In the great glass house at Ravensham, Lady Casterley stood close to
some Japanese lilies, with a letter in her hand. Her face was very
white, for it was the first day she had been allowed down after an
attack of influenza; nor had the hand in which she held the letter its
usual steadiness. She read:
“Monkland Court.
“Just a line, dear, before the post goes, to tell you that Babs has gone
off happily. The child looked beautiful. She sent you her love, and some
absurd message—that you would be glad to hear, she was perfectly safe,
with both feet firmly on the ground.”
A grim little smile played on Lady Casterley's pale lips:—Yes, indeed,
and time too! The child had been very near the edge of the cliffs!
Very near committing a piece of romantic folly! That was well over! And
raising the letter again, she read on:
“We were all down for it, of course, and come back tomorrow. Geoffrey
is quite cut up. Things can't be what they were without our Babs. I've
watched Eustace very carefully, and I really believe he's safely over
that affair at last. He is doing extraordinarily well in the House just
now. Geoffrey says his speech on the Poor Law was head and shoulders the
best made.”
Lady Casterley let fall the hand which held the letter. Safe? Yes, he
was safe! He had done the right—the natural thing! And in time he would
be happy! He would rise now to that pinnacle of desired authority which
she had dreamed of for him, ever since he was a tiny thing, ever since
his little thin brown hand had clasped hers in their wanderings
amongst the flowers, and the furniture of tall rooms. But, as she
stood—crumpling the letter, grey-white as some small resolute ghost,
among her tall lilies that filled with their scent the great glass
house-shadows flitted across her face. Was it the fugitive noon
sunshine? Or was it some glimmering perception of the old Greek
saying—'Character is Fate;' some sudden sense of the universal truth
that all are in bond to their own natures, and what a man has most
desired shall in the end enslave him?