The days went on, and to Mrs. Otway's surprise and bitter
disappointment, there came no answer to the letter she had written to
the German surgeon. She had felt so sure that he would write again very
soon--if not exactly by return, then within a week or ten days.
The only people she told were Major Guthrie's solicitor, Robert Allen,
and her daughter. But though both, in their different ways, sympathised
with her deeply, neither of them could do anything to help her. Rather
against her will, Mr. Allen wrote and informed his client of Mrs.
Guthrie's death, asking for instructions concerning certain urgent
business matters. But even that letter did not draw any answer from the
Field Lazarette.
As for Rose, she soon gave up asking if another letter had come, and to
Mrs. Otway's sore heart it was as if the girl, increasingly absorbed in
her own not always easy problem of keeping Jervis happy under the
painful handicap of his present invalid condition, had no time to spare
for that of anyone else. Poor Rose often felt that she would give, as
runs the old saying, anything in the world to have her man to herself,
as a cottage wife would have had hers by now--with no nurses, no
friends, no doctor even, save perhaps for a very occasional visit.
But Mrs. Otway was not fair to Rose; in never mentioning Major Guthrie
and the terrible misfortune which had befallen him, she was treating
her mother as she herself would have wished to be treated in a like
case.
A great trouble overshadows all little troubles. One disagreeable
incident which, had life been normal with her then, would have much
irritated and annoyed the mistress of the Trellis House, was the arrival
of a curt notice stating that her telephone was to be disconnected,
owing to the fact that there resided in her house an enemy alien in the
person of one Anna Bauer.
Now the telephone had never been as necessary to Mrs. Otway as it was to
many of her acquaintances, but lately, since her life had become so
lonely, she had fallen into the way of talking over it each morning with
Miss Forsyth.
Miss Forsyth, whom the people of Witanbury thought so absurdly
old-fashioned, had been one of the very first telephone subscribers in
Witanbury. But she had sternly set her face against its frivolous and
extravagant use. This being so, it was a little strange that she so
willingly spent five minutes or more of her morning work-time in talking
over it to Mrs. Otway. But Miss Forsyth had become aware that all was
not well with her friend, and this seemed the only way she was able to
help in a trouble or state of mental distress to which she had no
clue--though sometimes a suspicion which touched on the fringe of the
truth came into her mind.
During these morning talks they would sometimes discuss the War. Mrs.
Otway never spoke of the War to anyone else, for even now she could not
bring herself to share the growing horror and, yes, contempt, all those
about her felt for Germany. Miss Forsyth was an intelligent woman, and,
as her friend knew, had sources of information denied to the amateur
strategists and gossips of Witanbury Close. So it was that the forced
discontinuance of the little morning talk, which so often brought
comfort to Mrs. Otway's sore heart, was a real pain and loss.
She had made a spirited protest, pointing out that all her neighbours
had the telephone, and that by merely asking any of them to allow her
servant to send a message, she could circumvent this, to her, absurd and
unnecessary rule. But her protest had only brought a formal
acknowledgment, and that very day her telephone had been disconnected.
She would have been astonished, even now, had she known with what
ever-swelling suspicion some of her neighbours and acquaintances
regarded her.
The great rolling uplands round the city were now covered with vast
camps, and Witanbury every day was full of soldiers; there was not a
family in the Close, and scarce a family in the town, but had more than
one near and dear son, husband, brother, lover, in the New Armies, if
not yet--as in very many cases--already out at the Front.
In spite of what was still described as Rose Otway's "romantic
marriage," Mrs. Otway was regarded as having no connection with the
Army, and her old affection for Germany and the Germans was resented, as
also the outstanding fact that she still retained in her service an
enemy alien.
And, as is almost always the case, there was some ground for this
feeling, for it was true that the mistress of the Trellis House took
very little interest in the course of the great struggle which was
going on in France and in Flanders. She glanced over the paper each
morning, and often a name seen in the casualty lists brought her the
painful task of writing a letter of condolence to some old friend or
acquaintance. But she did not care, as did all the people around her, to
talk about the War. It had brought to her, personally, too much hidden
pain. How surprised her critics would have been had an angel, or some
equally credible witness informed them that of all the women of their
acquaintance there was no one whose life had been more altered or
affected by the War than Mary Otway's!
She was too unhappy to care much what those about her thought of her.
Even so, it did hurt her when she came, slowly, to realise that the
Robeys and Mrs. Haworth, who were after all the most intimate of her
neighbours in the Close, regarded with surprise, and yes, indignation,
what they imagined to be an unpatriotic disinclination on her part to
follow intelligently the march of events.
It took her longer to find out that the continued presence of her good
old Anna at the Trellis House was rousing a certain amount of
disagreeable comment. At first no one had thought it in the least
strange that Anna stayed on with her, but now, occasionally, someone
said a word indicative of surprise that there should be a German woman
living in Witanbury Close.
But what were these foolish, ignorant criticisms but tiny pin-pricks
compared with the hidden wound in her heart? The news for which she
craved was not news of victory from the Front, but news that at last
the negotiations now in progress for the exchange of disabled prisoners
of war had been successful. That news, however, seemed as if it would
never come.
In one thing Mrs. Otway was fortunate. There was plenty of hard work to
do that winter in Witanbury, and, in spite of her supposed lack of
interest in the War, Mrs. Otway had a wonderful way with soldiers' wives
and mothers, so much so that in time all the more difficult cases were
handed over to her.
* * * * *
"This is to warn you that you are being watched. A friend of England is
keeping an eye on you, not ostentatiously, but none the less very
closely. Dismiss the German woman who has already been too long in your
employment. England can take no risks."
Mrs. Otway had come home, after a long afternoon of visiting, and found
this anonymous letter waiting for her. On the envelope her name and
address were inscribed in large capitals.
She stared down at the dictatorial message--written of course in a
disguised hand--with mingled disgust and amusement. Then, suddenly, she
made up her mind to show it to Miss Forsyth before burning it.
Tired though she was, she left the house again, and slowly walked round
to see her old friend.
Miss Forsyth smiled over it, but she also frowned, and she frowned more
than she smiled when Mrs. Otway exclaimed, "Did you ever see such an
extraordinary thing?"
"It is not so extraordinary as you think, Mary! I must honestly tell you
that in my opinion the writer of this anonymous letter is right in
believing that there is a good deal of spying and of conveying valuable
information to the enemy."
She waited a moment, and then went on, deliberately: "I suppose you are
quite sure of your old Anna, my dear? Used she not to be in very close
touch with Berlin? Has she broken all that off since the War began?"
"Indeed she has!" cried Mrs. Otway eagerly. She was surprised at the
turn the conversation had taken. Was it conceivable that Miss Forsyth
must be numbered henceforth among the spy maniacs of whom she knew there
were a good many in Witanbury? "She made every kind of effort early in
the War--for the matter of that I did what I could to help her--to get
into touch with her relations there, for she was very anxious and
miserable about them. But she failed--absolutely failed!"
"And how about her German friends in England? I suppose she has German
friends?"
"To the best of my belief, she hasn't a single German acquaintance!"
exclaimed Anna's mistress confidently. "She used to know those
unfortunate Fröhlings rather well, but, as I daresay you know, they left
Witanbury quite early in the War--in fact during the first week of war.
And she certainly hasn't heard from them. I asked her if she had, some
time ago. Dear Miss Forsyth, do believe me when I say that, apart from
her very German appearance, and her funny way of talking, my poor old
Anna is to all intents and purposes an Englishwoman. Why, she has lived
in England twenty-two years!"
There came a very curious, dubious, hesitating expression on Miss
Forsyth's face. "I daresay that what you say is true," she said at last.
"But even so, if I were you, Mary, I should show her that letter. She
may be in touch with some of her own people--I mean in all innocence. It
would be very disagreeable for you if such turned out to be the case. I
happen to know that Witanbury is believed to be--well, what shall I call
it?--a spy centre for this part of England. I don't know that it's so
much the city, as the neighbourhood. You see, we're not so very far away
from one of the beaches which it is thought the Germans, if they did try
a landing, would choose as a good place."
Mrs. Otway's extreme astonishment showed in her face.
"You know I never gossip, Mary, so you may take what I say as being
true. But I beg you to keep it to yourself. Don't even tell Rose, or the
Dean. My information does not come from anyone here, in Witanbury. It
comes from London."
* * * * *
Straws show the way the wind is blowing. The anonymous letter sent to
the Trellis House was one straw; another was the revelation made to Mrs.
Otway by Miss Forsyth.
The wind indicated by these two small straws suddenly developed, on the
25th of March, into a hurricane. Luckily it was not a hurricane which
affected Mrs. Otway or her good old Anna at all directly, but it upset
them both, in their several ways, very much indeed, for it took the
extraordinary shape of a violent attack by a mob armed with pickaxes and
crowbars on certain so-called Germans--for they were all
naturalised--and their property.
A very successful recruiting meeting had been held in the Market Place.
At this meeting the local worthies had been present in force. Thus, on
the platform which had been erected in front of the Council House, the
Lord Lieutenant of the County, supported by many religious dignitaries,
headed by the Dean, had made an excellent speech, followed by other
short, stirring addresses, each a trumpet call to the patriotism of
Witanbury. Not one of these speeches incited to violence in any form,
but reference had naturally been made to some of the terrible things
that the Germans had done in Belgium, and one speaker had made it very
plain that should a German invasion take place on the British coast, the
civilian population must expect that the fate of Belgium would be
theirs.
The meeting had come to a peaceful end, and then, an hour later, as soon
as the great personages had all gone and night had begun to fall,
rioting had suddenly broken out, the rioters being led by two women,
both Irish-women, whose husbands were believed to have been cruelly
ill-treated when on their way to a prison camp in Germany.
The story had been published in the local paper, on the testimony of a
medical orderly who had come back to England after many strange
adventures. True, an allusion had been made to the matter in one of the
recruiting speeches, but the speaker had not made very much of it; and
though what he had said had drawn groans from his large audience, and
though the words he had used undoubtedly made it more easy for the
magistrate, when he came to deal with the case of these two women, to
dismiss them with only a caution, yet no one could reasonably suppose
that it was this which led to the riot.
For a few minutes things had looked very ugly. A good deal of damage was
done, for instance, to the boot factory, which was still being managed
(and very well managed too) by a naturalised German and his son. Then
the rioters had turned their attention to the Witanbury Stores. "The
Kaiser," as Alfred Head was still called by his less kindly neighbours,
had always been disliked in the poorer quarters of the town, and that
long before the War. Now was the time for paying off old scores. So the
plate-glass windows were shivered with a will, as well as with pickaxes;
and all the goods, mostly consisting of bacon, butter, and cheese, which
had dressed those windows, had been taken out, thrown among the rioters,
and borne off in triumph. It was fortunate that no damage had been done
there to life or limb.
Alfred Head had fled at once to the highest room in the building. There
he had stayed, locked in, cowering and shivering, till the police,
strongly reinforced by soldiers, had driven the rioters off.
Polly at first had stood her ground. "Cowards! Cowards!" she had cried,
bravely rushing into the shop; and it was no thanks to the rioters that
she had not been very roughly handled indeed. Luckily the police just
then had got in by the back of the building, and had dragged her away.
Even into the quiet Close there had penetrated certain ominous sounds
indicative of what was going on in the Market Place. And poor old Anna
had gone quite white, or rather yellow, with fright.
By the next morning the cold fit had succeeded the hot fit, and all
Witanbury was properly ashamed of what had happened. The cells under the
Council Chamber were fuller than they had ever been, and no one could be
found to say a good word for the rioters.
As for Dr. Haworth, he was cut to the heart by what had occurred, and it
became known that he had actually offered the hospitality of the Deanery
to Mr. and Mrs. Alfred Head, even to sending his own carriage for
them--or so it was averred. Gratefully had they accepted his kindness;
and though Alfred Head was now back in his place of business, trying to
estimate the damage and to arrange for its being made good, Polly was
remaining on at the Deanery for a few hours.
* * * * *
But those two days, which will be always remembered by the people of the
cathedral city as having witnessed the one War riot of Witanbury, were
to have very different associations for Mrs. Otway and her daughter,
Rose Blake. For on the morning of the 26th a telegram arrived at the
Trellis House containing the news that at last the exchange of disabled
prisoners had been arranged, and that Major Guthrie's name was in the
list of those British officers who might be expected back from Germany,
_via_ Holland, within the next forty-eight hours.
And, as if this was not joy enough, Sir Jacques, on the same day, told
his young friends that now at last the time had come when they might go
off, alone together, to the little house, within sound of the sea, which
an old friend of Lady Blake had offered to lend them for Jervis's
convalescence--and honeymoon.