_To the young woman God gives rich gifts: from the
middle-aged woman He asks them back: to the
old woman He gives them all again—for good._
Mrs. Sloane was distressed about Diana, and her old eyes were quick to
see a change in the girl whose reticence about her visit to Scotland
was unusual in one who was accustomed to confide.
When the news of Shan’t’s accident came her grief was unnatural in its
overwhelming force. Diana looked reluctantly upon the black side of
things: and was always eager to believe that things must come right. A
happy Diana would have refused to believe that anything could happen to
Shan’t for the very good reason that she loved her. Here, then, thought
Mrs. Sloane, was an accumulation of sorrow, sorrow, that had been held
back by force, let go. The telegram had said nothing of danger, so Mrs.
Sloane knew Diana was glad of the excuse to cry, and she, of course,
was right, as understanding old women usually are.
So she set about to stem the tide of Diana’s grief.
She wrote to Mrs. Hastings and begged the loan of her son for a few
days, because of those other days of long ago. She wanted to see
what (she meant who) he was like: and, of course, Miles’s mother was
only too delighted any one should see what her son was like, so he
was despatched to London—against his will—to see Mrs. Sloane: not to
Bestways; that would have been too clumsy a move on the part of the old
lady, and too obvious. She had yet to make a complete plan: London, at
present, was as far as she had got in her manœuvres.
Just before she started Diana flew in—it was the word Mrs. Sloane
invariably used to describe Diana’s movements: she had a telegram in
her hand which she gave in silence to Mrs. Sloane to read. And in
silence Mrs. Sloane read it. Shan’t was not so well.
“I must go to-night,” said Diana.
“You must go, of course,” said Mrs. Sloane, adding that she would have
waited and gone with her, so far as London: but she had an engagement
for luncheon.
So Mrs. Sloane went to London alone and drove straight to that hotel at
which she knew a young man would like best to lunch: although she had
a very shrewd suspicion that she was about to rob a young man of his
rightful appetite. When she arrived at the hotel she went into one of
the rooms where she was most certain of seclusion, and sat down in one
of the windows to wait. Personally she would have preferred one of the
quieter, older-fashioned hotels: but this was a concession on her part
to fashion and to youth.
She had only to wait a few minutes when into the room came a young
man, and at the sight of him her heart stirred, for reasons of its
own, not unknown to her. A vast area of rose-coloured carpet, a vista
of mirrors, and rows of pillars generally have a dwarfing effect, but
Miles Hastings looked very big and absurdly like his grandfather. Her
heart was beating normally again as she rose to meet the young man,
and going up to him she slipped her hand within his arm and gave it a
little squeeze of affection. “How kind of you to come!”
He smiled, wondering what this dear old lady wanted.
“Let me look at you,” she said. “You have grown!”
He said it was perhaps a long time since she had seen him.
“You were a baby in arms when I last saw you.”
Miles Hastings laughed, and turned to look again at this old friend
of his mother—and perhaps, he thought, of his father—and saw that her
cheeks were flushed—most delicately flushed—and her eyes were bright
with excitement. He wondered why? There was nothing very exciting about
him, he feared.
Mrs. Sloane gently directed him towards the sofa in the window.
“Now let me look at you properly,” she said, putting up her glasses.
“Deal with me mercifully,” he pleaded.
“I see no reason to do that,” she answered.
“It’s awfully good of you,” he murmured.
“I am going to be much gooder than that—as Shan’t says.”
“Shan’t?”
“Yes, Shan’t; do you know her?”
“No.” He did not know her, but he was beginning to understand the flush
on the cheeks of the old lady and the light in her kind old eyes.
“That’s a pity, as Shan’t herself would say; but now to business. I
want you to do something for me. I knew your grandfather; if that is
not reason enough you must do it for me because I am old—and a woman,
and because I want you to do it.”
“I will do anything you ask me to do—because you are you.”
Mrs. Sloane smiled: she was beginning to envy Diana.
“Some one I am very fond of is going to Scotland to-night—she is
unhappy and she is anxious. I cannot bear to think of her to-morrow
morning.”
“I guess—” he began.
Mrs. Sloane laid a restraining hand on his arm.
“—struggling for a breakfast-basket—there’s no time at which you so
much want a man, don’t you agree?—even if you have a maid?”
Miles was ready to agree to anything.
“I have two conditions to make—one is that you do not see her, or
speak to her to-night, and the other is that you leave her to-morrow
morning, when you have seen her into the train which will take her to
her destination—you agree?”
Miles agreed; adding, “I am wondering if you are an angel in disguise.”
“In disguise? Is that quite kind?”
“Forgive me—when the gate of Heaven opens suddenly the light is
blinding. You are a dear!” And he looked at her in a way that opened up
a whole world of romance. If he should look at Diana to-morrow even as
he had looked at an old woman to-day, Diana would possibly make a poor
breakfast in the morning, but would be very happy some day.
At luncheon Mrs. Sloane and Miles were the object of a certain amount
of speculation, and a greater amount of interest. By most people they
were voted grandmother and grandson—by others mother and son. Two
people gave it up. One of them was a big young man with a shock of fair
hair, and the other was the girl with him, who knew Mrs. Sloane had no
son.
“Speak to her,” said Mr. Flueyn.
Rose was shy. If the pillars and mirrors had not dwarfed Miles, they
frightened her. She was as appalled by their magnificence as she was
by that of her new hat. Her marriage had been so hastily arranged that
only that morning had she had time to send Mr. Maitland his bit of
wedding cake, and she had altogether forgotten Mrs. Sloane’s.
“You look so pretty, darling,” urged her husband, “she won’t mind about
the cake.”
And Rose, taking courage, walked across to the table where Mrs. Sloane
and Miles Hastings sat. With a pang she realized the extreme order
of this young man’s hair: then with a rush of loyalty she asked Mrs.
Sloane if she might introduce her husband.
“My dear child, do, I shall be so glad to meet him.”
And Rose motioned him to come, and across the room he came, like a
breeze ruffling the surface of a loch. Mrs. Sloane felt braced at
his approach, and, though suffering acutely under the force of his
handshake, smiled bravely. To his question, What did she think of the
wife? she answered that she thought her radiantly pretty. To the
question, What did she think of the hat? she less truthfully vowed it
charming. To his account of how and why the marriage had been hastened
on, she lent an interested attention, and when he and Rose had been
made thoroughly happy by her charming appreciation of everything, and
the promise of a present to come, they left: Rose returning to say
hurriedly that she was so sorry she had forgotten the cake. It was
coming! She hoped Mrs. Sloane had not thought her rude. “I only sent
Mr. Maitland’s to-day. I hope he won’t think me rude not having sent it
at once. He of all people in the world—I should never forget.”
Mrs. Sloane was quite sure Mr. Maitland would not think her rude. Then
she turned to Miles, wondering what he would say. She knew exactly what
Marcus would have said—about the hat.
“Happy young things,” said Miles, despatching them from his mind with
a smile. Then he leant forward, as though some thought had suddenly
struck him. “About those conditions you have exacted,” he said;
“supposing certain contingencies should arise, must I—am I in honour
bound—to leave this—person of whom you are very fond when I have seen
her into the train that takes her on—you know _where_?”
“That was one of my conditions! You accepted it!”
“Yes, and I mean to abide by it—but supposing—I only say supposing—it
is more than I can bear; the separation, I mean; may I at the last
moment jump into the guard’s van, if I don’t let her know I’m on the
train? It’s only a remote possibility, but I might feel unable to abide
by your condition.”
“You promised to—”
“And I mean to—but if I give my word of honour I can’t break
it—therefore, I only want your permission to do this in circumstances
over which I might possibly have no control: if, let us say, she should
look so beautiful that I lost my head—if by chance, let us say, she
should smile at me—you know how she does smile—I suppose you do—! Well,
may I use my own judgment? It only means that I shall be in the same
train. I won’t speak to her or let her see me?”
“Under very exceptional circumstances—and I leave it to your sense
of honour not to make them exceptional—you may travel in the guard’s
van—without letting her know you are there.” And Mrs. Sloane, looking
at him, shook her head as old women will do in affectionate despair at
those young people of whom they most particularly approve.