That same morning, but a good deal later, Blanche Farrow woke with a
start to find Pegler standing at her bedside with just one letter in her
hand.
Pegler was smiling. It was not a real smile, but just a general
softening of her plain, severe face.
Pegler knew that her lady had been rather "put out" at not having
received her usual Christmas letter from Mr. Mark Gifford. She had
spoken of it twice to Pegler, once lightly, on December 27, and then
again, in a rather upset way, on the 29th. After that she had pretended
to forget all about it. But Pegler felt sure Miss Farrow did
remember--often. And now here was the letter--a much fatter letter than
usual, too.
Pegler, of course, said nothing. It was not her place to know the
hand-writing of any of the gentlemen who wrote to her mistress.
Miss Farrow took the letter, and there came a faint, a very faint, flush
over her face. She said: "I hope Miss Bubbles has had a good night. Have
you been in to her yet, Pegler?"
"Yes, ma'am. She looks rather excited-like. But as you know, ma'am,
that's a good sign with her."
"Yes, I think it is, Pegler."
Pegler slipped noiselessly away, and then Blanche opened the envelope
containing Mark Gifford's long-delayed Christmas letter.
"Home Office, "_December 23rd_.
"MY DEAR BLANCHE,
"'How use doth breed a habit in a man!' Well anyhow, as you know, it
is my custom, which has now attained the dignity of a habit, always
to write you a letter for Christmas. Hitherto I have always known
where it would find you, but this year is an exception, for I really
have no idea where you are.
"This year is an exception in another respect also. Hitherto, my
dear Blanche, I have, with a tact which I hope you have silently
appreciated, always managed to keep out of my Christmas letter any
reference to what you know I have never given up hoping for even
against hope. But this time I can't keep it out because I have had a
really good idea. Even a Civil Servant may have a good idea
sometimes, and I assure you that this came to me out of office
hours--as a matter of fact it came to me when I was sitting in that
funny little old Westminster churchyard where we once spent what
was, to me, the happiest of half-hours.
"I know you have thought me unsympathetic and disapproving about
that which holds for you so great a fascination. Disapproving, yes;
I can't help disapproving of gambling, especially in a woman; but
unsympathetic, no--a thousand times no. Sympathy is understanding,
and, believe me, I do understand, and therefore I propose this plan.
"If you will do me the honour of marrying me, I propose that once or
even twice every year you should go off to Monte Carlo, or wherever
else you like, and play to your heart's content. I promise never to
reproach you, above all never to administer those silent reproaches
which I think are always the hardest to bear. Yes, I will always
play the game, I pledge myself to that most faithfully.
"Forgive me for referring to something which makes my plan easier to
carry out. This year two accidents, the death of one colleague, and
the premature retirement of another, have pushed me up the ladder of
promotion, and, in addition, there has been a legacy. The English of
that is that for our joint _ménage_ we shouldn't want your income at
all; we could quite well do without it, and you would be perfectly
free to use it in whatever way you like.
"There! That is my plan. Now, dearest of women, say yes and make us
both happy, for you would make me so happy that I couldn't help
making you happy too. I wish I had any idea where you will be when
you read this letter, on which hangs all my hopes. Perhaps you will
read it at Monte, out on the Corniche Road. Don't let the fact that
you have been lucky at play make _me_ unlucky in--you know what!
"Yours ever (this is no figure of speech),
"Mark Gifford."
Blanche Farrow sighed and smiled, as she deliberately read the long
letter through twice. Somehow it warmed her heart; and yet would she
ever be able to give up the life which in many ways suited her so well?
If she married Mark--dear, kind, generous-hearted Mark--various
friendships which, even if they did not mean so much to her as they
appeared to do, yet meant a good deal in her present lonely life, would
certainly have to be given up. To take but one instance. It had almost
been an instinct with her to keep Lionel Varick and Mark Gifford apart.
In the old days she had been disagreeably aware of how absolutely
Gifford had always disapproved of Varick, and of Varick's various ways
of trying, often successfully, to raise the wind. Of course, everything
was now different with regard to this particular friend. Varick had
become--by what anyone not a hypocrite must admit had been a fortunate
circumstance--a respectable member of society; but, even so, she knew,
deep in her heart, that he and the man whose letter she held in her hand
would never like one another.
And yet she was tired--so tired!--of the sort of life she led, year in
and year out. Her nerves were no longer what they had once been. For
instance, the strange series of happenings that had just taken place
here, at Wyndfell Hall, had thoroughly upset her; and as for the
horrible thing that had occurred yesterday, she hadn't been able to
sleep all night for thinking of it. Nothing that had ever happened in
her now long life had had quite the effect on Blanche Farrow that
Bubbles' accident had had. She had realized, suddenly, how fond she was
of the girl--how strong in all of us is the call of the blood! As she
had stood watching Dr. Panton's untiring efforts to restore the
circulation of the apparently drowned girl there had gone up from
Blanche's heart a wild, instinctive prayer to the God in whom she did
not believe, to spare the child.
Perhaps just because she had not broken down before, she felt the more
now all that had happened in the way of the strange, the sinister, and
the untoward during the last fortnight. And all at once, after reading
yet again right through the quiet, measured letter of her old friend
and constant lover, Blanche Farrow suddenly burst into a passion of
tears.
And then it struck her as funny, as even absurd, that she should cry
like this! She hadn't cried for years and years--in fact, she could
hardly remember the day when she had last cried.
She jumped out of bed and put on her dressing-gown, for it was very
cold, and then she went and gazed at her reflection in the one
looking-glass in the room. It was a beautiful old Jacobean mirror fixed
over the dressing-table.
Heavens! What a fright she looked! Do tears always have that disfiguring
effect on a woman? This must be a lesson to her. She dabbed her eyes
with a wet handkerchief, and then she went over to the writing-table and
sat down.
For the first time in her life Blanche Farrow wrote Mark Gifford a
really grateful, sincere letter. She said, truly, how touched she was by
his long devotion and by all his goodness to her. She admitted, humbly,
that she wished she were worthy of it all. But she finally added that
she feared she could never find it in her heart and conscience to say
that she would do what he wished. She had become too old, too set in her
ways....
Yet it was with a heavy heart that she wrote her long letter in answer
to his, and it took her a long time, for she often waited a few moments
in between the sentences.
How strange was her relationship to this man of whom she saw so little,
and yet with whom she felt on close, intangible terms of intimacy! His
work tied him to London, and of late years she had not been much in
London. He knew very little of her movements. Why, this very letter had
been sent to her, care of her London club, the club which had its
uses--principally--when she wanted to entertain Mark Gifford himself to
lunch or dinner.
His letter had wandered to yet another address--an address she had left
at the club weeks ago, the only address they had. From thence it had
reached the last house where she had been staying before she had come to
Wyndfell Hall. The wonderful thing was that the letter had reached her
at all. But she was very glad it had come, if only at long last.
After her letter was finished, she suddenly felt that she must put in a
word to account for the delay in her answer to what should have received
an immediate reply. And so she added a postscript, which, unlike most
women's postscripts, was of really very little importance--or so the
writer thought.
This unimportant postscript ran:
"Your letter had followed me round to about half-a-dozen places.
Bubbles Dunster and I have been spending Christmas in this
wonderful old house, Wyndfell Hall, our host being Lionel Varick.
He struck oil in the shape of an heiress two years ago. She died
last year; and he has become a most respectable member of society.
I know you didn't much like him, though he's often spoken to me
very gratefully of the good turn you did him years ago."
Blanche hesitated, pen in hand. Of course, it was not necessary that she
should mention the name of her host. She might rewrite the last page of
her letter, and leave the postscript out. It was unfortunately true
that Mark had taken a violent prejudice against the man he had
befriended to such good purpose years and years ago. She had been still
young then--young and, as she was quite willing to admit now, very
foolish. In fact, she looked back to the Blanche Farrow of those days,
as we are sometimes apt to look back at our younger selves, with
amazement and disapproval, rather than sympathy. But there was a streak
of valiant honesty in her nature. She let what had been written stand,
only adding the words:
"The party is breaking up to-morrow; but Bubbles, who had a
disagreeable accident yesterday, will stay on here for a few days
with me. All the same, I expect we shall be in London by the ninth;
and then, perhaps, you and I might meet."
It was by Bubbles' special wish--nay, command, that her engagement to
Bill Donnington was publicly announced that very morning, at breakfast,
by her aunt. Everyone was much interested, and said the usual
good-natured, rather silly, civil things; hence Blanche was glad Bill
Donnington had breakfasted early, and so was not there.
Helen Brabazon was extremely excited and delighted at the news. "I
suppose it happened yesterday morning!" she exclaimed. "For, of course,
they haven't seen one another alone since then. If they were already
engaged, what awful agony poor Mr. Donnington must have gone through
while you were trying to bring her to life again?"
She turned to Panton, and he answered thoughtfully, "I could see he was
most terribly upset. Don't you remember how he refused to go up to the
house and change his wet clothes?"
Blanche couldn't help glancing furtively from behind the teapot and high
silver urn at James Tapster. His phlegmatic face had become very red.
Almost at once he had got up and gone over to the dresser, and there,
taking a long time about it, he had cut himself some slices of ham. She
noticed, with relief, that he came back with a huge plateful, which he
proceeded to eat with apparent appetite.
"And when is the wedding to take place?" asked Helen.
"Almost at once," replied Blanche smiling. "Bubbles never does anything
like anybody else! She's set her heart on going to town the very moment
Dr. Panton allows her to get up. Then they're to be married without any
fuss at all in one of the old City churches."
"What a splendid idea!" cried Helen. "That's just how _I_ should like to
be married."
"I, too," said Sir Lyon, in his pleasant voice. "To me there's always
been something barbaric in the ordinary grand wedding."
But Blanche Farrow shook her head. "Perhaps because I'm so much older
than all of you," she said good-humouredly, "I think there's a great
deal to be said for an old-fashioned wedding: white dress (white satin
for choice), orange blossoms, St. George's, Hanover Square, and all! I
even like the crowd of people saying kind and unkind things in whispers
to one another. I don't think I should _feel_ myself married unless I
went through all that--"
And then, at last, James Tapster said something. "Marriage is all rot!"
he said, speaking, as was his unpleasant custom, with his mouth full.
"There are very few happy married couples about."
"That may be your experience," said Varick, speaking for the first time
since Blanche had told the great news. "I'm glad to say it isn't mine. I
think marriage far the happiest state--for either a man or a woman."
He spoke with a good deal of feeling, and both Panton and Helen Brabazon
felt very much touched. He had certainly made _his_ marriage a success.
Meanwhile, Blanche suspected that Dr. Panton had just had a letter
containing disturbing news. She saw him read it twice over. Then he put
it carefully in a note-book he took out of his pocket. "I shall have to
go to-morrow, a day earlier than I thought," he observed. "I've got an
appointment in town on Thursday morning."
Then Mr. Tapster announced that _he_ was going to-day, and though Varick
seemed genuinely sorry, everyone else was secretly glad.
There are days in life which pass by without being distinguished by any
outstanding happenings, and which yet remain in the mind as milestones
on the road of life.
Such a day, at any rate to Blanche Farrow, was the day which saw the
first disruption of Lionel Varick's Christmas house party. Though Mr.
Tapster was the only guest actually to leave Wyndfell Hall, all the
arrangements concerning the departures of the morrow had to be made.
Miss Burnaby, Helen Brabazon, and Sir Lyon Dilsford were to travel
together. Dr. Panton was going by a later train, as was also Bill
Donnington. Blanche herself, with of course Bubbles, was leaving on the
Saturday.
As the day went on Blanche realized that Varick much desired that Helen
Brabazon should also stay on till Saturday. But she, Blanche, thought
this desire unreasonable. Though she had come to like her, she found the
good, thoughtful, conscientious, and yet simple-minded Helen "heavy in
hand"; she told herself that if Helen stayed on, the entertaining of the
girl would fall on her, especially if, as Dr. Panton insisted, Bubbles
must not get up till Friday at dinner-time.
Looking back, Blanche Farrow told herself that that day had been full of
curious premonitions. Yet it had opened, in a sense happily for her,
with the coming of Mark Gifford's quaint, characteristic letter. Then
had come the shock, and it had been a shock, of Bubbles' engagement, and
of the girl's insistence on its being announced to the rest of the house
party at once--at breakfast.
The only outstanding thing which happened, and it was indeed a small
thing compared to the other two, was the departure of James Tapster.
Blanche felt sorry for him--genuinely sorry. But she philosophically
told herself that no amount of money, even had Bill Donnington never
existed, could have made Bubbles even tolerably happy tied to such a
man.
After Mr. Tapster had gone they all breathed the more freely. Yet
Blanche somehow did not feel comfortable. What was wrong, for instance,
with Lionel Varick? He looked ill at ease, as well as ill physically.
Something seemed also to be weighing on Dr. Panton's mind. Even Sir Lyon
Dilsford was unlike his pleasant easy self. But Blanche thought she knew
what ailed _him_.
Her only sheet anchor of comfort during that long, dull afternoon and
evening was the thought that Bubbles' life was set on the right lines at
last ... and that Mark Gifford had not changed.