DAVID'S DECISION
Diana found it quite impossible to await in the library, the return of
the motor.
She moved restlessly to and fro in her own bedroom, from the windows of
which she could see far down the avenue.
When at last her car came speeding through the trees, it seemed to her a
swiftly approaching Nemesis, a relentless hurrying Fate, which she could
neither delay nor avoid. It ran beneath the portico; paused for one
moment; then glided away towards the garage. She had not seen David
alight; but she knew he must now be in the house.
She waited a few moments, then passed slowly down the stairs.
Oh, lovely and belovèd home of childhood's days!
* * * * *
White and cold, yet striving bravely after complete self-control, Diana
crossed the hall, and turned the handle of the library door.
As she entered, David was standing with his back to her, looking up
intently at the portrait of Falcon Rivers.
He turned as he heard the door close, and came forward, a casual remark
upon his lips, expressing the hope that it had not been inconvenient to
send the motor so early--then saw Diana's face.
Instantly he took her trembling hands in his, saying gently: "It is all
right, Miss Rivers. I can do as you wish. I am quite clear about it,
to-day. You must forgive me for not having been able to decide
yesterday."
Diana drew away her hands and clasped them upon her breast.
Her eyes dilated.
"David? Oh, David! You will? You will! You will----!"
Her voice broke. She gazed at him, helplessly--dumbly.
David's eyes, as he looked back into hers, were so calmly tender, that
it somehow gave her the feeling of being a little child. His voice was
very steadfast and unfaltering. He smiled reassuringly at Diana.
"I hope to have the honour and privilege, Miss Rivers," he said, "of
marrying you on the morning of the day I sail for Central Africa."
Diana swayed, for one second; then recovered, and walked over to the
mantel-piece.
Not for nothing was she a descendant of those old knights in silver
armour, in the window on the staircase. She leaned her arms upon the
mantel-piece, and laid her head upon them. She stood thus quite still,
and quite silent, fighting for self-control.
David, waiting silently behind her, lifted his eyes from that bowed
head, with its mass of golden hair, and encountered the keen quizzical
look of the portrait above her.
"_I shall win_," said Uncle Falcon silently to David, over Diana's bowed
head. But David, who knew he was about to defeat Uncle Falcon's purpose
utterly, looked back in silent defiance.
The amber eyes twinkled beneath their shaggy brows. "_I shall win, young
man_," said Uncle Falcon.
Presently Diana lifted her head. Her lashes were wet, but the colour had
returned to her cheeks. Her lips smiled, and her eyes grew softly
bright.
"David," she said, "you must think me _such_ a goose! But you can't
possibly know what my home means to me; my home and--and everything. Do
you know, when I read your telegram saying: 'Consultation unnecessary.
Have decided,' I felt quite convinced you had decided that you could not
do it; and, oh, David, I have left Riverscourt forever, a hundred times
during this terrible hour! Really it would have been kinder to have
said: 'I will marry you,' in the telegram."
David smiled. "I am afraid that might have caused a good deal of comment
at both post-offices," he said. "But I was a thoughtless ass not to have
put in a clear indication as to which way the decision had gone."
"Hush!" cried Diana, with uplifted finger. "Don't call yourself names,
my dear David, before the person who is going to promise to honour and
obey you!" Diana's spirits were rising rapidly. "Now sit down and tell
me all about it. What made you feel you could do it? Why didn't you need
to consult Sir Deryck? Did you come to a decision last night, or this
morning? You will keep to it, David?"
David sat down in an armchair opposite to Diana, who had flung herself
into Uncle Falcon's.
The portrait, hanging high above their heads, twinkled down on both of
them.
"_I shall win_," said Uncle Falcon.
David did not "tie himself up in knots" to-day. He sat very still,
looking at Diana with those calm steadfast eyes, which made her feel so
young and inconsequential, and far removed from him.
He looked ill and worn, but happy and at rest; and, as he talked, his
face wore an expression she had often noted when, in preaching, he
became carried away by his subject; a radiance, as of inner glory
shining out; a look as of being detached from the world, and independent
of all actual surroundings.
"Undoubtedly I shall keep to it, Miss Rivers," he said, "unless, for any
reason, you change your mind. And I saw light on the subject this
morning."
"Oh, then you 'slept on it,' as our old nurses used to say?"
David smiled.
"I never had an old nurse," he said. "My mother was my nurse."
Diana did not notice that her question had been parried. "And what made
you feel it right this morning?" she asked.
David hesitated.
"Light came--through--the Word," he said at last, slowly.
"Ha!" cried Diana. "I felt sure you would look for it there. And I sat
up nearly all night--I mean until midnight--searching my Bible and
Prayer-book. But the only applicable thing I found was: 'I will not fail
David.' It would have been more comforting to have found: 'David will
not fail _me_!'"
David laughed.
"We shall not fail each other, Miss Rivers."
"Why do you call me 'Miss Rivers'? It is quite absurd to do so, now we
are engaged."
"I do not call ladies by their Christian names, when I have known them
only a few days," said David.
"Not when you are going to marry them?"
"I have not been going to marry them, before," replied David.
"Oh, don't be tiresome, Cousin David! Are you determined to accentuate
our unusual circumstances?"
David's clear eyes met hers, and held them.
"I think they require accentuating," he said, slowly.
Diana's eyes fell before his. She felt reproved. She realised that in
the reaction of her immense relief, she was taking the whole thing too
lightly.
"Cousin David," she said, humbly, "indeed I do realise the greatness of
this that you are doing for me. It means so much; and yet it means so
little. And just because it means so little, and never can mean more, it
was difficult to you to feel it right to do it. Is not that so? Do you
know, I think it would help me so much, if you would tell me exactly
what seemed to you doubtful; and exactly what it was which dispelled
that doubt."
"My chief difficulty," replied David, speaking very slowly, without
looking at Diana--"my chief difficulty was: that I could not consider it
right, in the sight of God, to enter into matrimony for reasons other
than those for which matrimony was ordained; and to do so, knowing that
each distinctly understood that there was never to be any question of
fulfilling any of the ordinary conditions and obligations of that sacred
tie."
David paused.
"In fact," he said, after a few moments of deliberation, "we proposed
marrying each other for the sake of other people."
"Yes," cried Diana, eagerly; "your savages, and my tenantry. We wrong
no one; we benefit many. Therefore--it _must_ be right."
"Not so," resumed David, gently. "We are never justified in doing wrong
in order that good may result. No amount of after good can justify one
wrong or crooked action. It seemed to me that, according to the revealed
mind and will of God, the only admissible considerations in marriage
were those affecting the man and the woman, themselves; that to wed one
another, entirely for the sake of benefiting other people, would make of
that sacred act an impious unreality, and could not be done by those
seeking to live in accordance with the Divine Will."
Again David paused.
"Well?" breathed Diana, rather wide-eyed and anxious. This undoubted
impediment to her wishes, sounded insuperable.
David heard the trepidation in her voice, and smiled at her,
reassuringly.
"Well," he said, "I was guided to a passage in the Word--a wonderful Old
Testament story--which proved that, at all events in one case, God
Himself had put out of consideration the man and the woman, their
personal happiness, their home together, and had dealt with that wedded
life in a manner which was solely to benefit a community of people.
This one case was enough for me. It furnished the answer to all my
questions; set at rest all my doubts. True, the case was unique. But so
is ours. Undoubtedly it took place many centuries ago; but were not the
Divine Law and Will, in their entirety, revealed in what we call 'olden
days'? Biblical manners and customs may vary according to clime,
century, or conditions; but Bible ethics are the same from Genesis to
Revelation; they never vary throughout the centuries, and are therefore
changeless for all time. I stand or fall by the Word of my God, revealed
in Eden; just as confidently as I stand or fall by the Word of my God,
spoken from the rainbow throne of Revelation; or, as it shall one day be
spoken, from the great white throne, which is yet to come. It is the
same, yesterday, to-day, and forever. I hold the Bible to be inspired
from the first word to the last. Let one line go, and you may as well
give up the whole. If men begin to pick and choose, the whole great book
is swept into uncertainty. Either it is impregnable rock beneath our
feet, or it is mere shifting sand of man's concoction and contrivance;
in which case, where can essential certainties be found?"
David's eyes shone. His voice rang, clarion clear in its assurance. He
had forgotten Diana; he had forgotten himself; he had forgotten the
vital question under discussion.
Her anxious eyes recalled him.
"Ah, where were we? Yes; the Divine ethics are unchangeable. We can say
of our God: 'He is the Father of Lights, with Whom is no variableness,
neither shadow that is cast by turning.' Therefore there is no shadow in
the clear light which came to me last night--from above, I honestly
believe. I may be wrong, Miss Rivers; a man can but act according to his
conscientious convictions. I am convinced, to-day, that your suggestion
is God's will for us, in order that we may be made a greater blessing to
many. I believe I was guided to that passage so that it might dispel a
doubt, which otherwise would certainly have remained an insurmountable
obstacle in the way of the fulfilment of your wishes."
"Who were the people?" asked Diana, eagerly. "Where was the passage?"
David turned his head, and looked out of the window.
He had expected this, but, until Diana actually put the question, he had
postponed a definite decision as to what he should answer.
He looked at the clear frosty sky. A slight wind was stirring the
leafless branches of the beeches. He could see the powdery snow fall
from them in glistening showers.
He did not wish Diana to read that passage in Ezekiel. It seemed to him,
she could not fail to know at once, that _she_ was the desire of his
eyes, if she read it. This would dawn on her, as it had dawned on him--a
sudden beam of blinding illumination--and there would be an end to any
service he might otherwise have rendered her.
"I would rather you did not read the passage," he said. "Much of it is
not applicable. In fact, it required logical deduction, and reasoning by
analogy, in order to arrive at the main point."
"And do you not consider me capable of logical deduction, or of
reasoning by analogy, Cousin David?"
He flushed.
"How stupidly I express myself. Of course I did not mean that.
But--there are things in the story, Miss Rivers, I do not wish you to
see."
Diana laughed.
"My good Cousin David, it is quite too late to begin shielding me! In
fact I never have been the carefully guarded 'young person.' I have
read heaps of naughty books, of which, I daresay, you have never even
heard!"
David winced. "Once more, I must have expressed myself badly," he said.
"I will not try again. But you must forgive me if I still decline to
give you the passage."
"Very well. But I shall hunt until I find it," smiled Diana, in playful
defiance. "Did you use a concordance last night, Cousin David? I did. I
looked out 'David'--pages and pages of it! I wondered whether you were
looking out 'Diana.'"
He smiled. "I should only have found 'Diana of the Ephesians,'" he said;
"and, though she fell mysteriously from heaven, she was quite unlike my
Lady of Mystery."
"Who arrived in a motor-car," laughed Diana. "Do you know, when you told
me you had called me--that, I thought it quite the most funnily
unsuitable name I had ever heard. I realised how the Hunt would roar if
they knew."
"You see," said David, "the Greek meaning of 'mystery' is: 'What is
known only to the initiated.'"
"And you were not yet initiated?" suggested Diana.
"No," replied David. "The Hunt was not initiated."
Diana looked at him keenly. Cousin David was proving less easy to
understand than she had imagined.
"Let us talk business," she said. "I will send for Mr. Inglestry this
afternoon. How immensely relieved he will be! He can manage all legal
details for us--the special license, and so forth. Of course we must be
married in London; and I should like the wedding to be in St. Botolph's,
that dear old church in Bishopsgate; because Saint Botolph is the patron
saint of travellers, and that church is one where people go to pray for
safe-keeping, before a voyage; or for absent friends who are travelling.
I can return there to pray for you, whenever I am in town. So shall it
be St. Botolph's, David?"
"If you wish it," he said.
"You see, we could not have the wedding here or at Brambledene. It would
be such a nine days' wonder. We should never get through the crowds of
people who would come to gaze at us. I don't intend to make any mystery
of it. I shall send a notice of our engagement to the papers. But I
shall say of the wedding: 'To take place shortly, owing to the early
date already fixed for the departure of the Rev. David Rivers to Central
Africa.' Then no one need know the exact day. Chappie and Mr. Inglestry
can be our witnesses; and you might get Sir Deryck. What time does the
boat start?"
"In the afternoon, from Southampton. The special train leaves Waterloo
at noon."
"Capital!" cried Diana. "We can be married at half-past ten, and drive
straight to the station, afterwards. There is sure to be a luncheon-car
on the train. We can have our wedding-breakfast _en route_, and I can
see you off from Southampton. I have always wanted to see over one of
those big liners. I may see you off, mayn't I, Cousin David?"
"If you wish," he said, gently.
"I can send my own motor down to Southampton the day before, and it will
be an easy run back home, from there. We can hire a car for the wedding.
Wouldn't that be a good plan?"
"Quite a good plan," agreed David.
"God-papa shall marry us," said Diana; "and then I can make him leave
out anything in the service I don't want to have read."
David sat up instantly.
"No," he said; "to that I cannot agree. Not one word must be omitted. If
we are married according to the prescribed rules of our Church, we must
not pick and choose as to what our Church shall say to us, as we humbly
stand before her altar. I refuse to go through the service if a word is
omitted."
Diana's eyes flashed rebellion.
"My dear Cousin David, have you read the wedding service?"
"I know it by heart," said David Rivers.
"Then you must surely know that it would simply make a farce of it, to
read the whole, at such a wedding as ours."
"Nothing can make a farce of a Church service," said David firmly. "We
may make a sham of our own part in it; but every word the Church will
say to us, will be right and true."
"I _must_ have certain passages omitted," flashed Diana.
"Very well," said David, quietly. "Then there can be no wedding."
"David, you are unreasonable and obstinate!"
David regarded her quietly, and made no answer.
Diana's angry flush was suddenly modified by dimples.
"Is this what people call finding one's master?" she inquired. "It is
fortunate for our peace, dear Cousin, that we part on the wedding-day! I
am accustomed to having my own way."
David's eyes, as he looked into hers, were sad, yet tender.
"The Church will require you, Miss Rivers, to promise to obey. Even your
god-father will hardly go on with the ceremony, if you decline to repeat
the word. I don't think I am a tyrant, or a particularly domineering
person. But if, between the time we leave the church and the sailing of
my boat, I should feel it necessary to ask you to do--or not to do--a
thing, I shall expect you to obey."
"Brute!" cried Diana. "I doubt if I shall venture so far as the station.
Just to the church door, we might arrive, without a wrangle!" Then she
sprang up, all smiles and sunshine. "Come, my lord and master! An it
please you, I hear the luncheon-gong. Also the approach of Chappie, who
responds to the call of the gong with a prompt and unhesitating
obedience, which is more than wifely! Quick, my dear David, your
hand.... Come in, Chappie! We want you to congratulate us! Your advice
to me at breakfast appeared so excellent, that I have lost no time in
following it. I have promised to marry my Cousin David, before he sails
for Central Africa!"