide upon things with one's brain," he said,
"and out of one's experience--important things that may affect one's
life. They can't be left to impulse."
"The two go together, I suppose," said Harry, almost with indifference.
It was one of those little speeches upon which Viola would hang as
containing the quintessence of wisdom. She might not have understood
this speech, but Wilbraham did, and it affected him profoundly. Here
was that rarest of characters--one who had never played with his
impulses, to give them scope beyond the guidance of his reason. He
could trust his impulses because their springs were controlled.
"Shall we go on?" said Harry, rising.
Wilbraham rose too, slowly, after a pause of reflection, and they walked
on. Viola's name was not mentioned again between them.
*CHAPTER XVI*
*DILEMMA*
Wilbraham walked up and down in a retired part of the garden where no
one was likely to disturb him. Sometimes, because he had walked rather
farther that afternoon already than was his custom, he sat down on a
garden seat at the end of the alley where he was. But only his body was
at rest; his mind was eagerly searching for the right course. If only
it were as straight and as easy to tread as this soft turfed walk
between the uncompromising green walls, with the evening sun flooding
the narrow space and warming even the sombre tones of the yew to some
leniency!
He did not know where Harry was. He had left him when they had reached
the house. For all he could tell, he might have gone straight back to
Viola; there was an hour yet before dinner. But he would hardly have
come right back to the Castle with him, to talk chiefly about the war,
if he had meant to do that, and he had let drop something which showed
that he had no intention of staying out during the dinner hour. Perhaps
he would go to her afterwards, as he must have done on occasions before.
It did not much matter. He had claimed the right to go to her when he
pleased, and Wilbraham had not controverted it. His authority seemed to
have come to a very sudden end, he thought with a wry smile.
There remained Lady Brent's authority. Should he invoke it? That was
what he had to decide for himself before he left this garden alley, the
retired scene of his cogitations.
Harry had extracted no promise from him. That pleased him, as it had
pleased Grant when he had acted in the same way over his secret midnight
roaming. They had been justified in their treatment of him to that
extent. He would be ashamed of nothing that he had done, not even to
the extent of asking that it should be kept secret where he had shown
that secrecy was what he wanted--and expected.
That made it all the more difficult for Wilbraham. He would seem to be
breaking a promise if he told Lady Brent, though he had given no
promise. He would at least be setting himself against Harry in a matter
which Harry had claimed the right to decide for himself. He wanted to
be very sure that the boy was wrong in his decision before he did that.
He loved and admired Harry at that moment more than he had ever done.
He had a clearer vision than ever before of the boy's clean
finely-tempered nature. He felt himself rebuked by it, and what thoughts
he spared for himself, as apart from his duty towards Harry and towards
Lady Brent, worked rather sadly upon the conviction of his own weakness.
He had kept silent about his previous visit to Bastian only partly
because of his wish to judge further for himself before he gave or
withheld the suggested invitation to the Castle. He remembered now the
pleasure with which he had set out that afternoon to go to the cottage,
and knew that its chief source was the anticipation of drinking with
Bastian--drinking just the amount and no more to give him the slight
exhilaration that he had gained the day before. Bastian had offered him
nothing to drink except tea. Viola's presence in the little parlour had
made the scene of the previous afternoon look ugly in the memory of it.
He was very glad now that it had been so. It would have been too
painful to have the burden of that secret upon him while deciding what
he should do with Harry's secret. Lady Brent would certainly have
looked upon it as a fall, whatever view he might encourage himself to
take of it.
But surely, weak as he was, he had had something to do with making
Harry, who was of so much finer clay, what he had grown into. He had
pointed him to noble things, fed his mind upon fine utterance of fine
thoughts, opened the door for him to all the rich stores of wisdom laid
up from the past. Yes, he had done that, though he had had small profit
of it for himself. He was consoled by the thought that Harry could not
be what he was if any breath of his own unworthiness had touched him.
He threw off the discomfort. He would act now for Harry's good, as he
had always acted. There had been nothing wrong in him there.
He threw off, also, not without some impatience, the influence of
Harry's assuredness. If it was to be accepted that the boy could do no
wrong according to his lights--which really seemed to be what it was
coming to--it was not the less necessary to judge the situation by
lights which did not shine upon him, the glimmer of which, indeed, had
been deliberately curtained from him.
The love of a boy and a girl! Oh, it was a touching thing, when they
were a boy and a girl like Harry and Viola. Wilbraham rejected then and
there any suggestion that might have come from his dinted experience
that Viola was not Harry's mate in innocence and purity. He had seen
her for himself. All that he knew of her father, all that he did not
know of her origin and upbringing, could go by the board. His heart
spoke for her, his sentiment went out to her. He was a poor, weak,
self-indulgent creature, he told himself, but he did recognize goodness
and purity when he saw it. Besides, what else could have attracted
Harry? He was doubly armed there.
But Lady Brent wouldn't see it like that. The outside resemblances
between what had happened to Harry's father and what was now happening
to Harry would be too strong for her. She would think that all for
which she had worked and sacrificed herself through long years would be
destroyed if Harry was caught in the snares of love at this early age.
She would put her spoke in. She would use all the wisdom of which she
was capable--and she had shown great wisdom in the past--in putting a
stop to it; but at least she would try to put a stop to it.
And then what would happen? Wilbraham saw a sharp contest between her
and Harry, and, with the deeper vision that had come to him of the boy's
character, he felt it to be extremely doubtful whether Lady Brent would
win. There would be a state of open conflict, and Harry would be more
firmly fixed in his courses than before.
Boy and girl attachments--they faded out. It was absurd to suppose that
at seventeen Harry could have any idea of marriage, however much he and
Viola might have played with the overwhelming bliss of some day being
always together. He was not as his father had been; he would marry,
when the time came for him to do so, with a full sense of his
responsibility. And Viola was not like Harry's mother. No, the danger
of a hasty secret marriage could be ruled out; it was an affront to both
of them to think of it.
Harry would go his way, and Viola would go hers. Their ways lay
naturally very far apart. They might write to each other for a time,
and they might see one another occasionally; but what would it matter?
At the end of four years, when Harry would be twenty-one, it was most
probable that this almost childish love passage would be forgotten, or
exist only as a fragrant memory.
Wilbraham divined in himself at this point a faint regret at the thought
of this beautiful boy and girl ceasing to love one another. Viola had
made a deep impression upon him.
At any rate, there was no harm in it. Probably there was even good in
it. Harry would soon be leaving home, to plunge straight into a world
for which Wilbraham had sometimes thought that his training had been a
dangerous preparation. With this innocent early love of his to
accompany him, he would be armed against many of the temptations to
which sheltered youth does succumb when the shelter has at last been
withdrawn.
Wilbraham felt a sense of relief at having come to these conclusions.
He was sure they were right. Harry had conquered. He should be left
free to sun himself in the glamour of his boy's courtship. How pretty
it was to think of them billing and cooing like two young turtle-doves
in their leafy fastnesses! Wilbraham's lettered thoughts flew to
Theocritus, and he murmured soft Greek words to himself, but decided
that there would be a delicacy about the wooing of these children that
could not be matched in Sicilian idylls. He rose from his seat and made
his way towards the house. He had decided. He would leave them alone.
But as he dressed for dinner in a leisurely way, lingering often at his
window to enjoy the scents and sounds of the garden dusk, the thought of
Lady Brent once more occurred to him and his face grew thoughtful again.
Hadn't he rather left her out of account? If the decision had been so
easy to come to, and seemed so right now it was made, wouldn't she be
quite as capable of making it as he had been?
Well, perhaps! And whether she arrived at the same conclusion or not,
one thing was quite certain--that she would be vastly annoyed with
Wilbraham if she knew that he had taken it upon himself to decide
without consultation with her.
But his doubts were soon dissipated. He had decided for Harry, and was
with him now. It might be rather painful at some future time to face
her offended surprise, but, after all, he was a man and she was a woman.
And Harry had proved himself a man already. They would only be in the
same boat. Wilbraham smiled to himself, put on his coat and went down
to dinner.
He had had some idea of giving Harry a word to indicate that his secret
was safe, but there was no opportunity before they went in to dinner,
and afterwards he was glad that he had not done so. For Harry did not
even give him a look of inquiry. He chatted and laughed and seemed to
be in a mood of quite unburdened high spirits. So had Viola been, but
Viola had not known that Wilbraham had discovered their secret, and
Harry did. Wilbraham was pleased to think that Harry's evident absence
of anxiety was the result of his trust in him. He had surprised his
secret and he would respect it. What could he do otherwise? Wilbraham
was confirmed in his decision to leave Lady Brent out of knowledge of
it, but could not forbear an exercise of imagination as he glanced at
her and wondered what she would do if the truth were suddenly blurted
out to her.
A remarkable woman, certainly! She provided another little surprise
that evening when for the first time she seemed to contemplate the
continuance of the war for such a time as would involve Harry in it. It
might be that it would take a year or even more to bring it to a
conclusion. Lord Kitchener was said to have prophesied three years,
which was impossible to believe; but the South African War had lasted
for two, when everybody thought it would be over in a few weeks. It
might be that officers would be wanted more quickly than they could be
turned out in normal times, and that Harry's Sandhurst training would be
speeded up. They must bear that in mind.
The prospect did not seem to cause her any dismay, or if it did she
concealed it. But poor Mrs. Brent raised a wail of protest. Surely
they couldn't take boys of eighteen, as Harry would only be in a year's
time. It would be wicked--unheard of.
"Not unheard of," said Lady Brent. "And not wicked either. For our own
sakes we should wish Harry kept out of it; but if he were of an age when
others went we should wish him to go. However, let us hope that there
will be no necessity."
"I don't think I hope that," said Harry. "I don't want the war to last,
because I think war is a horrible thing. All the same, I wish I were
fighting in this one."
Wilbraham controverted the opinion that war was a horrible thing.
Nations were apt to get lazy and selfish over long periods of peace, and
wanted rousing out of themselves, just as sluggish human bodies did.
War was a tonic and a cleanser.
"Perhaps it is, for those who can fight, with a great idea behind them,"
said Harry. "For all the rest I think it's beastly. At any rate, an
Englishman could fight in this war and know he was doing the right
thing. I wish I were a year older now."
Mrs. Brent breathed a deep sigh and looked at him hungrily. It was of
no use her saying anything. If Harry's fighting or not fighting should
come to be decided on, she would have no voice in the decision. She
looked anxiously at Lady Brent, who only said: "Fortunately, the matter
isn't in our hands."
"People of my age are enlisting," said Harry, shortly.